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An App Platform for Dumb Phones - ramseynasser
http://www.dumbsto.re/
======
shadowmatter
I like the idea.
Note that if there is a lot of text traffic on a given number, carriers like
AT&T, Verizon, et al will block texts to and from that number until the
traffic subsides. What's worse is that if you send a message to that number
from the Twilio dashboard, its status will be "sent," but you will not
actually receive it. Apparently in the world of SMS, "sent" simply means the
message has been delivered to the destination carrier, and it is not a
delivery receipt like with iMessage or BBM.
Twilio suggests that, to reduce this risk, you load balance across a
collection of such numbers, or purchase a short code, which isn't cheap:
<http://www.twilio.com/sms/shortcodes>
------
jakemcgraw
If you want to see what this would look like if it was a real business,
checkout <http://www.dotgo.com> and <http://dotgo.com/Support/Documentation/>.
DOTGO solves the problem of service discoverability by mapping domain names to
shortcodes representing TLDs. Want wikipedia.org? Text "wikipedia" to DOTORG
(368674). Want to checkin to Foursquare? Text "foursquare" to DOTCOM (368266).
DOTGO also provides a language of reusable components, known as CMRL (Concise
Message Routing Language), it allows you to create hierarchical menus, links
and URL callbacks.
They're available in the United States and select countries in Latin America,
Africa and Asia.
Previously, I was a web application developer for them, I still think it's a
great idea and recommend you guys give it a go.
~~~
ramseynasser
Wow. Thanks! We will be studying this thoroughly. I hadn't heard about it
before.
------
bryogenic
Slightly off topic, are there actually any good (i.e. recommendable) dumb
phones? It has been an interesting market to try to navigate and research.
~~~
rapind
I actually spent some time looking into dumb phones a couple years ago. My
favorite would be the motofone. It's got an e-ink display, which is great for
battery and sunlight, and 2 antennas which is also great if you _heaven
forbid_ make actual calls with it. Also, pretty sturdy, small, and light.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Fone>
Beware though, if you txt a lot, you won't like it. Not enough real estate for
the crazy font they use.
There are also these _printed_ cell phones showing up. Do a google for "card
phone". Pretty interesting.
~~~
kevinconroy
I had a Motofone (also called F3) for the last 7 years. It started with a two
week working battery life. It's a pain to text message on since it only shows
4 or 5 characters on, but it just _worked_ as a reliable phone. Finally
switched to an iPhone 5 after it became vital for me to have full Internet
access 24/7 for work. If it weren't for that, I'd still have my F3. I love it
as much as I love my iPhone 5.
You can still find some of them on eBay. I'd offer mine, but I'm keeping it as
an emergency (911) phone for my car.
~~~
devindotcom
F3 to iPhone 5 has to be the biggest jump I've heard of lately. I've been
meaning to pick up a dumbphone myself, maybe I'll grab an F3 - I remember when
they came out, I was dying for one. It's a bit like buying the... junker of
your childhood dreams.
------
train_robber
A very similar concept has been around in India - <http://55444.in/>
------
ramseynasser
Don't forget that anyone can write a dumb app! Just fork the repository, add
your app, and take out a pull request!
<https://github.com/dumbstore/dumbstore/>
------
JosephRedfern
Cool idea - but how is it being paid for? By the looks of things, it's using
Twilio - but that'll get expensive if this becomes popular.
~~~
allisonburtch
I'm doing my best to find change on the ground and in fountains and mailing
them to Twilio.
------
mayanksinghal
Seems extremely similar to what Intuit has been building in India: Txtweb[1].
The apps support two modes PUSH and PULL. The most common is PULL, where you
SMS to some number something like "@appname.optionalExtension <stuff that will
be passed on to the application logic", response comes back as SMS. Their
experimental PUSH automatically pushes subscribed users with SMSes. I had
developed an app, @news a couple of years ago and still see decent traffic on
it. The developers are also quite friendly and responsive. If you are
interested in a similar platform but in a market that is benefitted from this
application a lot more, you should definitely check them out.
[1] <http://www.txtweb.com/>
------
auston
I've thought about how you could probably get Siri to use SMS as an API to
tons of services, like opentable, fandango, etc, etc - this seems to be a
great step in that direction - which is actually the opposite of dumb, but
instead seems uber smart.
------
cheese1756
I like the idea, it might be a nice replacement in the wake of the Google SMS
shutdown. One quick thing: You might want to make app names case insensitive.
My phone automatically capitalized Ltrain, resulting in a message stating the
app was not found, however when I manually changed it to ltrain it worked.
Maybe simple spelling correcting for app names (e.g. off by a letter or a
letter is missing) could be added too?
~~~
ramseynasser
These are all great ideas. Case insensitivity has come up a few times and it's
an easy fix. We should have it in soon!
------
brackin
Don't like the interface (makes it seem 100x more complicated than it is) but
love the idea. I often hit my data cap, am in an area with slow or no data
coverage or don't want to load up an app and would be happy to shoot a text
off to get a piece of info.
I'm in the UK but this is a far bigger problem in other countries so if
executed better this would be very interesting.
~~~
ramseynasser
Do you mean the interface of the website, or how you use it on your phone?
~~~
brackin
The website.
~~~
ramseynasser
Noted.
------
Groxx
Neat idea. I might recommend allowing at least the first letter (of the app)
to be case-insensitive though, since lots of things auto-capitalize. Also I'm
not having much luck with 'dir', and some error messages or something would
help, but meh - the concept is great!
~~~
ramseynasser
dir can be buggy, depending on how you format your location names. Can you
give me an example of what's not working?
~~~
Groxx
I wasn't really sure what to expect, so I tried something that Google Maps
gets correct: AOL in Palo Alto to Pier 39
I didn't feel like typing too much :) What service does it use?
------
hayksaakian
I did an app for rolling dice
<https://github.com/dumbstore/dumbstore/pull/15>
ex:
roll 1d20+4
=21 | rolled 17 plus 4 for a total of 21.
------
huertanix
Just wrote up an app called Rick Roulette. It's like Russian Roulette, but
with Rick Astley instead of bullets:
<https://github.com/dumbstore/dumbstore/pull/13>
------
amjd
Similar services already exist in India and are gaining quite a lot of
popularity among users. <http://txtweb.com> <http://55444.in>
------
SSilver2k2
This is really awesome. Back when I was helping work on Pingie (an rss->sms
service), I put some of this functionality into it (weather reports, stock
quotes, traffic reports).
Good luck with this!
------
frankdenbow
Saw this at the ITP show, will be adding some Twilio apps
~~~
allisonburtch
thanks!
------
netghost
I knew my phone would be valuable some day!
------
hatu
This is exactly what companies were doing in the .com bubble of early 2000's!
SMS "games" and services.
------
amikahmad
for all the technology and cool applications we have today, we can't forget
that accessibility is still a key issue. dumbstore FTW.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
SOAP: The 'S' stands for simple (not really) - preek
http://harmful.cat-v.org/software/xml/soap/simple
======
Sidnicious
This is great. My (so far, only) experience with SOAP started when my boss
asking me to investigate the new version of a (very big) vendor's SOAP API.
Support for the old version of the API was being dropped in a few days.
It turns out that our framework has SOAP built in, so I had it suck in the
WSDL and make a sample request. It was rejected with a generic error. As it
turns out, our framework was generating requests that looked like this
(simplified with much SOAP nonsense stripped out):
<SOAP-ENV:Envelope>
<Authenticate xmlns="http://bigcorp.example.com/elements/global">…</Authenticate>
</SOAP-ENV:Envelope>
…and the requests in the API documentation look like this:
<SOAP-ENV:Envelope xmlns:bigcorp="http://bigcorp.example.com/elements/global">
<bigcorp:Authenticate>…</bigcorp:Authenticate>
</SOAP-ENV:Envelope>
the difference being that our framework declares a "default namespace", while
their API expected a "namespace prefix". As far as I could tell from _reading
the spec_ (always a bad sign when you're using a standard that both ends
support) the difference shouldn't matter.
\- - -
I went to my boss. He showed me the old code; all the requests it needs to
make are hardcoded based on the docs, and substitute XML-encoded variables in
the right places.
Save a few minor changes, that's the process we still use today, and it
fucking works.
~~~
dfranke
Something's seriously messed up if, once the XML has been parsed, their code
can even _tell_ the difference between those two constructs, much less care.
------
lkrubner
The original article is here:
[http://wanderingbarque.com/nonintersecting/2006/11/15/the-s-...](http://wanderingbarque.com/nonintersecting/2006/11/15/the-
s-stands-for-simple/)
I am glad to see it get more attention. It is a classic and it is really about
more than SOAP. It is about the way technologies get hyped and over-sold and
over-promised, and then made unusably complicated. SOAP is just the example.
~~~
raganwald
_It is about the way technologies get hyped and over-sold and over-promised,
and then made unusably complicated._
In the excellent book "Antipatterns," I recall that this is called a "Wolf
Ticket:"
_Wolf Ticket is a product that claims openness and conformance to standards
that have no enforceable meaning. The products are delivered with proprietary
interfaces that may vary significantly from the published standard._
<http://sourcemaking.com/antipatterns/wolf-ticket>
Wolf tickets are sold as safe choices because of their interoperability, but
of course once you have anything non-trivial built upon them, you discover
that the interoperability doesn't actually work and you are left locked into
your vendor.
------
jan_g
Must be ~5 years since I last used SOAP. Needless to say I hated the stuff.
Complex to build, complex to use (interoperability between different stacks -
java/.net/... - was like 'cross your fingers and hope for the best'), complex
to debug and walk through tcpdump network packets. It's complex in every way
but the name.
Of course, since that times I've alway advised against web services and so far
I've succeeded in avoiding them.
~~~
wizard_2
I'm being asked to create webservices so other developers don't do direct
database access and their stuff wont break when things change. How do you
manage that?
~~~
dansingerman
Designing an API is a skill in itself, but I think rule 1 is "Don't use SOAP"
JSON over REST seems to be flavour of the month FWIW.
~~~
roc
"Flavour of the month" might be a bit harsh. It certainly is popular these
days, so it's not wholly inappropriate. But it's worth noting JSON/REST is
popular with, and largely because of, people who've learned the painful
lessons of earlier messes like SOAP.
It's not (just) a hot new thing used by new faces who've never really known
any other way.
~~~
dansingerman
I actually didn't mean to disparage JSON over REST in any way. In fact I
really like it.
I only qualified the statement as technologies change quickly (only 12 months
age we would probably have been talking about XML over REST) and things will
no doubt change again.
------
chrisbroadfoot
My worst memory of SOAP was dealing with an attachments API that required each
_byte_ in a byte array to be wrapped in an XML element.
You ended up transferring ~10x the size of the file. I suppose gzip would have
helped somewhat.
~~~
ZoFreX
My worst memory of SOAP is using it. Experienced it for the first time ever a
couple of weeks ago (all I've used before now is ad-hoc JSON or XML apis,
mostly JSON) and (knocks on wood) never, ever again. The article touches on a
few of the things I really didn't like about it, the main one being the
expectation that you will use tooling to generate code rather than the
contract first, and that every time I hit a hurdle and switched to a different
library, I had to start over.
------
Jeema3000
I will now share my secret SOAP API Pro Method:
Step 1: Ignore all tools which supposedly make things easier (very important)
Step 2: Find the web service API documentation
Step 3: Ctrl-C example XML request
Step 4: Ctrl-V example XML request into program, replacing appropriate parts
with program variables
Step 5: Parse the response. You're on your own here... Godspeed. :)
~~~
Groxx
The company I work for has to digest a handful of XML and SOAP protocols.
Theoretically, they all conform to spec A or B, and/or define their own subset
of that spec with an XML language definition. There should be like 3 or 4
pieces of code which would handle _every_ format they offer.
Practically: ctrl-C, ctrl-V, and call them when it doesn't work. More often
than not it's either A) incorrect documentation, or B) you hit a bug (yes,
this means their sample-code doesn't work. It happens frequently). A good
chunk of our request-data builders are simply string manipulators, because
some of the APIs we call are nitpicky about the _order_ of XML attributes in a
tag.
I laugh when people tell me XML works better "because it's a standard".
------
ahupp
At one time SOAP wasn't too bad, until it tried to solve a lot of complicated
problems (via WS-*), and in the process made the simple problems complex.
Contrast this with HTTP which is being used for ever-more complex problems yet
is really no more complicated in the simple case than it was in 2000. This
seems like an important principle in protocol design.
~~~
pornel
Indeed. "RESTful" is basically a name for using HTTP well, and such APIs are
usable for anything from bash script to Big Vendor Library™.
------
colinloretz
I do a lot of Salesforce.com development and the use of SOAP has been the bane
of my existence. They have recently introduced a new REST API that will be
going GA in the spring.
"Dev: What happens if I GET the endpoint’s URL?
SG: Don’t know. Using GET is undefined.
Dev: Hrrm. And what happens if I move the service to a different endpoint? Do
I get a 301 back?
SG: No. SOAP doesn’t really use HTTP response codes.
Dev: So, when you said SOAP uses HTTP, what you meant to say is SOAP tunnels
over HTTP."
The beauty of REST is that it is representative of how the web works. With
SOAP you're almost always limited to the use of POST methods and when I go to
read another developer's code, I see their own defined nouns and verbs for
resources they are sending/receiving like "getUsers", "getContacts", and
"createPerson". These often are ambiguous or don't match up with the actual
resource they are trying to work with.
Endpoints in REST are self documenting, you can read what it is that you're
trying to do based on the endpoint and the HTTP verb (put, post, delete, et
al)
~~~
lanstein
From which language, out of curiosity?
~~~
colinloretz
Predominantly PHP and Ruby.
------
tomelders
I feel a bit sad for all those people who worked on SOAP. I assume most of
them simply wanted to make the web better and now we all point and laugh at
their efforts with the 20/20 vision that only hindsight can allow.
Thanks for trying SOAP people, it was a noble effort but it's game over I'm
afraid.... oh wait, I just saw on Wikipedia that these were Microsoft people.
In that case, screw em. SOAP is wank! YOU'VE WASTED YOUR LIVES!!
~~~
Ingaz
Even worse for CORBA. ..
On the second thought: The same companies made SOAP right after and along with
CORBA. Maybe, even the same people. Don't blame Microsoft too much: IBM,
Oracle, SAP, BEA - they are all ... equally "good"
------
orangecat
We have the misfortune of dealing with a third party SOAP API at my office. My
coworker did it the "correct" way, autogenerating thousands of lines of C#
from the WSDL and trying to get the objects transparently serialized and
deserialized. That turned out to be a multi-week effort, so finally I got fed
up and spent 4 hours writing code to directly extract the values we needed
from the raw XML.
~~~
vyrotek
I'm no fan of SOAP, but as a C# guy I'm curious to know what took so long?
~~~
silverbax88
I've got the same question. But I've written them in both Java and C#.
I worked on a project recently where we had a team of Java guys who worked on
a SOAP implementation for a month. They could not get it to work in any way,
shape or form. It was handed to me, and three of us did it a half an hour. All
custom SOAP, still worked.
I just don't comprehend why this seems so hard to people on Hacker News. SOAP
is just another protocol and as messy as any other.
~~~
steveklabnik
> SOAP is just another protocol and as messy as any other.
I think that's where you and most of the other people on the thread are losing
it. SOAP is way messier than just good old REST.
(disclaimer: I've never been forced to actually use SOAP.)
~~~
SoftwareMaven
I have had to do both: SOAP is WAY more messy.
------
dminor
I think it's a law that any protocol or technology with 'simple' in the name
invariably isn't.
~~~
cperciva
It's also a law that any field with the name 'science' in it isn't a science.
(Health science, social science, military science, earth science, computer
science...)
~~~
lsd5you
And any country with democratic or people's in it's name, is not democratic or
belonging to the people (Democratic Republic of North Korea, of Congo, PRC ...
)
------
grnknight
Wow. This sums up my entire exposure to SOAP over the last few months. Thanks
for the humorous, yet factual exchange of information!
------
st3fan
SOAP really just exists to keep a tools/consulting/appserver/softwarestack
business alive. Pretty sad.
------
bockris
Reminds me of the "Why I hate frameworks" essay by Benji Smith.
<http://benjismith.net/index.php/2005/09/30/hate-frameworks/>
------
aidenn0
SOAP has always seemed bizarre to me. It's something like "We think CORBA was
a good idea, but they messed some stuff up, so we'll toss the entirety of
CORBA and make something with a completely new set of problems while
completely ignoring most of the mistakes we learned with CORBA."
I'm still luke-warm at best on the whole ORB idea as-is, but even thinking
from the point of view of someone who thinks object brokers are the best thing
since sliced bread, I feel like the SOAP people got it very wrong.
------
dedward
It crosses some layer boundaries too.... having to manually edit (or I guess
dynamically generate) wsdl files so that we can add a reverse proxy or load
balancer in front of a webservice machine to access it several different ways
in .net was definitely a pain in the butt.
------
RyanMcGreal
This wonderful Socratic dialogue has articulated my professional hell over the
past six months.
------
Aaronontheweb
The only thing I like about SOAP's modern implementation is that it comes
packaged with a WSDL usually - I would welcome a world where most REST APIs
included a WSDL so I could just automatically stub a wrapper library.
------
erikstarck
Design-by-committee in action...
------
otoburb
Some previously implemented projects implemented a SOAP prepaid account
balance billing interface that runs in production today. Nobody is willing to
touch the interface for modifications because every developer tasked to review
proposed changes complain that it's way too brittle and prone to complexity.
This article is bittersweet because it sums up everybody's feelings pre- and
post- implementation.
------
naba
Sigh. this article made me a little sad. I keep wondering why the corporates
who have all the money and resources keep using a technology that is just so
old and has so many issues, when they have the better alternatives. My entire
week was spent in just trying to get the configuration and a hello world
service up and running.
------
ph33t
Let me preface this by saying I'm not particularly a microsoft basher, however
this smacks of their history of interface development. Remember COM in the
90's? It was so complicated no one really knew how it worked. The only way to
use it was to use a compiler that had native support for it ... MS Visual
Studio and MS VB. Delphi came a long way quickly and made it work. Anyway
whether intended or not, the result was you were initially tied to using a MS
tool to use the technology. SOAP seems the same. Odds are if you're writing
one end of it or another (client or server) somewhere the mix you're going to
have a Microsoft tool. If you want to talk to the product of that Microsoft
tool by far the easiest way will be to use a Microsoft tool. So despite being
"open", their implementation of it ties you into some vendor-specific tools.
------
mike-cardwell
Eurgh. Reminds me of writing Perl code to talk to .NET SOAP services in a
previous job. Never again.
------
bediger
Why did SOAP win, and XMLRPC not win?
~~~
wiredfool
Soap was supposed to be the enterprisey safe superset of XML-RPC.
From my experience back at the beginning -- XML-RPC was slightly
underspecified, and would have used a bit more of a firm hand about
clarification of what was legal and what wasn't. SOAP was wildly overspecified
and complexified to the point that you needed an army of consultants. Which is
just perfect for enterprisey stuff, since you conviently have an army of
consultants that need to have something to do.
IMHO, XMLRPC inhabited a middle ground that was washed away by REST and
ajax/json type interfaces. It's an extra bit of complexity that's just not all
that popular now, rather than a stunningly less complicated version of SOAP.
~~~
spolsky
Yep... as I remember it, XML RPC was "specified" by Dave Winer, and it was
really sloppy. As I remember, there was no discussion of character encoding in
the spec, and if you read the spec literally, you actually HAD to generate
invalid XML documents because the spec was written by someone who did not
understand that there was such a thing as character encoding and that it was
important. And Winer absolutely refused to add features or to allow any kind
of process by which XML-RPC could evolve into something good enough to use.
Then the Microsoft people who brought you COM in all its baroque loveliness
got their hands on the concept and made an industrial strength, godforsaken,
complex thing called SOAP. The problem with SOAP mostly stemmed from the fact
that they thought that all the work would be done by compilers and IDEs and so
forth... they thought all the programmer would do is click a button and hey
presto they would be able to run one object on one server and another object
on a second server, and who cares what happens on the wire protocol? It's the
compiler's job! But that's a terrible recipe for interoperability.
------
ojbyrne
The "Simple" in SOAP is seriously overtrumped by the "Simple" in SNMP.
~~~
Luyt
...and the 'Lightweight' in LDAP ;-)
~~~
Groxx
Oh God, I started reading the spec for LDAP a while back... terrifying.
------
Confusion
It's easy to rant, but hard to come up with a viable alternative, that
encompasses the same scope. XML-schema and WSDL are mocked as an aside, but I
dare you to provide me a REST alternative for those, as standardized as those.
For all the horror stories, I have used Java to interact with a C# webservice
without any pain, including WS-Adressing. The WSDL and XML-schema were a
godsend compared to the earlier spec.
Like people that think you can just replace XML with JSON: you are missing
stuff.
~~~
rue
A REST alternative for what?
------
iwwr
Could it be that SOAP never had a solid set of test cases? Implementing a
reasonably complex API should involve passing a series of public and very
specific tests.
------
Rabidgremlin
Love it. However at least SOAP is a spec and generally works.
REST is an architectural style there is no spec, just a idea! Added to that
most folk also only build REST-like services.
Implementing a client for REST based services often requires a bunch of
(generally simple) coding which takes time and is error prone.
Also pure REST is really good for building data access/CRUD services but makes
it hard to build RPC type services without mangling the semantics.
~~~
generalk
> However at least SOAP is a spec and generally works.
SOAP has several versions of the spec and a bunch of vendor-specific cruft.
The SOAP use-cases from this comment thread are enough indication of that.
> REST is an architectural style there is no spec, just a idea!
Yeah, but you use REST every day in your web browser. A lot of the times it
isn't strongly RESTful, but it's still REST. For example, to view this comment
thread and post your reply to someone's comment.
In SOAP, if I call the getUserByID(42) method on your end, and you don't have
a user with id 42, what do you do? Do you return an empty response? Do you
return some kind of SOAPFault? If so, what kind?
In REST, if I GET <http://yourservice.com/users/42> and you don't have user
42, I get HTTP 404. That's the only logical response.
> Implementing a client for REST based services often requires a bunch of
> (generally simple) coding which takes time and is error prone.
This is no different from SOAP, with the exception that with SOAP you have to
have your requests stuffed into XML by some libraries which have read some
other autogenerated XML to figure out how to stuff your requests.
With REST, you can write a library (that wraps HTTP calls), or you can use
curl, or (for simple GET requests) you can use your browser. Your platform
might not support SOAP, but it definitely supports REST.
> Also pure REST is really good for building data access/CRUD services but
> makes it hard to build RPC type services without mangling the semantics.
This has been said multiple times but let's say it again:
_REST is not RPC._
If you're looking to remotely call procedures on your app, REST isn't going to
provide that.
The only case where REST doesn't work is the case where your client demands
SOAP. In any other case, REST works beautifully. Not everyone does REST right,
but even when it's done suboptimally (e.g. not providing hyperlinks to related
resources) it's still worlds better than SOAP.
------
motters
I never did anything using SOAP, and thought that this technology died many
years ago.
------
MarkMc
"I trust that the guys who wrote this have been shot."
Ha ha! I must remember this put-down - it could be used in so many contexts :)
------
nervechannel
As an ex-SOAP-dev... Yeah.
------
mcherm
Oh god... that's my life!
------
yogipatel
I stopped using SOAP in the shower a month ago and have never felt cleaner.
Showering is a more efficient process now:
\- I spend less money on resources (SOAP, lotion, etc)
\- I get clean faster -- SOAP used to slow me down
\- Using someone else's shower is easy, I just take my towel. I don't have to
worry if their SOAP is compatible with me.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Why has Bill Gates become a conspiracy magnet? - tempsy
Maybe I haven’t been paying close attention, but I feel like as soon as Bill Gates reemerged in the public eye during this pandemic as part of his foundation’s effort to back vaccine research for the coronavirus he’s suddenly become the primary target for conspiracy theories related to everything from vaccines to 5G to mind control, etc.<p>Was he always the subject of conspiracy theories that I may have missed? Or is this a recent development that he somehow got pulled into due to his vaccine work (which has become more controversial in recent years)?
======
simonblack
People don't change. Leopard don't change their spots. Gates has always been a
secretive, grasping, amoral actor. He was notorious in the 80s and 90s when he
was the head of Microsoft in being the instigator of Microsoft's nefarious
practices.
Don't take my word for it, the evidence of that is available all over the
internet. Google for it. Some words you might want to Google together with
'Microsoft' are: AARD, OOXML, Halloween Documents, Netscape + 'take away their
oxygen supply', _NSAKEY, Stac Electronics, etc, etc, etc.
------
wmf
Rob Reich kind of painted a target on Gates 18 months ago and I think there
was a sort of latent blowback waiting for him to do something. Then this year
Gates basically said "I warned you about pandemics, you didn't listen, and now
I'm going to bail you out" and then people are like "oh yeah, aren't we
supposed to hate this guy?"
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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The primacy of the US dollar looks unsustainable - signor_bosco
http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21669875-americas-economic-supremacy-fades-primacy-dollar-looks-unsustainable-dominant-and
======
todayiamme
I get more than a little bit worried when I look at the American political
circus. The soft power the US once held has now been eroded by the steady
stream of WTFs coming out of the country. I think that what most Americans
don't realise is that when people threaten to shut down the American
government over women's healthcare - the craziness shakes up the risk calculus
of the world and people start searching for alternatives. This is bad for
America and it's bad for the world.
For the longest time, we've been under a hegemony that was originally far more
stable than the world before it. This has helped to bring an unprecedented era
of prosperity. The American empire is perhaps the first empire in history
where people want to be under its banner as opposed to out in the cold.† But
current antics threaten that very tenuous stability that was fought over for
so many centuries. It is not without any faults, but out of all the
alternatives out there - this is the most peaceful one.
Yes, there are arguments that broadening the base of support will help not
hinder stability.ß The fact remains that this is the best system we have found
so far and it does actually work. We might even someday have something far
more stable than this, but the transition to that is not going to be easy. In
fact, I think that on the existential risks meter of the world - stabilising
American hegemony should be a priority. It is vital that this system is
maintained until a better one emerges to take its place.
People might disagree, but it really is a tragedy that countries and groups
now want to overthrow the American hegemony largely due to political missteps
at home and a steady disconnect between what it means to be hegemon and the
day-to-day of American politics. They've forgotten that their alliances were
built upon shaky ground and need upkeep to maintain. And that even the firmest
of empires do fall.
†
[http://www.middlebury.edu/media/view/214721/original/OdomPap...](http://www.middlebury.edu/media/view/214721/original/OdomPaper.pdf)
ß
[http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/02/wo...](http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/02/world-
order)
~~~
hueving
The risk you talk about does not seem to exist in the real markets. If the US
were viewed as unstable like you suggest, it would be priced into US bonds,
which are trading near all time highs. If there is a risk in there, it's
nearly negligible.
~~~
eru
US bonds are priced in USD. If the USD is expected to collapse (if at all) if
and only if the US bonds collapse, what would you see in the prices?
~~~
zkhalique
At least US bonds being priced in USD does reflect the risk and demand
associated with them.
What I wonder is, how is inflation being calculated in terms of the CPI, which
is essentially prices _in dollars_? After all, what exactly is being measured
by this? If dollars the very currency which is being printed, how does
measuring prices account for how much M0 money there is?
~~~
forgetsusername
> _After all, what exactly is being measured by this?_
Purchasing power of Americans.
> _how does measuring prices account for how much M0 money there is?_
Why does it need to? On its own, the amount of M0 is irrelevant. We care about
how the effects of supply manifest in prices.
------
dkbrk
Is it so important to have a single reserve currency? Couldn't these problems
be largely offset with better diversification and less friction in currency
trading.
For example, lets say some banks got together and defined a meta-currency
called Euro-Dollars, which is a mixture of 55% Euros and 45% USD. I could take
out a loan in Euro-Dollars from a bank. I could buy and sell goods
internationally in Euro-Dollars. I could hold my personal savings in Euro-
Dollars. I could buy on Ebay, Amazon and Alibaba with Euro-Dollars because the
sellers know that it's a good idea to diversify their currency holdings, they
can buy other goods and services with Euro-Dollars and currency trading is
relatively frictionless.
Or, perhaps, we could go further and create a currency that's a mix of the top
10 most traded in some suitable ratio. Rather like an index fund, wouldn't
this insulate from the relative fluctuations of the individual economies and
help facilitate international trade?
On another note, this would help insulate individuals from currency
fluctuations in a global economy. I happen to be in Australia and my personal
accounts are in AUD. Since 2011 AUD has dropped about 40% relative to USD. If
I now want to buy something from a company in the US, I am 40% poorer. If my
money had been split into a mix of major currencies, I would be in much the
same position whether I now wanted to buy domestic or international goods.
Some banks offer multi-currency accounts for personal use, but it's far from
the norm. Wouldn't it make more sense if my bank automatically diversified my
currency holdings to insulate me from international fluctuations?
~~~
mamon
The system you described would be beneficial for all but USA :)
The last two people that wanted to challenge US dollar dominance in the world
financial markets were Saddam Hussein (wanted to trade oil for Euros instead
of USD) and Muammar Kadafi (wanted to trade oil for gold). We all know how
that ended for both of them - their countries were invaded in under 6 months
after they announced their plans.
Now, the only country powerful enough to force switch from USD to currency
basket is China, and their recent initiatives, like creating AIIB bank, or
devaluating juan are aimed at exactly that.
~~~
cheriot
I've not been able to figure out the benefits. Stability by increasing the
stakeholders in the value of the dollar? It gives people more reason to buy
dollars => raises the value of dollars => and makes US exports less
competitive => makes the US poorer.
~~~
nopinsight
Effects of strong dollar and its global reserve status:
\--> Americans can buy stuff / take international vacations more cheaply -->
Better lifestyle
\--> American corporations can use their stocks valued in dollars to takeover
foreign companies/assets and expand more cheaply.
\--> Power to punish enemies with financial sanctions/manipulations.
\--> QE over and over again with near perfect impunity. Ability to rescue
itself from certain kinds of financial crises.
~~~
cheriot
#1 Very nice from the Zanzibar beach I'm sitting on, but I doubt it's a big
motivator!
#2 Sounds like something significant. Do you know of a way to quantify it?
#3 As far as I know, the threat is to shut financial institutions out of the
US market. I don't think the US government has much control over a dollar once
it's leaves the country.
#4 The Chinese have a similar ability to print massive amounts of money
without inflation. I wonder if it's a property of sufficiently large
economies. The article also mentions a downside that the Fed has had to print
money to keep foreign institutions afloat.
------
mahranch
> Despite talk of the yuan’s rise, the primacy of the greenback is
> unchallenged.
And it _is_ just that, talk. People forget, as the Yuan rises, _so does the
dollar_. The real question is, how much ground is the Yuan gaining on the
dollar? And the answer? None. If anything, it's taken a couple steps back.
You see all these articles over the last few years about how the Yuan is
starting to do well but for some reason, people think that the U.S dollar just
stands still the entire time and is letting it catch up. It doesn't work like
that. If the yuan was to ever replace the dollar, it would be several decades,
likely much more, before it's even remotely close to replacing the dollar as
the world's currency. If it happens, it almost certainly won't happen in your
lifetime unless some asteroid drops of the sky, destroying most of the U.S.
Even in that unlikely event, they would still have to do something about their
rampant corruption before countries start pegging their currency to the Yuan.
They rank 127th on the global corruption index. No country is going to
willingly sign up for that, a country that tightly controls it's own currency
and where politics, business and corruption are all one in the same. It's just
not happening.
Like it or not, the U.S dollar is simply the lesser of all the evils. And it's
not even close, we're talking orders of magnitude. It also has a fortitude
that is unrivaled by anything before in world history.
~~~
rrggrr
"do something about their rampant corruption before countries start pegging
their currency to the Yuan."
Exactly. Reserve currency is as much about trust, political stability and
transparency as it is transaction frequency and liquidity. China is a
wonderful country, great people and an admirable success story. It also has
the wrong political system and current value structure to rise to reserve
currency status anytime soon.
------
digi_owl
What may be interesting in all this is that China is talking up the Keynesian
Bankor.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bancor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bancor)
Meaning a currency not tied to any one nation, existing specifically for trade
between nations.
And i'm not sure i follow the line about "rule of law" regarding China.
~~~
prewett
"Rule of law" means that the law is above the government; the government is
constrained by the law. This means that there is a common understanding about
what the government can and cannot do. China has "rule by law"; that is, the
government is above the law. But if the law is arbitrary, how can anyone trust
you?
Rule OF law means that, at some level, I protect your interests (because I am
forced to by the law). Rule BY law means I do whatever I want. You can't fully
trust someone who is only committed to their own interests. Trust happens when
I know that you will look out for my interests. Deep trust happens when I know
you will look out for my interests even if it costs you.
If China's rulers think it will keep the Party in power, they won't hesitate
to devalue their currency, or set an arbitrary exchange rate, or limit the
amount of money foreigners can exchange, or any numbers of other things that
could cause problems for a company holding a large amount of RMB. Imagine you
sold $100 million of goods in RMB, and you have $95 million in expenses in
USD. Great, convert RMB -> USD, collect $5 million in profit! But one day, you
wake up to discover that the currency is worth 10% less than yesterday, or now
there is a rule that you can only take $500 out of the country per day. In the
first case you now have a $5 million loss, in the second case you have a cash
flow problem. Not the kind of thing I look for in a reserve currency.
~~~
venomsnake
Is the US any better? There are so many vague, complicated, broad and
contradictory laws that the government can do anything it has decided and find
justification for it SOMEWHERE.
Edit: Talking strictly about constraints put on the government.
~~~
crucifiction
It is not static, hence why it is linked to being a level of trust. While this
can happen in the US, its rare to happen at the federal level without some
sort of check/balance. On the other side, arbitrary application of law is the
routine system of governing at all levels in China. One type you can mostly
trust, especially if history tells you how the pattern plays out. The other
side there cannot be any trust.
------
politician
TLDR: ...except that there are no alternatives... (last paragraph).
~~~
emn13
I think that's a pretty misleading TLDR (as it suggests nothing will change
which isn't at all what the article claims); The title is a better summary of
the message.
~~~
blumkvist
The article doesn't claim anything.
~~~
emn13
Sure it does; it claims the dollar's primacy is unsustainable.
------
adventured
This has been suggested for decades, that the dollar would lose its global
reserve currency status in the near future.
The Japanese Yen would rise to be the dominant currency, with Japan eventually
becoming the top economy. Then it was the Euro that would inevitably conquer
the dollar in importance. Then it was the Yuan that would of course conquer
the dollar, with China becoming the dominant global economy - that prediction
is also going to fall flat.
The dollar primacy is stronger today than it has been in 10 to 15 years and
it's gathering strength - pulling trillions in capital away from the rest of
the world, and crushing emerging markets in the process - even before the Fed
has raised interest rates. So long as the US avoids going on any more massive
spending binges that blow out the budget (2000-2010), and avoids starting any
new trillion dollar wars, the dollar will continue to gain in dominance rather
than lose it over the coming decade.
~~~
ZenoArrow
If the position of the US dollar as the world's main reserve currency is so
secure, why did John Kerry feel the need to talk up the financial importance
of the recent deal with Iran (who had started to sell their oil in Euros
before the deal)?
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PCAFnCo6nyM](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PCAFnCo6nyM)
~~~
forgetsusername
> _why did John Kerry feel the need to talk up the financial importance of the
> recent deal with Iran_
Because politics?
Again, what is the alternative to the dollar? It's completely reasonable that
the global community diversifies away from the USD. But any specific basket
they come up with is going to be heavily titled towards the strongest currency
of the biggest economy on the planet. Otherwise, it's useless.
~~~
ZenoArrow
> "Because politics?"
There's a bit more to it than just that, protecting the dollar is also part of
it.
If you want to understand where I'm coming from better, would recommend
watching the History of Oil (it's entertaining as well as informative):
[http://youtu.be/GIpm_8v80hw](http://youtu.be/GIpm_8v80hw)
------
conchy
Strange that the emergence of non-State digital cryptocurrencies was not even
mentioned in this article. Is it that radical to envision that perhaps one day
the successor to the U.S. dollar might not be fiat currency backed by any
single state?
~~~
forgetsusername
> _on-State digital cryptocurrencies was not even mentioned in this article._
I'm probably in the minority on these boards, so call me crazy: I _want_ my
currency backed by the economic and military might of the state.
To me, "money" is a means of performing transactions and acquiring _real_
assets. I don't need a hunk of metal or a fancy digital wallet that is
"unreproducible" to do that. Being able to print money is a _feature_ of the
system, not a detriment. The current system works well enough for me, for now.
~~~
jerbear
> I want my currency backed by the economic and military might of the state
You realize that this means you're actively supporting murder, surveillance,
and debt slavery built on the backs of the unborn, right? Sure it's easier to
just go with the status quo currency flow, but that doesn't make it the most
ethical or moral choice.
~~~
eli_gottlieb
>murder, surveillance, and debt slavery built on the backs of the unborn
None of these things are unique to fiat currency, as distinct from capitalism
as a whole.
~~~
Zigurd
That's true. But it is also true that, in the specific case of the US dollar,
it's backed by US hegemony. That hegemony is brittle, and supported by an
outsize military that was misused in a way that almost broke the nation in
combination with a derivatives crash that could easily have caused a global
depression. The US's ability to get away with ZIRP, QE(n), etc. rests on "You
and what army?" and on a hegemony where vassal states have no decision-making
autonomy and submit themselves to US surveillance.
We're only partway out of that crisis, and it could come roaring back. Chest-
thumping about "Where else ya gonna go?" is unproductive.
I don't see US hegemony as good or evil, except if you call brittleness that
could lead to a very deep unprecedented crisis "evil."
------
zkhalique
Well, it's regular mean reversion. China's treasuries and others will
eventually grow as reserve instruments. Also, the primacy of high US salaries
/ income relative to the rest of the world also looks unsustainable.
~~~
techdragon
What high salaries? The entire country is built on a house of cards where the
bottom layer stands in various degrees of minimum wage poverty that in some
cases make being a European feudal serf in the Middle Ages look like an
improvement.
------
digitalengineer
Also known as The Triffin Dilemma:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triffin_dilemma](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triffin_dilemma)
------
pessimizer
Good. Maybe capitalism will be allowed to work, the dollar will weaken, and
the US will stop running half trillion dollar trade deficits every year. Trade
deficit = public debt + private debt.
[http://www.frbsf.org/education/publications/doctor-
econ/2007...](http://www.frbsf.org/education/publications/doctor-
econ/2007/june/trade-deficit-exchange-rate)
The strong dollar and the unregulated medical sector are virtually the only
problems with the US economy.
The high US dollar is sustainable as long as the American public are willing
to collectively take on a half-trillion dollars worth of debt every year.
------
beedogs
Good. Hopefully that means the primacy of the US is equally unsustainable.
~~~
adventured
Not likely, the US is on the rise again after suffering a decade plus of
weakness.
The strong dollar is powering the US economy ahead while most of the world is
struggling to stay above water. Americans gained roughly 20-25% in purchasing
power against the rest of the world in just the last 18 months. US households
have paid down a vast amount of debt in five years, significantly improving
their debt to income ratio (while much of the world has done the opposite).
Full-time job openings are at 15 year highs. The US share of all global wealth
remains above 45%. The US median income remains among the highest of any
nation, with no indication of erosion inbound. US economic competitiveness is
among the highest, and total US manufacturing output is the highest it has
ever been. Economically the US has been persistently getting better the last
three to four years. The US is also about to enter a significant wage increase
cycle that will see the standard of living move upward for the first time
since the late 1990s.
By comparison, China is a disaster; Japan is stuck in the same hole it has
been in for 25 years with 'deflation' (debt) continuing to eat away at their
economy; Europe hasn't seen net GDP expansion since roughly 2007, with the
Eurozone having twice the unemployment rate of the US, and with the Eurozone
QE program failing to boost growth meaningfully.
Further, US neighbors Canada and Mexico both have done tremendously well over
the last decade and will continue to, which will act as a multiplier for the
US economy.
~~~
jazzyk
>...on the rise again
The only thing on the rise in the US seem to be:
\- all sorts of debts (check out the student loan debt, in particular, it has
exceeded the credit-card debt and has currently a 17% deadbeat rate)
\- the number of people not in labor force (95 million, the highest in 30
years).
The fact that the US is (for now) in better shape than Greece or Brazil does
not mean it is doing great. And the direction things are going in is down, not
up.
~~~
happyscrappy
Finance is hard. But not that hard.
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It's Better Over There - sasvari
http://www.thenation.com/article/154477/its-better-over-there
======
lmz
I have to agree with the author's friend that it's easier to share with those
that are similar to you. Europe is getting quite tired of the wave of mass
immigration, partly fueled by the welfare state. The hard working immigrants
are tolerated especially in today's climate of political correctness, but what
about the ones that live off welfare and don't integrate? This does not seem
to be the case in the US where you have to work so you integrate in the
workplace.
Here's an interesting editorial I just read on that topic:
[http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/sep/06/immigrat...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/sep/06/immigration-
germany-editorial)
------
elblanco
_My first day back in New York after a year in Berlin, I got on the subway and
found my end of the car dominated by an obscenity-shouting black man with a
crutch and a suitcase spilling garbage._
Apparently she has never met a homeless Roma on the U-Bahn. Except in Berlin
people won't stop to help her when she pretends to fall getting off the train,
they'll spit at her or throw trash.
_My friend David Abraham, a historian and legal scholar, gave a fascinating
talk at the American Academy in Berlin in which he suggested that the European
welfare state is linked to ethnic homogeneity: people are more willing to
share with those who seem like themselves._
_Muslim immigration will be the moral test, and not just for Germany but for
the rest of Europe as well._
I know the article is about Germany. But there's ample, recent, evidence that
_when_ the welfare states of Europe have problems, it's blamed (fairly or
unfairly) on immigrants. Similarly in the U.S., anti-immigration proponents
often blame the drain recent immigrants have on social services as part of the
justification for extreme policies.
Recent mass deportation events in France show that this sentiment is probably
true. Likewise, in the time I've spent in Germany, many people expressed
discontent with the wave of Muslim immigrants and the subsequent strain on the
welfare state of all these new, poor, undereducated people suddenly showing up
to the new promised land.
Europe is undergoing some massive growing pains as it has emerged as the new
go-to place for the poor unwashed masses of the world. These massive waves of
immigration are very new to the continent (and especially to the individual
countries).
But I think the American experiment can show that in the long run, relatively
open immigration policies pay off. Everybody forgets that the poor unwashed
masses from a foreign country that suddenly show up on your shores are there
for primarily one reason...to work and to work hard. That kind of free,
positive, energy needs to be harnessed. In two or three generations it pays
off with so many ways. If it's not harnessed, it goes someplace else, often
not in a constructive way. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Riots>
~~~
ZeroGravitas
Why did you state that your hypothetical Roma lady only "pretends" to fall?
Seems an odd detail that separates the article's mentally ill person from your
deceptive one and the appropriate responses.
~~~
elblanco
I'll admit there's a really powerful bias against Roma as charlatans,
hucksters, con artists, etc. Some of it is well earned, some of it is a
survival response to centuries of racial discrimination and segregation.
However, I've personally been approached by several Roma over the years
feigning some debilitating and crippling disease only to watch them hop up and
run to their ride at the end of a day working the local tourist spot.
But I think France's response to the Roma is unfortunate. As an American I'm
intimately familiar with the downward spiral racial discrimination can have on
a group. A people tends to reflect back the treatment they've received.
Turning that around can take generations and instead of rounding up camps of
people and force migrating them out of your territory, integration activities
will have a much better end result.
There are plenty of Roma throughout Europe who have managed to make the jump
to integration and are productive members of society. But there's an
unfortunately very large population who, as an insulative survival measure,
live on the edges of society and siphon off whatever they can from the
dominant civilization as they can. France's actions only justify that kind of
behavior. When you never know if the winds will change and you'll be rounded
up and kicked out or worse, you tend not to want to get too close.
------
kiba
Does every political essay have to be such one-sided argument? Isn't it
important to understand the truth, the crux of the matters?
_"Politics is the mind-killer. Arguments are soldiers. Once you know which
side you're on, you must support all arguments of that side, and attack all
arguments that appear to favor the enemy side; otherwise it's like stabbing
your soldiers in the back. If you abide within that pattern, policy debates
will also appear one-sided to you - the costs and drawbacks of your favored
policy are enemy soldiers, to be attacked by any means necessary."_ \--
Eliezer Yudkowsk
------
slavat
_My theory is more primitive: a critical mass of white Americans would rather
not have something than see black and Latino Americans get it too._
A good rule of thumb: any time you see some white liberal accusing others of
racism or complaining about the plight of minorities, that person invariably
lives in a white neighborhood and--if they have children--sends their children
to a white private school or to a "good" public school in their white
neighborhood.
While I couldn't pin down her current place of residence, in the article she
mentions returning to New York, and according to an old article[1], at one
point she lived on the Upper-West Side of Manhattan. I don't know if she still
lives there, but where ever she lives now, you can be certain it's not on Adam
Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard or anywhere else where the minorities she pines
for predominate.
tl;dr version: hypocritical white liberal accuses others of racism.
[1]
[http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1995-01-08/features/1995008...](http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1995-01-08/features/1995008099_1_katha-
pollitt-feminism-reasonable-creatures)
~~~
elblanco
Are you claiming that the Upper-West Side is only white? Isn't that a kind of
racism? Minorities can't get rich and own houses in a fancy part of town? She
might be the only white person in her building for all you know.
I suspect that many perceived racial biases are more class biases. It's
interesting that you chose places with people of different skin colors as her
theoretical avoidance zones. I suspect she'd be just as unlikely to hang
around in poor white areas as well.
~~~
slavat
I live in NYC. The Upper-West Side is _predominantly_ white, affluent and
liberal. That was my point. And there is no chance in hell that she is the
only white person in her building.
As for her disliking poor whites, I have no doubt that she does. Rich white
liberals love to promulgate policies that harm poor whites, such as race-based
affirmative action and illegal immigration.
------
dagw
Her opening argument seems seriously flawed. I've seen scenes similar to the
one she described here in Sweden on several occasions. And by all accounts
Sweden has at least as good a "safety net" as Germany.
The really interesting part for me was that two people actually stepped
forward to help the crazy man. That is something I don't think I've ever seen
here. So the generalized point to take away I guess is Americans are far
friendlier and more helpful than Europeans.
------
yequalsx
My girlfriend is German and lives in Berlin. I just spent 3 months there. She
lives in Kreuzburg, it's a poor area of Berlin. You get the winos, drunks, and
junkies. There's a fair share of street people with mental issues. But one
thing you don't get is fear. It's a safe place by American standards. You also
don't see many cops. There are way more cops in American cities. This suggests
that it really is fundamentally safer.
I don't know why this is so. Maybe it's because of the social safety system,
maybe it's because of culture or a combination of both. But German elites want
Germany to emulate America. The social system is under attack there and the
government wants to embrace American style corporatism. It's ironic that while
it is better there those in power want to make it more like America.
~~~
bokonist
The U.S. has always had a ~10X higher crime rate than the western European
countries, going back over a hundred years. The best explanation of why comes
from a writer in 1920, Raymond Fosdick who spent years studying both the
American and various European systems. Read his book online for free:
[http://books.google.com/books?id=NGBLAAAAMAAJ&printsec=f...](http://books.google.com/books?id=NGBLAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=crime+in+america+and+the+police&source=bl&ots=zxG6FtL166&sig=Rlb7gr3KGJ_c1b23YupR9BfwSVs&hl=en&ei=1_2ETLnxCYO88gauhYSDAg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false)
His arguments are backed up by almost everything else I've read on the matter,
and they still remain as true today as they were in the 1910's.
~~~
edderly
I can't claim to have read Fosdick, but I see an immediate problem in that
demographics have changed through out Europe. Take for example London has a
foreign population now of greater than 30%. At the same time there are areas
in the north of England which remain overwhelmingly white which have deep
social issues.
~~~
bokonist
London is also much less safe than it was 100 years ago. Actually, all of
England is much less safe. A good treatment of the subject is Peter Hitchen's
_A Brief History of Crime_ [http://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-Crime-Peter-
Hitchens/dp/...](http://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-Crime-Peter-
Hitchens/dp/1843541483)
~~~
hga
England may be something of a special case; as I understand it, from around
1,300 until sometime post-WWII it had a steadily declining crime rate. One or
more things prior to the more recent wave or waves of immigration changed
that.
(I have my own thoughts on that, starting with e.g. the 1950's court
decision(s) that effectively eliminated the right of self-defense, but that's
for another discussion.)
------
dantheman
Flagged - This article is nothing but racist hate bait.
~~~
dejb
How so? It seems that he is making a point that requires acknowledgement of
the existence of racism and the impact it may play in shaping social policy.
Hopefully we are mature enough to be able to discuss this on it's merits.
------
confuzatron
Tl;DR
_"I suspect white Americans are against European-style government services
because they're racists."_
~~~
ZeroGravitas
This seems to be a fairly common theme over here in europe when discussing
American resistance to social health care. And any nation doing well with
socialist policies seem to get tagged by Americans as "homogeneous". Whether
that makes it true or not is a different matter, but it's bigger than one
random article and might be worth addressing even (particularly?) if you think
it's a false impression.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
NSA provides German intelligence service with tools for eavesdropping - LinaLauneBaer
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fpolitik%2Fausland%2Finterview-mit-edward-snowden-im-spiegel-nsa-und-bnd-arbeiten-zusammen-a-909800.html
Better translation:<p>http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/edward-snowden-accuses-germany-of-aiding-nsa-in-spying-efforts-a-909847.html
======
thomasjames
Again, this is not surprising. European politicians have just been caught with
their pants down: on the one hand drumming up populist support by pandering to
anti-American sentiments when the opportunity presents itself, and on the
other being party to the alleged crime, or in France's case having its own de
Gaulle-style internet-based signals intelligence network, which we can presume
it shares with no one, unless asked nicely.
------
LinaLauneBaer
In real english:
[http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/edward-snowden-
acc...](http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/edward-snowden-accuses-
germany-of-aiding-nsa-in-spying-efforts-a-909847.html)
------
rbehrends
This seems to largely be a non-story, actually.
What it does say is that the NSA provided the German BND with the technology
for its international dragnet search program.
However, that program is not and has never been secret. Its basic functioning
is spelled out precisely in §5 through §8 of the G10 Act [1]. This law is
hardly uncontroversial, but it is not as though anybody can claim to have been
surprised by it; its provisions are well known and frequently and hotly
debated.
Regarding information-sharing with the NSA: The law allows the result of §5
surveillance only to be shared with foreign agencies under the conditions of
§7a and §8. In particular, this means that all such information sharing has to
be reported to the parliamentary commission and the commission has to inform
the public about the amount of information sharing that occurred. For
2009-2011 (2011 is the year covered by the most recent report) no such
information sharing was reported to have occurred.
Now, if the BND broke that law and shared information with the NSA without
telling the parliamentary commission, then this would surprise just about
nobody. But that's not what the Spiegel is talking about.
The part that is potentially interesting is the NSA establishing a new
"Consolidated Intelligence Center" in Wiesbaden (to replace a similar center
in Darmstadt).
[1] [http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/g10_2001/](http://www.gesetze-im-
internet.de/g10_2001/)
~~~
thomasjames
Why is it only bad when the BND works with the NSA? If it is just intercepting
all day to flow across Germany's borders via DE-CIX it is potentially equally
problematic.
~~~
rbehrends
Because the G10 Act contains safeguards that the BND is required to adhere to,
but the NSA isn't.
\- The BND has to immediately delete all records except the ones that are
relevant for an enumerated set of purposes and has to document this deletion.
Per the parliamentary commission's reports [1], the remaining messages are
generally a few hundred annually.
\- The BND can only share them with law enforcement for the prevention and
prosecution of an enumerated list of serious crimes. Using them for other
purposes it not allowed, and evidence obtained as the result of such illegally
shared information is to be excluded by the courts [2].
\- The BND has to notify anybody whose messages have not been deleted
immediately that some of their telecommunication has been intercepted. This
has to occur within 12 months, unless the G10 commission authorizes a deferral
of the notification. The annual report of the parliamentary commission lists
how many people were and were not notified.
The BND is subject to these constraints, the NSA isn't.
Furthermore, if the BND breaks the law, remedies are available; Germany does
not have any recourse against NSA actions.
[1] E.g.:
[http://dip21.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/17/127/1712773.pdf](http://dip21.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/17/127/1712773.pdf)
[2] BGH, 2 Str 731/79\. [http://www.ejura-examensexpress.de/online-
kurs/entsch_show_n...](http://www.ejura-examensexpress.de/online-
kurs/entsch_show_neu.php?Alp=1&dok_id=5796)
~~~
thomasjames
FISA theoretically had restraints as well (50 U.S.C. § 1803, Pub.L. 95–511, 92
Stat. 1788, enacted October 25, 1978), but it did not stop the process from
being corrupted and automated. When the capability is there, there is nothing
stopping it from being abused similarly. The Western country and alleged
safeguards that happen to be in charge of said apparatus is really irrelevant.
~~~
rbehrends
You are misunderstanding. The question was why the BND sharing with the NSA
was worse than what the BND does on its own.
What I was saying in response was not there is perfect safety against abuse,
but that if the BND could share information freely with the NSA, it would
render the existing safeguards largely worthless, because the NSA is not bound
by the national laws of Germany.
------
znowi
As it seems, all the NSA revelations are only that for general public. The
allies knew about them and to some extent participated. Which explains how
readily helpful the EU is in catching Snowden. Critical commentary from Europe
is just to save face. When it settles down, they'll get back to business as
usual.
------
kriro
I don't get why Germany (or any sovereign nation) allows foreign military
bases in the first place.
I'm kind of curious though are there any size limitations on embassies or
consulates? Could I technically have a really huge one of those in a foreign
nation and run all the spying etc. from that?
~~~
kimlelly
> I don't get why Germany (or any sovereign nation) allows foreign military
> bases anyways.
Exactly.
What happens when the US gets out of control? (And with the power that the NSA
has, that kind of corruption is not science fiction anymore.) There would be
no Europe to try to push back and correct things. The world would be f##ked
for real, this time.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Weapons of Math Destruction (The Dark Side of Data Science) - oldbuzzard
http://boingboing.net/2016/09/06/weapons-of-math-destruction-i.html
======
trendia
The problem with most of these is not adjusting for cohort changes. For
instance, in the SAT example, the author writes:
> In the 1980s, the Reagan administration seized on a report called A Nation
> at Risk, which claimed that the US was on the verge of collapse due to its
> falling SAT scores.
Suppose that low-income individuals start to take the SAT in 1980 whereas they
didn't in 1970. The _wrong_ way to analyze SAT scores is to evaluate:
sum over cohorts P(SAT Score | cohort, Y)
where Y is the year. For instance, you might compare the total average score
in 1980 vs. 1970. Doing so will show a decrease in SAT score because of the
increase in low-income individuals taking the SAT, _not_ because the high-
income individuals are doing worse. (This assumes that low-income people have
less access to SAT training materials, and those training materials affect the
score).
The correct way is to only compare scores _within a cohort_ :
P(SAT Score | cohort, 1980) > P(SAT Score | cohort, 1970)
That is, did the same cohort do better in 1980 vs. 1970?
(There might _still_ be some differences between the cohorts in 1980 vs. 1970.
Maybe the low-income individuals who took it in 1970 had high confidence in
school, whereas the 1980s kids were from a broader background.)
~~~
oldbuzzard
The article addresses that a couple of paragraphs down. Thats her whole
point.To quote:
"The Nation at Risk report that started it all turned out to be bullshit, by
the way -- grounded in another laughable statistical error. Sandia Labs later
audited the findings from the report and found that the researchers had failed
to account for the ballooning number of students who were taking the SATs,
bringing down the average score.
In other words: SATs were falling because more American kids were confident
enough to try to go to college: the educational system was working so well
that young people who would never have taken an SAT were taking it, and the
larger pool of test-takers was bringing the average score down."
~~~
trendia
I was converting her text into math-ish notation. She's saying that
P(SAT Score > 700 | 1970) > P(SAT Score > 700 | 1980)
is inaccurate, and that we should instead use:
P(SAT Score > 700 | cohort, 1970) ~ P(SAT Score > 700 | cohort, 1980)
------
ccvannorman
> These brokers are training their model on the corrupted data of the past.
> They look at the racialized sentencing outcomes of the past -- the outcomes
> that sent young black men to prison for years for minor crack possession,
> while letting rich white men walk away from cocaine possession charges --
> and conclude that people from poor neighborhoods, whose family members and
> friends have had run-ins with the law, and "predict" that this person will
> reoffend, and recommend long sentences to keep them away from society
This is an extremely important point to our times. Be aware that this sort of
algorithm is harming society when it comes to prison sentences, and you're
paying for it at multiple levels.
> Amazon carefully tracks those customers who abandon their shopping carts ..
> interested in knowing everything they can about "recidivism" among shoppers
> .. [and they seek out and talk] to their subjects -- to improve their
> system.
_If the prison system was run like Amazon ... [it would be] oriented toward
rehabilitation ..._
(emphasis mine) (edit:formatting)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Venture capitalists see their industry shrinking - timr
http://www.reuters.com/article/innovationNews/idUSTRE5545HV20090605
======
steve_mobs
The VC sector was too bloated to begin with and it is nice to see a shakeout
happening.VCs had so much capital then they should have that they have
invested in a lot of companies that did not deserve funding in the first
place.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How to Get a Job - nsedlet
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/opinion/friedman-how-to-get-a-job.html
======
aliston
Did anyone else catch the irony in Friedman talking about employers that
"increasingly don’t care how those skills were acquired: home schooling, an
online university, a massive open online course, or Yale," then writing an
article entirely about two Yale graduates who went to work at McKinsey and
Goldman Sachs post-graduation?
Last time I checked, McKinsey isn't recruiting at University of Phoenix. Going
to Yale doesn't hurt in getting into YCombinator either. Nowadays, YC's name
recongnition functions as a credential as well. Dig a little deeper than the
title, and this op-ed only reinforces the reality that credentials and
connections matter a lot more than raw skill.
~~~
chatmasta
Have people considered that "credentials and connections" are actually a
valuable signaling mechanism? Connections (in the broadest sense of the word)
indicate that a candidate is able to form strong personal relationships.
People are not robots, and this ability goes a long way in the workforce. If
you are hiring someone, you know you're going to spend the majority of your
waking time with that person for the foreseeable future. So any kind of signal
that this will prove a positive use of your time is a valuable one. This is
not to say that other schools don't offer this mechanism. I'm simply observing
that the idea of "connections" does not carry nearly as much negative weight
as its connotations often imply.
Similarly, credentials indicate that a candidate has conaistently passed more
screening processes over a long duration of time than a company could
practically present to the candidate. Consider that nobody is born into Yale
(contrary to popular belief, and any exceptions to this are in the minority).
To get to Yale, you effectively must pass through a fifteen year funnel. No
company can match that kind of screening rigor, so why not leverage it? From a
company's point of view, it would be dumb not to. (Also, think about it this
way -- if you are a high school senior with a choice of any school, and
therefore one of the smartest in your class, will you choose Yale or a state
school? I parenthesized this because it's a straw man argument, but do
consider that financial barriers to the Ivy League are basically non-existent
nowadays.) Yes, you can get qualified candidates from other schools. But your
chances of getting a "lemon" candidate from Yale are, I presume, much lower
than getting one from another school. You know that at the very least the
candidate is capable of learning quickly on the job. In many industries,
especially those where most domain knowledge comes from real world experience,
like finance and consulting, the ability to learn quickly is a candidates most
valuable asset. If every candidate will arrive at the company with a "blank
slate"of knowledge and experience, why not recruit the ones who can fill up
their slate the best? This is why finance companies recruit history majors,
for instance. They know that success in a liberal arts education demonstrates
an ability to learn quickly (not to mention strong writing skills).
I know many people on here are anti-liberal arts or anti-Ivy favoritism. Those
arguments, especially the latter, have obvious validity. But I hope this post
will cause you to consider the other side of the argument.
Disclaimer: I go to Yale. I realize we are extremely spoiled in the job
market, but I also do not necessarily think it's undeserved. It's unfortunate
that other people suffer, but I do not feel like we are disproportionately
favored. I think a VERY high majority of Yale students are top 1% job
candidates. Everybody gets in here for a reason.
~~~
jdietrich
You got into Yale because you were privileged. You had literate, educated
parents. Your high school didn't have metal detectors on the doors and a
razorwire fence. You didn't have to cut school if a younger sibling got sick,
you didn't spend every spare minute looking after an elderly relative. Nobody
on your block was a crack dealer.
Sure, you're smart, but America is full of people much smarter than you who
didn't even finish high school. The "fifteen year funnel" is a filter
primarily of socioeconomic status and only secondarily of ability. Most people
fall out of that funnel through no fault of their own, because they didn't
catch the breaks that you did.
That's the fundamental failing of a meritocracy - unless you take steps to
ensure equality of opportunity, you just end up with an oligarchy.
~~~
obviousanon
Unless you personally know the other person, I'm not quite sure how you make
these claims. On the face of it, you're slinging mud at walls and, of course,
some may stick. In other words, your claims may be on point _some_ of the
time. _Some_ Yale students (undergraduate or graduate) may have had literate,
educated parents. Mine aren't. Many others here could say similar things.
_Some_ Yale students may have come from Andover, Loomis Chaffee, and the like.
Not all. And I'm willing to bet there are numerous students who came from high
schools like the ones you describe. Or, as in at least a few cases, came from
"schools" that were essentially converted sheds or barns. _Some_ Yale students
may not have had to worry about taking care of their families or being the
breadwinner during adolescence. But others did. _Some_ Yale students may not
have lived in shady areas. Many did.
We're an intelligent lot, certainly. And certainly there are many others who
are much more intelligent than us. But Yale does not exist to serve the world.
Yale is not a public service. Yale is exclusive by design. You don't get here
by being intelligent, but by the same token, being here does not mean we're
more intelligent than you (in the plural sense). The fifteen year funnel
notion that the other person described is, in fact, much more a filter of
ability, grit, and exceptional achievement than you could ever dream of. A
minority of students here come from the sort of Gatsby-ish background that
popular myth suggests. There are students here who may not be the most
intelligent in the world (certainly, not all of us are MENSA members), but
they are, for the most part, people who have proved time and again their
exceptional qualities. There is a reason this institution has been an
incubator for leaders around the world.
Yale is not a meritocracy. Yale is one among a few institutions that have
carefully cultivated the ability to choose from an exceptional pool of human
beings each year. If you point out the issue of legacy admits, I'd ask: why
not? Why not give back to those who have given to Yale? I don't simply mean
monetary contributions, though certainly I would wish to signal appreciation
of someone who has endowed a chair, a library, or has done something to grow
Yale as an institution. But, in general, if someone has reflected well on
Yale, then I believe it is worth nurturing that relationship. So, yes, not all
legacy admits are evil.
The world is not equal, and equality is not a given. We will never be equal,
as long as scarcity exists. But instead of whining about how "all Yale
students are privileged" and thereby exposing your own prejudices and
jaundiced perceptions, why not make the best of your circumstances, much as we
have of ours?
~~~
flyinRyan
> I'm not quite sure how you make these claims.
Because statistically, this is nearly always the case.
>And I'm willing to bet there are numerous students who came from high schools
like the ones you describe.
I'd be surprised if there is even one student from the kind of school the GP
describes. Even if you find one, you've found an anecdote. An exception that
proves the rule.
> There is a reason this institution has been an incubator for leaders around
> the world.
And right here is where your argument flies out the window. "Leaders around
the world" are usually not better than anyone else, often worse. They're
simply better connected. Which, incidentally, is what is being pointed out.
I know you really want to believe it was grit, determination, and something
extra that everyone else doesn't have that got you where you are but it was
actually privilege. If you had been born to the wrong family all the "grit"
you think you have wouldn't have gained you anything.
~~~
obviousanon
Statistically, _what_ is nearly always the case? Please, point out these
statistics specifically instead of making airy allusions.
You may be surprised to see "even one student" from the 'wrong' sides of the
city, the 'wrong' skin of colour, the 'wrong' nationality, or the 'wrong'
religion. Get here and get your mind exploded, then. Or learn to accept that
you are clinging (futilely) to popular misconceptions and that Yale, like most
other "elite" institutions, is a home to all kinds of people. Privilege may
have gotten _some_ of them in, but it sure as hell is not the norm.
As for your final claims: You wish to imply that leaders in various fields got
there solely by leveraging connections. I am pointing out that leveraging
connections is by no means disproportionally represented. Leveraging
connections is an incredibly useful skill, and of course it has its place.
What I am pointing out is that for most undergraduates who ever got here,
connections didn't exactly play a big role. Yes, the people here probably have
a lot more grit, determination, and "something extra" that most of you don't.
Some of us are here thanks to family connections, sure. Now go find out just
how many students Yale (for example) has graduated in its entire history, and
compare that with the number of legacy admits. Or compare that with the number
of admits for whom a plausible case of "connections" may be argued. I can
assure you that it won't be a pretty picture for your case.
I'll reiterate what I've said before. Most of you are using popular
misconceptions to make straw-man arguments. Most of us here are not from
"connected" families, and most of us are here not because of some mythical
privilege. The sort of logic you people are using would make the mere fact
that you can go to the corner store and buy a pack of bread a "privilege."
Privilege is relative. Most of us got here because, yes, we did a few things
more and were a little better at some things than a lot of other people.
No reason to whine about it.
~~~
flyinRyan
Let it go. You lost. Not only did you lose, you lost so bad that yahoo! wrote
an article about how stupid your post was.
No one likes a person telling them that he/she is better then them. Especially
when that's clearly not the case.
------
hkmurakami
_> The way HireArt works, explained Sharef (who was my daughter’s college
roommate), is that clients — from big companies like Cisco, Safeway and
Airbnb, to small family firms — come with a job description and then HireArt
designs online written and video tests relevant for that job. Then they cull
through the results and offer up the most promising applicants to the company,
which chooses among them._
So hireart is tackling the problem from the demand side for employees by
improving the signal to noise ratio of applicants, so to speak.
This is only a partial solution, since at least a significant part of the
problem is the skill mismatch of the more "ordinary Joes" (for lack of a
better word) and the skills that are asked of them by their prospective
employers.
I don't think there will be a one size fits all solution for the variety of
employment related issues we face today. We'll probably see many "winners" in
the market that offer very distinct sets of benefits to both job seekers and
employers.
That makes me think that my friend's startup [1] which does focus on the more
basic tier of the supply side of the job market problem, training ordinary
people to gain the specific skills that specific employers want.
We can't have enough hypotheses tested in this market, so I genuinely wish the
best for all the current and future players in this market.
[1] <http://www.learnup.me/about>
~~~
esharef
learnup is awesome. we need lots of companies to solve this problem. Elli (co-
founder @hireart)
------
ruswick
> _The company receives about 500 applicants per job opening._
This succinctly demonstrates everything that is wrong with the entry-level
labor market, especially in fields dominated by overabundant cohorts like
political science and english majors. There are a deluge of incompetent
graduates competing for a negligible number of jobs. They are either forced
into menial shift jobs for years or, if they're fortunate, will have the
privilege working 70 hours per week in an unpaid internship before taking a
jobs marginally above the poverty line.
~~~
jseliger
_especially in fields dominated by overabundant cohorts like political science
and english majors_
Actually, according to Louis Menand's book _The Marketplace of Ideas: Reform
and Resistance in American Universities_ , the absolute number of English
majors has declined over the last 40 or so years:
_"Between 1945 and 1975, the number of American undergraduates increased 500
percent, but the number of graduate students increased by nearly 900 percent.
On the one hand, a doctorate was harder to get; on the other, it became less
valuable because the market began to be flooded with PhDs.
This fact registered after 1970, when the rapid expansion of American higher
education abruptly slowed to a crawl, depositing on generational shores a huge
tenured faculty and too many doctoral programs churning out PhDs. The year
1970 is also the point from which we can trace the decline in the proportion
of students majoring in liberal arts fields, and, within the decline, a
proportionally larger decline in undergraduates majoring in the humanities. In
1970–71, English departments awarded 64,342 bachelor's degrees; that
represented 7.6 percent of all bachelor's degrees, including those awarded in
non-liberal arts fields, such as business. The only liberal arts category that
awarded more degrees than English was history and social science, a category
that combines several disciplines. Thirty years later, in 2000–01, the number
of bachelor's degrees awarded in all fields was 50 percent higher than in
1970–71, but the number of degrees in English was down both in absolute
numbers—from 64,342 to 51,419—and as a percentage of all bachelor's degrees,
from 7.6 percent to around 4 percent._
What field has taken its place? Business, which now accounts for about a
quarter of all degrees awarded.
Moreover, according to the research done by Arum and Roska in _Academically
Adrift_ , undergrads in the hard sciences and humanities (including English)
tend to show substantial increases in their reading comprehension skills,
writing skills, and math skills over their first two years of college and over
their college careers.
------
ebbv
Friedman is such a shameless hack.
Using his column as an ad for his daughter's college roommate's business?
Honestly? Ugh.
Nothing against the HireArt folks who may be great people, and maybe they are
offering a useful service. I even understand why they couldn't tell Friedman
not to do this for them. I doubt anyone could turn down the free exposure.
But it's just tacky, and it doesn't help that Friedman is a hack to begin
with.
~~~
robg
It's really sad to me that the top comment on any thread at HN is ad hominem.
I'm not around much but this community really has changed.
Seriously, ebbv you have _nothing_ to add that is interesting or unique?
Calling a columnist at the NY Times a "hack" is hardly original or insightful.
~~~
ebbv
I pointed out he's shilling for his daughter's friend. That's not enough to
support my characterization for you? I think it's plenty.
But there's tons of other examples of how terrible Friedman is, and most
people don't need me to spell them out because they are very familiar with
them already.
Do a quick Google search and you'll see what the rest of us already know.
~~~
robg
There's nothing substantial about that "critique". You only know of the
relationship because he disclosed it. And any columnist of the last 50 years
at the Times provokes the same exact response from a segment of their
audience. In fact, as a columnist, that's the point of his job and so your
"test" would fail for every columnist at that paper.
My point still stands. Your comment adds no value to this community and itself
is a comment on the state of this community. You start with ad hominem then
work backwards to the "critique". When pushed, you simply re-state the ad
hominem. This community used to be much better than that, esp for a top
comment in well-read thread.
EDIT: At the very least, I'm glad vapid comments aren't staying at the topmost
position. I hope that's a combination of downvotes and the time-gravity
function. Too bad ad hominem is so easy to upvote and leads to the herd
mentality that begets the trivial.
~~~
ebbv
It's not a critique, it's a simple fact. He's shilling for a friend. That's
shady at best. Disclosing it is better than not disclosing it, but using your
Times Op Ed column to shill is always shady.
"Every columnist" at the Times (or anywhere else) does not elicit the same
response that Friedman does. That in itself is a baseless statement, which is
something you claim to dislike so very much.
Here's a short article pointing out _one_ of the problems with Friedman:
[http://gawker.com/5921030/thomas-friedman-writes-his-only-
co...](http://gawker.com/5921030/thomas-friedman-writes-his-only-column-again)
You seem like you could be a smart person from your profile, so I'd think that
if you actually read Friedman with any regularity you'd see what every other
intelligent person who reads him does; he's a hack. Call it an ad hominem if
you want, but to me it's like saying an apple is red. It's a statement of fact
backed up by evidence.
Also complaints about how the community used to be so much better based on one
comment you don't like being top temporarily is so ridiculous as to be
comical.
EDIT:
Also the subtext of your complaining about the decline of the community is
"ebbv get out you make this place worse." To which I say, you're the one who's
basically throwing a tantrum because you disagree with me regarding Thomas
Friedman.
~~~
robg
You've done nothing to substantiate that charge of being a shill short of
pointing out the very relationship he himself disclosed.
As to the claim on columnists all being "hacks", I have little doubt that
every single columnist at the NY Times has been called that or worse in their
tenure by some segment of their audience. Saying Person X is a "hack" (or
troll or asshat) has no place in rational dialogue. It's a non sequitur. Stick
to what's being said and dispute that. In this case, that would be a matter of
arguing that HireArt is not part of some broad new trend in hiring and being
hired. You are very far from arguing contra Friedman.
I don't know you. All I know is one ad hominem comment you made and continue
to defend. That's a problem for this community and indeed any community that
aspires toward rationality. What you continue to be (and this community, even)
is only up to you (and us). That you assume I'm throwing a "tantrum" and that
I disagree with you on Friedman won't ever get you (or us) there.
~~~
ebbv
Ok clearly my effort is wasted on you. You are not even reading what I'm
saying. So just a couple quick points:
1) Just because someone discloses something doesn't make it ethical / not
shilling.
2) I (and others) are not just calling Friedman a hack and leaving it at that
as you seem to insist we are. We are calling him a hack and backing it up with
evidence -- as I have said repeatedly, and I have pointed you to the evidence.
It absolutely does have a place in rational dialogue.
You pay lip service to being interested in discussion, but your behavior
indicates you are not at all interested as I have attempted to engage you
repeatedly and you pay it no heed whatsoever.
------
msellout
It seems a bit lazy of Friedman to interview his daughter's roommate. Why not
include other sources? At least he mentioned the relationship.
I don't begrudge Sharef for using the connection. It's another reminder of how
important networking is.
~~~
d0gsbody
Tom Friedman quit writing real articles back in the 90s.
~~~
caw
This showed up on HN a while back: <http://thomasfriedmanopedgenerator.com/>
~~~
d0gsbody
Hah!
When i was younger and trying to educate myself into a higher class, I read a
couple of his books. The only good one was From Beirut to Jerusalem, which was
published in 1989. Everything after that was just crappy analogies.
I really don't understand how an "expert" in Middle East affairs could think
that the USA going to war in Iraq was a good idea.
------
kenster07
This is a bandage to the problem, perhaps even a good bandage, but not a cure.
The issue is so much deeper than this.
On the "physical labor" side of the economy, the college system, in its
current form, will not efficiently fill America's production lines with
workers. It will not create more craftsmen. It certainly does not cure the
average American college graduate of the mentality that they are above being a
gardener in their own backyard.
On the knowledge side of the economy, MOOC can potentially add enormous value.
The distribution of credentials (aka a degree from an elite university) is
being decoupled from the educating of the knowledge workforce. Rather than a
couple thousand or tens of thousands of people having access to the highest
levels of education, it is now accessible to anyone with an internet
connection.
P.S. I take issue with anyone who is 28 years old being considered a "veteran"
at her job, let alone at McKinsey. Perhaps I think too old-school.
~~~
jacques_chester
> _Rather than a couple thousand or tens of thousands of people having access
> to the highest levels of education, it is now accessible to anyone with an
> internet connection._
The printing press has been around for hundreds of years. The problem has
never been _access to knowledge_. It has been:
1\. Selecting what people need to know (curricula), and
2\. Checking that they know it (credentialling).
If people want to learn about anything, about any topic, to any depth, public
library systems enable that and have done so for a long time.
Plus, the reductionist view of Universities as mere generators and
disseminators of knowledge is inaccurate. Attendance at universities
introduces you to new people, many of whom have similar interests. This leads
to friendships, business partnerships and romantic relationships that MOOCs
can't replicate (and libraries only poorly).
~~~
thaumasiotes
> If people want to learn about anything, about any topic, to any depth,
> public library systems enable that and have done so for a long time
About a year ago, I decided to read through what I considered the most
interesting topics in my old discrete math textbook, on basically this theory.
The first few sections were fine. Then I started getting different answers to
the ones published in the back of the book. Lacking someone who could tell me
what I was doing wrong, I gave up. :/
~~~
jacques_chester
Did you try a different book? When I get stuck on a subject I often turn to a
different book to get me over the hump.
------
rollo_tommasi
So the Detroit woman who taught herself Excel and outscored Stanford and
Harvard grads, and is held out as validation of Friedman's thesis - she's only
referred to as a "top applicant". Did she get the job? And if not, what was
the background of the person who did?
Otherwise, my only take-away from this article is that in a column ostensibly
about meritocracy, Tom Friedman managed to turn 3/4 of his column inches into
a PR piece for a company run by his daughter's Yale buddies.
Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide, no escape
from reality...
~~~
esharef
Hi, Elli from HireArt here. She didnt get the job because she lived in
Michigan and couldn't move to SF but she made it as a finalist. I was directly
involved and was astonished at how well she did given her lack of "formal"
education. I wish more people were like Patti. She really inspired me. The
fact that Michigan is struggling economically and that she was unable to leave
is a different and very interesting topic.
------
schrodinger
This feels a lot like an advertisement to me
------
cm2012
I took a hireart interview recently, really excited for a chance to show off
my skills. However, the responses asked for were basic interview questions
like, "Describe yourself" and other personality questions. Which is fine, but
I thought it had more potential.
One caveat is that it was time consuming and cost the company doing it
nothing. I really hope such time consuming tasks do not become the first line
of defense against job seekers, but are only used on already vetted resumes.
------
kefka
I'm injured. Right arm can lift much more than 5 lbs above horizontal. On Voc
rehab, yet disability says it's not one.
Been without a job for 2 years. Before that, fired from wal-mart because I got
injured (faulty equipment) and had to go to hospital.
What the hell do I do? I look and apply for jobs. I'm in school for drafting.
Every sign and indication says if you're without a job for 6 months, you're
screwed.
Do I just start and lie about my credentials? If they catch me, all they can
do is just fire me... I'm already up shits creek.
~~~
lambda
No, you're not screwed. Acquire a useful skill that's in demand and which can
be done from a desk: drafting, CAD, graphic design, 3D modeling, video
editing, web design, programming. Do that craft, and develop a portfolio of
work. Find a non-profit that you like that needs that work and spend some time
donating that work to the non-profit so you can have some real world
experience in that field, that demonstrates that you can work with other
people.
Almost every reasonable hiring manager (which may be a minority of hiring
managers, but is still non-zero) will value someone with a good portfolio
who's shown that they can get the job done over someone with credentials and
years of experience in the industry who doesn't have a good portfolio to show
(as someone who's been doing technical hiring recently, I've always wondered
about people who apply for a job with 20 years of experience and not a line of
code they can show me; I realize that there may be many jobs where you work on
proprietary code that you can't show to someone else, but not having a single
side project, one-off hack, a few patches to the mailing list of an open
source project, or even a former employer you can ask for a code sample to
show under NDA in your whole career seems a bit odd).
~~~
kefka
I already am going for drafting, which includes Autocad and Solidworks. I
already am decent at general 3d design (and still have plenty of classes to
go).
Still, because I'm past the 6 month employability gap, NOBODY will touch me.
[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/04/the-
terr...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/04/the-terrifying-
reality-of-long-term-unemployment/274957/)
[http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/04/16/after-
six...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/04/16/after-six-months-
unemployment-turns-into-permanent-unemployment/)
~~~
michaelochurch
It's actually easier to do "creative career repair" on a 6-month gap than a
4-month one.
Don't get me wrong. You always want to avoid being unemployed for 6 months if
possible; but there are ways of touching that up.
If you were in full-time school, just use that. You don't even need to lie.
The truth is always better-- not because there's major risk of getting caught,
but because it's always better to form relationships based on the truth, and
the cognitive load of maintaining a lie will take steam out of you even if you
never get caught. The "6-month problem" doesn't include full-time students. If
you were a part-time student, maybe you can make it look full-time?
However, if you are stuck needing to lie, I advise the "odds and evens"
strategy. Rank your choices 1, ..., N. Odd-numbered choices get full
disclosure of the truth. Even-numbered choices get the story you want to tell.
(Or, if you think your history is that damaged, tell the truth to evens and
your new career history to the odds.) This gives you a sense of whether the
issue you are covering up is an actual employment problem, or whether it's
something else.
------
naner
What is the HN term for "slashvertisment"?
~~~
oftenwrong
"submarine"
------
lmg643
having been on both sides of the hiring equation, my sense is that the current
system is broken by design.
For myself, I've read positions at a company that are a perfect fit, only to
see things like (paraphrasing) "5-10 years of prior experience at a digital
media company required". To get that, there are a small handful of companies
one could have ever worked for. why wouldn't the hiring manager just call the
5 people you know who are a fit? right - because HR says we have to post the
job.
From the hiring side - it is important to understanding managerial objectives
in hiring, which frequently diverge from company interests beyond a certain
size and maturity. Job security and minimizing headaches come to the
forefront. The most understandable is training - even a smart pup needs time
to learn. the remaining motives are questionable, and hard to surface.
No doubt there's room for a company like HireArt, but when i read the
description of what the company expects to solve, my first thought is that
rather than fix a broken-by-design hiring market, it will mostly relieve the
guilt of HR employees who know hiring is intentionally broken.
~~~
jonnathanson
I don't know if hiring is "intentionally" broken, so much as it's a casualty
of bureaucracy. Very few companies invest strategically in HR, and for the
most part, they treat the hiring process on an ad hoc basis. It's a nonissue
until it becomes an issue, at which point, it's a fire drill that nobody has
really thought through. The hiring manager has other things on her plate, and
the HR manager has a few dozen other positions to fill out. And then there are
the legal requirements, the risk mitigation, the forms and procedures, the pay
bands, and so forth. Nobody's set out to create a broken system; the breakage
in the system is the result of a couple dozen microscopic fractures that have
built up along the way.
What seems intentionally broken is the general approach to human capital. The
workforce is massively, ridiculously undervalued. Most companies -- especially
the bigger ones -- would rather churn and burn through their employees,
replacing them as they leave, than invest seriously in training, retaining,
and developing a strong and long-term workforce. The inefficiencies resulting
from this attitude are hidden, but massive. But the short-term ROI is, sadly,
quite positive. So nobody's got any incentive to change the approach.
~~~
jared314
Isn't that the reason most unions formed in the first place?
I wonder how many generations it will take to fix the current approach to
human capital. The current pessimism around employee training and development
will rub off on the next generation, like a downward spiral, but without some
of the reasoning or perspective.
~~~
geogra4
We had a fix. Unions. They were dismantled by Nixon, Reagan, et. al. from 1968
to the present because the professional classes believed that they were
insulated from the problems of the working class.
They were wrong, and we are paying the price, the profits going directly to
the owners of capital.
------
lumens
HireArt's approach is an interesting one, but culling through 500 video
interviews by hand is time intensive for the reviewer and the 499 candidates
who don't get the job.
We're working on these problems at Mighty Spring
(<https://www.mightyspring.com>), with a focus on talent whose time is more
highly in demand.
Our approach is to reverse this process: you have an anonymous profile that
companies view. If a company sees your profile and they're interested, they
can request an interview. You receive these requests via email and can choose
to accept or decline. The anonymity means you can both freely decline
interviews and use the site while employed with no repercussions.
The goal is to provide a similar service to working with a really great
recruiter, but without the hassle.
As most of the readership here is in our target audience, we'd love any
feedback and welcome questions. We'll expedite invites to HN signups - also
feel free to email me: lumen@companydomain
------
orangethirty
The correct term is advertorial. It is when the editori staff does an
advertisement disguised as an article. It works wonders, more so when it comes
from the NYT. This company is now front and center. Well done to your
marketers. You will get a lot of flack here, but this is one more way to jump
start growth. Good luck.
------
breakyerself
I think a big factor in this discongruety between education and the job market
is the fact that students cannot write off student loan debt in a bankruptsy.
It alleviates the banks from their due diligence of making sure their loan
will create a return on investment. There is virtually no risk on their side.
They can be certain. That no matter what you do or where you go you will have
to pay them and the longer it takes is just more interest for them to collect.
You can be certain that if student loans required the bank to take a risk
there would be a lot more engineers coming out of colleges in america and a
lot less degrees in ancient Greek philosophy. The banks would require people
to choose majors that will pay enough.
~~~
sokoloff
I agree that's a possible outcome, but I think an equally likely outcome is
that banks would require parental co-signing of loans, from parents with
income and credit ratings sufficient to mitigate the risks.
Which overwhelmingly means that the economically disadvantaged (or those
estranged from one or both parents) would be shut out, which would make
"college degree required" a proxy for "upper middle class or better".
I agree that it's a different outcome, but I don't agree that it's a better
outcome. There are benefits to easy availability of student loans; with those
benefits come some risks. You can't eliminate only the risks and leave all the
benefits.
~~~
king_jester
> Which overwhelmingly means that the economically disadvantaged (or those
> estranged from one or both parents) would be shut out, which would make
> "college degree required" a proxy for "upper middle class or better".
Considering the overall education picture in the US, this is already true.
Students from low income families already have a hard time getting to a point
where they can apply and be accepted to a university. See
[http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/21/news/economy/income_college/...](http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/21/news/economy/income_college/index.htm)
------
lpvn
>So what does she advise? Sharef pointed to one applicant, a Detroit woman who
had worked as a cashier at Borders. She realized that that had no future, so
she taught herself Excel. “We gave her a very rigorous test, and she outscored
people who had gone to Stanford and Harvard. She ended up as a top applicant
for a job that, on paper, she was completely unqualified for.”
I don't know if I'm too cynical but the first thing that came to my mind after
reading that was if her pay is gonna be the same of someone who went to
Stanford or Harvard.
~~~
supahfly_remix
Isn't excel just a tool? The challenging parts are knowing what numbers to put
in and the analysis of the results.
------
jerryhuang100
such a shameless advertisement on NYT that you can't even call it a placement
marketing
------
seferphier
This is a very interesting approach to solving an old age problem: how do you
match the right people to the right employers?
The solution for most people used to be stacking credential and hoping the
competition wouldn't have the same level of credentials as you.
What type of jobs are available on HireArt? How do you decide on what metrics
and skills are useful for that particular post? How many test have you
devised?
~~~
esharef
Hey, Elli from HireArt here.
We work only with non-technical jobs like marketing, biz dev, sales, etc (we
think technical jobs are quite different). And then we have two different
types of challenges: 1) Challenges that individual employers create 2) General
industry challenges that candidates can use to apply to lots of jobs.
In terms of how we come up with the questions, we mostly just ask employers:
"What does this employee do at work" and then we ask candidates to do similar
tasks.
~~~
jacques_chester
I'd be interested in hearing how you got such a high-profile writeup.
This is not a snark attack. Genuine interest.
~~~
npc
> Sharef (who was my daughter’s college roommate)...
~~~
Kurtz79
In the end, connections still matter then...
------
lifeguard
This read to me like think tank backfill. Friedman has definitely got his own
angle on things. I think reading _Linchpin_ would be more useful advice, “The
job is what you do when you are told what to do. The job is showing up at the
factory, following instructions, meeting spec, and being managed.
Someone can always do your job a little better or faster or cheaper than you
can.
The job might be difficult, it might require skill, but it's a job.
Your art is what you do when no one can tell you exactly how to do it. Your
art is the act of taking personal responsibility, challenging the status quo,
and changing people.
I call the process of doing your art 'the work.' It's possible to have a job
and do the work, too. In fact, that's how you become a linchpin.
The job is not the work.” ― Seth Godin, Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?
~~~
b1daly
Does anyone else find Seth Godins advice to be totally devoid of actionable
suggestions? It reads to me as "the key to being successful is to be awesome!"
It has some hand-wavey concepts, a few cherry picked anecdotes, and a pithy
title. I don't get it...
The original article had a similar quality when it came to the question of how
to actually acquire advanced skills. How many jobs exist in which the main
skill is knowing Excel? Maybe there are, but usually if it is listed it's as
part of a laundry list of required skills.
~~~
jarek
> Does anyone else find Seth Godins advice to be totally devoid of actionable
> suggestions?
Same as most motivational and self-help advice, then?
~~~
b1daly
Point taken!
------
31reasons
Personally I think this is not a Friedman level article, more like a HireArt
advertisement.
------
romeonova
After reading the article, I didn't really catch any tips on how to get a job
other than use HireArt. I guess that was the message?
------
georgeoliver
There certainly are multiple ways to attack this problem, but when the vast
majority of jobs now are never advertised it makes me wonder how many people
will find jobs with this kind of service.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Court Says Privacy Case Can Proceed vs. Google - 001sky
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/11/technology/court-says-privacy-case-can-proceed-vs-google.html
======
magicalist
discussed earlier today as well:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6362221](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6362221)
As I said there, what's worrying here is that the decision hinges on "readily
accessible to the general public". While this was just a refusal to dismiss
and there may be more to come, the problem is that this is just a small step
away from being able to criminalize any access of an open wifi hotspot. No
slope required, slippery or otherwise. All you need is a DA that feels
justified in prosecuting someone but without an obvious tool to do so, and
here one is.
Better to criminalize what you _do_ with that access, but that wouldn't fall
under the Wiretap Act as written, so wouldn't come up from this motion to
dismiss.
~~~
001sky
_what 's worrying here is that the decision hinges on "readily accessible to
the general public"_
This is a bizzare comment. The reporting here articulates the court's thinking
in slightly more detail than the earlier piece:
_the court didn 't think much of Google’s argument that unencrypted data sent
over a Wi-Fi network is “readily accessible to the general public” because
both the hardware and software needed to intercept and decode the data are
widely available.
People can easily buy technology to log every keystroke on someone’s computer,
the court noted, but that did not make those keystrokes “readily accessible to
the general public.”_
Using technology to snoop on people behind closed doors in their own homes, is
using technology to pierce the veil of "what is readily available to the
general public". Basically, if you have to use a fancy gizmo to make it
accessible, even if the gizmo is available to the public, it does not make all
information retreivable with that gizmo public by default. Which seems like
fairly common sense.
[NB: That doesn't make google guilty of anything. It just means that their
arguments to date have missed the mark in getting the suit thrown out without
further hearing]
~~~
magicalist
> _This is a bizzare comment. The reporting here articulates the court 's
> thinking in slightly more detail than the earlier piece_
I was not basing my statements on the nytimes piece, I was basing them on the
opinion itself, which is embedded in the wired story:
[http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/09/10/11...](http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/09/10/11-17483.pdf)
Much of the opinion does focus on if wifi should be considered "radio
communication"
The problem is that in accessing any open wireless access point you are
"piercing the veil" whether you intend to or not. That's how IEEE 802 networks
work: you get all the packets, you just drop the ones not meant for you.
I would argue that switching the hardware you're already using in every
computer that talks to a LAN or WLAN to promiscuous mode is not at all
analogous to installing a keylogger. But even if you don't switch modes, it
still will only take an ambitious DA to argue that whether you intended to or
not, you were capturing all packets when you connected to that business's wifi
hotspot, which is another broken law to add to your list of charges.
------
Mindless2112
You know, of all the things to be worried about regarding Google and privacy,
capturing publicly-broadcast wireless-network packets is not really high on my
list.
------
o0-0o
Good. They need to be stopped dead in their tracks.
~~~
hahainternet
They were, 3 years ago, when they outed this issue themselves and submitted
their code to a third party for review.
------
001sky
_The court made clear that federal privacy law applies to residential Wi-Fi
networks,” he said. “Users should be protected when a company tries to capture
private data that travels between their laptops and their printer in their
home.”
The ruling, written by Judge Jay Bybee, took sharp issue with Google’s
contention that data transmitted over a Wi-Fi network was not protected by
federal wiretapping laws because it was an electronic “radio communication.”
“In common parlance, watching a television show does not entail ‘radio
communication,’ ” Judge Bybee wrote. “Nor does sending an e-mail or viewing a
bank statement while connected to a Wi-Fi network.”_
~~~
kdragon
But.. but.. it _is_ radio communication! Using radio waves! If scientific
facts not define what is legally considered 'radio communication', by what
arbitrary rules is this defined?
So when a google engineering team stores unwanted, unencrypted radio
communication by accident (and is entirely open about it) the courts seem so
eager to throw the book? But when the U.S Government coerces telecom companies
to aid in massive unconstitutional wiretapping on a global scale, congress is
willing to step in and grant retroactive legal immunity to all parties?
Am I taking crazy pills??
~~~
001sky
_If scientific facts not define what is legally considered 'radio
communication', by what arbitrary rules is this defined?_
Not to point out the obvious, but laws are written using legal definintions.
And those are made by the legislature and the Judiciary. The NSA (and I'm not
here to defend them) at least has a prima-facie need to see certain types of
protected speech under limited (court ordered, direct national threat)
circumstances. Google is a merely a business, with no public policy need to
creep around the neighborhood. That being said, this decisino is merely
putting the issue to a trial/jury. Nobody has said google is guilty. But they
are not so innocent, or so in the right, with repsect to how the law is
apparently written/interpreted, than they can dismiss the claims of
impropriety as "baseless, without merit" &tc.
_...The unanimous, 35-page decision by a three-judge panel found little merit
in Google’s legal maneuverings, stating at one critical point that the company
was basically inventing meanings in an effort to declare its actions legal_
------
javajosh
The real story: There's a chance that each and every one of us might get $10k
from Google!
Don't bury the lead.
~~~
jrockway
I believe that it's the lawyers that get $10k, and we get a gift certificate
for a free ice cream cone. At least that's how every other class action
lawsuit I've seen has gone.
~~~
x0x0
nonono
the lawyers get $10k _for each of us_
we get an expiring in one year coupon for a free ice cream cone with purchase
of $20
~~~
jrockway
Yes. That's why they automatically put you in the class if you don't reply to
that postcard they sent to your address three moves ago.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Time to buy Bitcoin? - Zine
https://cryptorunner.com/why-use-bitcoin/
======
nxsynonym
This doesn't really present any new information. All the advantages listed are
the same ones that have been staples of the selling point since inception.
If you're asking if it's a good time to buy since it's been on a general
upswing the past 30 days, that's not really the right question to ask.
The whole FOMO/gold rush article peddling for crypto is getting out of hand.
If you actually want to invest in the tech, there are plenty of resources to
help guide that decision. Just because it's up x% in the 24 hour trend means
nothing.
------
Zine
I look for diversification of my positions and cryptocurrencies such as
bitcoin seems to be a good option. All the other advantages of using it are
just extra points. This seems to be the best protection against inflation and
good diversification for 5% of the investment portfolio. Don't you agree?
------
bdcravens
If your reason to buy is because of the current price, then no.
If you've noticed that the price has gone up for every year but one of its
tradable life, and want to dollar-cost average by making regular purchases,
then yes.
------
Zine
Is it time to buy or invest in Bitcoin? I found these good advantages in the
link. Any comment on those?
------
downrightmike
No, it really isn't. It will go down again a lot.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Submittable (YC S12) raises $750K to replace email - kirillzubovsky
http://pandodaily.com/2012/11/09/submittable-raises-750k-to-replace-email-for-real-this-time/
======
jacques_chester
I am finding it really difficult to understand what this tool is or does from
the hand-wavy description in the article.
The part where it turns out "replace email" actually seems to be "replace
usage of email for an apparently narrow document-editing task" is some good
old-fashioned link baiting.
Anyhow, I'll bite.
What does this tool do that SharePoint doesn't? Or other email-integrating
document management tools such as (shudder) TRIM?
~~~
citricsquid
it turns out "replace email" actually seems to be "replace
usage of email for an apparently narrow document-editing
task" is some good old-fashioned link baiting.
From what I understand of the description the idea is that it becomes a
management layer on top of email for submissions (hence submittable) that need
some collaborative management. Similar to how google docs forms work, but
instead of the results ending up in a spreadsheet they end up in the
collaborative document editing system.
After looking at their website the use cases seem clear, the Pandodaily
article does seem to lack a simple explanation: <http://submittable.com/>
~~~
jacques_chester
Yes, the website is definitely better at getting the gist across -- a document
management tool with email integration.
There's definitely a market here, as the zillions of DMS vendors have
demonstrated.
I guess I'm a curmudgeon who feels annoyed when people pass off as
REVOLUTIONARY HYPERNEW AMAZING ZING BOOM CRASH things that, upon closer
inspection, turn out to be nice implementations of a known genre.
(I hasten to add that the blame, if any, seems to rest with the journalist,
not the Submittable team).
~~~
citricsquid
(I hasten to add that the blame, if any, seems to rest
with the journalist, not the Submittable team).
I went back and read the article again and it really is quite questionable how
the company is presented. The author seems to have tried to spin some sort of
"email is terrible" narrative and got lost along the way.
I think the author should have tried to explain how Submittable would provide
value to a company like Pandodaily and that would have been better at putting
across the value. For example Pandodaily has a "tips" email which would be the
__perfect __use case for the editorial portion of Submittable, yet that is
unmentioned and instead the author tries to explain what seems to be a summary
of watching someone use the site for 10 minutes.
They also do not seem to have mentioned any of the other specific _types_ that
Submittable cater to, which includes resumes, audio / film submissions and
grant applications, all of which have their own systems to enable proper
management.
Hopefully Submittable will be covered again by someone else and properly so
they have a fair shot at being exposed to the masses, because this article is
really doing a poor job of even hinting at what Submittable is about.
------
anonymouz
Why is it taken for granted that everyone hates email? I love it. Its only
problem seems to be spam. Otherwise it's a simple, standard way of
communicating with great interoperability. If anything will replace it, it
most probably won't be a closed ecosystem built by a single company.
That said, as others have already pointed out, Submittable seems to be
something completely different anyway, with no ambition to do what email does.
------
UnoriginalGuy
We aren't going to replace e-mail. It has been tried countless times and
failed countless times. But e-mail is problematic simply because it has
stopped evolving as a technology. It is static. It is like HTML/JS back in the
IE6 era. Just stuck in a rut.
E-mail needs two things done to it but they're difficult to wrap one's head
around.
The first thing it needs is to get more simple. E-mail has a lot of quirks,
crust, special cases, and other things. This applies to SMTP but also to
addresses (TO, CC, etc). Just as one example did you know that technically
almost any character is valid in an e-mail address? Did you also know that
EXAMPLE@ and example@ are two totally different addresses (case is as equally
differentiating as characters)?
I liken this to the XHTML effort (to make HTML more strict). We need to take
e-mail as it is used today, and essentially call the "edge cases" illegal.
This would be compatible with 90%+ of existing implementations but would make
future e-mail implementations (both client and server) far more straight
forward. As it stands today you cannot build an effective client or server
e-mail system by just looking at the respective spec's since there are so much
strangeness.
Secondly AFTER the above has been done AND adopted they need to develop a new
standard to replace HTML as the display format for e-mail (XML based). This
should include things like signatures, quoting, in-line pictures, tables, and
a small subset of text styling. Essentially take HTML, remove 50%+ of the
functionality and then ship it as a standard people can cheaply implement.
~~~
icebraining
_Secondly AFTER the above has been done AND adopted they need to develop a new
standard to replace HTML as the display format for e-mail (XML based). This
should include things like signatures, quoting, in-line pictures, tables, and
a small subset of text styling. Essentially take HTML, remove 50%+ of the
functionality and then ship it as a standard people can cheaply implement._
Why? People who like HTML emails are happy with it; people who prefer plain-
text emails (like me) won't like your solution either, since it's XML.
I think we already have a decent format for lightly formatted email, and it's
the plain-text conventions (in which Markdown was based). Or Markdown itself,
if you want something closer to a standard.
~~~
UnoriginalGuy
Because the HTML supported by e-mail is too massive. It makes writing an
e-mail client too expensive and also means that security issues are more
likely to creep in.
Plain text should stay as is. HTML is the problematic format that needs
addressing. When they first started using HTML for e-mails it was just the
natural thing to do, but with the benefit of hindsight it was a mistake.
So I am suggesting we take a subset of HTML, add a very small set of e-mail
specific features (signatures, quoting, etc) and then deploy. This format
should be entirely display-able with a single XSL (as the easiest
implementation).
~~~
anonymouz
> It makes writing an e-mail client too expensive and also means that security
> issues are more likely to creep in.
I disagree: Libraries to render HTML already exist and will continue to be
developed, since they are used in web browsers anyway. The development effort
would be greater if we introduce another (new) format specifically for email.
Every E-Mail Client that wants to do so already implements HTML display.
Most of the security issues are mitigated by not running Javascript and
disabling loading of remote resources, by default. Then it's as safe as a web
browser with NoScript.
The problem with HTML mail in my opinion is simply that it is overused. Often
it is unnecessary bloat, and plain text works just fine.
------
robryan
From what I can see this product wouldn't be replacing email for a single
person. Only possibly for narrow use cases of email where you are accepting
and managing submissions of some sort.
Also I would assume that the product also uses email, or does the person
submitting go through a web app for the whole process.
I think this is purely a case of a link bait title and an article that does a
poor job of explaining what the product actually does. Which isn't ideal as
the method your startup first gets exposed to a wider audience (first time I
have seen it anyway).
------
rdl
This has nothing to do with how I use email, but does look like a useful tool
on its own. I don't understand the "replace email" branding at all -- maybe
it's "replace email for people who are currently abusing email in bad ways".
------
etherealG
their homepage doesn't even mention email. talk about a linkbait title
------
JoelMarsh
I think we should pause before having a serious discussion about an interface
replacing a protocol.
This is like Google's pitch being "Our search will dominate because we use a
single text field, and we have a 'surprise me' button."
If you want to "replace email" you have to replace its infrastructural value
to the internet too, not just the superficial day-to-day convenience of
messaging. As long as every website requires email to register, messaging is a
secondary consideration.
I think that 750k could have been used for a failure-less-obvious.
EDIT: for tone.
------
ikawe
I don't think there will ever be a single "email killer".
Email is a really general purpose tool, but I think we will continue to see
tools that take out a small chunk of email use cases.
e.g. google docs, IM, facebook messaging
------
jrockway
Sounds like Google Docs?
------
awayand
whatever
------
rorrr
This will NOT replace email, especially in the corporate world. You only need
to spend a week at a relatively large corporation to clearly see why.
Look at what we have now - basecamp, all kinds of free instant chats, group
video chats, all kinds of organizational SaS, etc etc etc. Yet we still have
ridiculously long email chains that often branch off and start to have a life
of their own.
Why? Because
1) Everyone knows how to use email. Most employees don't want yet another way
to communicate.
2) Your average office employee is pretty... average. And roughly half of the
employees are dumber than that.
3) Training is expensive. One quick demo on a projector will not train your
employees to use some new software. It's like half-life, 50% will learn after
a month, 75% will learn after another month, etc.
4) You will always have employees who don't get this new software, many will
probably not give a shit about learning a new tech, while they have a
perfectly working way of sending a message. They will realize that when they
change jobs, chances are, they won't be using this new software. But email
will be there.
5) It is similar to the craigslist syndrome - it's awful, but everyone uses
it, because... everyone uses it.
~~~
cdent
> 1) Everyone knows how to use email. Most employees don't want yet another
> way to communicate.
This simply isn't true. Most people don't know how to use email, which is why
these stupid memes of "everyone hates email" and "email must be destroyed"
persist. What people hate is email being used in a dumb way. Or to be more
blunt: People hate dumb people. No surprise there, really. So a solution is to
get better at getting rid of dumb people. One way to do this is to persist in
using email well, and demonstrating (with persistence and persuasion) the
better way when rolling across crap use.
This is one of those (rare) situations where the technology and infrastructure
is fine; the people using it are the problem. Email can be incredibly
effective when used correctly.
Mind you there are certainly email clients which make it far too easy to use
email poorly.
~~~
pork
I think there's a vast sea between "people who don't know how to use email"
and "computer literate", and it's disingenuous to make that a false dichotomy.
There's a large population of people within biopharma, manufacturing, tech,
and financial corporations, software engineers included, who are really fine
tweaking and managing their email filters and don't give a damn about "email
killer X", the reason generally being that the cost of learning a new "email-
replacement" system often outweighs its benefits.
Which is not to say that you don't have a point either, but rather just that
your assertion of "simply isn't true" well...isn't true.
------
drivebyacct2
Is that a wise tag to lead with? Even if it were better articulated or better
designed?
| {
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Thousands of early English books released online to public by Bodleian Library - diodorus
http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/news/2015/jan-27
======
ommunist
Not exactly released. And not exactly to public. As the site says "Please note
that it is very rare for us to set up free trial access for individuals.
Individual pricing is not available and all trial requests will be considered
on a case-by-case basis."
~~~
tfgg
It seems to be available to the public
[http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/eebotcp/](http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/eebotcp/),
and on github at
[https://github.com/textcreationpartnership/](https://github.com/textcreationpartnership/).
That first site is remarkably poorly designed for actually finding the
information, a common theme I find for websites created by librarians. There
should just be a box at the top listing the download links!
Web developers working for libraries: Far too often I visit a site and and am
confronted by acres of text explaining what the project is, who is involved,
how to enter data in forms and all sorts of hand holding, BUT NOT THE ACTUAL
DATA! Usually I find there's some link hidden in the least visible part of the
page, like the lower right hand side, that actually lets me get started! Does
Facebook have paragraphs of text with a welcome message from Mark,
explanations of what Facebook is, how you use it, or does it just let you dive
in and get started?
edit: And despite all that text it doesn't explain what phase I and II are.
I should say this is an amazing bit of work and it's really important that
it's being released public domain, and a good sign of the direction libraries
are taking. It's just a little frustrating that the final delivery step is so
obfuscated.
~~~
ommunist
I would like to point your attention to this: You don't have permission to
access /cgi/t/text/text-idx on this server. Apache/1.3.39 Server at
eebo.odl.ox.ac.uk Port 80
------
idiotclock
One of the problems searching in these books is that there is no standardized
spelling in early modern literature.
There is a project called DREaM, at McGill to standardize for "distance
reading" (macro analysis).[1] It uses a program called VARD (a text
preprocessor trained to correct spelling).[2]
Strangely, this application is licensed with the creative commons. I think
this means that it is closed source. Does anyone know of any open source
alternatives?
It cannot handle such an immense amount of data,[3]
[1] [http://earlymodernconversions.com/introducing-
dream/](http://earlymodernconversions.com/introducing-dream/)
[2]
[http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/vard/about/](http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/vard/about/)
[3] [http://www.matthewmilner.name/2014/11/18/VARD-and-EEBO-
TCP/](http://www.matthewmilner.name/2014/11/18/VARD-and-EEBO-TCP/)
~~~
sp332
There are lots of different CC licenses. None of them are closed-source,
although there are some which don't allow modification (No-Derivs / ND).
Others disallow copying for commercial use (NonCommercial / NC), and a couple
allow almost anything (Attribution / BY, No Rights Reserved / CC0).
[https://creativecommons.org/choose/](https://creativecommons.org/choose/)
~~~
dragonwriter
> There are lots of different CC licenses. None of them are closed-source,
> although there are a few which don't allow modification.
Licenses that don't allow modifications are closed-source. At least, they are
inconsistent with the Open Source Definition (specifically, with criteria #3:
"The license must allow modifications and derived works, and must allow them
to be distributed under the same terms as the license of the original
software.")
[http://opensource.org/osd-annotated](http://opensource.org/osd-annotated)
~~~
sp332
Oh right, I was just thinking of open publication.
------
walterbell
15 years of work! Well done to those who funded and performed this extensive
effort.
Files are hosted by github and box. Will Internet Archive be included?
For marketing this accomplishment, a few choice examples of long-inaccessible
text may attract new readers.
~~~
pbhjpbhj
Presumably IA can just get the Box and add the files to their own archive.
~~~
walterbell
Not sure how IA works, but casual observation suggests they give upload
accounts to libraries and the cataloging is done by the library, not by IA.
------
Normati
"The text files were created by manually keying the full text of each work,
based on millions of digital facsimile page images"
!!! This is not silicon valley. I wonder how they ensure accuracy.
Link to the books [http://ota.ox.ac.uk/tcp/](http://ota.ox.ac.uk/tcp/)
~~~
th0br0
Well, maybe they used Amazon Mechanical Turk ;)
~~~
jbaiter
I know from a similar German project
([http://www.deutschestextarchiv.de](http://www.deutschestextarchiv.de)) and
they have two independent non-German speakers transcribe the digital
facsimiles to ensure that the transcriptions are as accurate as possible.
| {
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The Hunt for Robot Unicorns - extarial
https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/industrial-robots/the-hunt-for-robot-unicorns
======
wtvanhest
The most successful robot in the world is probably a washing machine or
dishwasher, not an iRobot.
~~~
mmt
If you mean "will be" rather than "is", I'd agree. Otherwise, it's just a kind
of _reductio ad absurdum_ to stretch the definition of "robot" to include any
machine.
The key differentiating factors (any one will do) seem to be resemablance to
humans/animals (not all that relevant here, I'd expect), being self-propelled,
and being able to perform complex tasks.
It's debatable how to define "complex", but I'd say that, for example, telling
time, as a sibling comment suggests, does not qualify, no matter how complex
the mechanism required to do it well happens to be.
Similarly, a machine that washes items that have been carefully loaded (and
maybe even pre-treated by scraping food debris) by a human, such as a current
dishwasher, is also not performing a complex task. Doing so to a haphazardly-
filled bus tray or sink, however, would be.
------
bsder
Robotics companies tend not to be unicorns because 1) they require monetary
input to scale and 2) you can't sell them to a FAANG.
~~~
Isamu
Both Amazon and Google have bought robotics companies.
~~~
gumby
FWIW google divested itself of most of its robot investments, though there are
still people at X (at least) working on autonomous systems.
------
mattmg83
Knightscope is on its way to unicorndom, I believe, but overall I'd say robots
tend to be fairly specialized and therefore each go after smaller TAM than
most of unicorns out there today, many of which are agnostic to their
customers industry.
| {
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Show HN: Community Events - kpasa - mixmastamyk
http://lax.kpasa.co/
======
mixmastamyk
Hi, I needed a side project to teach myself Django & AWS but couldn't think of
anything Earth-shattering to work on... After searching and coming up empty I
decided instead to build the kind of events site I've been waiting for for
about ten years.
Though events sites are a dime a dozen, after all these years I still haven't
found one I like. None seem to focus on what I want to know--what are the fun
(and best) things to do today and this weekend?
I'm wondering, can such a mundane site pay for itself? It's been fun
implementing all the ways it could. I would appreciate some ideas on the
premium services front.
Also, would anyone be interested in renting the app for use in their city, on
something like Amazon Marketplace? Finally, if it doesn't get traction on its
own I'm thinking of open-sourcing it to see if hosting/consulting are a
possibility.
Would appreciate any thoughts, and thanks for your time.
TL;DR - I've made an (events + reddit + meetup + gmaps mashup) prototype for
fun and hope to turn it into something.
| {
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Don't name your variables after types:you wouldn’t name your pets “dog” or “cat” - kiyanwang
https://dave.cheney.net/2019/01/29/you-shouldnt-name-your-variables-after-their-types-for-the-same-reason-you-wouldnt-name-your-pets-dog-or-cat
======
munchbunny
I highly disagree with this advice. I understand the intent of the advice, I
just think the proposed rule (in the body of the post) is a bad implementation
of the intent because it is overly general.
Name your variable in a way that makes as clear as possible what the variable
is used for.
He uses the example of "userMap". I think its mistake is not saying what the
mapping is for. Names to users? Phone numbers to users? Emails to users? Its
mistake is not calling it a map, which tells the reader that a variable
behaves as a mapping. (And if it's not actually a map, then don't call it a
map.)
~~~
drdeadringer
> Name your variable in a way that makes as clear as possible what the
> variable is used for.
This is my consideration as well. It's like "documentation for free" or
"commenting without comments".
When I get hit by a bus tomorrow, you will be able to look at my variables and
have an easy, viable clue about what is going on. Reading my mind will be that
much easier when figuring my code.
------
klyrs
My first girlfriend named our cat named Kitty; my first spouse named our truck
Trucky and wouldn't let me name our snake Fluffy. Sometimes my variable names
reference types, but typically in dynamically typed languages. Didn't read
past the title because it's wrong about me and wrong about my code
------
tebruno99
I disagree. I don’t want to have to hunt around for the definition of users to
know how to use it. Yes the compiler will throw an error, but that doesn’t
help me when I’m typing code.
------
janpot
"Users": sounds like an array to me
"UsersMap": doesn't add much value, what are you mapping?
"UsersById": now this is my style
~~~
nickm12
Agreed. I think the article is wrong to imply that the type adds no value.
Even if you have typechecking, the names of variables help you understand
code. Also, why should we compare variables to pets versus the many other
things in our life that we do refer to by their type? I don't have proper
names for my filing cabinet or office chair.
------
romwell
Eh, my friend's cat name is exactly that -- cat.
My cat has a name, but I just call him "cat" most of the time.
The point being - if the name is not ambiguous, it's fine.
------
Jyaif
"If there is more that one *Config in scope at any one time, calling them
config1 and config2 is less descriptive than calling them original and updated
."
The correct naming is of course "originalConfig" and "updatedConfig".
~~~
eMSF
I think your proposals are still missing some sort of indication or
description on what type of configurations those variables might hold. After
all, we don't want to have any unnecessary confusion, do we?
Yeah, just 'original' and 'updated' are probably a better choice.
------
nonamenoslogan
I completely agree--having inherited a few applications worth of .NET code in
which the last (younger, right out of college) developer named all the
variables for things from Norse Mythologies.
I also inherited a bunch of circa-2005 ColdFusion with aptly named variables
in CamelCase which are much easier to understand.
varUsersTableID > pointer*Freya any day of the week.
~~~
mnorton
> developer named all the variables for things from Norse Mythologies.
this is hilarious.
------
ken
I actually had a teacher whose cat was just “cat”.
“He’s the only one. He knows I’m talking to him.”
------
gamblor956
Horrible advice unless you use an IDE which keeps track of variable types for
you.
------
coldtea
> _Don 't name your variables after types: you wouldn’t name your pets “dog”
> or “cat”_
I would if I could not tell just by looking at them what species they are (and
thus what I can do with them, what to feed them, etc) among 200 other animals
in my house.
------
defterGoose
I wouldn't name my variables "Fred" or "Noodles" either.
------
mikestew
Were my domestic pets actually amorphous blobs of text, damned straight I'd
prefix or suffix their names with "dog" or "cat" just so I could keep them
straight. "Honey, where's the header file for the blue one? Can't remember if
it gets dog food or cat food."
To torture the metaphor a bit more, of course I'd eventually remember which
one is which because they live with me. A better metaphor is the feral cat
that shows up on my doorstep once a week looking for a handout. I've slept
since then, what are you again?
------
Meph504
Firstly, I have known several people to name their animals some variation of
their type, but barring that.
I see it as a courtesy to myself than those that come after me to provide
relevant context to a variable name. If the type in the scope of the variable
is meaningful to its use then I will include it.
Good or bad code tells me what it does, rarely does it tell me what its
supposed to do.
------
CM30
Clearly the writer hasn't seen Tom and Jerry.
------
SomeHacker44
Odd. I could swear I just saw a movie with a boy and girl (human children)
named, respectively, Boy and Girl.
------
htfy96
Hungarian notation exists/existed for a reason: m_nWheels is still quite
useful in C++ program
------
maceurt
For statically typed languages yes, but for dynamically typed languages I
would say not in all scenarios.
------
ntlk
I had two mice named Mouse, and several hamsters called Hamsted, plus a guinea
pig called Guinea Pig.
------
rbanffy
I once had a cat named "dog".
~~~
LorenPechtel
Were I to get a cat (can't, my wife is afraid of them) I very well might name
it "dog" or "doggy".
~~~
codyb
"Reward for doggy" with a picture of your cat would be a great missing pet
flyer
------
shaftway
My Shiba Inu would beg to differ.
犬 = Inu = Dog
------
eznoonze
myCat1 myDog2
| {
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Go to www.owl.com and you get AOL.com with an Owl background - ry0ohki
http://www.owl.com
======
rachelbythebay
Set-Cookie: adCanvas=Paper_Owl; Path=/
That would do it.
| {
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Vivaldi Browser and Open-Source - baal80spam
https://vivaldi.com/blog/vivaldi-browser-open-source/
======
latexr
If someone from the Vivaldi teams reaches this comment section, I have a few
questions.
As I understand it, the major reason you don’t publish everything as open-
source is to protect the Vivaldi brand, which you feel would be difficult
because Vivaldi is not yet a household name:
> When it comes to large projects that have been around for long enough or are
> household names, people won’t take notice of the fork.
> However, as Vivaldi is still small and could be easily overshadowed, this
> makes our brand more vulnerable and not just in terms of revenue.
Does that mean that if Vivaldi became as well-known as Firefox or Safari,
you’d be open to open-sourcing everything?
> only 5% is our UI closed-source code.
> (…)
> If a new project based on our code implements features that are
> fundamentally against our ethics (damaging to human rights or to the
> environment in some way, for instance)
Can you provide a concrete example on how a malicious actor could damage human
rights or the environment from browser UI code (HTML+CSS+JS on the Desktop,
Chromium’s Java UI on Android)?
> there is some security-relevant code in the UI as well. If you think that
> specific security-relevant parts of the UI should be open-sourced to make
> Vivaldi more trustworthy, let us know and we’ll consider putting it out as
> part of our code bundles, so you can check it for yourselves.
Even though I’d be unlikely to personally review it, yes, I do think that’s
important.
I will note that I’m not a Vivaldi user partly because I don’t feels its open-
source components are shared adequately. Browsing the code is an inconvenient
task: it has to be downloaded as a single 1.5GB tarball from a webpage
([https://vivaldi.com/source/](https://vivaldi.com/source/)), which means code
changes aren’t simple to track when compared to getting a GitHub/GitLab
notification of changes and analysing the latest commits.
In other words, it’s impractical for someone to investigate your code out of
curiosity. It becomes a chore, something you have to decide to consciously
carve a piece of time for, meaning less people will do it.
| {
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The Need for Data Engineers - eaguyhn
https://thenewstack.io/data-scientists-get-the-glamour-but-there-is-also-a-need-for-data-engineers/
======
FZ1
I feel the term "Data Engineer" gets used for a lot of catch-all "we have
problems that need an owner" situations.
There's not much consistency across job postings and interviews for this kind
of thing.
I just interviewed for one "Data Engineer" position which consisted of nearly
100% stored procedures. No one knew what else to call it, and they didn't want
to advertise for a DBA, because there were no real DBA responsibilities. So
"Data Engineer" was chosen.
Another "Data Engineer" position was almost entirely Spark. There was no SQL
involved - they expected all applicants to be Spark experts, with a deep
knowledge of Scala.
It's hard to know what to expect out of "Data Engineer" positions until you
walk into a place and start asking questions in the interview.
~~~
closeparen
For us it's simply the runtime you target. A frontend engineer writes code for
the browser. A mobile engineer writes code for iOS or Android. A backend
engineer writes code for servers. A data engineer writes code for the
analytical/warehouse environment.
It was typically backend engineers doing the data pipelines to expose records
from their own services, until the company got bigger and the analysts got
more demanding, and that became a dedicated role.
~~~
moandcompany
Engineers are professionals in the business of solving problems :)
~~~
walshemj
Scientists with thumbs was one definition I heard
------
philsnow
I would pay in solid gold for a data engineer that knew how to glue <the
things the data scientists need> to <the rest of the infrastructure> in a way
that fixes the impedance mismatch that seems to exist in the tooling.
In my experience data tools don't mesh well with "cloud"-y IAM, monitoring, or
auditing frameworks. Data folks ssh to shared cloud workstations and of course
use agent forwarding because that's what the tooling expects. They want to use
EFS to share data sets even though NFS on machines where people have sudo is a
bad idea / EFS is maybe a poor fit if you're thinking about governance /
provenance. There's a mix of "notebooks" running locally (or on the shared
workstations) and DAGs running in the cloud with bespoke access control that
either doesn't map to IAM or else there's no access control so to get to the
dashboard you forward a port with SSH.
It's enough to make me want to wall them off in a separate AWS account, but
maybe I'm just being a grumpy old SRE. _edit: as I mention downthread, this is
a knee-jerk reaction and is not likely to "succeed" for whatever definition of
"success" your business has._
~~~
sixdimensional
I see this problem a lot, and in my experience there are at least two pieces
to this puzzle - 1) many data science tools were originally desktop oriented
or required specialized, siloed engines to run, causing a parallel universe of
data to need to be imported into those tools and environments (for example
SPSS) and 2) traditional infrastructure teams need to think of data
infrastructure and architecture as a different subdiscipline running at layers
5-7 of the OSI model.
My problem as an infrastructure provider and data architect is how to provide
a globally consistent, governed platform and model on top of which different
classes of users have different levels of access rights to data in different
forms and qualities, through different interfaces.
My 2 cents, I accept silver bars too lol :)
For what it’s worth, I don’t buy the argument that data folks should operate
in an isolated infrastructure - we just need to adapt how we serve their
needs, which can be quite extensive when you are talking about essentially
anything ranging from someone writing highly complex algorithmic code to
process large volumes of raw data (high level of support and access may be
needed) vs. someone just designing a report or dashboard using just a
graphical tool on top of a predefined data model (much lower infrastructure
access needed).
~~~
philsnow
I agree especially on these two points:
* it's counter-productive in a number of ways to create a data ghetto where they can do whatever they need to do. It doesn't engender trust or communication between Infra/SRE/DataEng/DataSci teams, and leads to "throw it over the wall" behavior.
* we need to adapt to how we serve their needs, not the other way around. It's a lot more likely to be successful if we are the ones who start bridging the gap. Data engineers are pretty specialized at enabling data scientists to do their job, they don't necessarily share the same skillset as Infra/SRE engineers.
~~~
sixdimensional
Definitely agree - these folks are a class of customer and they are
experiencing “pain”. It’s difficult to get there, as you have said, but I
could not agree more, that we need to adapt to ease that pain. It’s actually a
great opportunity.
------
moandcompany
"The Role of a Data Engineer on a Team is Complementary and Defined By The
Tasks That Others Don’t (Want To) Do (Well)" -self
From a talk I've given a few times called, "Life of a Data Engineer"
(Google slides link:
[https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Oer3Z9OXPsk9H9WE5g6x...](https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Oer3Z9OXPsk9H9WE5g6xlu4ATGEfEsU84xW3UMcIdd8/edit?usp=sharing))
~~~
moandcompany
Reposting a comment I made a few years ago on:
"We’re in the Middle of a Data Engineering Talent Shortage"
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12454901](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12454901)
\----------
(2016)
I am a data engineer working on a machine learning team with models actively
used as part of our product(s). From my experiences working in various
contexts (applied machine learning, analytics, policy research, academics,
etc...), there are several of factors that contribute to this shortage: (1)
"data engineering" often requires a lot of breadth and knowledge, (2) "data
engineering" is often (derisively and naively) referred to as the "janitorial
work" of data science, (3) the spectrum of roles and requirements within the
"data engineering" domain, in terms of job descriptions, can range from
database systems administration, to ETL, to data warehousing, curation of data
services / APIs, business intelligence, to the design/deployment/operation of
pipelines and distributed data processing and storage systems (these aren't
mutually exclusive, but often job descriptions fall into one of these
stovepipes).
Some of my quick thoughts and anecdata:
Companies have made large investments in creating 'data science' teams, and
many of those companies have trouble realizing value from those investments.
A part of this stems from investments and teams with no tangible vision of how
that team will generate value. And there are several other contributing
factors…
"Dirty work." People haven't learned how to, and more often don't want to do
it. There's a vast number of tutorials and boot camps out there that teach
newcomers how to "learn data science" with clean datasets -- this is ideal for
learning those basics, but the real world usually does not have clean or ideal
datasets -- the dataset may not even exist -- and there are a number of non-
ideal constraints.
There are people that wish to call themselves “data scientists” that “don’t
want to write code” and would “prefer to do the analysis and storytelling”
Engineering as the application of science with real world constraints: there
are a number of factors that we take into account, often acquired through
painful experience, that aren’t part of these tutorials, bootcamps, or
academic environments.
Many “data scientists” I’ve met have a hard time adapting to and working with
these constraints (e.g. we believe that the application of data science would
solve/address __ problem, but: how do we know and show that it works and is
useful? what are the dependencies, and costs of developing and applying that
solution? is it a one-time solution, or is it going to be a recurring
application? does the solution require people? who will use it? what are the
assumptions or expectations of those operators and users? is it suitable? is
it maintainable? is it sustainable? how long will it take? what are the risks
involved and how do we manage them? is it re-usable, and can we amortize its
costs over time? is it worth doing? This is part of a methodology that comes
from experience, versus what is taught in data science)
Larger teams with more people/financial/political resources can specialize and
take advantage of these divisions of labor, which helps recognize the process
aspects of applying data science and address some of the above
Short story: if you view data engineering as "janitorial work" you're missing
the big picture
Anyone else notice that the attributes of a 'unicorn' data scientist include
the traits of a 'data engineer?'
------
tumanian
I run a team of data engineers, and over the years there has been a lot of
confusion between what is a data scientist and what is a data engineer.
I draw the divide in that data scientists discover the features and the
methodology, while data engineers take these insights to production. One can
argue that data scientists themselves could do that, but this is constrained
by the domain expertise on tools(be that the depth of spark internals or
whatever) and the number of hours in the day. It's hard enough to deal with
the variance of the models to deal with the variance of the system.
A good data engineer is a unicorn.I define three central competencies for a
data engineer: _be a good coder_ : quality, maintainability, efficiency, _know
how to explore the data_ : SQL, R, just eye the damn data feed, _know enough
data science to interface with scientists_
For a data engineer it's okay not to know probability theory and stats that
much, but its a must for a data scientist( running TensorFlow out of the box
with no understanding of the underlying math doesn't make a data scientist,
just a common butcher).
~~~
dtjohnnyb
I've seen the role you're describing (taking insights to production) move to
be described as a "Machine Learning Engineer", whereas Data Engineering is
closer to the front end of the process, productionising the _data_ gathering
and organisation. I really liked this diagram, it matches well with how I've
seen roles advertised lately
[https://twitter.com/workera_/status/1215081851577962497](https://twitter.com/workera_/status/1215081851577962497)
------
bradleyjg
When I tried to hire data engineers under that title I got a ton of resumes
from people with very poor programming skills. It wasn’t until I swapped the
job title to “software engineer” and put the data engineering details in the
description that I got resumes from people with appropriate skills.
The main issue with good programmers is that you need to make sure that
candidates know what the job entails and are onboard with it. There are
definitely complexities involved but by and large it isn’t the type of work
that CS programs glorify as “interesting work”.
------
theK
I was under the impression that the Data Engineer role is just the market
reaction to too many Data Scientists being produced without having the
necessary Programming skills to self enable their day to day work.
Reading the comments maybe I was naive.
------
ldng
Data Engieneet to Data Scientist what Fullstack to Developer, aka more work
responsabilities while paying the same ?
~~~
devmunchies
i think the scientist defines what data they need and how they want to query
it and the engineer does what it takes for the data to get there.
data engineers would be like linemen for a utility company, setting up the
power lines
------
ianamartin
I'm interviewing for a Data Engineering position right now, and one of the
questions I was told to prepare for is "What is data engineering?" I think
it's far more than just the data science aspects this article talks about.
Data Engineering touches more aspects of your engineering projects than most
people think. Curious what this crowd has to say about my idea here. Also, I'm
looking for work. If you like my thoughts, hit me up.
I think there are 4 buckets of data engineering problems, each with their own
challenges and solutions.
Operational Data Engineering This is the detritus that grows like weeds as
parts of other projects and often isn't recognized as a data engineering
problem. We need to pull a file off an FTP server or hit an API and do
something with it. Next thing you know, there are dozens of these little
things that are not individually hard, but having visibility into dependency
trees and failure cases becomes difficult because they are spread out
everywhere and it's not obvious where to look when things go wrong. Tools like
Apache Airflow are a good solution even if you don't use them in other ways
because they can centralize monitoring, logging, and graphs. Scaling isn't
resource intensive for these tasks because they are discrete. You can fan out.
The scaling challenge for this type of data engineering is really about
tending your garden and keeping things coherently organized.
Business Logic Data Engineering This is processing where the data is highly
structured and sometimes even ordered or sequenced. It's hard to scale because
you can't just throw things into a stream and apply multiple workers. You have
to have a managed process and likely shared in-memory state that collects the
worker results and applies strict rules to a process. This is the opposite
problem from big data. It's small data, rigidly organized, and carefully
managed.
Data Science Data Engineering This is sort of classic ETL with a twist. ETL
systems are typically pretty static once the E, T, and L are known quantities.
But working with Data Scientists requires that your pipelines have to be
pretty flexible because scientists are doing experiments. But they also have
to be repeatable and comparable, which means your pipeline has to maintain
version. This is also the area where you are most likely to encounter Big
Data, so you have to be prepared to change your mental model and be able to
use tools like Hadoop and Spark to bring compute to where your data is.
Analytics Data Engineering This is classic ETL pipelines that move data from
point A to data lakes or data warehouses. The key thing to understand here is
what you are modeling at the endpoint. If it's a legit data warehouse, you are
modeling business processes. If you aren't doing that, you are--by definition
--pushing data to a lake. Understanding your endpoint is key to choosing your
reporting and analytics tools to lay on top of your data source. Data lakes
are a good use case for ad-hoc, SQL-driven reporting tools like MetaBase. But
if you are sitting on top of a well-structured fact/dimension type of
warehouse, you will want more formal tools like Tableau, Pentaho, or Cognos.
~~~
thedudeabides5
Good description. I've found it easy to explain to people that data scientists
are often your explorers or researchers, the folks that go out and deal with
raw, uncleaned, poorly modeled information, looking for relationships that are
relevant to the business/study.
Data Engineers are the folks that show up once the boss says 'yeah that's good
enough we want to see the result of that process/model/algorithm on an ongoing
basis'...now what was likely a pile of unsystemized jupyter notebooks and
excel needs to get cleaned, sytemized and productionalized, preferably in
tools designed to handle pipelines and scheduled jobs etc.
~~~
exdsq
Interesting, I always thought if the role as collecting and cleaning data for
data scientists. Are you suggesting the DS does this part, or is the DE
responsible for both and the DS ‘purely’ looks for the appropriate algorithm
or model?
~~~
Feyn_man_
As a DS, I collect and clean my own data (sometimes literally as they’re
coming off the upload line, if I’m not building the upload pipeline in
question too), serving the raw data AS WELL AS metrics/models/algorithms
Generated by notebooks/containers from raw data in from hive via Spark
queries.
~~~
luckydata
do you also instrument your own monitoring, are on call if one of your models
breaks and have built the system where you "just drop a container"? If you
are, then you are a data engineer too, otherwise you're standing on the
shoulders of your data eng team and they make it look easy for you. Go buy
them some donuts first time you go back to the office.
~~~
Feyn_man_
>>> do you also instrument your own monitoring,
Our architect wrote some cute Datadog wrappers that I implement in every pipe
I roll out (and is that instrumental in diagnosing bugs). He also programmed
in a call to keys in a store that times out from too many requests and hangs
the whole function the wrapper is decorated on, that took me a while to
diagnose pinpoint
>>>are on call if one of your models breaks and have built the system where
you "just drop a container"?
Our motto is ‘you wrote it, you fix it!’ If the container pipe works, and you
dropped a bomb in it that doesn’t work, why should the DE have to pickup the
DS’s garbage?
>>>If you are, then you are a data engineer too,
:D
>>>otherwise you're standing on the shoulders of your data eng team and they
make it look easy for you. Go buy them some donuts first time you go back to
the office.
I actually support a few data scientists in the manner you described above
where they generate some metrics notebooks or container and I have to diagnose
their crap in a DE capacity (recent problem involved optimizing their pyspark
code to be less memory intensive)
~~~
luckydata
Then they should buy you some donuts!
------
haffi112
In my experience a lot of people have the coding skills to be a data engineer
but lack the ability to understand the value they can create.
------
sixdimensional
Another helpful distinction I think here is architect != engineer, however you
often see data architects that are also data engineers. I do feel there is a
clear difference of focus though.
------
slowhand09
Data Engineer and Information Architect terms have both been watered down and
bastardized so they are ambiguous in meaning. I hate putting them on a CV
anymore.
Next topic "HTML Programmer".
------
singularity2001
I am currently available
[https://expert.pannous.com/](https://expert.pannous.com/)
------
AznHisoka
If one wants to become a data engineer, what specific vendors/technologies are
increasing in demand? Ie. Databricks, talend, Cloudera?
~~~
guessmyname
Here is a good infographic [1] taken from DataCamp [2].
The infographic and article show what skills and tools are relevant for a job
as a web developer _(more specifically doing Python Web Development)_ and
compares them with similarly important skills and tools for data science. It
includes average salary expectations and links to websites where you can both
learn, practice and search for a job.
[1]
[https://s3.amazonaws.com/assets.datacamp.com/blog_assets/Pyt...](https://s3.amazonaws.com/assets.datacamp.com/blog_assets/Python_Web_Development_Data_Science_Full.png)
[2] [https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/web-development-
data...](https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/web-development-data-science)
~~~
shubb
I think your diagram is for switiching to a data scientist role.
In data scientist job ads I often see companies that want a phd, advanced
stats skills, and depending on the role AI related skills. They want to see
track record in these, but will happily take a fresh PHD student who did a
project that involved these. They don't want a software engineer who did some
code camp courses, they want an accademic.
Conversely, data engineering, I see ads wanting a cross over of big data ETL
technologies and devops - i.e. pyspark, kubernetes, and depending on the role
experience of scaling and productionising AI, without actually needing a deep
knowledge of AI algorithms.
This could be more viable for a software engineer who did some online courses,
as they specify tools experience not academic background. However, it would be
difficult for an experienced software engineer to switch into an experienced
data engineer role, because it is expensive to set up data infrastructure at
scale, so you can't switch over with a hobby project in the same way you could
e.g. switch from experienced front end to experienced full stack by showing a
significant webapp. Actually might be affordable in the silicon valley bubble
I guess.
------
angel_j
Data is a pretty major component of the programmer's craft, whether it's DBs,
I/O, or blobs. Most any experienced programmer is a "Data Engineer".
~~~
threeseed
You couldn't be more wrong.
Data Engineer as a term came out of the Data Science space. Which means that
you will be expected to have skills around Spark, Data Lakes, ETL at scale,
validation, schema management and syncing, data catalogs etc.
It's not some general skill just like you wouldn't say every programmer is a
Network Engineer because they use a HTTP client.
~~~
ianamartin
A shorter version of how I described it above is that Data Engineers
intentionally decouple logic from data so that ETL processes can be managed at
scale (not necessarily talking about Big Data when I say scale. Sometimes lots
of small ETL processes are just as difficult to manage as Big Data).
------
sys_64738
Is data engineer just a posh title for a system analyst?
------
corporateslave5
Data engineering doesnt that well
------
tgbugs
So many posts in this thread are spot on. I've heard descriptions of some tech
positions being equivalent to 'internet plumbers,' well, having spent a two
week rotation shadowing plumbers in my youth, I have come to think of what I
do as more akin to being an 'internet garbage man.' I deal with the shit the
no one else wants to deal with, or maybe more like an e-waste manager. There
is gold in the shit, but no one wants to actually do the dirty work of
building the system to move all the nasty sharp PCBs to somewhere that the
precious metals can be extracted in a way that that delicate workers won't cut
themselves to pieces.
No surprise, it is hard to find people who want to do this job and are good at
it. I see the demand in the academic world ('scholarly infrastructure' is a
very niche place) where it is nearly impossible to hire someone who can do
this work, so hearing that it is also impossible in industry means I guess it
is time to start training the undergrads :/.
I have an idea for a curriculum that could teach some of the principles for
this kind of work (give them the gentoo handbook for a start, and see if they
can follow it to get a database up and running from a box of parts), but I
suspect that mostly it would act as a way to filter out people who simply
don't like the activity, and you also have to have some amount of
interpersonal skills in order to understand the use cases of your colleagues
....
Anyone who cracks this problem will have solved a far more general one in the
process.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
MSI CEO Charles Chiang “Dies Suddenly” at 56 - chrismmay
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/msi-ceo-charles-chiang-dead-56
======
russellbeattie
"MSI general manager and CEO Charles Chiang passed away after falling from one
of the company’s buildings."
Yeah, that would definitely qualify as "sudden".
Most likely it's something tragic, but after a lifetime diet of spy movies,
how can one not think of some international intrigue involved...
~~~
gnat
Can Russian investors be far away ... ?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Are Antiferromagnets the Next Step for MRAM? - rbanffy
https://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/memory/antiferromagnets-next-step-mram
======
physicsguy
I did my PhD in a related area of magnetics to this.
One of the problems is finding appropriate materials, and that applies for all
magnetic devices.
Crystal structures are hugely complex, and the way that atoms interact
manifests primarily through the 'exchange' interaction. This is caused by a
combination of the Coulomb interaction (charges repelling/attracting), and
through the quantum mechanical Pauli exclusion principle, which basically
stops electrons with the same state from sitting in the same position. The
problem is, while it's the dominant energy term, there are several forms of
exchange interaction - RKKY, Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (which affects the
boundaries at interfaces and in certain crystals), etc. and so while the
length scale over which the exchange interaction acts is normally on the order
of a single atom, it can often actually act on next-nearest neighbour atoms
and cause odd effects. This means that finding a 'pure' antiferromagnet is
difficult; many things are actually ferrimagentic.
Many studies which suggest wonderful new storage technologies are
computational and have little bearing on the experimental reality. There are
serious difficulties in predicting the magnetic properties of materials with
density functional theory because the results are often oscillatory as you
refine the model, meaning that the computational cost is enormous - the
properties of even simple systems such as the two species alloy FePt can't be
easily predicted. Real crystal structures are hugely more complex than this,
and so it's questionable whether results given by people are any more than
junk. The work in this area is hampered by the fact that DFT research is
overwhelmingly focused on calculating bonding and chemical structures. DFT
scales poorly, and while there are a few codes that scale better, they're
licensed under weird license structures. There's also some odd fallings-out
between various code authors with accusations of stealing...
The 'next level' in the heirarchy of modelling neglects quantum effects
completely and is known as atomistic modelling. These models are still
enormously costly, but it's the only proper way to treat properly
antiferromagnetism, as the next level in the heirarchy, micromagnetism, takes
a continuum limit of this discrete model, and by doing so has assumptions that
antiferromagnets break. Parameterising these models is enormously difficult,
because it is pretty much impossible to measure experimentally the values that
you need, and DFT gives answers which when used bear little resemblance to the
real material.
You have to sort of realise that many people in magnetics have lost funding
because industry has moved on, and academic labs seem to be left behind. So
everyone tries to work on the 'next big thing' \- there are hundreds of
various proposals for devices that haven't worked out, and it's worth being
very, very sceptical of articles like this which promise that a new technology
will revolutionise things. Just as an example, one of the biggest wastes of
time over the last 10 years has been that of Skyrmions, which have been cited
as the possible hallelujah of magnetic storage, and for which there is
basically no evidence of utility after millions of dollars of research funding
worldwide, and thousands of articles. Many scientists jumped onto this topic
in my opinion because a Nobel prize winner wrote a brief, speculative
computational paper suggesting that Skyrmions could be the panacea to the woes
of current magnetic storage, despite there being even a lot of evidence at
that point to the contrary - in particular, work by Stuart Parkin at IBM in
trying to use magnetic domain walls for storage, and a whole host of work on
magnetic bubble memory that even made it to market in the 70s and 80s but
which was replaced because of poorer performance.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Ask HN: Which WordPress theme, code snippet and Math eq plugins you use? - sytelus
There is just too much noise in search results and general information is not optimized for technical blogs anyway. I'll be going through lot of these myself but wanted to know if community here has some strong preferences or glowing revs for any options.
======
davidkrug
I use the Thesis Theme, and no plugins minus a related posts plugin.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Kim Dotcom shares his *secret* to living a good life - TaylorGood
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDiili2Gs-0&ab_channel=MrKimDotcom
======
kgc
How does he have time for making these videos when this is happening?
[http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f0d30b6-a927-11e5-843e-6269289097...](http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f0d30b6-a927-11e5-843e-626928909745.html#axzz3xlwz7hMc)
~~~
tkjef
I'd say at this point it's best to enjoy. Looks like he's having fun.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
QuestDB – Fast open source relational time series database - beagle3
https://www.questdb.io/
======
bluestreak
Hi, QuestDB's author here, thanks for posting! I wanted to post this on Show
HN, but someone beat me to it!
We are an open source (Apache 2.0) time-series database, programmed in zero-GC
Java. You can find us on GitHub
[https://github.com/questdb/questdb](https://github.com/questdb/questdb). We
would like to get your feedback.
~~~
dang
It's fine to go ahead and post your Show HN when you're ready. Reposts are ok
when an article hasn't had significant attention yet—this is in the FAQ:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html).
Plus a Show HN has additional value.
You should add a comment to the thread giving the backstory of how you came to
work on this, and explaining what's different about it. That tends to seed
discussion in a good direction. Good luck!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
An Alternative Approach to Archiving Blog Posts - stevenjames
http://freemontpost.com/calendar/view
======
stevenjames
Most likely not a perfect solution, but thought I'd share it anyway :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What are the most annoying things about tech recruiters? - plvch
======
gabrielblack
1\. Sometimes they pretend to have an open position "X". They do them to
increase their database of candidates, just in case a customer will require
that kind of profile in future. You know what's happening because, even if you
apply for that position 1 ms after the publication of the ad, they respond
that the selections are closed but they have "similar positions";
2\. Sometimes they pretend to be an "official" and "exclusive" recruiter for
the company "X" but after a brief search you can find out plenty of ad for the
same position around Internet;
3\. Related to the point 1 and 2, sometimes, when you require information
about the position or the company, no information is provided because the
position doesn't exist, the think you can contact directly the company that's
looking for employees or both these reasons;
4\. Sometimes recruiters don't know what are speaking about/ what they are
looking . I can testify hundreds of example related to IT.
5\. Sometimes they aggressively try to contact you by phone even when you,
after receiving necessary clarifications,you tell them you are not interested
to the position;
6\. Sometimes they are spammers, mostly spammers by mail and spammers by
Linkedin. About Linkedin, using it as a type of FB surrogate, sending tons of
links with private preferences, kitties, funny viedo on Youtube, photos of
celebrations in their offices, advertisement ot their customers, etc. Why they
don't send the only thing you want from them ? I'm speaking about _job specs_
of course.
------
CyberFonic
In my experience tech recruiters do not know anything about IT and seem to
have no ability to reason logically. So they call and email about jobs that
absolutely don't match my profile nor CV. On the rare occasion that I call
them about an advertised job they seem to ask masses of irrelevant questions.
It is extremely rare to come across a tech recruiter who has actually worked
in IT and has a minimal level of understanding.
------
cimmanom
When they email you a second and third time about the position that you
deliberately ignored because it was such an obvious poor fit that you’d have
reported it to LinkedIn as spam if there were a way to do so.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Matrix Multiplication - tosh
http://matrixmultiplication.xyz
======
s1t5
1\. Needs a back button.
2\. It might be more illustrative if the transposed vectors pass over the
matrix one by one. In the default example - you take the [2 6 1] vector and
show how its dot products populate the final matrix, then do the same for the
[5 7 8] vector. That's closer to the way I think about matrix multiplication.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
White House Petition Response: You have a right to unlock your cell phone - philsalesses
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-57572391-94/white-house-you-have-a-right-to-unlock-your-cell-phone/
======
jamesbritt
Other discussion here: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5319577>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What's the easiest way to unblock Hotspot on the iPhone? - wkoszek
I have AirVoice Mobile carrier SIM card with iPhone 6s. AV blocks Hotspot feature for some reason. Is there any hack without rooting of the Phone to get it enabled?
======
DrScump
The answer may be specific to the carrier, so I would suggest adding the
carrier to the title.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Save electricity by "hoarding" it - nreece
http://www.nilkanth.com/archives/2006/10/10/save-electricity-by-hoarding-it/
One company decided to create a device that cuts your electricity bill by 10-15%. How do they do it?
======
zach
"A TiVo for electricity" is a very clever line. Puts a smile on your face and
yet describes it well. A bit of humor is a good thing when you're trying to
sell your concept.
------
daniel-cussen
A good idea. However, the part about "pays for itself in 4 years" means it's
not for startups.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Apple Profit and Revenue Slide as It Copes with Slumping iPhone Sales - monsieurpng
http://www.wsj.com/articles/apple-profit-and-revenue-slide-as-it-copes-with-dwindling-iphone-sales-1477427419
======
rplst8
I think the market for high-end phones and devices is probably starting to
saturate. Apple has also been relying a bit too much on planned obsolescence,
specifically through software updates.
Iterating over iDevices and essentially making them thinner and thinner or
mini versions of them (i.e. the watch) doesn't really speak of "innovation" to
me.
Apple's real prowess has been in economies of scale, industrial engineering,
and supply chain management. This is how they extract more profit from their
devices.
However, that profit is now largely based on the same principles of why high-
fashion brands can charge $500 for a pair of jeans or shoes. It's also a bit
perilous in the sense that once demand falls for "the brand" then a lot of
margin just vanishes off the books.
~~~
Ntrails
> I think the market for high-end phones and devices is probably starting to
> saturate. Apple has also been relying a bit too much on planned
> obsolescence, specifically through software updates.
My iPhone 4 had four years of updates provided instantly and at no cost. In
comparison to competitors I'd argue strongly that Apple has historically had
better support for old models than most.
However. I owned my 4 for a pretty long time, because it did everything I
needed (until the home button died). I expect my 6s will last a long time too
- probably again limited by a hardware fault. Much like PCs, the improvements
get smaller and so the impetus to upgrade regularly drops.
~~~
ksk
Apple absolutely does do planned obsolescence. Apple continuously hammers you
with popups to update the OS till you accept. My 4S slowed down to a crawl
after I foolishly kept updating the OS. Luckily, I've found a way to block the
updates now and hopefully my 6S will give me a much more pleasant experience
than my 4S.
------
jaitsu
"Apple sales slump... compared to unrealistic expectations."
Wake me up with some news.
------
angryteabag
Please open macOS to non Apple hardware. I'd actually buy a license for that.
~~~
grzm
Apple is a hardware company. That's where they make their money. What would be
their motivation to open macOS? Do you think that macOS license sales would
provide a meaningful offset to the drop in revenues and profits?
------
my123
The iPhone 7 was released at the end of the quarter, the article means exactly
nothing.
~~~
the_economist
Same was true for the iPhone 6S, iPhone 6, iPhone 5S, iPhone 5, etc. Yet this
is the first time in 15 years Apple revenues have shrunk year over year.
That means something.
~~~
huxley
Sure it means something, it means that Apple had a spectacular 2015.
In 2001, Apple had revenues of $5.3 billion and a net loss of $25 million.
2014, revenues of $182.8 billion with $39.5 billion in profit.
2015, revenues of $233.7 billion with $53.4 billion in profit.
2016, revenues of $215.6 billion with $45.7 billion in profit.
Apple's 2016 revenues shrunk in comparison to a peak year but it's still their
2nd best showing ever.
~~~
the_economist
This is not telling the complete story. In 2016, Apple shrunk around 25% in
China, after growing 100% in China in 2015.
Something is very odd with their China business.
~~~
mifreewil
I think you just agreed with the parent comment.
------
Mao_Zedang
Phones are a commodity.
~~~
samfisher83
I think the phone market should follow the PC market since the phone is much
like a miniaturized PC. However Samsung and apple have been able to achieve
high margins. Porters five forces tell us given the competition the margins
should erode.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Inferring Canada's hockey-watching from water usage data - _delirium
http://blog.canoe.ca/canoedossier/2010/03/09/portrait_of_a_nation_peeing
======
jmackinn
This is a really cool graph to see. The gold medal hockey game was the most
watched television event in Canadian history by far with 80% (26.5 million
people) of the country watching some part of the game. I'm sure that just
about every water utility in the country has a very similar graph for water
usage on that day.
------
Kliment
Great work. I'm seeing an analogy here between this and cryptanalysis using
power consumption data.
------
olalonde
Does anyone have a link to the full size image?
~~~
rpledge
[http://www.patspapers.com/blog/item/what_if_everybody_flushe...](http://www.patspapers.com/blog/item/what_if_everybody_flushed_at_once_Edmonton_water_gold_medal_hockey_game/)
------
RyanMcGreal
I'm bemused to observe that this was essentially the plot of _Flushed Away_.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A curated collection of high quality gifs - qrush
http://quaran.to/gifs/
======
bazzargh
Flagged for removing all authorship info from the images.
eg it has this one from graphonaute
[http://www.graphonaute.fr/post/66574508654/inspired-by-
https...](http://www.graphonaute.fr/post/66574508654/inspired-by-https-www-
videocopilot-net)
and this by Rebecca Mock [http://rebeccamock.tumblr.com/post/95734713448/the-
aftershoc...](http://rebeccamock.tumblr.com/post/95734713448/the-aftershocks-
medium-com-i-was-asked-to-create)
A curator would attribute the collection.
~~~
qrush
Thanks. I'll try and track down who did what.
~~~
bazzargh
Thanks for trying to do the right thing.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: I just inherited 700K+ lines of bad PHP. Advice? - ohmygord
So, I've just inherited a very large, very badly written monstrosity. Including javascript, template files etc, it breaks the 1 million LOC barrier. I'm looking for some advice and strategies that you guys might have used in similar situations, in particular on:<p>- getting a handle on the code base
- communicating 'progress' to the client
- not losing the will to live<p>The software is based on vtiger, an open-source CRM that has a (deserved) reputation of being incredibly badly written, that has since been badly hacked apart by several different companies with wildly differing ideas. My client currently have 150+ installs and 150+ angry clients.<p>Words fail me trying to describe the state of the software.<p>- no niceties such as MVC, ORMs, a DBAL, or a modular design
- all DB queries are inline SQL, with tens of inner joins on most queries
- dizzying call stack, yet reams of copy+paste code<p>The best part: the code will often query the DB and execute PHP code contained in the response, or load and run arbitrary files and modules as dictated by parsing particular DB fields. The one page I have studied in detail generates 105 DB queries in the simple case.<p>The DB itself is even worse. There are over 600 tables, as well as views, custom functions, cascades and (but of course) triggers. There is no consistent naming schema, very few explicit foreign key references (despite being heavily, heavily entwined) and I have already discovered several tables that don’t have primary keys, but are referenced by exact string matches on things like date stamps.<p>I wont mention the table-based HTML, javascript, lack of version control etc.<p>I’m not sure if its even possible to give relevant advice (besides perhaps ‘run screaming’), but if anyone here has come through a similar situation and has any advice to share, I would be deeply grateful.<p>Help me HN - you're my only hope.
(PS. 2K char limit sux)
======
lhnz
1\. Get it onto version control.
2\. Make sure there is some workable strategy for deploying and testing the
code.
3\. Ask somebody to provide you with a list of the changes, or else try to
create some kind of diff against the original version of the code. If you can
see crazy stuff here then find out who did it...
4\. Ask somebody what the biggest bugs are? Which things are causing clients
the most problems?
5\. Try to establish which convention is 'winning' in the codebase. But you
might want to create a more sensible convention which will allow unit testing
(start this immediately!)
6\. At this point, ask if you can hire people to work on this with you as it's
a big problem, and you need to free yourself up for the rewrite.
7\. If that isn't possible then leave. You have done enough to make your CV
better and a company which passes you something like this does not care about
your career.
~~~
mtrimpe
First read the Fowler's 'Refactoring' book; it was written just for you. Then:
1\. Identify a small and easily separable piece of code (what you woud call a
component in a _normal_ system.)
2\. Write tests covering every (important?) edge-case of the piece of code you
want to rewrite.
3\. Mercilessly refactor until it's nice and squeeky clean.
4\. Lather, rinse and repeat.
And of course, make sure your client acknowledges that it's a giant
clusterf... and is on board with you pulling the system out of the stone age.
Also, if you want to make life a bit more interesting for yourself, get the
PHP code's AST and programmatically rewrite existing code to shared
conventions for kicks.
~~~
masklinn
> First read the Fowler's 'Refactoring' book; it was written just for you.
"Refactoring" is not the tool for the job, although it's a nice sidearm.
What OP needs is the big gun, Feathers's "working effectively with legacy
code": [http://www.amazon.com/Working-Effectively-Legacy-Michael-
Fea...](http://www.amazon.com/Working-Effectively-Legacy-Michael-
Feathers/dp/0131177052)
As the title hints, it was written specifically and expressly for the "I just
got a huge amount of complete shit of a codebase shoved unto me, how do I
survive". Just check the TOC of part 2 (the meat of the book):
[http://my.safaribooksonline.com/book/software-engineering-
an...](http://my.safaribooksonline.com/book/software-engineering-and-
development/0131177052)
> And of course, make sure your client acknowledges that it's a giant
> clusterf...
That's hugely important. No promises of delivery, and that the client
understands it's not a cakewalk.
------
ck2
I started writing some suggestions but you know what - someone is dumping this
on you because they didn't care and their predecessors didn't care, etc. They
probably make far more than you for doing far less.
The moment you start touching the code, you are going to start being blamed
for the nightmare preceding you. It could even affect your career if future
employment researches where you worked previously and gets told you made the
mess in the first place.
~~~
pasbesoin
My thoughts are in line with this. Are you (honestly) being hired or promoted
to _fix_ this mess, or to _keep things running_?
If the former, has the incredible scale and scope of this been properly
identified, addressed, and acknowledged? Are you guaranteed anything near the
resources to (try to) accomplish this (including your own time, without
traipsing far into overtime)? Is the current state documented sufficiently to
obviate any and all future attempts to blame you?
If the latter (more likely, I suspect), well... I guess the simplest question
is, do you have an agenda and an exit strategy that leaves your career intact?
(And your health...)
Maybe, given the particulars, this is a real opportunity for you. But that's
not spelled out at all, nor obviously implied, in your post. And given that
this situation was allowed to develop to this extent in the first place, and
that you have angry clients to deal with, right off the bat, it doesn't sound
promising.
Do you like playing the role of unacknowledged hero who falls on his sword and
is cursed by his clueless fellows, while some other protagonist goes on to get
the girl?
There is _a lot_ of downside, here. What's the upside? Do the organization's
goals and commitments match your personal ones?
------
fallous
I've faced similar Augean stables in the past (and present, unfortunately).
I'd suggest that correcting the DB is one of the last things you can do,
especially if queries are scattered throughout the code instead of in
functions. You could attempt to abstract it with an internal API and as you
update the codebase replace with calls to the API. Once fully abstracted, you
can then focus on getting the DB corrected and only need to modify the new API
functionality.
As to the code itself, sit down and map out all the verbs and nouns in the
system. If you have a Contact noun, what is the definition of that role and
what verbs can be applied to it or what verbs could it do. This gives you a
good map for creating functions that can then be used to replace existing
inline stuff.
Triage the worst bugs or performance bottlenecks and see if they are
particular to a noun and/or verb, which should give you an obvious starting
place to begin refactoring. For emergency hotfixes and such, feel free to just
tweak the existing crap code but otherwise try and work on your functional
units to get ahead of the game.
And always remember, pimpin' ain't easy. ;)
~~~
bobfromhuddle
+1 for this. The first job is to stabilise the system by fixing critical bugs.
As you're doing so, move all those queries into one big fat DB class, and when
you spot groups of related queries, split them out into their own classes.
The next priority should be to get rid of the PHP from the DB - if need be
create another huge class with a zillion if-else statements.
You need to modify the code to simplify it. You don't need to _improve_ the
design, you just need to dumb it down until you can understand where all the
parts are. Stabilise, simplify, then refactor.
------
citricsquid
What is most important is what are you trying to achieve. Are you trying to
make the system as stable as possible at the lowest cost to the client or are
you trying to bring this system into a future proof state and the client is
willing to pay for that?
Personally if I were in your position I would explain to the client that I'm
happy to temporarily fix some bugs but long term the system needs to be
rewritten. 700k lines of code is a lot, but the way you've described it I get
the feeling most of that code is needless. Depending on what the system
actually _does_ you could conceivably rebuild in a few months.
~~~
mtrimpe
I've spent quite some time the cross-component spaghetti code large companies
sometimes write.
I've come to believe that the skill of _not rewriting from scratch_ but
forcing yourself to slowly refactor (as per Martin Fowler's definition)
existing systems into a proper state is one of the most important skills you
can develop.
That way, once you've refactored most of the system (which includes adding
tests for all the important functionality) you can indeed confidently rewrite
everything. If you do it any sooner than that though, you're in for a world of
pain.
~~~
seldo
Second this. The temptation to rewrite from scratch is to be avoided; the code
is going to be a mass of edge-cases, and you can't spot them all at once.
Rewriting will take just as long as refactoring and introduce new bugs instead
of killing old ones.
------
burningion
I was in this exact same situation two years ago, only with an eCommerce
platform which shall remain anonymous. The client had gone through 4
companies, trying to get the project built and finished. Nobody had been able
to wrangle it clean.
Reluctantly, I took on the project, and started working through it. What I
initially estimated would take me a month to untangle ended up taking a year.
That's an entire year in the snake pit. And since it was eCommerce, there was
serious money on the line when it came to bugs. And there were hundreds that I
found.
Just understand the commitment you're making. Make sure your client has the
money and the time to make things right. Ultimately, in my project, the client
insisted on quick hacks to keep competition at bay, and the code dissolved
into a mess. I decided I couldn't keep working with a codebase that was never
given a chance.
Understand what you're getting yourself into. Because you're taking over the
responsibility of loading a massive crap ton of software into your head for
diagnosis. How long do you want to have fragile, crappy, lazy code in your
head? Forget about bring superman, you're not going to save a million lines of
code, you're going to become the builder of the hacks that work around
absurdity. Make sure you understand that.
The burden of broken code you're responsible for, that's always broken in
production is like nothing I've ever encountered. Make sure it's worth it.
------
toddmorey
So the cold reality for this client is that the codebase will have to be
replaced over time. You are not trying to escape legacy simply for the lure of
something new, you are trying to escape insanity.
I would talk to the client about focusing your effort on helping them
transition--a small piece at time--to a sane architecture. If they aren't open
to that, they aren't your client. I've been a business leader in a position
where we had to make really tough and painful decisions about coding projects
gone awry. I don't envy their position, but continuing forward with this
monster does not seem to be in the long-term interests of the company.
~~~
mattmcknight
This is the beauty of the web- the transition to a sane architecture can be
done page by page- without any visibility to the user. Every time you have to
make a change- fix an old feature or add a new one, you replace it with the
new architecture. Even if it's not a whole page- you can load in a partial
with javascript. The challenge is holding back from going too deep on the
refactoring all at once. Functional tests around the system have to be added
to keep your sanity as part of the change process.
------
schulz
1\. I'm so sorry.
2\. Set up a development environment and deploy the code there. Get it
working. With code that large (and with the added wrinkle of executing code
out of the database) changing things is going to be a nightmare of unintended
consequences. Getting a testable environment up will let you find those things
and help you understand what it does.
3\. Get it in version control. This should be number 1: Before you make
changes get a baseline of where it was.
4\. Find a bug that exemplifies the nastiness of the whole situation and make
a fuss. Let everybody know why this bug is so bad and what caused it. This
will give your employer a concrete example to look at when you say "this code
is shite". Harp on this bug.
5\. Fix that one bug. Roll it out. Be a hero.
At this point you'll have a good base line, some credibility, and the
organization will understand what a mess they've got. Now you'll have to
figure out what you want to accomplish: keep it limping along? Improve it?
Rewrite? The above steps will get your feet under you.
------
beck5
I would start by spending a week or two wrapping the application in Acceptance
tests (cucumber/capybara) just so when you do make a change you are able to
quickly find out to a semi decent level of confidence things are ok.
I would also recommend Working Effectively with Legacy Code By Robert C.
Martin.
Good luck!
~~~
mattmcknight
"Working Effectively with Legacy Code" is by Michael Feathers.
[http://www.amazon.com/Working-Effectively-Legacy-Michael-
Fea...](http://www.amazon.com/Working-Effectively-Legacy-Michael-
Feathers/dp/0131177052)
------
wpietri
My tips:
_Raise your rates._ If you just took the gig, you'll have to wait a bit. But
you should price your work such that whether they say yes or no, you have no
regrets.
_Expose the problem._ Start inventorying the issues. Track them in the same
way that you track other work. As you do things that the client has requested,
track real vs actual time. E.g., "This change took 12 hours; if the code base
were clean, it would have taken 1."
_Estimate the size of the problem._ Talk in terms of technical debt. E.g.,
"Module X needs 120 hours of work to bring the code to commonly accepted
standards of code quality." The clients are thinking, "We have a system we
paid $1m for, so it's an asset worth $1m." Expose the debt and they will have
a better idea of the true value of the code base.
_Look for opportunities to declare tactical bankruptcy._ Once you have
numbers, you can show that some portions of the code base will be cheaper to
rewrite than to clean up. Help your clients make good financial decisions
about when to just toss and rewrite particular parts of the code.
_Don't let them make you crazy._ I'd recommend something like a kanban board
to track work and strictly limit work in process. This system is probably a
mess because the client is insane. Develop some very clear, very firm
boundaries that keep them from driving you crazy as well. If you are lucky,
they will, over time, learn from you to behave rationally about software.
------
pfisch
You should quit. Life is short, there is no reason for you to spend it doing
that.
------
jsmartonly
* Rewrite.
* NEVER modify existing one. Once you change one line of comment, you own all the code and problem from that point.
* If rewrite is not allowed, then ask huge pay raise for this work. Basically it is not about money, it is about bring everyone on the same page on the status of he existing solution.
* If the above does not work out, prepare to switch to another project, or quit the job totally.
~~~
thaumaturgy
There is absolutely no way to rewrite a million lines of business logic
without ending up with an even bigger mess. See also:
<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html>
~~~
jsmartonly
I read that article before and totally agree with the point.
But that situation is different from the one we discuss here.
I do not know more information about ohmygord's project, but I basically want
to point out to consider non-technical side of it. For example, people in the
same team may not technical, and/or think maintaining existing solution is
simple. I was in similar situation before, I was lucky to happen to select
right strategy to deal with the situation.
------
wanderr
This might sound sacreligious to the many vim fans here, but get a good IDE,
it will help you get a handle on what the code is doing and let you navigate
around faster, which is especially handy if the execution path for
accomplishing any one thing involves dozens of files. A good IDE will also
point out blatant errors, and a really good IDE will point out potential
errors as well. I personally really like PHPStorm by JetBrains, the code
inspection tool is quite good. I was recently able to cut the size of our code
base in half by using it to identify tens of thousands of bugs, a lot of them
on inspection were "this never worked" type bugs, which with a little digging
I was able to confirm could never be called. Eliminating code also makes
refactoring the remaining code easier because you have fewer interdependencies
to worry about.
------
scotty79
Don't touch anything. Run. There's no glory for you in this.
------
stilkov
First of all, make sure the client and you agree on what the long-term
strategy is. Then get buy-in for a first step in this direction.
If the system is as bad as you make it sound, the long-term goal has got to be
a complete replacement of the existing codebase. That will usually require as
much effort, and thus money, as writing the existing version did. (Experience
shows there's is no reason to confidently assume different.)
Then, explain how to get there without doing a (hopeless) complete rewrite in
one big bang:
First, you need to make a set of decisions for the new code you're going to
write, i.e. the language, framework(s), architecture, whatever you want to new
code to be based on.
Next, you try to modularize the existing system so that you can replace one
tiny part.
That's going to be really, really hard - modularizing a systems after it's in
production always is. Don't do it all at once: If you've isolated some small
piece of so that there's a clear interface (based on a programming language
API, a database interface or (my favorite) some RESTful HTTP API), rewrite
that small piece using your new technology stack and integrate it with the
existing monstrosity.
Once you have done that successfully for some small aspect, you have some sort
of proof that this approach can work.
Then, over the next months (or more likely: years), rinse and repeat.
This is a hugely expensive thing to do, but that shouldn't come as a surprise
– after all, you're replacing the organs in a living body while it's running a
marathon on its last breath. An MBA should understand that the additional cost
is because this strategy drastically reduces the risk.
You can explain to the customer that they can try this out using just a small
part, and decide whether or not they want to continue afterwards. Point out
that you're going to start with those parts that produce most of the existing
pain. Explain that you're helping them to return to a situation in which they
have fewer bugs, can introduce new features quickly and easily, and best of
all, that the end result will be a system that's modularized, hopefully
ensuring that they won't run into the same situation again.
If they expect you to do magic, i.e. maintain the mess and magically turn it
into a good piece of software without being allowed to actually change it
significantly, get out of the contract as quickly as you can.
~~~
algermissen
Stefan humbly omitted a reference to his excellent treatment of breaking up a
monolithic giant. It's well worth a watch, so here you go:
<http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Breaking-the-Monolith>
------
beering
You should make sure to set expectations. If your employer only wants the
minimal amount of maintenance done, then don't do any more. You could go to
heroic lengths to repair the codebase, but if that's not what they're asking
for it will be in vain.
Second, I suggest applying as many tools as you can. A modern version control
system, of course, and keeping any version control history that you inherited
(although it sounds unlikely).
A powerful IDE might also let you start cutting out crap immediately, so try
PHPStorm or Eclipse+PHP (or both!) and see what they can tell you.
And start writing tests as you start making changes, because you'll likely
break something seemingly unrelated when you start changing things.
------
RivieraKid
700k+ codebase and a single developer? That sounds crazy.
Run away from this. Trying work with this code would make you stressed and
frustrated, which will have a significant negative impact on your
productivity.
If the company plans to add features to this software, they should hire more
than one developers and perhaps rewrite it from scratch.
Edit: Also send your boss link to this discussion :)
------
pmtarantino
A few weeks ago I was commited with something like that. I just quit the job,
I couldn't sleep at night and I was not making any progress in the first days.
I know there is a learning curve, but it had been two weeks and I couldn't do
anything. Be sure you can work with that before accepting, because then is
really hard.
~~~
kellishaver
I had a similar experience a few months ago, myself, with a huge, very poorly
written PHP app. I lasted three weeks; three weeks in which I didn't sleep and
felt constantly agitated while I spent nearly every waking moment at the
computer trying to be productive amidst an ocean of stress. My whole family
suffered from this project, because I became very difficult to live with.
------
ScottBurson
Lots of good advice in here. I lean toward the "run screaming" side myself.
The fact that they've burned through several contracting companies and still
think it's possible to get large numbers of bug fixes in the first month
suggests that they're pretty clueless. It's going to take you two or three
months (if not longer) just to get your head into the code enough that you can
fix anything nontrivial.
If I were advising _them_ , I would say they need two teams: one team of just
two or three people (or maybe just one) solely trying to fix bugs in the
existing code, and the other team of three or four people doing a complete
rewrite from scratch. As others have commented, complete rewrites are normally
a bad idea, but this code base is so far gone I don't think it can be
incrementally refactored into sanity. Oh, and they should expect the rewrite
to take two years.
But despite their experience to this point, it sounds like they're still not
ready to hear that. Which leaves you little choice but to run screaming.
EDITED to add: what these people need to understand is that their demand for
results in a hurry _is what got them into this mess in the first place_. Until
they get that I don't think there's any hope.
------
grey-area
The first thing I would do, before doing any work, would be to sit down with
the client/your boss and explain just how bad the situation is, that drastic
solutions are in order, and that it will take years to get this under control
(with 1m LOC and 150 clients presumably all running customised software, this
would take years to sort out even with a large team working on it). Unless
they understand that from the beginning you will never get the backing you
need to sort this out.
This might be one of the few occasions where a complete rewrite is justified
(if you can keep scope limited to reproducing what you have). You've said the
code is incredibly complex, and if the problem domain is incredibly complex
too, you're probably stuck refactoring. If the problem domain is pretty simple
(a CRM without too many extra features might be), you may be better starting
with your smallest client who uses the product the least, asking for all the
pain points, and things they love, about the current software, and writing a
simple CRM to cover their needs which replicates the features of the current
product, then gradually porting other clients over to the new system and
adding new features to it, while keeping the old code-base in maintenance mode
and fixing serious bugs only. If you do a rewrite you'd have to port the 150
clients over 1 by 1, and leave the other code in maintenance mode - your
primary client may not be at all happy with that.
If that's not possible, you'll have to refactor it slowly while keeping the
code in place, so the first step is to get it into version control, sort out a
sane deployment strategy with testing servers, then try improving some small
isolated areas of the code for one of the clients in isolation. Good luck!
------
thaumaturgy
I have actually worked on a code base like you're describing, on a contract
basis, for a client. I _loathe_ maintenance programming, so the relationship
didn't last very long -- just a few months. So:
1\. Make sure you have a rock-solid contract in place with the client that
will ensure that you get paid, get paid well, and get paid often. Receiving a
check in the mail makes it easier to look at the code. If your payment terms
are anything like, "payment-upon-completion of ...", or, "paid net 30 after
invoice", or anything like that, you simply won't want to work on the code.
2\. If "soul-crushing", "depressing", or "makes me want to hang myself" are
phrases you'd use to describe the code or your state of mind when looking at
it, then go into this project knowing that you're not going to last long.
There are people who genuinely enjoy working on stuff like this. You aren't
one of them.
3\. Everybody that says "rewrite" is dreaming. It is _impossible_ to rewrite
something that large without breaking something and spending too much money.
Re-factoring a function is doable. Re-factoring a thousand-line file is
doable. Re-factoring part of a database is doable. Re-factoring all of it all
at once is starry-eyed fiction. Not gonna happen.
4\. But, if taking ownership of this code base is something you want to do,
then add re-factoring time in to your agreement with the client -- something
like, "20% time spent replacing bad code" -- and focus on the tiniest little
ugly thing you can find, and re-factor that. Start on it, don't stop until
it's done. Keep it in small bite-sized chunks.
5\. Make sure you're getting paid for time spent just getting familiar with
the code base. If you work with it long enough you'll actually get pretty
familiar with most of it, but you want to do that on _their_ dime, not yours.
6\. Get help. They surely realize by now that they've got a mess on their
hands. Talk with them about whether or not you can bring on additional help.
If they flat-out refuse, _run_. (That is what killed my work with my client; I
wanted to move into a position where I managed a junior programmer and focused
on code rewrites and higher-level stuff; they refused, I quit. They wanted an
employee, not a contractor.)
7\. Version control and a sane bug tracking system (Mantis isn't horrible) are
must-haves. If they don't have these, again, make sure they pay for it.
Dealing with a code base like this one is as much about state-of-mind as
anything else. Either you can handle it or you can't. No amount of advice here
will make it more palatable to you if you're not the sort of person that's OK
with inheriting a disaster.
Also, even if you've got some kind of agreement in place with the client
already, it sounds like you've just now gotten your first look at the code.
This, in my opinion, makes it totally OK to go back to the client and re-
negotiate. You can open it with, "I'd like to work with you, but now that I've
seen the project that you want me to work on, I can understand why this has
been a problem for you, and I need to make sure that we can come to an
agreement that will work for both of us so that I can fix this for you." (Or
something.)
~~~
robomartin
" Everybody that says "rewrite" is dreaming. It is impossible to rewrite
something that large without breaking something and spending too much money.
Re-factoring a function is doable. Re-factoring a thousand-line file is
doable. Re-factoring part of a database is doable. Re-factoring all of it all
at once is starry-eyed fiction. Not gonna happen."
I don't think so. Yes, the opportunities to do something like this are rare.
It is up to the project lead and the client to decide whether or not this
makes sense.
Also, keep in mind that a "complete re-write" doesn't necessarily literally
mean that every line of code must be re-written. There's often tons that can
be salvaged.
If the code base is an absolute disaster I would not touch it without the
understanding that the project might entail massive re-writing of portions of
the codes base as well as significant structural modifications. Maybe I'm
lucky in that I've never really had to go look for work. I would flat-out
reject a project like this without massive client buy-in.
If it is mission critical for the client and they can afford it there is no
reason not to step back, truly evaluate the situation and consider a
significant redo of the app.
For any non-trivial enterprise having a solid and maintainable code base is
nearly priceless. Is it worth investing a year and the corresponding financial
commitment to fix the problem once and for all? For the right business, yes!
The alternative is to live with a patch-work of code for the next ten years of
more.
Because I move across disciplines I have seen this sort of thing in many areas
outside of just software code-bases.
I have, as an example, seen data processing facilities with millions of
dollars in equipment designed in patch-work fashion that bleed money on a
daily basis. In one such cases I proposed a complete redoing of the facility
(in staged fashion in order to not affect business). It was very costly, but
the owners where under such pain due to the constant bleed that they saw the
intelligence in investing a lot of money to lay down an infrastructure that
would withstand the test of time, not to mention stopping the bleeding.
Similarly, I have seen this in faulty processes. Process optimization or
redesign can be critical to a business. The most well known example of this is
the automobile industry.
Car manufactures like Mercedes were devoting fully 20% of their factory floor
space to repairs. Cars would come off the assembly line with defects that
would have to be repaired after the fact. This consumed a tremendous amount of
time, money and resources.
In sharp contrast to this, companies like Toyota where using an approach that
aimed to have cars come off the line with zero defects. They'd stop the
assembly line when an defect was detected. At first they nearly couldn't make
cars. The philosophy was to ensure that detected defects never re-occurred.
With time cars started to come off the line with few, if any, defects. Most
car manufacturer have now adopted these ideas.
The point is that sometimes a "complete rewrite" is warranted and even
necessary. On cannot categorically state that the idea of a re-write is
"fiction" any more than stating that it is an absolute necessity while being
completely detached from the players and their circumstances. I suggest that
it is for the client and consultant to evaluate and decide.
On a personal note. I don't enjoy working with crap. I enjoy my craft. Whether
it is writing code, designing electronics or mechanical. I enjoy doing good
work and working in quality projects. Life is too short to work on shit
projects. You learn nothing and nobody is happy.
~~~
ohmygord
Yes, I have often said that you should never, ever throw (significant amounts
of) code away and start from scratch. I have worked on two bodies of legacy
code before and more or less used most of the techniques discussed in the
comments, but this is unprecented - for me - in both size and badness. Client
and I have agreed that I will work for a month and then see where we stand...
I'm hoping that after a month I will have a better feel for whats going on and
can outline either a staged or complete rewrite.
Lots of great advice in here, has lifted my spirits a bit. Especially getting
complete client buy in (which I have internalised but I guess haven't
expressed, either to myself or the client).
~~~
robomartin
That's a good approach. Remember, it isn't your problem. It is your client's
problem. You are there to help solve his problem. If he doesn't care enough
you certainly shouldn't.
In a month you'll know a lot more about what you might be walking into. It is
critical that you client also learn what he has to contend with. In other
words: Communicate profusely throughout the process.
------
kristiandupont
My secret weapon is a folding editor called Code Browser.
<http://tibleiz.net/code-browser/> \-- with this, you can do a non-destructive
(well, it only adds comments) folding of the source. This is a very fast way
to get a better view of what's going on. I've used it many times when trying
to make sense of legacy code.
That is, if you choose to go through with it. My real advice would be to avoid
it altogether as many others here. It's going to be extremely frustrating no
matter how you attack the problem.
------
michielvoo
Make sure the code (including any stored procedures or code that is otherwise
stored in the database) is in a version control repository. Because any change
in this code might have unexpected, subtle consequences (i.e. introduce more
bugs). In which case you'd do better rolling back that particular change.
The next step would be to get a grip on deployment. Automate it, so you can
roll out updates and roll back updates to all clients without breaking a
sweat.
Then set up a proper backlog and bug tracking system, where you can prioritize
bugs and work items. (And maybe open it up for bug reports by clients?)
Just like with a real debt, with a technical debt, seeing progress can help to
keep you going. At this point, you should have a grip on it, it's just still
going to be a lot of hard work. There's good advice on how to approach the
refactoring.
Finally, and this is not related to the code, educate stakeholders in your
organization about the concept of technical debt. (Back it up by time tracking
various work items from the bug tracker.) Somehow your organization got into
this situation, so there may be a problem where new features or custom
features for clients get priority before bugfixes, and are written without
much guidance. Joel Spolsky has written on this subject, you may find his
writings help explain the concept, as well as find a way out of this mess
(like the '12 steps to better software').
Good luck!
------
tpolecat
The problem you will face is that you have no way to verify that you haven't
broken something unrelated when you make a change, because the current
behavior of the system is unknowable; you can't write comprehensive tests for
a codebase that large and that bad because you don't even know what it's
supposed to be doing. The chickenshit nature of PHP and the lack of a sensible
type system and refactoring tools will make things even more difficult.
So, run. Seriously. You're doomed.
------
dillinger
1\. Put it under Version control. Preferably GIT, You will need a lot of the
tools that git and github provide. A private Github account will do but hosted
github is what I'd prefer.
2\. Get a Test System that has enough horsepower.
3\. Create a deployscript
4\. Deploy until it seems to work.
5\. Start working with CI and static code analysis. You might get lucky when
it comes to copy paste code. Copy-Paste detection and Coding Standards come to
mind at first but there are a lot more helpers
6\. Automatically create some API Documentation. The worst code cant hide what
is inheriting from which class etc. Integrate Generation of Docs into the CI.
7\. Create some basic so called "Smoke Tests". I'd prefer some very basic
Selenium Tests opening the most important parts of the app. This is straight
forward. Run them against the APP with error logging turned on on every E_ALL.
This error.log is your scary list.
8\. Setup Single Builds and try to integrate with More than one Version of
Vtiger, PHP and Mysql. Since you have 150 Customers, chance is great that you
have 150 different setups.
Note: You havent changed one line of code yet. Sit down with the customer and
discuss all your findings and metrics.
9\. Start creating different GIT repos with the above process for all the
modules that are added by your customer. Integrate with the build and run the
tests until you have the same amount of errors like before. start extending
the build To build Against your Mysql, PHP Versions
... I could go on forever .. but basically this will get you up and running.
------
jsmartonly
* Situation like this is not only technical issue any more. Your solution needs to reflect that.
* This is not best situation to be in, but if you learn to deal with this and emerge from it. This experience will make you so much stronger. So be ready to quit, but do not quit too early.
Good luck!
(I replied earlier, but the above two points are so important that they worth
a different post.)
------
robomartin
Take a few steps back and relax. If you were looking at this from the Space
Station, who would you say has a problem with the code base? That's right,
your client. Not you. Your client.
If he/she has 150 installs and 150 angry clients he/she knows that this thing
is rotten somewhere. You client may or may not have some technical
understanding but rest assured that they understand business.
Life often boils down to binary decision. You have two choices. Gracefully
exit and move on or try to help your client.
If you choose option B you've also made another choice: Your first job is NOT
to be a programmer. No, you are going to have to be a teacher.
You have to do your best to explain to your client why he might be sitting on
a ticking time bomb (or whatever you might want to call it). It is imperative
that your client understand that he has handed you an ugly, stinking, putrid
and smelly mess. Without client buy-in I would walk away.
Now, here's the challenge: You have to find a way to communicate the problem
that is not menacingly full of CS jargon and acronyms that mean exactly zero
to your client.
I've had to deal with these kinds of problems before. On one or two occasions
I made the mistake of not securing an understanding with my client and
suffered the consequences. These were miserable walking-through-feces-
infested-mud experiences. Never again. Once I learned that lesson things
changed. My most memorable experience was when I got client buy-in from a
major international corporation and, once they realized that they had a huge
problem, they put me up at the Waldorf Astoria in Manhattan for a full month
(these guys are so big that they have rooms pre-paid for "emergencies").
Imagine a guy in a t-shirt, jeans and sandals showing up at the Astoria. I've
never been looked at like that before. Once they realized who my employer was
things changed. Fuck, the room had marble and gold-plated crap everywhere.
But I digress, the point of that last example is that once a client understand
the degree of the problem in their hands things change. If having a solution
to this problem is important enough there is no end to what they will spend to
fix it. Is it a business-killing problem? Even better.
Judging from your description my proposal to your client --after they really,
really get it-- is to re-write their entire app from scratch.
I would further propose that you are going to need to hire a few more people
(two to five?) in order to get this done as quickly as possible. And, yes,
this will be expensive.
You can use many analogies to explain the problem. I'll leave that up to you.
I've used ideas like that of constructing a building on a foundation of sand
rather than concrete while using substandard supplies rather than industry-
accepted good quality building components. Whatever analogy you use, it has to
convey the severity of the problem without resorting to CS. If your client has
some technical chops you can get into it a little AFTER you are done with your
analogy.
Finally, the most important part: You have to be willing to walk away from it.
You state the problem and explain that it will be expensive. You also state
that you are not interested in anything other than a full re-write of the app
because you are not in the business of doing further damage to your clients.
Respectfully suggest that without full buy-in you'll need to move on and he
will need to find another developer who might we willing to patch this thing
up.
In many ways, it's that simple. Two choices.
~~~
shimsham
Excellent, thoughtful and presumably experience-based reply. This gets my
vote.
------
smoyer
This is a case where having a defined development process and good sharp tools
can be very helpful. Here are the steps I'd use to tackle this problem code
(though it's based on what you wrote above and might need to be adapted as you
learn more.
1) Study how the software is actually used and design the "ideal architecture"
(this may be a moving target).
2) Get the software into a version control system.
3) When a section of the code needs work, first write tests that pass for the
current functionality of the module but fail for the behavior you're trying to
fix.
4) As you repair code in step 3, also migrate the code "towards" your
preferred architecture ... this is going to be a very gradual process so don't
try to complete it in one step and use your tests to verify you haven't broken
the system. This is also a good time to start inserting patterns like MVC/MVP
as it will help. - <http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?TestEveryRefactoring>
5) When you've found "reams of copy+paste code", refactor that code into
utility classes (files, whatever). - <http://martinfowler.com/refactoring/>
6) Establish processes for migrating the database both forwards and backwards
between versions (you'll need a rollback someday).
7) Treat the database schema as source code and refactor it as you work. It
sounds like you're a long way from being able to use an ORM, but have a plan
for migrating the database towards the day you can. -
<http://martinfowler.com/articles/evodb.html>
8) Get the PHP code out of the database ... that's going to be painful but
worthwhile.
9) Get some help! I've used the Sonar source code quality analysis tools on
Java projects for years. There's a PHP plugin for it here
(<http://docs.codehaus.org/display/SONAR/PHP+Plugin>) and it will help you
determine what areas might be worth targeting. It also helps by establishing
style and practice rules that will help get a team coordinated.
One of the hallmarks of a project like this is that coding styles changed
dramatically during the project's existence - Establishing a style guide
(including patterns and forbidding anti-patterns) can be very helpful.
So in short ... don't "run screaming" but rather sit and think when you feel
overwhelmed. If you can solve a complex problem when writing source code, you
can also solve systemic problems.
Good luck!
------
army
I hope you're getting paid well for this.
One of the most important things is just to manage expectations - it sounds
like you've got a huge task ahead of you and people will underestimate how
long it will take you to fix stuff.
It might also pay to just focus on getting the software into a maintainable
but ugly state.
------
languagehacker
This sounds like a decent candidate for being put into maintenance-only mode
while you gameplan a new product. It's pretty impressive the kind of distance
you can get with a modern framework these days. You've got the other
application there to refer to, so it shouldn't be too hard to port over the
more core logic into a service layer that you can actually test.
What I like about the "start from scratch" approach, though most people argue
against it, is that it gives you an opportunity to shape the entire
development process and architectural philosophy of the product. Sometimes the
tree of good software must be refreshed with the blood of bad projects.
------
joell
Run.
------
d0m
But what do you have to do with that? Is it maintenance? Do you need to fix
bugs?
If it's maintenance/bug fix, I'd suggest starting by writing tests and fixing
things on a day to day basis.
So, for all small tasks that you'll have to do with the code base, just
analyse the safest way to tweak it. Most often than not, you'll see that it's
just changing a couple lines. If you need to add new features, just code them
correctly in another part of the program.
And before you know, you'll understand the code-base. But, _tests_ are really
the most important thing here. Don't try to refactor if you can't make sure
you're not breaking everything.
------
cranklin
I have a similar story... only I inherited terribly written JSP. It was just
as bad if not worse than you describe. I ended up re-writing everything from
scratch; now, I am so glad I did.
------
debacle
I remember a client asking for vtiger once. I downloaded the source, and
didn't even get to installation before I fired the client.
I really, really feel for you on this one.
The only thing I can say is: Make a beachhead of clean, working code. Slowly
work your way out. Make it very clear to this client how much of a favor
you're doing them, and give them meaningful status reports (even if all you
did is rewrite the glue between to pieces of code).
------
pyalot2
Chances are infinitesimally small you can fix it. If you start to maintain it,
you'll be the one who gets the blame if it doesn't work. In an absolute best-
case scenario you get to rewrite it whole in your spare time, while trying to
keep the legacy code together with ducttape and chickenwire on your employers
time.
Get out, get out now. They don't need a maintenance programmer, they need a
ninja programmer, the liquidator kind.
------
RobAley
OK, so everyone else has pretty much covered the arguments for "don't do it,
run" and for "re-write it". But assuming that you either
a) have to maintain it anyway (can't afford to lose job etc.)
or
b) are going to re-write it but don't have a definte spec to know what it has
to do
then you are going to need to try and understand the code base. Here are some
PHP specific tools to help you.
\- Use XHGUI[1] (which is a fork of Facebooks XHProf) to profile the code as
it runs. It can draw call-graphs for you (if you have Graphviz installed)
which will help you to visuallise the code flow.
\- Use PHPdoc[2] to generate API docs. This will help you get a simplified
overview of the code to use as a reference.
\- Use Xdebug[3] as you make changes and execute code to get more insight into
how it is running and to trace variables etc. through the execution. You can
use KCacheGrind [4] to visualise the output of Xdebug.
\- Use a staging/development environment for everything you do with this code,
and don't push any changes into to production until you really, really have
to. When you do, use version control (e.g. Git, SVN etc.) and use an automated
build system (Phing[5] is a great PHP specific one) to try and keep everything
consistent.
Good luck! Quick plug : I'm currently writing a book [6] about PHP development
(called PHP Everywhere : Programming beyond the web with PHP) which covers the
tools above (albeit not for the kind of job you are taking on!). The one small
mercy you may have when tackling a project like this is that it is written in
PHP. PHP is usually quite a verbose language, which while it doesn't always
produce sexy code, does mean that its straight forward to read and understand
(at the local level!). An extra space here and there doesn't usually alter the
meaning of the code as it does in some languages!
[1] <https://github.com/preinheimer/xhprof> [2] <http://www.phpdoc.org/> [3]
<http://www.xdebug.org/> [4] <http://kcachegrind.sourceforge.net> [5]
<http://www.phing.info/> [6] <http://leanpub.com/php>
~~~
ohmygord
Hey RobAley, thanks a lot for the tool recommendations... also big thanks for
the person who suggested SONAR+PHP, will definitely look at that too.
I was planning on using phpdoc and xdebug, but haven't ever looked at XHGUI.
Is it significantly different from xdebug? At first glance there seems to be a
fair bit of overlap in terms of functionality.
~~~
RobAley
There is a fair amount of overlap in what they do, the main variation is in
the interfaces and how the information is presented. I tend to use one or the
other depending on the task at hand. They're both of good "pedigree", xdebug
has been around now for about 10 years I think and so has a good amount of
history behind it, and XHProf which XHGui is based on was developed by
Facebook and used against their code base which is probably somewhat larger
than yours (though hopefully better written!). At then end of the day they're
both pretty easy to get up and running (and of course they're free), so I
would suggest giving them both a test run and see which you prefer the feel of
and which better suits your needs in terms of the information it gives you for
your task. Given that you look like you will need all the help you can get,
you might even end up using multiple tools like this to get as much insight
into the code as you can. If you do, be aware that they can often interfere
with each other (or so I've read, I've never tried those two on the same code
base at the same time) so you might need to deploy them on separate
virtualised but identical environments with the same code.
Edit: Just to say, I usually use XHGui for profiling existing code and code in
production, and xdebug for profiling _changes_ to code and code under
development. But thats just because thats how the tools "feel" right to me,
and there's no reason why you can't do both with both.
------
nader
If you haven't done anything like this for the past I would say that as much
as it is a pain in the ass you probably can also learn a lot from it and you
will get out of the job with a lot of experience in refactoring, testing,
bugfixing and deploying. You could also see it as a chance to establish a long
lasting relationship and a boost in confidence and salary if you do it right.
------
cdavid
what does inherit mean here ? You were most likely not hired to refactor
700KLOC, because they would not have been in that position if they had a
decent engineering process in the first place. Obviously, do not rewrite from
scratch: it is a 700 KLOC piece of code so even at a completely unrealistic
rate of 500 LOC / day, it would take you a 5-10 man years to do it, and I
doubt the system is well specified.
First, I would focus on doing something visible for the client: show that you
can deliver, and do it as quickly as possible. This means: do not try to
understand everything, do not try to get a mental model of the whole thing.
Once you get some buy-in from your customer and people within your client, you
will have more flexibility to negotiate things, and be able to use most of the
technical advices you were given.
If the customer is not willing to enter this kind of discussions _after_ you
showed you could deliver, I would just walk away if you can.
------
zalew
you are doomed. flee.
------
mahasvin
Is there an option to migrate db to another CRM with similar functionality? If
memory serves, vTiger is a sugar clone.
------
naww
[http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/155488/ive-
in...](http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/155488/ive-
inherited-200k-lines-of-spaghetti-code-what-now)
------
TomGullen
Even though the DB is a monstrosity, I'd start by familiarising yourself with
it intimately. Once you know what data is meant to go where, it should be a
good starting point for fixing things.
------
korona
Explain the situation as calmly and thoroughly as possible to the client, and
suggest a complete rewrite, if they ever want future development to be
possible.
------
ecaron
Are you working on this by yourself? How long until your employer is expecting
bugs fixed and features added?
~~~
ohmygord
Yes, by myself. The client so far has been understanding... they've already
burnt through several contracting companies, and I think they're starting to
understand what a mess it is. But still, they want to see serious progress
within a month (eg. large number of bug fixes).
~~~
neuroscr
You're not going to have serious progress for a year. The DB is borked, so you
have no foundation at all.
Software Engineering is serious business, there's bugs, new features,
maintenance, testing, etc. They failed to manage their code. You need to be
realistic that with a team of 2-5 people it could take years to fix.
It might be best to put it out of its misery if they can't hold off their
clients demands and buy you the time needed to rebuild it.
------
smiler
I love this kind of stuff - if you fancy an extra pair of hands then contact
details are in my profile
------
krapp
Charge them a dollar per line?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How an early telephone silencer took on AT&T - tintinnabula
http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-battle-over-net-neutrality-started-with-the-1920s-era-hushaphone
======
alister
> _A modern analogy would be if AT &T was somehow able to ban putting
> protective cases on smartphones_
A couple decades ago, one of the telephone companies in Canada sued a business
that was giving away free protective vinyl covers for printed telephone
directories. The vinyl covers were plastered with ads[1], so the telephone
company argued that it was theft from their business or an infringement. I
don't recall how the case turned out.
[1] Example:
[http://www.westsky.com/phbkcvr1.jpg](http://www.westsky.com/phbkcvr1.jpg)
------
userbinator
_No equipment, apparatus, circuit or device not furnished by the telephone
company shall be attached to or connected with the facilities furnished by the
telephone company, whether physically, by induction or otherwise_
That begs the question of whether, in some interpretation, the human holding
it might also be considered a "device not furnished by the telephone
company"...
~~~
rzzzt
There is an acoustic coupler involved that converts the signal into
electromagnetic waves.
------
chiph
Despite this ruling, for years the only way to get online was via an acoustic
coupler (I used one to connect to CompuServe via Tymnet). In searching for
images of them, I came across this set of someone connecting to a pay phone
out of their van. I can't imagine how many quarters it took to get their
email...
Reposted on imgur to avoid hug-of-death:
[http://imgur.com/a/n4PMb](http://imgur.com/a/n4PMb)
Original site:
[http://wrybread.com/WryRoad/gadgets/coupler.htm](http://wrybread.com/WryRoad/gadgets/coupler.htm)
~~~
kalleboo
It sounds like preceding the Hush-A-Phone decision, even an acoustic coupler
would have been against the terms of service
------
gcb0
this is exactly the business model for Apple or Sony and nobody seems to care.
and treat people that boycott such companies as crazy.
~~~
delinka
Neither Apple nor Sony have monopolies. Their respective offerings have plenty
of competition. This is why "nobody seems to care." Don't like Apple's walled
garden? Go elsewhere.
~~~
gcb0
they "aim" for monopoly.
They lock you in at every step they can. In hopes to archive monopoly, or
quasi monopoly market cornering.
ever since the walkman, sony tries to have a monopoly on media production.
from betamax to memory stick cards to mini cd to blueray. oh, wait, they got
it. what is the alternative to blueray when dvd goes away?
Apple tried to do that with custom ports and data formats and now found the
sweet spot with apps and media. Adobe also tried that with formats a while ago
but is giving up.
------
kalleboo
And I always thought the landmark telephony "net neutrality" decision was
Carterfone
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carterfone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carterfone)
------
tsomctl
Interesting how it was used in Washington, DC (especially Congress) and New
York, yet when it was banned by the FCC, Congress wasn't able to make it
legal.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ultimate Setup for Your Next Python Project - MartinHeinz
https://towardsdatascience.com/ultimate-setup-for-your-next-python-project-179bda8a7c2c
======
bitfhacker
A cookiecutter for this was a cherry in the top of a cake, but... Thank you!!!
------
pettycashstash2
Thank you. Added to my favorites
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Obama Administration Denies Record 77% of FOIA Requests - chishaku
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SUNSHINE_WEEK_FOIA
======
yuhong
OT, but on public record laws in general and the problems:
[https://twitter.com/JonathanRabbitt/status/71028873888713932...](https://twitter.com/JonathanRabbitt/status/710288738887139328)
[https://twitter.com/yuhong2/status/710292317031116800](https://twitter.com/yuhong2/status/710292317031116800)
[https://twitter.com/JonathanRabbitt/status/71029285122607104...](https://twitter.com/JonathanRabbitt/status/710292851226071041)
------
DrScump
Link fail.
~~~
greenyoda
It looks like this may be the updated version of the article:
_US gov 't sets record for failures to find files when asked_
[http://bigstory.ap.org/article/697e3523003049cdb0847ecf828af...](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/697e3523003049cdb0847ecf828afd62/us-
govt-sets-record-failures-find-files-when-asked)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: We Need a Bug Tracking Software Recommendation - Scott_MacGregor
We have decided to implement an in-house bug tracking application on our development server <i>(dedicated RHEL5.3 64-bit box with 4 virtual machines via XEN)</i> and have narrowed the list to three possible candidates. This will run on the host OS not in virtual.<p>We are using Eclipse/Zend Studio with Subversion as our IDE.<p>Does anyone have any experience/comments/recommendations regarding any of these. We would appreciate both positive and negative points.<p>Our short list is:<p><pre><code> 1. JIRA
2. TRAC
3. BugZilla</code></pre>
======
Kliment
I quite enjoy trac as it plays nicely with SVN and is fairly simple to set up
(and free). I'd start with that and look to other things if it doesn't do what
you want.
------
cgherb911
3\. Simple to use, free, Anyone in your organization can use.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
IPage web hosting is bad even for shared hosting - ebiggins
http://y2kemo.com/2010/04/ipage-sucks/
======
ebiggins
Like this poor sap, I tried iPage and had nothing but issues. I understand
shared hosting is cheap for a reason, but iPage is awful. Ended up with
Hostgator.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Fireflies - octosphere
https://martijnbrekelmans.com/generative-art/fireflies/fireflies.html
======
gus_massa
Are the path random? Does a firefly see the other fireflies? Can I select the
color of the background or the fireflies? (Perhaps also density, and path
length.)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Bringing HSTS to www.google.com - ejcx
https://security.googleblog.com/2016/07/bringing-hsts-to-wwwgooglecom.html
======
chinathrow
Doesn't that mean that wifi captive portals using www.google.com won't be able
to take over the connection and re-direct to the captive portal?
~~~
jc4p
This was my immediate first thought too. A lot of subway stations got WiFi in
NYC and for the one directly underneath my office I always had to load Google
first to get the login portal to load. Any other websites I visit (including
this one) just displayed a HSTS error instead.
~~~
AntiRush
[http://http.rip](http://http.rip) will always be http only; it's the domain I
use for this purpose.
~~~
jevinskie
Very nice, I didn't know there was a dedicated site for "I need _just_ HTTP"
purposes. Thanks for the tidbit!
------
the_mitsuhiko
Does this mean that "nosslsearch" is now no longer supported?
~~~
chinathrow
Nope. [http://nosslsearch.google.com/](http://nosslsearch.google.com/) -> 404
~~~
the_mitsuhiko
That's always how it worked. nosslsearch only responds if you access it as
"www.google.com" not as "nosslsearch.google.com".]
(As of writing it still works if you do it on a new browser. However once you
have HSTS info it will always attempt to do an HTTPS connection I suppose)
~~~
DanielDent
I believe nossl was intended as a concession for schools that believe in
censorship. It makes it relatively easy to configure things so Google doesn't
go over SSL so that your existing MITM boxes which censor continue to function
as before.
If they continue to support this use case, it may be hard to do without
introducing bugs - one exposure to a 'real' service which spits out an HSTS
header (or the preload list), and the machine loses the ability to conduct
Google searches.
I think they'll either have to use some nasty workarounds, or they'll need to
use a different domain - which isn't necessarily something you want to do when
you are trying to provide simple rules which allow users to identify phishing.
More likely they'll simply force sites that want to continue to MITM to load
their own CA roots.
Although I don't think this is their motivation, it also has the neat side-
effect of making Google's Chromebook & device management services more useful.
~~~
stable-point
> If they continue to support this use case, it may be hard to do without
> introducing bugs - one exposure to a 'real' service which spits out an HSTS
> header (or the preload list), and the machine loses the ability to conduct
> Google searches.
Those wishing to spy on their users with nossl could just disable HSTS in the
browsers they provide.
~~~
zalmoxes
Google has changed this almost a year ago
> Turn on SafeSearch VIP To force SafeSearch for your network, you’ll need to
> update your DNS configuration. Set the DNS entry for www.google.com (and any
> other Google ccTLD country subdomains your users may use) to be a CNAME for
> forcesafesearch.google.com.
>We will serve SafeSearch Search and Image Search results for requests that we
receive on this VIP.
You can enforce safe search over https now
[https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/186669?hl=en](https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/186669?hl=en)
~~~
nsgi
However, this means that schools can't see what pupils search for, and that
any network operator can force safe search.
~~~
mikecb
Schools almost ubiquitously use SSL -decrypting dpi devices with the device
root installed on endpoints, bypassing both HSTS and HPKP.
------
huula
Just curious, this looks like some already supported feature of nginx, only
that it's supported through redirection. Is this a redirection too or a
protocol change? How will that be reflected on the address bar?
~~~
garaetjjte
No. If browser see HSTS header, then for specified time it will never even try
to connect using http to this domain.
~~~
huula
Uh, thanks, but 304 Moved Permanently also has a similar effect right?
~~~
garaetjjte
No, 304 refer to specific URL, not whole domain.
------
peterwwillis
HSTS will one day be remembered as the HTTPS version of SMS 2nd auth: A bad
hack with good intentions. Sure, it can have some positive effect in the short
term, but there are so many ways to subvert it that as its popularity grows,
so will the attacks.
~~~
Buge
I'm interested in what these attacks are and what you think would be better.
Especially with HSTS preloading (supported in Chrome, Firefox, IE, and Edge) I
don't see any attacks really.
~~~
kuschku
> Especially with HSTS preloading
HSTS preloading is just distorting the market towards the already large sites.
A smaller site now will get ads injected by your ISP, but their larger
competitor doesn’t.
Yet, you obviously can’t add every single private blog to the preloading list.
I tried getting my personal blog added, it’s just impossible.
So your solution is only good for the already huge websites.
What’s with democratizing the internet, giving every single personal blog the
same tools as every huge site?
~~~
icebraining
_I tried getting my personal blog added, it’s just impossible._
Why? [https://hstspreload.appspot.com/](https://hstspreload.appspot.com/)
didn't work?
~~~
kuschku
Last I tried was a few years ago when that didn’t exist, nice that it does
exist now.
I wonder what will happen once the preload lists are several billion pages
long?
~~~
pfg
Hopefully by that time we've reached the point where we can deprecate HTTP
without TLS and show appropriate warnings in browsers.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Map illustrates 'Russian GPS' failure - chris_alexander
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-26957569
======
bobdvb
I saw a presentation about "opportunistic radio SLAM" which uses naturally
occurring radio signals: TV transmitters, mobile phone masts and even analogue
music radio to passively provide relative location data. The demonstration was
amazing, some cleaver processing and you can figure out pretty much where you
are (even inside a building). If ships had DPSLAM then they would have better
location data:
[http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rmf25/papers/Opportunistic%20radio%...](http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rmf25/papers/Opportunistic%20radio%20SLAM%20for%20Indoor%20Navigation%20using%20Smartphone%20Sensors.pdf)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Future of AI - levlandau
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZdSb0bQCA7md5ax2aA3XEX6lQU4Ei63p
======
drsintoma
shame that the audio is not a bit better.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Tiddlywiki – A non-linear personal web notebook - entelechy
https://tiddlywiki.com/
======
mih
Ever since the decline of Evernote, I've been looking for something as
convenient, but been pretty much disappointed in the alternatives. For a while
Qownnotes was my choice, but it's not without its drawbacks. Currenlty Joplin
( [https://joplin.cozic.net/](https://joplin.cozic.net/) ) is the one I'm
taking for a test drive, and I'm pretty much pleased with what I've seen so
far. Among the features that impressed me most in terms of personal priority
are:
\- Importing from Evernote (.enex files)
\- Cross-platform support (Win/Lin/Mac) + Mobile apps (ios / Android)
\- Synchronization (Dropbox, Onedrive, Nextcloud, WebDAV, Filesystem)
\- Support for encryption
\- Webclipper extension (for Firefox and Chrome)
\- It's FOSS, with a number of active contributors on GitHub
([https://github.com/laurent22/joplin](https://github.com/laurent22/joplin)).
A good bus factor and no more dependence on the whims of private
organizations.
\- A command line interface
\- Use of Markdown. Drag and drop support for files and media in the GUI.
There are still features of evernote I miss such as inline PDFs and audio
recording
~~~
luckman212
I've got my eye on Joplin as well to replace EN. The deal-breaker issue for me
right now is that the mobile app (iOS) only supports Dropbox as the backend
sync provider. I refuse to use Dropbox, and prefer to sync via filesystem. I
use Resilio Sync (formerly btsync) for this. Until some other method is
allowed, I can't make the jump.
~~~
garfieldnate
Why do you refuse to use Dropbox?
------
TomDavey
A hyperlinked knowledge-management system for personal use, on all my
computers, is essential. To achieve it, I use Emacs and Org-Mode and Dropbox.
An additional benefit of using Emacs: the personal wiki can be integrated with
my task-management system, which Org-Mode handles as well. Plus I can draft
and edit at warp speed, having customized the native Emacs keybindings to suit
me better.
Were I going to publish my wiki to the Web for others to use, I'd export the
wiki to HTML with Org. But for now it's all personal.
~~~
danShumway
How do you handle images/screenshots/handwritten notes?
I am also using Org-Mode and Dropbox for the majority of my notes. I really
like it. In particular, Orgzly for Android works great with this system, so
check it out if you want mobile notes as well.
The problem is that I also like to take paper notes, and take videos/pictures
of stuff, and scan documents, and download webpages. Org-mode kinda stinks for
embedding external content that isn't text? As far as I can tell.
I can link to external content, and if I export to HTML it'll show up. But...
I never export to HTML, because, as you probably already know, it's way easier
to read notes in an editable format. I can turn on picture rending in Org-
mode, but it's not responsive, and I can't crop the pictures or annotate them
with a stylus, or do any of a dozen different things that I want to do.
What I've thought about is that I really just want the ability to render
HTML/CSS inside of an Org-mode buffer, and ideally to be able to set up custom
CSS classes that would be applied to every snippet. Just set up a quick
region, write some helper functions to compile/render the HTML, etc...
I've been thinking for a while about taking some time off of work to just try
and solve the problem. Is it already solved? I know that at one point people
were looking into getting webkit embedded into buffers. Did that go anywhere?
I guess you can build GTK widgets for Org-mode as well? But then you lose the
ability to define custom styles on the fly.
~~~
nextos
You can make some tweaks to org to get images to display nicely:
[https://lepisma.github.io/2017/10/28/ricing-org-
mode/](https://lepisma.github.io/2017/10/28/ricing-org-mode/)
~~~
danShumway
A) That is beautiful, thank you for sharing
B) Does it actually address the image problem? The config appears to be using
the built in inline-images, which don't support responsive widths.
Even getting rid of responsive widths, simply embedding the image into the
buffer isn't really good enough for handwritten notes -- you need _at least_
the ability to crop/zoom.
~~~
nextos
I'm not sure whether it solves the problem you mention. But it might be a good
starting point. If you can roll your own solution, I'd be very interested in
hearing about it, and probably most org users! I keep my scanned notes in
separate files, though.
------
pixelmonkey
I personally think Tiddlywiki is a fascinating project and I even used it
professionally for a few years. But, these days, I think you likely do better
with either a Dropbox directory full of Markdown files or installing the free
tool Simplenote everywhere (mobile/desktop) and using its support for
notes/Markdown. It's true that if you go with these simple schemes, you lose
wiki-style linking. But, I've found that YAGNI applies here.
~~~
another-cuppa
Anyone reading this thinking a "bunch of markdown files" sounds like a good
idea should really look into org-mode. Trust me.
~~~
pqs
I used the great org-mode for many years, but the lack of a good option to
view and edit my notes from mobile pushed me to Evernote, which I'm happily
using since, even though I miss the simplicity of text files and the power of
git.
~~~
pqs
I just have checked orgzly and it impressed me. It has really progressed since
the last time I checked it.
So, now I have to think about the possibility of reverting back to org-mode
after a couple of years of heavily using Evernote.
~~~
kaushalmodi
I've used EverOrg[0] to convert my evernote files to Org files, retains the
attachments (images, PDFs, etc) wonderfully too.
[0]: [https://github.com/mgmart/EverOrg](https://github.com/mgmart/EverOrg)
------
Glawen
I discovered TW a few months ago and I decided to use it for our new project
at work. We use it to document our SW, one tiddler for each module. So far, it
is working great, we can quite easily merge our code and doc because
everything is in one file.
I find it much easier to use than Word. My colleagues were startled by it, but
they mastered it now.
The only annoying thing are:
\- we need to press 2 carriage return to go to the next line
\- the markup languages are never standard. we use redmine with textile which
is kinda compatible with TW, but not 100%
------
hobo_mark
I look at TW every couple of years or so, and there has never been either:
\- a sane way to keep a wiki on something like Dropbox (at the time, the only
way to have persistence was to disable browser security and allow JavaScript
to write to disk directly) or
\- a service to sync a wiki between machines
Has that changed nowadays?
~~~
jimpick
I hooked up Dat multiwriter and the Automerge CRDT for my own personal use...
I’ve been using it for several months and it works well.
I haven’t tidied it up for a public release, but feel free to try it out:
[https://dat-tiddlywiki.glitch.me](https://dat-tiddlywiki.glitch.me)
[https://github.com/jimpick/dat-tiddlywiki](https://github.com/jimpick/dat-
tiddlywiki)
~~~
tgirod
Wow this looks great. Can you tell me a bit more about how it works ? I've
been looking for a way to do collaborative work with TiddlyWiki for ages ...
------
TeMPOraL
A bit of a tangent, but I'm looking at the (official? shown on site)
Tiddlywiki poster[0], and I just have to ask: what is that fish doing, and
does this really communicate something positive about the product?
\--
[0] -
[https://tiddlywiki.com/poster/images/TiddlyWiki_TiddlerPoste...](https://tiddlywiki.com/poster/images/TiddlyWiki_TiddlerPoster_en_L.png)
~~~
OJFord
Never used Tiddlywiki, just guessing from your link:
the fish is a tiddler [0], it's consuming a mess [several entangled lines] and
excreting something unified and cohesive [single line].
[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiddler](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiddler)
('Tiddler' is perhaps BrEng slang? I'm British, and I'd say it's slang -
especially when applied not to a fish, but to something or someone small - but
I don't know how widespread it is.)
~~~
tofof
From that wiki page:
> A small fish, especially the three-spined stickleback
My wife, a neuroscientist researching three-spined stickleback, has never come
across the term 'tiddler'. Midwestern US.
So, yes, I would say it is solitarily British slang.
------
lxe
The most unique thing for me is the fact that it's an .html file that you can
just download and run. The data/saving mechanism is completely separate. This
"unhosted-ness" seems to be a growing trend.
~~~
kvakil
You might find this interesting:
[https://unhosted.org/](https://unhosted.org/)
------
eponeponepon
I tried using TiddlyWiki some years back but never really reached the stage
where I felt I could definitely trust my use of it to result in it saving my
notes properly. The real utility of it, I'm sure, comes with a large corpus -
but I never got there.
At the time though, my only option was keeping it as a local file on a single
machine - these days my home infrastructure is much more developed, and I
think I might have more luck running it on a proper http server. Maybe I'll
give it another shot.
------
cbau
I've been writing a personal encyclopedia for the last five or six years or
so. I have some 1500+ articles multiple of which are 50+ pages. I think it's
been really valuable. I think I get a few things out of it:
1\. Perfect recall. Every little detail I read in a book/blog/article stays
with me. Makes it easy to synthesize results from multiple pieces across time,
which is useful when you only have a casual interest in something. (I really
like downloading the cool education images/GIFs and and inserting them in
articles- otherwise I don't know where I'd keep them.)
2\. Reveals what I don't know about a subject. For example, whenever I start
off writing a new article on some topic, the first thing I write is a
definition, e.g. "A cat is an animal that ...". The process of doing that
often reveals gaps in my understanding.
3\. It makes me better at asking questions when I'm trying to understand
something. The analogy I like to make here is that learning a second language
is harder than a third language, because after learning the second you know
what you need to know to understand a language. But there's no reason that
should be limited to languages and couldn't apply to all things, and things
themselves. Some questions I like to ask are "What is the function/uses of
this thing?" "What are the parts of this thing and how are they arranged?"
"How do we make this thing?" "What's the history of this thing?" "What
subtypes of this thing are there?"
The downside is that it dramatically slows down my reading speed, since I now
feel I need to take detailed notes, and then I often have to reconcile them
with notes on other things which can be time-consuming. Considering the number
of books a person could realistically read in their lifetime is limited, it's
unclear if it's worth the tradeoff.
I'm curious how other people think about remembering things, and if they have
a system, what tools they use. It seems unsatisfying to me to read a book and
realize I'll probably forget it in four years, yet most people seem content to
do so.
If anyone is interested in the specific software I use, here's the Github
project:
[https://github.com/Ceasar/Encyclopedia](https://github.com/Ceasar/Encyclopedia).
It uses restructuedText (as opposed to Markdown) for the text. I edit them
using Vim. All the files are stored in Dropbox so it gets synced between my
devices. A simple Flask web server renders the pages in a prettier format.
Still very primitive compared to what it could potentially be, but combined
with regular Unix command line tools it's worked fine for my needs. (I like
the idea of a hacker-wiki by the way, more than something like this which
comes out of the box. Seems like an personal wiki designed for a power user
could be way more interesting.)
~~~
themodelplumber
Thank you for sharing. I have a system that is kind of like this. Except it's
not meant for memory as much as analysis. And I don't consider the entries
"articles" but rather refer to them as "models" as in mental models. Like a
real life model, say a toy car, I try to cover enough bases that it--
metaphorically--at least _resembles_ a car at first. Then as I identify needed
leverage points in the model, I refine my analysis and expand the model. So
maybe at that point it has a hood you can open, and an engine you can see, so
to speak.
I think I'm at or near around 800 of these, and many are very short. But no
matter how short they are, they are all there because they provided me or
continue to provide me with needed leverage.
I keep the bulk of the information in markdown in a Dropbox folder and also
occasionally try new methods. For example, for topics that will quickly
benefit from hyperlinks, I developed a LibreOffice web template and a
companion PHP script that indexes these files and inserts additional CSS,
variables, JS, etc. when they are served up. For searching I like Regexxer a
lot, but I also use grep quite a bit :-)
On my XFCE desktop are buttons for opening a random one of these files, and
for opening a random journal entry to try to harvest new models, so to speak.
And there's some paper involved here too... Can't get away from it, because
paper has its own special leverage points...
I'm not concerned about memory, knowing it's a special weakness of mine. If
I'm working in a context where memory is super important, my energy is best
spent moving to a more sustainable context. :-) Memory is a hobby for me, a
side gig for memorizing pi, that kind of simple and fun thing.
~~~
Noumenon72
I have no idea what it means for a piece of text to have "leverage points" or
a hood you can open.
~~~
themodelplumber
A model has leverage points if there are parts of it that can be useful for
solving a problem. For example, a website-building model might provide useful
links to software that can be used to build different kinds of websites. Those
links are important leverage points.
Each model has different leverage points. Your comment, taken as part of a
model of your psychology, provides leverage for understanding that part of my
text was not well received by your psychology.
Regarding the hood, look at it this way: If you don't know much about cars,
you might look at a simple toy car _without an opening hood_ and make
assumptions about what happens in the front of the car. When you get a car
where the hood opens, maybe all of a sudden you make a huge leap: There is
stuff under here, and it does something. So at this point, maybe you start
working on (by asking around, or reading), or building, a model with a working
engine. Or even just a working dipstick, who knows. As the parts are revealed,
the model gains leverage. Pretty soon you are able to run more advanced
simulations and predict traffic dynamics, things like that. Or you change
models and learn the leverage points of the tractor, or motorcycle. You begin
to learn why a motorcycle is helpful and even necessary in some circumstances.
Texts work the same way as they unfold. And there are also various text-
creation methods that expose different leverage points. Reliance on charts and
graphs, or emotive graphics, etc. All of it is helpful in some way, and maybe
--like my original comment--low-leverage in other ways and for other people.
Anyway I hope that helps, but I know I'm still couching this in metaphor which
isn't a high-leverage communications method for everyone. YMMV, which is what
makes human psychology so cool.
------
hboon
An anecdote:
In a previous job as a presales engineer, I kept notes of prospects and
customers in a TiddlyWiki. When I left, I handed the file over to my
replacement. He told me after a few years that the "wiki" was of great help to
him.
------
agentdax5
I looked into Tiddlywiki before but it seemed too involved to maintain easily
and overkill for my use case. I have recently found
[https://www.notebooksapp.com/](https://www.notebooksapp.com/) and am in the
process of converting all my desperate notes and documents into it using the
internal linking to create my own kind of wiki.
Everything is plain text, has markdown support, apps on most platforms,
ability to automate things for everyday use, and easier to use overall.
Also I just can’t stand the idea of “tiddlers”.
~~~
moioci
Although I kinda love the idea of desperate notes and documents, I think you
probably meant "disparate."
------
jtl999
I remember first hearing of TiddlyWiki back in 2005(?)
Glad to see it's still here.
~~~
Milner08
I was wondering if it was the same project I remembered! I used to use it in
high school, with its stored on a USB stick that i'd carry around on my keys.
Was pretty useful at the time, wouldn't want to carry around a USB stick now,
but using dropbox is interesting.
------
hyperpape
I wrote my own system for capturing and organizing information
([https://lobste.rs/s/ord0rg/does_anyone_else_keep_their_own_k...](https://lobste.rs/s/ord0rg/does_anyone_else_keep_their_own_knowledge#c_cxecdn)),
so I understand the desire to fiddle with your own system.
That said, the list of literally 20 different ways of storing your Tiddlywiki
data is user-hostile. Don't tell me that you have a Node server and a PHP
server, just give me the easiest way to self-host, how to use Dropbox/Google
Drive, or perhaps one more option. You can include a link to "other options",
but don't put them front and center.
Even open-source tools that appeal to us nerds need some attention to
marketing.
------
carapace
Here's a single-page "simple self-contained web notebook inspired by the
"classic" version of TiddlyWiki."
Live demo:
[https://calroc.github.io/HulloWurld/Hullo.html](https://calroc.github.io/HulloWurld/Hullo.html)
Once you're seeing the page you have it all. Click the "Save..." button to
keep a local copy with any edit you've made. If you right-click and "save
page" you'll get the original content only.)
Repo is here:
[https://github.com/calroc/HulloWurld](https://github.com/calroc/HulloWurld)
It's just a simple experiment, nothing fancy.
------
rwbt
TiddlyWiki is great, but I really need is something like Notational Velocity
but everything is stored in a single html file (with .js embedded of course),
so that it's very portable.
------
ttroyr
[https://www.notion.so](https://www.notion.so) offers an excellent balance of
power & simplicity. Definitely worth a try for those who prefer to visualize
the connection between different projects. Shines in long-term planning & wiki
knowledge collection.
------
igorp74
After TiddlyWiki classic with tons of plugins, I used SpringPad while it
lived, then Evernote but markdown was able only via browser addon (Markdown
here or something). OneNote never suited for my needs and finally settled down
with Quip.com. It is like TW with all fancy plugins + live editing...
------
rb808
Nothing beats a plain text file for me.
~~~
galfarragem
A text file formatted as markdown and a text editor is an easily searchable
_flat wiki_. After having tried _a lot_ of stuff I can say that nothing beats
it on my usecas e.
------
rmu09
For those who want to sync TiddlyWiki between multiple computers, there also
is [https://noteself.github.io/](https://noteself.github.io/).
This TiddlyWiki-variant stores documents in the browser (pouchdb) and can sync
to a couchdb-server.
------
platz
[http://mgsd.tiddlyspot.com/demo3.html](http://mgsd.tiddlyspot.com/demo3.html)
TiddlyWiki powered GTD system
there is a newer version, but I think it's worse than the old one.
------
darpa_escapee
Besides Tiddlywiki, does anyone have recommendations for personal wiki
software?
~~~
interfixus
Zim, if you actually need the wiki-like stuff. Cherrytree, if you are mainly
after the structured note-taking functionality.
I use both. Cherrytree for all my daily notational needs.
[http://zim-wiki.org/](http://zim-wiki.org/)
[https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/](https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/)
------
qwerty456127
Does it integrate with Gitub Pages? I'd like my personal WiKi to be shared as
a part of my Jekyll-powered Gitub Pages blog (and I'd love to see more people
go this way sharing their knowledge).
------
shawn
I'd like to be able to press a shortcut key and have my computer save a
screenshot of whatever I'm looking at, along with letting me type a brief note
for context. Ideally it would also record the URL of whatever the browser was
visiting (if it's a screenshot of a browser page), or the file path of
whatever was open.
So basically Pinboard, but for pages of PDFs and other random scraps.
~~~
submeta
Evernote does something like this. And it let's you search for text in the
images as well. I have over 12k notes in Evernote. Many screenshots. It has
excellent OCR capabilities, full-text search (via Lucene?) and syncs across
devices.
~~~
luckman212
What platform do you run EN on? I have 9.3k notes and find it _horrifically_
slow to run searches on macOS (Quad core i7 Mini 16GB RAM and 1TB SSD).
It's so bad that I am actively looking for alternatives, even though I'm
dreading getting my highly-formatted data out in a usable form.
~~~
submeta
Mainly macOS. Well, to begin with: I don't perceive it as "terribly slow".
Yes, it has hiccups at times, but we are talking about several thousand notes.
And in that range I haven't seen a real altrrnative. For instance I imported
my 12k notes in BearApp. The app won't open anymore after the import.
I am in the exact same position. Especially so after several senior execs left
the Evernote company. I even work on a custom notes store (Django and mysql
backed) to keep kopies of all my notes because I really see no real
alternative with the search capabilities of Evernote. And no, OneNote is not
the same (search wise)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
BlackBerry cofounder Jim Balsillie is sounding the alarm about surveillance - walterbell
https://thewalrus.ca/are-you-afraid-of-google-blackberry-cofounder-jim-balsillie-says-you-should-be/
======
aresant
This article is a long winded view of the sophisticated behavior modeling ad-
targeting networks that google and others employ - long on hand wringing and
short on solutions.
Stratchery published a beautiful, irreverent proposal earlier this week to
address this very challenge through a regulatory framework that actually feels
like it could work and I encourage all HN users to absorb:
[https://stratechery.com/2019/a-regulatory-framework-for-
the-...](https://stratechery.com/2019/a-regulatory-framework-for-the-
internet/)
~~~
maksimum
> platform providers that primarily monetize through advertising should be in
> their own category: as I noted above, because these platform providers
> separate monetization from content supply and consumption, there is no price
> or payment mechanism to incentivize them to be concerned with problematic
> content
The article does a good job of explaining why YouTube and Facebook don't
currently do a good job of currating content, or whether that should even be
their responsibility. It's not about machine learning, it's about price
incentives.
~~~
nnq
Maybe _forcing separation_ of _content providing companies_ and _advertising
companies_ should be the modern equivalent of separating State from Church.
An advertising company would always want to get more and more infos about the
users that it sees as "resources" instead of customers. A content providing
company would be forced to treat its users as actual customers and respect
their rights at least a bit, and would push back against the advertising
company asking for more surveillance data.
Now, unfortunately this _can 't actually work_ because the more an advertising
company makes, the more it can afford to pay the content
creators/channels/providers, and everyone just wants more $.
_But if anyone has any idea how to make it work, do share!_
------
batbomb
I’d be afraid of Google if I had worked at Blackberry too, just look at the
destruction they did.
~~~
na85
Eh, I think blackberry's destruction was of their own making. They had a huge
head start but failed to embrace apps. The onboarding process for developers
was painful and their devices were chronically underpowered.
They failed to read the winds of change that saw Bring Your Own Device come to
the workplace and thought they were safe with enterprise and government users.
~~~
29083011397778
Jim Balsillie actually tried to change course, open up, and monetize BBM. He
was shot down hard by the rest of the board, who thought hardware was the way
to go. I can't imagine how much that would sting, considering a couple years
later Whatsapp would be sold for billions. Taken from the book mentioned in
the article actually, _Losing the Signal_ , before anyone asks for a source.
~~~
na85
I was an avid bbm user and when they brought in the monetization changes I
quickly grew to detest the app.
If that was his vision at work, then I'm not surprised it failed. Monetized
bbm was/is a spammy, irritating mess.
------
AFascistWorld
Any of these big tech companies is not your friend.
------
Zhenya
Pretty rich, coming from the co-founder of a company that willfully handed
over encryption keys of user data to authoritarian and brutal governments[1].
[1][https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blackberry-saudi/rim-
to-s...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blackberry-saudi/rim-to-share-
some-blackberry-codes-with-saudis-source-idUSTRE6751Q220100810)
~~~
cantrevealname
I would fully trust an encrypted communication system only if it is (1) end-
to-end encrypted, (2) open source (or at least with source code available and
buildable from source), and (3) based on a sound security design. Having said
that, however, you're being very hard on Research In Motion (now called
BlackBerry Ltd).
From everything I read and know about RIM, the enterprise level BlackBerry
systems were unbreakable to governments and the keys were generated and
controlled entirely by the customers (not by RIM). The pissed-off governments
demanded access and threatened to ban RIM--the market leader at the time. I
think the first to demand access was India and RIM put up a years-long fight
against them before they capitulated.
It's easy to say that they should have taken a principled stand and lost the
market. (In a similar vein, RIM had to pay a slimy patent troll $612.5 million
dollars [not a typo, more than half a billion!] by a certain deadline
otherwise the judge in the case would have _banned them from the entire US
market_ until they had a trial. The patents in question were ludicrously
obvious and should never have been granted. I'd like to have seen RIM take a
stand and fight the troll, but I can forgive them for having chosen not to go
bankrupt.)
At the other extreme of corporate misconduct, are you aware that AT&T has been
giving the call records (meta data) of every person in the United States to
the NSA for _decades_? If Snowden's info is correct, they even allowed live
tapping into phone calls for every phone call that passed through their
network.
Furthermore, here's a quote from the article you linked to: _" RIM, unlike
rivals Nokia and Apple, operates its own network through secure servers
located in Canada and other countries such as Britain."_ I have a high degree
of respect for Apple (and somewhat for Nokia), but isn't it odd that RIM was
being targeted by the host country but Nokia and Apple weren't? Perhaps they
had a way to monitor communications (or at least get meta data) on Nokia and
Apple phones, but they couldn't monitor RIM because RIM maintained its servers
outside of the country.
In summary, cut some slack on RIM. RIM did use good encryption and did put up
a fight. Many other companies have done and are doing much _much_ worse.
~~~
bigprovolone
not sure if you are aware of this story concerning Blackberry
[https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/mg77vv/rcmp-
black...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/mg77vv/rcmp-blackberry-
project-clemenza-global-encryption-key-canada)
~~~
cantrevealname
I hadn't seen that story, thanks for linking it. Just to clarify, that story
is about consumer BlackBerrys which were known to be insecure, where the keys
were at the mercy of RIM's willingness to protect them.
I was talking about enterprise BlackBerry systems being unbreakable to
governments. That story does not contract this. However, it's saddening to
hear that RIM apparently coughed up the keys for consumer BlackBerrys even
though it didn't face an existential threat. If they had refused, I doubt that
they would have been banned in Canada, being their home turf and a darling of
the Canadian industry at the time.
~~~
amaccuish
I believe you are correct. Blackberrys connected to a BES were end-to-end
encrypted before that became mainstream. The key was only stored on the device
and on the server.
For consumer services the story is very different.
------
dosy
it's pretty funny as blackberries used to be the phone of choice for
intelligence services. but now their business has failed he's against people
who are exploiting data. I know he's talking about a different type of data
but it's still funny.
as an aside I'm wondering when the the last nail in the coffin is going to
laid for one of these big tech services. and how are these huge tech companies
going to respond to this increasing government interference.
I'm sort of waiting for one of the big five to go full early-airbnb or Uber
and just start circumventing. a part of me would find this big tech versus big
government civil war out in the open pretty funny.
plus big tech being distracted and hammered by government would provide more
opportunities for startups.
------
IshKebab
I got many paragraphs in with no new information given. Yes we know that
Google allows targeted advertising. It's how they make money. We also know
that they don't sell user information. Neither does Facebook actually - they
just had a stupidly permissive (and _free_ ) API in the past.
------
frolig
"Free as in puppy" is something people say? I don't like this meme.
------
devoply
In the future we are Sims running on Google's computers.
------
guntars
Does a day go by when an article about some version of Google Is Evil doesn’t
make it to the top of Hacker News? It’s ruining the site, imo.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Programming Can Ruin Your Life - jklubnik
http://devizen.com/blog/2007/09/11/ruin/
======
henryw
I can relate to this:
"The frantic pace of the software world will instill in you a sense of panic
and urgency. You must do everything now. Tomorrow is too late. The thought of
working constantly will no longer seem foreign or ridiculous. You will spend
your free time feeling guilty about not working."
And need to remember this:
"Don't miss the life you have in the search for the one you think you want."
------
dappelbaum
This is a good read. I personally eat well and avoid candy, but this cracked
me up.
------
run4yourlives
>Programming presents you with a problem and allows you to eventually solve it
provided you don't quit.
lol... That's a great quote.
~~~
create_account
Not a joke.
~~~
run4yourlives
I didn't take it as one. I'm laughing because it's so painfully true.
------
henning
it's the only thing i've ever not sucked at, so it's not like i have a choice
in the matter.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Proficiency of Black Students Is Found to Be Far Lower Than Expected - Alex3917
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/09/education/09gap.html?_r=2&src=twt&twt=nytimesnational
======
JabavuAdams
I suspect that home and community culture is the main reason, and race is
somewhere off in the noise.
I'd like to see research on different home cultures. I'd especially like to
see a way to assign a metric to a family to rate how "scholarly" the
environment is for the children.
You couldn't ask people directly, because pretty much every parent will agree
with the statement: "We think education is important." It's just that a lot of
them don't translate that into action. E.g. "What, why would you read to a 1
year old? They can't understand it."
Instead, go to substantive things like:
1) How often did you read to your child at age 0-3 months
2) When did your child first start watching TV?
3) Do you have books or magazines in the house?
4) Do you read with your kids every day?
...
~~~
Alex3917
Reading to your kids doesn't seem to help them read more proficiently, at
least not on average. The 1994 Scarborough & Dobrich paper on this is one of
the most famous in education literature, and there are a bunch of good
responses to it as well.
~~~
stevie
I think this is wrong.
Reading does help, but it has to done in the correct way, like much else to do
with education in general.
The Success For All study done in 2006:
"Conclusion The quantity and quality of research on Success for All, and the
positive outcomes found in almost all studies by more than fi fty
investigators in eighteen different research institutions worldwide, clearly
establish that Success for All is highly effective in increasing student
reading. The effects can be quite substantial, averaging more than half of the
national white-minority achievement gap and almost a full grade equivalent by
second grade (see Slavin et al., 2006). In a time when educators are
increasingly being asked to use proven programs, Success for All is the best
demonstration in existence of the idea that rigorous research on practical
programs can be done and can show substantial positive effects. Every child
should have a right to participate in a program with this level of evidence."
~~~
Alex3917
Right, that's why I said 'at least not on average'. If you are asking your
kids questions while you read that are phrased in the proper way then there is
benefit, but most people wouldn't do that unless they were trained to.
------
asmithmd1
I started to develop a little skepticism when I came across this quote:
"In college, black men represented just 5 percent of students in 2008."
Isn't that exactly how many you would expect based on the demographics of the
US?
~~~
nickpinkston
Wikipedia says they're 14% of US population - I'm not sure how the age
distribution is, but that's plenty high enough to show a problem.
~~~
billpaetzke
But the stat is about black men only--excluding women. So 7% then.
Is 5% actual vs 7% desired a big enough gap to cause alarm? I don't know.
~~~
kmak
I suppose it depends on the way you're framing it. If it gets to 7% as
desired, it is 40% more!
------
Towle_
The more excuses any given demographic has available to it, the worse it will
fare.
~~~
maxklein
That's a terribly dismissive thing to say about people who are just one
generation away from not being able to vote because they were born darker than
others.
~~~
Towle_
It should be noted that it matters not whether those excuses are valid. When
an entire group buys into the idea, correctly or incorrectly, that their lack
of success is someone else's fault, the group as a whole stops trying at all.
"What's the point in trying? _They_ won't let us succeed."
edit 1: A strong, telling corollary is that forced immigrant groups always
fare poorer than willful immigrant groups. Always.
edit 2: How many generations removed from communist tyranny are America's
Chinese and Taiwanese immigrants? How're they doing?
~~~
maxklein
'Communist tyranny' as you term it, is very different from systematic racism.
I doubt that the attitude of 'they won't let us' is really without merit -
just 20 years ago, MTV would not play music by black artists.
Black America has come vey far, and is one of the most dominant cultural
forces on the planet. That's for the peak of the society. The bottom of the
society still has to deal with a lot of legacy problems, and attitudes like
yours don't help the problem.
I doubt that the majority of problems comes from a sense of entitlement, like
you strangely enough, seem to believe.
~~~
Towle_
_I doubt that the majority of problems comes from a sense of entitlement, like
you strangely enough, seem to believe._
What? I'm not making value judgments.
This is absurdly simple. If people have reason to believe that their efforts
will be in vain, then they make no effort. But it's worse than that with
socio-economic groups. Some members come to rely on the group's official
explanation for lack of success, in order to maintain self-dignity. Those
members hold back the others in their group to the best of their ability, else
the official defense of mediocrity be disproven.
A great example is the Irish Catholics in America. "No Irish Need Apply"
signs? Never happened (in America). <http://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/no-
irish.htm> The myth of The Other keeping them down was necessary for them as a
group. Even up through the first half of the 20th century, they insisted they
were being held down as the explanation for their much lower income levels
relative to white Protestants. Then came 1960. JFK was elected. If one of your
group can get elected president, there's no more need for excuses. Since 1960,
Irish Catholics have grown more and more like white Protestants. Both have
almost the exact same income distribution now. Catholic church attendance has
plummeted since 1960, asymptotically approaching Protestant church attendance.
The group stopped reaching for excuses, and things got better for them. Fast.
~~~
maxklein
Catholics and protestants are indistinguishable from one another.
~~~
Towle_
Yeah, they are _now_. That's the freaking point. Two groups who slaughtered
each other for centuries are now indistinguishable to observers.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Save the Males - echair
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/book_extracts/article4448371.ece
======
msie
I see men around me being as macho as ever and the popularity of mixed-martial
arts, wrestling, NASCAR and the use of the word "gay" to deride stuff. My
anecdotes cancel her anecdotes!
------
iuguy
I'm glad someone out there is making a point about the emasculation of men at
the expense of wimmin's lib, even if it's not in the most articulately
expressed manner.
~~~
dgabriel
Do you really think that "wimmin's lib" emasculates men? In what way are your
options in life more limited as a result of gender equality? How is it that
equal opportunity makes you less of a man?
~~~
elai
wimmin's lib emasculates men if they choose to listen and accept it.
------
jimbokun
As the father of two boys, this was my favorite part:
"But seven-year-old boys are not interested in making lanterns from coffee
tins. They want to shoot bows and arrows, preferably at one another, chop wood
with stone-hewn axes and sink canoes, preferably while in them."
All true.
~~~
menloparkbum
This is generally true. However, much to the consternation of my macho dad, I
was the weird kid who was more interested in making lanterns from coffee tins
than shooting at canoes or chopping wood with rocks.
If the author is really concerned about society going down the tubes it might
be worthwhile to not include making things in her stereotype of behavior that
isn't "manly." The guys who spent their youth throwing stuff at each other are
the ones having the most problems when they grow up. Last I checked, makers do
pretty well in adulthood.
~~~
sfg
I enjoyed making my bow and arrows and I am sure that would be included fully
in her definition of manly. She is moaning about activities and toys that are
unmanly, not the process of making stuff.
------
scott_s
Cherry-picked anecdotes and data to support _a priori_ conclusions.
~~~
pg
That could equally well describe any essay. An essay is not a report on a
controlled experiment. You have to work to decide which parts you agree with.
~~~
scott_s
It could describe most bad essays, yes. Good essays either stay out of
falsifiability territory, or they invite formal exploration of the subject.
In this essay, she makes claims that are supported only with anecdotes, when
data could be used. This is important since I can easily think of counter-
anecdotes that nullify her arguments. The biggest example is her claim that
males are predominantly presented as emasculated in popular culture. I'm sure
one can consume a subset of all popular culture where that is true, and I'm
also sure one can do the opposite. But if someone were to actually come up
with a metric and _test_ this idea, then that would be worthwhile.
~~~
pg
_Good essays either stay out of falsifiability territory, or they invite
formal exploration of the subject._
It would be a mistake to write an essay using anecdotal evidence to argue
about a precisely defined question in math or the hard sciences. But outside
math and the hard sciences, falsifiability gets fuzzy. A statistical (surely
you don't really mean formal?) analysis of this topic would be in the domain
of "social science," and though such studies usually measure something
precisely, it's never clear what. Often a thoughtful essay will come closer to
the truth, despite containing no tables of numbers.
~~~
scott_s
I'd prefer an attempt at a statistical analysis (yes, that's what I was
getting at) which is upfront about assumptions and methodologies. Essays are
worthwhile, but are only honest if the author is upfront about their
assumptions. This author presents her assumptions as fact. That's when I tune
out.
In particular, this essay is predicated on the assumption that our culture is
more emasculated than in the past - if this is not the case, then the entire
thing falls apart. I think there are reasonable ways to test this assumption,
but the author, as a reporter, is probably not equipped to do so.
------
dejb
I think this article is somewhat self-selecting. For any guy who agrees with
it - then maybe it is true. For guys who think it's a load of crap - then it
probably is.
------
omouse
What's interesting about these articles is how out of touch with reality the
journalists are.
------
zandorg
I could be wrong, but as a Brit (ish) it seems America is a lot less forgiving
of men on the whole. In the UK, TV adverts have Homer Simpson-like figures who
are funny, but in a forgiving way.
I see feminism's flaw as being that women have wombs and can reproduce, but
men can't. Fix that by letting single men adopt.
The other flaw is that feminism is an offshoot of Marxism.
~~~
dgabriel
Single men can adopt. One of my son's best friends is the adopted son of a
single man.
~~~
zandorg
Thanks for correcting me. I'd better do some more reading before jumping to
conclusions outside my education.
------
time_management
I wish I had read that article in my apartment rather than at a cafe. I
could've cleaned the floor with all the sweeping generalizations in it.
The article raises some good points, especially on the reproductive inequity,
but most of what is in it is just boring overgeneralization. It's too long for
the few points it makes.
[Edit: Made this comment as I was RTFA. The second half is better.]
------
blurry
To save everyone time reading complete garbage, allow me to provide one
representative quote from the article:
_The shame attached to unwed motherhood did serve a useful purpose once upon
a time._
/sigh/
~~~
blurry
So I take it everyone here supports the view that single mothers are shameful.
Wow.
~~~
run4yourlives
No, you can take from your downmodding that this isn't reddit, and you'll need
to make stronger arguments than that to be taken seriously.
~~~
dgabriel
It's amusing that the arguments in the original article are not strong, and
are based on bias and anecdote. Also, the reply comments here are _extremely_
reddit-like.
~~~
run4yourlives
People have already pointed out the former. I agree.
There are also some very astute comments on this article, which is hacker news
all the way.
------
pavelludiq
It was an interesting reed, but why the hell was it on the front page of a
computer nerd site? The sun has no spots on it? Ok, thats cool, and nerdy,
thats real science, brain burning extra calories? Well interesting, of course,
we are smart people and we care what happens in our brains, there are viruses
in our genes, cool!!! But save the males? Who cares? Western civilization has
a lot of more interesting issues than this. It wasn't even THAT interesting,
just readable. I was alway annoyed by 'not HN' posts, and i know my post is
annoying too, good, it was meant to be annoying, it's important, you can't
ignore my bitter rant!
~~~
river_styx
Based on your word choices and spelling mistakes, I'm gonna place your age in
the neighborhood of 16-17. Am I right? Maybe you'll find this kind of topic
more interesting when you're a bit older...
~~~
blurry
Where does _I'm gonna_ place you?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Yahoo acquires Ptch - bonchibuji
http://blog.ptch.com/post/68919650988/ptch-joins-yahoo
======
aaronbrethorst
I am so tired of the upbeat acquihire 'hey, users, this is good for you!'
spin.
Our passion and our mission was to give you
the best way to make and share beautiful movies
made from the photos and videos on your phone.
Well, someone noticed!
...Ptch will shut down on January 2, 2014
~~~
jmathai
If it _is_ an acqui-hire, then think of the scenario. A team that's probably
burned out. The passion probably died a while back and along with it went the
mission.
What type of announcement do you expect?
We appreciate that you signed up for and used our product.
Things haven't gone as well as we had hoped and we're
exhausted. The truth is we'd be shutting down the site
in due time anyway but this is a better option for us and
doesn't make any real difference for you, our user.
It says they launched a year ago so this particular company was still very
new. It may not apply to them but I imagine this applies to most acqui-hires.
~~~
aaronbrethorst
Ideally an honest one.
Edit: here's a thought.
Thanks again for your support of Product since our launch. It means the world
to us, and it's been a terrific ride for us. Unfortunately, we haven't seen
the broad usage of our service necessary to sustain it and we'll be shutting
it down in X months. Luckily, BigCo is acquiring our team, which means that
we'll have jobs making their quasi-similar product even better.
Here's how you get your data: (blah)
Here are some similar services you may want to consider moving to: (blah)
~~~
anoncowherd
You want honesty?
How about:
_" Thanks again for your support of Product since our launch. It means we're
now in a position to get acquired by Yahoo. In other words, your support means
we get money. We could gush about how much you mean to us, but really, we're
running a business here, with the explicit goal of making money. We've done
that now, so, thanks!"_
~~~
aaronbrethorst
After the liquidation preference the founders
(probably 1-3 people) are likely to get 90%
of the remaining proceeds and the staff –
those engineers that the acquiring company
so desperately wants – would ordinarily
receive a very small proportion.
[http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2013/05/13/the-
corrosive-...](http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2013/05/13/the-corrosive-
downside-of-acquihires/)
Hopefully Ptch employees were making market wages, because an acquihire
certainly won't net them much of anything.
------
gregcohn
Ptch was incubated at Dreamworks and was a pretty high-profile project
internally there. As another commenter noted, it was something along the lines
of an instagram video type of app, with very notable enhancements (think the
equivalent of instagram filters, powered by dreamworks technology and
content).
It was publicly available in the iOS App Store but didn't get much traction.
I'm not sure what's left of the team, as I believe all of the original mobile
engineers were already poached.
------
ulfw
Next: Yahoo! acquires an extra vowel for it's businesses
~~~
001sky
I'd like to but a vowel for $100MM, please...
------
junto
Rule 1 when announcing your imminent acqui-hiredness: tell us what your
company did when making your announcement, otherwise it is just gloating.
Can anyone tell me what ptch actually did?
~~~
swang
The first paragraph says:
"Our passion and our mission was to give you the best way to make and share
beautiful movies made from the photos and videos on your phone."
------
Hovertruck
How do you pronounce the name of this company? Patch? Pitch?
~~~
codegeek
Their homepage says
"Make a ptch (pronounced "pitch") by combining the photos and videos on your
phone, or using media from your social networks, like Facebook or Instagram.
Personalize it by easily adding captions, music, and effects."
------
wangweij
Ask the users to download the data? Since they are about photos and videos,
why not simply say "if you can provide us your Yahoo account, we will move all
your data to Flickr in a private photo set"?
~~~
spader725
You're assuming everyone has a Yahoo Account, and they like using Flickr
------
chadwickthebold
Does anyone have any idea how this fits into Yahoo's overall strategy?
~~~
3am
[http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-
switch/wp/2013/11/26...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-
switch/wp/2013/11/26/katie-couric-david-pogue-and-why-yahoo-wants-more-video-
content/), Marissa Mayer has made several statements about not having enough
clip inventory for all of the ad inventory they have. User generated content
is cheap... I have no idea if it's that, technology, acqui-hired, or what,
though.
~~~
loceng
Interesting. Thanks for sharing
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Learn Computer Graphics with Processing - octopus
http://www.processing.org/learning/
======
sipefree
I had to do a Processing group project course as part of my CS degree.
While it's a nice toolkit for doing very basic visualizations of data, it's a
pain in the hole to do anything more advanced than that.
They made us use it to develop a GUI application with text input, buttons,
tables, and graphs, in order to visualize some IMDB-style movie ratings data.
Unfortunately it's absolute crap for doing things like that. I basically ended
up implementing GTK in it, with widgets rendering to buffers and having a
hand-rolled DOM-style event system. I implemented scroll views on my own, and
used them to create text input boxes and scrollbars. While I'm personally
proud of making it actually work, it was a horrifying experience to do using
the really basic tools provided.
The IDE that's included with Processing is also really awful. It can't do
indentation correctly, doesn't work at all in tiling window managers, and
seems to make people write horrible code. Walking around the labs trying to
help people, I found that the vast majority of people's bugs were missing
curly braces and things indented wrong simply because of the awfulness of the
text editor.
If you want to do anything useful in it, you need to import core.jar into
Eclipse (or do it on the command line) and do it in Java. It seems that the
processing compiler is really just a small preprocessor over Java that wraps
the whole thing in 'public class Main implements PApplet {' and '}' and
replaces #FFFFFF with 0xFFFFFF.
I also used processing to make a tetris game
(<https://github.com/sipefree/setris>), which was much easier than doing a GUI
application, but I really didn't get any decent drawing performance on non
state-of-the-art hardware.
TL;DR it's nice but a pain in the hole.
------
arctangent
Processing is excellent and I have used it extensively. I have also used
Nodebox, which is something similar but in Python: <http://nodebox.net>
Most recently however I have switched to using Field. I'm not a huge fan of
Java syntax, so being able to write Processing apps in Python/Jython via Field
is a big win for me.
<http://openendedgroup.com/field>
There are lots of features I haven't even touched in Field yet...
~~~
Vivtek
This is the kind of thing I read HNN for - stuff I never even knew I needed.
Do I understand correctly that Field lets you build graphical representations
_of your code_? Kind of like ... graphical literate programming?
This is where my wife would say "Jézus Mária és minden szentek". It's ... full
of stars ...
~~~
arctangent
You can attach code to visual elements and then "scrub" across them in real
time, a bit like how a DJ would scratch a record.
You can also embed sliders and colour-pickers etc. directly in your code to
give you even more ways to modify things.
Yes, this is as amazing as it sounds!
------
schwabacher
I found processing powerful and really easy to pick up. It is also very easy
to port from processing to javascript (processingjs.org)!
------
mrcharles
Processing is pretty cool, I messed around with it a while back. Problem is,
once you start making complex enough sketches, you hit a point where it would
be really useful to have a debugger, and last I checked processing didn't
provide that.
I expect you could probably debug it with java tools somehow, but given that I
only learned java via processing on a lark, I didn't explore that path.
~~~
twymer
You can do processing in Eclipse to get this.
<http://www.processing.org/learning/eclipse/>
------
mcritz
Processing is amazing. It’s the only “open” substitute for Flash as a cross-
platform dynamic graphics generation tool.
Learning Processing gave me the confidence to pursue C and Objective-C.
------
winxordie
I highly encourage playing with Processing.js: <http://processingjs.org/> It's
art on a web browser!
------
irfn
processing is indeed my choice for graphics. I tend to use ruby & clojure
processing libraries. <https://github.com/rosado/clj-processing>
<https://github.com/jashkenas/ruby-processing>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Pharmaceuticals could be the prescription for trade war that truly hurts the US - ojbyrne
https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/why-pharmaceuticals-could-be-the-prescription-for-trade-warfare-that-truly-hurts-america/
======
erentz
“That means that Canada’s symmetrical retaliation is not working...”
That’s because Canada and other countries are responding rationally with
tariffs targeting America as a whole. They don’t seem to understand that guy
in charge (Trump) and his cohorts who started this trade war don’t care about
America.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
When Blockbuster Video Tried Burning Game Cartridges on Demand - szczys
https://hackaday.com/2018/10/01/remember-when-blockbuster-video-tried-burning-game-cartridges-on-demand/
======
patcheudor
>Even if someone were able to obtain an unauthorized copy, a decent CD-ROM
drive, sans burning capabilities, still cost in the neighborhood of $600.
I was part of the early CD-ROM days with a Yamaha CD-ROM burner in 1994. It
was well over $3000. It wasn't until 1995 that HP introduced a writer for
under $1000 at $995. Worse, the early burners didn't have any cache, so to
support the Yamaha, I was using a high-end dual-processor Pentium system that
was in the neighborhood of $16,000 and I still got plenty of buffer under-
runs! On top of all this, the first writeable CD's I purchased were in the
$30/each range.
~~~
achairapart
Also: those cd burners were 1x so it was a whole painful endless hour to burn
a single CD-ROM!
~~~
therein
An epiphany I once had as I was waiting for that endless hour to come to an
end was Nero has a logo of the Colosseum on fire. It is a circular structure,
like a burning CD and it is on fire because "Nero set Rome on fire".
~~~
tgsovlerkhgsel
Also, the full name was "Nero Burning ROM". It came from a German company, and
Rome is spelled Rom in German.
~~~
zokier
And if we are reminiscing Nero, these track (and others like it) might bring
up some memories:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDWAmgwQvOk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDWAmgwQvOk)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yovnD-
yI68U](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yovnD-yI68U)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u39ZqQYOHM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u39ZqQYOHM)
------
testplzignore
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Super_NES_enhancement_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Super_NES_enhancement_chips)
would have made it difficult to do this on the SNES, especially for great
games like Yoshi's Island that took advantage of this.
~~~
tzakrajs
Easy, just put FPGAs in them :P
~~~
badlucklottery
That's actually the current solution for SNES enhancement chip games:
[https://sd2snes.de](https://sd2snes.de)
------
rocky1138
I believe Nintendo did this first in the 1980s with their Famicom disk drive.
Players were able to buy games at a kiosk which copied the games to a floppy.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULRz20droeg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULRz20droeg)
~~~
1001101
Multi-Game Hunter and files off of your local (or LD) AmiExpress BBS did this
for SNES/Genesis.
[http://videogamedevelopmentdevices.wikia.com/wiki/Multi_Game...](http://videogamedevelopmentdevices.wikia.com/wiki/Multi_Game_Hunter)
------
supernovae
Didn't Sega have the "Sega Channel" for streaming roms to something like this
at one point?
I do remember being impressed with virtua fighter and virtua racing having
processors embedded in the cart - that was a creative way to give life to the
Genesis - obviously not being able to be be burned at the store unless there
was a custom cart
~~~
freehunter
I've missed the Sega Channel for so long. I recently bought an Xbox One and
was pretty pleased to find a "Sega Channel"-like subscription service. I'm a
lot happier paying $8/mo for a big library of games than paying $60 for one
game that I might only play for a month or two anyway.
~~~
joshschreuder
Sony recently announced they are turning their Playstation Now service into a
similar thing (previously it was cloud streamed titles, now you can download
the title to your console for a monthly fee)
[https://blog.us.playstation.com/2018/09/20/playstation-
now-a...](https://blog.us.playstation.com/2018/09/20/playstation-now-adds-
downloading-of-ps4-ps2-games/)
------
duxup
Aside from a some high profile / high demand games.... was this really solving
a problem? I don't recall ever having problems getting my hands on a
cartridge.
Obviously there are some supply chain savings and such but at least as far as
availability I'm not sure this solved much.
~~~
w0m
When i was like 10, every time my parents were grocery shopping i'd walk into
the (attached) video rental store and ask for specific copies of a couple
games that were hard to get. To date myself, this was likely NES era.
~~~
swozey
We were hiding the games you wanted behind games you didn't until we got
enough allowance.
~~~
w0m
100% this, i'd hide games in the vhs section
------
crtasm
Towards the end of the 90s I did some work for a startup who'd made an on-
demand system for PC/Mac software. The unit was huge and contained a 4
burner/1 printer+robotic arm device, a raid array, two printers (black and
white for manual, colour -from solid wax cartridges! - for DVD case insert),
an iMac for customer to browse and make selection and a POS touchscreen.
All software was being sold in the big box style at the time so we did a lot
of rejigging artwork for DVD case. We had blank CDs with a gold underside so
they didn't look like the usual bluey-green home burned ones.
------
your-nanny
Goes to show that the best ideas don't always win, especially when they
collide with the interests of critical partners. Maybe it took Napster et al.
to really break open the status quo.
~~~
babypuncher
Blockbuster's plan failed because too many games were shipping on cartridges
with custom hardware on the PCB.
In the NES days it was simple data mapper chips that allowed a program to
address more than 40kb of ROM by switching between multiple 40kb data banks.
On the SNES this went much further, with games including specialized co-
processors for things like sprite scaling, digital signal processing, and even
hardware accelerated 3D scene rendering.
Making a universal cartridge that can handle all of this is a challenge even
today.
~~~
brirec
> Making a universal cartridge that can handle all of this is a challenge even
> today.
Oh it is, but let me tell you: it's beautiful.
[http://krikzz.com/forum/index.php?topic=8045.0](http://krikzz.com/forum/index.php?topic=8045.0)
~~~
voltagex_
Until Krikzz stops producing them. His GBA carts are 10x faster than the ones
from AliExpress (and 10x the cost, too)
------
ct520
Nothing like the good ol days. Burning a cd at 1x with your Yamaha in windows
311. Move the mouse and BOOM buffer under run. Kids today will never know the
struggle.
------
spilk
Nintendo did this extensively in Japan, first with the Disk Writer for the
Famicom Disk System and then later with Nintendo Power kiosks for Super
Famicom and Gameboy.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Faunus: Graph Computing with Hadoop - okram
http://thinkaurelius.github.com/faunus/
======
danielweber
I have suffered buzzword overload. :(
------
hendler
Anyone used this?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A DataOps Perspective on App and Data Democratization - lensesio
https://medium.com/@antonios_46161/a-dataops-perspective-on-app-and-data-democratization-99377aaeb2ad
======
mastergui
"Extreme Data Nudity" lmao
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Go Remote Jobs – Jobs to Go - tadake
https://goremotejobs.com?=2
======
meagher
Before I can even view the site, a pop up prompts me for my email!
Until you provide me some value (or I can at least see the site), then I'm a
lot less inclined to give out my email. Are you trying to optimize for email
sign ups or people actually using the site? If it's the second one, get rid of
the email modal or delay it until I've read at least one part of your site.
------
roryisok
Rendering broken on windows phone... Hardly matters I suppose but I couldn't
use it on my first attempt
------
BoysenberryPi
How is this any different from the million other remote job websites like
weworkremotely?
~~~
tadake
Hi! What makes Go Remote Jobs better than the other remote job websites, is
that the focus is on making it easy on the user. We've put a lot of extra work
into ensuring there are no fees to search for jobs, the searching is as easy
as possible, and that we have an expressive site search with more to come!
Some future updates (because Go Remote Jobs is only about a month old) that
are going to be coming, are going to include an email "matchmaker" to pair you
with the best jobs and advanced search filtering to do things such as
narrowing the listings you see to only jobs with 6 digits. I hope you enjoy!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Who is Losing the Nile? - Thevet
https://orientxxi.info/magazine/who-is-losing-the-nile,2276
======
wehadfun
"about US$1.8 billion are reportedly financed by Chinese banks"
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Ethiopian_Renaissance_Da...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Ethiopian_Renaissance_Dam)
------
jessaustin
Maybe Egypt is isolated and wants to avoid military conflict, but it's hard to
imagine a public works project that is more catastrophically vulnerable to
really low-tech attack than a giant concrete dam. If Egypt played its cards
right and got the Ethiopians or Sudanese to strike first, it could solve this
problem in a moment, all by itself, possibly while plausibly denying its own
role in the disaster. The Sudanese would be upset to find half the buildings
in Khartoum floating in Lake Nasser, but they'd sure hesitate to support a
rebuild.
~~~
onetimemanytime
I think the idea is not to go to war. Say Egypt wins...and what do you do ? No
major country will stand a such invasion. Taking out a damn is almost
certainly a war crime and should be considered like a nuke, the last option.
Imagine the wall of water wreaking havoc tens of miles away, village after
village, town after town. Egypt lost when they couldn't stop it.
~~~
jessaustin
It could be argued that Egypt "lost" when Mubarak destroyed the agricultural
sector, to the extent that the Gift of the Nile now requires _food aid_. That
may be why there isn't a constituency for really opposing the new dam. If
there were, however, there are enough violent gangs in the region that dams
can be attacked without leaving obvious fingerprints. Who's to say the dam
hasn't already been attacked, by a subtle sort of supply sabotage? For the
reasons you cite, if the dam comes down, it won't be rebuilt. The point is
that giant dams are uniquely vulnerable to veto by theoretically unrepresented
parties.
~~~
Bekwnn
It's worth noting that the Nile is one of just 10 rivers which outputs 90% of
the plastic that goes into the ocean. Some of the agricultural problems could
be related to things such as that.
[https://news.sky.com/story/just-10-rivers-carry-90-of-
plasti...](https://news.sky.com/story/just-10-rivers-carry-90-of-plastic-
polluting-the-oceans-11167581)
~~~
jessaustin
Mostly it was Mubarak implementing a bizarre corrupt version of land reform
that took land from farmers whose families had owned it back to antiquity and
gave it to cronies with no farming experience. [0]
[0]
[https://www.marketplace.org/2011/12/12/sustainability/food-9...](https://www.marketplace.org/2011/12/12/sustainability/food-9-billion/food-
fuels-egypts-revolution)
------
jonte2018
The author did not mention that other Nile basin countries are planning to
build their own dams on the White Nile for irrigation purposes and power
generation. So the amount of water that will reach Egypt in a few decades from
now will be vastly smaller than today.
------
mnw21cam
Just for reference, the Hala’ib triangle is in the South-East corner of Egypt,
not the South-West.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Set Bing's photo of the day as your desktop's wallpaper, Automatically – Windows - guptarohit
https://github.com/guptarohit/bing-wallpaper/
======
coreyp_1
I myself have wanted this, but there's no way that I would run an exe like
this without knowing what's in it!
~~~
rakshithbekal
there are apps on the windows store that do the same. Why'd you want to use an
exe?
~~~
guptarohit
is windows store available on windows 7?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How To Avoid Equidistant HSV Colors - dhotson
http://vis4.net/blog/posts/avoid-equidistant-hsv-colors/
======
viggity
There is an alternative color space called YIQ that deals with perceived
luminescence. I wrote a small function that can tell you given an arbitrary
background color, whether white or black text would be most readable. You can
checkt it out here: <http://blog.nitriq.com/BlackVsWhiteText.aspx>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YIQ>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Illinois judge rules police entitled to SWAT raid over parody Twitter account - dreamweapon
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/19/illinois-judge-swat-raid-parody-twitter-peoria-mayor
======
cryoshon
Horrendous precedent set here, but it props up my theory that people looking
to the courts to strike down government overreach will be disappointed. Free
speech can be countered with a SWAT team, legally. Even if they hadn't found
marijuana when they bashed down his door, it is still extremely intimidating
to be raided by paramilitaries.
The USA is a police state, and has been for a few years.
------
earlz
Summary: You piss someone in power off, and you're subject to a SWAT raid for
one reason or another
------
pavel_lishin
That's not a flattering photograph of Mr. Daniel. I find it hard to believe
that that's the only one that was available.
~~~
wldcordeiro
Maybe that was done on purpose?
------
Thesaurus
Police state.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Why so little looting in Japan? It's not just about honesty. - PixelRobot
http://www.slate.com/id/2288514
======
pwim
_They're good at their jobs, too: The clearance rate for murder in 2010 was an
unbelievable 98.2 percent, according to West—so unbelievable that some
attribute it to underreporting._
High clearance rates don't mean police are good at their jobs. Police in Japan
can hold a suspect for 23 days without charging him. During this period, they
try to get a confession out, using techniques such as sleep deprivation.
Furthermore, once you get to trial, it is usually with only a judge, not a
jury. All levels are pushed to keep up this high conviction rate. So just
because the rate is 98%, this doesn't mean justice was actually served at that
rate.
~~~
ugh
How does the judge/jury distinction come into play? Is there empirical
evidence that trials with juries have more accurate outcomes?
I truly know nothing about this but my gut feeling has always been that juries
don’t improve trials and I never perceived that as a strange or uncommon view.
~~~
pwim
Judges face bureaucratic pressure to maintain high conviction rates. According
to the following paper, it can have negative effects on a Judge's career if he
appears to be lenient:
<http://www.rasmusen.org/published/Rasmusen-01.JLS.jpncon.pdf>
~~~
ovi256
Only in a system where judges are elected, like the US. Many, if not most
European countries (to discuss the examples I'm familiar with) appoint judges
and have had a jury trial system until the beginning of the 20th century. It
was abandoned after it was found to be easy to manipulate on a regular basis.
Jury trials degenerated into character trials - prosecution would try to
discredit the accused, and defense would try to paint him as a pillar of the
community. Juries placed too much weight on their personal feeling towards the
accused, and too less on what happened and what the evidence was.
We like to hope that the US system solved this problem, of course.
~~~
metageek
I believe only a few US states elect judges; they're usually appointed.
~~~
moomba
Even if a judge is appointed, there could still be public outrage over the
perception of low conviction rates. This would cause another judge to be
appointed. The same thing goes on with cabinet positions of all levels of
government where the public demonstrates outrage.
------
forkandwait
High human capital, perhaps? I would hazard the educational/ cultural level of
a japanese high school grad about equals that of an American state univ grad
(I is one, so I can criticize). Nobody would be surprised SF State got hit by
an earthquake and the students didn't loot. (The low educational and cultural
level of the US is embarassing....)
~~~
DannoHung
What the hell is a "cultural level"?
How do I gain additional "culture"?
~~~
aaronbrethorst
I recommend building theaters or deploying Great Artists.
~~~
ovi256
There are some wonders with empire wide effects that may be a cheaper way to
improve culture. Look into those. One may argue RL Japan has a lot of those:
the Shinto shrines, the temples, the castles.
------
Duff
These stories have the odor of propaganda to them.
I'd argue that there's no looting because refugees are penned up in shelters
inland, and the coastal towns are pretty much gone.
In Katrina and Haiti, people were stuck in the immediate area of destruction,
and didn't have anywhere to go. Remember the guy blogging from the datacenter
in New Orleans during the Hurricane? The whole city broke down, there was
nowhere to go. In Haiti, the whole place was barely functioning before the
earthquake.
------
kadobaro
So little looting? Hate to burst your bubble, but the Japanese news is full of
scammers pocketing money "for earthquake victims", people stealing from
charity boxes, and looting.
Yes, looting. I can't find many news articles other than in Japanese, but here
we go. Just use Google translate (<http://translate.google.com/>).
Since the earthquake, there were over 250 cases of looting in Sendai alone.
[http://www.jiji.com/jc/eqa?g=eqa_date3&k=2011031900317](http://www.jiji.com/jc/eqa?g=eqa_date3&k=2011031900317)
Here's a nice article that mentions people trying to break into ATMs right
after the quake.
[http://www.jiji.com/jc/eqa?g=eqa_date2&k=2011032000211](http://www.jiji.com/jc/eqa?g=eqa_date2&k=2011032000211)
Here's just one about stealing from charity boxes. There were probably 4 or 5
articles today.
[http://www.jiji.com/jc/eqa?g=eqa_date2&k=2011032000250](http://www.jiji.com/jc/eqa?g=eqa_date2&k=2011032000250)
Stuff is happening, it's just not getting translated into your news.
~~~
fadzlan
While that is true, I think the looting cases there could be viewed as an
exception, as compared to widespread looting that happens just after natural
disaster anywhere else in the world.
------
stretchwithme
Whether Japan is the ideal or not, society needs to reward productive,
mutually beneficial action and discourage parasitic behavior. We couldn't even
plant crops if other people could easily reap the results.
The US has been failing at that quite a bit in some areas of the economy. We
encourage unwise risk taking, while shifting the consequences to those who
produce. That is unscalable and unsustainable.
------
angus77
I wonder how many people returning lost goods actually claim the 5-20% they're
entitled to. I lost my bag once (with my wallet in it). I went to the police
box closest to the area where I'd lost it, and of course they had it. Someone
had picked it up and turned it in. The officer I talked to explained to me
that the finder was entitled to a percentage, but had checked a box on the
form waiving the finder's fee.
And to be honest, I don't think I'd claim anything either if I turned in
someone's wallet.
------
dhughes
I work with a Japanese woman she's about 30 years-old and has been here in
Canada for at least ten years (a guess) and I can confirm that she is polite
and courteous to the extreme.
It's embarrassing to see the contrast of some of my fellow Canadian co-
workers' manners they eat with their mouths open, talk with food in their
mouth, suck their teeth, turn up the TV in the break room with others in there
just because they want to watch TV, walk in front of elderly people - so
infuriatingly self-centered.
Customers at work keep asking her about Japan and if her family was injured
and she politely answers they're OK but day after day people keep asking as if
they think they are the first to think to ask her the obvious instead of
having some common sense and keep their mouths shut.
People think of Canadians as polite but Japan certainly holds the top spot for
manners of all nations on this planet if all Japanese people are like my co-
worker friend.
If we ever had a disaster here I know of at least one person who won't be
opportunistic and rob me when I'm down.
~~~
elai
There are disadvantages and advantages to politeness. A polite society tends
to be more disconnected, less intimate and harder to make friends with in vs.
a more intimate, but possibly a bit more "rude" society too:
[http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/pacificnw/2005/0213/cover.h...](http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/pacificnw/2005/0213/cover.html)
------
Helianthus16
>"Why don't Japanese loot? Because it's not in their culture. How is that
culture defined? An absence of looting."
immediately followed by:
>A better explanation may be structural factors: a robust system of laws that
reinforce honesty, a strong police presence, and, ironically, active crime
organizations.
how is that in any way different from the circular definition the writer just
criticized?
which I think indicates the real problem with the 'culture' argument; it's not
that it's circular, it's that it is vague, which is why the rest of the
(detailed) article is actually quite informative.
~~~
jerf
One is circular, one proposes a social mechanism whereby looting will lead to
negative consequences for the looter. I'm having a hard time seeing what you
think is not different about those two things.
~~~
Helianthus16
Those social mechanisms are a part of culture. I find it hard to conceive a
definition of culture that does not include the systems of negative
consequences that a society enforces.
------
mynameishere
The next time the entire state of Iowa floods, I want to see endless articles
about why midwestern white people don't loot. Don't bother, here's the reason:
_Most people don't loot_. The default "loot bit" on most people is firmly OFF.
In New Orleans, people loot. That also doesn't warrant a lot of analysis.
------
Joakal
Police in Japan are said to beat confessions out of suspects, even false
ones[0]
[0] <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8290767.stm>
------
davej
I found it interesting that a lot of supermarkets in Japan _lowered_ their
prices following the earthquake/tsunami.
This is despite the fact that they were disincentivised to do so because
obviously the potential for profit on foods and commodities is high after a
natural disaster.
------
phrotoma
The bit about the response of criminal organizations is very interesting. I've
heard odd rumors about Japanese career criminals, such as commonly going into
the business fully expecting to go to jail. Can any one suggest books / docs
on the subject? (Preferably non hollywood-ized).
~~~
btn
The article cites Jake Adelstein and his book "Tokyo Vice", which is a good
review of the Yakuza from a western perspective. He also contributes regularly
at <http://www.japansubculture.com/>, which also features a lot of insight.
------
vjk2005
I've been studying them for a few years now and will now offer my observations
to those interested. The reason why there's no looting in Japan is a result of
their uniquely homogeneous population combined with the unique culture that
they have been forced to develop as a result of their perilous location, where
there's a quake every 5 minutes on average, where tsunamis are so abundant
they came up with the name 'tsunami' in the first place, and where there's no
dearth of fires and typhoons.
To deal with this high probability of disaster, they have become ants(updated
below). What's that? Ants live in a world where disasters many orders of
magnitude more than an individual ant can handle, occur multiple times a day -
colonies getting crushed by predators, flooded with water from human habitats,
food they chance upon is multiple hundred times an individual ant's weight etc
etc. To deal with this, they have evolved into the 'superorganism', which is a
fancy word for saying every individual will put the community first and
themselves second, which enables the whole colony to move and work as if it
has -one and the same- mind. So if a colony gets destroyed, there's no looting
or in-fighting in ant-colonies... they all move as if they possess the same
mind, with the ants who were in-charge of foraging for food run out as a team
to find the next suitable space for the colony while the ants in-charge of the
colony' larvae protect it for the moment till the time is right to re-locate
and so on.
Becoming a superorganism is the only way for the ants to deal with the
catastrophe of the magnitude that they face everyday and still ensure the
survival of the majority of the colony successfully - they have to put the
colony first and the individual second. Unlike the simple minded ants, humans
are far more intelligent, hence independent, than ants, making it harder for
human societies to function with the kind of 'one-ness' the ant colonies show.
But the Japanese, thanks to their largely homogeneous population, are the
closest human equivalent to the superorganism.
Being in a country where they know that a disaster of such magnitude is
inevitable, they have evolved into a culture of disaster recovery than
disaster prevention -"It's not possible to prevent disasters, too numerous,
too powerful. So let's focus on recovering from the disasters with the least
cost to time, people and resources." They do this by being fast &
efficient(you know where JIT, Kaizen come from) and function as if having the
same mind (even their language has evolved to support this way of functioning
with the strange third-person like way of speaking which I believe is called
気遣い, kidukai or consideration). By trying to become a superorganism, they
achieve the same benefits that the ants do - incredibly fast and efficient
disaster recovery, but they also show the same side-effects - no looting or
in-fighting, fiercely protective of their homogeneity (again, their language
has evolved to support this with something called Katakana where non-native
words like 'Advanced Cartridge Slot' are turned into pure Japanese sounds -
アドバンスカートリッジスロット which is pronounced as adobansukaatorijjisurotto, all native
Japanese sounds), clearly visible patterns in the way they work, highly rigid
social pecking order (Senpai+Kouhai, gekokujō), outliers will be punished and
so on.
This unique culture is why they survived a 'surprise' nuclear attack (emphasis
on surprise as it is many orders of magnitude easier to deal with something
you know about than it is to deal with something that is happening for the
first time in history) and came back to be who they are today. This is all
made possible by their homogeneous population and such strategies will fall
flat on its face anywhere outside of Japan.
Just my 2 cents.
update: My comparison with the ant-colonies is not meant to belittle the
Japanese but to show how their community has evolved similar to the ant-colony
superorganism. If tiger communities behaved like a superorganism I'd have used
tigers. The focus of my comment is on the 'nature' of ants and not on their
physical properties.
俺の国語より日本語上手いんだぜ。大好きっていうレヴェルで住むことじゃねよ。なんで好きな人たちの悪口言うわけ！
~~~
forkandwait
SInce I just downvoted you, and I hate downvotes without explanation, let me
explain: The japanese are no more "ants" than, say, Southeast Asians. You may
be correct in saying they have a society that values cooperation and that has
developed norms and structures partly in response to common natural disasters.
However you then slide into characterizing them as mere insects driven without
the dignity of human choice, creativity, or spontaneity. And you come off
sounding like a racist (though you are probably a good deal more complex in
person).
Plus your post was way too long.
~~~
vjk2005
Tigers are not known for functioning as a superorganism, that's why I had to
go with ants. See this video to know about the power of ants - Ants: Nature's
Secret Power - Part 1: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwATgYaEku4>
In your mind, perhaps ants are 'little' and 'mere insects' but in my mind I
see only those parts of them that apply to the discussion at hand.
Let me elaborate.
I never said they are 'no more than ants'. When I said 'they are ants', I
meant it to be an intro to the analogy of how their society's functioning has
similarities to the superorganism that is the ant colony, thus showing the
same behaviors of stronger community, less in-fighting, rigid society and
protective nature, which enables them to efficiently handle disasters that
would cripple any other normal society, just like how ants can handle their
entire colony being destroyed only to rebuild it anew in 2 days.
I also never said anything about them lacking choice, creativity or
spontaneity. You will note my references to concepts they have pioneered -
JIT, Kaizen, Katakana. Sony was built amidst the ashes of the war in a
dilapidated building. There's so many more I could write a book.
Racism is not about -ignoring- differences. Racism is the opposite -
recognizing the differences and still treating people the same -despite- the
differences. I treat everyone the same.
Comment is long. It's the result of years of observation that started when I
was 23 and first came to know that in Japan, the average delay per train
throughout the year is a mere 0.4 minutes, including delays caused by
typhoons, earthquakes, snowfall, heavy rain, and other natural disasters. It
boggled my mind and I set out to learn more about the people who could make
this happen. That comment is not meant for everyone but only for those curious
about what makes the Japanese do the things they are renowned for.
------
MaysonL
Perhaps it's a myth?
See:
[http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2011/03...](http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2011/03/why-
no-looting-in-japan-ctd-3.html)
------
known
"The nail that stands out will be hammered down." -- Japanese Proverb
------
Aetius
Also, Japan's population is very old...average age is 45. Older people take
far less risks than young people.
------
michaelochurch
One important note: _most_ Americans are honest and some will go well out of
their way to do the right thing. I think there's actually more of the latter
(people going well out of their way to help others) in the U.S. than in many
other countries. If you lose something in the U.S. and there's a way for a
person who finds it to return it to you, your odds are well above 50% of
getting it back. Possibly 90%. This number is pretty constant across racial
and geographic lines. Oddly enough, measured honestly rates tend to be
slightly lower at the socioeconomic top and bottom than in the middle. At the
bottom, it's because of economic desperation. At the top, it's because people
are so used to a sense of winning and entitlement that they enjoy "beating the
system". I'd argue that, at all levels, class-based resentments are the reason
for lower levels of honesty among Americans.
Japan has something much closer to a "middle-class society" or classlessness
than we do. They have rich and poor, but not in the way we do, and economic
status doesn't persist over generations as in the U.S. For example, the
earthquake victims are in for a very difficult few years-- more difficult than
most people in the industrialized world ever experience-- but they're not
going to fall to the bottom of society because of this. In the U.S., they
easily could. I know PhDs in the U.S. who end up in $7/hour retail jobs after
developing health problems, losing their jobs, their insurance, and their
savings.
The biggest difference in the U.S. is that we have a large, angry underclass
that (justly) considers itself failed by society and hates it. We also have a
tiny but invincible upper class that gets away with literal robbery and tends
to set the moral pace in our society: kids in academic cheating scandals
generally say they're just preparing for the real world, and they're more
accurate than we'd like to admit. "Most people cheat" is false, but "most of
society's biggest winners are cheaters" is true.
I think the contempt for society and ethical behavior that you see in a
visible few Americans is based in social class, not anything else. Every
society has poor people, but our underclass comprises 20-40 percent of the
population. It has a mix of people who've fallen into it recently (from the
disintegrated bottom of the middle class) and who are angry, and it has
families that have been in it for tens of generations and have been nurturing
grudges forever. Also, not all looters and ruffians are in this underclass,
because there are a lot of opportunistic middle-class people who adopt "thug"
culture for kicks. In the U.S., we enable cultural illnesses (mean-spirited
conservatism, religious bigotry, lower-class "thug" culture) that other
societies have the sense of marginalize.
------
Groxx
A handful of broad claims, an abnormally high amount of data and decent
writing, and discussions here ranging everywhere. So, because someone has to
do it, and because I'm curious what his take on this is:
00000
0000000
000P11000
0000000
00000
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Why top Ivy Leaguers are the best sellers - 6g
Was having this convo with some friends of mine, who all agreed with this...<p>They sold themselves ever since they were 14 and starting high school. Selling admissions officers of their achievements, selling teachers and counselors of their desires and passions... that's the hardest part in the admissions process. The rest (getting a high GPA and high SATs) is secondary (since most applying to HYP have 4.5s and 2300+ SAT anyway - need differentiation) and honestly, pretty darn easy to obtain if one simply tries. And while they're about to graduate out of college, they're continuing to sell, sell, sell, branding and marketing themselves for consulting and banking positions.<p>Have to hand it to them, it's an awfully important life skill to have in this world.
======
toomuchcoffee
_Selling admissions officers of their achievements, selling teachers and
counselors of their desires and passions..._
Wow. I guess I'm just so glad that I got to grow up in a completely different
universe.
Where no one cared about "selling teaches and counselors of their desires and
passions..." - we cared about our desires and passions quite a lot, thank you,
_but for their own sake_. And couldn't give a rat's ass about selling an
admissions counselor on them. Even if in fact we were busting our chops to get
into the best school we possibly could -- this would have seemed like an
incredibly vain and superficial approach to getting to go where we wanted in
life. Like trying to game the system somehow, because that was the only way to
get ahead. Or flattery.
And the thought of nurturing a portfolio of extracurricular "desires and
passions" for the sake of impressing these kinds of people -- let alone for
the supposed brass rings that would supposedly be within our reach, after
years and years of such compounded drudgery and self-abasement -- really, now.
Who has time for any of that?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Bootstrap Design for Hacker-Founders - webwright
http://www.tonywright.com/2007/bootstrap-design-for-geek-powered-startups/
This post was a response to a fellow YC Winter '08 founder, but I figured it might be valuable to other folks, so I threw it up on my blog.
======
dcurtis
This is an awesome article. Lots of people confuse graphic designers with
interface and user experience designers, and they often end up with shitty
applications with pretty outer shells.
Good user experience and also pretty: wufoo.com
Pretty, but lacking user experience: imthere.com
Awesome UI: cdbaby.com
Sadly, bad user experience ("noprocrast" implementation), also not pretty
(though simple): news.ycombinator.com
~~~
dcurtis
Ahh, not cdbaby.com's default style, this one: <http://cdbaby.com/?css=plain>
------
german
Have you guys noticed the text highlight in Firefox! That's great CSS!
------
brianm
"As a startup, the first thing that you'll need is a logo."
Umh.
~~~
webwright
I was talking about from a design perspective... I think that's obvious given
the topic of the post, but I suppose I could clarify it. Jeeez. Nitpick much?
~~~
brianm
:-)
I still say "umh" to that. Are you more likely to use an app by a company with
a good logo, or an app with a good ui?
~~~
tel
Brand development is still deadly important. No one is going to use your site
if they can't remember it. If your competitors are on par with you feature-
wise, the one with the stronger brand is going to win.
That being said, if your opponents _aren't_ on par with you feature-wise,
well...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Suspected AlphaBay Admin Takes Life as Feds Close Site - TaylorGood
https://themerkle.com/suspected-alphabay-admin-takes-his-life-in-thailand/
======
dmix
Apparently he had 4 Lamborghinis and 3 houses registered under his name living
as a 'programmer' in Thailand. He wasn't exactly living inconspicuously. I'm
curious how he manged to cash out all that Bitcoin without drawing attention.
It's easy to blame criminals for being dumb after the fact but this one seems
a bit obvious... even when in Thailand. He was being reckless.
I'd imagine going from that life style to a Bangkok jail cell can be pretty
hard. Still though the trial might have been somewhat of an interesting
experience. I guess he had planned for this upon getting caught (he used a
towel).
It would probably have been far harder to hang yourself in a high security
American jail.
[https://www.google.ca/amp/s/coconuts.co/bangkok/news/canadia...](https://www.google.ca/amp/s/coconuts.co/bangkok/news/canadian-
drug-fugitive-lived-luxury-life-thailand-dying-police-custody/amp/)
------
bhouston
It is in Montreal? Then it is likely in either the AWS Montreal or OVH
Montreal datacenters.
~~~
borne0
I imagine they would have their own hardware for a site like this. It could be
any datacentre in Montreal, of which there are many to chose from.
As an aside; if I were a drug kingpin the last place on earth I would go to is
Thailand.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Installing Google Android for Mobile Browser Testing on Mac OS X - benhedrington
http://www.buildcontext.com/blog/2009/11/06/installing-android-sdk-browser-testing-mac-os-x/
======
hack_edu
If you can essentially run Android in an OS X app, then it can't be too hard
to get it running on an iPhone.
~~~
TwoSheds
It runs the whole Android system including Linux kernel. It doesn't perform
that great on a desktop, it wouldn't probably fit into iPhone at all this way
memory-wise. If it did, it would be extremely slow.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Where Should I Look For A Programmer To Partner With For My Start Up? - GaryLivingston
I am looking to find a programmer/designer or two to partner with in order to continue building my start up company's website.<p>I can only offer part ownership of the company in the form of stock issued to them. It is a legal S-Corp. How much stock depends on the amount of work and input offered. I do not have capital at this point.<p>I originally launched my site in 2005. It is a Social Magazine about all forms of art and the business of being an artist.<p>Its content is by and large about and by the community. The goal for every piece of content is to inspire and educate people.<p>33% of the profits once monetized will be donated to charity every quarter.<p>Every piece of content is linked together using a system like facebook's pages. We released that feature in 2005. This is one example of how I know my concepts and ideas of how they should be executed are still ahead of the curve.<p>In 2006 everything came to a halt because I became very ill and almost died. I was out of commission for years and my entire personality was altered for this time due to a tumor.<p>While dealing with that my original team had to take on new jobs and what capital I had raised was used up.<p>I am not looking to find a programmer to take advantage of and not compensate them what they deserve. The plan is again, to offer part ownership of this company and split income accordingly once the site is monetized.<p>I have a very extensive plan for how this entire project will scale.<p>I just don't know where to look for a potential partner to build it out with me.<p>I am based in Los Angeles but I am willing to travel between San Diego and San Francisco if there are good meet ups going on where programmers look for start ups to join.<p>If there are good places to meet programmers online please inform me of those sites.<p>Please advise me on where to seek a new partner or two. Thank you.<p>Sincerely,
Gary Livingston
======
mindcrime
You might find some useful into here:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2320545>
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2309722>
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2293542>
[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site:news.ycombinat...](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site:news.ycombinator.com+find+developers&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=)
[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site:news.ycombinat...](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site:news.ycombinator.com+find+hackers&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=)
[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site:news.ycombinat...](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site:news.ycombinator.com+find+cofounder&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=)
~~~
GaryLivingston
Thank you! Lots of fun stuff to look through!
------
codingstaff
Gary, I am not sure if developers would be interested to partner/share the
stock of non-profitable company. Usually good developers get at least one
inquiry as such a week. Therefore, they got to be very careful. Besides,
nowadays it is extremely hard to get a startup developed by an individual, you
need to find a team. I would strongly suggest to hire a team. And make sure
you hire the best of the best, not the cheapest of the cheapest. Of course, it
costs money... but... in software development you always get what you pay for
or less. I would suggest joining a solid software development team as a
marketing or sales pro and get hours-for-hours deal from them.
~~~
GaryLivingston
Sidenote: I would hire and pay a very high rate if I was able to.
Unfortunately, that illness had me out of work for years and I am just now
getting back to the job market. My savings are shot from what my medical
insurance didn't cover of my half a million in bills.
I swear I am not someone that looks to take advantage of others or unfairly
compensate myself at the expense of another. I believe in the same notion you
have about paying for the best of the best and paying what they deserve.
I just simply can not do that at this time so I can only offer what I have and
fair ownership of what they put into this.
I hate when people try to take advantage of me as a photographer. Part of why
I started this project is to undo that mentality of taking advantage of others
and using this project to establish higher rates for all creative people.
Just, one step at a time.
~~~
codingstaff
Sorry to hear about health problems you've gone through. Wish you the best
luck and, yeah, as a web developer/designer, I know it is really hard for
people in creative services nowadays.
------
codeslush
You're in LA - look up coloft - they are in santa monica and have a website of
the same name. They have a lot of events for startups and the owners are
fantastic people.
You have all kinds of hacker groups in la too. go to meetup.com and see what
you can drum up.
My observation is that LA startup scene is really heating up and I wish you
the best.
~~~
GaryLivingston
Thank you for leads to both. Coloft sounds great! I think my friend has gone
to a few of their events. So, I'll be sure to drag him with me.
I'll see what meetup.com has to offer too. Thank you again!
------
iworkforthem
You could post on the monthly "Who's hiring" thread on HN. Lots of programmers
look at it for interesting gigs.
~~~
GaryLivingston
Will do! I'll be sure to look through others first. Thank you for the
suggestion.
------
haploid
IRC
~~~
akkartik
Care to elaborate? (Assuming it's not sarcasm.)
~~~
haploid
Sure. Freenode and EFNet tend to have significant concentrations of talented
developers and developer/managers.
I think many people would be surprised at the caliber of people who idle(
usually as ops )on the various programming-related IRC channels. Of course,
these channels also attract droves of newbies looking for help, often with
elementary homework projects. But if you use a decent vetting process, sorting
signal from noise can be fairly trivial.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Git for Windows: Change non-inclusive naming - drevil-v2
https://github.com/git-for-windows/git/issues/2674
======
drevil-v2
"Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of
thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because
there will be no words in which to express it."
\- George Orwell, 1984
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Notion- all-in-one workspace for your notes, tasks, wikis, databases - middle1
https://www.notion.so/
======
PeOe
It's great to see, that people see real value in the market for project
management SaaS solutions. We started developing Zenkit
([https://zenkit.com](https://zenkit.com)) 1 1/2 years ago and have since then
seen an explosion of new and amazing solutions coming to the market. I take
that as a sign, that we're in the right market. I'm very excited about our
future, and Notion's.
------
eslaught
I looked at Notion a while ago as part of my ongoing quest to find a good
Markdown editor. Notion isn't aiming to be that, but like a lot of products in
this space, it can kind of do it depending on what exactly you're looking for.
Anyway, I went back to Emacs for Markdown, but the idea of Notion (for its
actual intended use case) still seems really cool to me.
------
middle1
Notion is not my product, but I found it today at Product Hunt. I thought it
was nothing cool at the first moment, but I really liked the idea team is
executing.
------
tomtompl
Mac and Windows? Thanks, I'll pass.
&good luck
~~~
eslaught
It has a web interface. Admittedly, their Firefox support has been less than
perfect, but it works pretty flawlessly in Chrome.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A Bloated Silicon Valley and the Madness of Crowds - mudil
https://www.ft.com/content/968f2022-6878-11e7-9a66-93fb352ba1fe?segmentId=7ac5b61e-8d73-f906-98c6-68ac3b9ee271
======
DrScump
(paywalled)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Flush+Reload side-channel attacks on secp256k1 used in Bitcoin protocol [pdf] - mukyu
http://eprint.iacr.org/2014/161.pdf
======
epaga
Here's a great ELI5 summary by reddit user "underachiever" on the reddit
discussion page linked to by p4bl0. Can't vouch for its accuracy, but it at
least makes a bit of sense to me:
Basically you run a co-process that invalidates cache lines by evicting them
out of the cache. While each process has their own virtual memory they all
share physical memory and physical memory is mapped to the cache in a lossy
fashion (because there is less cache than physical memory). So if you guess
that a particular temp variable is on cache line X you can evict it. Now if
the algorithm chooses to use that variable based on a bit of the key then you
can measure it (the overall operation). So now you know that a particular
bit(s) of the key are probably that value. The trick is to refine the attack
so your evictions are meaningful (e.g. you evict the right data and at the
right time).
Where this attack fails practicality:
* It requires the victim to be signing a lot and on demand. That is the attacker basically forces you to sign things
* The attacker needs to run an unprivileged task on your machine
Where it gets weird ...
* The attack can be placed in a completely different VM so long as it runs on the same host processor
* The attack is unprivileged
* The only way to prevent the attack is to lock down all other cores and processes while this operation is happening
~~~
p4bl0
Yes, that's pretty much it. A very similar technique was already used 2 years
ago by Zhang et al. in their paper _Cross-VM Side Channels and Their Use to
Extract Private Keys_ [1] at CCS.
[1]
[https://www.cs.unc.edu/~reiter/papers/2012/CCS.pdf](https://www.cs.unc.edu/~reiter/papers/2012/CCS.pdf)
------
p4bl0
I posted that earlier but it did not get any traction. I guess I should have
added "Bitcoin" in the link title…
Anyway, there are some reactions on the crypto subreddit
([https://pay.reddit.com/r/crypto/comments/1zmzto/sidechannel_...](https://pay.reddit.com/r/crypto/comments/1zmzto/sidechannel_attack_against_openssls_ecdsa/))
and Twitter
([https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/44123758372587520...](https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/441237583725875200)).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
CS136: Economics and Computation - mubaris
http://beta.blogs.harvard.edu/k108875/lectures/
======
montenegrohugo
Are all the materials posted here? As well as homework/assignments? Does
Harvard release this free of charge?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Javascript mode for Emacs - comatose_kid
http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/js2-mode-new-javascript-mode-for-emacs.html
======
shaunxcode
remotely related, but I've always wondered how hard it would be to do the
opposite (for those who haven't read the article he mentions in the beginning
that the round about goal of javascript mode is to eventually write emacs
extensions in javascript); Would/could/should it be possible to use Lisp in a
browser in place of javascript? you know, script type="text/lisp". Just
totally replacing javascript for dom interaction etc. with lisp. Is that
insanity or have other people thought similar things?
~~~
LogicHoleFlaw
I'd love to be able to script in a browser in multiple different languages.
I've been thinking about this lately. If we had some sort of lightweight VM
embedded in the browser which took bytecode rather than interpreted source
then many languages could successfully manipulate the DOM.
As much as I like this idea, I don't think it will gain very much traction.
Since no browser currently implements such a thing, and there's not any
standard which includes a VM for DOM manipulation, it is extremely difficult
to reach critical mass to the point that you can depend on your audience to
have access to execute any bytecode you embed in your web page.
Flash, Silverlight, and Air are VMs (I think?) which could be considered for
this sort of project, and Flash at least has very high market penetration. But
it's still a proprietary environment and I don't think I've ever seen it used
for actual DOM manipulation, rather than as a self-contained "Walled Garden"
of animations. Silverlight and Air are shooting for being platforms for rich
client-side applications but they are not designed to be first-class citizens
on the web, as part of the HTML / Javascript / CSS collection of standards.
The Google Web Toolkit takes an interesting tack on running multiple languages
in a browser. They compile their language (in this case, Java) with the
Javascript interpreter being the target platform. It's a neat idea but it
feels kind of odd to me to compile down to an interpreted language. As the
next generation of JIT Javascript interpreters come to prominence this will be
less of a performance issue and more of an aesthetic one. The advantage here
is that you can piggy-back on all of the Javascript advances as they come
along.
Interpreting lisp, or any other language, from Javascript inside the browser
feels klugey to me. It's just another layer of indirection which my gut
instinct tells me will be very leaky, with a high performance overhead. I
suppose you could write a VM in Javascript which executes compiled bytecode of
your favored language. You'd then need to write a bytecode compiler for your
language. At least you wouldn't need a separate interpreter for each language
you wish to use in your page. But if you're going to have to write a compiler
for your language (or at least a new compilation target for an existing
compiler) why don't we compile down to Javascript rather than a new bytecode
interpreter written in Javascript?
If we could get the standards bodies to bless one particular VM specification
then developers could use whichever language they like to do DOM scripting.
They could include their compiled scripts directly in the page. Javascript
would probably be the default, and the browsers would including compilers down
to this bytecode representation. That's actually not too far from what the
browsers are doing with Javascript today. There's just not a standard for what
the VM looks like.
Anyway, sorry for rambling on like that. It's Monday morning. I'd love to be
able to have the capability to use whatever language I like for scripting a
page, but I don't think it's very practical right now. Javascript is mostly
Good Enough and has a lot of momentum in the browsers. In the long run I think
that an open and standardized browser VM specification is the way to go but
who knows when that will happen? In the short term if it's very important that
you be able to use some nonstandard language for DOM scripting I think your
best bet is to compile your language down to Javascript like the GWT does.
That's an awful lot of effort though. I don't know how much advantage you will
gain from doing that as opposed to just using Javascript in the first place.
------
michaelneale
I think steve forgot the rest of his post. Short and to the point !
------
Tichy
Intriguing - I love to hear about hard programming challenges.
------
abstractbill
People who wonder what's so great about Lisp's s-expression syntax should read
the bit about indentation. _27k_ lines of code to do a good job of indenting
C-like languages!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Can you code friendship? - barce
I know this is a philosophical can of worms, but if you can describe X, does it follow that you can code X? Let's replace X with friendship. Are there any books that tackle this question? I guess I've been feeling lonely.
======
rdegges
Being a friend is pretty simple:
\- Talk to people you like.
\- Call them, message them, and get them to do stuff with you.
\- Repeat.
But in all seriousness, being a good friend and making friends is easy! Just
be willing to put yourself out there and initiate!
When I was younger, I never really understood how this stuff worked: I would
isolate myself from everyone, and somehow feel 'lonely'.
Over the past 5 or 6 years I realized that if you want a real connection with
someone, just go for it! Be friendly! Say hi! Invite people out to do stuff
with you (go to a meetup, grab coffee, tag along on a trip -- whatever).
It's a little scary at first (everything is), but it's honestly great!
I'm not sure if you're in the bay area at all, but if you are, and want a
friend, feel free to hit me up. I'm a nice guy and would be happy to hang out
-- can never have enough friends =)
I'm [email protected] on google chat and my phone number is 818-217-9229.
-Randall
~~~
barce
Hi, thanks for reaching out. Would you be a friend and help me out with my
initial question: If you can describe X, does that mean you can code X? :)
~~~
rdegges
Hah, no idea :(
I would assume so. ^^
------
MichaelCrawford
If this has been a persistent problem, I suggest group therapy.
I am absolutely serious. I spent years in group therapy, it did me a world of
good.
Before I started therapy I came very close to leaping off the top of a six-
storey building. Now I'm quite happy, and have lots of friends.
~~~
barce
Hi, don't worry, I'm not going to jump off the bridge. I just want to know the
theoretical limits of coding friendship. Despite all this "social" technology,
more people claim they are more lonely than ever. This looks like a market
opportunity. Once again: Can friendship be coded?
~~~
MichaelCrawford
Among the reasons I ride the bus and light rail, is that doing so gives me the
opportunity to meet new people.
That mostly works, but quite commonly, other commuters are staring at their
mobile devices, or listening to them. The only new friends I meet, are people
who choose not to befriend their gadgets.
My Mom likes her email, but back in the day she used to talk to people on the
phone.
There's a lot more to human companionship than what the words in text say.
Body language, for example. You don't get any of that from an email.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google Chrome 2.0 - Fast but lacking features - soundsop
http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=4404
======
arthurk
_"For Mac and Linux users, there’s still no Google Chrome for you."_
You can grab the latest nighly build for OS X here:
<http://build.chromium.org/buildbot/snapshots/sub-rel-mac/>
It works pretty well and the UI is great. However, there are still some
features missing, like the ability to delete bookmarks.
~~~
boundlessdreamz
I follow the development of Mac Chrome Pretty Closely. Here is a list of what
works and what doesn't as of build 16630. Keeping track of this at
[http://www.manu-j.com/blog/download-updated-native-google-
ch...](http://www.manu-j.com/blog/download-updated-native-google-chrome-for-
mac-os-x/230/)
What Works
* Almost all websites
* Bookmark pages
* Most visited sites
* Open link in new tab
* Open new tabs
* Omnibox
* Back, Forward, Reload
* Open link in new window
* Drag a tab to make a window
* Launch new tab
* Cut, Copy, Paste
* Keyboard shortcuts
* about:version, about:dns, about:crash, about:histograms
* Find in page
* History with search
* Form Fill
* Delete Thumbnail in New Tab Page
* Window Positions Remembered
* View Source with synatx highlighting and clickable links
What Doesn’t Work
* Open link in new tab Rev 13759
* Plugins (No flash -> No youtube)
* History Rev 16050
* Omnibox Rev 13759
* Bookmarks Bar
* Find Rev 16050
* Print
* about:network, about:memory
* Web Inspector
* Input methods such as Kotoeri (Japanese)
* Preferences (Partial implementation)
* Full Screen Browsin
------
jpedrosa
I have been using Google Chrome on Linux since about a month ago. I installed
it so I could test JavaScript programming with it as well. As Google Chrome
was still a very work-in-progress (it still is though has improved a lot) at
the time I also built a WebKit nightly to test JavaScript with a WebKit
process. Since about two weeks ago I have stopped using the WebKit standalone
process to test things as Google Chrome is not crashing and considering its
roughness it is working well enough for testing JavaScript at least. ;-)
It is super important to have Google Chrome supported on Linux as well as it
is going to make it all the more cross-platform and help with getting WebKit
quality installs everywhere so we all can share some common ground.
That said, when I am on Windows, Google Chrome is my preferred browser.
Despite being unfinished, the Linux version is coming along nicely and it's
always open right beside Firefox for me. Opera never enjoyed that status for
me however many features it came with. As a matter of fact, programming
JavaScript with Opera has been a little awkward when comparing the same code
that works OK with Firefox and WebKit and does not quite work with Opera.
I appreciate the Linux version, Google! Thanks! :-)
------
anigbrowl
I've been using Chrome almost exclusively for about 3 months now. I do miss
the rich selection of Firefox extensions, but the upside is that the core
functionality feels so fast and reliable that my overall browsing experience
is much better. And I'm using the Dev track, so 'fast and reliable' _includes_
the expected hiccups you encounter with a weekly development build.
Yes, it's imperfect (#1 annoyance: too few configuration options), and yes I
think they need to do more to speed up the extension development. But I do
love the fact that a page can blow up or die without taking the whole browser
down, and that load/new incidence times are close to zero.
------
Sephr
How is comparing Google Chrome 2, Safari 4 beta, and Firefox 3.0.10 fair?
Firefox 3.5 or 3.6 should have been tested instead.
------
Maascamp
I can not use Chrome as my browser until they get with the times and include
mouse gestures.
------
vitriolize
>"For Mac and Linux users, there’s still no Google Chrome for you."
And this is when I stopped reading. If Google was truly committed to
opensource they'd make a Linux version.
~~~
noss
A quick look-around and I find that they're working on it.
[http://build.chromium.org/buildbot/snapshots/chromium-rel-
li...](http://build.chromium.org/buildbot/snapshots/chromium-rel-linux/)
I'm sure you could help out. I mean, if you are truly committed to open
source.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
1/3 of US Homes Cost More to Build Than They're Worth - masonhensley
http://blogs.smartmoney.com/advice/2012/04/17/homes-cost-more-to-build-than-they%E2%80%99re-worth/
======
aristus
Title is editorialized and misleading. "One third of builders said that some
homes were appraised at less than they were built for" is NOT equivalent to
"One third of homes are appraised less than their worth".
------
mindslight
That's it?! Maybe one third is accurate for new-construction cookie-cutter
homes where turning undeveloped land into a neighborhood contributes to the
profit. But after pondering the financials versus replacement-cost of a metro-
Boston historical house that I'm currently involved with, I can only come to
the conclusion that building a new home (and major renovations in general!)
should be seen as _luxury spending_ on one's specific desires, _not_ justified
as some sort of nebulous "investment".
~~~
delsarto
> not justified as some sort of nebulous "investment".
I can never understand on these HGTV shows how someone does $X work to a
house, then they get appraised and someone says "you increased the value of
the house by Y%". There's even a whole show based around it which I can't
think of, where they appraise your upgrades and how much value it added.
Strictly speaking, I'd think that the moment the construction workers walked
out, you had increased the value by $X, i.e. whatever it just cost you to get
them to do the work, and from that moment on it's depreciating. Maybe there is
some "convenience" factor if you sold right then as the next person wouldn't
have to bother with the upgrade; but they're also not getting new renovations
(and presumably warranty, etc). Why is your house suddenly worth so much more
when all you did was get a kitchen guy to come in an do his thing?
~~~
Lazare
Increased the value by $X? Oh heavens no, that's far too optimistic.
You see, one of the joys of being a homeowner is that you have the option of
improving your house so it's better to live in...for you. That might mean
granite countertops, or that shade of fuchsia you LOVE on the bathroom walls,
or a hot and cold running Pepsi, or a built in movie theatre, or a library,
or...well, whatever it is you, personally, like.
We can assume that - unless you screwed up or got ripped off - that you
personally value whatever improvements you make at more than their cost. "Wow,
the main hallway is a halfpipe so I can practice my skate moves! I'd have paid
$50k for that, but it only cost me $30k to have it built! SCORE!"
But, human taste being what it is, the next guy probably doesn't value
whatever you built as highly as you do. Pretty much everyone likes stuff like
having a closet in every bedroom; that's why houses tend to have them. But not
everyone really cares about having a mirrored ceiling in the kitchen (perfect
for cake decoration!). The fact that every house doesn't have them is a good
sign that most people value this "wonderful" feature as being less valuable
than the cost to install it.
Which is why, as a general rule, and with a few very specific exceptions, any
improvement you make will always add less than $X to the market value. There's
a few areas where you _might_ be able to break even or even gain on the deal.
If there's a gaping hole in the lounge, fixing that is probably worth it. Sure
the next owner could fix it too, but you're going to have a hard time selling
it like that. If you have vintage 1970s shag carpets and avacado wallapper,
this might also be a good candidate. (Although you might luck into finding a
buyer who'll pay _more_ for the nostalgia value, I guess...)
But everything else (and especially any remodelling of an otherwise perfectly
functional kitchen or bathroom just to add nicer fittings, which is stupidly
common mistake) is almost certainly going to lose you money if you're just
looking to sell the house. If it costs $X, it will (almost) always add much
less than $X to the market value.
------
cowkingdeluxe
There's not many facts or statistics in this article, more of an anecdote. I
highly suspect it's more of a "we're mad because we can't sell houses for
insane prices like we could in 2007 so we're going to paint ourselves as the
victim."
------
kevinpet
"Cost more to build than they are worth" means "we built something in hopes of
turning a profit, and in fact, we can't sell it for as much as we planned, so
we won't turn a profit."
This isn't a mysterious conspiracy on the part of appraisers. They shouldn't
have built those houses that aren't worth enough to cover the cost of building
them.
~~~
roel_v
Did you even read the article? The point is that when people want to have a
home build, they get a quote from a builder, agree on a price, then go for a
mortgage. To get one, the house (that is yet to be built) needs to be
appraised. It's about _those_ appraisals that the article is about - the
houses are appraised at _less than they can be built for_ , even when nobody
has turned a profit yet (well the builder turns a 0.5 % profit on average,
according to the article).
~~~
kevinpet
Yes, I read the article. The bank is telling them "you are stupidly
overpaying, our risk is based on the resale value of the collateral, and we
think the collateral is only worth $X, so we are not going to loan you more
than 80% of $X."
Putting this magic voodoo phrase "less than they can be built for" in italics
does not make it any more meaningful. Some other things that can't be made for
less than they are worth: manual typewriters, augmented reality glasses, 50
foot butter sculptures of Mickey Mouse. It happens that right now in our
current housing market, there is a surplus of existing homes which means it is
not economical to built houses. Now, it seems unlikely that this is a
permanent state of affairs (since houses, unlike manual typewriters, are still
in pretty high demand).
------
meric
Just practicing thinking through this with my knowledge of finance and
economics...
The _worth_ of an _investment_ is the sum of all its discounted future
cashflows multiplied by some sort of risk factor that depends on standard
deviation of those flows, plus the value of the option of being able either to
expand or liquidate the investment at any time. The _price_ of an _investment_
can be different to their intrinsic _worth_ (which can only be estimated),
especially during peaks of booms and busts.
The _worth_ of a _consumer good_ is how much marginal benefit the consumer
derives from the good.
By saying "1/3 of US Homes Cost More to Build Than They're Worth", they imply:
1\. For new homes that are investments, the current price is too high compared
to their intrinsic worth.
2\. For new homes that are built to be lived in, somehow the marginal benefit
derived by the owners has now dipped below the cost to have built it. Dang.
Of course, [2] sounds ridiculous. So the third of homes they are referring to
must all be investments.
They want to say house prices are going to keep falling because its still too
high, and that no one is buying new homes, so fewer people will build them.
What happens if no one is building new homes? Supply is reduced...
What happens then is now left as an exercise to the reader.
------
dsil
99% of US Software costs more to write than it's worth.
------
Tangaroa
Reactions:
1\. It's worse than it sounds because home prices include land. If the article
is true, it often costs more to build a home than that home _plus the land_ is
worth.
2\. House prices are still inflated. Adjusted for inflation, houses probably
cost two to three times as much as they did ten or fifteen years ago. What has
made home building so much more expensive that the inflated home prices do not
cover the costs of building them? It's not labour; the unions were broken by
the importation of illegal immigrant labour in this time period and the labour
costs have gone down. So why are the costs so much higher?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
US bosses now earn 312 times the average worker's wage - eplanit
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/aug/16/ceo-versus-worker-wage-american-companies-pay-gap-study-2018
======
maxxxxx
"the bosses of America’s largest companies got an average pay rise of 17.6% in
2017, taking home an average of $18.9m in compensation while their employees’
wages stalled, rising just 0.3% over the year."
That's the worst part of it. Companies are split up in two sections. One that
benefits from the company's success while others get almost nothing. I see
that in my company. In meetings they celebrate increased revenue and earnings.
When I look around almost nobody except a few top guys I see benefits from
that success and instead has to wonder when his job goes to India.
There was a discussion here about increasing employee participation. I really
think we should get away from the belief that only shareholders count but also
acknowledge that employees and even the communities where the company has its
buildings have a stake.
~~~
sgslo
It seems as though there are two competing issues tied to pay inequality:
1) Increasing inequality of social power between the mega rich and the common
person
2) A feeling of unfairness as business leaders take home the lions share of
profits
#1 is a true issue, _but_ , let's be honest here, the average CEO's level pay
isn't contributing to increasing inequality. That McDonald's CEO had a yearly
take home pay of 21.7m. That's _unbelievable peanuts_ compared to the wealth
of the mega-rich. It is the multi-billionaires flexing their political muscles
and exerting influence that leads to the nasty consequences of pay inequality.
As to #2, I understand the unfairness, but fail to understand the social
consequences of it. In other words - what harm to society is being done by a
manager getting paid more than a line employee? You mentioned offshoring jobs,
but that is a separate issue, not tied to pay inequality.
~~~
jonathankoren
The problem with wealth inequality is that it's the same distorting forces of
a monopoly. A small cadre use their wealth an influence to shape politics to
serve their interests. Markets chase after small lucrative pools of customers.
(For example, luxury condos get built, but affordable housing does not.)
Education gets warped as the wealthy concentrate in small neighborhoods and
thus improving those schools, while the rest fall farther and farther behind.
The macroeconomy becomes more unstable as it's driven by the fads whims of the
few. This instability and political disenfranchisement then leads to political
instabilities and eventually sudden political upheavals where entire
political, social, and economic systems are overthrown for sake of reform, but
at the same time just leads to more extreme instability.
Until ironically, the wealthy simply leave (because who wants to stay in an a
dangerous unstable place, when you can afford to leave), and let place that
they set on fire burn to the ground, click their tongues and say, "Who knew
this would happen?"
To think of it another way, no one puts all bets on a single investment. You
diversify. That's what spreading the wealth does. It diversifies opportunity.
~~~
maxxxxx
"he wealthy simply leave (because they can afford to), and let place that they
set on fire burn to the ground,"
There was a movie while ago where the rich people lived in space in beautiful
habitats, had technology that could heal anybody while the rest had to labor
on Earth under terrible conditions. Don't remember the name but maybe the move
isn't that fictitious.
~~~
godzillabrennus
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elysium_(film)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elysium_\(film\))
Elysium is the film.
~~~
ajeet_dhaliwal
Great movie. I liked the way the regular citizens (the non leadership) of
Elysium were portrayed as largely oblivious or lacking in any care to the
sufferings on Earth.
~~~
maxxxxx
That's probably how I as middle class would look from the view of a poor
person in the third world :-).
------
weeksie
It's simple: workers have less bargaining power than they used to have so they
can't demand a share of the profits the way that those at the top can. I'm not
a fan of unions because they have the same power-structure problems that any
large organizations have, but the rise in pay inequality clearly coincides
with the decline of unions.
No idea what the answer is. Whether it's some version of ensuring a worker
advocate is on the board of a corporation or that some kind of coop ownership
scheme gives employees voting rights, hell I have no idea, but pay inequality
won't change on its own.
Workers that have done well are those who can either draw a direct line
between their contribution and profits (sales) or are scarce enough to demand
high compensation (tech workers). Most everybody else is shit out of luck from
a negotiation perspective, at least without some form of collective action.
~~~
maxxxxx
Unions have to make a comeback. Look at German unions. They are organized over
a whole industry, not just companies, have a seat on the board of directors. I
think this system works really well.
~~~
pkhagah
I'm not confident that Unions would work for huge issue that is coming up -
Mass Mechanization. There will be very few jobs Robotics will not be able to
replace in a decade or so. This will easily facilitate few people owning large
chunks of means of production. I don't see any serious solutions to this issue
on the horizon.
------
jandrewrogers
This is only the 350 highest paid CEOs in the US -- there are >50k enterprises
of substantial size in the US. The _median_ pay for CEOs per the government is
less than many medical professionals. Some CEOs receive lavish compensation
but _most_ work for wages of a Silicon Valley software engineer.
I'd much rather work as a software engineer than a CEO.
~~~
pcarolan
I love this perspective. Do you have data to support it?
~~~
onefishtwofish
> The median pay for CEOs per the government
[https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes111011.htm](https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes111011.htm)
------
roenxi
If I put my shareholder hat on I can believe that competence at the CEO level
is 312x more valuable than at the worker level.
Personally, I'm suspicious that all the extra money won't correlate with any
sort of useful increase in performance. How is paying these people more going
to encourage better decisions? It just means they'll have more comfortable
holidays. I've seen head-office politics, and believe that the system used for
promotions can tell great from terrible. But there is no way it has the
capability of picking who would be best choice to run a company out of 50
senior management figures. There is a lot of pot luck in whether the market
conditions are favorable in any given CEOs tenure. Anyone 3-4 levels away from
the frontline probably has a reasonable shot at being the best choice to
manage a large company.
~~~
village-idiot
Iirc studies have shown very little correlation between executive compensation
and company productivity/profitability.
The CEO is worth more than the typical janitor or manual laborer, you’d be
pretty hard pressed to prove otherwise. But the current compensation scheme
seems to be way out of wack with what each employee actually brings to the
table.
~~~
zimablue
I think this study has the same problem as the argument that hedge funds are a
waste of time because hedge funds don't make money on average. Imaging the
average return of hedge funds was 50%, what would happen? people would open up
more and more less and less competent hedge funds until it was a flat return
and no longer attractive.
You're measuring the results post (arguably) a market force which has impacted
the results. If paying managers more than the current average showed obvious
results, the average would go up. You also have correlation/causation.
I'm not sure if i'm pro bosses mental pay or whether I think it makes any
difference just don't buy this argument/study.
~~~
jimbokun
"I think this study has the same problem as the argument that hedge funds are
a waste of time because hedge funds don't make money on average."
Maybe they are a waste of time, on average?
~~~
zimablue
Not making money on average like I'm trying to say is a true but meaningless
statement.
But there's a difference between the statement:
"I can't make money on average by putting money into this system (this system
isn't undervalued)"
and "This system is worthless" which is kind of conflated. Like the system
will always expand to the point that there's no free cash on the table, so
looking at it and saying "on average paying more for CEOs or putting money
into a random hedge fund doesn't move the dial" has no bearing on whether
executive pay being high or hedge funds existing is keeping money off the
table (if they were smaller/lower there would be gain to expanding).
The gradient at the equilibrium is always zero, "We found that paying
developers more or less doesn't impact the average success of a firm". Yeah
because there's an equilibrium where the firms/market has decided roughly what
a developer costs, and everyone is paid close to that. That's not an argument
that developer pay should be wildly less, because if the average was moved to
"developers make $10k per year" than at THAT point, far from the equilibrium,
you'd see a big gradient that firms who paid developers more (ergo probably
got better devs) did far better.
------
anilshanbhag
Average Walmart worker earned $19,177 in 2017 while CEO Doug McMillon took
home $22.8m – a ratio of 1,188-to-one. Yes its a big number, however I don't
see anything wrong here. Walmart has around 2.3m workers, Doug's salary is
roughly $10 per worker per year. Also, $23M is chump change as he is doing a
great job in moving Walmart (just this morning Walmart stock increased 10% ==
$26B - 1000x his salary).
Salaries are only part of the equation. For example, Drew Houston (founder of
Dropbox) is worth $3 billion while an software developer at Dropbox has net
equity of less than $1 million. Thats 3000-to-1.
~~~
jmcqk6
So what about the fact that the average worker earned a salary low enough to
qualify them for foodstamps (given a household size of 2)? Basically walmart
is paying these low wages and getting subsidized by the federal government so
that their workers can eat.
Or when you say "I don't see anything wrong here" are you really just limiting
yourself to the difference between average worker salary and ceo pay?
~~~
zdragnar
Worker pay is a function of the available supply of people capable and willing
to work the job and the opportunity cost of not filling the position.
The opportunity cost of not filling a low paying job is generally quite low.
Likewise, the wages for such jobs vary quite a bit, moreso than cost-of-living
differences would account for.
If you want to price wages based on some moral virtue, you will risk losing
investors, or hurt poor people (aka your customers) by raising prices. In your
scenario, it isn't Walmart that's being subsidized, it's a community with so
many people desperate for work but not qualified enough to get a better job
that they're willing to take a job that doesn't pay enough.
~~~
aerotwelve
Don't you think there are plenty of people out there that would be willing to
do Doug's job just as well (or better) for < 22.8 million?
~~~
zdragnar
There certainly are. Some of them might even have the experience that would
lead the board to believe that they could do it successfully.
What's the point? CEO positions should be chosen by random lottery? The
company either offered a large enough chunk of money to attract the most
talented / experienced individual they could, or Doug negotiated strongly
enough to convince them that hiring him to CEO would be worth paying him that
much.
------
forinti
As the US's gini gets closer and closer to Brazil's, its politics start to
look similar also.
~~~
marcosdumay
When you marginalize people, they'll look more and more outside of society's
box.
The US is luck in that there are plenty of opportunities for non-workers
without advanced education to make their life, but there is no way their
inequality can keep increasing without those opportunities disappearing (as
they depend on a middle class). When they disappear, the only thing out of
society's box will be crime.
If you want to know how the US will become once it gets more similar to
Brazil, take a look at Brazil.
------
makecheck
The problem, as always, is that there are no _apparent_ penalties for being
Worst CEO Ever, except “fewer millions of dollars”. And the screw-ups are the
ones that make workers say “hell, pay me 1/100th of what you paid him and I
can make bad decisions too!”.
Worse, there is a scale of effect here. If you take a million dollars away
from even an above-average worker, his life savings is gone and he’s screwed
and in debt. If you take it away from an overpaid exec, he’s just a little
pissed but he’ll be fine. Heck, the excellent PR alone should make it a good
idea for companies to spread extra millions among workers, as it is
unquestionably the right thing to do morally (besides: the workers probably
deserve it due to inflation alone, the company _will_ do better due to worker
motivation, etc.).
------
village-idiot
I’m worried that this is starting to get to destabilizing levels of
inequality.
~~~
sgc
It's well beyond that already. There is just a lag between the condition and
its effect. But if you look at American politics, it seems we might be in the
midst of the destabilization process.
~~~
village-idiot
I live there, so I’m not super thrilled about this social experiment.
------
GlobalFrog
That reminds me of a study about the ancient Rome by Walter Schiedel et Steven
Friesen (The Size of the Economy and the Distribution of Income in the Roman
Empire) Link there :
[https://doi.org/10.3815/007543509789745223](https://doi.org/10.3815/007543509789745223)
To sum it up, they studied the economy of that time and noticed a few things :
the "elite" (1,5% of pop.) had about 20% of the state wealth, they studied the
other classes, and reached the conclusion that the economy structure could not
allow for more concentration of the wealth. And if you analyze the numbers,
the inequality in the USA is more important today than it was in Rome. That's
quite striking when you remember that in Rome, they had slaves, their kind of
nobility, domination of vast lands and resources...
I don't know where, but I read something else about Rome, and the parallels
with today :
\- the candidate elected to an office was the one who spend the more money on
90% of the time
\- the draft abolition led to distancing the citizens to the blood shed in
wars, and there was a rise in the use of mercenaries ("private contractors")
\- the empire expanding, being a citizen was not being simply a white guy born
close to the country.
All those three points were true for Rome and they are today true also for
most of the Western countries. In Rome, it led first to the fall of the
Republic, the rise of the empire, the growth of inequalities and its fall. So
my guess is that all Western countries should think about it, because they all
have some similarities with this society evolution course.
~~~
orf
The elite also retreated into their estates, away from the law. This led to
perverse insentives where they would withhold fighting men from the state,
illegally, as the empire desperately needed men to replenish losses.
There are many parallels to draw, not all are valid given the 1500 year
difference, but... Yeah.
------
pome
Maybe somewhere there are CEO/Workers salary statistics by country in 2018?
I'm found only this[0], but 2014 years.
[0] [https://www.statista.com/statistics/424159/pay-gap-
between-c...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/424159/pay-gap-between-ceos-
and-average-workers-in-world-by-country/)
------
pitaj
"The society that puts equality before freedom will end up with neither. The
society that puts freedom before equality will end up with a great measure of
both."
\- Milton Friedman
~~~
ionised
Milton Friedman was one of a few economists responsible for what would become
the neoliberal economic policies that free markets are infallible that we have
today.
Policies that have benefitted primarily the already wealthy amassers of
capital and which are in large part responsible for the massive income
inequality and erosion of labour rights that is present for the first time
since the Gilded Age.
His idea of human beings as rational, self-interested economic actors that is
a ludicrously narrow model of the human being and has been disastrous for the
working and middle classes all over the developed world.
Quotes from Friedman are worth nothing to me, personally.
~~~
fbonetti
> His idea of human beings as rational, self-interested economic actors that
> is a ludicrously narrow model of the human being
Sure, but in order to understand human behavior on the scale of millions of
people making billions of transactions, you need to start with a simple axiom
and move on from there. I think people hear the word "self-interest" and think
"greed", and assume that mainstream economics must be predicted on a very
cynical view of human beings. That's not the case at all. We all want to
survive. We can't possibly understand the individual needs of other people
outside of a small circle of people that we love and care about. None of us
are omniscient. The beautiful thing about markets is that none of us need to
have perfect information in order to participate. By simply buying the things
we need and selling things the things we don't, prices emerge in a totally
decentralized way.
If you can think of a more accurate way to describe human economic motives,
I'd like to hear it.
> has been disastrous for the working and middle classes all over the
> developed world.
Capitalism has lifted billions out of poverty. Sure, there's a large gap
between the richest and poorest, but the poorest people of the world are also
materially better off than at any other point in human history. I don't see
how this is a bad thing.
~~~
s73v3r_
That doesn't mean Capitalism can't do better. I'm extremely tired of this
"Capitalism did good things once! Why are you criticizing Capitalism?" trope
when talking about the very obvious flaws of it.
~~~
fbonetti
I agree. It's definitely not perfect, and I do view the rising inequality and
stagnant wages as a serious issue. I just find it alarming that when people
criticize capitalism, they usually advocate for some variety of full blown
socialism, which has been tried many times before and failed disastrously
every single time.
I don't know what the solution is. Every government intervention has the
potential to distort the market and create corrupt/perverse incentives. Rent
control is a great example of something that sounds nice on paper but ends up
increasing housing costs as a result. I'm generally in favor of expanding the
welfare state but I think we should be extremely cautious in doing so.
~~~
s73v3r_
"I just find it alarming that when people criticize capitalism, they usually
advocate for some variety of full blown socialism, which has been tried many
times before and failed disastrously every single time."
Scandinavia says hi. And those "disastrous" times you're talking about are
more the result of dictators, than any economic system used.
~~~
fbonetti
> Scandinavia says hi.
Idk, maybe I'm spending too much on the internet but it seems like the
discussion around inequality has shifted from "let's increase the welfare
state" to "let's dismantle capitalism and give socialism a try". There seem to
be a lot of people these days that call themselves Marxists or capital-S
Socialists, and even some who are apologists for the likes of Stalin and Mao.
These people are everywhere on Reddit and HackerNews.
I'm all for the Scandinavian model (which, to be clear, is capitalism with a
large welfare state and a sovereign wealth fund, not socialism), but do I want
a planned economy or a dictatorship of the proletariat? No, because it doesn't
work.
> And those "disastrous" times you're talking about are more the result of
> dictators, than any economic system used.
Socialists use this argument a lot but I can't think of a scenario in which
socialism doesn't eventually devolve into fascism. Even if the means of
production are owned by the workers, the workplaces are run democratically,
and resources are allocated by direct consensus, you'll still need to use
coercion to force people to participate in the economy. If people in village A
need more grain and the farmers in village B don't want to produce more grain,
do you point a gun to the farmers' heads and make them produce more grain?
Disagreements will still happen in Socialist societies. People will still
fundamentally be selfish. People will still want to barter with each other and
enrich themselves through their labor, intellect, and unique talents. How do
you seize peoples' property, prevent them from bartering and hoarding, and
force them to participate in a planned economy without a massive and violent
state apparatus?
The great thing about capitalism is that it recognizes the inherent self-
interestedness of human beings and channels it into something that is (mostly)
positive for society. Socialism starts with the premise that human beings
would behave in higher-minded way if only they had more economic power, which
I think is a flawed assumption and the reason why socialist economies will
always fail.
~~~
s73v3r_
"Idk, maybe I'm spending too much on the internet but it seems like the
discussion around inequality has shifted from "let's increase the welfare
state" to "let's dismantle capitalism and give socialism a try". "
Given how shitty capitalism is treating people right now, that's a pretty
valid viewpoint.
"There seem to be a lot of people these days that call themselves Marxists or
capital-S Socialists, and even some who are apologists for the likes of Stalin
and Mao. These people are everywhere on Reddit and HackerNews."
So what?
"Socialists use this argument a lot but I can't think of a scenario in which
socialism doesn't eventually devolve into fascism."
I can't really think of a scenario in which capitalism doesn't either.
"The great thing about capitalism is that it recognizes the inherent self-
interestedness of human beings and channels it into something that is (mostly)
positive for society."
This isn't a positive, and it does not channel it into positives for society.
Captialism encourages things like dumping waste into rivers. How is that a
positive for society?
------
close04
Getting a big payout is not the problem. Getting a big payout that's
disproportional to the company's performance or profitability is. Getting a
golden parachute while the plane is diving should not be an option.
Bonus/malus.
~~~
s73v3r_
Agreed. I'd wager that most people on this board, if they fuck up at their job
and get fired, are not going to get any kind of golden parachute. They're just
going to be kicked out on their ass.
------
eeZah7Ux
> Bezos ... took home $1.7m in 2017 while the average Amazon worker earned
> $28,446 - a ratio of 59-to-one.
The claim is highly misleading. Bezos owns a large amount of Amazon stocks.
The stock value growth is a huge extra to his salary.
~~~
Waterluvian
Which is pretty great way to bind Performance to compensation.
~~~
phil248
And a truly great way to exacerbate economic inequality.
------
locklock
What are the chances that this has anything to do with merit? It's just
another example of the same thing happening everywhere else in the American
economy: people who are already rich taking more and more money for
themselves, leaving much less for the rest of it. Of course there are people
whose job it is to tell us that yes, these CEOs actually deserve this and have
earned it, but that's just another part of the scam.
------
HugoDaniel
How do I become a US boss ?
~~~
xkcd-sucks
I became my own boss through a program called AmWay, and you can too. Email me
for details
~~~
selimthegrim
Even as a troll, that shit isn’t funny here. I’ve seen college students at
Tulane trying to “finance their education” by selling Cutco. These guys are
not from poor families.
------
Shivetya
I am still of the opinion that you need to look at the overall compensation of
the company versus how much the bosses are taking in. this type of comparison
can be made in many industries from sports to movies as well. there are always
people at the top of the food chain but for some reason we single out
corporate leaders rather than sports and movie stars. heck we could sit back
and compare the pay and benefits of the leaders in politics to the rank and
file at the bottom of their party or typing pools too.
my local university pays over a million plus benefits to its
chancellor/president, how does that compare to the cafeteria workers or
sanitation people of the university? a public funded university.
it is all perspective, you are being led by the nose to look everywhere but
behind the curtain. behind that curtain you will find many who want to slap
others with rules they will quietly excuse themselves from or word in such a
way as to miss them. it is exploitation of jealousy for political benefit
------
jeffreyrogers
I wonder what this looks like if you break it down by industry and firm size.
It seems odd that this sort of thing can persist (and increase) over time
since you'd expect competition within industries to drive this down over time.
~~~
dantheman
Just to flip your assumptions around here's an idea; no personal knowledge
here, just a potential alternate narrative.
Perhaps competition drives executives salaries faster than general workers.
There is intense competition for those who can have a large impact on the
bottom line. In tougher/faster paced competitive environment the demand for
qualified/experienced individuals must be intense.
~~~
maxerickson
I imagine much of the explanation is firm size growing.
You don't have to scrape out a lot of Walmart's revenues to get a huge salary.
You have to scrape out a pretty big chunk of the revenue of a 50 person firm
to get a large salary, never mind a huge one.
------
titzer
I'll be flamed or downvoted or both, but food for thought:
After a long time (most of my adult life) as a small-l libertarian believing
in the rationality of free markets, the rule of the invisible hand, and heck,
the sheer _morality_ of profitability, after seeing what wreckage that has
brought to societal institutions, the internet, the environment, and generally
speaking, what growthism has done to our ability to plan long-term as a
species, as nations, societies, and what selfishness and greed has led us all
to, I have gradually come to the conclusion that the world should institute an
overall personal wealth cap that _specifically_ targets the people at the top.
Concretely, I think that no human should be allowed to have personal assets of
more than $~100 million in any way, shape or form.
Yeah, I know, it's unworkable. Unfair! Impossible to enforce! It won't fix our
financial mess! It'll suppress growth and innovation! How do you expect people
to motivate themselves if they can't make a billion dollars!?
Well I'll humbly submit that anybody who feels driven to earn a billion
dollars--that's enough greenbacks that if you thumbed through them, one a
second every second of every single day of every day of the year, it'd take
you 30 years just to count them--has a severe mental illness called _greed_. A
billion dollars is 100 lifetimes of living 100 years at $100,000/yr living
standard. It's just insane to think that we're OK with this because they
"earned it". Horseshit. Jeff Bezos's $150 billion is _15,000 lifetimes_ worth.
Billionaires are accidents. They are artifacts of hierarchy that we endure,
cowed, because we don't have stomach to see how empty our souls are and _do
something about it_. No billionaire has ever earned 100 lifetimes of wealth.
~~~
guru4consulting
To put the 15,000 lifetimes in perspective... there has been 7,500 generations
of humans since the emergence of Homosapiens. Civilization started only 500
generations ago..
------
ratsz
The CEO of my company could give each of his 10,000 employees $1M and he'd
still have a higher net worth than all of them combined.
------
tribesman
it's the same story in football. I am an average player and Ronaldo makes a
lot of money, while i nearly went broke playing football.
Pretty, sure most people don't understand what it takes to be a good CEO, so
they'll be crying inequality. Inequality comes from the nature.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
DNS results now being manipulated in Turkey - makmanalp
Here is a valid reason for adopting DNSSEC or DNSCrypt. It's likely they're
using deep packet inspection. Using VPNs seems like the only valid solution
here for now.<p>Result from "dig youtube.com":<p><pre><code> ; <<>> DiG 9.8.3-P1 <<>> youtube.com
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 21333
;; flags: qr rd; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0
;; WARNING: recursion requested but not available
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;youtube.com. IN A
;; ANSWER SECTION:
youtube.com. 86091 IN A 195.175.254.2
;; Query time: 25 msec
;; SERVER: 8.8.4.4#53(8.8.4.4)
;; WHEN: Sat Mar 29 13:59:52 2014
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 45
</code></pre>
Result from "dig youtube.com @4.2.2.2":<p><pre><code> ; <<>> DiG 9.8.3-P1 <<>> youtube.com @4.2.2.2
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 61182
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 11, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;youtube.com. IN A
;; ANSWER SECTION:
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.38
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.40
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.33
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.35
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.41
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.37
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.39
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.36
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.34
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.32
youtube.com. 197 IN A 173.194.113.46
;; Query time: 78 msec
;; SERVER: 4.2.2.2#53(4.2.2.2)
;; WHEN: Sat Mar 29 14:33:53 2014
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 205
</code></pre>
Clip from the whois result on 195.175.254.2:<p><pre><code> inetnum: 195.174.0.0 - 195.175.255.255
netname: TR-TELEKOM-960902
descr: Turk Telekomunikasyon Anonim Sirketi
country: TR</code></pre>
======
alex1
Can you do a traceroute to 8.8.4.4? If it's actually reaching Google's
network, then yeah, they're doing deep packet inspection on DNS traffic. If
not, they're probably just routing 8.8.4.4 to a DNS server they control.
If their goal is to manipulate traffic to www.youtube.com (probably to block
access to certain videos), another solution would be for YouTube to require
SSL for all connections coming from Turkish IPs. Of course, this wouldn't work
if they got some Turkish (or other) CA to sign a bogus www.youtube.com
certificate.
EDIT: As lawl points out, trying to require SSL on www.youtube.com won't work
either, since they could just do an sslstrip type attack.
EDIT 2: Proof that they are in fact messing with routes to Google Public DNS
anycast addresses (they're doing to same to OpenDNS):
[https://twitter.com/esesci/status/449902883933126659](https://twitter.com/esesci/status/449902883933126659)
~~~
lawl
> _another solution would be for YouTube to require SSL for all connections
> coming from Turkish IPs._
What? NO! They are messing with the DNS results from 8.8.4.4 (Google DNS)
Too early for TLS to do anything. Maybe with HSTS, but I still doubt that HSTS
is any effective against state level MITM.
~~~
alex1
You're right. Maybe if they turned on and required SSL for everyone visiting
www.youtube.com _and_ added www.youtube.com to Chrome's preloaded HSTS list
_and_ somehow got everyone to use Chrome. Sadly, this probably won't happen,
but DNSSEC adoption probably won't happen either. Even with DNSSEC, they could
still do deep packet inspection on HTTP traffic going to YouTube IPs and
initiate MITM attacks that way.
~~~
psykovsky
Why not ditch the current DNS system and use Namecoin? If you have to force
some piece of software into users computers, let's do it right at least...
------
bayesianhorse
Seems like Erdogan is hell-bent on restricting free speech in Turkey.
Somehow it is comforting how abysmally bad he is at doing that though...
~~~
mrtksn
The elections are tomorrow and it's prohibited by law to broadcast political
rallies on the last day.
The pro-government TV channels are broadcasting Erdogan's rallies while other
TV channels respect the law(and they are afraid of disproportional penalties
if they do the same).
So today only Erdogan is on national TV.
~~~
bayesianhorse
So every voter in Turkey essentially knows what Erdogan is doing. So nobody
who understands democracy should vote for Erdogan.
If however not enough people understand democracy ...
~~~
mrtksn
Erdogan claims that there is a "global conspiracy to stop the rise of Turkey"
and people who believe him don't care much about the unlawful things he is
doing because you know, Turkey is under attack and extraordinary measures
should be taken to protect the country.
Polls show that %77 of the population believe the corruption case against the
government is real.
However the situation is really complicated. Without going into details, I
have to say that probably there is a real conspiracy orchestrated by the
Gulen(islamic cleric allegedly with big influence on the judiciary & law
enforcement) movement because some of the leaked tapes seems to be collected
illegally.
The Gulen movement was close ally with the government till recently. They
probably collected evidence about the corruption in the government since years
and waited until the right moment comes to start the criminal case. The PM
responded by demonizing the whole movement and suspending the rule of law.
The allegations against the Gulen movement are not proven at all but few years
ago the same prosecutors started a case against the military and lot's of
unlawful things took place during the whole trail process. That time the PM
Erdogan strongly supported the case but today he claims that this was a
conspiracy against the Turkish army.
Many lawyers agree that lots of the evidence against the military was
fabricated and many people were imprisoned for political reasons.
Back then a sex tape of the main opposition party leader was leaked and PM
Erdogan used it as a political tool. Today the same PM claims that these leaks
about corruption are invasion of his privacy. Another leak shows that the PM
was involved in the filming and distribution of the sex tape of the opposition
party.
It's just huge mess here.
~~~
mercurial
Yes, it's really nasty. Three groups with different agendas and none of them
interested in democracy or the rule of law.
------
ttflee
[sarcasm] Having been enduring this kind of shit for years in mainland China,
I am glad to see that it migrated to the (sort of) 'free' world, eventually!
[/sarcasm]
BTW, I have to manoeuvre some IP addresses of the CDNs in /etc/hosts in order
to get access to github.com today, and some others for stack overflow.com last
week. Interference from those who have power really sucks!
CDNs nowadays are so vulnerable to political issues, and some CDNs seems to be
hurt by extended non-specific attacks/blocks to some other sites sharing the
same IP addresses, due to some unrelated reasons, which makes me feel
nostalgic to the web before CDNs.
------
davidu
DNSSEC wouldn't stop this... unless the resolver knew to require DNSSEC and
ignored unsigned responses (which is unlikely).
DNSCrypt could help here... but chances are their middleware would just barf
on it.
You need something more evasive.
~~~
axaxs
It wouldn't prevent getting the wrong answer, sure. But a smart resolver would
see DS records at the parent and recognize it as an unsigned, thereby invalid,
response.
~~~
nahlio
Thus, DNSSEC doesn't protect against censorship.
It's hilarious that people are saying DNSSEC can be used in Turkey (or
anywhere else) to defend against censorship. Either they don't know what
they're talking about or don't care about having an honest discussion. Or
both.
------
sanqui
I didn't see this posted on HN yet - Turekey is also blocking the Tor
Project's website: [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/03/when-tor-block-not-
tor...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/03/when-tor-block-not-tor-block)
------
mrtksn
I can confirm NS lookup to Google DNS, when done using the national cable ISP
network, returns spoofed results.
here: [http://i.imgur.com/jfZS31C.png](http://i.imgur.com/jfZS31C.png)
------
wila
Google also offers IPv6 public DNS servers, maybe that helps? (probably not
though as they might not yet have turned on ipv6)
2001:4860:4860::8888 and 2001:4860:4860::8844
Also look at the other links that user lemonade posted here.
------
vijayp
Too bad DNSSEC isn't widely used; signing the records would prevent this from
working. The government could still block the DNS requests, though.
~~~
davidu
As I pointed out above, DNSSEC doesn't stop this.
I am not just a DNSSEC hater, but the level of misunderstanding on DNSSEC is
quite large.
When victim issues a query for youtube.com, I can intercept that query and
hand back whatever response I want. Unless the victim KNOWS IN ADVANCE (which
DNSSEC doesn't offer) that the response should be DNSSEC signed, they will
accept my forged response.
DNSSEC solves problems we don't really have, and ignores the ones we do.
~~~
wtallis
Can't you say the same thing about users who don't know to expect their
connection to use TLS? What you're claiming as the problem isn't a problem
with DNSSEC, but with the absence of DNSSEC. If DNSSEC were the default, then
this attack couldn't happen.
------
gaoshan
"Using VPNs seems like the only valid solution"
But a government like China interferes with even VPNs (more so outside of the
greater Shanghai and Beijing metro areas, in case anyone is sitting in those
areas saying "My VPN works great"... they permit it and can block or interfere
with it anytime they like) so I don't think they are really a solution. In
China, nothing really works if the authorities don't want it to. VPNs are
degraded to the point of being unusable, SOCKs proxy over SSH is the same, TOR
is unusably slow, etc. Unfortunately, I don't think there really IS a solution
in the face of determined governmental interference.
~~~
rahimnathwani
Yes, the Chinese government can interfere with or block VPNs whenever they
want.
However, don't discount the impact of bandwidth/peering issues on VPN
performance. In most cases, I've found that VPN throughput over TCP (either
PPTP or OpenVPN) is similar to HTTP throughput to the same host.
You can test this yourself. Put a file on your VPN server, and try to retrieve
it over HTTP. If you're worried that the latency is limiting the throughput,
use wget to make several connections at the same time, and sum up the transfer
speeds.
Finally, you're right - there is no (technical) solution in the face of
determined governmental interference.
------
roeme
Please correct your second query, asking for the A RR of
"youtube.com\@4.2.2.2." is needlessy wrong
~~~
makmanalp
Ooops, missed a space there. Fixed, thanks!
------
Jugurtha
SSH tunneling also works. It's cheap and easy to set up.
~~~
michh
By default using a SOCKS proxy (which, using ssh -D is probably the easiest
and most common way to do this) in most browsers doesn't solve this problem as
DNS resolving is still done locally.
As they're messing with DNS, you'll still be connecting to their evil version
of YouTube through your SSH tunnel. In Firefox this behaviour can be changed
by toggling network.proxy.socks_remote_dns in about:config.
Of course, setting up an actual tunnel (i.e. on a lower network layer) would
be better but that's a bit more complicated to do.
~~~
alyxr
Why isn't it default behavior to route dns through socks?
~~~
michh
AFAIK it's a legacy thing. SOCKS4 didn't support it, SOCKS5 did but using that
functionality changes behaviour depending on which SOCKS version the remote
end happens to use.
------
cryptologics
this is what I get with VPN and without VPN
[http://i.imgur.com/XNtDGYq.png](http://i.imgur.com/XNtDGYq.png)
------
acd
Wont stop tor or onion addresses
You can do the same setup as
[http://piratebrowser.com/](http://piratebrowser.com/)
------
M4v3R
Excuse my ignorance, but does anybody knows why they are doing it? Is there
any piece of news I missed?
~~~
higherpurpose
Yes, you missed quite a bit. They tried to block Twitter and Youtube, and then
people started using Google DNS, OpenDNS or others to circumvent the block.
Some leaks about Erdogan's corruption and false flag attack in Turkey to blame
Syria and go to war with it came out in those channels, and he wanted people
to stop talking about it or see the leaks. I think some elections are in
Turkey soon, too.
------
lemonade
There are many more public DNS servers out there, too many to block.There is a
nice comprehensive list here:
[http://public-dns.tk/](http://public-dns.tk/)
You might also be interested in [https://dnscrypt.eu](https://dnscrypt.eu).
~~~
est
They mangle all udp port 53 data.
~~~
leath
Actually not all port 53 as there are some DNS servers still accessible and
actually resolves stuff fine.
------
bohm
namecoin would fix this:
[https://www.namecoin.org/](https://www.namecoin.org/)
------
STSW
Hide my ass will do a good job here..
~~~
Jugurtha
Yeah, tried that. It's really slow most of the time, plus many websites will
warn you or delay you (Google will display a message). Plus I wouldn't trust
my data going through those machines.
As I said, I much rather get my own hosting (even shared hosting) for as cheap
as 4 bucks a month, and tunnel my traffic through that machine.
But HMA is a valid solution for someone who's not willing to pay.
------
Fasebook
It's about time Turkey took a step towards US in controlling the flow of
information. I mean, how long has this been going on here, undetected? The
obvious solution, Turkey, is to target specific individuals after digging into
their background, confirming that they are not computer experts before
attacking them via their computer.
------
hadoukenio
The NSA and GCHQ have been doing this for years, so why complain about Turkey
doing this? The only difference I can see is targeting individuals vs
targeting the general population.
~~~
javajosh
Your tacit assertion is that if something wrong is done for years, and you
find out it's done one more time, you shouldn't bother complaining about it.
People like you have existed for all time, and will always exist, but your
views truly don't matter: change comes because people continue to fight for
what is right, despite the balance of years. Slavery on US soil had been legal
and "normal" for hundreds of years, but that didn't stop people from
"complaining" about it, and eventually changing it. Women's suffrage, same
story. Wanton violation of our 4th Amendment rights in the digital age will
proceed accordingly.
~~~
hadoukenio
See my reply to the other comment.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Canadian Conservatives commit to Internet surveillance. - mrcharles
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5733/125/
======
joshes
_The first prong mandates the disclosure of Internet provider customer
information without court oversight. Under current privacy laws, providers may
voluntarily disclose customer information but are not required to do so. The
new system would require the disclosure of customer name, address, phone
number, email address, Internet protocol address, and a series of device
identification numbers._
Wow. The key phrase "without court oversight" is indicative of, at every
conceivable level, a massive, gaping hole for trucks of corruption to be
driven through. Ridiculous abuses.
_The second prong requires Internet providers to dramatically re-work their
networks to allow for real-time surveillance. The bill sets out detailed
capability requirements that will eventually apply to all Canadian Internet
providers. These include the power to intercept communications, to isolate the
communications to a particular individual, and to engage in multiple
simultaneous interceptions. Moreover, the bill establishes a comprehensive
regulatory structure for Internet providers that would mandate their
assistance with testing their surveillance capabilities and disclosing the
names of all employees who may be involved in interceptions (and who may then
be subject to RCMP background checks)._
Double wow. It seems unnecessarily close to turning each Canadian ISP into
another branch of the Canadian government's surveillance agencies. These
politicians want to _force_ providers into restructuring their networks and
systems so that they can be used as a tool for the Government's every covert
whim... AND subject the employees of these providers to background checks so
that they can be trusted with this unnecessary, malevolent work shoved in
their laps?
Insane.
~~~
cperciva
_It seems unnecessarily close to turning each Canadian ISP into another branch
of the Canadian government's surveillance agencies._
Only if you consider Bell Canada to be a branch of CSIS. None of the
requirements being proposed for ISPs go beyond what is already required for
telephone networks -- and unlike phone conversations, it's easy to encrypt
your internet communications.
~~~
joshes
Honest question: does the RCMP require background checks for employees of
civilian telephony providers?
~~~
cperciva
Employees of phone companies generally? No, of course not.
Employees who have access to the wire-tap systems? I'm sure they do.
~~~
joe_the_user
Can you back that up with anything other than your personal certainty.
~~~
cperciva
I have reasons to believe this, but none I can present here.
------
mrcharles
Canadians really need to be aware of what this election could mean for the
internet. OpenMedia.ca is running a campaign of "Vote for Internet" which is
interesting, but I don't think they are approaching it in a way that will have
any real weight.
Canadians need to make sure that the internet is an election issue, and not
just ridiculous stuff like this, we also have to worry about C32 (the
copyright bill), internet billing, etc.
~~~
pasbesoin
This part summarizes one thing I particularly noted. From Geist's description,
the Conservatives appear to be trying to force this through with little or no
debate -- and, presumably, if they can pull it off an equal lack of press:
_There are several concerns with the Conservatives lawful access plans.
First, it bears noting that these bills have never received extensive debate
on the floor of the House of Commons and never been the subject of committee
hearings. Police officers may support the legislation, but there has never
been an opportunity to question them on the need for such legislation or on
their ability to use lawful access powers if the bills become law. Federal and
provincial privacy commissioners have expressed deep concerns about these
bills, yet they have never had the opportunity to air those concerns before
committee. Internet service providers, who face millions in additional costs -
presumably passed along to consumers - have never appeared before committee.
By making a commitment to passing lawful access within 100 days, the
Conservatives are undertaking to pass legislation with enormous implications
for the Internet that has never received parliamentary scrutiny and will
receive limited attention._
~~~
RyanMcGreal
> the Conservatives appear to be trying to force this through with little or
> no debate
That's why they want a majority of seats in the House of Commons: it gives
them a de facto dictatorship for four years.
~~~
caf
From what I hear, the domination of the Bloc Quebecois in Quebec makes that a
pretty hard target to reach.
------
tlb
What would go wrong in society if the internet and phone system were totally
un-tappable by government and people could easily communicate in complete
secrecy?
Every government seems to want to intercept communications against the
people's wishes. What do they understand that I don't?
~~~
kijinbear
Proposals like this can win votes from law-enforcement circles. After all,
warrantless disclosures and always-ready surveillance equipment would allow
cops to gain information about a person with just one phone call. They hate
having to follow procedure, especially if that procedure involves waiting for
a judge to issue an order.
There's also the more dramatic explanation about how this all boils down to a
power struggle between the haves and the have-nots, but I prefer the making-
cops-happier explanation. There are plenty of good cops in every country, but
law enforcement has a lot of solidarity built into its ranks, so police-
related groups can sway many votes. Harper would do anything for a few
thousand extra votes.
~~~
adestefan
It's also an issue of costs. If the government can hold up device/protocol X
and say your equipment must interact with X, then it makes legal surveillance
cheaper.
------
jrockway
I don't really understand why so many politicians are writing laws that make
invasions of privacy possible "without a warrant". Why don't they just require
a warrant? Then there are checks and balances, and everyone's happy.
~~~
kijinbear
Warrants are issued by judges. There are few things that a politician hates
more than having to answer to a judge.
All of the Internet surveillance and censorship policies proposed and
implemented around the world attempt to bypass judges. USA (Patriot Act),
Australia (mandatory filtering), and now Canada. The usual excuse, of course,
is that things on the the Internet move too quickly to wait for due process to
take its course.
~~~
jrockway
Aren't judges politicians?
~~~
__hudson__
In Canada judges aren't elected so technically I wouldn't call them
politicians.
------
jhack
Get out there and vote, people. The Conservatives have been far too dangerous
with a minority, a majority would be even worse.
------
Cyndre
And one aspect that no one is touching on is unsecured wireless hotspots. What
is the implications of this for Safeway, or any other company that runs a
customer friendly wifi access network?
Say goodbye to those conviences as well. ISP's will need waivers for customers
running unsecured networks, not to mention potential liability when your
supplying wireless devices to your customers.
Like gun control the only people this will punish is law abiding citizens.
------
gruseom
I don't have time to work on this, but am willing to do my bit as a citizen.
What, besides emailing candidates, would help?
~~~
mrcharles
I wish I knew. The liberals aren't a whole lot better at this point, having
had their fingers in a similar pie some years back.
I guess at this point, try and oust the Conservatives and hope for the best.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fred Wilson: A Lot Can Happen In Five Years - lrm242
http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2009/11/a-lot-can-happen-in-five-years.html
======
Alex3917
"Things take longer in the short run but they happen faster in the long run."
The way I've heard it is that most people overestimate what they can
accomplish in a day, but underestimate what they can accomplish in a
week/month/year.
------
StrawberryFrog
I've heard it phrased as "We overestimate change in the short run, and
underestimate it in the long run"
[http://www.boingboing.net/2008/01/03/roy-amara-
forecaster.ht...](http://www.boingboing.net/2008/01/03/roy-amara-
forecaster.html)
E.g. it doesn't take long to go from "OMG online Social networking"? this will
change everything! To "eh, my life is still the same". Then year later, you
notice how much your social life has been slowly but totally extended and
rearranged.
------
davidmathers
Ray Kurzweil also likes to point this out. It's his explanation for why we
don't appreciate how fast things are actually changing.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: advice for working with a bad programmer - mxmpawn
I'm working at a startup with another programmer, the founders are business guys and they don't even look at the code.<p>We're working on two different applications which communicate through different API calls. The problem is the other guy has really bad coding practices(doesn't use version control, doesn't know how to debug code, writes overly complex code for simple things, ...), takes a lot of time to get something done and when he does the api doesn't work as intended. As my services depend on him, this results in a big waste of time.<p>I tried suggesting him to improve in person and by email but I keep getting ignored.<p>The project manager(and founder) doesn't seem to care or realize what's happening because I don't see him telling anything about this to the programmer.<p>It's an interesting startup, good networking possibilities, good pay, work at home, twenty hours per week so it's hard for me to quit.
We both work at home.<p>What would you do in this situation?
======
7Figures2Commas
Since it sounds like the other developer you're working with isn't going away
any time soon, you have two simple options:
1\. Deal with it. If you're being paid well, like working from home and nobody
is (yet) concerned that it's taking you longer to deliver because of the other
developer's shortcomings, you can learn to live with the situation and do your
best to be as productive as possible in the 20 hours you're being paid for
each week.
2\. Quit. If your happiness ultimately requires that you work with competent
people, you should seek out other opportunities that will give you the ability
to do so.
------
hkarthik
My advice in this situation would be to talk to the founder and ask them to
hire someone else and let this guy go.
If they won't, you should probably just quit. You will be carrying this
individual for a long time, and it may take a third or fourth person coming on
before it becomes more obvious that this individual is a problem.
In situations like this, the founders should have hired on a technical lead
and have both of you reporting to the lead. Or one of them should be technical
enough to be the lead. I would suggest looking for opportunities that are
managed in this way in the future.
------
julianpye
As you mention that you both work from home, but that you met him in person,
it sounds as if you're locally close together. As such the best thing would be
to work together for one day. Think XP pair programming and start off with
version control. Many people would like to learn better techniques, but need a
non-stressful environment such as pair programming for it. Since he writes
complex code for simple things, it sounds as if he is struggling and he may
have a hard time learning more.
------
sharemywin
I think the biggest issue is the founders aren't working to fix the problem.
But it might not be as big a problem right now. I would keep them in the loop
but their first concerns should be deliverying a fantastic user experience and
getting initial users. tThe backend code will probably need to be rewriten
anyway to scale.
------
mattwritescode
Dont give them any responsibility, tell them there rubbish and generally dont
be nice to them. Make sure you tell them the reason you are being horrible is
because there crap at there job. It will do one of two things to them.
Either, make them leave, or make them want to improve themselves.
~~~
PencilAndPaper
Terrible advice! Stressing people out typically makes them less competent and
more prone to error. Teenage passive aggressive drama rarely works well in the
workplace... or life in general.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fisherman Interactive Music Video - andrewstuart
http://andeinerseite.video/
======
andrewstuart
Here's some explanation as to what this is. Seems extremely well done.
[https://www.unit9.com/project/kontra-k/](https://www.unit9.com/project/kontra-k/)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Most effective path to become a solid systems practitioner? - fizwhiz
Context: I'm a mid-tier dev at a BigCo, and I was never classically trained as a computer scientist. Lately, I've been interested in problem spaces where having a deeper systems knowledge (think databases, streaming systems, operating systems, distributed systems etc.) is incredibly beneficial. I haven't found a straight forward path to learn all this short of maybe doing a Masters degree.<p>Is there a set/sequence of resources/MOOCs that HN could recommendation on getting ramped up on these topics. I understand that it will likely be a multi-month journey at the very least, but I'm tired of hitting a ceiling on what I'm able to contribute to due to my lack of knowledge.
======
basetensucks
Starting to feel like a parrot since I’ve recommended this book a few times
already on HN but Designing Data Intensive Applications [0] is a great
starting resource. I’m not affiliated in any way just a happy reader.
[0] [https://dataintensive.net/](https://dataintensive.net/)
------
hackermailman
Click on 'old video' to see the lectures, this covers x86 arch from a
programmer's perspective, such as writing cache friendly code
[http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~./213/schedule.html](http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~./213/schedule.html)
Database lectures here including a really good advanced playlist on building
your own dbms
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHnBsf2rH-K7pn09rb3qvkA/pla...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHnBsf2rH-K7pn09rb3qvkA/playlists)
From there the book _Programming Rust_ is a great book about systems
programming. There's also an OS class [https://www.rust-
class.org/pages/classes.html](https://www.rust-class.org/pages/classes.html)
or you can try taking some CS theory classes
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWnu2XymDtORV--
qG2uG5eQ/pla...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWnu2XymDtORV--
qG2uG5eQ/playlists)
Andrew S Tanenbaum has a Distributed Systems and OS book too that most
universities still use.
~~~
steveklabnik
That Rust OS class is from 2014, and so was pre 1.0 and therefore near useless
today. Phil Opp’s work is preferred, for sure.
------
Bucephalus355
I would learn AWS. Their GUI and the abstraction available in their PaaS
services will allow you to build really cool “distributed” application without
needing to know all the ins and outs of say Linux and Sambda and Kerberos that
you would typically need. It would be a good introduction.
EDIT: and to learn AWS of course there is
[https://acloud.guru](https://acloud.guru). Strange name of a site but def
considered the best for learning AWS. I would focus on the AWS Solutions
Architect courses if you need something to start with.
------
DeltaManiac
Have you tried this ? [https://github.com/donnemartin/system-design-
primer](https://github.com/donnemartin/system-design-primer)
~~~
testb
imo the best way is to look at what other's have built. Here's some of my
favorite talks that go from 0 users to millions.
Dropbox -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE4gwstWhmc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE4gwstWhmc)
Instagram -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNA2C1vC8FQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNA2C1vC8FQ)
Slack (bonus. not as applicable but good reminder of why initial architecture
does matter) - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WE9c9AZe-
DY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WE9c9AZe-DY)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Samsung Galaxy S4 due in February - nreece
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2012/09/182_120024.html
======
clarky07
Am I the only one that thinks 5 inches is far too big for a phone? I'm not
sure how I feel about the 4 inch iPhone 5, but I'm certain I don't want
anything that is 5 inches.
~~~
Trezoid
I want to know how people are fitting them in pockets. 5 inches IS far too big
for a phone. That's a tiny tablet, and apparently is quite good at that...
~~~
ok_craig
Depends on the kind of pants you wear. My Nexus 7 fits in the pockets of my
shorts and they're average size. (I tested just to see once. I don't carry it
that way. :)
------
bmunro
5 inches seems to be pushing it a bit. I think that the S3 is already at the
upper limit for a phone. The 5.3 inches of the galaxy note is way too big for
an ordinary phone in my opinion. My 4.65" Galaxy Nexus is a nice size, but I
don't want it any bigger.
Perhaps they can reduce the size of the bezel to counteract the greater
distance you will need to reach.
~~~
cageface
I'm inclined to agree. I really like my S3 but it's big enough already. I
don't think making their flagship phone so huge is a good idea. Leave that for
things like the Note.
------
molmalo
Now that they mention Samsung's flexible screens...
A few relevant links: Samsung's Flexible display evolution:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-k6r2HQY9Ws>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJEHp15Hoo0>
If they put this in the S4, it will be pretty interesting to have an
_extremely_ resistant phone!
And of course, if they make a tablet that can be folded this way, that would
be awesome!:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dY_ADCTBKVE&t=1m25s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dY_ADCTBKVE&t=1m25s)
------
brianwillis
Pastebin of this article for anyone that wants to read it without the
horrifying tooth repair advert: <http://pastebin.com/5HnhXJWz>
------
ricksta
The super short product life cycle of android is making me hesitate to buy one
now because it always feel like the next generation is just around the corner.
~~~
natrius
If you're a Hacker News user who wants an Android phone, you probably
shouldn't be buying anything that isn't Nexus-branded. The Galaxy Nexus is
great, but there's usually a new Nexus each winter.
~~~
robbiet480
I don't get this. The S III has much better specs then the Nexus and with
CyanogenMod 10 it runs great. Why is the Nexus so special other then being a
AOSP phone? Also, camera sucks I hear
~~~
dkd
AFAIK, google's update for ICS to JB is only available in Goolge Nexus till
now. So Samsung S3/2 will get updates probably a bit later. :)
~~~
robbiet480
But again, install CyanogenMod 10 and you have Jelly Bean, pretty much stock.
I still don't see the draw
~~~
barrkel
> install CyanogenMod 10
This bit is the problem. I don't jailbreak a device before I am ready to throw
it away. I've seen too many issues with non-official hacks of various sorts.
Nothing major; just rough edges.
~~~
bornhuetter
Samsung made it _really_ easy to install Cyanogenmod on Galaxy phones.
They even provide an official tool for rooting.
There's pretty much no chance of bricking your phone, and if you go with a
stable CM build, you shouldn't have any problems.
------
thetinguy
>But Samsung has yet to decide whether it will use flexible display technology
for the upcoming Galaxy due to production problems encountered by Samsung
Display.
I see they have yet to decide to whether they will use a flexible display for
a product being released in February. Thanks for the press release Korea
Times.
~~~
tesseractive
Being _announced_ in February, I believe. Availability will be somewhat later,
if it follows the Galaxy S3 pattern.
If I remember correctly, the original iPhone went from a plastic screen
surface to glass a month before the announcement because Steve Jobs was
unhappy with it. Hardware specs are always subject to change based on feedback
until the company is satisfied with the result.
------
thechut
>The S4 will see some external changes but retain its popular rectangular
shape with rounded corner concept.
Sounds like not only are they not worried of the patent suits but they are
going to thumb their nose at them too.
~~~
cageface
Which just goes to show you how ridiculous the patent suits have been because
the S3 looks _nothing_ like an iPhone.
------
joshuahong100
The consternation over the ever increasing phone size will be proven to be the
same as that over the omission of a numeric keypad on smartphones.
------
6ren
The screen size of the S4 is expected to reach 5-inch from the current 4.8
Bigger isn't necessarily better. The iPhone 5 went with decreased volume and
weight. I own neither, but it's an interesting case-study of features vs.
benefits - and sales.
~~~
sabret00the
5 inches is too big. That's phablet territory. Smartphones should be limited
to 4.8 and under.
~~~
regularfry
Why 4.8?
------
pixie_
God speed Samsung.
------
voodoomagicman
It is interesting to see the different perspective on Apple/Samsung in the
korean vs american press.
~~~
frugalmail
I'm in America, an American, and not Asian. I find what apple is doing
repulsive. \- They are using highly questionable patents to discourage
competition, are ruling their ecosystem like a fascist regime, \- forcing you
to swallow their whole stack to work with any part of their ecosystem (e.g.
you can only build ios apps on mac) \- their bundled applications suck (damn
the "rainbow wait wheel" \- making disposable laptops, ipods, and iphones
which is counter to the environment and very anti-consumer but pro apple
pocketbook.
And all this is especially funny when you look back:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYecfV3ubP8>
Although that article is definitely not substantiating their bias it's just a
shame that brand marketing here has so clearly pulled the proverbial wool over
the American public's eyes.
------
Nikkau
They extend the screen, what a surprise!
~~~
frugalmail
Dell Streak (Android) had a 5 inch screen and was released in early 2010. You
are a perfect example of what strong brand soundbites have done to the public.
~~~
Camillo
And people have been making fun of phonblets for two years. What's your point?
~~~
bergie
The press has been making fun of "phablets", but people sure seem to be buying
them:
[http://www.theverge.com/2012/8/16/3246378/samsung-galaxy-
not...](http://www.theverge.com/2012/8/16/3246378/samsung-galaxy-note-
sales-10-million-worldwide)
[http://thedroidguy.com/2012/09/samsung-predicts-galaxy-
note-...](http://thedroidguy.com/2012/09/samsung-predicts-galaxy-note-ii-
sales-to-surpass-20-million/)
~~~
Camillo
Well, we do have an obesity epidemic.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Apple Hires Amazon Search Exec to Run Siri - scottchin
http://allthingsd.com/20121015/exclusive-apple-hires-amazon-a9s-stasior-to-run-siri-does-hire-signal-a-bigger-move-into-search/
======
ChuckMcM
That is an interesting move for him. Given the amount of time Siri seems to go
to the web for search it seems like Apple would reasonably want something in
house to better manage the user experience.
My understanding though was that Apple's relationship with Microsoft was
covering that (see this :
<http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-20006971-56.html>) while tentative it seems
another tie to Google that they probably don't want.
------
paulsutter
So the news is that Apple hopes for Siri to duplicate A9's level of success in
the marketplace?
~~~
mikeryan
A9's search portal died years ago they've been focused more on product search
as a service. I actually sincerely doubt this move is intended to be search
portal to take on Google.
------
scottchin
I'm interested to see where Siri will lead to in terms search. Will it
eventually divert significant traffic from Google's mobile search marketshare
(on iOS at least)?
~~~
mezeek
Yes. Peak Search has already happened. [http://www.businessinsider.com/peak-
search-google-search-que...](http://www.businessinsider.com/peak-search-
google-search-query-decline-2012-10)
~~~
scottchin
That's a very interesting article. I wonder whether search, in general (as
measured by traffic on the major search engines) is declining, or whether
people are using more specialized search websites/apps (this was kind of
touched up in the article).
For example, when i have programming questions, my first place to look is
StackOverflow as opposed to Google. or for restaurants I look at Yelp or
Urbanspoon.
In other words, is search traffic just becoming more fragmented across
different sites (Yelp, Amazon, StackOverflow, etc.) and apps?
~~~
lumisota
this; I think that as people are using their phones more than their
traditional PCs, they see apps as starting places for their searches, rather
than Google. I'm not sure where Siri will fit in..
------
Codhisattva
Now this is going nuclear against Google.
------
mars
run siri, run!
------
jrabone
I have one word: hashpipe !
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Stop Dumbing Down The World with Bad Interview Questions - gacba
http://www.lessonsoffailure.com/developers/stop-dumbing-world-bad-interview-questions/
======
ohashi
I think it's easier with stump the chump type questions because some
artificial filtering. Interviewing and trying to gain real insight into a
person is really hard and time consuming... and many people just can't do
it/scale it effectively. A sad reality, but I think it's a similar case if you
look at startups compared to existing businesses and how they run. Bureaucracy
and layers just get built, it's hard to re-create that initial singular
purpose. Now this is just adapted to the hiring process.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Bill Gates and Warren Buffett Pick Up a Shift at Dairy Queen [video] - dennisgorelik
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQWkNXr2ujI
======
canada_dry
You figure in the thirty minutes that Bill and Warren spent 'working' at that
Dairy Queen their wealth probably increased by more than every employee in the
entire chain combined will earn this year!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Disneyland raised prices to shorten waits - t23
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-disneyland-wait-times-20170712-htmlstory.html
======
skywhopper
I don't go to Disney parks very often but the "expanded ride reservation
system" mentioned in this article has actually gone from good to terrible, and
I think it has contributed to longer waits.
The old Fastpass system required you to go visit a kiosk near the ride itself,
and acquire a ticket for a specific time window later in the day, at which
point you could go in via a shorter priority line. It worked great and was
actually kind of fun.
I understand they would want to get rid of the physical passes the machine
printed out as the machines were probably maintenance nightmares, but they did
more than that. They changed the system entirely to an app, which is fine in
itself, but they eliminated the need to visit the ride area to get the pass,
which is part of what made the system fair. Instead, you can schedule the
passes ahead of time, even for future days, and of course passholders and
people staying at the park get priority, so all the popular rides' Fastpasses
are already gone by the time the typical visitor is even able to attempt to
schedule anything, which means they will just have to wait in the regular long
line because there's no way smooth out the demand across the day anymore,
since all the scheduling happens for a select group ahead of time without
requiring any physical commitment.
In short, they sabotaged themselves, at least from this visitor's POV.
Fastpass was one of my favorite bits of visiting Disney parks, but the new
system is one of my LEAST favorite bits. Ah well.
~~~
hammock
>they eliminated the need to visit the ride area to get the pass, which is
part of what made the system fair
The time spent walking to the ride can be considered part of the time you
spend in line. So they shortened that.
That's something my dad taught me once, by putting popular rides far from each
other in a park, you should realize your "time spent waiting for the ride" is
not just time in the line, but the time it takes for you to get to the line
also.
~~~
Cpoll
I'm not sure if it's a fair comparison. Walking to the line is far more
pleasant than waiting in the line.
------
dkonofalski
I always wondered why Disney doesn't open a third park somewhere square in the
middle of the U.S. There's literally no competition with Disney parks as
they're one-of-a-kind and it would both open more space at their other parks
and bring in a huge segment of the population that doesn't go to their parks
simply because of travel costs. Disneyland and Disney World are _always_ busy.
Look at the data. It might be time.
~~~
InTheArena
Disclaimer - Disney annual passholder here.
In terms of where to locate the park, Disney was a big early believer in a
analytical approach. They hired SRI to determine the best location for
Disneyland back in the 1950s. They came up with a amazing amount of
operational and systems research that we use now. The big factors where
climate, access to a huge population base, and multiple access to freeways.
When it came to Disney World, the factor where those, plus the ability to buy
large amount of land before anyone was aware of it, and could drive up prices
with speculation.
Disney has tried a number of different strategies in the past to make parks
more accessible - including the idea of building a Disneyland on a boat, that
would travel the world, and stop in various ports for months, before packing
up and sailing to the next trip.
Most of the demand for Disney growth wise is international, with Brazil
probably next to get a park.
In terms of line waits, there are two things at play - one Disney has realized
that they have been leaving money at the table. Contrary to this article, the
vast majortity of the excess demand is not single day visitors at Disneyland,
but rather season pass holders in California. This is why they have jacked up
the cost for annual passes a ton. I was listening to a podcast recently that
postulated that as much as 45% of the daily visitors to Disneyland might be
annual pass holders. Expect the cost to go way up - it’s getting close to
double the cost of a Disneyland pass compared to a Disney World pass.
The other thing is that Disney is putting massive capital into the parks, to
grow them. They just opened Avatar land in Animal kingdom, but the most
exciting are the new STar Wars Land, Toy Story Land, Epcot overhaul, and
marvel land in California. Disney will be adding a ton of capacity, but they
are trying to raise ticket prices to offset.
~~~
rdslw
Can you explain reason behind annual pass? I've seen it once. Enough for
10yrs, maybe a lifetime.
P.S. I do understand hobbies ;)
~~~
wccrawford
My wife and I, and her family, have been Walt Disney World (Florida)
passholders for years. My dad was a passholder for years until he moved
another 45 minutes away from Disney.
It's a little expensive, but there's always something fun to do. Most of us go
to re-ride some of our favorite rides. My dad went to just walk around and get
exercise and look at things.
Epcot center also has a ton of live entertainment including live bands and
performers. They also have events with foods from around the world, flower or
butterfly festivals, and more.
For what it's worth, my impression of Disneyland (California and Tokyo) wasn't
nearly as good. They were fun, but they didn't have enough stuff to keep me
coming back. But then, I don't live there, so maybe there's more to it. Those
parks did have one thing that I wish Florida had: They change some of the
rides once in a while to match another theme, such as Nightmare Before
Christmas on the Haunted Mansion or "Hyperspace Mountain" (Star Wars) on Space
Mountain.
I have to say... You're the only person I've ever heard say they went to
Disney once and have no interest in going back.
~~~
jshelly
You can add me to the list of people never wanting to go back.
I was fairly excited to take my kids to Disney as I had never been there
myself as a kid for unknown reasons. And while I had good time, once is
certainly enough. I'd rather travel and see different places as opposed to
going the same place year after year.
~~~
logfromblammo
I think I have had my fill of Magic Kingdom in Orlando. Last time I was there,
I hated just about every minute of it. Every square inch of the park seemed to
have been redesigned to suck more money out of my pockets rather than to
ensure I was having an enjoyable experience.
Every last one of the rides seemed dated and lame, even if they had been
recently renovated. Wait. Scratch that. The _Finding Nemo_ one was okay. And
that was back when they were using Fastpass instead of this wristband/app
system they apparently have now.
I'll actually be in Orlando again a week from now, and we didn't even consider
planning anything Disney. The entertainment value divided by the total daily
cost of visiting a park is simply too low now. It isn't just the high ticket
prices. They unabashedly overcharge for meals and food, and the nearby
lodgings nickel and dime you on everything. And the _time cost_ for everything
is ridiculous.
The only reason it is so popular is that Disney cross-promotes _everything_ in
its media empire. If you let your kids watch enough Disney Channel on
television, they will eventually want to visit a Disney theme park or cruise
ship.
~~~
wccrawford
FWIW, they're still doing fastpass... It's just that the bands are another way
to get a fastpass, as is the smartphone app. You can still just get one the
old way, though.
I can't argue about the nickel-and-diming, though. It's getting ridiculous.
------
k2enemy
If the strategy of avoiding long lines captures your interest, you'll probably
enjoy the El Farol Bar problem
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Farol_Bar_problem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Farol_Bar_problem))
and more general minority games.
------
Aloha
Former Disneyland CM (Cast Member) here.
Burgeoning wait times, and park overcrowding is (in my opinion) largely a
result of Annual Pass sales. The AP's come out, clog up the park and make it
less hospitable to non-AP guests.
~~~
nf05papsjfVbc
"clog up" seems a bit strong given that they actually paid for the entrance
and are just using a service they paid for.
~~~
Aloha
Yes, they did - but...
They don't buy (lots of) stuff - AP's often will drop by for half a day and
eat off property, but yet will still plop down in a restaurant and take up
table space. They also don't purchase much merch either.
They travel inefficiently - AP's often will come to meet up with friends, and
like most southern californians, they don't usually carpool - to the point
that in 2015, Disney almost stopped selling parking with the AP because of
capacity reasons.
So I think clog up is accurate here. AP's in general use the park in very
different ways then the people who are vacationing at the park - Disney has
made it clear that its primary market is the vacationer - but they cant drop
the AP system without alienating a bunch of folks.
------
ikeyany
> _During the first month after it opened, the new Guardians attraction had an
> average wait time of 93 minutes, with the maximum wait time climbing to five
> hours, according to the data._
Words escape me.
~~~
dave5104
One thing I didn't see mentioned in the article are demographics for visitors.
Disneyland has always had a very local crowd, which is why they do things
differently from Walt Disney World in Florida. By "local crowd", I mean you
get a lot more people with season passes who go just for dinner in the park
and then leave. Waiting up to 5 hours for the Guardians attraction would be a
novelty to them since they've literally done everything else in the park many
times over.
------
Fjolsvith
Back in '92, right after my discharge from the Air Force, I went to work for a
copier company, who sent me to LA for training on how to repair copiers. It
happened to be during the week of the LA Riots!
My instructors told us to take the day off and they stayed home to protect
their homes. I hopped the bus to Disneyland.
There were no lines there that day. I rode Space Mountain about 12 times!
~~~
justforFranz
This comment seems a bit white to me. Just guessing.
~~~
Fjolsvith
What do you mean by 'a bit white'?
------
Simulacra
It looks like by the article raising ticket prices did not reduce the number
of people into the park. I think they should have just capped the number of
people in the park at one time, in addition to the increased ticket prices. I
feel like Disney is a melting pot. It's affordable at some time interval for
just about every family. If the prices keep going up it could risk being less
of that melting pot, and more of just the pot with more money.
~~~
Klathmon
They already do limit the number of people in the park, it just only tends to
get hit a handful of times a year.
And for good reason IMO. I don't know about you, but if I planned a vacation
and then wasn't allowed in the park during that time I'd be pissed, even more
if the reason was so that those who did get in could have less wait times and
I couldn't even get into the park to experience it.
~~~
eof
It would be pretty straight forward to buy tickets in advance for a specific
day.
~~~
Klathmon
But now you are just making it so only people that plan it many many months
out can get in.
And it comes with it's own slew of problems. Like you'd need to either have
hourly booking, or you'd need to assume when people are going to be going for
the day, and you could still just end up with an empty park at some times, and
crazy long lines at others.
Combined with the fact that "park hopping" is really common, especially when
you don't have a huge amount of days in a vacation there (or don't want to
blow a whole day on one of the smaller parks).
I'm not convinced it's as straightforward as you'd think.
Their solution of the "fast pass" system they have in florida is I think the
best of both worlds. You can "schedule" time for a ride months out, but they
still let as many people as they safely can in the park.
------
kalleboo
In Tokyo they just built a second park right next to the first one
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokyo_DisneySea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokyo_DisneySea)
~~~
fjdlwlv
Disney world has several parks
~~~
kalleboo
I wonder if it's like roads - build more of them and you just get more
visitors, not less congestion.
~~~
toast0
It doesn't seem surprising to me that if there is demand, but supply is
capacity limited, it's hard to determine the full extent of the demand, and
that when more capacity becomes available, the demand may exceed that as well.
If you build more lanes where the roads are generally uncongested, you won't
see much 'induced demand', because the there wasn't much demand for travel
that was waiting for less congestion.
If you build more lanes where the roads are generally congested, you will see
the amount of time the roads are congested decrease when construction is done.
However, most additional lanes are built in areas where there is strong
population growth, leading to increased demand overtime anyway. For example,
in southern california there was a project to add another lane to the I-405;
when completed, the average duration of heavy congestion (rush hour) was
reduced by several hours; but it's reasonable to expect that over time the
congestion will increase again, just as it was before construction.
It's reasonable to expect the same to happen for theme parks. There are a lot
of capacity constraints preventing people from attending a Disney park, and
you see that in the high attendance. It's probably difficult to predict how
many additional parks you could build and still have good attendance, but
building one at a time seems reasonable; being a bit hard to get in isn't
terrible for Disney's brand perception.
------
amelius
If only customers were so forgiving if their webpage didn't load within 500
milliseconds.
~~~
petervandijck
If only our webpages were as awesome as Disneyland :)
------
paulpauper
IF this were Uber Disney ..they would do surge pricing, and although the media
would get mad but at least the lines would be shorter for those willing to pay
~~~
bobbygoodlatte
Disney does offer a VIP service. It's $400-600 an hour though. I'm not certain
what the maximum group size is, I think 6-8:
[https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/events-tours/vip-tour-
serv...](https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/events-tours/vip-tour-services/)
------
mrbonner
I'd like to take my little girl there but after hearing wait time I am kind of
withdraw to the idea. Does someone have any tip to visiting DL to minimize the
suffering for us adults (i.e time of year, what ride/fun things are worth the
wait, etc..)
~~~
sosuke
Get the speed pass band thingy. Totally worth it and it pretty much kills the
wait times. At least it was that way when I had gone.
~~~
dave5104
The Disney MagicBands? Those are only available in Walt Disney World in
Florida, not Disneyland in Anaheim.
Anaheim only has paper FastPasses, which are the same concept, but a little
more difficult to manage since you need to run around the park getting them.
MaxPass for $10 extra per person per day is coming soon, however, and will let
you book FastPasses via their app, but it's a shame it's an additional cost.
------
neonhomer
Growing up somewhat near Cedar Point I'm actually surprised at Disneyland's
wait times aren't longer.
These are from 2013, but wait times at Cedar Point are much worse!
[http://www.fodors.com/community/united-states/cedar-point-
wa...](http://www.fodors.com/community/united-states/cedar-point-wait-
times.cfm#comment-8222807)
~~~
lentesta
The total ride capacity of Disneyland is staggering. I'm not sure what Cedar
Point's is, but I'd be surprised if it exceeded Disneyland's.
------
fourmii
Do they do staggered ticket pricing based on what attractions are accessible?
Last time my family was passing through LA, I looked into taking my 3 and 7
year olds. We could only see the one ticket price. Thought it was just too
expensive considering the younger kid wouldn't have been able to nor would
have wanted to ride most of the attractions. It would have been nice to bring
them just to poke around...
~~~
dave5104
Kids 2 and under go in for free, but that's about it.
------
justforFranz
They probably need to create a phone app that tracks guests, and then offer a
discount for people to install it on their phones. It might be the best way to
divide the customer base into various profiles that could later serve for
computer simulations & models for when different events happen: ticket price
changes, rides opened & closed, etc.
------
tyrw
"passholders and people staying at the park get priority"
They didn't trade a faster system for a slower system, they started price
descriminating to further maximize their profits. You just happen to be in the
group that gets a slower experience.
------
grafporno
> Average wait times at the Disneyland Resort have been on the rise over the
> past few years, despite efforts by the park to ease crowding by raising
> ticket prices on peak demand days
They raised prices because there was more demand, so they could make more
money.
~~~
fjdlwlv
Yes and no. They haven't maxed capacity, they get paid if people wait in line
in the park. Selling fewer paak day tickets at higher prices is better
experience for customers.
------
hanapbuhay
When going, I try to remind myself that Disney parks are not designed to be
seen in one day.
------
lionhearted
Does anyone know if Disney publishes any of their operations materials or
data, a la Toyota? I didn't find any on a quick search; it'd be fascinating to
dig into materials on how they do planning, capacity, traffic flows, etc.
~~~
lentesta
They publish almost nothing publicly. Certainly nothing useful that I'm aware
of.
------
burntrelish1273
Or do like Burning Man, Yosemite, Hamilton, etc... schedule sale of limited
tickets well in advance. This has the added benefit of not taxing lower-income
people and makes the experience much more scarce and something to look forward
to.
------
dsun179
Clickbait-title but actually great content. Never seen this before.
------
ww520
They have already capped the people going into the park. People with single-
day passes can be turned away at the gate if the park is full. Two-day or
multi-day pass got priority.
~~~
habosa
Link? I can't believe if you have a one-day trip you can really get turned
away at the gate.
~~~
wccrawford
[http://www.disneydining.com/happens-disney-park-closed-
due-r...](http://www.disneydining.com/happens-disney-park-closed-due-reaching-
capacity/)
------
BigChiefSmokem
Disney, instead of using fancy "wait in line" tech just stop shoving so many
people into the park. Problem solved.
~~~
kin
This could definitely work if they changed how their annual passes worked.
Right now, pass holders can come in whenever there is not a black out date,
but Disney needs to first implement a system where days have to be booked in
advance. Otherwise, first come first serve would unfairly block those
traveling from out of town.
------
leejoramo
Please bring back the E-Ticket
------
dmh2000
sounds like basic economics
------
fiatjaf
Please, what are the results? There's too much useless text behind that
clickbait headline.
~~~
nmstoker
How can you tell it's useless if you didn't read it?!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
GIF for CLI - lainon
https://github.com/google/gif-for-cli
======
Sir_Cmpwn
See also the venerable libcaca:
[https://github.com/cacalabs/libcaca](https://github.com/cacalabs/libcaca)
Demo:
[https://asciinema.org/a/kjsWPMv5qtn87IHRd4th3EuNB](https://asciinema.org/a/kjsWPMv5qtn87IHRd4th3EuNB)
~~~
digi_owl
Or if we go even deeper down the rabbit hole:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixel)
------
esimov
I made something similar in Go.
[https://github.com/esimov/gifter](https://github.com/esimov/gifter)
------
cs702
Of course.
Love the little note at the end:
"This is not a supported Google product."
~~~
saagarjha
It's probably someone's 20% project.
~~~
q3k
I don't think you could get your manager to approve that as a 20% project.
More likely, it's someone's personal project they worked on in their spare
time, but it still belongs to Google (because everything does, according to
most engineering contracts there).
~~~
saagarjha
> everything does, according to most engineering contracts there
Most of the contracts I've heard about only transfer ownership if you use
company resources to work on it. Any project done in your free time, with your
own resources, belongs to you.
~~~
q3k
Not at Google.
------
jwilk
It should be "CLI for GIF" or "GIF CLI" or "GIF for terminal".
"GIF for CLI" doesn't make sense.
------
daleroberts
If you like this project then you might like these ones.
Image visualisation in terminal using Unicode 9 and True Color:
[https://github.com/daleroberts/tv](https://github.com/daleroberts/tv)
Image visualisation for iTerm2:
[https://github.com/daleroberts/bv](https://github.com/daleroberts/bv)
Matplotlib graphics and animation in iTerm2:
[https://github.com/daleroberts/itermplot](https://github.com/daleroberts/itermplot)
------
lainga
Is it possible to do something like this, but writing the actual GIF to the
host's framebuffer (/dev/fb*)? Or are we getting into X11 territory?
~~~
gknoy
If you use a Mac, the Iterm2 terminal emulator has an additional protocol that
supports rendering images [0]. It basically encodes the image with terminal
escape sequences, and also works for animated gifs.
Unfortunately, it seems to not be a standard - it would be neat if there were
such a standard, and if other terminals could/would do similarly. It seems
like the silliest thing but I like being able to easily indicate when my tests
fail or not:
alias SUCCESS="echo -e '\n\nSUCCESS' \
&& imgcat ~/Pictures/success-100.png \
|| imgcat ~/Pictures/fail-100.png"
make test && SUCCESS
0: [https://www.iterm2.com/documentation-
images.html](https://www.iterm2.com/documentation-images.html)
~~~
aumerle
See [https://sw.kovidgoyal.net/kitty/graphics-
protocol.html](https://sw.kovidgoyal.net/kitty/graphics-protocol.html) for a
much more comprehensive terminal graphics protocol
~~~
gknoy
Slick :D Thanks for pointing that out!
------
kotajacob
Libsixel is also pretty sweet. You can even integrate it with sdl and all
kinds of crazy shit.
[https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel/](https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel/)
------
marzell
Ah, this reminds me of fond memories of watching The Matrix converted to
ASCII.
------
oh_sigh
You can also do this easily with mplayer: mplayer -vo caca ~/my.gif
~~~
digi_owl
note that the heavy lifting there is done by libcaca...
------
chinathrow
Can someone shine some light on how Tenor makes money?
~~~
ediardo
¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
well, they were acquired by google...
------
cup-of-tea
Stop calling text based graphics CLI! Grrr
------
pwaivers
Excellent choice for the example GIF. Haha.
------
mchahn
Why are the results so dark?
------
asdfman123
My god.
I think programming as a profession has now jumped the shark.
~~~
jethro_tell
Why do you think that? Is it because you personally find no value in this
project? If you don't understand what the value of this project would be then
it's not for you but that doesn't mean it has no value. Also, computer science
and programming are built on the two mule team of 'because we need it' and
'because we can!' This is nothing new.
~~~
asdfman123
I'm mainly just joking, because it's combining two things that are trendy:
GIFs in everything and CLI wizardry.
No real criticism of this software. If I had thought of it first I might have
built it myself.
~~~
OJFord
"CLI wizadry" is trendy?
~~~
SeriousM
Kind of, yes. More and more products and services are going to offer cli
clients. Angular, vue, Azure, kubernetes, docker, choose your weapon.
~~~
jethro_tell
That's been the norm since the 80's, not sure what's new about that.
~~~
yjftsjthsd-h
The industry is, to a degree, cyclical and prone to fashions; CLI was
everything in the 80s, then went out of style in many circles in the 90s and
00s, and now is coming back into style in more circles. And with each new wave
we get new variations and fun things as new people hit the old ideas with new
perspectives:)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Gab's domain registrar gives 5 days to transfer domain or they will seize it - DanAndersen
https://twitter.com/getongab/status/909646893516414977
======
thatonechad
When you can't defeat someone in a debate, silence them.
~~~
ivraatiems
Is a company morally obligated to serve all customers, and not permitted to
exercise discretion about who they provide services to?
Even if those people are using the company's services to break the laws of the
country the company operates in?
~~~
peoplewindow
It's really a judge's responsibility to decide if they're breaking the law in
this case. DNS registries can't possibly decide if Gab.ai is actually guilty
of what they claim given the incredibly vague wording of the requirements.
Surely Twitter and the Guardian could be argued to also meet such a vague
standard to be banned.
It's quite obvious what's going on here. There's an organised effort to erase
people with right wing views off the internet by people with extremist left
wing views, who simply describe anything they don't like as "hate speech".
~~~
thatonechad
You are spot on. They are trying to do it behind the scenes at this point, but
as the culture war continues to shift to the right winning they will go full
blown. My theory is it will start with google, facebook, and twitter. This is
why its more important to get these alternative media up before its too late.
------
Overtonwindow
This is getting out of hand. Domain registrars should not have the power to
silence speech they disagree with. Not everything is hate speech, and not
every platform promotes it.
------
ryanx435
Richard Stallman has been way undervalued, as a whole, in the last couple of
decades. He has predicted this and other similar situations and worked his
entire career to try to prevent the "tyranny of software companies", or
however he phrases it.
If you don't know who he is, or haven't read up on him recently, please check
him out.
He gave a talk at my college back in 2007/2008 that I went to, talking about
quants and investment algorithms, and how they had directly contributed to the
economic collapse. He made the point that, because all of the algorithms were
closed source and not open to public review, they were dependent on the market
understanding of the individuals who wrote the algorithms. Given the nature of
humanity, many of those individuals likely had faulty or incomplete
understanding of the markets, and therefore the algorithms also misunderstood
the markets. Free (open sourced) code could have prevented that.
Well, i'm not sure I agree with his conclusions about that. I asked him about
his thoughts on the recursive effect the algorithms would have on the market
(the algorithms were so prevalent that they basically were the market makers,
thus changing the market itself to reflect their faulty assumptions about the
market before their existence).
He said it was an excellent question, didn't have an answer, and offered me an
internship to work on that problem under his direction. I declined for various
reasons.
anyways, he was correct about a lot of things.
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman))
([https://stallman.org/](https://stallman.org/))
~~~
cheez
Disclaimer: I wrote some of those algorithms. I used to believe that as well:
the algorithms are gobbledygook, but once I got into it and really understood,
I realized it's use of the algorithms that was problematic. The first time I
priced mortgage-backed "bonds", I was honestly aghast as to how it was
possible to perpetrate such a structure.
After a lot of testing, I realized that the models were fine, but the politics
behind choosing the parameters were to blame (hint: the ones that gave the
best bonuses).
Just my 2c. Stallman is smart, and correctly called a lot of the stuff that is
happening now, but I don't think he is right there.
------
neo4sure
well done. Apluade this measure...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Apple takes a few more bites out of cellular carriers - SlipperySlope
http://www.gadgetbox.msnbc.msn.com/technology/gadgetbox/apple-takes-few-more-bites-out-cellular-carriers-823733
======
SlipperySlope
The Microsoft Network blogger is highlighting this issue because Microsoft
itself faces headwinds with cellular carriers because it owns Skype - which
carriers hate as they make a lot of revenue from voice calls and SMS text
messages today.
"In short: With iOS 6, we'll be using more carrier bandwidth than ever, but
will require fewer and fewer carrier services."
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Dear Stack Exchange, Inc. - bmease
https://dearstackexchange.com/
======
xibalba
I suspect that the average user of SE will not care one bit about this whole
drama.
I do find it frustrating, puzzling, and sad how SE appears to have treated
Monica Cellio. She provides an excellent summary (from her perspective) here:
[https://cellio.dreamwidth.org/2064709.html](https://cellio.dreamwidth.org/2064709.html)
~~~
drusepth
As a self-described "average user of SE", I find this drama pretty similar to
drama I've seen circling around the Quora "community" for the last 6 months or
so: confusing.
I use both SE and Quora to get answers, especially to extremely-niche
questions. I understand that some people do use them for community and that
people do interact and know each other on both platforms, but it's hard to
understand complaints about a subpar community when the goal of the site
doesn't seem to revolve around a community at all.
To me, SE is a Q&A site. It exists to let people ask questions and get those
questions answered. If you took away the community entirely, would it be any
less useful?
This probably comes off a bit flippant to the situation, but it's meant to
illustrate that you're right: I'd say I'm a pretty average user of SE (in that
I just use it to get answers, and occasionally write my own answers when I
can, and so far it's worked perfectly well for me) and I don't care one bit
about community-based drama.
~~~
dxbydt
> If you took away the community entirely, would it be any less useful?
so for a while, due to strange quirk of circumstance, i had the inside track
of a profitable adult website. it was your standard “streaming adult videos,
no ads, charge hefty subscription” model. one morning the ceo says let’s do
community. everyone’s going social. lets have blogs, message board, the whole
shebang. Announcement made with much fanfare. The idiot audience thought
community means they could talk to their favorite pornstar :) once the ceo
clarifies that no, community doesn’t mean that, they turn on him like a pack
of wolves. what do you mean, you want us to talk to each other ?! like random
perv from oklahoma should message arbitrary perv from cleveland about which
vid gets him off ? wtf ?!! the poor ceo’s got his back to a wall. he says,
we’ll be the world’s largest adult community. the peeps are like, dude,
largest community of pervs ? fbi will have a ball. half of us are scared our
employer or our spouse or worse, teenage son hacks into our account. now you
want us to have wacky avatars & actually talk to each other on a messageboard
so whatever we say persists for posterity ? it quickly went downhill from
there. they brought in a moderator, sort of like dang. he was supposed to
police the crowds & tamp down on contentious disagreement. but hardly anybody
participated, so they had to broaden dang’s role. so now everytime a video was
posted, poor dang would have to watch the whole video and make insightful
comments like “lady featured in this clip at 7:15 is the same lady in that
other clip at 9:20” and so on. soon he became an encyclopedia of porn trivia.
people actually started showing up on the community board just to poke fun of
his wide acumen. Around that time i quit. But it was quite the experience.
Community can be a major hassle.
~~~
mekane8
This was an interesting read. If you wrote more of these stories out into a
longer blog format I'd totally read it!
------
ldigas
While, in the beginning, a very active user, I've long now given up on that
network. I can't remember when was the last time I asked a question without
being forced to defend it for a period of at least a few hours, why it
shouldn't be closed as a duplicate, offtopic or ... It used to be an excellent
network, but nowadays it's just script-kiddies-playing-admins/editors
playground. It is no longer a productive technical community, so I've gone
back to specialized forums. Pity, I really liked the sites in the beginning.
~~~
sytelus
I don't understand this cry against moderators. These people are volunteerily
giving their time to keep quality bar high without any payment. If these
people weren't there then SO will be full of duplicates, off-topic and opinion
based Q&A just like Quora. A general tendency I have seen is just to ask
(often poorly stated) questions without doing simple search to see if it is
already answered. Someone needs to respect those people picking up garbage on
the street.
~~~
wpietri
I think SO is poorly designed as a system. It certainly does encourage people
to ask not-so-great questions. It doesn't handle them particularly well. And
then expects people to clean up the mess for free. Those people of course feel
stressed and overwhelmed, so are inclined to be rude, aggressive, and hasty in
their decisions.
Like ldigas, I long ago gave up on SO because of bad moderation experiences.
I'm grudgingly willing to respect those mods as humans, but I certainly won't
as moderators. They do a poor job, needlessly offending and discouraging
contributors. They could quit any time. They could go on strike at any time.
But no, they just kept on.
I can definitely muster up some sympathy when people trapped in bad jobs are
jerks. They are doing it to survive. But people who volunteer to be jerks?
That's on them.
~~~
greggman2
As someone who answers quite a few quesitons on SO I'd really like to see
posts that were perceived as wrongfully closed to see if I agree (haha) and
also to see how to fix the system.
Of course I have no hope that S.O. will change anything. When they started
their "be nice" campaign I suggested the "CLOSED: This is a duplicate" message
should be changed to "CONGRATS: This appears to be a duplicates so you win!
There is already an answer [here]!"
In any case there are rules. One is "post the code you're having trouble with
in the question, not a link offsite." The offsite link is useless if the code
changes there or the offsite site goes offline. Some not insignificant percent
of the time the question will just have a link to offsite code. I'll leave a
comment saying effectively, "please add the code to the question" and then I
vote to close, reason "missing code". The person never adds the code. Are they
like you claiming S.O. is rude and unreasonable? Did they get their answer
somewhere else and never come back to follow up? I have no idea.
Actually the rule is even more specific. "Make a minimal repo and post it the
question itself". Almost no one makes a remotely minimal repo which is fine,
but in general lots of people fail at the "repo" part period. In order to help
them we'd need to download code, setup dev environments, make up test data,
etc...."
What I do know is I often spend 30 to 240 minutes writing working examples for
a single answer. I do that volunteerily for reasonable questions. When someone
barfs out a "give me teh codez" question it can be very angering. They're
basically asking for free labor. If that's not rude I don't know what is.
Here's a recent "give me free labor" question
[https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58206647/removing-the-
ba...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58206647/removing-the-background-
on-this-webgl-animation)
Here's a recent "teach me an entire CS course" question
[https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58165198/how-to-
process-...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58165198/how-to-process-
model-data-in-unit8array-in-webgl)
And here's an answer I spent over 150 minutes on, trying to understand their
code, trying to make a working sample, running into bugs, when I looked up 2.5
hours had passed.
[https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58101753/drawing-a-
torus...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58101753/drawing-a-torus-in-
webgl)
And another more typical 30 minutes on this one
[https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58111380/in-webgl-the-
pe...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58111380/in-webgl-the-perspective-
cameras-are-added-to-the-canvas-or-to-the-3d-model-its)
note I'm not trying to brag. I hear your complaint often. I just don't run
into it myself. Instead I see lots of volunteers answering questions and only
voting to close the bad ones and they are bad ones.
~~~
slavik81
> As someone who answers quite a few quesitons on SO I'd really like to see
> posts that were perceived as wrongfully closed to see if I agree (haha) and
> also to see how to fix the system.
This person[1] was getting unexpected results when calling is_integer.
According to the duplicate, the solution is that they should call
is_integer... which is what they were doing. The original close voter
commented 'sorry I didn't read your question properly before suggesting the
dupe', but it remains closed.
The question was answered in the comments: this surprising result was due to
floating point error and rounding done by the print function. However, it
could not be posted as an answer, because the question was closed. I voted to
reopen, but the vote failed.
[1]:
[https://stackoverflow.com/q/49847677/331041](https://stackoverflow.com/q/49847677/331041)
EDIT: The share link I posted takes me to a different question when I'm logged
in than it does when I open in an incognito window. WTF.
EDIT2: Apparently serving completely different pages to logged-in users and
logged-out users is by design.
[https://meta.stackoverflow.com/q/271077/](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/q/271077/)
Here's a link to question [1] that should work for everybody:
[https://stackoverflow.com/q/49847677/331041?noredirect=1](https://stackoverflow.com/q/49847677/331041?noredirect=1)
EDIT3: It doesn't work. Sorry. I tried my best, but only logged-in users will
get the correct page from the links I posted.
~~~
dorgo
>The question was answered in the comments
It's lucky that the person who answered had enough carma to write comments.
SO's job seems to be to prevent users from answering questions.
------
ben174
It's incredible that pronouns can bring down an entire community. Pick you
battles please, we're losing good things because of this silly conflict.
~~~
blanche_
Ben would you mind then being called she/her then if that is so silly? I'm a
hetero woman and I've been called a male few times when gaming and this is not
silly, people are rejecting your identity and I can't even imagine how bad
this is for trans/NB people.
~~~
koheripbal
People are not "rejecting your identity" if they use the wrong pronoun. That
is an emotional interpretation of an error.
~~~
mcv
Some people are. There are people who intentionally use the wrong pronoun,
exactly because they reject someone's transgender identity. We cis-gendered
people may not notice this, but to transgender people, it is every-day reality
to be confronted with someone who insists on denying their identity. Consider
the stupid bathroom bills in a couple of US states for example.
So against that background, it's entirely understandable that they react more
emotionally also to accidental mistakes. That doesn't mean overreaction is a
good idea, but it's a backlash against a long history of having their identity
denied. If we don't like the backlash, maybe we should work harder to address
the original hatred that it's reacting to.
------
oefrha
> We are disappointed with the lack of responsiveness to community concerns.
> On Meta Stack Exchange, bug reports, feature and support requests go
> unacknowledged, sometimes for months or years, and some excellent posts
> never receive a staff response. Meanwhile, there have been cases when staff
> have responded to complaints on Twitter almost immediately, taking action
> without due process and without consulting with the impacted sites.
It’s sad that more and more companies ignore normal support channels (a very
well established and proven one in SE’s case) and only answer to Twitter
shaming. For one thing, it’s very unfair to those of us who don’t (otherwise)
use Twitter — I have to keep an account just for tech support, and even then I
highly doubt my requests are valued as much as ones from accounts with 10k or
more followers.
------
onetime0001
I don’t understand why gender/pronouns is even being discussed. Someone’s
personal feelings don’t really have any place in a question/answers site. It’s
fine to respect a persons feelings and such when talking to a person but when
answering a question or asking the question. The gender/pronoun is irrelevant.
~~~
yitchelle
The folks moderating SE are very pedantic about the wording of passages. Once
I called SE a "forum", and I was politely told not to call SE a "forum". I
would really hate to be a person that is not very fluent in English and trying
to interact with SE.
~~~
Ixio
One of my latest questions got as first comment : "Please use English
punctuation when writing in English."
Certainly polite but a bit jarring as a non-native speaker that feels fluent.
Also a bit nonsensically-bureaucratic : I made the mistake because I didn't
know any better, after the comment I still couldn't correct the mistake
because I still didn't know any better, I wasn't even sure what rule of
punctuation I had wronged.
I would've preferred a direct edit instead of a comment prompting though I
guess that can be seen as worse by some people.
~~~
Symbiote
> ... nonsensically-bureaucratic : I ...
Maybe you put a space before a colon, and the eagle-eyed moderator spotted it
:-)
(English rarely has a space before a punctuation mark — except for a dash in
British usage. Americans—I think—do this.)
~~~
tsukurimashou
Yeah exactly, in French for example you put a space before a colon, a question
mark, exclamation mark, while in English you don't, it is quite hard to spot
for a lot of people.
------
u-dissolve
This reminds me of the time when stack exchange updated their terms of service
to include an arbitration clause. The community was in uproar over this
decision, yet the clause stands to this day.
[https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/309746/a-new-2018-u...](https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/309746/a-new-2018-update-
to-our-terms-of-service-is-here)
Stack overflow's terms of service is pretty terrible, receiving the worst rank
in terms of user hostility on TOS;DR.
[https://tosdr.org/#stackoverflow](https://tosdr.org/#stackoverflow)
~~~
greggman2
That hardly seems fair. For 99.99% of users everything they do on the site is
publically available. There is no private messaging, no private anything. The
entire history of everything on all sites being public is one of the explicit
goals of the site. So "sharing with 3rd parties" means absolutely nothing.
Those 3rd parties could scrape the site or they could download the archive.
[https://archive.org/details/stackexchange](https://archive.org/details/stackexchange)
It doesn't seem like they should be marked as having a poor TOS for at least
half the things listed as those things are basically the known purpose of the
site.
~~~
u-dissolve
This simply isn't true - your most sensitive information _is not_ public, yet
is shared with 3rd parties. From their privacy policy:
"We collect location information about you including your IP address, your
location, browser information, and how you came to the Stack Overflow
Network."
(SO also collects your email address, interests, and employment status upon
registration - this is not mentioned specifically in the privacy policy)
"This is the case for individuals who have registered for an account, and non-
members who engage with the Stack Overflow Network by visiting our website(s)
but who have not completed an account registration."
"We share this information with certain third-parties (e.g., talent
recruiters, payment processors, and advertising providers)"
[https://stackoverflow.com/legal/privacy-
policy](https://stackoverflow.com/legal/privacy-policy)
------
King-Aaron
I remember when Stack Exchange was about fixing broken code.
~~~
ronnier
Politics have crept into every aspect of life unfortunately.
~~~
Espressosaurus
Politics is part of every human endeavor: between kids on the playground, in
the workplace, at the level of local, regional, national, and international
governments and businesses.
Politics and the negotiation of status and access between various in and out
groups is a fundamental part of being human.
~~~
tim58
Thank you. There is a tendency in tech people to dismiss politics as less than
important ("just politics", "just political"). It's a fundamental part of our
social fabric.
~~~
lukifer
Simler & Hanson provide a pretty solid explanatory framework:
[http://elephantinthebrain.com/](http://elephantinthebrain.com/)
~~~
raxxorrax
Have only read parts of that, but describing attributes to human nature mostly
fails to do so and attaches them to the author instead.
No, not everything is political. From that perspective you could substitute
the term politics with "battle for share", which can be political, but doesn't
encompass the whole set of politics. You can even generalize that further and
it gets more primitive along the way:
"Every day is a battle for survival"
Of course it is political play to attach attributes to groups and then
highlighting fault lines. But it is the most primitive form of what many
people call politics.
And since it doesn't accomplish anything productive, many people have the need
to remove politics from platforms like SE, because they just see it as a
distraction to the topic at hand and is pitting people against each other.
Pronouns do that, most of the gender discussion does that and now we have also
started a new discussions about racism that won't net positive results.
All because some people crave some validation? Maybe that is not always the
case, but it seems that people wanted a conflict and that is what they got.
~~~
crooked-v
> No, not everything is political
Name literally anything and I will point out its political implications.
~~~
raxxorrax
That would not constitute proof. But to humor you and me, what about
cornflakes?
~~~
zrobotics
The food literally created due to political beliefs?
"The story of corn flakes goes back to the late 19th century, when a team of
Seventh-day Adventists began to develop new foods to adhere to the vegetarian
diet recommended by the church. Members of the group experimented with a
number of different grains, including wheat, oats, rice, barley and maize. In
1894, John Harvey Kellogg, the superintendent of the Battle Creek Sanitarium
in Michigan and an Adventist, used these recipes as part of a strict
vegetarian regimen for his patients, which also included no alcohol, tobacco
or caffeine. The diet he imposed consisted entirely of bland foods. A follower
of Sylvester Graham, the man cited as inspiration of graham crackers and
graham bread, Kellogg believed that spicy or sweet foods would increase
passions." [0]
[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_flakes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_flakes)
------
chimi
Honest Question: Why continue to support stack exchange through this? They
have shown themselves to be disingenuous at best. They are now profiting off
free labor. They started it because ExpertsExchange was hiding answers. They
rode the high horse to hypocrisy.
Why continue helping people like that succeed?
Why not just start a new one? Leave en masse to a new playground. Speak with
your answers.
Show the powers that be they can't treat the sharecroppers like this anymore.
Hasn't history shown the way? It's repeating itself all over this controversy.
Is this an inevitability? How can this be prevented?
It feels like the issue regarding Monica is just _the_ issue we are all
talking about, but ultimately, it goes _much_ deeper.
~~~
tinus_hn
Unfortunately StackExchange fell into the trap of trying to support social
justice warriorisms.
Either they will fold or they will come to realize that the only ways to deal
with users that are preoccupied with genders, religion, sexual orientations
and whatever protected class they can come up with are to lose them or ignore
them. You can’t go along with their demands because there will always be a new
demand, each one crazier and more irrelevant than the last one.
~~~
claudiawerner
I'm curious as to what part of the issue was about "social justice
warriorisms", especially since Monica herself and most of the other mods who
resigned were okay with the principle of calling people by the pronoun they
prefer to be called by.
~~~
mkohlmyr
Perhaps my reading of the situation is way off, but at the risk of making a
fool of myself:
My understanding is that Monica wanted to use gender neutral pronouns
throughout her writing as a general case, but that this was deemed "not good
enough" (or indeed hateful) in the cases where someone has chosen specific
pronouns. So I suppose this is what the GP is referring to. And I can't argue
that it seems like a rather extreme position - although I'm happy to be
persuaded otherwise.
~~~
abstractbarista
_That_ is what this is about? There is something wrong with the way our
culture is shifting. There is absolutely nothing wrong with Monica's choice.
It is literally the most pacifist choice you could make. Anyone who feels
"harmed" by her choice is only harming themselves.
~~~
mcv
I care deeply about social justice, and I'm totally on Monica's side here.
Even more so because as far as anyone can tell, she wasn't even violating a
CoC yet, and would probably have followed it if it was sufficiently clarified.
But at the most basic level, I feel gender-neutral language should always be
okay.
In fact, I think it would be healthy if language in general developed in a
more gender-neutral direction. We don't use special pronouns to divide people
based on other characteristics, so why gender?
------
Causality1
It's terribly sad that StackExchange is less likely to respond to a well-
reasoned argument by informed and invested moderators like this than a pack of
idiots on Twitter hooting for blood. Cancel-culture is cancer.
------
je42
This is totally sad. I really wonder how a company could publish a year ago in
2018 "Our Theory of Moderation, Re-visited.":
> Trust people. > Supporting people should be your default reaction
and then a year later be in this current state.
Worse is, SE seems to unable to reactify the situation in a meaninful and
trustful way.
------
sqldba
Shouldn’t the CTO fire the person who was directly responsible for firing
Monica? Why isn’t that part of it?
~~~
SnarkAsh
because she has 46k Twitter followers and the company fears Twitter above all
else
~~~
zo1
Not sure I understand - who is she that you're referring to?
~~~
Kiro
Sara Chipps.
------
OedipusRex
See
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21175225](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21175225)
------
throwaway10_06
"Beware of words. The moment you look away, they will take on a life of their
own; they will dazzle, mesmerize, terrorize, lead you astray from the reality
they represent, lead you to believe they are real. The world you see is not
the kingdom seen by children, but a fragmented world, broken into a thousand
pieces by the word. It is as if each ocean wave were seen to be distinct and
separate from the body of the ocean."
------
fenwick67
I would love a nice couple paragraphs that said "here's what happened",
otherwise taking any side in this is just taking shots in the dark, I'm
basically reading "certain events happened with a certain individual and
that's not okay"
~~~
xibalba
As asked:
[https://cellio.dreamwidth.org/2064709.html](https://cellio.dreamwidth.org/2064709.html)
~~~
moneywoes
Is there a TLDR of what happened anywhere?
~~~
ALittleLight
Seems like there was a disagreement regarding the use of gender pronouns that
resulted in 73 moderators getting "fired" or leaving.
The author of that summary mentioned one thing I found especially egregious,
which is a policy that stated avoiding using pronouns was out of alignment. If
I understand correctly, when she asked how they would know if she was avoiding
pronouns or just naturally not writing them, she was fired. I may have this
wrong as I just skimmed the summary. Also it seems she had multiple
disagreements on this front before.
~~~
ShamelessC
Is the implication that the LGBTQ+ community found it _more_ offensive to use
e.g. "they" than "he" or "she"?
I'm so confused. Wouldn't "they" (the gender neutral version) be _more_
inclusive? Is there some other alternative that's even better that I haven't
considered? I hope I'm not offending anyone by asking this. Just trying to
make sure I understand.
~~~
patmcc
Yes, people will often find it offensive if you use "they" after asked to use
"he" or "she".
If someone says "I am a man, please use he/him for my pronouns" and you use
'they' \- that would generally be considered at least odd, if not
inappropriate.
I don't think that means it's inappropriate to use "they" as the default if no
other information exists though.
~~~
anon12345690
uh but using "they" as a neutral way to talk about anyone is just fine. people
have been doing that for literally centuries, its called "singular they"
this is all about people wanting to be outraged for no reason
~~~
patmcc
"Singular they" is indeed well used, but it's _not_ normally used when the
gender of the person in question is explicitly known.
If you use "they" for someone who has specifically said to you "please use the
pronouns 'she/her' when referring to me", you are being rude, not neutral.
~~~
NeedMoreTea
"Where's Dave?"
"They're in the garage, I think"
is common to hear, just as
"He's in the garage, I think"
Many will mix between the "he/she" and "they" in the same conversation. Quite
often referring to their closest friends and family rather than pointed
attempt to misuse a pronoun.
~~~
bmn__
> ["They"] is common to hear, just as ["He"]
> Many will mix between the "he/she" and "they" in the same conversation.
That does not match my observed reality at all. All natural languages I know
are gendered the same way English is.
Singular "they" is already exceedingly uncommon by itself; and across all the
languages, and in my whole life-time, never once I or a conversation partner
used "they" instead of the specialised pronoun, or mixed in a conversation,
_when the gender of the person in question is explicitly known_ as GP wrote.
The same is true for all written material I read in my whole life.
~~~
NeedMoreTea
All I can say is it matches mine. So we're at impasse I guess.
English speech varies. Even across the UK there are dozens of regional accents
and dialects. Now add the many regional variations across the USA and other
world Englishes. All with their own traits and habits, some more widespread
than others. A deep rabbit hole with many forks then.
Common enough that I would not think it the slightest bit unnatural on
hearing, or give it a second thought. I wouldn't give it a second thought
reading it in a natural conversation in a book - not just in intentionally
neutral business or net writing, so that's not going to be memorable. It's not
an idiom I'd single out as localised to any one group or region. It _would_ be
memorable and feel odd reading if it were all that way in a novel's quoted
conversation, or nearly all names with few pronouns like some telesales
scripts seem to encourage.
Not _as_ common as he/she certainly, but I dunno 1:4 or 1:8 or something. I
couldn't say what proportion is names not pronouns either. FWIW My people skew
international, educated, Scots and perhaps city in a part of the UK that's
well north of London.
------
loxs
Stack Exchange is now a political battleground and long are gone the days when
it was a tool for sharing technological knowledge. They are now competing who
is more oppressed instead of who knows more.
That's what you get when you let ideology become more important than the core
of the product.
This is only the beginning of the downfall.
------
awinter-py
the free & freemium web have an arbitration gap and it will get worse before
it gets better
stackexchange works because questions can get answered with relatively little
money changing hands (AWS & advertisers mainly), but that means employees
can't offer due process on disputes without erasing the company's margins.
these companies can't offer centralized due process to everyone because it
would open them to being DDOS'd by competitors / trolls. Maybe justice can be
crowdsourced in the same way as javascript questions by identifying neutral
people in the stackexchange network, but that would be a huge experiment and
open SO/SE to community backlash when it went badly.
~~~
gizmo686
If only SE could somehow get a bunch of people to work as moderators without
paying them. Except that is exactly what happened; but recently SE managed to
piss off a large number of its volunteer moderators, who have (among other
things) written the linked complaint.
------
tzfld
I have read every hn submitted articles about this drama, but I still don't
get what this is all about. Maybe because of my english not being the best.
~~~
Yen
I'll do my best to summarize the situation, at least as well as I understand
it.
When speaking in English, it often sounds awkward to repeatedly use the same
proper noun in a sentence or paragraph. So, instead of repeated use of the
actual noun, a pronoun is used.
When referring to individual people, or to some animals, the most common
pronouns to use are "he" or "she", depending on the person being talked about.
When referring to a group of people, the typical pronoun is "they". It's also
possible to use "they" as a non-gendered pronoun for a single person.
By itself, the mere grammatical fact of these pronouns is not particularly
interesting.
However, right now the United States, and other countries, are experiencing
social and political tension around a broad range of related topics - how do
we treat people of different genders? How do we treat people who are
transgender? Or people who don't feel like they're clearly masculine or
feminine? Should gender even have a great role in society?
Usage of pronouns has become a particular sticking point during this tension.
For example, let's imagine a person named "Pat". Pat was born as a male, but
wishes to be identified as a woman. When talking _about_ Pat, I have a few
options in how I talk about he/she/them, and which I choose to use will divide
me into one of two political camps.
\-----
I could refer to Pat as "she", indicating that I respect her choice and
identity, which also implies that I find her framework of gender at least
tolerable or imaginable.
I could refer to Pat as "they", which is typically not particularly offensive,
and some people prefer it. It shows that even if I don't agree with their
choice, I want to sidestep awkwardness with them. This lightly shows me as
being in the gender-inclusive camp.
I could refer to Pat continuously as "Pat". This would tend to sound awkward,
and Pat might wonder why I won't use pronouns to talk about Pat, and might be
mildly offended, but it shows I'm at least aware enough of Pat's feelings to
try and avoid serious offense.
I could refer to Pat as "he", which would indicate that I do not respect his
choice. Pat would likely feel that I don't respect him at all, and that I'm
being belligerent in opposing his framework of gender.
\-----
It seems like the inciting incident on StackOverflow in particular unfolded as
follows:
* StackExchange began to introduce a new policy, intended to promote being inclusive of people of different genders and gender expressions.
* If I understand correctly, the policy indicated that writing should strive to be gender neutral. I believe in particular that this meant that the pronoun "they" should be preferred.
* One particular Moderator (by the username Cellio) of the site attempted to clarify, about whether writing that _avoided_ pronouns rather than using pronouns, would be allowed.
* _In Particular_, Cellio was concerned that the usage of the "they" pronoun to refer to individual people could be confusing to non-native English speakers, as "they" is more commonly used to refer to groups of people.
* Drama ensued, in which the stance of Cellio was cast as ideologically equivalent to the stance of someone who would intentionally use the wrong pronouns. (i.e., because Cellio was indicating that they did not wish to refer to a hypothetical Pat as "they", the assumption was that Cellio would refer to Pat as "he", even though Pat would prefer to be referred to by either "she" or "they")
* StackExchange thus fired the Cellio.
* Other people found this firing to be unfair, with a few reasons for finding it unfair:
People who agree with the ideological framework of gender which promotes
inclusivity and sensitivity felt like the fired moderator was actually being
quite reasonable, and that this was an over-reaction or misunderstanding.
People who don't agree with that ideological framework of gender see this as
another example of an opposing political camp colonizing more spaces.
There are a handful of people who believe the firing was reasonable, but I
don't believe I can adequately express their viewpoint.
~~~
tzfld
Thanks. This whole debate is more than strange for me, having a primary
language (hungarian) which do not use gender pronouns at all when referring to
a person/object.
------
notadev
In the early 2000s, Community Leaders (unpaid volunteers who 'worked' as
moderators on AOL) sued AOL for compensation for their work under the Fair
Labor Standards Act. They won $15 million.
All volunteers should do the same. StackExchange mods, Reddit moderators, etc.
Stop working for free to advance the financial interests of these for-profit
companies looking to exploit your labor.
------
nazka
I don't understand how they are not actively engaging with the community. It's
going to cost them every day this is not taken care of. Key people already
left, more will leave, and the damage will still be here. Even if they come
back to how it was before doesn't mean everybody will come back after that
like nothing happened.
------
_pmf_
I see the moderators as (major) part of the problem.
> There was a time when the most valuable asset of the Stack Exchange network
> was the people who freely contributed their time and energy to build
> communities in support of its mission.
Deleting valid or interesting questions is not something I consider to be a
valuable contribution.
------
dangus
I'm totally out of the loop about what this drama is about, and I'll stay that
way.
These are unpaid community moderators. They are essentially volunteers doing
this work because they want to. So let's ponder to ourselves and relate this
to our own lives, what kind of relationship do we have with the organizations
and people we do volunteer work with?
If you're at a point where you're so dissatisfied that you're writing a
sprawling open letter, a manifesto of your dissatisfaction, going as far as
buying a domain and setting up a website to publicize how upset you are, just
to complain to a place that you volunteer at, you know, maybe it's time to
just let it go. Maybe don't volunteer there. StackExchange isn't even a
charity, it's a private for-profit company.
At the end of the day, people visiting the site just did a quick Google search
and wanted their questions answered for free. They are generally unwilling to
pay for this service. If StackExchange didn't exist something very similar
would take its place. None of the general public needs to hear about whatever
moderator drama took place, even if something criminal happened. It's not our
problem.
The users don't actually implicitly value what the moderators do. So if the
moderators aren't happy, they should do something else with their valuable
time.
~~~
brian-armstrong
This is a shockingly unempathetic way to view the situation. These people have
poured lots of their time into making SO work, and they deserve to be heard.
There's no way anybody could build this service without volunteers. These
things don't just spring up from the ground on their own, and as someone who
uses the SE properties for personal and professional reasons, I hope these
moderators can find some sort of satisfactory resolution.
~~~
olingern
I agree. Without these people the site could fall into a mess of bad answers
or a self promotion answer driven platform like Quora.
~~~
edoceo
Sounds like they are so important they should have been compensated. I mean,
if they were so critical to the success.
~~~
mister_hn
They've got compensated in visibility. I don't know any moderator with less
than 20k points to date.
And the more points you have, the upper you stay in the ranks and you can
always embed their badge in your website.
So, yes, they don't earn money, but they receive visibility
~~~
p1esk
What does this visibility mean? Can it be converted to cash somehow?
~~~
bryanrasmussen
I suppose if your profile on StackOverflow is high enough you could put it on
your cv.
SO also has a jobs site, which I suppose can be linked to your profile if you
want it to.
A company I consulted at one time was trying to improve it's profile for job
applicants so they wanted people to put up their github profiles and SO
profiles in some advertisements or whatever they were doing - I think it was
on linkedIn they were doing this. Anyway I think they stopped because nobody
had a particularly high impressive number so why would you even want to do
that (but they did it)
~~~
p1esk
Lots of SO points means I spend a lot of time there answering questions
(usually during work hours). Not sure I’d want to advertise that.
~~~
bryanrasmussen
I would totally agree with that, however I have over the years developed the
suspicion that people who make hiring decisions might not be operating at the
same logical level that I am.
Given both that suspicion, and how they seem to behave about prominent github
profiles and such, I think that being in the top 20th percentile or so on SO
and a strong focus on the tags that correlate to the terms in a job
announcement might be a big draw to some HR people/managers who just really
don't want to mess up one more time! After the fifth complaint or so of
programmers we hire don't know how to code or whatever - it might be soothing.
------
ykevinator
Dear moderators,
Stop flagging stuff as dupes, then I will support your thing. And also why do
you work for free,
Love, Kevin
------
sgt
I'm confused here. What's the TL;DR of what happened?
------
anon12345690
yea these pronouns affect like 0.01% of people but go ahead and worry about
them instead of everyone else and youll ruin every community
when are people gonna figure out that you cant make everyone happy and the
people who whine about pronouns wont ever stop
nice downvotes lol, cant handle the truth?
~~~
Pfhreak
Pronouns affect most people. Most people use them. If you are talking about
trans people, it's estimated to be about 1-3% of people. That's roughly one in
thirty to one in a hundred people.
That puts it at about the roughly same numbers as the number of redheads. It's
uncommon, sure, but it's not totally minuscule.
Trans folks are also one of the most likely (if not the most likely)
minorities to suffer physical violence just for who they are. All they are
asking for is the same basic level of respect and politeness that anyone else
gets.
~~~
barry-cotter
> If you are talking about trans people, it's estimated to be about 1-3% of
> people.
Transgender Demographics: A Household Probability Sample of US Adults, 2014
American Journal of Public Health
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5227939/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5227939/)
Transgender individuals made up 0.53% (95% confidence interval = 0.46, 0.61)
of the population
~~~
Pfhreak
Health and Care Utilization of Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Youth: A
Population-Based Study
Pediatrics Journal
[https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/14...](https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/141/3/e20171683.full.pdf)
Participants included 2168 (2.7%) students who identified as TGNC and 78 761
(97.3%) students who identified as cisgender.
There's a reason I give such a wide range. Maybe I should widen it to 0.5-3%,
but I believe that in the past 5 years we've seen an increase in the number of
people who feel comfortable with a trans or gender nonconforming identity.
~~~
barry-cotter
Trans and Gender Non-Confirming != Trans
Using that article as a source for trans population is like saying 40% of the
US population are people of colour, therefore 40% of the US population is
black.
~~~
pseudalopex
The TGNC group identified as transgender, genderqueer, genderfluid, or unsure.
Cis people with unusual gender expression didn't count.
------
peterwwillis
Who else remembers the world before SE, when people just did exactly the same
thing as SE, but on mailing lists, and we found answers via web search, and we
didn't need all this moderation, categorization, voting, etc?
~~~
whatshisface
Stack exchange works a lot better for me than mailing lists did. Its greatest
contribution is the near elimination of duplicate questions.
~~~
tbyehl
Except that every new question gets shut down as a duplicate and the older
question being "duplicated" is 5 years old, full of obsolete answers, doesn't
address the subtle differences in what people are asking, etc.
They want to use the Q&A format to build something Wikipedia-like for each
site's subject areas but the incentive structure hasn't lead to Wikipedia-
level content curation.
Mailing lists, sub-Reddits, forums... they all end up high duplicative. But
people are also paying attention to all those duplicated answers, and the next
go 'round they contribute an even better answer, and maybe that ends up in a
FAQ or wiki and someone actually puts in the effort to keep it up-to-date.
Or Google figures out the best answer based on being newest, click rates,
whatever other voodoo that they do. Which, in my experience, is almost never a
Stack Exchange.
------
nabdab
Stack exchange has had issues from the beginning with absolutely horrible
people being mean aggressive and deflective, telling people they are idiots
for not providing 110% of available information in their first answer. Moving
to close questions as duplicates or irrelevant while the answer still hasn’t
resolved anything. The site supported this because it helped promote their
“one true answer high on google ranking”-value drive
It’s been an extremely toxic environment, which however was very useful for
searching out answers to common questions after the fact.
Now not too long ago I thought from their public communication that they
wanted to fix this, or at least make some serious headway towards reducing the
toxicity and vile. But no. Instead they decided to hire the assholes and have
them be assholes to the community moderators. This time over something as
silly as the right to not always actively referring to people in gendered
terms.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Why the economic fate of America's cities diverged: deregulation - blahedo
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/11/cities-economic-fates-diverge/417372?single_page=true
======
sportanova
This article is worse than useless without taking into account the cost of
living. Yeah, people in San Francisco + NYC make a lot more than people in
Cedar Rapids - but it also costs a lot more. Take that into account, and then
tell me if there's a big difference
It would be much worse if people in NYC made the same income per capita as
people in the midwest - even though it would be more "equal"
~~~
quesera
I completely disagree.
I think your complaint is baseless and I'm glad I ignored your comment and
went on to read the article.
It's a failing of mine, but I will sometimes skip an article if the comments
here are like yours, because truly some useless articles do appear.
This isn't one of them. I'm confused by your dismissal, and more so by your
reasoning.
~~~
sportanova
Ha ok.. care to actually challenge any of my points?
~~~
quesera
I think the most confusing part for me is that wages and COL are correlated,
obviously, but generally (and specifically in the cities mentioned in TFA),
COL is driven by wages and not the other way around.
So your objection seems to be conflating a follow-on effect with a cause, and
dismissing the article because the author didn't address that effect when he
was really interested in the cause (of COL and many other effects).
Mostly I just wanted to encourage other people to go ahead and read the
article. But since we have this thread to ourselves, there ya go. :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Hashids – Generate short hashes from numbers - yildizbe
http://www.hashids.org
======
dsl
> use them as forgotten password hashes
Please don't.
The author tries to trick you into believing it is secure by including a salt.
However the resulting key space of the "hash" gives you the same security as a
5-6 character alphanumeric password. A motivated attacker could enumerate all
possibilities in a few hours.
~~~
brey
You could use that argument to say 4-digit bank card PINs are really bad
security - and you'd be right, except that they're always locked out after N
attempts.
Why not the same approach here? if you try to brute force a password reset,
you lock out further attempts for a few minutes.
~~~
krallja
You can then use this lockout for a denial of service attack.
~~~
brey
oh no ... I am unable to change my (perfectly secure) password for ten minutes
because an attacker is attempting to brute force my password reset. I'd regard
that as a feature, not a bug.
you don't need to lock out the entire account.
------
zrail
Interesting. Effectively it's base62 encoding with a fixed salt. I think
saying "encrypt" and "decrypt" is sort of misleading, even though you call the
non-cryptographic nature of the hashing in the README files.
For my own products I do something a little different. Instead, when I create
a record I generate a random number (with Ruby's SecureRandom module) and
store the base32 encoding in the database. With the universe set at 1bil, this
reliably generates a random 6 character string that I can safely show to the
customer.
_Edit: base62, not base82_
~~~
bazzargh
You're storing 6-char base-32 values, so 1073741824 possibilities, but you've
got 50-50 chance of collision after 38582 values - that's not a lot, the
birthday paradox bites again! Using much larger random values or hashes gives
you a better safety margin.
~~~
zrail
I also have a unique constraint on the value and re-run the generator if
there's a collision.
~~~
d55
That is something that hashid avoids.
------
ExpiredLink
If it is encryption and decryption why is it called 'hash'?
~~~
d55
They explain that on their website.
~~~
ExpiredLink
Oh, I see:
>> _A true cryptographic hash cannot be decrypted. However, to keep things
simple the word hash is used loosely to refer to the random set of characters
that is generated -- like a YouTube hash._
What?
------
jbaudanza
I've used the Blowfish cipher to obfuscate database IDs into youtube-like
URLs. Blowfish has a small 64-bit blocksize which fits nicely into a base64'd
URL param.
------
xhrpost
I recently tried using this for a project but ended up switching. I don't
really need the encryption ability. More of an issue though is that there is
no way to force that the hashes are "short". If you use their example for
hashing the default _id in Mongo, you'll end up with a fairly long hash. The
only way I could get them short was to switch to an auto-increment starting at
1 and then they will remain short for as long as the number is small. This
presented other issues and in the end I found ShortId [1] which made the whole
process much simpler.
\- [1] [https://github.com/dylang/shortid](https://github.com/dylang/shortid)
------
mischanix
I mocked up something similar [1] a while ago, although operating on fixed-
length integers instead of db keys and not designed with any regard for the
"decryption" process. I'm curious if it's flawed in any significant way for
the purpose of converting sequential ids into apparently-random distinct ids.
1\. [http://ideone.com/qLQHI5](http://ideone.com/qLQHI5)
------
latchkey
I've been using this for a while now and I'm pretty happy with it. Java
implementation of Crockford's Base32 algorithm for encoding simple numeric
values:
[https://code.google.com/p/unsuck/source/browse/trunk/src/mai...](https://code.google.com/p/unsuck/source/browse/trunk/src/main/java/unsuck/io/CrockfordBase32.java)
------
kvz
I have an old blogpost around the same idea that many people contributed
versions in different languages to: [http://kvz.io/blog/2009/06/10/create-
short-ids-with-php-like...](http://kvz.io/blog/2009/06/10/create-short-ids-
with-php-like-youtube-or-tinyurl/) Hope it's useful
------
underwater
If you don't need salts you can just use the inbuilt base64 functions:
var numbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5];
var encoded = btoa(''+numbers).replace(/=/g, '');
var decoded = atob(encoded).split(',').map(Number);
console.log(encoded, decoded);
------
hcarvalhoalves
If you need a short code the user will have to type the legibility is more
important than the length, you can optimize for human input like this:
[https://gist.github.com/hcarvalhoalves/5330d8af36e7163d58c4](https://gist.github.com/hcarvalhoalves/5330d8af36e7163d58c4)
~~~
underwater
You still need to remove '5' and 'S'. I'd like a to see people use similar
algorithms for mobile input. The two most important characteristics would be
to be purely lowercase and to cluster numbers and letters to minimize keyboard
switching.
------
mcao
I actually created something really similar, except with more options to fine
tune the encoding/decoding process:
[https://github.com/mikecao/hashkit](https://github.com/mikecao/hashkit)
------
oh_sigh
FYI the salt has a max size n - All salts longer than n are equivalent to
using a salt of substr(salt, 0, n)
------
cordite
My only complaint is that not all the implementations yield the same results.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Nissan Leaf - dools
http://www.nissanusa.com/leaf-electric-car/
======
danenania
Having used both (flash extensively, js less so), I agree that flash's closed
plugin status completely sucks, and this is major.
That said, for nearly every other aspect of developing thick client RIAs and
complex visual experiences, flash/flex/as3 wins by a mile. From IDEs to the
display api to as3 apis in general to the true object oriented architecture to
lack of browser inconsistencies to client side storage to sockets and
networking options to modular applications.
Say what you want about flash. It certainly has its problems and it has
certainly been abused, but let's not ignore all the areas where js is still
playing catch up and will be for a long time (even it's just IE). Flash has
been a lead innovator in web-based interfaces for many years. Even if it's
true that it's in decline, completely discounting such an important technology
only shows ignorance.
~~~
treeface
"true object oriented architecture"? I agree with that, but what are you
comparing it to?
~~~
danenania
HTML/Javascript
~~~
treeface
And in what way do you find JavaScript to be less than "truly" object
oriented?
------
JulianMorrison
I'm a little worried about losing what is to me one of the main advantages of
Flash: that it can be blocked. So your all singing, all dancing website shuts
the hell up and behaves like a sedate page full of text and static images.
I mean, I can block JS, but it's irritating to have to. That's generally used
for useful things like navigation. Flash marks something up as useless pizazz.
~~~
nikster
Very interesting point here.
Maybe Adobe's next ad campaign will feature this idea: Flash is better because
you can turn it off. In fact, if you turn it off, you remove 99% of all truly
annoying ads on the web.
Thinking ahead, maybe we need a ClickToJS...
~~~
cookiecaper
We have one, it's called NoScript.
------
citricsquid
I don't understand how we've gone from "Flash is crap for entire websites"
(edit: which is almost always true) to "Flash is the devil in every
situation". It has its place, Javascript will never and _shouldn't_ try and
"kill" Flash, they're different.
~~~
benmccann
Flash is a threat to the openness of the web. I can't reliably watch video,
play games, or do anything else requiring Flash on my computer because I run
Linux. Requiring you run an OS of Adobe's choosing is antithetical to the
basic tenets of the web.
~~~
radley
No it's only antithetical to the tenets of Linux users.
edit: Just saying, people who knowingly choose Linux don't expect to use
Flash.
~~~
billybob
I disagree. The web exists because browsers and servers communicate based on
open standards. The HN server doesn't know or care what OS or browser I'm
using. I could be sitting here typing in my GET requests manually if I was
fast enough. Nobody cares. It's a protocol.
When the web relies on a technology where the "protocol" is "first install
this proprietary plugin, if it's available for your setup, and if not, screw
you," it is antithetical to the protocol-based approach.
Look at how much browsers have improved in the last few years, making new
things possible on sites. This happened because anybody can write a browser
that conforms to HTTP protocols, Javascript specifications, etc. Do you see
the same kind of improvement in Flash players? No. Because there isn't
competition.
The web is better off without Flash. Or anything else that can't have 100
competing implementations.
------
fleitz
One should note that if you pull the site up in IE it still uses flash, which
means we still need flash. Unless you're willing to say goodbye to 40% of your
customers.
~~~
baguasquirrel
Oh whatever. I can see it on me iPad. And iPhone. And Android. Who uses a
fucking computer these days anyway? Programmers? ;-)
~~~
extension
Well, you can _see_ it but you can't really _use_ it. It's brutally
unresponsive and you can't scroll the text popups. Kind of a waste to dodge
Flash and ignore the biggest reason to do so.
~~~
baguasquirrel
Wait now, hold on a minute. I thought people have been saying that Flash on
the Android was horribly slow.
------
soljin2000
Unless ... You want to record video or audio from a user. Or run more than 5
fps in IE7 (about 25% of our users). Everyone says flash is a piece of crap
but you can see from stuff like boxcar2d.com that can run for days without
crashing or leaking. It's about how it's coded. There are tons of poorly
programmed flashes out there but that doesn't make Flash bad. Flash has been
abused but it's not the devil. far from it.
~~~
soljin2000
PS the links for the video or any of the others around the car don't work.
------
jtchang
There is a desc tag:
<desc>Created with Raphaël</desc>
<http://raphaeljs.com/reference.html>
Awesome stuff.
~~~
SeanLuke
What's this then?
[http://www.nissanusa.com/leaf-electric-
car/js/js.swf__v2.0.2...](http://www.nissanusa.com/leaf-electric-
car/js/js.swf__v2.0.22.gz.js)
~~~
buster
Most probably they will have a Flash fallback. Didn't try the page in IE6
though..
------
enobrev
A lot of grandiose claims in hopes of the death of Flash around here. As
though Flash has never done anything good for anyone.
I agree that it's nice that the browsers are now supporting new features that
allow so much well needed functionality across the board - but they're really
just now catching up to what Flash has offered us for years.
Forget all-flash websites. Seriously, forget them. I like the OP's site about
as much as I liked flash intros from 2001 before they started adding "Skip
This" buttons. I'm referring to media players, socket clients, file uploading
tools worth using, vector animation, a decent programming experience that
worked across the board (AS3 is actually a fun language if you give it a real
shot).
Where would the web be without Youtube? Where would Youtube be without Flash?
How about last.fm? or Pandora? Do you remember what the web was like before
flash? Real Player, anyone? Java applets? I'll take a flash game over a Java
applet any day. Regardless if you use these media-centric sites personally,
they changed the internet as we know it - making it accessible to normal human
beings. To disregard Flash's place in that history doesn't make any sense.
And it's far from over. The browsers STILL haven't gotten media playback right
across the board. Everything's a big fat beta right now and IE is dragging us
behind as usual. It would be nice if everyone could at least agree on a codec
or two, but no. Meanwhile, flash-based media players still work just about
everywhere.
I'm happy that the browsers are catching up with Flash - truly. I loved
developing in Actionscript, and I'll love replacing it. But these claims that
Flash is somehow the bane of the internet is to deny some of the very
foundations of how successful the internet has become.
~~~
steveklabnik
> Where would Youtube be without Flash?
<http://www.youtube.com/html5>
> To disregard Flash's place in that history doesn't make any sense.
Nobody is saying that Flash wasn't worthwhile, ever. It's just nice that
something that used to be a large part of the web can be taken out of the
hands of a company, and returned to us all.
> But these claims that Flash is somehow the bane of the internet is to deny
> some of the very foundations of how successful the internet has become.
Ehhhh I'd disagree. I certainly agree that until very recently (and not quite
yet for everyone), Flash is no longer needed, and that that's a good thing.
Flash is a threat to the Internet: it's in the hands of Adobe. The web should
be open, and for everyone. But that's precisely _because_ the internet has
become so successful. It's far too important to be left under corporate
control.
~~~
gloob
> <http://www.youtube.com/html5>
So what you're saying is that without Flash, YouTube wouldn't have existed
until 2009 or 2010?
~~~
steveklabnik
Yes, and that that has no bearing on Flash's importance today. Lots of things
that seemed awesome in 2004 aren't that great in 2011.
------
moe
Only on HN you submit an _electric car_ website without further comment - and
instead of discussing the car everyone starts arguing over the implementation
of the website. ;-)
~~~
wmeredith
This was originally submitted with a title that read, "Flash is dead forever"
or something similarly sensational and was meant to point out the actual site
implementation. In accordance with HN guidelines, the submissions title has
been changed to reflect the given title of the actual submission.
~~~
mkenyon
This whole comment page makes so much more sense. Thanks!
------
mixmax
Well it appears that at least the linked site does need flash. If you click on
features and specifications the embedded video is flash (firefox 3.6)
So not quite true.
~~~
thristian
I assumed it was a <video/> element that Firefox wouldn't render because it
used H.264 video, but no... it's an ordinary Flash video. How odd.
~~~
nitrogen
It seemed to play without Flash in Chrome 10.0.648.82 on Linux.
------
Johngibb
Very cool, but I'm not sure creating a site that looks JUST like a flash site
is really the right direction... ;)
~~~
trustfundbaby
You've got to convince the masses, that you can do Flash ... without flash
first, before you can get them to stop using flash.
~~~
gloob
As soon as the masses decide that HTML5 = "Flash, but better", everything that
is bad about Flash will rapidly become everything that's bad about HTML5.
Changing the underlying technology will not change the people who use it.
~~~
ringm
It will be worse. This stuff can't be contained with simple tools like
Flashblock. Unless you want to block all Javascript by default, which will
probably break 99% websites in the near future.
------
wmwong
This is awesome. I was expecting to see HTML5 and was surprised when it
wasn't. The doctype is strict and a lot of the interface uses JavaScript. The
center navigations use svg and Raphael[1]. Either way, this is pretty sweet.
And so is the car.
[1] <http://raphaeljs.com/>
------
lyime
Nice site. We don't need Flash anymore you say?
Keep me posted when RTMP media, video/webcam/audio capture, audio analysis,
content protection is supported cross browser in HTML and JS.
------
WesleyJohnson
I was going to post this as a reply, but several people made the comment that
them duplicating what Flash could do, even if done in HTML and JS, wasn't the
right path? I can understand the hatred of Flash itself, but why the dislike
for these types of sites in general? Not everything needs to be plain text,
easily scanable, SEO compatible, clean, simple, etc.
This site is as much about marketing and generating appeal as it is about
information. I don't see anything wrong with how it was done. Someone
enlighten me please.
Edit: And somewhat off-topic - is it a requirement that production electrics
cars have to hideous? Tesla and Chevy (Volt) seem to be the only ones that
have made them actually nice to look at.
~~~
tomkarlo
It's not a requirement that they look hideous, but for mass production hybrid
/ all-electric cars, it's kind of a requirement that they look DIFFERENT.
Why? Because people who are choosing to buy a hybrid or electric usually want
EVERYONE ELSE to know they got one. That's one reason the Prius has no
"regular" version - if you see a Prius, and its distinctive shape, you
immediately know the person bought a hybrid. With other cars, (including the
Tesla) you have to see the badges on the back to know. So part of the "moral
reward" for buying hybrid, paying more and sacrificing some performance is
lost.
------
daniel02216
Their feedback form doesn't work in Safari. The site feels like a Flash site,
but doesn't use flash, which is nice!
It also works on my iPad. The 360 is a bit slow but it's there.
------
shawndrost
Why would a manager at Nissan allow this to be built? They now have to
maintain two parallel versions of their complex site. What is the non-
ideological payoff?
~~~
shawndrost
In case it was unclear, this is a serious question. I'm wondering why a
business would build a complex HTML5 site if they're going to have to build a
flash version anyway.
~~~
whiskers
I would imagine the case made was to support iPads - presumably a small
segment of visitors but I'm sure the agency devs wanted to play!
~~~
shawndrost
Oh, right -- good point.
------
antirez
What's seriously needed is an HTML5 authoring program that can be used with a
GUI and zero programming skills. Otherwise Flash will be very needed in the
future.
~~~
steveklabnik
A HNer is working on this, actually: <http://radiapp.com/>
------
radley
There a huge irony to this post. Look who made the site:
<http://criticalmass.com>
It's talent that matters, not the platform.
------
noibl
If by 'we' you mean Nissan, well... great.
Counterexample: [http://blog.phono.com/2011/02/17/how-to-build-a-voip-
based-b...](http://blog.phono.com/2011/02/17/how-to-build-a-voip-based-baby-
monitor/) (browser-based VOIP, Flash under the hood)
Bizarrely, Chrome has support for speech input on text-based forms which
translates microphone input to text on their servers, but it doesn't expose
direct access to the audio. Argh!
------
delackner
I'm surprised no one has suggested the obvious reason why making a site like
this is not necessarily "wasted extra effort" for Nissan. When Apple's iAd
platform was unveiled, they demoed... a Nissan Leaf ad. That ad content had to
be written in javascript, so it probably wasn't a huge leap to say hey let's
push that content out to the web as well.
~~~
gavingmiller
I was a developer at the studio that did this. Brands like Nissan think much
more ahead than this, and the two development efforts went on in parallel
(another studio did the iAd work.) In fact, if I'm not mistaken the leaf site
launched before the iAd did, or at least really close together.
------
elboru
We'll need flash until we have a GOOD IDE for those technologies...
~~~
timsco
This is the biggest factor in Flash going away. In our shop, we have a guys
that would never be able to code in a text editor but can bang out great
looking advertising at amazing speeds (which means cheap production costs)
because of the Flash IDE.
If you believe that advertisers can live without animation, you have your head
in the sand.
------
juddlyon
Impressive, to be sure. But terms like "anything" and "ever" are hyperbolic.
Flash isn't going anywhere for years.
~~~
dools
Yes, unabashed, brazen hyperbole to be sure. Good headline though, I thought.
The thing that really struck me the most about this is that as little as 2
years ago there would have been absolutely no chance of deploying a huge brand
interactive experience without Flash.
This is the first time I've seen a site that I thought was _obviously_ Flash
only to right-click and not see "Zoom in". I was pretty gobsmacked.
------
buro9
There is some flash on there (a video, under Specs > Features & Specs), but
this is still a very impressive demonstration of how little it is actually
required to achieve these kinds of effect.
------
51Cards
"Say hello" to a REALLY slow running website and my hardware ain't that
shabby. Running FF 3.6 It's very cool but a little too much too soon for
general consumption IMO.
------
ck2
Hmm flashblock is triggered for some reason but works anyway.
Those menus are rather distracting and complicated for an average consumer
site.
ps. OT but the "Leaf" is not available in _green_ ???
~~~
Klonoar
Flashblock might be triggered due to SoundManager 2.
Which is funny, considering in many cases it's probably Flash handling the
audio for this, and thus the title is inaccurate.
------
roryokane
Unless there’s a vector-based action game running at a decent frame rate
hidden somewhere on that site, I don’t think you’ve adequately proven your
statement.
------
Skroob
Nice and all, but the scroll bars don't work on the iPad, nor is there a way
to scroll the tag list on the left. A step in the right direction though.
------
ch0wn
I used my back button and it ... worked. Wow.
------
ziadbc
Anybody have an idea on how this was done?
Javascript by hand?
~~~
cookiecaper
As above, it uses the Raphael JavaScript drawing and animation library.
------
marknutter
I don't get why this is better than standard, non-animated text. I just want
information about the freaking leaf. By all means, make the typography and
design look pretty, but stop with the damn animation. I don't want to have to
re-learn a new interface every I want to learn about a new product.
------
paulocal
The intro video uses the video tag to play this video:
[http://www.nissanusa.com/ev/media/video/nissan-leaf-
intro.mp...](http://www.nissanusa.com/ev/media/video/nissan-leaf-intro.mp4)
No flash there. It will fall back to flash in Internet Explorer.
------
tomelders
Stop.... Hoooldup.
Replicating what Flash does in HTML, CSS, SVG & JS is not the way forward.
------
treblig
It's kind of funny that they built their (very similar-looking) iAd with
HTML5, and then went ahead with a Flash marketing site. Seems like there could
have been some shared resources there.
------
webuiarchitect
Wow! I like that!! Much faster.. and not need of any plugin that crashes every
now and then.
Plus you don't lose on search engines and history management can be left to
the browser.
------
tsycho
Anyone know how they created the scrollbar in the popup dialog boxes? It works
in IE6 as well, though doesn't look as pretty as in Chrome/FF.
~~~
mgcross
JScrollpane: <http://jscrollpane.kelvinluck.com/> Good stuff, but doesn't work
with touch/mobile devices. It would have been nice if they would have detected
the userAgent before calling JScrollpane, as default scrollbars do work with
mobile.
------
yarone
On this site, the browser "back" button doesn't always behave as expected. Ex:
Go there. Click Back. Doesn't go back. Chrome 9.
------
doki_pen
Chromium-9.0.597.84(0) and I see tons of flash on that page. I know because
I'm using flash blocker.
------
mcmc
No one tell those "punch the monkey" ad authors... at least not before
html5block is out.
------
SolarUpNote
Aside from the whole Flash accessibility debate, this site is REALLY cool. I'm
lovin it.
------
ryanisinallofus
Great. A whole new and cool way to make really unusable and shitty websites.
------
tocomment
Why are all the comments about flash? The Nissan Leaf is a car.
------
pacoverdi
Doh! Need a facebook account to "watch the electric revolution begin".
Never mind.
------
TamDenholm
Its still just as annoying even though its not done in flash...
------
redthrowaway
Ambitious, but it runs very, very poorly on my mbp (chrome).
------
dbabalik
We still do until the <device> tag arrives in town.
------
jasonlbaptiste
The world's best flash car site... done in HTML5.
------
hazelnut
but hey, you can build ugly banners with html5 / canvas too ... and the
performance will be the same. should be banish html5 too?
------
sjs382
HTML5 still can't interact with a webcam...
------
pero
Anyone know which agency did this?
~~~
timsco
Critical Mass, I believe.
------
ThomPete
Until it's possible to do audiotool.com you are not even close to be able to
replace flash
~~~
catshirt
ambitious but not impossible
~~~
ThomPete
It is impossible since you can't sync the sound properly
------
NHQ
Slick website. Ugly Car.
------
damoncali
Cool car. Oh, nevermind.
------
nika
I'm glad to see this. I for one am looking forward to the day when javascript
is at the point where it offers a level of programing ease for animations,
etc, that you get with flash. (It may have happened already, last time I did
lingo programming it was called lingo, and I am not conversant with the state
of the art in javascript.)
Or it seems that CSS is supporting animations and maybe that is a better
choice over javascript? (because the browser, I presume, can optimize CSS a
lot easier than javascript which can have arbitrary functionality.)
~~~
cookiecaper
Flash is here to stay until someone creates a designer-oriented HTML5/JS/SVG
IDE analogous to Adobe's designer-oriented Flash/AS IDE. Even after that
point, it'll be a while before we see Flash head out the door. There's a lot
that HTML5 doesn't address yet.
~~~
varaon
"Someone" might be Adobe: [http://tv.adobe.com/watch/adc-presents/preview-of-
the-edge-p...](http://tv.adobe.com/watch/adc-presents/preview-of-the-edge-
prototype-tool-for-html5-/)
~~~
Raphael_Amiard
I think it would be a dream for adobe, to be able to discharge themselves of
maintaining their player on multiple architectures on browser makers.
~~~
cookiecaper
Agreed. Adobe doesn't make much money off of the Flash Player, just the Flash
IDE, so they'd be thrilled if they could offload Flash Player's functionality
and the horrible reputation it gives them and just focus on creating a good
IDE.
------
gcb
it probably took the team 10x the time to do that this way instead of flash.
it will not work on 100% of the devices. but at least they got some clicks
from us that they wouldn't otherway.
Continuing with this rationale: if done in flash, it would have take the team
10x the time to that instead of plain html. or 200x the time if done in a
simpler html format, like a wikipedia article.
it would work on 100% of the devices... you would be able to use back/forward
buttons, you would be able to translate on google translator and still see the
site... wouldn't use all the cpu... it would load instantly for the user
(well, it would be loading the rest bellow the fold while the user was
reading/looking at the top part)... it would hopefully play well with
screenreaders... i would still be able to use the left menu even after
increasing font size... but you wouldn't have buttons that jump around.
~~~
gavingmiller
I was a developer working at the studio that did this. Development took
roughly the same amount of time in JS/HTML instead of flash.
~~~
gcb
That's awesome to know. And I really think you guys should do a writeup about
the experience... :)
I bet folks here would love it too.
------
drivebyacct2
I'm not exaggerating when I say that the 360 view was very confusing because
it wasn't really 3d. I was dragging my mouse in so many directions, only to
find, only the horizontal component affected the presented image. :(
------
jijoy
Not bad but not cool . Not upto Flash
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Angela Merkel’s record on environmental policy has been a disaster - Tomte
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/19/world-leading-eco-vandal-angela-merkel-german-environmental
======
marze
Germany's generous subsidy and build out of solar, while solar was still
really expensive, was key in driving the cost down which now the whole world
benefits from. Huge credit there.
But bio fuels are an unmitigated disaster. Electric ground transportation is
the future.
~~~
dvfjsdhgfv
> Electric ground transportation is the future.
It's a relatively less evil, for now. We still haven't found a good way of
dealing with old batteries and it's a huge environmental problem.
~~~
guitarbill
Do hydrogen fuel cells have major issues, other than the chicken-and-egg
problem of hydrogen refueling stations?
~~~
speedplane
Expensive materials (platinum) and difficulty making them small enough for a
car.
~~~
czechdeveloper
Is hydrogen low stability and easy leakage not an issue anymore?
~~~
speedplane
From what I understand, it's handled by well placed fuel tanks, where even if
they blow, no on inside the vehicle gets hurt.
------
_Codemonkeyism
Basically Germany will miss the goal of a 40% reduction by 2020 with only
reducing CO2 by 30%.
Beside coal/gas power, mostly from closing nuclear power plants. For example a
quarter of CO2 emission in Berlin is coming from two Vattenfall coal power
plants. Other effects are larger increase in people and economic growth.
I have been buying renewable energy for 15 years, but not many/not enough
people in Germany care.
On a positive note renewable energy is 35% in Germany.
~~~
guitarbill
This largely coincides with the Green Party's rise in popularity. Sadly it
seems they have no real plan, only ideology. IMO this is why they've
prioritised shutting down nuclear power over coal power, because demonstrating
against nuclear power is almost required to be a member, but sensible policies
are not.
I don't think you can blame Merkel, she doesn't really have a hard stance on
most topics - if anything, the opposite is true, and her position on many
things is vague or pragmatic. It seems to me that the popularity of Martin
Schulz and the AfD are a direct response to that.
~~~
hannob
> This largely coincides with the Green Party's rise in popularity.
The green party could probably profit much more from those topics if one had
the feeling they'd be more trustworthy in those issues. Particularly in the
diesel emissions scandal the greens are a big failure - the reason being that
the greens form the government in southwest Germany (Baden Württemberg), which
has a strong car industry.
~~~
guitarbill
I'm from Baden Württemberg, and I'm not sure how strong the car industry is
any more. For example, every year a bit more autobahn has a speed restriction
applied to it.
I think you're spot on though. The diesel emissions scandal is made worse by
the fact that diesel was promoted in the EU because the CO2 emissions tend to
be lower than petrol. This is reflected by diesel vs petrol prices in France
or Germany (diesel was/is? cheaper per 100km), compared to the UK where diesel
wasn't as popular.
~~~
wink
Where do you get this rise from?
2009 - 10.7%
2013 - 8.4%
2017 - 8-10% (projections)
Only B-W has a ruling Green Party, I'd they they're still mostly at 10%
everywhere else.
~~~
qznc
Living in Baden-Württemberg is probably the reason. Green is the strongest
party there (2016 30%). They are ahead of CDU (Merkels party) for two periods
now.
~~~
wink
Yes, that's why I claim it's a local thing :)
~~~
guitarbill
Fair enough, the point I was trying to make is that it's more than just Merkel
+ some lobbying, and that this article is badly written and mostly rubbish.
------
yorwba
The article voices a bunch of valid criticism, but I really wish it could have
done so without turning environmental damage into a contest and using
unsubstantiated superlatives. Is it not enough to criticize someone without
claiming that they are _the worst_? The jab at Trump felt misplaced as well.
~~~
shangxiao
I feel like jabs at conservative politics are the norm now with a lot of
journalism. A few weeks back an article [1] I read, from reddit, started with:
…the dastardly Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor seem to be a great gift to the Alt-Right’s xenophobic nationalists.
Interesting article, but unnecessary (and daresay incorrect?) jab at the
start.
[1] [http://www.thedailybeast.com/the-american-who-buried-a-
kamik...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/the-american-who-buried-a-kamikaze-
enemy)
~~~
qf303rjr3
If you're going to quote an article, you shouldn't leave out context that
changes the meaning of the sentence you're quoting -
"The 75th anniversary commemorations of the dastardly Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor
seem to be a great gift to the Alt-Right’s xenophobic nationalists."
It's the 75th anniversary commemorations that seem to be a gift - not the
attack itself (obviously).
~~~
shangxiao
Ah yes you're quite right! Apologies to all. I'd misread that, although I
think my point still stands: I'd like to read about the story and not hear
about politics in a foreign (to me) country.
------
Grue3
IMO being anti-nuclear and pro-environment are mutually exclusive positions.
Easy way to discern who really wants to reduce carbon emissions and who is
just a populist.
~~~
ahartmetz
According to environmentalists in Germany, nuclear and pro-environment are
indeed mutually exclusive. But I prefer not to copy all of my opinions from
the group I most agree with.
FWIW I think nuclear is good in principle, but neither states nor companies
have proven responsible enough to handle it. So I'm kind of against nuclear
but not in this dogmatic way.
The practical difference is that I think there should be further research to
design inherently safe approaches and processes to reduce the risk until it's
orders of magnitude safer - maybe something with Thorium, maybe fusion, maybe
a new fission reactor design. Then I'd be in favor of using it.
The nuclear waste "killer argument" is mostly bullshit. Highly radioactive
substances are spent quickly, long lived substances radiate weakly. 100000
years are quite predictable in geology.
~~~
mfukar
> FWIW I think nuclear is good in principle, but neither states nor companies
> have proven responsible enough to handle it.
So the currently operating nuclear plants that have gone without incident are
dismissed? Why so?
~~~
cygx
Their design is still fairly naive in dealing with worst-case scenarios (eg
lack of core catchers).
~~~
mfukar
I'm not sure what that means. Are you pointing out a severe deficiency that
makes their whole operational record somehow moot?
~~~
cygx
It means their design is flawed, cannot be fixed and likely would not pass
muster if proposed today.
Whether or not you consider this a severe enough deficit to necessitate a
shutdown is a matter of policy.
As to any operation record, just keep in mind that the Fukushima Daiichi
Nuclear Power Plant had one dating back to 1971.
~~~
mfukar
I don't make policy. Policy, however, involves risk management. If deficient
plants have been operated successfully for this long, the implication to me is
that their operators have proven responsible enough to handle it.
~~~
cygx
_If deficient plants have been operated successfully for this long, the
implication to me is that their operators have proven responsible enough to
handle it._
A lack of air bags is not noticable until your car crashes.
~~~
mfukar
Sure, but what you're claiming is that air bags are missing based on never
having seen them operate.
~~~
cygx
No, they are missing because the car had been built before the invention of
airbags. It's uncontestable that currently operating reactors generally lack
certain safety measures we'd have added if we built them today.
The question is if we nevertheless deem them 'safe enough'.
~~~
mfukar
> It's uncontestable that currently operating reactors generally lack certain
> safety measures we'd have added if we built them today.
It is, because it is also a tautology. To me it has no bearing over the point
we're discussing.
------
kome
Very good article. The industry-government nexus in Germany is indeed super
powerful and underrated: other countries call it corruption, in Germany is
called corporatism.
In the last few years we saw it in action, with important repercussion on the
global level: for example, the way the Greek crisis was managed it had to do
much more with the safety of German banks, that with the welfare of Greece
([https://www.esmt.org/pub/where-did-greek-bailout-money-
go](https://www.esmt.org/pub/where-did-greek-bailout-money-go)).
~~~
lispm
Without European (and incl. German) money Greece would be bancrupt and no
longer in the Eurozone. Bancrupt banks in Europe would have helped no one,
particularly not Greece.
For the welfare of the people in Greece the greek government is responsible,
not Angela Merkel.
~~~
sjwright
Without being tied to the common currency, the Greek Drachma would have
devalued relative to the Deutsche Mark, making Greek exports and tourism more
lucrative. Had this been able to occur, the impact to the Greek economy would
have been far less.
Instead, the common currency has greatly benefited Germany: had the Germans
retained the Deutsche Mark, their currency would be valued higher than the
Euro is now, making their exports more expensive and/or lowering the profits
of export industries.
~~~
lispm
Greece imports a lot -> gets more expensive.
Greece with its Drachma would have been a welcome victim for currency
speculation. This was tried with the Euro, too, but it failed.
People also think in economic terms, but the Euro is a political project.
Countries like Greece wanted to be in the Eurozone. It was not Germany's wish.
It was the wish of Greece and the population of Greece also wanted it - not
just the politicians.
Germany actually did not want to have the Euro itself, it agreed to the Euro
to get the Reunification. But it agreed on the Euro to be a stable currency,
not one that politicians would devalue to gain short term effects.
~~~
readittwice
> Greece imports a lot -> gets more expensive. I just want to add: This could
> also be a good thing, since people in Greece are more likely to spend money
> on goods produced in Greece. This could help their economy.
~~~
lispm
It could, but for example Greece lacks energy resources and imports a lot of
oil and gas. That's not easy to replace and that still would involve imports.
The top imports are fuels, machines/computers, pharmaceuticals, electrical
equipment, ships, ...
------
dvfjsdhgfv
As a person, she's extremely obstinate. For a leader, this trait can be
advantageous - after all, who wants a leader who changes their minds all the
time - but for the rest of Europe it's a curse. Somehow she is unable to admit
she made some serious mistakes, and we're all suffering because of it.
~~~
lispm
That's actually the opposite of the perception of Angela Merkel in Germany. In
Germany she is seen as populist, because she changes her mind quite often or
waits until the public opinion is clear. Only in the refugee crisis, she was
seen as following moral principles having not made any concessions to right
wing politics (which earned her a lot of respect and a lot of hate). Make no
mistake, generally her team is very accurately tracking public opinion.
~~~
dvfjsdhgfv
> she was seen as following moral principles having not made any concessions
> to right wing politics
Well, Bavarians might disagree with both "moral principles" and "right wing".
Especially CDU is hardly "right wing".
~~~
MagnumOpus
The CDU is extremely fiscally conservative (see Schaeuble's black zero
project) and very socially conservative (anti-gay-marriage, anti-drug-
legalisation, pro-surveillance compared to the average view of the
population).
It is rather right wing in a global context. If you don't think they are right
wing, you might want to recalibrate your views of what you think of
"centrist".
~~~
gozur88
In the US the CDU would be center left.
~~~
zmix
No, it wouldn't. :)
------
mixedbit
I fail to understand why German automotive industry is lobbing pro diesels.
All German car makers make both gasoline and diesel engines, if diesels were
banned or taxed to be more expensive customers wouldn't resign from buying
cars but would choose some other available option (gasoline, hybrid,
electric).
~~~
ahartmetz
I think it's because they have a technical edge (well...) in diesel engines
for cars and / or because they sell so many of them, especially in Germany
itself. Markets favoring diesel engines thus favor German car makers.
~~~
mixedbit
I wonder if the technical edge is there only because German diesels do not
meet emission regulations. It is easy to have the best product on the market
if all the competitors need to make weaker engines to meet the regulations and
German companies make a cheating software instead.
------
baybal2
This sounds alarmistic to me.
Diesel emissions are exaggerated. European emission standards set limits for
diesel emissions that are just minutely different from gasoline emissions.
American limits for diesels are notorious for being more restrictive than for
gas engines.
All of that considered, diesels are plainly more economical and more efficient
on pretty much all common engine size ranges
~~~
mtgx
First off, the big problem with diesel is not CO2, but NOx gases, which are
way more immediately dangerous to human health. That's why some _cities_ are
thinking of banning them ASAP right now.
Second, besides VW which was creating even 40x the emissions than the standard
you mentioned required, pretty much all the other car makers were creating
10-15x as many emissions, too, thus making that "strict standard" way looser.
Forget Euro 6 or Euro 5. These cars weren't even compliant with the 25 year
old Euro 2. In other words, all of these car makers "passing" the emissions
tests over the past two decades has been all a bad joke played on the EU
population.
[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/sep/19/many-
car-...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/sep/19/many-car-brands-
emit-more-pollution-than-volkswagen-report-finds)
Finally, a new stricter (than Euro 6) standard was supposed to arrive by 2021
or so, but Merkel once again intervened to make the standard even looser (by
+50% more emissions allowed) than the previous one, which would be a first in
the history of the Euro emissions standards, which have become increasingly
stricter not looser, so far. All thanks to Merkel.
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/24/petrol-c...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/24/petrol-
cars-allowed-to-exceed-pollution-limits-by-50-under-draft-eu-laws)
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/jun/28/angela-m...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/jun/28/angela-
merkel-eu-car-emissions)
~~~
lispm
The industry was promoting the Diesel also with the smaller CO2 emissions of
this engine.
The other negative effects of the Diesel boom was very visible for a long time
and politics and authorities were ignoring it.
Merkel (and her coalition partner the CSU) is especially responsible for
having a very weak minister Dobrindt, who was not willing or able to guide the
automotive industry.
Merkel and the government is a part of the problem, but the automotive
industry and the consumer is even more so. The automotive industry promoted
the Diesel engine and the consumer bought especially the high-powered ones.
The government is responsible for low Diesel taxes, supporting large company
cars and a lack of regulation.
------
_pmf_
"Vorne hui, hinten pfui" is the correct term (which means "nice from the
front, but disgusting from the rear" or something like talking the talk, but
not walking the walk).
------
fogetti
Cool. Nicely put.
------
addHocker
Yes, she is a nice little sockpuppet for the car-industry and obviously
getting what you want as a industry always damaged the industry itself. No
innovation, no risk taking, no fast adaption of new tech..
This sort of behaviour opened up a whole industry for disruption, so in a way
corrupt politicians are the grave-diggers of old industrys.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Crowdsource Microsoft's new CEO - ray_sun
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Y62ugAoO58msPK4yDxXgHdI7lvivFWQXc7HvEuE_Wi4/viewform
======
ipodize
A bit easy to game... Just submitted Bill Gates eight times.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
When work doesn't pay for the middle class - viggity
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2009/1005/taxes-financial-aid-college-roughing-up-middle-class.html
======
ajross
I'm not following some of this. It's true that the marginal benefits of salary
changes for wealthy[1] parents with children in private (US) colleges who also
are applying for a mortgage payment reduction on homes they can't afford is
very small. And for these folks, it may be very tempting to take a part time
position[2] instead of working harder.
But needless to say, that's a rather small population. The article is cherry
picking this small population[3] of kinda-sorta-unfortunates (they're still
making $120k a year!) and using it to argue against a bunch of government
programs that provide real benefits to people with a fraction of their income.
Could things be tuned better? Yeah. Benefits programs are filled with this
kind of unintended side effect. But to write this kind of blanket argument
cautioning against them seems awfully partisan to me. It's a fairly typical
right-wing Forbes editorial in journalism clothing.
[1] $120k per year is in the top 10th percentile or thereabouts -- it's at the
very edge of what most people would consider "middle class".
[2] NOT simply a lower paying one, as the article implies. A lower paying
position is still full time work, after all. The contention that making less
is "bad for the economy" isn't really sound. Downward wage pressure in high-
paying jobs is a good thing for the export economy and a good thing for
profits (companies are paying historically high fractions to their most highly
compensated employees).
[3] That is: gate the income to a small range just big enough to be affected
by the loss of financial and mortgage aid, but not so big that it dillutes
back to the overall tax rate of ~38%. Then pick out only the people who
actually _need_ that tuition _and_ mortgage aid: parents with both underwater
mortgages _and_ privately-school children in the right 4-year age range. If
this isn't cooking the books, I don't know what qualifies.
~~~
gnosis
_"$120k per year is in the top 10th percentile or thereabouts -- it's at the
very edge of what most people would consider "middle class"."_
If 90% of the people are making less, I don't see how it can be considered
"middle class".
~~~
pbhjpbhj
When did middle class become a synonym for a particular range of pay? The
majority in the $120k+ USD pay range may be middle class but I'm sure there
are working class folk in there too. Consider sportsmen, Beckham and Rooney
are very high paid but they're not members of the traditional middle-class.
Membership of various classes is a huge quagmire. If you want to refer to
people solely on what they are paid then talk about wages and steer clear of
notion of class.
Edit: not so stupid now.
~~~
ZachPruckowski
I'd say "Class" can be used to refer to the types of economic problems or
challenges facing people, regardless of salary. In this case, if the question
is "what's the best way to pay for my daughter going to an Ivy" and not "how
on earth can we afford this", they're not middle-class. If mortgage is the
topic and "how are we going to ever pay this off" isn't the question, you're
not lower-class.
I'll certainly agree that the lines are far from clear-cut, but I think it's
best defined in a problem-oriented manner. The middle class gets these tax
breaks because they can't otherwise afford to send their kids to good schools
or own houses, while the upper-class can. They're facing different problems,
and so the solutions are tailored differently for them. This causes confusion
when you have income-to-SoL disparities in the country ($60k goes further in
Kansas than in NYC), so people at different income levels can be facing the
same problems.
~~~
pbhjpbhj
Thanks, your last para clears up the need for a classification, here we'd
probably say middle-income as middle-class is not necessarily related to
earnings.
I guess as class and income in the UK are not coterminous this leads to
confusion. For example I earn well below the poverty line in the UK but would
be described as middle class due to my education and parentage.
Beckham, for example, would probably come in as working class - son of a
kitchen fitter and hairdresser (according to Wikipedia) low academic
achievement, low IQ, no titled lineage.
~~~
ZachPruckowski
Here in America, I'd find it hard to classify Beckham as anything other than
upper-class (upper-income, if you prefer). He's got enough truckloads of money
(and his former-pop-star wife is also likely well-off) that he doesn't deal
with middle-class or lower-class issues like affording his mortgage payments
or saving for retirement or paying for college educations for his kids.
I suspect it's a cultural difference. Here in America, people don't really
care much where your parents came from or how you did in school, they measure
success and class by what you have. We haven't really discriminated on "old-
money"/"new-money" lines in decades at least, and we've never had much in the
way of titled lineages. We don't have the centuries of cultural history of
class immobility that Europeans have (I don't mean that judgmentally, I'm just
saying we don't have that history in the back of our minds).
~~~
pbhjpbhj
This was just linked on Reddit an amusing look at British attitudes to class:
[http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/sathnam_...](http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/sathnam_sanghera/article6992855.ece).
I chatted to a younger friend about it and he couldn't believe I'd be so
gauche as to classify people based on their background, parenting and
education but felt class was and should only be about your income.
------
idm
Ugh... Since Forbes can probably make this argument based only on the facts,
why did they have to invent a "79% tax rate" for this person? It's simply not
true.
Paying college tuition is not tax, and student financial aid usually does not
take the form of a tax rebate. Therefore, including this in their "79%
bogeyman" is inaccurate.
Furthermore, paying your home mortgage is not a tax, and relief on your
mortgages may or may not take the form of a tax rebate. Again, it is
inaccurate to lump this into the so-called 79% tax rate.
Forbes made this even worse by applying these expenses to the top 60,000 of
the person's 120,000 income, and calling the entire thing the "marginal tax
rate."
By my calculations, we're talking about a 27.5% marginal tax rate on the top
60k of her income, and then whatever the tax rate would be on her lower 60k of
income. I'm going to estimate the tax rate is something like 20%, which is far
less horrifying than 79%.
It's still true that income differences will affect financial aid and mortgage
payments, so Forbes should point that out, but it's totally irresponsible to
call this a 79% tax rate.
~~~
marvin
Semantics. The effect of the incentive rules quoted in the article is that by
taking the higher-paying job, the woman will end up with 20% more money while
working twice as hard.
I see the same thing in Norway: If you are able to hold a great-paying job
(equivalent to 200,000 USD a year, for instance, typical for a hard-working
oil industry consultant), the marginal tax greatly reduces the value you get
from your extra effort. (Typical numbers here are 35% tax on everything up to
50000 USD, increasing to 55% for everything above 130000 USD). Given that you
invariably work your ass off in jobs like these, the prospect doesn't seem
very tempting. Why work twice as hard when you only get 50% more money? You
can't even work hard one year and slack the next, because it doesn't pay.
The problem is that you want as many people as possible to do the best work
they can do. The effect of tax/incentive rules such as these is that the
government is telling people capable of holding high-paying jobs to start
slacking. This is bad on many levels.
~~~
gte910h
> Why work twice as hard when you only get 50% more money
1\. Salary doesn't correlate to "hard work". It correlates to "bargaining
position vs work undesirability". It means the responsibilities will either
need to be separated into more jobs, or they'll need to compensate more if
they can't decrease the job shittyness.
2\. If you bring home 80k about 30k of that goes straight to living expenses.
If you bring home 120k, only about 35k of that needs to go to living expenses,
the rest is all disposable income. So you're working for about 80% more
disposable income, not a flat 50% more money. The upper middle class has an
issue realizing what the term "luxury" means.
3\. While there are plenty of individuals who both have the choice between a
120k and 60k job and choose the 60k job for the better quality of life and
subsidies they'll get, there is yet another subsection of the population
who'll choose the 120k a year job for the somewhat extra disposable income.
This is not a problem, companies aren't struggling to fill 120k jobs that much
I'm pretty sure.
------
fortes
> How did a middle-class single mom wind up with a 79% marginal tax rate? At
> $120,000 she would pay $16,500 a year more in federal and state taxes,
> wouldn't qualify for the five-year $12,000-a-year cut in her mortgage
> payments she's applying for and would be eligible for $19,000 a year less in
> need-based college financial aid.
It's a bit disingenuous to include lack of financial aid as a "tax" on her
income .I assume the college is private? Regardless, she's not paying another
$19,000 to the government, just not getting it in aid from another
institution.
Without the financial aid "tax", her marginal tax rate is 47.5% for that
$60,000. Not great, but not absurdly high considering it includes federal and
state taxes (which in NY are quite high).
> Work isn't the only middle-class virtue that is getting punished. The system
> penalizes savings, too--not just through taxes, but also through programs
> that reward debtors, the profligate and college families that show up at the
> financial aid office with empty pockets. Yet another series of tax and
> benefit rules penalizes marriage.
As a non-homeowner and big saver, I agree :)
I think the real issue here is that tax code is far too complex, filled with
favors and subsidies left and right that complicate matters (think spaghetti
code).
------
nazgulnarsil
the disincentive to work is very real, it is not a bogeyman of the free market
advocates. that said, it's also a common mistake of free marketers to think of
a work disincentive as inherently bad. people would do well to remember that
economic statements in themselves are value free: If you do X, Y will happen.
it says nothing about whether Y is good or bad. That is up to the people Y
affects to decide for themselves.
~~~
viggity
I'd like to know when you think an increased economic output is a bad thing?
The only argument I can see for that is to protect people from themselves, but
then again, I really don't like it when the government tries to mettle with
people who are doing no outside harm.
I'd rather have a large supply side driving costs down and improving my
quality of life than otherwise.
~~~
nostrademons
There're costs to that economic output that are not reflected in its dollar
value.
For example, what's the value of having a parent at home full-time? What's the
value of having both parents home for dinner? A bunch of studies have shown
that one of the best predictors for having successful, well-adapted children
is how much time the family spends together. But how do you quantify that? You
won't know what the exact payoff is until 10-15 years later, when the kids are
well into their own careers and having their own children. And it varies a lot
from kid to kid - someone who's performing well academically with a supportive
peer group needs a lot less parental involvement than a loner with no friends
who's threatening to blow up the school.
Or another example: when I went to college, I believe the fin-aid formula was
that the college would take 100% of my assets, based on my age and income.
That meant my gap year was revenue neutral - it didn't matter how much I
worked or what I worked on, I wouldn't be able to keep any of it. But that
gave me the freedom to observe and to try things out, without the stress of
trying to make a lot of money, and in the process I found my eventual career.
You don't want to run an economy like this - there needs to be some
accountability so that people work on things that are actually useful. But a
high school grad who's time-limited to one year of work isn't going to
accomplish anything actually useful anyway - instead, that gap year is an
investment in perspective, a way to understand more of the world before you
commit to four years in college.
The same thing often comes up in research - a short-sighted focus on increased
economic output leads you to miss opportunities that have no obvious dollar
value attached, but can be big economy-changers in the long run. How long did
it take GMail to become profitable, and would it have existed had Google had
the same quarterly bottom-line orientation that most public companies do? How
about Google itself? If Larry and Sergey had done the economically rational
thing in 1995, would we still be searching on AltaVista? Is Twitter making
money yet?
~~~
viggity
"There're costs to that economic output that are not reflected in its dollar
value."
I agree, but I'd rather put that decision in the hands of each individual and
not a bunch of central planning bureaucrats. You're assuming that people
aren't capable of weighing all the costs (dollars or otherwise).
~~~
nostrademons
Well, the tax/finaid structures here also place the decision in the hands of
each individual, they just tilt the incentives.
I'm very much in favor of finaid working the way it does, because it also
opens up the possibility of bright children from backgrounds who _simply would
not be able to afford it_ going to elite colleges. That's supposed to be the
point of education - level the playing field, so that even if you're born to
garment-worker immigrants, you can make it big in your own lifetime. If it
means that middle class families have some skewed incentives, I don't care.
I'm less sure about the tax issues. I'd like to see the tax code simplified in
general, if only because tax preparation is so inefficient now. And I think
disincentives in tax rates may cause more harm than the revenue collected from
them does good.
~~~
fexl
Here's an interesting video about the history of financial aid for education:
[http://schiffforsenate.com/?q=media/how-government-
programs-...](http://schiffforsenate.com/?q=media/how-government-programs-
drive-college-tuitions)
Synopsis:
In 1918, a factory worker at Ford Motor Company earned $5 per day and kept all
of it. In 32 days he would earn $160, enough to cover the annual tuition at
Yale University.
~~~
ZachPruckowski
Real (inflation-adjusted) wages have declined or stayed static since the
1970s. Even if college tuition only increased at the rate of inflation, it
would still be harder to afford today than it was in the past.
Also, Ford workers at that time were making above-average salaries. They
weren't the lower-middle-class to middle-class auto workers of today, they
were solidly upper-middle-class. And 32 days is like 12% of his salary, so it
wasn't exactly cheap for him (though far better than the 30-40% we see now).
Finally, it's disingenuous to compare 1918 colleges to 2008 colleges. Two
major events really shook up the post-high-school landscape in those 90 years:
the GI Bill and Vietnam. The GI Bill sent like 5 million people to college in
the 40s-50s who otherwise couldn't have afforded it. Then Vietnam made college
compulsory for middle-class or upper-middle-class men looking to avoid
military service. Throw in desegregation, affirmative action, and co-
education, and it's pretty clear that college went from being the domain of
the brilliant and affluent to being open to the majority of Americans who
finish high school. This total structural shift and basic re-definition of
college makes pre-70s tuitions irrelevant to today's system.
If you want, you can also toss in the degree to which the job market has
changed to requiring skilled workers with some form of post-secondary
education. While some of this is likely a result of the education levels of
the labor-supply, at least part of it is due to our changing industrial and
commercial landscape.
------
nopinsight
If the parameters are set right, this could potentially increase the overall
happiness of the society.
_Anyone ever wonders why we earn so much more than our parents and
grandparents, yet we're not any happier?_
Data shows that inter-generational happiness stays the same, despite the fact
that within the same society during the same time period, richer people are
actually happier on average.
My hypothesis is that greater material wealth in the recent past comes with
serious human toll. Higher competition at all levels. Larger and larger gaps
between the rich and the poor, the skilled and the unskilled, the well-
connected and the commoner. These effects offset the materials comfort we gain
from all these fantastic technological innovations.
Focus on and competition for material wealth does shift us away from certain
communal bonds & feelings. To experience an extreme case, try visit a middle-
or lower-end shopping mall in China, you can feel the intense greed and
competitiveness between sellers. That's hyper-competition at work. We feel it
a bit more abstractly in a developed country. But it's certainly there.
I bet many people who has watched Avatar actually want to live as a Navi'.
Their lack of material wealth and powerful technologies are more than
compensated for by community bonds, closeness to the beauty of nature, and
minimal competition for status. Such a community actually exists. Many of them
can be found in a more remote part of the world. Bhutan and certain
communities of Buddhist monks, for example, come to mind.
For more on this, I recommend this TED talk by Matthieu Ricard on the habits
of happiness:
[http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/matthieu_ricard_on_the_hab...](http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/matthieu_ricard_on_the_habits_of_happiness.html)
and the book Happiness: Lessons from a New Science by a noted British
economist Richard Layard [http://www.amazon.com/Happiness-Lessons-Science-
Richard-Laya...](http://www.amazon.com/Happiness-Lessons-Science-Richard-
Layard/dp/0143037013/)
~~~
100k
Rather than increased competition, I think the reason we are not happier is
that wealth levels have risen for all classes[1]. Materially we are better off
than our ancestors but relatively speaking we are the same.
Most people would prefer to have higher status than higher wealth. For
details, I recommend the excellent book "Choosing the Right Pond: Human
Behavior and the Quest for Status" by economist Robert H. Frank.
[http://www.amazon.com/Choosing-Right-Pond-Behavior-
Status/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Choosing-Right-Pond-Behavior-
Status/dp/0195049454)
[1] There is no question that we are all materially better off than previous
generations. However considering the 30 years of stagnating middle class
incomes, whether this will be true in the future is up for debate. If the
middle class starts declining relative to the super-rich expect major
unhappiness.
------
yardie
Seems like not a lot has changed since I went to school. It seems like
universities cater for the very poor and the very rich. The middle class is
left to carry the brunt of education costs.
Also, welfare isn't indefinite. Most states require you to take a job, any
job, or they reduce your benefits. This is the legislation that came out of
the Clinton era (when Gingrich was claiming welfare queens were living it up
by having 7-10 kids). I'm glad that I'm still young and healthy. It's one
thing to drop COBRA in your 20s, quite another to do it in your 40s.
~~~
jbooth
It's not specific to universities. Go take a look at a chart of middle class
salaries over the last 30 years, adjusted for inflation. Looks awfully flat,
right?
~~~
smokinn
Elizabeth Warren wrote an excellent article about that last year:
[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elizabeth-warren/america-
witho...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elizabeth-warren/america-without-a-
middle_b_377829.html)
~~~
gruseom
That is a good article, thanks. Every time I hear/read something by Elizabeth
Warren I come away thinking that she is a voice of unusual sanity. Pity that
her oversight work isn't amounting to anything.
------
araneae
My mother didn't bother working at all when she lost her job and I was in
college, for exactly this reason.
------
Virax
Holy cow - when you read this article right after this one:
[http://reason.com/archives/2006/03/01/why-poor-countries-
are...](http://reason.com/archives/2006/03/01/why-poor-countries-are-
poor/print)
it really blows your mind. I think the nay-sayers are missing the point of
this article - it doesn't matter if you are sympathetic to the family. You
have to remember that the higher paying job isn't creating 2x the economic
output - her choice to take the lower paying job means that:
There is one fewer position making $120K
There is one more position making $60K
Now consider this: the $120K position is much more likely to be a management
position, which, if done well, could create several $60K positions, lets say
3. This means that for the economy as a whole, there is one less $120K
position and TWO fewer $60K positions.
In my opinion this is very scary.
~~~
Pahalial
Well this is just plain wrong. She has two positions available to her; her
choosing the $60k one does not wink the $120k position out of existence, and
there will certainly be someone else trying for that. Perhaps one of the many
people who do not fall in the narrow description of "parent with a mortgage,
two kids, one in college" that would make it such a seemingly terrible deal.
~~~
fburnaby
>> and there will certainly be someone else trying for that
That deserves an award for understatement of the year. You could probably set
up a five man brawl to the death for that job right now.
------
bediger
Isn't this just another example of Forbes pandering to the ultra-rich? You
know: "Any improvement of services/policies towards the riff-raff will bring
down the Country!"
Forbes: Crypto-fascist puppet of the Imperialistic Elite since 1955!
~~~
dgordon
Did you actually say something, or just toss out a bunch of epithets that have
nearly lost all meaning?
I'll address one: 120k/year is a long, long way from "ultra-rich."
------
jsz0
I don't really understand some of the assumptions made here. It sounds like
someone making $60k a year is simply not eligible for programs designed to
help people making say $35k a year. Is that wrong? $60k/year is a pretty good
amount of money. Opting out of a better job to avoid paying taxes on your
increased income is a really bad career choice. All of the tax rates level
out. So maybe $100k isn't a great spot to be in but you're not going to get to
$150k by opting for the $60k/year job are you? This article just spews out
entitlement. I can't stomach people making $60k+ year crying about how hard
their life is. Try living on $20k/year and see how that works out for you.
~~~
onoj
I think what the article was trying to say is that someone earning 120K is
worse off or the same as someone earning 60K - so there is no benefit in
earning more money in some cases - you will get no real benefit from that
money, you will just have to pay it out for things that others get for free. I
think (again) that the issue was that really high earners 300k plus have real
benefits from the money but everyone from 150k down is screwed. But i could be
wrong.
------
galactus
I have a problem with this part:
"Given a choice between a part-time or easy job paying $60,000 and a
demanding, stress-ridden job paying $120,000, Lederman would be wise to take
the former"
So, people making 60k a year have either part-time or "easy jobs" and those
making 120k are working hard and contributing to the economy, right?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Android's Expansion into China - flashgordon
http://venturebeat.com/2008/12/05/androids-expansion-into-china-a-big-deal/
======
mark_h
What's most intriguing about this to me is the pics of the device
(<http://www.eprice.com.hk/mobile/news/?news_id=6051>) don't seem to show a
hardware keyboard.
Has android picked up a touch-screen keyboard already, or are they maybe just
assuming that it will be available by the release date? (or do phones for the
Chinese market use a different input mechanism anyway, perhaps).
~~~
btw0
No, we don't use alien mechanism, just plain keyboard.
~~~
mark_h
I thought as much, thanks. I wonder what they have planned then..
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Negative Cashback from Microsoft's Bing Cashback - jpuskarich
http://bountii.com/blog/2009/11/23/negative-cashback-from-bing-cashback/
======
petesalty
But this could just be the vendor (not that I'm defending MS). It could easily
be a different price for Google, and another for Yahoo, etc. It doesn't mean
MS has any knowledge of this, although they could probably police it if it's
affecting their reputation.
~~~
tonyb
Your exactly right. Search for the same product using google shopping and it
shows the higher price.
~~~
jrockway
Ouch. This is why I usually buy everything from Amazon, instead of some random
place that shows up in Google Shopping results.
~~~
oneplusone
I read a while back that Amazon does something very similar. They give new
visitors a larger discount on certain items compared to regular visitors. Of
course googling it now only returns
[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2000/09/06/amazon_makes_regular...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2000/09/06/amazon_makes_regular_customers_pay/)
so it may be bunk.
~~~
ggrot
This is pretty old news. Amazon experimented with this briefly, caught alot of
flak, and stopped.
I recently had an experience where I thought amazon was doing this - I'd get
one price when signed in to prime and another cheaper price when not signed
in. I called up amazon and the rep was astonished as she could see the exact
same thing. A few minutes of digging and she figured out what happened. Amazon
was showing me signed in the item shipped from amazon (candidate for prime)
and showing me not signed in the item shipped from someone else. When shipping
was added in, Amazon was always showing me the lowest price available. In both
cases, I was presented an option to choose a different supplier, but it wasn't
very prominent on the page.
------
amalcon
It's not that difficult. Turn off your cookies. Manually allow them for the
rare cases where they're actually necessary. If that's too much work for you,
clear cookies or turn on your browser's "privacy" mode before you buy
anything.
This sort of thing has gone on for years. You used to be able to find a good
deal on a flight at orbitz.com, leave to go comparison shopping, come back,
and see a higher price. Clear the cookies, the original price was back.
~~~
bigiain
I wonder if a Firefox plugin could have a list of shopping aggregator sites
(like Bing and google shopping) and automatically block referrers when using
outgoing links from them, and maybe specially treat cookies being set by the
sites those links land on?
------
bumblebird
If you're clever, you find the merchants affiliate scheme, sign up, check it's
ok to place orders through your own affiliate links, and place an order.
Then there's no middle man and you get all the discount. Hassle for cheaper
items, but worth it for bigger stuff.
I once signed up to get a 0% rate credit card (first 6 months) that gave cash
back on purchases. I signed up through my affiliate link that paid out
something like £40, had a few K of credit for 6 months, and got cashback on
everything I bought using it. Then I cancelled it. I expect they hate
customers like that.
~~~
bdr
I doubt they're giving you more in cashback than they make from transaction
fees.
~~~
jrockway
They might be. For every person that implements this trick, there are 100 more
that are making only the minimum payment every month and paying thousands of
dollars in interest (free money).
~~~
pyre
I thought that most credit card companies sold off this debt for Wall Street
to repackage.
------
tonyb
Don't blame Bing. It is the store that is deciding to charge you a higher
price.
I have seen this several times, on both newegg and Buy.com. Normally the "add
to cart to see price" type items are cheaper if you don't do the bing cash
back
~~~
natemartin
Yeah, I also think this is the merchant's fault. (full disclosure, my wife
works for a competitor of Bing Cashback)
My wife's company runs into this issue, and they try to stop the merchants
from raising prices, but sometimes a few companies slip through the cracks.
However, maybe Bing doesn't make this against their ToS. In which case, that's
bad.
------
tk999
On a side note, anybody interests in doing a startup related to affiliate
and/or rebates? I have an idea and I want to talk to somebody about it and
hopefully the idea is good enough to create a startup.
terencekwan at gmail dot com
------
bantic
I've always wondered what I might be revealing (demographics-wise) through my
cookies while browsing, but I never though I might be getting shafted by them!
Wonder if Bing is revenue-sharing w/ their vendors this way somehow.
~~~
dangrossman
It appears on Microsoft's quarterly financials as "income from overcharging
partner customers"...? Unlikely.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Workspaces: A Super Awesome Feature Coming Soon To Chrome DevTools - twapi
http://browserfame.com/1090/chrome-devtools-workspace
======
georgemcbay
This is pretty cool.
I had to do one other thing (I'm using Canary on x64/Windows 7) I didn't see
mentioned in the post to get this to work, which is to add an empty file named
".allow-devtools-edit" to the directory I was adding as a workspace before
adding it in the devtools settings.
Prior to doing this, adding the directory was failing in a way where it wasn't
obvious what the problem was (Chrome prints out the message to add this file
to its DevTools console, but if you don't have that open there's no way to
tell why adding the workspace directory failed).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Remap Your Caps Lock As Backspace - RevRal
http://www.michaeljaylissner.com/blog/remap-caps-lock-as-backspace
======
samdk
I use my caps lock key as a right arrow key. Reaching for escape in Vim
doesn't really bother me, and I find it surprisingly useful pretty much any
time I'm typing.
I use AutoHotkey (<http://www.autohotkey.com/>) to remap it on Windows, and
xmodmap/xset under X on Linux. If anyone has suggestions for doing this easily
under OS X I'd love to hear them.
The AutoHotkey script is this: SetCapsLockState, ALwaysOff CapsLock::Right
And the xmodmap/xset commands are basically the same as those mentioned in the
article for remapping backspace: xmodmap -e "remove lock = Caps_Lock" xmodmap
-e "keycode 66 = Right" xset r 66
------
hyperlogic
It's pretty common for emacs users to remap caps lock to the control key. In
fact, it's the first tip in Steve Yegge's Effective Emacs essay.
<http://sites.google.com/site/steveyegge2/effective-emacs>
------
bwr
I've been using Caps Lock as Escape for an easy to access escape in vim. I am
so used to this now that it is one of the first things I have to change when
setting up a machine before I go crazy.
------
RevRal
For Vim I use tab as esc, and s-tab as tab. Auto-indent turned on.
Caps as right arrow is an interesting idea.
Basically, caps lock is silly.
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