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A designer’s perspective on a Groovy and Grails meetup - sabrinamach
http://blog.feralabs.com/2009/04/a-designers-perspective-on-a-groovy-and-grails-meetup/
======
sabrinamach
"... I am not a programmer at all. My background is in design and HCI. The
thought of a geek programmer meeting was slightly disheartening, as I was
worried that I was going to be sitting there with blank eyes, not
understanding a word.
But to my surprise, my preconceptions were found to be wrong. I really enjoyed
the talk..."
------
jemmj
What a designer thinks about a programmers meetup for Groovy and Grails
------
dreur
"...Grails 3 to 5 times faster than Rails.."
| {
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Microsoft: We've sold 40 million Windows 8 licenses to date - mun2mun
http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-weve-sold-40-million-windows-8-licenses-to-date-7000007990/
======
aresant
Win 8 moves ~40,000,000 licenses in first month. Upgrades are $39.99.
Win 7 moved ~30,000,000 in month one. Upgrades were $120 - 220/upgrade.
Vista moved 20,000,000 first month. Upgrades were $129 - 299.
MSFT is offering the DVD-version of Windows 8 for ~$30/more per copy so let's
just pretend that the fair price for comparison of Windows 8 is $69.99 (since
I assume far more physical media went out of Win 7 in 2009).
So that's still 1/2 the revenue per upgrade they collected in the previous
cycles.
Looking at their revenue by division Windows & Win Live have been on the
decline:
[http://www.tannerhelland.com/wp-content/uploads/Microsoft-
re...](http://www.tannerhelland.com/wp-content/uploads/Microsoft-revenue-by-
division-2010-2012.png)
I wonder how drastically this will impact them - if they see a real, sustained
gain in traction vs. Windows 7 adoption in the 25% range, that's not going to
make up for the shortfall in revenues but certainly would help to lay a
foundation for future growth in mobile / server & tools / business / etc.
I'm not sure I even have a point, just trying to sort through this data and
get a sense of what it means for MSFT macro.
~~~
chc
I don't think cash flow is Microsoft's overriding concern at the moment.
They'll still get plenty of steady income from their corporate cash cows.
Right now, I think Microsoft is more worried about the existential threat of a
world where people are weaned off Windows. They want Windows 8 to be used in
as many places as humanly possible. If they can maintain their ubiquity, their
overall ecosystem is secure. They will gladly trade a little profit from the
consumer OS market to stay entrenched.
~~~
guygurari
If that were true, then I would have also expected them to ease up on the
anti-piracy measures.
~~~
kyriakos
They did. By lowering the price. I used to have 2 PC's running pirated copies
of windows. Not anymore, they are both running Windows 8 I purchased at a
reasonable price of 39.99.
~~~
guygurari
As far as I know that is an upgrade price, which you can only get if you
already own a legitimate copy of a previous version.
~~~
kyriakos
I do have Windows Vista OEM licenses which give me the right to upgrade to 8,
just no windows 7 licenses which i used to run 'illegally'.
But I believe Microsoft knows what they are doing, cause the upgrade
assistance does not check if you are running a legit version. It either means
they were too trusting that users will be running legit versions before
upgrading or it means that they deliberately left this hole in order to get a
revenue from users who would otherwise just install a pirated version of their
new OS.
------
nsns
Which might simply mean that this is the approximate amount of non-Apple
laptops (and desktops?) sold since Win8's launch, because most of them are now
sold only with Win8 licenses [0]. Hardly a mark of success, but of MS's
(doomed?) pervasiveness.
[0] e.g.,
[http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/web/LenovoPo...](http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/web/LenovoPortal/en_US/catalog.workflow:category.details?current-
catalog-id=12F0696583E04D86B9B79B0FEC01C087¤t-category-
id=0E6E3D0084869C3EB4172DA2F965A301)
~~~
brudgers
_"Microsoft had not released any sales figures for Windows 8 other than saying
the company sold 4 million upgrade licenses of the operating system to those
with previous versions of Windows during the first three days it was
available."_
That's 10% of the total in the first three days to existing users.
Including myself.
~~~
dkhenry
If a month has 30 days then that's also 10% of the time period, or another way
of saying it is that sales remained constant over that initial time frame.
------
mtgx
The vast majority of these licenses were sold to OEM's, who now have to "get
rid of them" in the market. So we'll see how long that takes before they ask
for another bulk of licenses from Microsoft. Could be weeks or could be
months. If it's months, next time they'll request much fewer licenses.
------
NZ_Matt
Has anyone else noticed that any pro Microsoft news gets immediately flagged
off the front page? The Hackernews hivemind really is creating its own little
bubble.
<http://hnrankings.info/4839043/>
------
melling
We should be able see real Win8 usage numbers in the IE10 stats over the next
couple of months, at least until IE10 ships for Win7.
~~~
robotys
I like this line of thinking. But it still only reflect a portion of Win8 user
as another portion of them will use alternative browser (chrome, ie).
------
ErikAugust
They booted the guy who headed up the Windows product line. They can claim
success and "greatest OS ever" all they want but it's clear to me that MS
isn't thrilled.
~~~
illuminate
He left, he wasn't booted.
------
wheaties
Yeah, I bought one of your licenses Microsoft. I didn't want to buy it. Given
the choice I would not have bought it. And quite clearly as evidenced in my
past week of Twitter I've been trying to get rid of it. Alas, to no avail...
~~~
dangrossman
Considering Microsoft is not reading this, and you don't have a Twitter
account in your profile, would you mind sharing with HN what your message
means? Why did you buy Windows 8 if you didn't want it, and why can't you get
rid of it?
~~~
wheaties
I bought an emergency computer at Best Buy pre-installed with Windows 8. No
matter what I've tried I can not get the thing to start not in Windows. I
can't even drop down to the legacy BIOS to get Linux to boot.
Oh yeah, I also failed the recapcha several times before I could even get into
the computer in the first place. A recapcha when you're first starting...
brilliant. Btw, I'm not an MS hater but I am a Windows 8 hater.
~~~
hnriot
What you describe is a feature of Windows 8, it's to ensure that a trusted
source controls what runs on the hardware. Windows 8 is, as you've discovered,
far more security conscious.
~~~
rbanffy
> it's to ensure that a trusted source controls what runs on the hardware.
Trusted by whom?
------
forgotAgain
If Microsoft wanted to impart real knowledge in pronouncements such as this
they would have clarity in what they say. By not giving a definition of what
they mean by "licenses sold" they are avoiding clarity. It's an example of why
many people, including myself, have lost confidence in everything they say.
~~~
kenjackson
Licenses sold is pretty clear. What else would you like them to say? This is
the figure they've always given. It would seem odd to me if they created some
new metric that we couldn't compare with Win7 and Vista sales.
~~~
zik
Since the vast majority of these licenses are sold to OEMs to build systems it
doesn't reflect anything much. The number sold to actual customers would be a
lot more useful.
~~~
kenjackson
What do you mean? Are you talking about the amount sold directly to consumers
or the amount that get into consumers hands?
The former is uninteresting. The latter would be great, but MS doesn't know
this info (and they've never reported it).
And the channel I suspect is pretty efficient when it comes to license
acquisition, since you don't need to do runs like you do in HW.
------
joelthelion
I wonder how many they actually _sold_. Many are simply bought with new
computers, and quite a few are probably the free upgrades that hardware
vendors were promising for new Windows 7 computers just before the release.
------
kyriakos
What's very important is to know how well the store is doing. The windows
store is the reason they are selling at a lower price than in the past,
expecting a continuous stream of revenue through it.
------
arscan
Any news on enterprise adoption of Windows 8? I assume that this will be like
Vista -- many large companies won't bother upgrading. That will be a huge drag
on Windows 8 adoption.
~~~
sliverstorm
I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft is actually already kind of banking on
this. When better to venture towards mobile, than on the cycle that enterprise
is less likely to pick up?
------
xutopia
That's all? Their OEM manufacturers alone would account to about that much.
------
dhawalhs
I wonder how many Windows 7 licences were sold in the same period
~~~
arscan
_"How does this compare to Windows 7 sales? Microsoft said it had sold 60
million Windows 7 licenses from the end of October 2009, its launch date, to
the end of January 2010 December 2009. So that's 60 million Windows 7 licenses
sold in two months. So far, Microsoft has sold 40 million licenses of Windows
8 in one month."_
~~~
dhawalhs
By same period I meant since October 26 i.e. since the launch of Windows 8
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Programmers Should Curb Their Enthusiasm - edmoffo
======
bediger4000
So should pilot and aerospace engineers. It's hard for the product people to
make some decent product when engineers and pilots and programmers and chefs
are out there agitating to make planes that are fast and flyable, food that's
tasty, and programs that do things we haven't done before.
------
PaulHoule
?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Where do I invest? - nikhilsaraf9
Where do you personally invest your money: savings account / fixed deposit / 401k, ESPP, bonds, mutual funds, Betterment / Wealthfront, individual stocks, personal algorithmic trading / Quantopian, real estate / own a house, lending marketplace, angel investor, founded a company with savings, or other.
Looking for HN's opinion around the best place to invest one's savings with recommendations for allocation percentages of net worth across investment options (more than one of these options most likely). If you could also provide an approximate of number of years in the industry that would be helpful (1-4 years, 5-10 years, 10+ years)<p>Example:
1-5 years in industry
Savings/Fd/401k 50%
ESPP 30%
Betterment / Wealthfront 10%
Individual stocks 10%
======
ryanckulp
In the past 12 months:
-Building a house (w/ shipping containers) in the mountains. Very inexpensive but slow process. Hope to flip it.
-Saved $30k cash, not "intelligent investing" but great for peace of mind
-Some stocks via Robinhood, Schwab, Tradeking (< $5k total invested any given time)
-IRA
-Acorns (petty cash, fun to watch it increase)
In general if you can save 20%+ of net income you're doing better than most.
Some months (good months, I freelance) I can save 2x more than I spend, which
is nice. But those months I keep it liquid.
~~~
raincom
Where are you building your house? Smokies, Sierras?
| {
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Show HN: Goms is a ready-to-deploy schema driven adaptable platform - artpar
<a href="https://goms-demo.herokuapp.com" rel="nofollow">https://goms-demo.herokuapp.com</a><p>This is a very early stage demo for Goms.<p>1. Independent User registration / User sign-in<p>You can create a public site or a private site, or mixed. Was using auth0 earlier but felt it as an extra step during setup. Authentication/Authorization is a first class component.<p>2. Native support for user defined entities<p>Create extensively related entities, eg. (Clothing)"Style" has a "Style File", some "Order" and "Costing", and "Order" has "Vendor" associated to it. Entities you see in this demo are defined here [1], [2]<p>3. Oauth Connections and Tokens ( Live Sync Google Sheet [3] )<p>We are handling "data exchange" with the external world (think google sheets, slack messenger, other APIs) as a first class citizen.<p>To demo this, four of the entities defined (using our JSON above) are synced to this Google sheet [3]<p>- Blog
- Style
- Order
- Vendor<p>Whenever one of these is created, goms will call one/some REST API.<p>- Oauth connection details configured using JSON files
- Access tokens and refresh tokens:, complete oauth2 flow
- Tokens/passwords stored securely to avoid accidental leak<p>4. Behind the scenes<p>- Everything is backed by a relational database
- Built in golang with goals to compile for IOT devices as well
- The view/dashboard is completely detached from the backend<p><pre><code> [1] https://github.com/artpar/goms/blob/master/gomsweb/static/samples/blog.json
[2] https://github.com/artpar/goms/blob/master/gomsweb/static/samples/style.json
[3] https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Ru-bDk3AjQotQj72k8SyxoOs84eXA1Y6sSPumBb3WSA/edit?usp=sharing
[4] https://developers.google.com/sheets/api/reference/rest/v4/spreadsheets.values/append
</code></pre>
Github: <a href="https://github.com/artpar/goms" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/artpar/goms</a><p>You can deploy using readily available <i>docker -p 8080:8080 run goms/goms</i>, or "Deploy to Heroku" button.<p>Would love feedback on all parts of Goms. Plus welcome hackers who can help in identifying holes.<p>PS: this is a demo instance. please use dummy details to sign up. nothing is tracked though.
======
fiatjaf
You should repost this with a direct link.
~~~
artpar
I wanted to, but I was afraid since my documentation at GitHub currently
sucks, and a direct landing to a "Sign in" / "Sign up" page wouldn't be
intuitive at all.
Adding links here again for clarity/tldr;
[https://goms-demo.herokuapp.com](https://goms-demo.herokuapp.com)
[https://github.com/artpar/goms](https://github.com/artpar/goms)
| {
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git-feature: agile git workflow in code - jgeewax
http://geewax.org/my-git-workflow-in-code
======
helium
Cool, I like it. Seems like it could save some time typing, although it I
don't you should use this unless you understand what is happening under the
covers.
------
sandGorgon
what is the equivalent of this is mercurial ?
| {
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MIT Scientists Develop a Drug to Fight Any Viral Infection - schintan
http://healthland.time.com/2011/08/11/mit-scientists-develop-a-drug-to-fight-any-viral-infection/
======
fauigerzigerk
That would be very good news indeed, if it turns out to work on anything but
mice.
But after reading a lot of that kind of articles over the past years, I'm
starting to wonder what's wrong with mice. Whenever a new treatment is tested
in mice it seems to work wonders. It makes them not just a little bit better
but orders of magnitude. It's like a miracle. Mice must have an incredibly bad
natural constitution. You throw them some homeopathic pill and bang you have
cured cancer. You drop some genes on them, whoosh, a new human ear pops up.
It's amazing :-)
~~~
briggsbio
Actually overall, in vivo animal testing on vaccines, antivirals, and
antibiotics are typically quite predictive from animals to humans. These types
of tests are not historically very predictive when moving from in vitro to in
vivo animal studies, however. This is typically because the treatments and
vaccines are structural and/or expression-based (exploit a bacterial surface
protein and poke holes in the cell, use a virus to get into T-cells and inject
genetic material to let them identify and kill polio, etc). (yes,
oversimplified). But moving from cell culture to a living organism This doesnt
always work out. If it does, then it's relatively easy to confirm the effect
if it works in animals to humans (virus is gone/never infects, etc). So more
antibiotics and vaccines fail from in vitro to in vivo than from animal to
human data.
In treating diseases of inflammation, rheumatic disease, pain, etc., it is
generally quite predictive when moving from in vitro to in vivo animal studies
(e.g. is it down-regulating inflammatory transcription factor NF-kB, or not?).
But it becomes much less predictive translating endpoints from animals to
humans. That's, very generally, because it is difficult to assess disease
measures of improvement in inflammation in animals and translate that to
humans (pain, discomfort, edema, these processes may present much differently
in rats versus humans, for example). Great animal data may not mean you'll get
such a strong effect in human subjects, and thus the failure rate for these
drugs in clinical studies is quite high compared to vaccine and antibiotic
human trials, because those vaccines were shown to be ineffective earlier in
development. This was a very general explanation, to be sure, and I'll dig
through my archives for some papers on this and try to add links later.
~~~
fauigerzigerk
That's very interesting. Do you have an idea in which of these two categories
cancer treatments typically fall?
~~~
briggsbio
That depends on the cancer and depends on the approach (structural, genetic,
or immunological).
The difficulty in cancer treatment is that you're dealing with a natural
biological process gone awry. It's not like viral or bacterial infections,
where you're fighting something off. You're dealing with aggregations of
unwanted mutations and cellular proliferation (over simplification warning).
Chemotherapy is less trying to alter a process than it is dropping a bomb in
the body and hoping that you kill the cancer before killing the patient. There
are some incredibly effective chemotherapy agents that will never make it to
market because they are just too toxic.
Gene therapy approaches are making promising moves, but it is very early.
There are some pretty cool structural approaches, such as protein conjugated
nanotubes that lyse cancer cells under infrared light (Stanford and Oklahoma
researchers), but these too are early, and for only specific tumor types.
Cancer is a huge problem that takes a multifaceted, case-by-case approach.
Lots of tools in the tool shed, and it's growing every year. I feel in my
heart that one day in the future, cancer will be called "the biggest problem
of the last generation." But there is much work to be done.
------
geoffschmidt
So if it's that easy, why did natural selection not find this solution? It
sounds like the cells already have far more sophisticated machinery to detect
and respond to dsRNA. Evolutionarily, adding apoptosis to that must have been
found to be a net loss.
Maybe it's that we're in a cleaner environment and live longer? Maybe it's
that we can selectively administer the drugs?
~~~
michaelcampbell
> So if it's that easy, why did natural selection not find this solution?
Evolution is still working; who's to say it wouldn't have? Your question
should be, "why did not natural selection not find this solution YET?" at
which point the answer is obvious.
We're not "evolved", we're just the most recent step in evolution. As long as
we (or anything) lives, there's more to go.
I hope I'm not feeding a troll; your question smacks of a thinly veiled "Ha!
See?!" type creationist rebuttal.
~~~
geoffschmidt
Please assume good faith. My question is, "Is it more likely that natural
selection didn't find the apoptotic strategy, or that the apoptotic strategy
wasn't a net win, in the environment in which the natural selection happened?"
So let's try to get a handle on which it is likely to be.
The Time article says:
> To fight infection, human cells have proteins that attach to dsRNA and
> trigger a cascade of reactions that stop viruses from copying themselves.
So, what we observe is: \- Human cells have a mechanism to detect dsRNA; -
Human cells have a set of countermeasures that they can produce to block viral
replication; \- Human cells have a mechanism to produce those countermeasures
when dsRNA is detected (and I'll give you good odds that they have other ways
of detecting viral infections that also activate the countermeasures); \-
Human cells also have an apoptosis pathway (which, as it turns out, the cell
is not shy about activating in other circumstances, like if too much DNA
damage is detected)
One of the following must be true
(1) All of the existing machinery (dsRNA detection, existing countermeasures,
and the linkage between the detector and the countermeasures), taken together,
must be much simpler than this little transducer they engineered that connects
the existing dsRNA detection signal to the existing apoptosis pathway, so that
X years of natural selection was likely to find the existing machinery but
unlikely to come up with this new solution (2) Blindly triggering apoptosis
when you detect dsRNA is not the way to maximize the amount of sex your
children have (3) The only reason viruses exist, and plague mankind, is that
we got incredibly unlucky
My money's on (2). (1) seems unlikely because it seems like you have to search
a much larger space of DNA base pairs to find this whole complex of dsRNA
detectors and virus replication inhibitors, than to find this transducer. (3)
is unlikely a priori.
So, what would explain (2)? Like I said, several options:
(A) The drug isn't valuable in practice (the cure ends up being worse than the
disease) (B) The drug is valuable but has a lot of side effects, so taking it
all the time is bad. You only want to take it when you have a really nasty
viral infections. The machinery to detect the correct case in a cell is too
hard, but now that we have brains, doctors, and the internet, we can make a
better decision than a cell could about when dsRNA should be connected to
apoptosis than a cell could. (C) Having the linkage was a bad idea for most of
the history of mammals, but is a good idea for humans today. Maybe we used to
have a lot of immune resistance that we no longer have because of our super
clean environment. Maybe we have better nutrition and that somehow makes
speculative apoptosis hurt less. Maybe viruses are more dangerous in the dense
urban environments where we now live. Maybe it's a bad idea for young people,
but a good idea for old people.
These all seem possible to me.
~~~
michaelcampbell
Sure, it's all possible, but evolution isn't an optimum-finding strategy; it's
just a "good enough to be better than the last one". And, it's random, so even
if a "6" on a dice roll is better than a "5", it's still possible to roll 1
through 5 ten-billion times in a row. And even if I do roll a 6, it's possible
no one would see it, or I die immediately afterwords and can't take whatever
advantage such a roll would invoke.
So the question of "Why didn't evolution come up with this?" is, to me,
somewhat nonsensical.
But reasonable people disagree, and I'm no expert.
------
csomar
So, is the HIV virus concerned? And can this cure the AIDS?
~~~
brimpa
Why was this down voted? HIV was my first thought after reading the article.
On another note, does anyone have info on the rate of death by virus world-
wide? I'm only curious so we I compare to other major killers (cancer, heart
disease, etc).
------
geuis
Direct paper, submitted 3 days ago.
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2870955>
------
leoh
What if lots of critical cells (e.g. bone stem cells, brain cells) are
infected? Wouldn't it be better for the body to fight the virus rather than
killing those cells?
~~~
eru
If a virus has infected a cell, the cell is usually beyond hope.
------
AshleysBrain
I always think excitement over these kind of articles is overblown. Wouldn't
it work like this?:
1\. Develop a super-treatment for fighting a broad range of infections
2\. Enjoy a few years of low levels of disease
3\. The "super-bugs" that are naturally resistant and were naturally selected
by the broad application of treatment make a comeback
4\. Back to step 1
~~~
alextp
Except with antibiotics history did not quite play out like this, in that
there were far more fatal diseases before the invention of antibiotics, and
some superbugs can be controlled with different variations on the same basic
technology.
~~~
maayank
"Except with antibiotics history did not quite play out like this"
Sure it did. In fact, already in the 60s the original penicillin became
dangerously ineffective. Around that time we (==humanity) developed semi-
synthetic penicillin that enables us to change some core ingredients in the
formula every few years and thus avoid saturation by bacterial evolution.
Of course, IANABiologist, so look for more information if it interests you.
p.s. if anyone is around London I highly recommend going to the Alexander
Fleming museum. Highly recommended and since (sadly) no one goes there you
effectively get a private tour of Fleming's lab.
------
hammock
Is there such a thing as a good virus (don't just think of your own body as
well, think of ecosystems, symbionts etc)? Couldn't there be some harmful
implications of a drug that eliminates ALL viruses?
~~~
eru
To compare: There are lots of useful bacteria in your guts, and when you take
antibiotics most of them die. But most people survive that, and you can help
re-populate your guts with the right mix of microbes.
------
logjam
We discussed this study previously on HN - an extremely preliminary study
based on cell culture and a small number of mice. The first author of the
paper is the drug patent holder.
~~~
pak
Yep, here was the previous article.
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2847675>
| {
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Fighting the Imperial Californian Ideology - wmoxam
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/hirsh-california-ideology
======
pjkundert
Quoting (near the end): "The Free Market f...d us in the last year..."
At this point, I stopped listening.
The Market that f...d _anyone_ in the last year is _anything_ but Free. It is
becoming difficult to be generous to those who claim some level of insight in
this space, who then mistake rampant Mercantilism (the incestuous relationship
between the all-powerful State, and the businesses that they choose to allow
to own various industries), and the Free Market. Such an oversight implies
either ignorance, or willful rejection of fact.
In a truly Free Market, the concept "Too Big To Fail" (for example), is
impossible -- there is a natural exponential limit to the economies of scale,
related to the introduction of multiple layers of management, which _must_
introduce incompetency into the management structure of such large corporate
entities. Anyone who has worked in a truly large enterprise understands this.
Thus, their size is limited, and smaller, more agile and efficient competitors
come into the Free Market and "eat their lunch".
Of course, when Government creates laws that allow _only_ a specific Cabal
(eg. the Federal Reserve Act), or Scale of enterprise (eg. Sarbanes Oxley) to
exist, you get Too Big To Fail, the Federal Reserve inflating wealth away
toward the Banksters, Government Motors (vs. Tesla, et. al), etc.
That some Truly Enlightened group needs to "clean up" the neighbourhood is
somewhat frightening; what happens should I resist being "cleaned up" to their
satisfaction? What if I wish to invent and sell something that undermines the
influence of the Truly Enlighted cleaner-uppers? How far are they willing to
go to ensure I stay "cleaned up"?
As always, maximum socialism (or fascism) requires maximum force.
The deformed child of these failed ideologies being birthed today in America;
fascialism?, where the all powerful state both grants Mercantilist writs to
select businesses (eg. via the various Czars), AND decrees who lives and dies,
and who else pays for it (Obamacare, and massive taxation and wealth-
destruction via Inflation) will ultimately require this maximum force, in
order to enforce the levels of loss of freedom required to implement and fund
these disgusting policies.
------
billymeltdown
This was an awesome presentation, it really was, and it ended up causing some
good post-presentation debate in person and on the 'tubes. If you search for
#futureruby in google and/or twitter you'll find some lively discussions of
Jesse's talk.
~~~
wmoxam
Pat Allan had the best follow up, which kicked off some interesting
discussion. You can find it here: [http://freelancing-
gods.com/posts/future_ruby_and_california...](http://freelancing-
gods.com/posts/future_ruby_and_californian_conflict)
| {
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Chronicle Will Make You Question the Need for Blockchain Technology - CiPHPerCoder
https://paragonie.com/blog/2017/07/chronicle-will-make-you-question-need-for-blockchain-technology
======
smt88
You may (and obviously do) disagree, but there is no universe in which I would
use a security-essential product built with PHP.
It has to do with the lack of static types, the "flexible" (i.e. lax) syntax,
silent errors, and type coercion. But, even more than that, it has to do with
the practices of PHP's maintainers. I suspect HHVM is better, but I can't say
for sure.
Just one man's opinion, of course.
~~~
CiPHPerCoder
> It has to do with the lack of static types
We're using PHP 7, with declare(strict_types=1) everywhere.
> the "flexible" (i.e. lax) syntax, silent errors, and type coercion
We use return types with strict_types=1, and throw exceptions if something is
going wrong rather than proceeding with invalid state. If something was going
to return a falsy value where e.g. a string was expected, PHP will throw a
TypeError instead. [https://3v4l.org/8VR05](https://3v4l.org/8VR05)
> But, even more than that, it has to do with the practices of PHP's
> maintainers. I suspect HHVM is better, but I can't say for sure.
The release manager for PHP 7.2 is a former HHVM dev, who is very much about
correctness and maintainability.
It sounds like your opinion of PHP is based on circa 5.3 and earlier, but a
lot has improved in 7.0 and newer. I'd definitely recommend giving newer code
a second look.
[http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/php7/](http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/php7/)
[https://paragonie.com/blog/2017/02/cryptographically-
secure-...](https://paragonie.com/blog/2017/02/cryptographically-secure-php-
development)
------
CiPHPerCoder
With apologies to
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14643488](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14643488)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Node.js devs - What apps are you building? What tools are you using? - mousetraps
Hey everyone! I'm Sara, one of the devs on the Node.js Tools for Visual Studio team @ Microsoft<p>What?! msft + node.js?! Crazy talk.<p>Crazy indeed...<p>Anyways, now that you're over that shock... Can I ask you a favor? We want to improve the Node.js experience in Visual Studio (and Windows), and we'd love to hear you brag and/or complain about your Node.js dev environment. What are you building? What tools are you using? What tools do you want to be using? Full survey here:<p>http://www.instant.ly/s/v9aha<p>WHOA THERE... SURVEYS ARE LAME! Yes, yes they are... they're one-sided, and don't spark conversation... that’s why we’ll share the results back with you all once we compile them, remove potentially sensitive info about peoples's projects, email addresses, etc. So please please please fill it out (npm install _sugar-on-top-and-icecream-in-the-middle). This data helps us build a better product and collaborate with mgmt and other teams to improve the Node.js experience.<p>And obviously let's all have a great discussion below... that was implicit, wasn't it? :-)<p>[P.S. random 50 survey participants will get $5 towards caffeine or whatever else you like at Starbucks]
======
ketralnis
I don't really HN want to be a place that companies think they can reach
developers, whether for surveys or advertising. It's an extremely slippery
slope to being a marketing channel, and then the gaming of the system begins.
~~~
icpmacdo
>What?! msft + node.js?! Crazy talk. >Crazy indeed...
the worst.
------
KhalPanda
> [P.S. random 50 survey participants will get $5 towards caffeine or whatever
> else you like at Starbucks]
Your submission and responses read as if you already consumed the $250 of
caffeine yourself. Can we tone it down a bit? It's 9am. :-)
Submitted my response.
~~~
mousetraps
Thanks for the response. <\- no exclamation point, just for you
My manager always jokes that I have caffeine running through my veins, so
you're not too far off the mark ;-)
------
mkoryak
I wasnt aware that AngularJS is considered a nodejs technology.
for that matter, why is NPM on that list? who uses node without using NPM?
~~~
mousetraps
That's a fun question :-). Technically it's not, but we're interested in
supporting the entire node.js dev experience. One of the advantages of node.js
is the ability to move between client side and server side code without
switching contexts, so we want to ensure we properly support people working on
both.
I also personally get the sense that the lines are being blurred between node
and JavaScript (especially now that Npm brands itself as the JavaScript
package manager). Curious if anyone else feels that way?
And yeah... You're right... Id be pretty surprised if anyone used node without
Npm... Well at least it might serve as an indicator that someone read the
question and wasn't just checking random boxes :-)
~~~
reverius42
Using npm to manage package dependencies, and browserify to bundle those
dependencies for the browser, is such a good client-side development
experience that I use it even if I have no other use for node. I guess
sometimes I'm using npm "without" node (which is to say, I'm not always
running a server).
~~~
alessioalex
Amen to that.
------
proveanegative
I can't fill out the survey right now but I like ClojureScript. I'd love a
ParEdit mode in VS for ClojureScript.
Disappointed edit: Your account has given answers on a range of Microsoft-
related topics with different writing styles (rather decaf at first). Have
multiple people at Microsoft used this account?
~~~
mousetraps
mousetraps?! This account - the one I'm posting on now? Haha! Nope, I'm just
weird. Sorry to axe the conspiracy theory :-).
Now watch this: My HN account? Nope... sorry to inform you, but I'm just
weird. Anyone who knows me will attest to that. I'm generally far too full of
energy, but depending on the occasion oscillate between a playful and pensive
writing style. Here's my quora page, and a blog post I did earlier this year
if you want to cross-check. You'll notice there's a healthy mix of both
"caffeinated" and "decaffeinated" Sara. Let me know if you'd like to see any
more writing samples :). \- [https://www.quora.com/Sara-
Itani](https://www.quora.com/Sara-Itani) \-
[http://blogs.msdn.com/b/lightswitch/archive/2014/04/17/scala...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/lightswitch/archive/2014/04/17/scalar-
properties-and-collection-properties-and-screens-oh-my-an-overview-of-screen-
property-actions-sara-itani.aspx)
Waitaminute... What just happened?!! CAN'T RESOLVE... COGNITIVE...
DISSONANCE... MIND... IMPLODING!!!!
It's not so hard, actually. Both writing styles are pretty similar - one is
simply more staccato and contains over-the-top faux-dialog with the reader.
Usually if I'm trying to construct a convincing argument or reason about an
idea while I'm writing it, my writing will turn out more pensive. If I'm super
excited (as I was when people were posting awesome feedback,) or trying to
get/keep someone's attention - it'll be more energetic/playful. If I want to
do both, I'll combine the two.
Make sense? Awesome.
Apologies for the confusion :-). You may now return to your regularly
scheduled HN thread.
EDIT: oops - got distracted trying to prove I'm me, and forgot to address the
more important part of your message. Thanks so much for the feedback, even if
you couldn't take the survey :)
------
sgslo
I'm happy to take the survey, it will be interesting to see what MSFT works
out over the coming months.
Small pet peeve: It'd be nice if you didn't require input on all forms of the
survey, especially the open response text fields. I understand if instant.ly
doesn't give you an option.
~~~
mousetraps
Thanks, we'll keep that in mind for the next survey. That's something we went
back and forth on - those are always some of the most interesting fields, and
we didn't want people to consider the field as unimportant and skip it because
they were optional. On the other hand, I can see that it would be annoying for
it not to tell you you're missing fields until you submit. Maybe we can try
editing it tomorrow to do a quick a/b test and see if it has an effect on %
(good) responses for those questions...
------
markuz
I don't like surveys, but I can tell you this. ES6 all the way down. ES7 async
stuff looks great. facebook flow looks promising
take a look at 6to5 project
~~~
mousetraps
awesome, thx for the pointers!
------
stevekemp
Unfortunate typo there calling Linux "Linus".
~~~
mousetraps
fixed!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
JQuery iPod-style Drilldown Menu - chaostheory
http://www.filamentgroup.com/lab/jquery_ipod_style_drilldown_menu/
======
tlrobinson
I found it sort of confusing and hard to navigate.
------
bouncingsoul
iPod navigation is great for displaying lists on devices with small, low-
resolution screens and limited input. Using that system in a place without
those limitations does nothing but make navigation harder because it's
artificially hiding and limiting the amount of information visible.
------
mattmaroon
That's much less intuitive on the web than it is on the iPod.
------
truebosko
Very cool yes, but as tlrobison said, very hard to navigate.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
What I Learned About Life at My 30th College Reunion - aberoham
https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/10/what-my-harvard-college-reunion-taught-me-about-life/573847/?single_page=true
======
arunmp
>discussions throughout the weekend centered on a desire for love, comfort,
intellectual stimulation, decent leaders, a sustainable environment,
friendship, and stability
This is the realization that comes after years of living. May be these are the
things worth living for too.
~~~
NTDF9
>discussions throughout the weekend centered on a desire for love, comfort,
intellectual stimulation, decent leaders, a sustainable environment,
friendship, and stability
Wait, so the average person doesn't care about GDP or debt or trade wars? They
don't want to be an economic robot?
How surprising!
------
kanyethegreat
_Many classmates who are in long-lasting marriages said they experienced a
turning point, when their early marriage suddenly transformed into a mature
relationship. “I’m doing the best I can!” one classmate told me she said to
her husband in the middle of a particularly stressful couples’-therapy
session. From that moment on, she said, he understood_
Loved the sentiment of that. But surprising that the metamorphosis happens in
marriage. I wonder what percentage of people wait for their relationships to
mature before getting married? Or if marriage, as a societal construct, is
this mental barrier people feel like they have to overcome before their
relationship really evolves.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: what do you think of my chat app? - th0ma5
http://270rule.appspot.com/ is anonymous live chat for any page, plus a feed of who is chatting where. no login, bbcode, and some embedding are supported. let me know what you think! thank you hn!!!!
======
jackowayed
It's pretty cool. I'm using it on this page right now.
Your home site needs a little work. The links sometimes collide with the text.
It also would be good to add some kind of description on the home page. Even
just putting "Anonymous Chat for Any Page" right below the big "270rule" would
be a step up.
Also, it would be nice if it would highlight what I've posted (even if it's
only temporary, going away after a refresh) so that I can quickly see which
messages are "new" (as in came later than the last thing I've said).
Also, I did eventually find the close link on my own, but it's not at all
obvious. You can put "270 rule" somewhere else, but you really want to tell
people that that link closes it.
And if you can find a way not to allow people to open it several times on the
same page (Try clicking the bookmarklet several times and see what happens.)
that would be cool.
------
fadmmatt
Done: <http://www.yaplet.com/>
~~~
th0ma5
nice way she handles a lot of things there. i like the way usernames on the
chat are handled. interesting use of frames too
------
safetytrick
I tried out the Hot right now link, should this show active yaplet chats
across the web? I can't see myself checking pages to see if they have open
chats (I'm sure the plan is to use a link rather than check each page) Maybe a
browser plugin could alert me if other yaplet users are chatting or visiting
pages I am browsing?
------
tocomment
Whatever happened to circle of chat/conversation (I forget the exact name :-(
That was a nice one. This one sounds cool too, I'll check it out later.
------
jackowayed
Looks like you're having issues w/ the quotas already.
I just got a 403 Over Quota. Refresh fixed, but still.
------
th0ma5
sorry to interact with the service, use the bookmarklet on the main page while
browsing any other page
------
sanj
<http://talkinator.com/>
------
poops
here's another with dynamic room names <http://yamr.net/hacker_news>
------
jonursenbach
Needs a lot of work, to say the least.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Eva: The World's First Smart Shower - ph0rque
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/eva-the-world-s-first-smart-shower
======
jack-r-abbit
This looks pretty cool. I've often thought about how to build smart tech into
the shower. What I always envisioned would require a more integrated solution
(actually using controllable valves to adjust the temp instead of the old
knobs, etc) but this looks like it gets a lot of bang for a minimally invasive
add-on.
------
xkcd-sucks
A shower controlled by a smartphone...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Kurento WebRTC Media Server 6.7: Moving Forward - j1elo
https://www.kurento.org/blog/kurento-67-moving-forward
======
j1elo
Hi, we are happy to officially announce the new release 6.7 of Kurento, the
WebRTC Media Server!
It has been available for some days in our repos, but now that version 6.7.1
has been fully published (including not only Kurento Media Server packages for
Ubuntu, but also Java API artifacts and a full documentation overhaul), it's
time to make it official!
Here is an archived copy of the blog post, in case it goes down due to a
traffic spike: [http://archive.is/qpRSJ](http://archive.is/qpRSJ)
Regards, the Kurento team.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Facebook Lie Files - zepto
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/12/20/facebook_disaster/
======
deogeo
> Well, you can do all that, and still Facebook will know where you are and
> sell that information to others.
So after limiting what it is authorized to access, the Facebook app proceeds
to access it anyway. You could say it 'exceeds authorized access' \- a
criminal offense under the CFAA! Should someone perform a citizen's arrest on
Mark Zuckerberg?
~~~
renholder
The Facebook app, itself, may not have location permissions but another app
might and because the Facebook SDK is imbedded into _that_ app, it's of ill-
consequence if the Facebook app has location permissions or not. They're still
getting that data from the imbedded Facebook SDK.
------
goldenkey
Remember, you can make all the money in the world but people will still hate
you if you are a lying douchebag.
I think as nerds we have a proclivity to "scheming", looking at the world as
if it can be hacked with some cleverness. But we are social animals, and a
balanced approach will yield better results than simply destroying other
people's lives and emotional stability by lying and cheating, scheming and
stealing.
Recently saw this parody of Zuck on Reddit [1], which is inflammatory but in
my opinion, called for. When you open yourself up to fierce judgment, you
shouldnt be surprised when it becomes much more exaggerated than justified.
[1]
[https://i.imgur.com/jKFFTyB_d.jpg?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&f...](https://i.imgur.com/jKFFTyB_d.jpg?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium)
~~~
renholder
That image is 145x68 pixels[1], for some reason.
[1] - [https://media.makeameme.org/created/what-is-
this-3kgg8z.jpg](https://media.makeameme.org/created/what-is-this-3kgg8z.jpg)
~~~
goldenkey
Thanks for the heads up. It should be fixed now - didn't realize imgur now
requires all these silly query params..what a regression.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Auto-Threading Compilers Are Here - jacquesm
http://developinthecloud.drdobbs.com/author.asp?section_id=2284&doc_id=255275
======
chucknelson
The author should really remove this statement:
"The power of a single CPU core has plateaued and won't ever get faster. CPUs
are only getting more cores."
Pretty sure that isn't true. It may be getting more difficult to make CPUs
faster, but advancements in CPU architecture continue.
~~~
wwwtyro
Additionally, his premise that CPUs will continue to get more and more cores
is probably also flawed. The diminishing returns of the extra cores due to
Amdahl's law will make them less and less economically viable.
~~~
marshray
Intel and AMD want to continue making processors that cost more than $150. If
feature size continues to shrink, what else are they going to do with the
extra room on the chip? (other than slash their own prices using ever-more-
expensive fab equipment)
In single threaded code, the unused cores can be powered off.
~~~
rpledge
Larger caches is an option for using the extra die area. RAM access times
aren't increasing at anywhere near the rate that CPU power has.
~~~
Joeri
Why have caches at all? Couldn't you move the entire RAM on-die.
~~~
JohnBooty
It would be prohibitively expensive. Several _megabytes_ of cache already take
up about _half_ of the CPU die size.
[http://techreport.com/review/21987/intel-
core-i7-3960x-proce...](http://techreport.com/review/21987/intel-
core-i7-3960x-processor)
Think about how much larger a CPU would have to be to include an entire
gigabyte of cache, much less multiple gigabytes.
------
m0th87
I call bullshit. Researchers have been trying to make auto-parallelizing
compilers for decades without anything substantive making it to industry.
Even in functional languages, auto-parallelization hasn't worked well because
of the coarseness issue: it's difficult for compilers to figure out what to
run in multiple threads and what to run single-threaded because of tradeoffs
with inter-thread communication.
~~~
7952
Surely auto-parallelization is exactly what CPU pipelining and branch
prediction do quite effectively?
~~~
benzor
Well, sort of, but then the moment you run into hazards [1], bad branch
predictions [2] or any other problems, the CPU will either stall the pipeline
a few cycles or just flush the whole thing, so it's not like it's a magic
solution just waiting to be adapted.
[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipeline_hazard> [2]
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branch_predictor>
------
zackzackzack
The author seems to think that because a language supports functional
programming, it cannot support mutable state in any form. It would be
worthwhile to actually look into what sort of support for various types of
state that a language like Clojure has (<http://clojure.org/state>). There are
at least 3 ways off the top of my head that I can change the value of a
variable in a Clojure process during runtime. It's obviously not the sort of
control over state that you have in C++, but it's a far cry from define a
variable once and that's all you can do.
~~~
nicktelford
The re-enforcement of the fallacy that FP shuns mutable state really put me
off this article.
~~~
Locke1689
Functional programming does shun mutable state. It just doesn't make it
impossible.
Functional programming is a style of programming which uses the lambda
calculus as its base model of computation. Just because you can subvert that
at times doesn't mean that idiomatic code doesn't disapprove of breaking
referential transparency.
~~~
jmillikin
Functional programming doesn't shun mutable state. It shuns _global_ state,
which is not the same thing. Mutability is well-supported even in very
stringently functional languages such as Haskell.
~~~
Locke1689
No. It shuns mutable variables. It provides outs for performance or
architectural reasons, but it's never a "good thing."
The ST monad is there for many reasons but if you can avoid it you probably
should. If profiling says it's necessary, then add it.
Look at Coq.
~~~
jmillikin
That's a frankly silly position to hold.
There's no reason to avoid ST, and in many cases it makes the code clearer and
shorter than trying to figure out some pointfree contortionism to reach the
same goal.
I'll look at Coq when it has support for binding to C libraries, opening
sockets, or doing anything else than a programming language needs to support.
~~~
eurleif
You seem to be setting up a false dichotomy between using the ST monad and
writing pointfree code ("functions as a composition of other functions, never
mentioning the actual arguments they will be applied to"). But you can write
non-pointfree code that doesn't use the ST monad, and you can write pointfree
that does use it. They're unrelated.
------
malkia
Here is a good overview of the 13 isolated computing problems when comes to
multi-threading.
It's really not about compilers, fp, not fp so much as to what kind of tasks
are easily multi-threaded. As I replied in another post - things like state-
machines are very hard to parallelize (one of the dwarfs that the article
below talks), while others very easy - like raytracer (to a point, since a
raytrace have to share data across all computing units - cpu-s).
(An article from 2008)
<http://www.cs.nyu.edu/srg/talks/BerkeleyView.pdf>
~~~
scott_s
Don't confuse "mutlithreading" with "parallelism." Multithreaded code is a
particular kind of parallelism, but not the only kind.
~~~
martinced
"Multithreaded code is a particular kind of parallelism"
No.
Parallelism implies that there are multiple CPUs and/or multiple cores at work
(or in older use of "parallelism", at least some instructions that are
parallelized).
Multithreading doesn't imply that at all: you can have a multi-threaded
program (like, say, a Java program using multiple threads + its GC thread, EDT
thread, etc.) running on a single-machine using on CPU which has a single core
and which doesn't do any kind of parallelism.
To me you're totally wrong in saying that multithreaded code is a particular
kind of parallelism.
Multithreading doesn't imply parallelism.
~~~
scott_s
You are correct, I over-simplified. Multithreading is a way of implementing
parallelism, but it will not always lead to parallelism. Multithreading always
implies concurrency, but only yields parallelism if the underlying hardware
allows it. (Concurrency allows for time-sharing the processor so they are not
actually running simultaneously; parallelism means they are running
simultaneously.)
However, I was not primarily concerned with this distinction, but with the
distinction between obtaining parallelism through multithreading, versus
parallelism through message passing. Multithreading implies that parallel
threads will communicate implicitly through shared memory, which does not
scale past a single machine.
------
PaulHoule
My favorite parallelizing compiler is Pig.
Pig can turn a combination of relational operators into a series of Map and
Reduce operations that can be done on a Hadoop cluster. This is all stuff I
can code up by hand, but most the things I might do with a shell script or SQL
statements I can parallelize in a way that's scalable in both directions.
Because I can write parallel code easily and quickly, I can use it to do
little jobs. As for big my home cluster handles terabytes and I can rent any
level of power from AWS.
------
octo_t
This is task-based parallelism and does require significant (and verbose)
annotations of the source code.
~~~
profquail
The paper referenced by the article, "Uniqueness and Reference Immutability
for Safe Parallelism", says:
The group has written several million lines of code, including: core libraries
(including collections with polymorphism over element permissions and
data-parallel operations when safe), a webserver, a high level optimizing
compiler, and an MPEG decoder.
So it also handles data-parallelism.
~~~
kibwen
Paper available here:
<http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/170528/msr-tr-2012-79.pdf>
Incidentally, I hear this paper is quite similar to one that the Rust[1] folk
recently authored regarding their "borrowed pointer" system, due to be
possibly published next year. If this sort of thing interests you, I suggest
you take a look at Rust (though keep in mind that it's still very pre-alpha).
<http://www.rust-lang.org/>
~~~
stcredzero
I was just thinking that this cries out for language support.
------
georgeorwell
This is just a fluff article pushing some MSR C# thing. Why not submit a link
to their actual paper from OOPSLA?
[https://research.microsoft.com/pubs/170528/msr-
tr-2012-79.pd...](https://research.microsoft.com/pubs/170528/msr-
tr-2012-79.pdf) (this is the TR linked from the Dr. Dobbs thing.)
Automatic parallelization has been the holy grail of performance-based
computing since the 1980's or earlier, and if auto-threading compilers had
arrived we would all know about it.
The fact remains that for general-purpose code, automatic parallelization is
an unsolved and exceedingly difficult problem. So difficult that PG claimed it
as one of his highly ambitious startup ideas.
------
gilini
The author states that "we made the fastest CPUs that physics allows," linking
to an article that doesn't exactly say that.
Assuming that he's merely talking about CPU frequency, does that hold? And if
so, why?
------
stephengillie
Hopefully we'll see improvements in videogames, which I understand are among
the harder type of program to multithread.
~~~
RKearney
Doubtful. Most games are GPU bound not CPU bound so CPU threading really isn't
the issue.
~~~
stephengillie
Has the pendulum swung back? I'm pretty sure GPUs overtook CPUs in the past 5
years, and before the i7 was released CPUs were the bottleneck.
~~~
anonymous
Depends on the game, really. Take a look at minecraft and dwarffortress - they
are both cpu-bound due to
1\. Simulating a large world using complex entities and voxels
2\. Being single-threaded with no clear way to make them multi-threaded
Minecraft in particular is a pretty interesting problem since it only
simulates the part of the world that's within a radius of a player, it would
make sense to have each player's machine simulate their own part of the world
and the server to somehow merge those together.
~~~
cousin_it
Simulating a large world seems like a textbook example of an "embarrassingly
parallel" problem, doesn't it? At least that's true for cellular automata.
~~~
MichaelGG
I think the problem comes from that the world is a large mass of
interconnected mutable state. You don't know if updating a particular object
will update another.
Think of a player crouching on a plank that another player just phasered. If
you continue simulate the first player's movement "crawl forward" by itself,
how do you integrate the result of the plank being disintegrated, causing the
player to fall? The first player's simulation outcome depends on multiple
inputs, but they aren't findable directly from that player's perspective. You
have to first simulate the phaser beam to know the plank is gone to know the
player is falling now, not crawling.
And then imagine that with far more complex rules and a few hundred thousand
objects having similar interactions, each one possibly modifying any other
one.
~~~
Evbn
If you limit communication to "speed of light" , then each tick involves only
local message passing, which is easily parallelizable.
------
malkia
In the mean time I'm still waiting for the Octopiler...
------
michaelochurch
The not-always-pure FP that sometimes uses state is what real-world functional
programmers actually use. We _manage_ state. It's neither possible nor
desirable to _eliminate_ it outright.
It wasn't until recently (a couple weeks ago, when giving a presentation on
FP) that I realized _why_ stateful programming lends itself so easily to evil.
If a program is a serial collection of possibly unrelated stateful actions,
everyone can add new intermediate behaviors to a function to satisfy some
dipshit requirement, and the API doesn't change. Writ large, this allows
silent complexity creep.
I think a major reason why FP is better is that changing a purely
referentially transparent function requires an API change: more parameters or
a different return type. If nothing else, this tends to break tests. It's hard
to change functions that already exist, and it _should be_ hard. You should be
writing new ones instead. Also, if there's only one way to combine programs
(function composition) it's easier to break them up. So you don't get the
500-line monsters that plague enterprise codebases.
That said, the worst thing about OOP isn't state. It's _inheritance_ , which
is the 21st-century goto.
~~~
MatthewPhillips
You had me until you knocked goto.
~~~
michaelochurch
Goto is fine in self-contained uses, but turns catastrophic on large,
enterprise codebases, like inheritance.
[http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/08/15/what-is-
spagh...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/08/15/what-is-spaghetti-
code/)
~~~
akkartik
I'll include part of my comment to that post:
_"Are goto’s always bad eventually? Who cares? There’s far bigger problems
with gradual change in codebases, let’s think harder about them. My peer
reviewers, hold off review until you’ve used what I’ve built and found
problems with it. Managers and programmers, wrestle with judgement everyday,
the stuff not easily put into rules. Leave the comforting shallows and engage
with the abyss."_
[http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/08/15/what-is-
spagh...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/08/15/what-is-spaghetti-
code/#comment-836)
------
DanWaterworth
> Eliminating state is usually possible, but it makes programming
> exceptionally hard.
In the words of a Wikipedian, "citation needed".
EDIT: To the downvoters, care to comment?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Space-Filling Curves in Geospatial Applications - dhotson
http://www.ddj.com/184410998
======
wwalker3
It's always nice to learn something I'd never even heard of before that's so
simple. The article is about how you can use a neat trick (space-filling
curves) to turn a multidimensional search into a set of one-dimensional
searches, which could come in handy in many areas, not just geospatial ones.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
I just released this website about apps. Tell me what you think about it - netipsum
http://www.appsta.com/
======
usaphp
Looks a bit cluttered to me.
~~~
netipsum
You mean too many items? Or colors?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Wealthiest 5% Grabbed Most of the America’s Gains - privacyguru
http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2011/09/16/the-top-5-grabbed-most-of-the-americas-gains/
======
ender7
It's easy to start filtering yourselves into the camps of "the rich are too
rich, tax them!" or "the rich earned their money, you have no right to take it
away!". Then you can yell at each other from across great echoing divide until
the sun grows dark.
The sad fact is that America is no longer a country that makes things, and as
a result we no longer find ourselves in a position to employ people in
positions that are actually worth a damn. Or that pay a salary worth a damn.
We still make some things. Software. Circuit designs. Entertainment. Product
design (to sell things to ourselves). Pharma. People who work in these areas
are paid well.
Oh, and the financial industry. Which, despite demonstrating a wonderful
ability to make itself mountains of cash, has failed to demonstrate how it
benefits the rest of the country. (obviously, its ability to provide lines of
credit is valuable, but we had that long before investment banking came to
dominate the entire financial industry)
I remember reading Snow Crash for the first time and coming across this line:
There's only four things we do better than anyone else:
music
movies
microcode (software)
high-speed pizza delivery
and thinking "what an alien dystopia that future must be".
~~~
webwright
More data: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_exports>
The US is the #3 country in terms of exports.
~~~
pbsurf
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_current_ac...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_current_account_balance)
Scroll all the way to the bottom.
~~~
enjo
What does that have to do with anything?
~~~
sologoub
Short version: We buy more than we sell. Wealth is being transferred out.
Long version: It means we import way more than we export... In other words, we
buy from others a lot more than we sell to others. In theory, this would
create a strong downward pressure on US dollar, but as it is the reserve
currency of the world and is backed by giant consumer economy that everyone is
selling into, as well as US military might, the pressure is negated.
Some economists argue that this is extremely unhealthy and is unsustainable.
I'm not qualified to say if it's true or not. One thing I would say, is look
at most countries with a huge positive balance - most are oil producers or
cheap(er) labor sources for less skilled stuff. Notable exceptions here is
Germany. In fact, Germany is very luck that the rest of Euro zone likes to
spend profusely. If not for those other countries dragging the Euro down,
their currency would have appreciated exponentially, making their exports way
too expensive.
~~~
yummyfajitas
Wealth is being transferred in - it is _money_ that is being transferred out.
The net result is that we are trading China some green pieces of paper for
flat screen TV's.
I like my Chinese-made laptop more than green pieces of paper, so it sounds
like a win to me.
~~~
stouset
Unfortunately, on the macro-scale, we've run out of green pieces of paper and
are actually just issuing them IOUs at a higher value than the cost of the
goods.
In layman's terms, we're cashing out our hard-earned savings for meaningless,
disposable trinkets. It isn't going to last, and when it's over, it's going to
_hurt_.
------
callmeed
I know this is wealth and not income, but I get sick of the media (and
politicians) using the "top 1%" or "top 5%" label.
When it comes to income, the top 1% includes an attorney making $250K and a
hedge fund manager making $10M. I imagine its similar for wealth. My guess is
that distribution curves spike somewhere past the 1% mark.
Maybe I'm biased because I barely make the cut and don't want to pay more
taxes, but it seems odd to use such an arbitrary cutoff for reporting and
(especially) policy decisions.
And please tell me if I'm wrong or off here–I'm geniunely interested in this.
EDIT: downvoted? Seriously?
~~~
samfoo
If you only barely make the cut, you'll only be paying barely more in taxes.
Only your income above the cut is taxed at the higher rate. It's not like if
you make $239,999 and you get one more dollar in income you lose money. Only
that dollar is taxed at the higher rate.
~~~
sage_joch
This isn't something that's communicated very well in our society. I didn't
realize it until I actually did the math on the tax tables.
~~~
roel_v
It's not about being communicated imo, it's about most people not being
numerically literate enough to be able to understand (not saying you aren't,
just in general). I'm convinced that more than half of the population simply
isn't capable of truly understanding progressive taxation, just like they
cannot comprehend time value of money or similar things. When you spell it out
on a sheet of paper most people will say 'oh yeah', but they cannot really
internalize it, and never will.
Of course this is a problem, because how can you expect people to abide by law
they cannot understand? Worse, how can you communicate to people that they're
incapable of understanding without being (or even just 'coming across as')
condescending? I don't know, I don't have an answer. But when people like
this:
[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/magazine/03european-t.html...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/magazine/03european-t.html?pagewanted=all)
show being absolutely oblivious to the mechanism (people who are for the rest
presumably quite intelligent, and who - _professionally_ \- spend quite a bit
of time on a piece like this), how can we expect the average citizen to really
understand?
I guess it's a recent problem too - just 50 years ago people just listened to
their banker about financial things and their doctor on medical things, and
believed whatever they said, but we've long passed that point.
------
noonespecial
Has anyone ever stopped to try to get an estimate of how much of these gains
this 5% have _created_?
I honestly have no idea what this number would look like but it must be non-
zero. Everybody wants to fit a picture of a fat, stupid, cartoonish banker
gambling away grandma's pension and getting a mammoth bonus into this slot but
how much is that the case? If the number's not zero, then its something. How
much?
Its not completely outside the realm of possibility that the 5% created nearly
_all_ of the gains and then only grabbed most. Net win.
~~~
shawnee_
Milton Friedman said that most fallacies in economic thinking were derived
from the "fixed pie" assumption: that one party can gain only at the expense
of another. In an ideal world, the pie would always be growing, and those
marginal increases in utility would spill over and everybody would increase
well-being gradually over time.
But that's not what happens.
The top 5 percent may create _some_ gains for the other 95, but their gains
that "trickle down" do so very, very selectively, and only go so far. Probably
the most obvious evidence that trickle-down economics doesn't work is this:
_The share of wealth held by the bottom 60% dropped 7.5%._
When over half of the people are on the shrinking pie side of the table, it's
pretty tough to spell "Net win"
~~~
webwright
So the pie hasn't grown? I'm serious asking-- I don't know.
It it has, then it COULD be a net win. Example: Pie consists of $100. I (rich
guy) have $50, the rest of the folks (5 people) split the other $50, and have
$10 apiece. I cleverly invest abroad and double my money. I now have $100. The
rest of the folks invest less cleverly, and turn their $10 into $12. Their
share of the wealth declines, no?
~~~
0x12
In absolute sense (number of dollars) the pie grows and so does everybody's
share in the pie. But you have to take in to account buying power as well and
once you do that for lots of people their actual take drops.
~~~
noonespecial
But also remember that there are things they can buy now with those dollars
(even if they have less of them) that before they just couldn't.
They might be making less inflation adjusted dollars than their parents did in
the 70's working at the Ford plant, but how many 1970's dollars did it take to
buy an iPad, or laser vision correction, flat screen HD tv, cable with 500
channels etc etc? (1)
Steve Jobs is a billionaire. I make less programming than my dad did at my age
as a lowly salesman. But I have _so much more_. I'm OK with that.
(1) I don't mean what would the inflation adjusted price of the iPad be in
1975 or whatever. I mean all the money in the world in 1975 couldn't have
bought even one seeing as how they didn't exist and all. "The Pie" is more
than dollars.
------
Tichy
I usually defend capitalism, and I read and mostly agreed with PGs wealth
essay. But having seen pictures of how the poor live in the US (I am not from
the US), this just feels wrong. How much wealth do you really need? It is one
thing if everybody lives a happy live, and some people live in slightly bigger
houses by the seaside. It is another if lots of people live in squalor at the
same time.
I think some things should be rewarded. If you find a cure for cancer, you
deserve to be rich. But even then, maybe a couple of million $ would be
enough, even if what you gave to society is worth trillions. Perhaps related:
Joel Spolsky's article on how to compensate an intern who created a lot of
value for the company. Can't find the article atm, but I think he ended up
giving hardly anything. Cancer researchers are just interns of society, when
seen from space.
~~~
learc83
I'd be interested to know where you saw these "pictures".
There's a group of people who like to paint the picture that the US is
devolving in to a Dickensian nightmare. There is always room for improvement,
but as someone who lives here and has traveled extensively I don't think you
can say that "lots of people live in squalor".
Sure, we have 300+ million people, so you can find people who are homeless and
living on the street, but that would still be the case even if the government
offered unlimited free housing.
~~~
Tichy
I saw them on German TV, and OK, maybe also in Michael Moore's movie (not
sure, I watched it recently but I am foggy about the details). For example
there are pictures of the tent cities that emerge.
To be honest lots of stories from the USA sound disturbing, but then again I
can not claim to know every corner of Germany. Perhaps there are lots of
people living in squalor here, too.
~~~
learc83
I have traveled very extensively through the US (still, there are plenty of
places I haven't been). From my experience, you'd have to look very hard to
find what I'd classify as a tent city.
That being said I know where one is and I've been there working with a local
church organization. It's in the woods behind a local shopping center, and at
any given time there are about 15-20 people living there.
The church helps out the best they can, but the vast majority of the men
living there wouldn't leave if they were offered free housing. Most of them
have mental issues, and the only way to really get them out would be
involuntary commitment.
In short, it's ridiculous to find a tent city somewhere, film it, and use it
to claim that America is devolving into Calcutta.
~~~
Tichy
I am not sure if I trust your research. How have you traveled - did you seek
out poor places? I don't think tent cities emerge at the typical tourist
locations.
Are you saying that there is no problem in the USA, no financial crisis etc?
Because I have been hearing other things - but I know the media likes to hype,
too...
~~~
learc83
Yes, plenty of the places I've gone have been by plane, to tourist locations.
However, I've travelled extensively by car throughout the middle to lower
sections of Georgia and Alabama (fairly poor areas).
I'm fascinated with how technology has changed rural life, so I like to visit
small towns just to observe. For instance 10 years ago I noticed fairly
substantial differences in the way teenagers from rural areas dressed compared
to suburban teenagers (i was a suburban teenager at the time). Now the
differences, in apparel are closing rapidly. Also, when I was a kid and the
Nintendo 64 came out but everyone was out of stock. All you had to do was
drive to some small town (Hazlehurst, GA) Walmart to find one. Now because
everyone is so connected, that same Walmart had a line out the door on the day
the PS3 was released.
I'm also the type of person who likes to go to a city with no plan in mind and
just wing it. A few friends and I, went to New Orleans about 2 years after
Katrina, we got a hotel near Bourbon Street, but we spent most of our time
just walking. We walked for miles, covered a huge part of the city, and
definitely ended up in some places where we probably shouldn't have gone.
In summary, yes I've definitely been in places where one would expect to find
tent cities.
I'm not saying they don't exist, but if you do find one, it's likely to be
just a handfull of people living in the woods, not what I'd really call a
"tent city."
Also there is a problem in the US, there is a financial crisis, but the
average person gets up everyday and goes to work. They may be worried about
the economy, but no more than the other stuff the 24 hour news warns them
about (you know--child murderers, plagues, terrorists etc...)
------
prostoalex
Most of the US wealth is ephemeral and is tied up to the real estate market.
The poorer one is, the greater proportion of personal wealth is tied up to the
value of their real estate.
If you started off wealthy before the real estate crisis, and just stayed in
cash, your wealth in absolute terms would decline slightly as your house lost
value and your super-conservative cash holdings earned you 0%.
In relative terms the guy who bought with no money down, easy mortgage
guaranteed is now seeing his total wealth delta in severe red, so yeah, the
wealthy ones are seeing their proportion rise by staying stable.
------
hammock
Before jumping all over the rich, consider whether you are one. For example,
if you earn $100k or more per year, you are IN the top 5% of income earners.
And if you have a total net worth of ~$200k or more, you are IN the wealthiest
top 5%. Easy to imagine that many HN readers are in these boats.
~~~
jeffreymcmanus
Not even close. A $100,000 income puts you at about the 75th percentile, not
the 95th.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:United_States_Income_Distr...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:United_States_Income_Distribution_1947-2007.svg)
~~~
stephenbez
As the legend states, the graph shows family income not individual income. If
you and your spouse both earn $100k, you'd be above the 95th percentile.
~~~
keithnoizu
Ahh, if only i didn't have an english major for a live in girlfriend.
------
Terry_B
Not picking on this article in particular but whenever I read these types of
stories I get the feeling that people don't make a clear separation of these
two very different issues:
1\. The bottom is worse off relative to the top in terms of wealth than they
were before.
2\. The bottom is worse off in terms of wealth (quality of life) than they
were before.
People seem to imply 2 when they talk about 1. but they are very different
things.
~~~
sabat
But it's both, isn't it? Fewer Americans have health coverage, fewer Americans
have jobs, fewer Americans can stay in homes. What you hear people saying is
that #1 implies #2.
~~~
yummyfajitas
Apart from short term fluctuations during the recession, more Americans own
homes and health insurance coverage is roughly the same as it ever was.
<http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/USHOWN>
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._Uninsured_and_Uninsur...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._Uninsured_and_Uninsured_Rate_\(1987_to_2008\).JPG)
~~~
sabat
What you call "fluctuations" most of us call a downward trend. And the fact
that you think that it's "same as it ever was" is somehow a positive thing is
somewhat disturbing.
~~~
yummyfajitas
I made no claim that anything is positive or negative, I merely pointed out
that you are factually wrong on two of your points.
------
barmstrong
Some PG thoughts on distribution of wealth:
<http://www.paulgraham.com/gap.html>
~~~
klenwell
PG asks:
_Why? The pattern of variation seems no different than for any other skill.
What causes people to react so strongly when the skill is making money?_
I'd offer this passage from Robert Wright's The Moral Animal as one answer.
This assumes the distribution of wealth serves as a proxy (inexact, even
inaccurate, perhaps, but functional) for the distribution of access to sexual
resources among males:
_Men have long competed for access to the scarcer sexual resource, women. And
the costs of losing the contest are so high (genetic oblivion) that natural
selection has inclined them to compete with special ferocity._
[http://books.google.com/books?id=MuI_DVZ1Xo8C&lpg=PP1...](http://books.google.com/books?id=MuI_DVZ1Xo8C&lpg=PP1&dq=moral%20animal%20wright&pg=PA100#v=onepage&q=%22inequality%20amoung%20males%22&f=false)
So the argument goes something like this:
Material resources (wealth) provide access to sexual resources and
reproductive success (any organism's raison d'etre). An organism hard-wired to
persist its genes will probably also be hardwired to recognize the existential
threat presented by unequal access to the resources required to persist its
genes and take radical action to avoid it. Since among most animals (including
humans), females make a greater biological investment, they enjoy the
privilege of selecting among males, preferring those with resources to best
provide for their offspring, which puts males in the position of scrabbling to
accumulate the resources necessary to win the affections of a mate.
That probably leaves out a few necessary premises, but if you're not familiar
with the argument, hopefully you at least get the picture.
Wright makes the point that a society in which there is such radical
inequality of wealth that a significant number of men have not the resources
to attract a mate, settle down, and marry, also tend to be the most violent
and unstable.
If you had a society in which there was radical inequality of wealth, but not
radical inequality of access among young males to mates, you would expect less
instability. But allowing for the shortcuts in reasoning that evolution might
encourage, you'd still expect some. And as various behaviorial economic
experiments have demonstrated, humans seem to have a tendency to reason about
fairness in relative rather than absolute terms. So in such a society, you'd
probably still have a greater threat of instability than one where there was a
more equitable distribution of wealth -- and, especially, the perception of
it.
~~~
rphlx
This is a Beta male view of female sexual selection: "if I can just get rich
enough, girls will like me".
The truth is that for the middle class and above, social intelligence, wit,
charm, "Game", and other characteristics matter as much, or more, than raw
financial net worth. Of course, these are often correlated, but there are
plenty of broke bikers, musicians, and womanizers doing quite well too, in
comparison to Aspie SW millionaires.
------
steve_b
Wealth != income as pg says in <http://www.paulgraham.com/wealth.html>.
I think wealth is more equal to total free time left on the planet. So total
time minus time spent working to provide things for survival minus time spent
surviving (like cooking, sleeping, running from lions). The washing machine is
invented, lots of peoples' wealth skyrockets. Food gets cheaper, people's
wealth goes up.
Looking at income is a short-sighted definition of wealth.
------
jeffreymcmanus
This is pretty damning when you consider it's being run by the Wall Street
Journal.
~~~
jeffool
WSJ, Economist, Forbes, none of these pull punches. You want a stark look at
these kind of numbers and the issues around them, they all provide it with no
hesitancy or softballing.
Don't be surprised when someone talks about the money they've made. They think
they have it rightly, just as many feel slighted. No shame in the game of the
wealthy.
~~~
cema
Just like it should be. Of all the "mainstream" publications, the financial
(and business-oriented) newspapers are the ones I distrust less, because in my
experience they tend to understand it is their interest to work with the facts
and real numbers.
------
aj700
I supported (absolutely past tense) capitalism on the basis that the right
people would end up with the money. Maybe they will. Waiting another 30 years
isn't on.
Things shouldn't go to people "according to his need".
But now things are going to people "according INVERSELY to his need".
Endless claim checks on future productivity are being stockpiled by precisely
those who have no need of 99% of that productivity. In many cases they also
have very little future, because they are old.
Politics is bought and paid for. People will not pay taxes. Inflation must now
be used as a regressive wealth tax of last resort. At least it transfers
purchasing power from the old to the young.
Poor people should, if they were intelligent, stop spending their disposable
income and use it to buy the thing that gives the best return on investment -
which is bribing politicians. And no, corporations aren't people, and money
isn't speech.
------
graiz
It drives me crazy when I see encoding issues in popular articles. Come on,
it�s embarrassing.
~~~
byoung2
Looks like it was composed in Word and copied into a rich text editor (without
using the paste from Word feature). It converts the double spaces to space,
, and doesn't convert the smart quotes.
------
linuxhansl
I am quite tired reading the top x%.
Many people living in the SF bay area for example technically belong to the
richest 3-5%... But cannot even afford a nice house here.
And with "nice" I do not mean a pool, 10 rooms. movie room, etc, but just
enough rooms for the kids and in a neighborhood with good schools.
Now I have a very liberal viewpoint, and above categorization mostly fits me.
Still I personally do not mind to be taxed a bit higher.
But all that talk about the richest 5% living the life of riches is just not
accurate.
~~~
Game_Ender
> But all that talk about the richest 5% living the life of riches is just not
> accurate.
It's relative. You seem to define rich as basically being able to spend
whatever you want and not have to worry about money. As another commentor has
stated, being able to own a home in an area like the SF bay area _is_ rich. It
is a very desirable area, with good climate, and jobs.
------
DanielBMarkham
Once again, this is a statistical aggregate. As difficult as it might be,
please do not picture a filthy rich old white Scrooge character stealing
cookies from poor orphans on the street when you read numbers like this. As
the author clearly indicates, these numbers are in relation to _averages_ ,
not real people. Movement between income groups is an area of current study,
but I've seen numbers as high as 40% moving from one statistical group to
another inside of a year. The rich may indeed be getting richer, but it may
only be a small percentage of them who stay in that group over a period of
decades. There might be many new arrivals and many people leaving each decade.
Of course, it's perfectly fair to say that the disparity is important whether
or not the same people are involved year-to-year or not. I'm not trying to get
into that part of the discussion. I'm simply trying to point out the
difference between stereotypes and averages and real, live people. There are
lies, damned lies, and statistics. (old joke)
~~~
hammock
One thing that has always bothered me about these reports is that they are not
longitudinal, as you point out. We say "the poor are getting poorer" but is it
the same poor person that got poorer, or did that poor person discover his
inner tycoon and move up while some terrible, lazy deadbeat took his place in
the income ladder? If it's the latter, would that not be considered a success
despite the fact that "the poor have gotten poorer"?
~~~
jbellis
In particular, "[immigration] disproportionately brings low-skill workers into
the U.S. instead of moving jobs abroad. As immigration increases the relative
supply of low-skill workers, the income of individuals at the 20th percentile
declines."
[http://www.frbsf.org/publications/economics/letter/2007/el20...](http://www.frbsf.org/publications/economics/letter/2007/el2007-28.html)
------
Hyena
Of course they did. As more gains are realized in capital rather than wages,
the rich will literally get richer. At the same time, it's becoming ever less
clear that many of them serve a useful purpose. Justifying executive pay is
losing ground in economic literature and, frankly, has always required
recourse to casuistry.
------
paulnelligan
I would say that the problem is systemic - you have two political parties
which are basically at eachothers throats the whole time, and a historical
belief in a very pure form of capitalism - money is the bottom line, and the
markets should govern themselves - the result? - all of the manufacturing has
moved abroad, effectively killing the working classes ...
Any attempts to change this system gets vigourously branded 'socialism' both
by the media (fox news) and by republican opposition which also has historical
connotations harking back to McCarthyism and the Cold War ...
I don't think this is going to change anytime soon unless we see some sort of
systemic collapse ... I would argue that this is possible ...
------
MarkPNeyer
divide (rather arbitrarily) the population into a few groups.
very wealthy: anyone with net worth exceeding $10M.
wealthy: anyone with net worth between $1M - $10M
upper middle class: anyone with net worth between $100k - $1M
middle class: anyone with net worth between $10 and $100k
poor: anyone with net worth < $10k
now let's make some overt generalizations!
the very wealthy seem to fall into one of two groups: successful business
owners and venture capitalists on the one side, and bankers, traders, and some
classes of lawyers on the other.
the wealthy and middle classes all seem to consist of professionals and small
business owners, who have met with varying degrees of success.
the poor consist largely of immigrants, people living in impoverished urban
and rural areas, as well as people without a trained skill.
here's what i think is happening: a group of the very wealthy, mainly those on
the banker-trader-lawyer side of the divide, have this country by the balls.
they have accomplished this by having their politician friends (how many
politicians are former lawyers? and how many came from wall street? ok, now
how many are former business owners or venture capitalists?) convince the poor
that the "rich" are responsible for their plight. to fix this problem, they
propose raising taxes on the "rich."
this proposal invariably means raising income taxes, which the very wealthy
rarely pay because their income is mostly in the form of capital gains. the
democrats propose a tax raise, the poor vote them into power, and income taxes
go up. the wealthy and the middle class both feel like they're getting fucked,
probably because they are. so they fight back, saying they want to lower
taxes, reduce government spending, and cut social programs. the republican
party says they support these ideals, so they get this type of vote. once in
power, the republicans pass a tax cut on both income and capital gains taxes.
they also increase government spending, because, hey, why not, fuck you buddy.
the poor see this response and it confirms to them what the very wealthy have
been saying through their proxy politicians, so the fight goes on.
if this process is going to stop, we need a new word to describe the members
of the very wealthy who are contributing nothing but misery to the economy,
whether by gambling with other people's wealth and getting bailouts when they
lose, or simply by using the broken legal system as a weapon to extract wealth
from the venture capitalist / successful business owner side of the divide. if
we had a single word to embody this concept, i think more people would become
aware of the distinction between the 'productive rich' and the 'destructive
rich' and we could fix the problem. since 'destructive rich' isn't exactly
catchy, i propose we call those people 'dicks.'
~~~
ryanlar
There's a a real word for this. 'Plutocrat.' A member of the 'plutocracy': a
government controlled by the wealthy.
If we had a flat tax (say, 20% on both capital gains -- short and long term --
and income tax), we wouldn't have any of this nonsense. But then, we'd have a
lot of out-of-work lobbyists (read: politicians in 'retirement') and people
who work for non-profits and charities...
~~~
MarkPNeyer
i would argue plutocrat doesn't have a ring to it, and makes the user sound
like onna them lib'ral elitists
------
charlesju
There are a lot of stats everywhere. Here is one I like. The top 1% pays for
38% of all taxes. The top 10% pays 70%. If I showed you this stat, you would
lean on taxing the poor more, but that isn't right either. Everyone should
look at the problem in aggregate and decide for themselves what is fair for
our system as opposed to analyzing individual stats and extrapolated analysis
from that alone.
<http://ntu.org/tax-basics/who-pays-income-taxes.html>
~~~
danssig
>If I showed you this stat, you would lean on taxing the poor more
No I wouldn't. The ones who are getting most of the benefit should be paying
the most for the service.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
NoPSW.com - use secure passwords you don't need to remember - tomd3v
http://nopsw.com/index.html
======
venomsnake
I cannot note that I gave that as an example of security antipattern a few
days ago when we were discussing the xkcd style passwords.
This is one of the things that become worse the more people use them. Having
any correlation between different passwords is BAD idea.
At least use bcrypt/PBKDF2 instead of plain SHA-3
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science - paulygarcia
https://github.com/ossu/computer-science
======
tombert
This is a bit hypocritical coming from a self-taught dropout, but I have kind
of grown to dislike a lot of these "learn programming on your own!"
things/bootcamps/courses.
This isn't because of some idea that it's bad to learn programming for fun,
but more that I think it's kind of reductive to try and squeeze things down to
a streamlined lesson to begin with...There's a reason college takes four or
more years; it takes a long time for these fundamentals to really sink in, and
moreover, a lot of the "extra" classes you're required to take actually _do_
inform your perspective on a lot of career stuff. For example, I hated taking
philosophy classes and thought they were "pointless", but I recently realized
how much they have helped me with logical thinking, and being able to justify
decisions I'm forced to make.
If you're learning to code just for fun, these things are totally fine and can
be incredibly fun, but if you're learning to code for a job, _please_ don't
treat these things as an "alternative" to college. Any kind of self-learning
system almost universally requires a huge amount of self-study, probably more
than a university, if you want to become any good at this stuff.
~~~
Pfhreak
I'm 50/50 on this. Part of me really agrees with you -- you need time and
practice and mistakes to learn this stuff. But also, I'm not sure it has to be
wall clock time.
Four years at university gets you breadth that is probably good for you as a
human, and probably important for contextualizing your work as an engineer (oh
hey, history might be a valuable lesson for your understanding of ethics. Art
and literature might combine with your computer science degree to inspire
projects natural language processing or generative art.)
I think it's possible to condense down from 4 years for someone who is highly
motivated and self driven. And honestly, I think many, many people's careers
would benefit from going partway down the computer science path -- being able
to script repetitive tasks or diagnose computer issues methodically will help
you wherever you land.
~~~
lol768
>oh hey, history might be a valuable lesson for your understanding of ethics.
Art and literature might combine with your computer science degree to inspire
projects natural language processing or generative art
For what it's worth, this is a very American approach to college.
You generally wouldn't spend more than 3 years on an undergrad course as a
student in the UK - because you tend to spend the vast majority of time on
your chosen degree subject. There's maybe room for one or two optional modules
in an unrelated field.
~~~
devmacrile
Possibly because the U.S. provides the "best high school education in the
world.. It's just a shame you have to go to college to get it."
\-- Alan Kay, some anecdote I forget how to locate
~~~
alankay
From the very proper English lady across the table from me at a supper at
Douglas Adams' house: "You Americans have the best high school education in
the world -- what a pity you have to go to college to get it!"
------
ChuckMcM
As someone who has lived through a big chunk of the 'computer science'
lifecycle arc :-) My perspective is a bit different here.
"Programming", or the skill of writing specifications that can be translated
via software into product has come a long way from the 60's to the present
day. People I meet, interview, and work with, often fall into three broad
chunks of the spectrum.
At one end there are 'coders', who are essentially cooks, they take previously
written code, adapt it to their requirements, attach it to third party
libraries and ship the end result. They have been essential to the boom in
Internet companies for decades because they ship a lot of code and they are
relatively inexpensive (with respect to the expected generated revenue) to
hire. When their code doesn't work as they expect they generally iterate on it
using other suggested solutions until they arrive at one that operates the way
they need/want it to.
In the middle are 'engineers' who build more at the system level and can fill
in the gaps with third party software when needed but are also fully capable
of generating the required capability starting with a blank screen. When the
system doesn't work they expect they can analyze it from first principles to
get to the root cause of the problem.
At the other end are 'scientists' who think about the problems of the nature
of computing. These folks rewrite an algorithm in three different ways to
understand how different compute architectures might execute it. Driven by the
joy of discovering new insights about how computers work, if something they
build doesn't work they are delighted because it has illuminated a gap in
their understanding that can be productively filled.
Different educational settings are useful for addressing the goals of the
student, and in my experience those goals will be different depending on where
on the spectrum of 'programmer' they see themselves.
~~~
carokann
Simplistic but it's a pragmatic way of looking at things.
------
jamestimmins
This has some good courses, but in general seems overly long and is of
inconsistent quality.
As an alternative,
[https://teachyourselfcs.com/](https://teachyourselfcs.com/) is a curriculum
from the folks at Bradfield, but it's narrowly focused on core CS
concepts/topics.
~~~
newguy1234
The big problem with projects like this is the quality is pretty much lacking.
Most of those MOOCs to begin with are no way intended to replace the
equivalent college class. Most of them are watered down introductions to the
courses. At a baseline for me to take any MOOC seriously then I want to see a
high-quality textbook (or equivalent) for the course. If that doesn't exist
then my opinion is the course is likely to be of low-quality. I'm sorry but
replacing a textbook with a series of online blog articles or tutorials is
simply not a sufficient replacement.
~~~
Jimpulse
The site gp posted addresses your concerns. All the topics listed in that site
primarily focus on textbooks with the videos or courses as additional
resources.
~~~
sincerely
What does gp stand for?
~~~
doctorsher
GP stands for grandparent.
In case you need an explanation: in the context of a forum, the parent comment
is the one you are replying to, and the grandparent comment is the one your
parent comment replied to.
~~~
sincerely
Thank you
------
jlevers
It seems to me that one of the biggest advantages of having a CS degree from
an actual institution is that prospective employers are far more likely to
believe that you actually have the skills you say you do.
If you're self-taught, but have truly gone through something like OSSU (or
[[https://teachyourselfcs.com/](https://teachyourselfcs.com/)](https://teachyourselfcs.com/\]\(https://teachyourselfcs.com/\)),
or any other set of courses that covers much of what a CS degree would), how
do you convince employers that you actually know what you say you know? Sure,
you can perform well in the interview, but first you have to make it that far.
~~~
greggyb
Just an FYI for you. HN does not support Markdown, but does automatically make
URLs into links. Unfortunately, its parser doesn't play well with Markdown
syntax. Your link goes to the URL below:
https://teachyourselfcs.com/](https://teachyourselfcs.com/)
Rather than to [https://teachyourselfcs.com/](https://teachyourselfcs.com/)
------
kevintb
I hate to be that person, but “Multivariate Calculus”, “Introduction to
Probability” and “Introduction to Logic” cannot possibly be considered
“advanced math” and “advanced theory” as this guide states. This is something
every CS freshman learns in their first term.
------
CalChris
If this is self taught then calculus shouldn't be core. It should be moved to
advanced math and replaced by more linear algebra. Calculus is a beautiful
course but linear algebra is central to data science and ai. Unless you're
getting into topics that require it, 3 semesters of calculus will go unused.
You can't know too much linear algebra and discrete math.
~~~
h3ctic
Linear Algebra is indeed essential - but Calculus as well. If you're talking
about AI, then backpropagation would be the first thing that comes to my mind
where Calculus is needed. On the other hand if you talk about data science, I
would focus more on statistics and probability theory (again linear algebra
and calculus are tools you will need)
~~~
PeterisP
There's really nothing in applied machine learning that requires calculus.
1\. Usually you're not _implementing_ training, you're most likely using a
framework that does training for you while you set up NN structures and data
flows.
2\. If you are implementing specific training methods yourself, massaging loss
functions, new regularization functions and various objectives, and you _are_
explicitly implementing backpropagation, then you're not implementing
differentiation yourself, you're most likely using some kind of autodiff
library or framework that does that for you.
3\. If you _are_ actually doing something with ML that involves _you_ doing
calculus, congratulations, you're likely doing PhD research on the topic and
yes, sure, you're expected to know calculus at that point. But it's not really
_necessary_ even at this stage, an intuitive understanding of the concepts is
obviously useful, but much of actual applied ML academic research doesn't
really _use_ calculus directly, the methods obviously use calculus but it's
used just like CUDA kernels are used - obviously necessary but as a very low
level of abstraction that's handled by those who specialize in it and most
others can just apply it because it just works and is good enough.
I mean, seriously, you can get good progress and published papers in computer
vision or NLP or data analysis without ever needing to directly use calculus;
most people doing that would obviously know calculus as it's a basic thing,
but it's not really that relevant to the daily work, most likely none of the
experiments you'll run will require you to solve any calculus problems.
------
mlthoughts2018
Given there is variation of skill at anything, there will be variation of
skill at self-teaching. Not all self-teaching is created equal. If you’re not
good at self-teaching, then you get a bad teacher every single time.
Colleges diversify this risk. A few teachers might be bad, a few will have
their back to the gigantic lecture hall the whole time, etc. But averaged over
all your classes, most of them are actually pretty good, and many TAs,
tutoring center employees, classmates, etc., can help a ton. Plus you’ll
practice and improve self-teaching the whole time.
Like it or not, college can command a high price for this standardization and
diversification of teaching quality risk. It confers a status credential.
Meanwhile, if I see you are self-taught in a complex engineering discipline,
so what? If you also have job experience already to back it up, then ok. If
you’re asking me to be the first one to take a gamble on whether your
particular instance of self-teaching led you to sufficient competency, no
thanks, I don’t have time to take that risk.
~~~
woat
If the self-taught candidate can pass an interview screen at the same level of
a new grad, then how does hiring the former become more riskier than the
latter?
~~~
mlthoughts2018
Passing trivia interview screens is useless, can’t tell you anything useful.
You have to dig recursively into technical details about past experience or
projects, and for university new grads this would be their education work.
What will the self-taught candidate do at this point?
~~~
flukus
> What will the self-taught candidate do at this point?
Generally self taught people will have built something. I'd generally consider
that the definition of self taught and would not include people that have only
done self directed learning.
~~~
mlthoughts2018
That would be fine, but I think it’s weird that you’re trying to make the
phrase “self-taught” stretch to include also building something. I think it’s
far more common for people to believe taking a self-directed online course and
getting a certificate entitles them to equal consideration for a job as
someone who put in 4 years of a structured university program.
~~~
flukus
Maybe I'm out of touch with how it's used today, but self taught used to be
someone that built things, W3schools was the closest thing to online courses
years ago. If so I'd argue the modern usage is wrong though, a self taught
mechanic is someone that tinkers with cars, a self taught electrician is
someone there own cables, a self taught sysadmin typically fell into the role
by doing stuff, a self taught investor has invested money. So I see know
reason why a self taught developer shouldn't be someone that's built software.
------
pmiller2
This is great, but I was wondering if there is any similar, more text-based
alternative? Videos are great, but I prefer text.
~~~
icpmacdo
See jamestimmins post about
[https://teachyourselfcs.com](https://teachyourselfcs.com) it's a
recommendation of textbooks to follow for self learning CS
------
saboot
I really like this list, but believe it's wrongly titled. I'm a nuclear
engineer, who pretty much just writes modelling software all day. The software
architecture stuff is something I've never been taught and always felt would
be immensely valuable to learn. Some good resources for that on this list.
Also a request for any resources of scientists trying to get their head around
how to write good software, we're all pretty much people who once read a C++
tutorial and just went with it.
~~~
devmacrile
That is basically the mission statement of Software Carpentry
([https://software-carpentry.org/](https://software-carpentry.org/)). They
have a _ton_ of great material for those in scientific computing wanting to
improve their software engineering skills.
~~~
saboot
I've looked into software carpentry, I'm glad it's there but learning how to
commit and 'intro to <python/R/unix>' is about five years behind what I need.
Most scientists can read intro tutorials themselves. I'll keep looking around
on their website though, thanks for sharing.
------
quaquaqua1
I am entirely self taught. I have a degree in History but didn't do any
programming in college courses.
Everything I learned I learned from a non-structured source.
I talked my way into my first technical job, then talked my way into my next,
and so on. Many people denied me during coding test or on resume screens.
But for the few employers who didn't, I thank them for taking a chance on me
and it seems they're keeping me around because I deliver valuable code to end-
users.
~~~
mjfisher
Did anyone tell you why you failed the coding test stages? I'm putting
together a best practice checklist for coding tests, and I wondered if you'd
noticed any common themes.
~~~
quaquaqua1
It's probably not very helpful but certain problems are just too hard for me
or I've never seen them before :) I don't have a deep background in data
structures and algorithms, so most of the jobs I get are more like for very
small companies that just want a guy to stand a bunch of libraries on top of
each other and make a cool crud app with a "modern" interface.
It's a very different experience from an org with 100 or more engineers. Good
luck on your project!
------
swiley
I'm not sure this is meaningful as a path to employment in the US if you don't
actually get a degree at the end.
I've gotten calls from at least five recruiters this week alone all excited to
have _finally_ found someone who's at least done some C only to realize that I
haven't finished the community service hours for my degree (I've done all the
classes but the university won't officially confer the degree until I've
finished this, that's made my summer pretty complicated which has actually
made it a lot harder than it needs to be, thankfully I'll be done in a couple
weeks.)
What you actually know only matters once you're hired (at least for your first
couple jobs.)
But it is always good to be learning new things and if that's why you're doing
this than good! I've been teaching myself violin and I can definitely
appreciate classical music more because of it, I absolutely don't expect it to
get me a job.
------
neogodless
I see some comments here along the lines of "Is this a good way to get
educated in computer science?" or "Is this a good path into a career?" or
"What are some good alternatives?"
Maybe the problem is that it's pretty hard to gauge how good education of any
kind is. We have countries all over the globe doing things a bit differently,
and we have public and private schools with different methodologies. But,
while I personally don't have the answers, and obviously our governments
probably aren't sure either, clearly there is work being done in figuring out
what works and what doesn't.
What are some good resources for identifying the best forms of education?
Are there any resources for identifying the best way(s) to learn computer
science, or entry-level computer programming, or foundational software
engineering?
------
unnouinceput
Browsing throughout those courses I found out that more then 50% of them
require you to either sign in with FB or Google in order to access them, so no
thank you. Remember, if something is free then you're the product.
~~~
user_50123890
it doesn't always have to be nefarious.
By having a FB/Google sign in a website won't have to deal with implementing
login, registration, email verification, forgotten passwords, etc.
Oh and even better; if they get hacked then all the hackers will be left with
are hashed FB/Google IDs.
------
groundCode
> assumes the student has already taken high school math and physics,
> including algebra, geometry, and pre-calculus
Does anyone have good resources for someone who would like to brush up on
these subjects?
~~~
lolinder
The best source I've found for reviewing these is Khan Academy. Their courses
are more thorough and accurate than most high schools teach them, and they
have all subjects you list.
------
rc-1140
While it isn't directly related to the topic of the thread, is the Imposter's
Handbook a suitable purchase for someone who didn't major in CS in college to
"catch up"? I had two intro to CS courses during my undergrad and took several
night courses while employed at my first job and did get a tech-facing career,
but once I got that job I haven't had the energy to go back and tackle things
like Data Structures and the maths I have to take all with the pressure of a
grade.
~~~
hnruss
I went back to college after having worked as a developer for a few years,
which helped me focus on what mattered. That book looks like a good overview
of many important CS topics.
I recommend the following topics (in roughly this order):
\- Data structures
\- Sorting algorithms
\- Search algorithms
\- Algorithmic complexity analysis (Big O) - _Important_
\- Databases
And these topics that aren't in the book:
\- Set theory
\- Networking
\- Security
\- Encryption (learn what to do and what not to do)
My take on the rest of the book:
\- The history of computing is interesting but not necessary to learn (plus
there's a lot more than what's in that book)
\- Software design patterns and principles are nice to know, but they're only
useful when you're in a position to design the software (not likely for an
entry-level job)
\- Study functional programming before trying to learn lambda calculus, unless
you like abstract math (guessing you don't)
\- Learning how compilers work is not necessary unless you're working on a
compiler or writing much low-level code (sounds like you're not)
\- Testing is good to know, but it's not really that hard to figure out how to
do
\- Unix basics can be useful, depends on your situation
------
w8rbt
You could also get a free Udacity account and watch the Georgia Tech CS Master
classes (OMSCS). Algorithms, Machine Learning, Operating Systems, etc. It's a
good program.
------
dang
A thread from 2017:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16035839](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16035839)
------
ilaksh
Personally I think this is great but I would spend less time on certain things
and more time on others.
I think what people who are trying to train themselves for programming jobs
need most is topics in software engineering. And in particular I have my own
view of the most important parts of software engineering.
So I would put more emphasis on modern tooling, practical requirements
analysis, hammer home the importance of iteration and closed feedback loops
such as end-to-end testing and observing/interacting with users. Emphasize
iterative requirements analysis and verification -- it's very easy to get on
to the wrong path early on in a project and waste a lot of time. And for most
projects the programmer is the person who is best equipped to really
understand and steer requirements and this means they need to be assertive
which is quite a challenging aspect that requires practice.
Also modules and components can be critical so they need to get beyond objects
or functions to that level. And also they need to understand and have
experience with package managers and registries. These are examples where
things have changed over the years. In the past it might have been more
important to, for example, have experience with assembly language, or
something. But these days, for building new software or integrating existing,
selecting and combining components is critical to leverage the massive amount
of available code and systems and avoid reinventing the wheel. People
disparage that as "glue" or "plumbing" etc. but it is a high-level skill that
needs to be developed and I think in most cases a much more advanced approach
than building everything from scratch. Also it takes practice to know which
parts should be components and which parts should be custom.
------
Havoc
I’m glade that this exists and it looked interesting for me at first glance
but it’s just too detailed. Wouldn’t mind brushing up my theory but learning
about CMOS isn’t what I had in mind
I guess I’m not the target audience, which is fine
------
aronhegedus
This reminds me of
[https://functionalcs.github.io/curriculum/#linear-
algebra](https://functionalcs.github.io/curriculum/#linear-algebra)
------
dlphn___xyz
why doesnt this exist for any other field? you never hear of a DIY
mathematician or economist...further proves that tech is a trade not a
profession
~~~
KoftaBob
All it means is that the software engineering sector is more open to
applicants with varying backgrounds. This shouldn't come as a surprise, given
how relatively young and innovative the tech industry is.
There's nothing stopping someone from getting textbooks and learning the
fundamentals to be a mathematician or economist, what stops that from getting
them a job is the industry not being open to that.
The differentiator between "trade" and "profession" has traditionally been
physical work vs intellectual work, not how tightly controlled the training
is. For someone to describe something as complex as machine learning or
building Netflix's backend as "a trade not a profession" is just absolutely
absurd.
~~~
hogFeast
It also depends on the culture of teaching. In econ and, to a certain extent,
in comp sci the stuff occurring within universities is very different from
what students of those subjects do when they leave.
And, imo, this is actually due to the popularity of the underlying subject.
Both econ and comp sci are popular because of what you can do when you _leave_
uni but this means more funding for those _inside_ uni. This funding seems to
go into producing more arcane research and increasing the complexity of the
subject (not knowledge, just complexity).
Mathematics doesn't do this. The practical and the abstract are clearly
demarcated. If you are studying to go onto research, there are usually
specific courses. If you just need to know calc, there are different ones.
It isn't healthy when this distinction isn't clear. Economics has suffered
massively from being very abstract. Comp sci is probably going the same way.
And I think in both cases more effort needs to go into making the knowledge
more accessible.
------
codesushi42
Does anyone have a similar resource for applied math?
I am looking for something that goes beyond the standard calculus, linear
algebra and stats material. For example, optimization, numerical analysis,
stochastic processes, dynamical systems etc.
~~~
proverbialbunny
The first thing that came to mind (maybe due to mentioning stochastic) is
MITx's [https://micromasters.mit.edu/ds/](https://micromasters.mit.edu/ds/)
Masters in Data Science. It's statistics, but 102. (Of the alternative MIT
6.0002, which is MIT's intro to DS stat class.)
I take it you've done Discrete Mathematics and have enjoyed it? If you
haven't, I highly recommend going that direction first, as imho it is the most
beneficial math class a programmer can take in college.
~~~
codesushi42
Yes, I did Discrete Math long ago and enjoyed it.
Thanks for the link! Though it looks too basic for me, I was hoping for
something on the more advanced topics I mentioned.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Every Unicode character shown once per frame as a 33-minute movie - DanielKehoe
http://netpoetic.com/2011/04/unicode/
======
coderdude
I'm surprised that I was able to perceive individual characters. At the
beginning when the movie is displaying the alphabet it seems like I can see
each letter. Is this really one character per frame (assuming playback at 24
frames per second)?
_Edit:_
49,571 (characters) divided by 25 (frames per second) comes out to 1,982.84.
1,982.84 seconds is 33.03 minutes. Taking into account the padding at the
beginning and end of the video reveals that the video displays 1 character per
frame at 25 frames per second.
~~~
jerf
Some people adapt this into a system they claim helps speed read [1], and
while I don't particularly believe the speed reading claims it is true that
you can actually read quite quickly with words flashing at fairly high rates.
There are various sites online that can help you play with this, but I can't
get any of them to work on the machine I'm posting this on (no Java,
zapreader.com doesn't work for unknown reasons).
[1]:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_Serial_Visual_Presentatio...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_Serial_Visual_Presentation)
~~~
sliverstorm
I could buy the speed reading claims, perhaps at _slightly_ slower rates. One
of the cool things about language and our brains is you can miss letters and
get order mixed up, and instantly guess what was meant with a very high rate
of success.
Emxalpe: I persmue you sitll udnr snatd tis?
~~~
Rondrak
sliverstorm, I don't want to take this too far off topic, but what are the
rates you're hearing of that you have trouble believing? I read at a little
over 1,300 words per minute (and I keep getting faster). As to comprehension,
without taking a test it's hard to say, but by reading a section of material
for a few minutes, writing down everything I can remember without looking at
the book, then re-reading to see what I've missed, I seem to get roughly 80%
comprehension, which I find acceptable for most things (and it keeps getting
better through practice).
Disclaimer: That's depending on the material, I read at about half that rate
(around 600 wpm) if it's extremely technical or dense, or a good deal faster
in anything at or below a high school reading level.
~~~
sliverstorm
What I have trouble believing is that anyone could, using Rapid Serial Visual
Presentation (which was the subject of the comment I replied to) process
characters (or words) that flash on the screen as fast as (or faster than)
25fps.
Problem with serial presentation is of course, you cannot skip words or
process words in parallel. I suspect when you attain 1,300wpm, you are
focusing your eyes on half a page or perhaps the entire page, and only
skimming sentences and absorbing key words and ideas, rather than processing
each word one at a time.
~~~
Rondrak
Ah, my apologies for misunderstanding your comment. That's what I get for
attempting rational thought at one in the morning.
Before I learned to speed read the way I currently do, I tried learning using
RSVP. In my personal experience I didn't find it very helpful, and my
comprehension rates (when using RSVP) plummeted. I'm in complete agreement
there.
As to my 1,300wpm, you're partially correct. 1,200wpm is just about the limit
at which I can read word by word, line by line in a book, using my hand as a
pacer. After 1,200, I stop dropping conjunctions, pronouns, and prepositions,
and anything that can be inferred through context or isn't necessary to the
meaning of the sentence (e.g. - absorbing key words and ideas, but still more
precise than 1/2 a page at a time).
Here's the book I learned from so you can judge the merits based upon
something better than my attempted explanation:
[http://www.amazon.com/Breakthrough-Rapid-Reading-Peter-
Kump/...](http://www.amazon.com/Breakthrough-Rapid-Reading-Peter-
Kump/dp/073520019X?tag=duckduckgo-d-20)
------
pavel_lishin
"Oh, neat, I found where the Asian characters begin!"
And then they never ended.
~~~
fedd
i personally think it's not very correct to call hieroglyphs characters and
assign each of them a code.
i may be wrong but i think that there is an growing number of hieroglyphs as
there is an infinite (growing) number of words; and every h. consists of more
primitive parts - i think they should be coded so that the sequence of
primitives would form a hieroglyph like in european languages letters form
words
~~~
qq66
That's an interesting idea, but there seems like there would be a tremendous
amount of complexity in encoding how the various strokes or components fit
together. In English, there are twenty-six letters that fit together in one
linear order, delimited by spaces and a few punctuation marks. How would you
write that "down-and-to-the-left diagonal stroke meets unfilled square
somewhat above the midpoint of that square's right-hand side?"
~~~
Umofomia
The granularity doesn't necessarily need to get down to the stroke level. In
fact, if you start playing the video at around the 6 minute mark, you'll see
that many of the characters are composed of the same elements, known as
radicals (see: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_(Chinese_character)> ).
Unicode does have the concept of "combining characters" in which a string of
characters is used to compose one glyph (see:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combining_character> ), but currently they
generally are only used for adding diacritics. All Chinese characters in the
current Unicode standard are precomposed, but it's potentially not out of the
question to encode them as a composite of two or more sub-characters. The
downside to this is that each character would end up taking several more bytes
to encode, but one advantage is that novel characters could be created by
combining two or more existing characters, which currently cannot be done
without explicitly adding the novel character to the Unicode standard (see:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precomposed_character#Chinese_c...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precomposed_character#Chinese_characters)
).
The input methods that fedd mentions are just input methods, which translate
what the user inputs into encodings of precomposed characters. This is
different than having the encoding themselves represent the composition of the
characters.
~~~
calloc
This here explains why this has not been done:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2435708>
------
Vivtek
Fantastic!
What is the sound and how was it generated? It sounds like it might be narrow
samples of some voice.
~~~
kilovoltaire
It gets higher and higher pitched as the video goes on, so may have to do with
the unicode values. But too jumpy to just be that.
~~~
andos
You're probably right. Not all values have been assigned a glyph yet.
------
sp332
It's not _every_ Unicode character, just the ones in Helvetica.
------
fishtoaster
I'm curious how the audio was generated. It seems to be somewhat dependent on
the character being displayed, as evidenced by jumping between different types
of characters (basic letters vs japanese characters)
------
BasDirks
See also: <http://www.youtube.com/user/ffoitl#p/a/u/1/gGiENL4XrjE>
------
syncsynchalt
Only shows the Basic Multilingual Plane, when does the first sequel come out?
------
biot
I was really hoping to see things ordered by closeness of one character's
shape to another so that as it plays it looks like something organic growing
and moving around. I'll buy a beer for the person who creates that video.
------
stretchwithme
They say characters are the most important element of a story.
~~~
chrischen
They're the most important element to a movie, especially this one.
------
BasDirks
Strangely beautiful.
~~~
Rondrak
It is, isn't it? I found myself thinking, "I'll just watch for a minute to see
what this is", then getting lulled in until a distraction broke my reverie.
------
artfail
Where were you guys in 2009?
<http://vimeo.com/7489601>
------
charlesju
This video would be a lot cooler with some good background music.
------
fedd
u vee double u ex wye zed now we know the alphabet
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Dutch East India Co was richer than Apple, Google, Facebook combined (2017) - sytelus
https://dutchreview.com/culture/history/how-rich-was-the-dutch-east-india-company
======
em500
This is a non-sensical article, relying on some obfuscating math hidden behind
"Infl. Adjusted".
Inflation adjustments gets pretty fuzzy even in the same nation across a few
decades, let alone between different nations across centuries.
The article equates the 1637 peak valuation of 78 million guilders with
current day 7,900,000 million dollars (not the 79,000 million according to the
bad math in the article!). Now consider that the initial capital raised for
the company was 6.4 million guilders in 1602. That would be around 600 billion
USD. (I'm neglecting inflation between 1602 and 1637 here, that doesn't change
my point.) This was raised around 1800 families, with share varying from 50 to
85,000 guilders, which according to the implied inflation/currency conversion
is between 5 million and 8.6 billion USD. How credible is is this conversion
factor?
Consider as another reference that the nominal value increased 12 fold over 35
years. Todays elite PE/VC/incubators would probably scoff at such low
ambitions. (Though the East India Co was pretty profitable and paid handsome
dividends, so the returns are higher than capital gains.)
~~~
em500
As another reference point, an annual salary for low-to-medium skilled labour
in mid-17th century Holland was around 100 to 200 guilders, which would be
about 20 million USD according to the implied "Infl. Adjusted" conversion in
the article (upon which the entire premise of the article rests).
~~~
CydeWeys
It does make you wonder what the inflation-adjusted figures are purported to
mean even, given that they result in completely ridiculous results.
By contrast, an inflation calculator tells me that $100 one hundred years ago
is worth around $2,500 now (so 25X). And according to this article
[https://www.jstor.org/stable/1820827?seq=1#metadata_info_tab...](https://www.jstor.org/stable/1820827?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents)
, a pretty typical wage back then was $0.50 per hour. 25X that is $12.50,
which sounds about right as a typical median wage nowadays (perhaps a bit low;
there is a real increase in standard of living over this time period too). So
the inflation figures going back at least a hundred years do make sense. What
causes them to break down when you try to go back much farther, then? Are the
inflation figures simply wrong? Are there compounding errors that, over enough
time, make the result completely ridiculous?
~~~
notahacker
Inflation is usually measured as the change over time in the prices of a
"representative" basket of goods (and _which_ goods in which proportion is a
pretty subjective choice). Over time, the costs of particular goods diverge a
lot, especially with respect to wages, and how important those goods are to
the economy also varies a lot.
The purchasing power of a typical weekly wage in 1800 or 1637 looks very
different depending on whether you express it in terms of bread rolls, non-
leather settees or bluetooth speakers (all of which are constituent parts of
the modern UK CPI index)
~~~
CydeWeys
Excellent point. So it sounds like the basket of goods wasn't chosen
correctly, or not changed often enough to be representative across each time
line, or something? Because it simply cannot be a valid result that a typical
wage way back then (when standards of living were much lower) is worth
millions of dollars today.
------
flexie
It is impossible to compare wealth across centuries. Even really difficult
across decades.
The owners of the Dutch East India Company endured conditions poor Europeans
would find appalling today. I'd say the average welfare client lives a far
more powerful, peaceful, safe and comfortable life today.
And if by wealth we mean power or abilities, at the height of it's power,
whether we talk shipping, trading or ship production, the combined manpower of
the Dutch East India Company could't produce an output greater than that of a
tiny company today.
~~~
RosanaAnaDana
Can you dig into that more and explain _why_ it is so difficult to compare
wealth across centuries? It would seem to me that you would just find some
basic unit to divide against (a dozen eggs; a liter of milk; a sq kilometer of
land), and then scale?
Whats wrong with my presumption? I know there must be quite a bit wrong with
it, but I'm not familiar with economics whatsoever.
~~~
flexie
Because inflation doesn't take into account all the improvements that have
been made. A liter of milk or a dozen eggs may almost be the same in 1630 and
2019. A square kilometer of farm land is not, since the crop yield today far
exceeds that of 1630 (it has increased almost tenfold since 1930 due to
mechanization, fertilizers and new grain types). So the same piece of land
that could feed a family in 1930 now almost feeds 10 families. And, more
importantly, land has many more applications now than back then: Factories,
sky scrapers, airports, gardens, etc.
Take our homes. In the 1630s, homes had almost no insulation, no electricity,
no central heat, no air conditioning, no shower, actually no running water,
not even cold. The people who lived there inhaled smoke from the fireplace all
day. They had no toilets or sewers, no internet, no cable TV or radio or cell
phone connection. From evening until morning they sat in almost complete
darkness since candles or oil lamps or whatever they used were crazy
expensive. Houses weren't fire proof, barely water proof, wind proof or earth
quake safe.
What I describe was true for the richest too. The very richest king or
business owner in 1630 lived in a home, which fits my description. How do you
even begin to compare his wealth to your wealth? 1,000 servants still couldn't
bring him a tiny fraction of the comfort we enjoy. The very richest king in
1630 was dead poor compared to you. And that's just the material part. People
were also exposed to crime in a way that we cannot even begin to imagine, and
which you wouldn't even find today in our poorest neighborhoods. And their
life would likely end decades before ours, and be a lot more painful. Even the
richest business owner would not be able to stop his headache with a pill the
way you or I can. Or tooth aches. Or fix a broken leg. A small wound could
kill him. Most would see a number of their children die, maybe also wife in
child birth.
Inflation numbers capture none of this.
~~~
cr0sh
> The very richest king in 1630 was dead poor compared to you.
I guess it depends on how and what you compare things.
All you say is arguably true. Yet I can guarantee that in one manner, those
people were as wealthy or potentially wealthier than most of the ultra-wealthy
of today:
Because they owned land.
If you look at the sheer square footage of their "houses" (palaces) - not
including the surrounding estate land - they tend to be very large and
grandiose sprawling things.
While the ultra-wealthy of today do own a lot of land (and in some cases,
perhaps more than the richest of kings back then) - the majority of people
have little to none (and of those that do, most don't have the mineral rights
to their land).
In that manner, there isn't much comparison. The question of whether or what
is the better trade-off can be quibbled over; after all, all the land in the
world back then couldn't transport one halfway across the world in hours - but
some today might see that tradeoff as fair, and others back then might have
traded all of their land in order to be able to stream youtube to a handheld
"magical" device.
But the ultra-wealthy of today are able to have virtually everything the
ultra-wealthy back then had (and in some cases, that even includes a "standing
army" more or less), plus all the extras normal people have access to today.
------
xeeeeeeeeeeenu
Dutch East India Company had its own colonies and army. Practically speaking,
it was a branch of the Dutch government, so comparing it to the contemporary
companies doesn't make much sense.
~~~
black-tea
Practically speaking some of today's big companies are branches of the
government too.
~~~
debaserab2
Name one?
~~~
jacquesm
Blackwater/Xe/Academi/whatever they will whitewash their name to next.
~~~
AndyMcConachie
Mercenary outfits are by definition not part of the government. That's what
makes them mercenaries.
------
caymanjim
The Mississippi Company was never really worth $6.5T in any meaningful sense.
Unlike Dutch East India, Mississippi was purely a speculative bubble. It only
hit that value for a few weeks at the end before the whole thing imploded.
~~~
dalbasal
South sea company too.
That said, you could make a similar case about apple. If you measure by
dividends, I think the VOC's lead over all those companies grows by a lot.
~~~
caymanjim
Apple's value isn't just dividends. They have literally hundreds of billions
in cash, about 25% of their market cap. They have vast other assets, both
material and otherwise (the brand alone is worth real money). Their revenue is
over $300B per year, and net profit is nearly $100B. And they post numbers
like this year after year. Apple's value is real and obvious, and given the
liquidity and sustained numbers, it's also correct. There's no bubble
component at all.
------
Razengan
These comparisons of wealth across different eras seem kind of stupid:
I, a barely-middle-class individual, can own and have access to things and
services that the richest nobility of 100 years ago wouldn't have been able to
even dream of.
Everybody can go to almost anywhere in the world within basically 24 hours,
whereas a century ago long-distance journeys were measured in weeks and
months. In a couple generations, hopefully, ordinary people may even be able
to take trips to the moon, and at least into orbit during this generation.
How do you account for that in these kinds of comparisons?
~~~
Hatamatarat
Everybody can go to almost anywhere in the world within basically 24 hours? I
will have to disagree with that. I'm a citizen of a certain "developing"
country and I can't get a tourist visa to more than half of the world, and
100% of Western countries.
~~~
Razengan
Yes, I meant technically, not politically. In the latter, there is less
freedom now than there used to be, but there are more means now than there
were, to escape the bracket one was born into.
~~~
Hatamatarat
Means to escape from bracket of being born in some no-name Belgium city to
California, sure. Means of escaping from a savage country no one even knows
the name of? Haha, no.
Most people that escape from worst countries don't escape on the basis of
merit, but luck.
~~~
Razengan
or money/connections/asylum?
~~~
Hatamatarat
Those count as luck, as I said.
------
occamschainsaw
I wonder how the British East India Company compared to its Dutch equivalent.
I am too tired to write a comprehensive post right now, but with the Opium
Wars and the monopoly on the Indian Subcontinent, I think the British EIC
would be more powerful (and wealthier) than the Dutch EIC. Here are some
(probably low quality) sources [0], [1]. Will write a better comment tomorrow
after work.
[0] [https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-the-
Dut...](https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-the-Dutch-East-
India-Company-and-the-British-East-India-Company-Why-the-similar-names-Which-
one-was-bigger) [1] [https://indonesiaexpat.biz/travel/history-
culture/colonies-d...](https://indonesiaexpat.biz/travel/history-
culture/colonies-dutch-east-indies-vs-british-india/)
~~~
chewz
You are comparing apples to oranges ie. VOC at XVII/XVII century to British
EIC at end of XVIII/XIX century.
Dutch had been able/lucky to grab/monopolize the most profitable trading route
and hold to it. But at some point spice trade lost its appeal.
British had been unable to muscle into Dutch controlled trade (they have
invented 'free trade' to justify their attempts).
But in their 2nd best trading posts in India British EIC had to built up
military (because Indian and French presented tough military opposition) and
find creative ways to finance its presence there (textiles, opium). As a
results after 200 years British EIC became a force to recon with while Dutch
VOC had been in decline.
------
SRTP
>The VOC’s stocks pushed the company’s worth to a massive 78 million Dutch
guilders, which is a pretty solid business even today, but translates to a
whopping $7,9 trillion dollar worth today… Yes, really, trillion. That’s 7,900
billion – or 79,000 million!
The math doesn't seem right.
------
ignoramous
VOC (Dutch East India Company) was more powerful than most nations at the
time. I asked this question on Quora once and got interesting answers [0]. VOC
was an incredible enterprise, and there are a few today too, imo, they exist
as conglomerates (Samsung, P&G, Amazon), political entities (CIA, CPC),
monopolies (Maersk, Google), syndicates (DeBeers [1], NeoAristocrats [2],
BigPharma, BigBank, BigSugar, BigOil), and cults (ISIS). These select few have
an immeasurable and uncontrolled sway over the globe-- its environment [3],
its inhabitants [4], its future [5], its past [6], its present [7].
The greed unrelenting [8], the game rigged [9][10].
\--
[0] [https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-companies-that-are-
power...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-companies-that-are-powerful-
than-most-nations-in-the-world)
[1] [http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-
you...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-you-ever-
tried-to-sell-a-diamond/304575/)
[2] [https://youtu.be/d_zt3kGW1NM](https://youtu.be/d_zt3kGW1NM)
[3] [https://theintercept.com/2015/08/11/dupont-chemistry-
decepti...](https://theintercept.com/2015/08/11/dupont-chemistry-deception/)
[4]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosure...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_\(2013%E2%80%93present\))
[5]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16208421](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16208421)
[6]
[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ICN066A](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ICN066A)
[7] [http://money.com/money/3994949/wikipedia-paid-
editors/](http://money.com/money/3994949/wikipedia-paid-editors/)
[8] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil-
storage_trade](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil-storage_trade)
[9]
[https://www.amazon.com/dp/1593764278](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1593764278)
[10]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Papers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Papers)
edit: links
~~~
coldtea
> _VOC was an incredible enterprise_
It's easy to be incredible on the backs and dead bodies of slaves...
~~~
jacquesm
This should not be downvoted, it is historically accurate, the VOC imported
10's of thousands of slaves to do work that they were not prepared to pay for.
It's a nice example of there being a huge crime at the foundation of huge
riches, the VOC was definitely not a clean company by any stretch of the
imagination and to this day the names of those who were responsible for the
worst atrocities are proudly on display in the streets of various Dutch
cities. Nothing to be proud of.
~~~
speleding
Slaves were merchandise for the VOC but they did not import many slaves to do
work [1]. They typically (ab)used the local population to do that. Still
nothing to be proud of, but it is a different story than slaves that were
brought to the Americas to work on plantations. Exploitation of the local
people would certainly be unethical by today's standards, it wasn't unethical
back then and it also wasn't a crime (although you probably meant the word
"crime" figuratively).
[1]> the Dutch had only a relatively insignificant share in the Atlantic slave
trade—never averaging much more than 5–6 per cent of the total.
[https://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/545](https://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/545)
~~~
cromulent
It's an interesting discussion. Liverpool was a huge trading port and a
powerful city for a long time, mostly built from the slave trade. No local
slaves, but plenty of people who became rich from slavery.
"Overall, Liverpool ships transported half of the 3 million Africans carried
across the Atlantic by British slavers."
[http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/ism/slavery/europe/liverp...](http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/ism/slavery/europe/liverpool.aspx)
------
inglor
Also mentioned: The south sea company was basically a huge banking bubble
scam. It is quite an interesting tale:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1kndKWJKB8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1kndKWJKB8)
~~~
arcticbull
Hello? Bitcoin? Is that you? Nah just a ghost of poor banking decisions past.
Spooky.
~~~
fsloth
I think Bitcoin resembles the Mississippi company a bit more.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi_Company](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi_Company)
TLDR: Scottish gambler becomes the most influential financial state official
in France and uses his power to create an impossible financial scheme, makes
everyone crazy for stocks for a colony that is mostly composed of colonists
dying of hardship, resulting in an implosion of French Economy. Scottish, oh
how they've been around. This is a funny sidenote to one of the founding
fathers of US, Alexander Hamilton, who was as well of scottish heritage but
created a financial system that did not implode.
~~~
VintageCool
Scotland agreed to merger with England in 1707 after the country was
financially ruined by another crazy scheme in the Americas. They had tried to
create a colony in Panama, in an area which is "virtually uninhabited" today.
------
amriksohata
Even if the inflation figures arent 100% accurate, there is no doubt this was
the reason behind the British calling India the "jewel" in the crown, so many
countries looted India, including the Portuguese, Dutch and British. They had
spices and cotton, the modern day "oil" now that there is nothing more to be
gained from India they have moved onto the middle east, then onto the services
sector blah blah wherever the next area that can be exploited with greed.
------
sasasassy
I didn't check the math but it doesn't surprise me. These guilds were quite
often in the business of war making and colonisation, selling ads seem paltry
in comparison.
~~~
jobigoud
I don't know, today they can sell ads targetting the more than 4 billion
people that are on Internet. Back then the _total_ population was half a
billion and most weren't potential targets for any market.
------
boramalper
> For while Smith might be publicly lauded by those who put their faith in
> private capitalist enterprise, and who decry the state as the chief threat
> to liberty and prosperity, the real Adam Smith painted a rather different
> picture. According to Smith, the most pressing dangers came not from the
> state acting alone, but the state when captured by merchant elites.
> The context of Smith’s intervention in The Wealth of Nations was what he
> called ‘the mercantile system’. By this Smith meant the network of
> monopolies that characterised the economic affairs of early modern Europe.
> Under such arrangements, private companies lobbied governments for the right
> to operate exclusive trade routes, or to be the only importers or exporters
> of goods, while closed guilds controlled the flow of products and employment
> within domestic markets.
The real Adam Smith: [https://aeon.co/essays/we-should-look-closely-at-what-
adam-s...](https://aeon.co/essays/we-should-look-closely-at-what-adam-smith-
actually-believed)
Still as relevant today I believe.
------
san_dimitri
I don’t think it’s a valid comparison. Comparing a company which had an army
and used force to occupy and obtain its wealth is not how corporates work
today. Today there is deceptive advertising and marketing which are not the
same as army and force.
~~~
apexalpha
Saudi-Aramco might be something that comes very close to the VOC: a for-profit
company protected by armed forces, arguably for hire.
------
Leary
And Adam and Eve were together richer than the USA.
~~~
Erlich_Bachman
What do you even mean? It sounds like a witty metaphor for something, but even
for what?
DEIco is a real historical enterprise with well-documented operations.
~~~
Illniyar
I assume he meant to decry the use of inflation adjusting and similar
shenanigans to be able to compare two groups in vastly different ages. It is
similar to saying that a peasant in today's world eats/lives better then a
king a thousand years ago.
For instance if you use percentage of world wealth as ameasure, then Adam
controlled 50% of the world's wealth, arguably the richest person to ever live
(or mythologically live at least).
~~~
ionised
I doubt a peasant today eats as well as a King of even 1000 years ago.
Lives better, maybe. Eats better? Hell no.
~~~
D_Alex
I am not sure who would eat better... consider:
\- the variety of foods available today is far greater, especially in winter
\- Spices available 1000 years ago were quite limited, today any supermarket
will have 100 varieties from all around the world for like $2/satchel \-
refrigeration allows safe storage of food \- Things like ice cream, chocolate,
popcorn etc etc just did not exist.
So I think a "peasant" today CAN eat tastier and healthier food than kings of
1000 years ago... whether or not they choose to is another matter.
------
algaeontoast
I think the closest modern day equivalent to the Dutch East India Co, at least
in regards to their financial and strategic ties to a nation state, is the
relation of Emaar (a state owned and funded global property developer) and the
UAE (which in current times is basically Saudi Arabia).
For reference Emaar was the company that built the Burj Khalifa (formerly the
Burj Dubai before funding ran out), Dubai Mall, Skii Dubai etc...
------
dalbasal
The history of these companies (also the British east India company, and the
various British and French companies of the Americas) is a _massive_ part of
modern history, and how the world got to where we are.
They were richer than monarchies, had armies, controlled massive colonies,
founded cities, printed money, made international trade deals/wars. They ran
circles around the older form of monarchy-run-empires like the Portuguese and
Spanish. Late European colonial empires inherited _their_ empires.
When Marx wrote about international capitalism (eg capitalism as a "fourth
estate") in the 1840s, this is what he was referring to.
------
anuraj
And to think that this great company was defeated once and for all at the
Battle of Colachel by Travancore King Marthanda Varma and faded away soon
after :)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Colachel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Colachel)
------
jpttsn
Were the pyramids also taller than the Burj Khalifa? That stretches the
definition of “tall” dangerously thin.
------
pier25
So where did all that money go? To the British crown?
------
brettonwoods111
how can you compare money from befor bretton woods and after, though?
------
lota-putty
"Modern-day Companies Don’t Even Compare! (And That’s a Good Thing!)" Nope,
it's not a good thing; but a step in right direction.
------
jayalpha
Are Apple Google and Facebook so rich? And how do you measure it? (Have not
read the link).
t the time of his death in 1937, John D. Rockefeller was worth an estimated
$1.4 billion. Rockefeller was the first man in history to ever accumulate more
than $1 billion (nominal dollars) in total wealth.
Rockefeller's $1.4 billion net worth in 1937 was 1/65th of the total GDP of
the United States. In 2011, the total GDP of the United States was $15.09
trillion. If somebody currently had 1/65th of the total GDP of the United
States, they would have a fortune of over $232 billion.
It's also important to note that Rockefeller gave away over $500 million
(nominal dollars) over his lifetime, which helped to significantly shrink his
net worth.
~~~
zeropnc
> 232 billion
I mean, there's a guy coming pretty close to that right now.
~~~
melling
He just lost 25% of his money.
~~~
_Codemonkeyism
How was it "his" money?
~~~
_Codemonkeyism
To explain: My wife founded a startup and owns it. But we both worked really
hard in the beginning, and I've lost quite some income as an opportunity. So
the value of Amazon if this is the same rightfully to some part belongs to his
wife and that part not "his" to lose.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Heim – A real-time community platform - tvvocold
https://github.com/euphoria-io/heim
======
renke1
I kind of like the idea of threaded chatting. Is there any other chat program
that uses this idea?
~~~
PopeOfNope
It has the same problem every other threaded system has: notification of
updates. How do you know what's changed and what hasn't? At least with linear
chat you can draw a line on the screen and everything below it is new.
Slashdot wasn't bad in that it greyed out everything you'd already seen and
only show you the new messages, but even then you had to scroll all the way up
and down the page to see what's new. If you could tag threads to follow...
WOAH. I just found the hidden side pane that organizes all conversations by
date, the most recent changes at the top. You click on it and it shows you the
whole thread. Then you click on 'new pane' and it opens just that thread in a
new window!!
Well done, gentlemen. Well done.
~~~
chromakode
Designer/frontend dev here -- thank you! Helping users understand what is
going on in the tree has been a core challenge. However, exposing too much
right away is very overwhelming, especially to people who are unaccustomed
similar chat interfaces. I've been learning a lot about how to get the UX for
this right from user feedback, but there's much more to explore. If you are
interested in chatting about this problem, feel free to ping me in &heim. :)
One amusing anecdote. We very recently rolled out two bits of functionality:
auto-collapsing long threads, and defaulting to replying to your own thread
you started. Many of the people who jumped in and started spamming today
didn't realize they were confined to their own collapsed threads. :)
------
willpearse
I get a message saying it's not ready for Hacker News yet, so I can't even see
what's going on :-(
~~~
willpearse
...not anymore. Thanks!
------
Gracana
I've been a user on the site for a few months now. There's a lot you can
imagine would be difficult with threaded chat, but in practice it works pretty
well, to the point that I generally miss having the ability to reply to a
specific message on other chat platforms.
~~~
fit2rule
Seems interesting - is the site invite-only for now? Care to invite your ol'
pal fit2rule from HN? :)
~~~
Gracana
Some of the rooms are private, but you're welcome to check out
[https://euphoria.io/room/heim/](https://euphoria.io/room/heim/) (the dev
chat) and
[https://euphoria.io/room/welcome/](https://euphoria.io/room/welcome/) (where
most newcomers end up.) There's also an xkcd chat, which was very active for a
while, but I'm not sure what it's like now.
------
delqn
This is like IRC and FB posts fused together. I love it. In traditional IRC
you have many topics intertwined - very distracting / waste of time if you
only care about a single topic and don't have time to sift through everything
typed. Slack very much suffers from that same problem - you care about
something important - and there's all that noise.
With the introduction of threaded conversations you could collapse and ignore
threads you don't care about and drill into the details of the things you
want/need.
Love it! Congrats Max and team!
------
jbi
I like that you can host it yourself. I'ld like to guide my company away from
email+phone but it is a long way to go. And in Europe there are still a lot of
concerns if you can't host something in your own environment.
I don't see any FOSS / paid modern solutions similar to slack, flowdock,
scrollback, .. ready to be hosted in your environment. HipChat seems to be the
only solution with a standalone server available. There are some open source
competitors but they are far from production-ready. Am I missing something?
~~~
ValentineC
Have you checked out Let's Chat? [http://sdelements.github.io/lets-
chat/](http://sdelements.github.io/lets-chat/)
------
corn13read
[https://euphoria.io/room/dev/](https://euphoria.io/room/dev/)
------
planetix
Looks like the IRC on my other monitor..
~~~
andygmb
There's a trend of seemingly reinventing IRC and just putting it into the
browser with a "hip" UI as of late.
~~~
mbrock
By "reinventing IRC" you mean "making any kind of chat software"?
~~~
vezzy-fnord
Making any kind of chat software without compelling improvements over IRC.
Familiarity itself doesn't count.
~~~
unhammer
Threaded replies does seem nice to have, but not nice enough that I'd be
willing to give up on the other features of IRC.
One thing that'd be nice to have with IRC is if there were a cheap host
somewhere that easily let people run their own weechat instance; too many of
the people I talk with keep disconnecting because they don't have / can't be
bothered with having their own server with a bouncer. (There's stuff like
[http://blinkenshell.org/wiki/Start](http://blinkenshell.org/wiki/Start) but I
was thinking something that one can recommend to complete newbies.)
\-----
What else would be nice to have in IRC?
~~~
PopeOfNope
The interesting thing about IRC is that it can be modified to suit any
individual's taste. But, that takes time and expertise. That guarantees IRC
will stay within a niche audience of people technical enough to bend it to
their will. What I'm liking about these new chat systems is it has some of the
best features of IRC made available to all users with an interface they can
understand and use.
------
fiatjaf
I see a picture of a cat, a bad drawing of an orange and a not-handsome guy.
Only that.
------
DoubleMalt
But does it federate? (Honest question, did not see a documentation for that)
~~~
Arathorn
It should be trivial to federate it via Matrix.org if they felt the urge :)
~~~
jbi
How does Matrix compare to xmpp? I do not see a lot of differences (however,
xmpp is kind of mature)
------
sergiotapia
Looks like a more confusing version of IRC.
------
gamekathu
amazing stuff, pushing React to its limit! flat chats will never be the same
again!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How to Run a Business in 202 - NN88
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/30/style/millennial-entrepreneur-startups.html
======
LukeBMM
I'm not going to shame anyone for a simple typo, but I will admit that I was
genuinely hoping the link would be about how one would have run a business
1818 years ago.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Philip Greenspun Reviews “Lean In” - soundsop
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2013/05/12/lean-in/
======
therealarmen
Those who enjoy this review will also enjoy Philip's review [1] of "Straight
from the Gut" by Jack Welch (former CEO of GE):
_If you want to learn the names of every person who ever worked at GE during
Jack Welch's 40 years there, you'll find this book invaluable. If you want to
learn something about what made GE successful, however, good luck picking out
the few saplings of wisdom from the thick forest of names. Golf and tennis
fans will also find the book fascinating for its endless catalog of golf and
tennis resorts nationwide. Apparently being anywhere near the top at GE
requires moving to Fairfield, Connecticut and aping the Lifestyles of the
Bland and WASPy.
One interesting thing I learned is that GE went from 0 percent employee
ownership to 31 percent during Jack Welch's tenure as CEO, primarily through
granting of stock options to top managers such as Jack himself. Jack doesn't
talk about this except to say that he's proud of the number. He doesn't get
into the question of whether the investors from 1980 are happy now that they
own less than 70 percent of the company. Nor does he talk about what would
have happened to GE's earnings if they'd accounted for all of these stock
options at time of issue.
The useful and interesting content in this book could have been presented in
75 pages if the editors and ghostwriter had been doing their jobs. But they
weren't doing their jobs. So the readers all have to "give 110 percent" or
"give 1000 percent". Maybe this is what Jack Welch wanted because he uses
these expressions numerous times throughout Straight from the Gut._
[1] <http://www.amazon.com/Jack-Straight-Gut-Welch/dp/0446690686>
~~~
sinnerswing
His reviews would've been a lot funnier if Arsdigita didn't crash and burn
years ago.
>He doesn't get into the question of whether the investors from 1980 are happy
now that they own less than 70 percent of the company.
They should be happy considering GE's value rose 4000% during Jack Welch's
tenure at GE.[1]
When Jack Welch became General Electric’s CEO in 1981, the company was worth
about $14 billion. When he retired 20 years later, GE was worth nearly $500
billion.[2]
[1]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Welch>
[2][http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/jack-welch-
and-...](http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/jack-welch-and-the-lone-
ranger-theory/)
~~~
jseliger
_His reviews would've been a lot funnier if Arsdigita didn't crash and burn
years ago._
On the other hand, it's famously uncertain as to whether that's his fault:
<http://waxy.org/random/arsdigita/> . I haven't seen a compelling rebuttal of
this narrative.
~~~
sinnerswing
It's his company, he was the CEO. It's his fault.
~~~
rdl
It's not the CEO's fault if he gets fired/forced out and then the bad stuff
happens, though.
------
temphn
This is utterly devastating and long overdue. Sandberg makes $845 million in a
year (at a company she didn't found), lives a charmed life, and is promoted
aggressively by men...yet has managed to convince herself that the world
is/was biased against women.
But even Greenspan is prevented by polite convention from making the obvious
point: women and men have different chromosomal structures, lifespans, organs,
and hormone levels. There's also substantial evidence[1,2] that they differ in
average levels of spatial, verbal, and mathematical reasoning ability (with
women generally having an advantage in verbal and men in
visuospatial/mathematical). We should not expect them to have the same
outcomes on average.
Women also can only have at most 10-20 children over their lifespan, whereas
men like Genghis Khan[3] can have a virtually unbounded number. This is why
males have a greater evolutionary payoff for high-risk, high-reward behavior:
intrinsically higher reproductive variance.
But hey. That's evolution, and even though it provides a consilient
explanation for a variety of allied phenomena, everyone knows that doesn't and
couldn't apply to human beings (we all well know what happens to people who
propose that a behavior has _genetic_ influences). It is instead easier to
pretend that humans aren't biological creatures with hard biological
constraints.
Yet if your premises are wrong, one is simply practicing fashionable
creationism. And that is where we are today, presented with the spectacle of a
privileged billionairess who lashes out at phantasms rather than wrestling
with the realities of molecular biology. Why not lean in to a publication on
behavioral neuroendocrinology, for a change?
[1]: <http://www2.nau.edu/~bio372-c/class/behavior/sexdif1.htm>
[2]: [http://www.amazon.com/Female-Brain-Louann-
Brizendine/dp/0767...](http://www.amazon.com/Female-Brain-Louann-
Brizendine/dp/0767920104)
[3]:
[http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/02/0214_030214_...](http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/02/0214_030214_genghis.html)
[4]: [http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-how-and-why-sex-
diff...](http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-how-and-why-sex-
differences/201101/which-sex-is-playing-higher-stakes-reproductive-game)
~~~
jackowayed
The reason that people are berated for suggesting inherent differences is that
there's so much more to the story. Almost nothing derives purely from genes;
it's a complex interaction of genes, epigenetics (environmental and hereditary
factors other than genes that control which genes are active), and
socialization.
Males and females are treated extremely differently _from birth_. Literally,
in the very first day. Thus, it is nearly impossible to actually prove
scientifically that a significant difference comes from genetic and biological
factors. The socialization is a confounding factor that's impossible to
separate out unless you're willing to do a study where you raise kids in
isolation from society so you can treat them identically.
And even "inherent" differences are often easily overcome with social
solutions. There's research to suggest that the difference in spatial
reasoning is societal.[1] Furthermore, I believe I saw a study suggesting that
even in our society, if you put everyone through a proper course teaching them
spatial reasoning, the women catch up to the men. So society can choose to
eliminate "inherent" differences by devoting a few resources to something that
helps one group catch up to the other.
Furthermore, it ultimately doesn't matter that much. Western society has
decided that we want equality between men and women. If that's not happening,
then we've committed ourselves to make it happen. There are currently
differences between men and women, largely from socialization. Since our
society was largely built by men, it unsurprisingly is oriented toward having
successful men in it. That doesn't mean we throw up our hands and say, "well,
this is how our society is structured, and our society socializes men to win
in that structure. I guess equality is inherently impossible." No. We find
ways to reduce gender socialization (see: radical schools in Sweden). We find
ways to restructure society so that there are fewer barriers to some groups'
success.
1:
[http://lesswrong.com/lw/7fk/gender_differences_in_spatial_re...](http://lesswrong.com/lw/7fk/gender_differences_in_spatial_reasoning_appear_to/)
~~~
temphn
You don't link to actual molecular genetic research on behavior and sex
differences. I will. Let's do two quick examples.
[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/15/science/studying-recent-
hu...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/15/science/studying-recent-human-
evolution-at-the-genetic-level.html?_r=0)
Gaining a deep insight into human evolution, researchers
have identified a mutation in a critical human gene as the
source of several distinctive traits that make East Asians
different from other races.
The traits — thicker hair shafts, more sweat glands,
characteristically identified teeth and smaller breasts —
are the result of a gene mutation that occurred about
35,000 years ago, the researchers have concluded.
One pleiotropic mutation actually causes smaller breasts, among other things.
For added visual impact, take a look at the EDAR transgenic mouse:
[http://mathildasanthropologyblog.files.wordpress.com/2008/10...](http://mathildasanthropologyblog.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/picture-2-741394.png)
Wow! Across _species_ , you can actually see that a single variant makes the
mouse hair look East Asian. It's so crazily reductionist, it looks like what a
troglodyte like Strom Thurmond might sketch if you had him draw an "Asian-
looking mouse". Here's another great one, Fruitless:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruitless_(gene)#Function>
Although many genes are known to be involved in male
courtship behavior, the fruitless gene has been considered
noteworthy because it exhibits sex-specific alternative
splicing. When females produce the male-spliced gene
product, they behave as males. Males that do not produce
the male-specific product do not court females and are
infertile.[1] ... The fruitless gene locus also controls
the expression of hundreds of other genes,[6] any subset of
which may actually regulate behavior.
We don't yet know the human analog of Fruitless, the master regulator of sex
differences. But if it exists, it's a good bet that it's on the Y or X
chromosomes.
Point: it's not all super-complex gene-environment interactionism that we'll
never understand[1]. Indeed, as Fruitless or the EDAR story show, the genetic
origins of complex gender differences and/or behavioral traits can be almost
cartoonishly reductionist, attributable to a single master upstream regulator!
So: do you really want to bet it all on black, bet that genetics researchers
aren't going to find governing loci for human gender differences and/or sexual
orientation, bet that it's 100% social construction? Because if you know
anything about where genomics is going, that is a bet you are going to lose.
[1] PS: I love it when people bring up _epistasis_ , for god's sake, as a sort
of catch-all neo-Lamarckianism, reached for like a drowning sailor flailing
for a life preserver. Methylome much? Didn't think so.
EDIT: You know what? Let's actually go line by line on this thing.
Males and females are treated extremely differently from
birth. Literally, in the very first day. Thus, it is nearly
impossible to actually prove scientifically that a
significant difference comes from genetic and biological
factors.
Science: doing the impossible since ten years ago. Behold, gene expression
analysis of innate male/female neurological differences _before birth_ , known
since 2003 (and well before):
[http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/10/031022062408.ht...](http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/10/031022062408.htm)
Using two genetic testing methods, they compared the
production of genes in male and female brains in embryonic
mice — long before the animals developed sex organs.
To their surprise, the researchers found 54 genes produced
in different amounts in male and female mouse brains, prior
to hormonal influence. Eighteen of the genes were produced
at higher levels in the male brains; 36 were produced at
higher levels in the female brains.
“We didn’t expect to find genetic differences between the
sexes’ brains,” Vilain said. “But we discovered that the
male and female brains differed in many measurable ways,
including anatomy and function.”
How about this little flail-for-a-life-preserver:
There's research to suggest that the difference in spatial
reasoning is societal.
Which in turn links to this paper:
[http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/08/19/1015182108.full...](http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/08/19/1015182108.full.pdf)
This is almost a caricature of academia. To come to the conclusion that gender
differences in spatial rotation ability are "culturally influenced"...they
analyze two tribes in Northeast India on a "spatial puzzle" that has never
been administered to anyone before (Figure 1). And in Table 1 the mean puzzle
solving time for men in the "matrilineal" society is still actually lower than
that for females, even though the medians point the other way.
Forget about the crimes against psychometry that such a test perpetrates. It
goes without saying that they did not compute test-retest reliabilities or do
a proper battery of spatial tests, let alone estimate IRT parameters for their
single idiosyncratic "spatial" item. And this innocence of all aspects of
item-response theory is confirmed by their supplementary information
(<http://goo.gl/ltysD>).
The more fundamental point is the lack of thinking. Not only does this study
cut against the grain of literally hundreds of other datasets, it is
intentionally designed to not be reproducible. Among other things, why else
would one use such an obscure population? And why not use the standard
Shepard/Metzler test, in which one is actually mentally rotating two objects
and seeing if they correspond? One can programmatically vary the rotation
parameter to increase the difficulty, and Shepard famously even observed that
reaction time varies linearly with rotation angle
([http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mental-imagery/mental-
rota...](http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mental-imagery/mental-
rotation.html)), as if people were actually rotating the objects slowly in
their heads.
Anyway. You know what is reproducible? Let's consult this handy meta-analysis
of 70 studies...
<http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10648-012-9215-x>
It shows a huge and _reproducible_ spatial rotation ability difference between
men and women. Don't believe me? Put up a web-based test with WebGL, pay
participants, and reproduce the result for yourself. But something tells me
that you may not really be interested in such studies. Instead:
Furthermore, it ultimately doesn't matter that much.
Western society has decided that we want equality between
men and women. If that's not happening, then we've
committed ourselves to make it happen.
Right. Comrade, here is where I bid you adieu. If men and women have
fundamental neurological differences, which all the evidence indicates that
they do, attempting to "close the gap" in mathematically & spatially
challenging software engineering is a Sisyphean task. It is as futile as
encouraging women to make it to the NBA and out-dunk the very best men. While
there will be a Lisa Leslie or Cheryl Miller, there won't be very many of
them, and that won't be the fault of men.
Because there can be no obligation to do _that which cannot be done_.
~~~
polymatter
I try to keep an open mind, but I am finding it difficult to get past your
tone. I find people as confident and dismissive as you appear to be, are the
crackpots who are not worth my time. You don't have anything in your HN
profile either. But you also went to the trouble to provide references, so I
am confused and want to learn more.
Are you seriously suggesting its a Sisyphean task to teach women maths or
business on the basis that - on average - these have historically been male
dominated careers? If not, can you please explain further. Are you aware that
50 years ago women faced massive discrimination and that this may still be
having a lag effect today? Have you heard of stereotype threat enough to
convince someone who believes in it?
You are being condescending and rude and seem to expect your audience to share
your conviction in a fringe view of genetic determinism. Nobody is disputing
men and women are genetically different. That this change extends to
neurological changes should hardly be surprising. Different machinery require
different control structures. The scientific debate is on exactly how
significant these differences are compared to other factors that have
significant influence including the culture. I don't think the parent was even
suggesting it was 100% cultural effect either. Whereas you seem to suggest its
100% genetic, which would preclude the possibility of any woman having better
spatial abilities than any man - which I hope sounds as ridiculous to you as
it does me.
~~~
temphn
Have you heard of stereotype threat enough to convince
someone who believes in it?
Well, stereotype threat has actually been debunked. I encourage you to read
this full pdf, including Steele and Aronson's response and
Sackett/Hardison/Cullen's reply:
[http://www.asc.upenn.edu/usr/ogandy/C45405%20resources/Sacke...](http://www.asc.upenn.edu/usr/ogandy/C45405%20resources/Sackett%20et%20al%20stereotype%20threat.pdf)
I find people as confident and dismissive
This is a matter of perception. From my vantage point, people who don't know
much about genetics, neuroscience, biochemistry and the like are
extraordinarily confident in dismissing the influence of hard scientific
evidence in favor of the wishful thinking and hand-waving of much less
rigorous sociological disciplines.
I don't think the parent was even suggesting it was 100%
cultural effect either.
See above: jackowayed himself notes that people with an alternative opinion
are "berated". Only on the internet can the facts about genetics even be
stated without character assassination. And then, and only then, the backpedal
starts from a 100% cultural to a "50/50" position.
_Who knows what the split is? How can we know? Gene-culture environment
interaction is so complex. And what about _epistasis_._
But "we don't know" is not the position that Sandberg takes. And of course, if
the position is actually not 100/0 then these gaps can never be fully closed
[even if this were desirable], and this resilient inequality is not the fault
of men but of Nature itself. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think
"the gap can never be closed" is a position you would subscribe to (let alone
jackowayed or Sandberg herself). So yeah, I think it's fair to characterize
the conventional wisdom as a 100% social constructionist position, which
executes a tactical rhetorical fallback when confronted with overwhelming
fact...changing not one iota in its policy prescriptions, which are still in
the main comprised of struggle sessions at places like Facebook HQ.
Whereas you seem to suggest its 100% genetic, which would
preclude the possibility of any woman having better spatial
abilities than any man
You know, there's something about this topic which makes people unable to
reason statistically. Obviously there are tall women and short men. Obviously
there are Emmy Noethers. That's just not where the averages or medians are. I
mentioned Lisa Leslie and Cheryl Miller; y'all _really_ think people who know
what item-response theory is aren't intimately familiar with the concept of
overlapping Gaussians...maybe even more so than people who blanche at the very
thought of Bell Curves?
But overlap isn't equality.
~~~
edwinkite
My basic gripe with Bell-curve arguments against female genius is that at the
high end, in the exponential tail, fine-tuning is needed to explain why a non-
negligible fraction of professors at MIT (say) are women. Even a small
difference in variance would lead to overwhelming male dominance.
On the other hand, if there were no difference in the distribution of
intelligence, but cultural factors held women back, then the current "one-
tenth to one-third" fraction of women in jobs needing high intelligence is
naturally explained.
A recent PNAS paper showed that International Mathematics Olympiad teams from
countries with high gender equality contain more women.
<http://www.pnas.org/content/106/22/8801.abstract> IMO team members are one-
in-a-hundred-thousand people - deep into the exponential tail of any Bell
curve.
A study in 1999 showed 70% of psychology professors hiring Robert, and 45%
hiring Ruth, on the basis of an identical CV. The waters of geek sexism run
deep.
Cordelia Fine wrote a good book on the evidence. PDF:
[http://hagocrat.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/delusions-of-
gen...](http://hagocrat.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/delusions-of-gender-
cordelia-fine.pdf)
It's totally anecdotal, but the young people in the canteen at JPL are about
50/50.
Notice also the political fine-tuning of the variance argument: it doesn't
dare suggest that mean female intelligence is lower (because we'd all reject
that). God of the gaps, anyone?
Getting this right matters. If you must hire very good people, and you have
the wrong model of how very good people are distributed among the population,
you will fail.
~~~
temphn
My basic gripe with Bell-curve arguments against female
genius is that at the high end, in the exponential tail,
fine-tuning is needed
Well, actually no fine-tuning is needed. The Central Limit Theorem is most
valid for a sum process in the middle of the distribution. It converges most
slowly in the tails [1,2]; indeed, if your goal is to model the tails you
really are dealing with a max-phenomenon rather than a mean-phenomenon.
In this case, the underlying sum process could be a bunch of small alleles of
roughly equivalent size, each contributing to high IQ (viz. a QTL model for a
multifactorial trait [3]). In that case, if you cared about the tails rather
than the body, the discrete chunkiness of the underlying binomial distribution
becomes more crucial.
Put another way: Bell Curve arguments (aka "statistical genetics") are at the
lowest level based on discrete alleles, not perfect Gaussians. Now, those in
the field would love to get better models of the genetics of highly
intelligent people -- but to study that kind of thing you need to move to
China and work at BGI. Remember, thoughtcriminals who propose genetic
explanations for behavioral phenomena are "berated" in the US [See
jackowayed's wonderful admission against interest up thread].
International Mathematics Olympiad.. Notice also the
political fine-tuning of the variance argument: it doesn't
dare suggest that mean female intelligence is lower
(because we'd all reject that). God of the gaps, anyone?
While we're talking about fine-tuning, why do you cherry-pick a few stats
without acknowledging that the history of science is male? Do the thousands of
male names (Newton, Maxwell, Einstein, Gauss, Euler) that have inscribed their
name into history count as a datapoint here? Do the Fields Medals? The Nobel
Prizes in Physics? The faculty of math and science departments around the
world? The gender of the inventors of the locomotive, the aeroplane, and the
automobile? The names of those men who built steam engines and search engines?
I know why. All the conquests and murders in history are counted against men;
but is a little odd that every male invention is counted in the demerits
column too! I think the idea is that said ancient men ostensibly discriminated
against women, shoving them out of the way before they could figure out the
value of pi. Without said invidious discrimination women - biologically,
neurologically, hormonally, genetically different women - would have been
tearing it up on the math tip at the same rate. Just as they have been dunking
from the free throw line ever since we started the WNBA.
Bottom line: you can't have it both ways. If achievement in science and
engineering is to be a signal, if you are to cite any stats related to IMOs
and whatnot, you need to take on board the enormous imbalance in the favor of
men on historical measures of sci/eng aptitude and achievement. All due
respect to Noether, Daubechies, and Curie -- but the prior probabilities of
achievement are not equal.
If you must hire very good people, and you have the wrong
model of how very good people are distributed among the
population, you will fail.
That's right. Your statement is: if you have the wrong model, you will fail.
The logically equivalent contrapositive is: if you succeed, you didn't have
the wrong model.
So given that Google, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube succeeded with highly male
software engineering staffs, logically they _did not_ have the wrong model of
how very good people are distributed among the population.
[1] [http://math.stackexchange.com/questions/314659/central-
limit...](http://math.stackexchange.com/questions/314659/central-limit-
theorem-speed-of-convergence-in-center-vs-tails)
[2] <http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~yuvalf/CLT.pdf> (see page 2)
[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_trait_locus#Multif...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_trait_locus#Multifactorial_traits_in_general)
------
dmvaldman
This is so embarrassingly bad...it starts bad, and then gets worse...
examples:
He discredits one of Sandberg's scientifically verified claims that women take
criticism worse than men, by referencing "as John Ioannidis notes, “Most
Published Research Findings are False.”
Yet he begins his review with a US News report:
"This US News article describes research that found that, among college
graduates, left-handed men earned 20 percent more than right-handed men."
Talk about a bayesian paradox here. It's easy to prove people wrong (and
right) when you believe A and ~A.
I could go on, it gets much worse. Does he really think Harvard uses the same
internet bandwidth for their particle physics dept and the dorms? Ugh...
~~~
jerrya
Philip Greenspun used sarcasm. He knew all the tricks, dramatic irony,
metaphor, bathos, puns, parody, litotes and satire.
~~~
dmvaldman
ah. so being methodically retarded is all part of his plan. how clever!
------
whiddershins
Yeah, for me, this review points to a bigger picture issue. Why is the tech /
startup scene so easily lured in by establishment values?
Of course there are exceptions, Fog Creek's articles about their compensation
policy comes to mind, but very little of the egalitarian ethos that made
hacking so cool survives in the way people talk and write about working in
tech.
Corporate long-hours and ladder climbing ambition? Where every dating site [or
other product] presumes fixed gender, sexual preferences, and monogamous
behavior. Happily pouring your earnings in to high rents and overpriced 401ks,
quibbling over the .02% equity versus the extra $5k a year at the next job
while recreating the hierarchy and wage slavery which characterized the 19th
and 20th centuries. To the point where even the feminism seems regressive. And
the "art" is airbrushed illustrations and all the music is power pop.
Did I wander too far? Well it is one lens to view it through.
~~~
eli_gottlieb
As below, thanks for saying all this. I often wonder what the bloody hell
happened to the hacker-ethic and hacker-aesthetic that had drawn me towards
tech in the first place.
It's getting very close to flipping my switch for, "Burn it all down and start
over."
~~~
qu4z-2
I think the hacker ethic alive and well, and living outside the startup
scene/Hacker News.
------
salimmadjd
We all know "Lean In" is a ploy to get her into the national election psyche.
She is probably a better candidate than most of the other jokers. However, we
really can't take the book that seriously nor it's pseudo science. I listened
to a NPR event by her and was so surprised how she used stereotypes about men
to dispel stereotypes about women and no one once called her on it! It's very
simple. She now has "business" background, she is using Lean In to recruit
activist women who she needs as volunteers. Her Facebook credentials will
endear her to younger voters as well. So she will get some of independents who
might like her business background. She will get the female and youth vote. So
on paper she is a good candidate and the book is her gateway.
~~~
mr_spothawk
Sandberg Schmidt 2016. You heard it here first. They're in the middle of PR
marathon saturated with juicy election tidbits: North Korea, Facebook, etc.
~~~
salimmadjd
Sandberg wont run with another technology person. She would need a policy
person to give her credibility and help her win 1-2 states. She will get
Florida based on the Jewish vote probably. So she needs to get a VP to win
Pennsylvania and Ohio.
------
philwelch
I don't know why people are so critical of Greenspun. Maybe I'm the only one
who finds cynical curmudgeons amusing.
~~~
Vivtek
No, no! He's always a pleasure to read. But then I come from a long line of
cynical curmudgeons and this stuff always reminds me of my (now deceased)
uncles.
------
vrodic
The Last Psychiatrist also covered Sandberg as a female role model, you might
find it interesting:
[http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2013/03/dont_hate_her_because...](http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2013/03/dont_hate_her_because_shes_suc.html)
~~~
girvo
That was so deliciously brutal.
~~~
salemh
TheLastPsychiatrist is an excellent and polarizing writer. Heres a punch in
the gut on Steubenville. Much like her (I think her, its a matter of debate on
gender, but mostly accepted via the comments page as "she") other posts, the
storytelling and long-form leads to meta "aha!" points.
[http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2013/01/no_self-
respecting_wo...](http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2013/01/no_self-
respecting_woman_would.html)
------
askimto
Greenplum's mean-spiritedness makes this more a review of himself than the
book, which is too bad because he manages a few golden nuggets here and there
among all the brown ones.
~~~
harichinnan
You should be evaluating data warehouse software. You got the name wrong.
------
softbuilder
Could someone explain this paragraph? I've read it several times and I don't
understand what his point is:
_"Sandberg’s personal experience, however, contradicts this. She says that
she has never worked for a woman. All of the mentors and sponsors she
describes are men. When she was 27 years old, a man hired her to be Chief of
Staff for the United States Secretary of the Treasury. Would a woman have been
willing to hire her for the same job at age 17?"_
~~~
natrius
My rephrasing of that is, "If the working world is systematically biased
against women, was it biased against Sandberg? Why did her male bosses and
mentors choose her to be the exception? Would female bosses and mentors have
made Sandberg's success easier to achieve?"
~~~
softbuilder
Hmm. I guess I got the gist that you've expressed. That makes me feel a little
better, thanks. That last sentence was the puzzler.
~~~
jdminhbg
Here's the point of the last sentence, which I had to read a few times as
well:
When she was 27 years old, a man hired her to be Chief of Staff for the United
States Secretary of the Treasury. What, if women were in charge, she'd have
not been biased against and gotten that job when she was 17 instead?
~~~
softbuilder
AHA! Thank you. It finally clicked.
------
mountaingirl
I couldn't read this entire thread because it made me so incredibly angry. As
a woman in tech I have done plenty of reading about the genders and their
capabilities. I've read that while women tend to be stronger in English
comprehension and men tend to be stronger in Math, this is lately due to how
we are socialized, not genetic factors. I am saddened by how this thread
degenerates from reviewing Sandberg's book in a horribly irresponsible way to
discussing the incompetence of women in general. This entire thread is so
discouraging and I am disappointed there hasn't been a more rational
discussion of this book and the topics it raises.
------
fringedgentian
Seeing how quickly this entirely negative, picky-pants review got voted to the
front page of hacker news has inspired me to purchase and start reading Lean
In immediately.
It makes me think there must be something to this book.
------
wcgortel
The value of lean in is almost unrelated to anything except for it's author's
gender. Most of this stuff has been said before. There are tons of career
books, and she cites a lot of existing research.
It's valuable because it shows a career track to women in technology, which is
undoubtedly a male-dominated field. It also repackages a lot of existing
knowledge into a format that is accessible to ambitious young women.
It's valuable because it allows me to talk to my sister about how she
perceives gender issues. She is a mechanical engineer, and without having a
common language it would be difficult for me to relate my career to hers.
It's valuable because my girlfriend can pick it up and use it to develop an
understanding of how she fits in the workplace. Having a reference text allows
her to interface with peers and build a dialogue.
When I first started editing inside investing, I realized something about two
days into the job: we commonly conceive writing as the pursuit of truth
through argumentation. In many cases, that is patently wrong. Most writing
serves to stoke conversation.
All of this discussion--whether it suggests males are intrinsically different
or that there is more to women's pay and achievement gap in terms of social
dynamics--is the point of the book.
All of this criticism is valid, but guess what--did the book get you to think
about women in the workplace? Have you considered how you behave in relation
to your female colleagues and employees as a result of reading this book? If
so, it's done its job.
------
tyang
Mean but juicy.
Kudos on stirring the pot.
Sheryl's book - and the important topics it addresses - were at risk of being
a bit forgotten.
Your review could help change that.
------
jbapple
Can someone explain this to me:
> When government cannot impose right-thinking via new regulations it must be
> imposed by our social and intellectual superiors bullying us: “Everyone
> needs to get more comfortable with female leaders”
I'm having a lot of trouble finding the implication of Greenspun's summary in
the quote he uses from Sandberg's book.
~~~
Kudzu_Bob
That's because you don't know what bullying is.
------
Uncompetative
$845,000,000 salary...
Doesn't this strike anyone else as rather a lot?
------
podperson
This is an interesting piecemeal critique of Sandberg's book but doesn't seem
to look for or address any overall theme or thrust of the book. If there is no
such theme, this itself is worthy of comment.
Yes, the bolts of which the bridge is assembled are rusted, but where, if
anywhere, does it lead?
------
michaelochurch
The problem that I see has little to do with the fact that Sandberg is a
woman. It's that the Corporate System (yes, there is such a thing)
deliberately promotes people who are smart enough to run operations but don't
have what it takes (which is more of an out-of-band creativity than raw IQ) to
figure out how people and organizations really work. Then its pre-selected
leaders go on to peddle Success Crack that tells us how we can be successful,
and how it's just _so_ easy.
The title alone is enough to give me pause. "Lean In" refers to the antiquated
idea that the reason why so few women succeed in the workplace is because they
"lean back" instead of "in" during meetings. Right, because all you need to do
to wring a few more dollars out of a stingy, psychopathic billionaire
institution that would throw you out on the street if it saw profit in it, is
a little more work on your posturing. Keep an acute angle between your spine
and your pelvis and everything else will follow.
Reality: most people who are successful have no insight into how they got
there, and the system's supposed to work that way; the elevator up is made of
glass, but the people allowed into it were deliberately picked not to look
anywhere but at the digital red numbers that say what floor they are on. Of
course, most people who fail (and that's most people) have little insight
either, which is why these books sell so well.
Also, let's talk about Small Data, the realm not of normal distributions but
of Poisson distributions on discrete events. Reputations are a Small Data
problem. So are introductions, resumes, and all of the other mechanical rat-
traps that make up the career game. You can control serendipity to some
degree. If you know a disgusting secret on a Harvard MBA alumnus (which is not
that hard, because as unethical people become increasingly arrogant, they get
worse at hiding it) you can use it to get a powerful recommendation, get in to
Harvard Business School, and make influential friends. Sure, there are things
like that that you can control. Then there are things that you can't.
Filthy secret: the workplace is full of extortionist thugs, bullies, and
generally horrible people. I'd estimate that horrid people are 1-in-10 in the
general population (but you rarely see them in daily life, because there isn't
money involved) but they are 1-in-5 co-workers at the most competitive
companies, and 1-in-3 bosses. Okay. Let's just get that on the table. Unless
you have extreme luck that makes you independent in your first 5 years, you
_will_ meet horrible people who will fuck up your career, damage your
reputation, gaslight you until you embarrass yourself in a major way, steal
credit that you needed to get out of corporate hell, possibly even give you
PTSD (that's rare, but if you have the condition pre-existing, it can flare up
again). One such encounter takes you out of the running for those COO/Facebook
jobs that require a flawless career history, but you can still be modestly
successful. Two hits and you will never raise VC. You're too damaged for that.
Three and you're barely holding on to the upper-middle-class. Four, and you're
lucky to stay in the _middle_ class. Now, some people manage to get hit _zero_
times. Look up Poisson distributions if you don't believe me. It's not many of
them, but it happens. Good for them.
Why do so few women succeed in the workplace? This "they stop leaning
in!!!111" bullshit is useless, because it glosses over the real problem. It's
because bullies (including workplace bullies) prey on the people they consider
to be weakest, and those are disproportionately going to be women. It's not
that they're sexist. Not all bad people are everything bad (i.e. not all
psychopaths are sexist or racist). They're just opportunists. They hit women
disproportionately because they presume them to be weak.
You can really tell what kind of career (in a corporate context, and VC-istan
is corporate because of the king-making around funding) someone will have
based on one integer number: how many times that person has been attacked by a
workplace thug. You will never be a Sheryl Sandberg if you've dealt with a
true workplace bully, and at least 90% of people get hit at least once in the
first 10 years. Your reputation and career history are too damaged, and you
really can't "start over" because every achievement is age-graded.
It's great that some people like Sandberg are able to enjoy legitimate
careers, but the fact of never having been bullied or attacked (they might
have been laid off once or twice, but never robbed or extorted) makes them
extreme statistical anomalies. They end up with these rosy-eyed half-picture
views of the workplace, and they're able to _sell_ it in business books and
TED talks, because most of the proles _want_ to believe there's something
different out there, and that they're just missing one easy insight (i.e. just
"lean in" during meetings!)
Success Crack presents a view of the workplace that is so non-repeatable and
often self-serving as to be indistinguishable from a fantasy novel-- but with
a less inspiring setting and worse writing.
~~~
theorique
_If you know a disgusting secret on a Harvard MBA alumnus (which is not that
hard, because as unethical people become increasingly arrogant, they get worse
at hiding it) you can use it to get a powerful recommendation, get in to
Harvard Business School, and make influential friends._
[citation needed]
No doubt this is true in an abstract sense, but is there any recorded data on
this (reports of scandals, etc) or is this just speculation.
~~~
ims
Right. While not impossible (it's possible for almost anyone, no?), this type
of blackmail is probably extremely uncommon.
In the real world, it's so much more likely to be "he's a cool guy, we went to
the same prep school, why not?" Which renders the same result, but in less of
a movie-script dramatic way.
~~~
michaelochurch
_While not impossible (it's possible for almost anyone, no?), this type of
blackmail is probably extremely uncommon._
Wrong. It's extremely common, but it's also _subtle_.
It's best if the target doesn't know what you have on him. That's the beauty
of business school. You were out drinking with him 25 times and he doesn't
remember half of them, so you don't have to mention "the dirt". (Also: you
shouldn't. Explicit extortion will put you in jail.) He has no memory of
_what_ specific episodes you have on him, and there might not even be any. He
just knows that if you say, "introduce me to <Y>" or "invite me to your winter
party" that he has no choice.
~~~
jerrya
Sigh. I clearly went to the wrong business school, and I bet being married and
having a kid didn't help me either on this score. :(
(I was there in that capstone project where you had a bug in the excel
spreadsheet and we just pasted value over it!)
------
zurn
People should read (if they must) this in context of Greenspun's rather
fanatical political ideology. His blog has plenty of samples, I don't want to
link to it.
~~~
macspoofing
I've never read anything of Greenspun, other than this review. I don't know,
or particularly care, what his "fanatical political ideology" is. As far as
I'm concerned this essay is perfectly capable of being judged on its own
merits.
I am however greatly annoyed whenever someone thinks they are doing everyone
else a favour by trying to dissuade others from reading an opinion (especially
through vague ad hominem attacks). I don't think you need to protect anyone
here from uncomfortable opinions.
~~~
corin_
I'm in the same boat as you with regards not not having read anything else
he's written (I glanced at a few of his political essays this morning but
didn't read any thoroughly), so this comment is a general thought not specific
to Greenspun.
Surely every article/essay has the potential to be read differently in the
context of who wrote it. If it was on the subject of, for example,
Israel/Palestine, would you not want to know that it was a Palestinian
campaigner who wrote about their suffering, or a Zionist who wrote about their
acts of terrorism? Whether you agree or disagree with one side or the other,
context is often relevant.
~~~
macspoofing
>Whether you agree or disagree with one side or the other, context is often
relevant.
Is it really, in this case? If Greenspun was a Neo-Nazi who was serving time
for killing 12 people, would it really have changed the content of this
review?
I understand it would probably colour your perception of him, and certainly
that's what the OP was going for, but I still think that this review stands on
its own.
~~~
corin_
I haven't actually read this review, it's not something that interested me,
but I do find that (for better or for worse) I judge content on its author.
Yes, if he was a Neo-Nazi who had killed 12 people, it would make me lose
respect for his opinions.
~~~
macspoofing
Alright. Do you want to go and research Philip Greenspun before you decide
whether or not you agree with his review?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Golden Rule For Internship Interview Survival - sydneyb
http://refer.ly/the-golden-rule-for-internship-interview-survival-/c/0849c51c85e511e2bfbf22000a1db8fa
======
tomcardoso
Sorry, but I gotta nitpick. Sure, bad interviews happen, but it doesn't sound
to me like this was a bad interview — looks more like you just flubbed it.
Don't get me wrong: the interviewer was certainly pushy, possibly in a bad
mood, and probably annoyed at the prospect of having to do the interviews in
the first place, but that's exactly the kind of thing you need to prepare for.
Interviews are a poker game. You want to get a good read on who you're playing
against before you even begin to consider showing your cards. You tipped your
hand too early by seeming over-eager to someone who didn't appreciate it, and
that cost you the interviewer's attention and interest.
I work in tech and advertising as well, and I've known my fair share of people
like the one you described. They're a reality, so the only answer is to adapt.
They're usually actually pretty great coworkers, too; they can just afford to
be direct and demanding. I once met a creative director who famously hired
writers and designers without ever opening their portfolios. He'd talk to
them, get a read on them, and decide if they had the right attitude. It drove
some interviewees crazy, but it worked for him, and it worked for the company.
My point is this: interviewers aren't the ones that have to make a good
impression. You are, regardless of how curt or pushy the interviewer might be.
------
sydneyb
Anybody else have similar stories from their early days in the startup or
advertising community?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How Software Companies Die - signa11
https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/jokepg/joke_19970213_01.txt
======
chrisrickard
I loved this. Funny, and very much true.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Benefits of Exercising Before Breakfast - robg
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/15/phys-ed-the-benefits-of-exercising-before-breakfast/
======
robchez
This is hardly amazing to anyone who fasts regularly. I saw increases in all
my major lifts when I train fasted and eat plenty of good fat (60% of total
kcal).
I would love to get a hold of the full study for a better look at it.
Edit:
Reading this article a bit closer, and taking to look at the study, it is
clear that the author has some serious bias against the idea that a high-fat
diet with fasted training will be of benefit. The people who lost weight were
eating 30% more than usual. If they modified there diet to 50% of fat, and not
increased calories, you would have seen an even great weight drop.
~~~
sliverstorm
'fast' is a terrible word, IMHO. Denying yourself food for a handful of hours
is not the same as denying yourself food for several days, and yet both are
considered fasting.
How long were the fasts you took? I am curious because my lifts suffer when I
have not eaten breakfast, and I'm pretty sure it's because of the exhausted
feeling in my muscles, which I attribute to the lack of food.
~~~
robchez
denying yourself food for days is starving not fasting HaHa.
I fast every day, 16-19 hrs at a time. I train completely for strength rather
than endurance, so lift super heavy for 4-5. Max 2-3 sets. If you are going
for muscle endurance (8reps+) then some food prior to training.
~~~
bumbledraven
How close to your workout is your eating window? I was doing 23/1 intermittent
fasting and my coach told me it would interfere with my strength training. I'm
also training for strength/max lifts, not endurance.
~~~
robchez
Straight after. I will train, have a shower then eat. My window is generally
4-8 hours depending how full I get.
I have seen only improvement in my lifts since I started this regimen. Lost
some serious bodyfat % whilst gained muscle.
~~~
aik
Mind if I ask what your motivation is for training strictly for strength and
not endurance?
~~~
thesz
My own reason is that training for strength stimulates your body to produce
testosterone, which stimulate logical thinking, among other things.
Low level of testosterone found to be one of reasons of men's depression.
~~~
awi
I'm pretty sure aerobic exercise is better for the brain than strength
training. Aerobic exercise increases oxygen flow to the brain and it directly
improves creation and survival of neurons. Effectively it acts as a drug for
your brain.
It has the additional benefit that it alters your mood, aerobic exercise makes
you happy :)
Strength training may boost testosterone, but the effects of aerobic exercise
is well established. Several comparisons have been done between aerobic and
strength training and the conclusions have been that strength training have
little effect on executive function.
My source for this is the book "Brain Rules" by John Medina [1]. Also check
out his presentation on exercise [2] and his Authors@Google talk [3].
[1] <http://www.brainrules.net> [2] <http://www.brainrules.net/exercise> [3]
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IK1nMQq67VI>
~~~
oostevo
I'm really struggling to think of a strength training scenario where your
heart rate wouldn't be elevated (thus increasing blood flow). Consider a max.
back squat, where all your muscles are contracting to the maximum degree that
they can for several seconds. I'd say that'll make your heart pump.
(Thanks for the citations. That's awesome, and I wish more people would do
it.)
~~~
jacques_chester
Weight training and cardio training have different effects on the heart.
Weight training forces the heart to pump against resistance, leadening to a
thickening of aorta walls. Cardio requires blood to be circulated more
frequently, leading to an enlargement of some heart chambers.
------
DrStalker
I've dropped 20kg (44lb) since august, and I have found that eating well has a
much much greater effect than exercise does. I've kept track daily of both
weight and key tasks:
[http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0ArDlY2B14P1IdFA2NElD...](http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0ArDlY2B14P1IdFA2NElDaV9VbDV5RlBPOGdpOHRXTUE&hl=en_GB)
It's pretty easy to see the exercise has died down to just enough to keep
metabalism up, but the weight loss has been very steady. There's been no
difference for me between pre-breakfast and post-dinner exercise, but huge
difference based on what I eat and when.
I would expect different results if I was trying to burn calories directly
through exercise, but I spent a month planning how to lose weight without
spending lots of time in the gym because I knew I wouldn't stick to that :-)
~~~
eru
Interesting spreadsheet and congratulation on your dietary improvements!
Exercise doesn't really help you with losing weight, but it helps you with
losing fat and/or gaining muscle.
In the last few months I've exercised a lot and ate a lot. I've gained around
7kg of mostly muscles.
I don't know whether losing weight is a useful goal at all. Aiming to lose
body fat while keeping lean body weight (=muscles, bones, everything that
isn't fat) seems much more sane to me.
~~~
DrStalker
Starting from a BMI of 40 there's no way I'd attempt to put on that much lean
muscle. :-)
~~~
eru
Yes. Have you considered also tracking your abdominal girth? I read about some
studies showing that this (or the ratio of abdominal girth to hip
circumference to make it work between different people) is a better indicator
of health.
------
StavrosK
I saw a comment on reddit the other day, which I don't remember exactly, but
it said (paraphrasing):
"In the morning (when waking up after a night's sleep), your <something>
reserves are depleted so exercising before you eat will burn fat (no, you
won't burn muscle)."
It seems to me that the commenter knew about this effect just fine.
~~~
detst
This comment was also made here on HN not long ago (maybe that's where you
read it). I believe someone also stated that it's not good for your back to
exercise too soon after waking.
I believe your "<something>" is glycogen. The basic idea being that if you
have no glycogen to burn, you'll burn fat.
~~~
StavrosK
I am 99% sure that they did say glycogen. It was glyco-something, anyway. It
might have been on HN, although I think I remember fittit. Regardless, that's
not important.
Also, it's probably true that it's not very good to exercise after waking, but
nobody said you have to exercise after waking, just that you have to do it
before eating breakfast :)
~~~
DrStalker
glycogen is your short-term in muscle energy storage.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketosis#Metabolic_pathways> explains why
exertion with no glycogen burns fat.
------
sliverstorm
Come to think of it, this makes sense historically speaking. You can't eat it
until you catch it.
~~~
zoomzoom
I don't mean to offend, because I know that you mean well with this line of
thinking. But it seems really silly to think that our cellular metabolism
evolved in conjunction with the imagined hunting patterns of a proto-human.
Cellular metabolism is a much older process.
Also, the human body did not evolve to perform best when fasting. Certainly we
have adrenaline for "kill" moments, but I would bet that eating before a long
physical challenge would increase performance during that challenge. You might
bur more fat if you don't eat, but I don't think we evolved to burn fat -
rather the opposite seems more likely.
~~~
awolf
I really encourage you to do some research on evolutionary biology. Almost
everything you said here is wrong.
It's only very recently in human history with the advent of agriculture that
large amounts of grains and legumes becme available for human consumption.
99.5% of our human existence was spent as hunter-gatherers surviving on mostly
meat.
~~~
zoomzoom
hm, not sure what I said about eating meat vs grains.
------
tomjen3
While this is interesting research, I hope they would use their time to focus
on how to get these benefits without the exercise part. It's pretty clear at
this point that no matter what people will not exercise, no matter how many
times we hear about how smart it is.
Imagine the shear number of people that would help.
~~~
lsb
As hackermom said above, "exercise" doesn't have to be some boring gym
workout; cycling or running to work is exercise too, and makes for a far more
awesome commute (if you live within 10 miles of work).
~~~
eru
Yes. Also I find short and intensive freeweight exercise to be much more
bearable than endless cardio.
~~~
jules
But that doesn't burn as many calories does it?
~~~
eru
I don't know. I exercise for gaining strength, not for burning energy. Look up
High Intensity Interval Training to see how short high-intensity bursts
compare to long low-intensity efforts (i.e. cardio).
(For the lazy: <http://duckduckgo.com/High-intensity_interval_training>)
Gaining more muscles does raise your base metabolic rate, though.
------
discreteevent
Like a lot of these studies they are only measuring one factor - fat
gained/retained. So as usual its good to remind oneself to take it with a
grain of salt and always keep a sharp eye on what works best for you overall.
It beats waiting for some new study next year saying that people over 40 who
exercise heavily without eating anything are twice as likely to have a heart
attack or whatever. I know that if I go for a run first thing in the morning
when its quite cold in winter without having anything to eat at all I can feel
pretty bad for the rest of the day in comparison with (on a weekend) eating
some breakfast and waiting for about an hour before I go out. In my case I
usually pay attention more to how I feel rather than the results of some
study.
------
threejay
I delivered newspapers from the ages of 8-18 every morning from 5a-6a. I was
skinny as a rail and had more mental clarity than anytime since. If only I
could go back to those days...
------
skizm
For added fun wash your mouth with a carbohydrate solution (don't swallow)
before exercising: [http://journals.lww.com/acsm-
msse/Abstract/2004/12000/The_Ef...](http://journals.lww.com/acsm-
msse/Abstract/2004/12000/The_Effect_of_Carbohydrate_Mouth_Rinse_on_1_h.17.aspx)
~~~
threejay
Using a cho based mouthwash is pretty much asking for dental carries. Couple
that with a little exercise induced xerostomia and you should be good to go.
------
mickdarling
I am finally able to do regular workouts after recovering from a slipped disk.
But, the weight I have put on in the intervening time is hard to work off,
especially this time of year.
So I am going to try this and see if it improves my burn rate, or at least
slows my girth rate. :-)
------
dave1619
Wow, this is amazing. I'd love to try it out, but I'm not sure what I can do
in the morning before breakfast. Maybe stationary bicycle. Anybody exercising
before breakfast? What kind of exercise are you doing?
~~~
chime
Get a good elliptical. It will work out your entire body (unlike stationary
bikes) and not hurt in case you have knee problems (like treadmills). Put the
elliptical in front of TV if you like and do 30-45mins every other day. I was
193lbs in August. I'm 174lbs now. Though I'd say I'm more of an exception
because I gain/lose weight really fast. Nevertheless, I highly recommend a
good elliptical - both my wife and I love the one we got.
~~~
artmageddon
Each machine has its strengths and weaknesses. I find that stationary bikes
tend to get really uncomfortable after awhile, too. My posture isn't the best
and I feel like I suffer on a bike because of the hunching I feel like I have
to do in order to grip the bars in front of me. It's also worth mentioning
that a mediocre seat can definitely be painful after a period of time.
In the bike's defense: as a runner, spinning on the bike is an absolutely
awesome to maintain cardio-fitness after a running injury.
------
jules
For the people who do strength training: how much do you exercise and how
quick are the results? (in kg of muscle/year or in strength improvement or
whatever is the standard)
~~~
jacques_chester
I train 3 to 5 times per week (Olympic lifting). Like most people I had a
period of fast improvement which is tapering now.
------
dreaming
Presumably I can get similar benefits for exercising just before dinner?
Morning exercise is about the last thing I want to do...
~~~
jamesbritt
"Morning exercise is about the last thing I want to do..."
It's almost the last thing I want to do. The last thing I want to do is
exercise after I've started my day. I simply never do it.
Good to hear about eating _after_ exercising, too, since I have to go running
first thing when I get up. If I first have coffee or eat breakfast I lose all
my "go running!" magic power due to the mysterious hypnotic beams emanating
from my laptop.
------
nolite
Sounds great if you're looking to finish your workout with a hypoglycemic
attack.. fun fun
------
jamesaguilar
I wonder if this also applies to exercising right before dinner, which is what
I do.
------
rkwz
After exercising, how long should one wait till breakfast?
~~~
matwood
Only as long as you need to wait to feel comfortable eating. With weight
training I usually drink a post workout shake high in carbs and protein then
within the hour eat a well rounded meal.
~~~
rkwz
_> >Only as long as you need to wait to feel comfortable eating._
Could you please elaborate a little bit? It sounds a little vague to me.
~~~
danielh
Some people can eat something immediately after exercising, some can't.
When I run in the morning I usually rest for a few minutes to cool down, take
a shower and then have breakfast. But you can eat immediately after you
finished exercising if you feel like it.
~~~
jules
If the theory is right it's better to wait longer, as it takes time for your
body to re-stock the glycogen reserves. So you are still burning fat after you
finished exercising.
~~~
matwood
What you're getting into now is EPOC and used to be thought to be caused by
HIIT. Basically, doing short bouts of high intensity exercise you could drain
your glycogen reserves and raise your base metabolism (and thus calorie
burning) over the course of 12-24 hours. This theory has been mostly debunked.
Also, keep in mind that while depleting your glycogen stores may help your
body focus on using fat instead of other sources of energy during exercise, it
doesn't change the fact that the only way to lose weight is to eat less than
you use. Too many people look at these studies (GI, insulin response, and HFCS
immediately come to mind) as silver bullets. The only real silver bullet is
eat less than you use. There was an article not long ago about a guy who only
ate twinkies and lost weight by counting calories.
Physically, losing weight is pretty basic stuff, but it's so hard to do
because it requires a tough combination of mental and emotional skills and
often requires people to change their deep seated (often decades long)
relationship with food.
~~~
jules
I completely agree, I'm just saying that if the theory is correct, then this
is probably a consequence. I can think of a reason why you'd lose weight by
eating later: now your body burns your fat to replenish your glycogen levels,
and later when you eat it stores the food in fat. This may well be less energy
efficient than eating right after exercise and replenishing your glycogen
levels with food.
------
hackermom
This is no news, really; in fact, we were even taught this part in basic
metabolism in biology class in 7th grade. In the morning, the body has
depleted its reserve of "immediate energy" in the blood stream and tissue -
glycogen, mostly, assuming you have a carbohydrate-rich diet - and will
instead have to source energy by instantly burning your fat deposits if you
call upon the body to do so by increasing your heart rate and breathing etc.
(read: exercise - even a 30 minute walk will do the trick). This is called
lipolysis, btw., and is a fundamental part of the human metabolical system.
Remember: the human body is _primarily_ a FAT-BURNING MACHINE.
add.: Someone sitting next to me as I wrote this asked me, "how long ago was
7th grade?", as a reference of how "re-inventive" this study was. 7th grade
was 17 years ago.
~~~
eru
> the human body is primarily a FAT-BURNING MACHINE.
How would our metabolism have to be different for you to come to a different
conclusion?
(I just want to know, how strong your statement is.)
~~~
hackermom
Lipolysis is the inherit, main metabolical function of our liver and muscle
cells. We cannot make use of monosaccharids without "switching" our cells into
another mode. This is done by the pancreas secreting a hormone, insulin, into
our blood stream; the hormone signals to our cells to stop burning fat and
just store it instead, in order to focus on processing the sugar in the blood
to prevent a sugar coma. Sugar is in essence a poison in the blood stream, and
a too high presence of it will end your life at shortest within minutes. Also,
we cannot store sugar for any mentionable duration of time - it's not a long-
term energy source the way fat is. This is also the case for almost all other
animals on the planet, mammals in particular. If the roles of sugar and fat
would be reversed - sugar being storable, lipolysis needing to be acquired
through switching of cell function - we could come to a different conclusion.
Today we have empirical evidence, through years of study of people living on
rigorous LCHF diets, that the human body does not require a single gram of
sugar a day to function; it can slowly adapt and switch entirely, both brain,
core and limbs, into being solely a fat- and protein-consuming machine. We can
from this perspective consider sugars as being available as an alternate form
of energy that we can process by secondary function, at a cost - the cost of
insulin in our blood stream, and all the problems that can come with the
production of such (various cardiovascular diseases have been linked to this,
as well as the cases of insulin resistance and lack of insulin production from
the pancreas from being "burnt out" being the two major problems).
~~~
eru
Thanks!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Independence Days: My Perfect Imperfect Gap Year - wallflower
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/06/education/edlife/my-perfect-imperfect-gap-year.html
======
aaron-lebo
Flaunting wealth isn't cool. This essay is mostly him discussing jobs that
middle and lower class kids accept as part of life. They don't get a NYTimes
article about it.
His evidence that gap years aren't elitist is:
_The idea that gap years are inherently elitist may be due to the potentially
high cost of travel and of independent programs, which offer a structured
experience — typically of adventure, service and more or less education — that
can cost upward of $20,000. But that criticism cuts against the realities most
students already face — that is, average in-state tuition and fees of $8,940,
or $28,308 at private colleges, according to the College Board. When factoring
in room, board and other expenses, this would mean spending about $100,000
over five years at public colleges and more than double that at private ones._
"See, college is expensive anyway, what's a little more debt gonna hurt?"
Well, that's easy to say when your parents can shell out $50k to go to
college. It's obvious the guy has gained some perspective and its great to
see, but he's still talking like a rich person who doesn't know what it's like
to not only not have money but to have a family that doesn't have a lot of
money. It's bordering on Romney's "just borrow $20k from your parents and
start a company!". What about when your parents are borrowing from you?
His end point seems to be that gap years seem to reduce drinking or other
goofiness in college. Why not instead of adding a gap year to the already
ridiculous nature of today's college, get rid of the bloat which makes it so
that you have to spend $50k to go to a 4 year summer camp?
~~~
jcrben
The author said he worked through the gap year as his parents provided no
support.
~~~
remarkEon
Yeah, sure, they provided no material "support."
But they certainly would have if he'd asked, and that's the point. He always
had a lifeline, so to speak.
------
thesmallestcat
So this is what it's like to come from money... whole 'nother world. The
paragraphs about how a "gap year" is not a privilege mostly enjoyed by the
elite, and mental contortions therein, are so painful to read.
> Although I appreciated my parents’ support, I also recognized the extent to
> which it had become detrimental. Their attempts to eliminate any possibility
> of real failure had guaranteed its own kind of failure.
So you rejected it after your enlightening "gap year," right? Right?
~~~
jcrben
Don't see the reason for negativity around "privilege". The point of the essay
seems to be to explain how taking a year to live and work in the "real world"
changes the perspective of a young adult, particularly with regard to
finances.
~~~
remarkEon
>...changes the perspective of a young adult, particularly with regard to
finances.
FTA: Time free from the obligations of schoolwork had enabled me to realize my
passion for writing, and to apply this to an English major, where I would
discover the most formative classes and professors of my education.
Hmmm.
~~~
asdfwhatever
Time scrubbing dishes enabled me to realize how lucky I was and that I should
work harder in college.
------
remarkEon
I think that we're even having this discussion about whether or not a "Gap
Year" is appropriate is more evidence that the entire University system as it
is today needs to be blown up.
>More colleges in the United States are encouraging applicants to consider a
“bridge” year before enrolling, and many independent programs and some
campuses — like Florida State University, the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, Princeton and Tufts — even offer fellowships and financial aid.
This is a huge red flag, is it not? To me this looks like a signal that
Universities are becoming quite worried about their graduation rates (overall
and "within 5 years", which I guess is difficult nowadays) and are willing to
test out whatever it takes to keep enrollment up through all classes.
~~~
gumby
FWIW MIT tracks 6-year graduation rate and takes action (good or not TBD)
based on what they find out.
------
bshimmin
It's interesting from a UK perspective to see this described as a "growing
trend" \- the "gap yah" [1] has been a tradition amongst wealthy students for,
oh, decades over here.
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gap_Yah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gap_Yah)
------
geebee
I think the equation is very different if you major in STEM rather than
humanities or social sciences. An internship at Surfer would probably help you
if you're an English major hoping to break into publishing or magazines, and I
don't think a year off really harms your writing or reading skills the same
way your math skills can atrophy if left unused. My only basis for this
assertion is that I was a double math and English major, and I'd definitely
say this is the case in my life, but I don't have any study to back it up.
A gap year between high school AP calculus and the much faster science and
engineering track "Calc through Differential Equations" sequence at a rigorous
university, on the other hand, could be very risky. Especially in schools like
the UC system where many popular STEM majors are "impacted" and you may get
bounced from the major if your grades are low (I consider this loathsome,
failing out kids who might be bright but struggle a bit in their first year,
but it's a reality).
I did read that the "eliteness" of your college doesn't really matter if you
study STEM, but it makes a big difference if you major in humanities. That may
also account for some of the class difference we see in this gap year issue.
People who attend expensive, private schools, especially elite ones, and who
major in humanities are probably not harmed by a gap year at all. Lower income
people who attend state schools and major in STEM probably don't benefit much,
and may watch their math get rusty just before they enter a challenging
program with minimum GPA cutoffs.
------
dougmwne
What should have been his correct response to growing up with some privilege?
Something other than what he did?
~~~
kneel
He questioned his place in the world and did a little soul seeking. It's
unfortunate that most people don't have this option but there's nothing wrong
with what he did, probably gave him a good perspective that a classroom could
never teach.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Microsoft Blocks FSF Donation Website as a 'Gambling Site' - dartttt
http://www.ubuntuvibes.com/2012/06/microsoft-blocks-fsf-donation-website.html
======
stephengillie
The "verify" link just takes me to an MS error reporting site, which doesn't
present any of the error or informational messages from the articles.
I'm confused. O_o
------
mtgx
I'm worried for a future of a more locked down Microsoft (UEFI, encrypted
bootloaders, allowing you to install only from app stores on the ARM machines)
that doesn't have to be monitored for anti-competitive things anymore
~~~
antidoh
Worried about RIAA? Don't buy (and don't obtain without purchase) their media.
Worried about Microsoft tech? Don't buy it.
Make them irrelevant.
Tell your friends.
------
Kjeldahl
But it is; Gambling with Microsoft's future! ;-)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: A home for your trip itinerary - s1mpl3
I've done a lot of travel over the past couple years and my trip itinerary has always been there to make things run smoothly. Well, I've finally decided to codify this process. No more quip docs or google docs, just https://trrip.co. A home for your trip itinerary.
======
wickedwizard
can you post link to a demo trip?
~~~
s1mpl3
Good suggestion, you mean post a link to a demo trip on the landing page or
post here?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Tape Delay by NBC Faces End Run by Online Fans - echair
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/sports/olympics/09nbc.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
======
noonespecial
FTA _As dancers and acrobats whisked across the National Stadium in Beijing,
anonymous users uploaded more than 100 video clips of the ceremony to YouTube,
but the site, owned by Google, swiftly removed as many as it could. Similarly,
some live video streams on Justin.tv, a popular source for international
video, were also removed. According to International Olympic Committee
guidelines, the television networks with the local rights to the Games are the
only legal sources of video in each country._
I think its time we grew out of the idea that companies can buy the Olympics.
Its supposed to be for everyone. All that BS about unity rings pretty hollow
when its for sale for $900 mil.
~~~
akd
Someone has to pay for it. The Olympics must be an expensive operation. What
do you recommend?
~~~
noonespecial
We could start with the tiniest bit of grace about the thing. JustinTV is not
a threat to televised olympic coverage. Whats going on here is just plain
bullying.
The games are for everyone, form every nation. That means some people might
want to watch it on ARD, auf Deutsch, but live in California. Some people will
catch some interesting stuff on their cellphones and want to share. Its about
the _world_ now, and its not 1960. I'm not saying we shouldn't have
advertising sponsors, I'm just saying we should grow up a little about it.
------
Hexstream
"But NBC, which paid $894 million for the exclusive rights to the Olympic
broadcast in the United States, intends to show some premier events like
swimming live on television only to reach a wider audience and charge higher
rates for advertising. "
Hum... _Don't ask what advertising can do for you, ask what YOU can do for
advertising!_
Seriously, I don't get it sometimes. So much effort expanded on advertising...
for what? For bugging people, mostly. Why are we even bothering with all this
shit? When everyone (ok, mostly big corps) has "high visibility" because of
advertising, then nobody has high visibility.
------
wave
It is true that watching something on computer doesn't give you the same
experience as watching it on TV, but it wrong to assume that everything on the
Internet will be watched only on computers. I don't watch movies/shows from
the Internet (example from Hulu) on a computer, rather I watch them by
connecting my computer to a TV.
------
pongle
I'm surprised the IOC didn't put a requirement for a live broadcast into the
contracts with the broadcasters.
Putting it out live on a separate channel would probably make sense in terms
of segmenting their audience for advertising purposes. I guess since they
depend on raw volumes of viewers, instead of necessarily on quality of
viewers, they have to push people to all watch the same thing at the same
time.
~~~
jrockway
Why would the IOC ever do anything good for the "end user"? They solely exist
to make lots and lots of money. NBC offered them lots of money, so why would
the IOC turn that down?
~~~
pongle
I was surprised because I believe that a large portion of the excitement of
sport is its event nature and viewing a live-event live enhances that
experience, improving the Olympic brand. I guess the IOC was willing to
compromise the brand for the bundle of cash from NBC.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Scientists create quantum sensor that covers entire radio spectrum (0-100ghz) - lysp
https://phys.org/news/2020-03-scientists-quantum-sensor-entire-radio.html
======
lysp
Direct link:
[https://www.army.mil/article/212935](https://www.army.mil/article/212935)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Has anyone sponsored a J1 specialist or trainee? - mezod
Hi, I'm trying to figure out how to sponsor a foreign professional for a J1 visa to work with us. All the info I find links me to https://j1visa.state.gov/participants/how-to-apply/sponsor-search/?program=Specialist , which is a list of designated sponsors, mostly universities and cultural organizations... Do I have to apply through them? Doesn't make much sense...<p>Has anyone ever had to deal with a similar problem? We considered H1B but the process is costly and slow.<p>Any links, info or contacts are highly appreciated!! Thanks!
======
jakozaur
I was in USA few times on J1 as an intern. It is the best visa, if you like to
hire someone for 3 months internship while someone studies at Universities.
Though this is not H1B replacement, as this visa require that trainee/intern
have intern to leave the USA after the program.
If you are employer, you need to contact sponsoring organization. For all
internships I used: [http://culturalvistas.org/programs/us/j-1-internships-
traini...](http://culturalvistas.org/programs/us/j-1-internships-training/)
(they got different name before "CDS International") The paperwork is light,
even startups with reasonable funding can get the visa.
Disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer.
------
jedisct1
I'm a French citizen, but I joined OpenDNS (acquired by Cisco since) on a J-1
Visa.
Most of the paperwork has to be actually done by the candidate, but the
process was pretty straightforward.
I had to pay about $500 for the express/priority/whatever-it's-called version
of the Visa, plus insurance coverage, plus the fee for a local third-party I
used for the application, for a total of about $1500 (that the company was
supposed to reimburse but never did).
Unlike the H1-B, the petition for the J-1 can be done at any time.
The J-1 can be extended twice, and is valid up to 1.5 years. It can be
upgraded to a H1-B, although this requires leaving the country for a couple
weeks in-between.
~~~
tsaprailis
Not looking to hijack the OP thread here but could you provide some additional
information on your case?
I'm thinking of attempting this next year (try to get a J1 visa) when I finish
my Data Science MSc, so could you let me know how easy it was to find a
company, how long it took you to find the position, what was the reason for
your work (thesis, internship), what's your salary level compared to a normal
position in the company etc
Also regarding the J1 visa it was my understanding that you have to return to
your home country for 1-2 years before being able to apply for a H1B, is that
not the case?
Any information is welcome. Thanks in advance
~~~
jedisct1
You need to return to your own country and wait for 2 years to get another J-1
after it expires (1.5 years).
But transitioning from a J-1 to a H1-B doesn't require waiting that much. I
was out of the country only for 1 month or so.
~~~
coherentpony
> J-1 after it expires (1.5 years)
1.5 years might be for your case. For research scholars you can extend it for
up to 5 years.
> But transitioning from a J-1 to a H1-B doesn't require waiting that much. I
> was out of the country only for 1 month or so.
The current processing time for an H1-B visa is eight months. You also aren't
required to leave the country.
I'd be careful taking your experience and extrapolating it to all situations.
People here may be mislead by some of the information you provided.
~~~
martell
I was on a j1 and missed the h1b lottery but I was told I was not required to
go home if I won.
A friend (also on a j1) who won the lottery never had to return home.
He is going home for the holidays however and may now have to go to an embassy
to have his passport done before returning to the US. Will know in the new
year if this is the case.
~~~
coherentpony
> He is going home for the holidays however and may now have to go to an
> embassy to have his passport done before returning to the US. Will know in
> the new year if this is the case.
Yes. If you leave the US without a valid (and appropriate) entry visa stamp in
your passport, you will need to go to a US embassy to get one.
------
swalberg
My understanding of the J1 is that it is a cultural exchange visa and that the
intent is that it's very short term work and specifically not as an
alternative to the H1B.
Another caveat is that the position could be designated as subject to the 2
year residency rule, and therefore your employee would not be allowed to work
in the US for 2 years after their J1 expires.
------
martell
I'm an Irish Citizen. I was on a j1 graduate visa for 12 months. I just
arrived back in my home country this week.
The process is straight forward but you will lose the first month waiting for
approval of the placement. Depending on the country you might need to have the
position approved before your SERVIS start date.
A friend of mine from Catalonia like you (according to your github account)
applying from Spain had to have his placement preapproved.
He managed to get a h1b half way through the year, the transition over to h1b
mid j1 was actually very easy without him having to return home which is
interesting, due to the dual intent of the h1b. If he does go home however he
has to then go to an embassy to get the visa inserted into his passport.
Also you are not always subject to the 2 year rule. It did not apply to my
application nor my friends. If I go back for a second j-1 as a trainee it will
be subject to it next time however.
Feel free to asking any questions.
------
capnrefsmmat
Note that the person you sponsor will most likely be subject to the two-year
home residency requirement: after their J1 expires, they are required to
return to their home country of residence for at least two years before
converting to any US immigrant visa (i.e. any visa which could lead to
permanent residency or citizenship).
If your employee doesn't intend to stay in the US, that's fine, but if they,
say, get married while in the US, they'll have significant obstacles in their
way.
There are certain circumstances in which this requirement doesn't apply or can
be waived, but I won't presume to know if they apply to you.
[https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/study-
exchange/stu...](https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/study-
exchange/student/residency-waiver.html)
~~~
tehlike
I was a j1 trainee thrice. lifting 2 year residency condition was a
prerequisite for h1b. Clearing it was a beurocratic but straightforward
process which involved mailing some papers to my own country's consulate. It
probably depends on the origin country, but for me since my funding was given
by the us school i was interning at, and since there was no involvement of my
government, it was rather straightforward.
Good thing that is all over now :)
~~~
binoct
Glad it all worked out for you!
I would definitely recommend any J1 candidate take a careful look to the
2-year residency requirements and their particular situation. Sometimes it is
relatively painless paperwork to have it waved, however in some situations
they can pretty seriously enforce it.
------
smartician
J-1 trainees get sponsored by a third party exchange organization, not the
company they will be interning at. Typically you (as the host company) and the
candidate work with the exchange organization to complete the paperwork to get
the visa.
When I did my J-1 internship back in 2001, I used CIEE, which was pretty
painless and straightforward:
[https://www.ciee.org/intern/](https://www.ciee.org/intern/)
------
uiri
I've been on a J-1 multiple times with different employers and they've always
used Cultural Vistas. Cultural Vistas has to be the worst, most bureaucratic
organization with which I've ever had the displeasure of interacting. All of
their employees lack basic critical thinking skills to the point that I've
often wondered if I'm dealing with an automated system written by government
contractors.
Are there any sponsoring organizations for J-1 that are not such a pain on the
intern/trainee's part?
------
jaredhansen
We have done this multiple times at Breezy. You won't want to go it alone but
the fees aren't astronomical. I can make good intros; my email is in profile.
------
chank
[https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/study-
exchange/exc...](https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/study-
exchange/exchange.html)
[https://www.ice.gov/sevis/overview#wcm-survey-target-
id](https://www.ice.gov/sevis/overview#wcm-survey-target-id)
------
chillydawg
I think with this kind of situation the best thing for you to do is lawyer up.
~~~
muramira
Lawyers cost money to fill the same long-ass forms that you can fill up
yourself!
------
madman2890
The J-1 visa is going away, according to Trump. Just a heads up...
------
dorianm
I'm on my second J1 Visa, it's pretty straightforward:
\- proving to be a student
\- proving that the job fits with the studies
\- proving that the job is gonna be done in good conditions
\- proving to have enough money to live there
\- etc.
~~~
jedisct1
You can get one even if you are not a student.
The only requirement to be a "trainee" is to be less than 40 years old.
------
wprapido
i was in the states twice on a J1 visa. highly recommended. easy to get. there
is age limit though
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
SpaceX to relaunch rocket Tuesday 12:44 AM PST/ 3:44 AM EST - jasondc
http://www.latimes.com/business/money/la-fi-mo-spacex-second-launch-attempt-20120521,0,1777511.story
======
ChuckMcM
While watching the pre-launch, and listening to NASA comment on the rocket and
its sub-systems, I am left wondering how it feels to be NASA looking at
something which previously only they and the DoD could muster.
Will be a strange new world when one can put 'what ever they want' into orbit
if they have the cash. Yes, I know that up to now that has been handled by
'the brotherhood' (this is what I heard a Lockheed engineer call the set of
public and private actors that were the components of the US space program).
I'm really excited to someone putting up the ULA long duration vehicle [1] (an
internal combustion engine in space, how cool is that?) and depots with fuel
for things to move around. That will be a new day indeed.
[1]
[http://www.ulalaunch.com/site/docs/publications/Integrated%2...](http://www.ulalaunch.com/site/docs/publications/Integrated%20Vehicle%20Propulsion%20and%20Power%20System%20for%20Long%20Duration%20Cyrogenic%20Spaceflight%202011.pdf)
------
ChuckMcM
I remember when all the major networks covered a space launch. The count down,
the NASA checklists, Walter Cronkite talking to some ex-astronaut type person
explaining what was going on. This feels like that (except for the fact that
not a lot of coverage other than NASA TV and a web cast). I appreciate that it
will be on earlier on the west coast, waiting until nearly 3AM was killing me
:-).
~~~
krschultz
I can understand indifference of news outlets. After all, unmanned launches
have become fairly routine. Even cargo missions to ISS have become routine.
The 'what' isn't the exciting part of SpaceX, the 'who' excites us. Most
people probably don't get that.
What I can't understand is the disparraging nature of a lot of the coverage.
Both Slate and the Wall Street Journal had really snarky commentary this
morning about the delayed launch. There were many people poking fun at them on
Twitter.
Meanwhile, as someone who actually follows this stuff, I was amazed by their
ability to shut down the rocket after ignition without damage. I'm also
impressed by the fact they're able to refire the engine almost immediately.
You can't do that with every rocket ever made. Not only is the Merlin engine
cheaper, it's better (than some). That's something to be proud of.
And even if the journalist doesn't know enough about rockets to be impressed
that a failure didn't lead to the thing blowing up on the launch pad, they're
acting as if government launches don't get delayed repeatedly. The Space
Shuttle would seemingly only actually liftoff about 50% of the time they said
it would. It's hardly a major set back that they pushed it back 48 hours. Why
does it seem like people want this to fail?
------
simonb
= 7:44 UTC
------
christianbryant
I'm hoping as these flights become more regular, SpaceX gets into the business
of installing an InterPlanetary Internet.
~~~
Anon84
Technically, there is already an IP address outside the solar system... I
guess that's InterStellar Internet?
~~~
Tossrock
I don't think the Voyager probe uses IP datagrams, and as the furthest manmade
object from Earth, it's not even outside the heliosphere. Perhaps I'm missing
something?
------
thebooktocome
I'm fairly certain that both times should be in PDT/EDT, but time zones were
never my strong suit.
~~~
jeffbcross
I know... get the timezones right, people; it's not rocket science!
------
metatronscube
Watching this from Scotland live over the Internet. Feeling quite excited at
the prospect of private enterprise supplying the International space station
and hopefully kick starting something.
------
bostonvaulter2
Does anyone have a link to where on Space X's site they will be streaming the
video? Preferably including a countdown until launch.
~~~
bhassel
Doesn't have a countdown timer, but the Spaceflight Now mission page has a
pre- and post-launch timeline, as well as status updates:
<http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon9/003/status.html>
Here is a countdown timer until 3:44:38 EDT (the scheduled launch):
[http://www.timeanddate.com/counters/customcounter.html?msg=S...](http://www.timeanddate.com/counters/customcounter.html?msg=SpaceX+Falcon+9+%2F+Dragon+COTS+2+Test+Launch&month=5&day=22&year=2012&hour=3&min=44&sec=38&p0=867)
------
daimyoyo
That was amazing to watch. I honestly feel like I just witnessed history.
------
vitno
so early... oh well, who am I kidding? of course I'll be watching!
------
suborbital
Yes! No failure to launch tonight!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Crate.io on ContainerShip - phildougherty
https://medium.com/containership-articles/crate-io-on-containership-197ec8664cb3
======
spanktar
Spanky from Crate.io here if there are any followup questions.
------
phildougherty
Co-Founder here. I'm happy to answer any questions!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Alan Turing papers on code breaking released by GCHQ - colinscape
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17771962
======
IsTom
Did the Brits publicly apologize for what was done to him yet?
~~~
winknudge
Nope. Would you excuse/apologise everyone who was prosecuted under that law or
just make a special case for Turing?
I too believe what happened was wrong but if you start apologising for some of
the old laws which now seem completely backwards... where does one stop?
------
excuse-me
>A GCHQ mathematician said the fact that the contents had been restricted
"shows what a tremendous importance it has in the foundations of our subject".
It probably shows that nobody with the authority to clear them for release
understood them and it was safer/easier to just stamp restricted and let
somebody else worry about it in another 30years than admit it.
It's pretty much a safe bet that, even within GCHQ, anybody with any seniority
in the British civil service will have no technical background.
~~~
DanBC
> _It's pretty much a safe bet that, even within GCHQ, anybody with any
> seniority in the British civil service will have no technical background._
A tricky question to answer. Most of what they do is secret, and people don't
talk about the work at all.
It's not necessarily a bad thing to leave people good at the job doing the job
and let people good at managing doing the managing.
But look at, for example, mathematician Clifford Cocks who (it's safe to say)
is a good mathematician and is in a position of seniority with GCHQ and
possibly other research partnerships such as the Heilbronn Institute.
(<http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/heilbronn_institute/>)
~~~
excuse-me
> leave people good at the job doing the job and let people good at managing
> doing the managing.
In my experience of UK military/security service there is a boffins + officers
divide attitude all the way up.
Above any level of required knowledge it moves into the Oxbridge/PPE/civil
servant mindset - it shouldn't take too much imagination to realise that these
people aren't necessarily hired for the brilliance in management.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A bonus for HipChat users - Live Chat integration for customer support - kunle
http://www.hipmob.com/hipsplash
======
kunle
Hey HN - Ayo from Hipmob here. Recently several users have asked us about
using HipChat to support customers (there's also a Quora question about it:
[http://www.quora.com/How-would-one-integrate-Hipchat-and-
Ola...](http://www.quora.com/How-would-one-integrate-Hipchat-and-Olark)).
We've made a solution and we're rolling it out would love any feedback to
[email protected]
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Evolution Is the Greatest Show on Erath - pabo
http://m.nautil.us/issue/85/reopening/evolution-is-the-greatest-show-on-earth
======
zelphirkalt
The far far away planet of Erath! The stories told far and wide …
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Interactive editing of basic distance field operation - rinesh
http://stephaneginier.com/archive/editSDF/
======
power
For anyone wondering what distance fields are for, check out:
[http://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarching...](http://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarchingdf.htm)
The code to generate all those images comes to only 13k.
There's a simple tutorial for modelling with distance fields on the same site:
[http://iquilezles.org/www/articles/distfunctions/distfunctio...](http://iquilezles.org/www/articles/distfunctions/distfunctions.htm)
If you're into this kind of thing it's worth exploring that site.
------
iamwil
Did anything change that made this possible that it wasn't possible before?
Was it just that we have faster computers now? Or something else?
~~~
bhouston
Signed distance fields have been used in VFX since the mid-1990s. One of the
first paper formalizing its editing techniques was by Ken Museth in 2002:
[http://diyhpl.us/~bryan/papers2/frey/applications/Museth%20K...](http://diyhpl.us/~bryan/papers2/frey/applications/Museth%20K.,%20Level%20set%20surface%20editing%20operators.pdf)
My contribution to the field (in collaboration with Ken, the author of the
above) is making these scalar volumetric representations more scalable via
using a recursive hierarchical sparse representation:
[https://www.cs.ubc.ca/nest/imager/tr/2006/Batty_HRLE/](https://www.cs.ubc.ca/nest/imager/tr/2006/Batty_HRLE/)
Ken Museth is now the head of R&D at Dreamworks Animation and picked up a Sci
Tech Oscar two years for his level set work:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FwOc4OSOR0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FwOc4OSOR0)
------
zellyn
Pretty nice. Is there any way to see/edit the tree of previously "applied"
primitives?
~~~
zellyn
I really like the SDF visualization in this tutorial:
[https://youtu.be/s8nFqwOho-s?t=12m](https://youtu.be/s8nFqwOho-s?t=12m)
------
fla
Very nice ! I think it would be great to have the max iterations as an option
as well ;)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Amazon launches Houston web services hub as city looks to boost tech sector - lil-scamp
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/Amazon-launches-Houston-web-services-hub-as-city-14189045.php
======
RNeff
Texas cannot be a high tech hub until it prohibits non-compete agreements.
With non-compete agreements, startups can start, but cannot grow.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
We're Trying To Be Less Evil. Really. - zaveri
http://www.thebigmoney.com/blogs/sausage/2009/07/10/were-trying-be-less-evil-really?page=full
======
SwellJoe
This article is over a year old.
Swoopo.com still exists, and is still absolutely and utterly evil.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
From Ruby to Fantom:introspection - geoscripting
http://ssscripting.wordpress.com/2010/01/15/from-ruby-to-fantomintrospection/
======
jamesbritt
A more robust comparison of the two, or something that explained why or when
one would prefer Fantom over Ruby, would be great.
This isn't it.
~~~
geoscripting
That will come as soon as I learn more about Fantom
~~~
jamesbritt
Looking forward to it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Snapline - social recommendations for online retailers via FB Connect - tmcneal
http://www.getsnapline.com
======
tmcneal
Hi everyone,
I'm the (solo) founder of Snapline, which is a B2B startup that lets online
retailers provide their customers with online recommendations via Facebook
Connect. Customers who opt into Snapline will see personalized product
recommendations based on their Facebook profile; so it looks at age, gender,
location, education status, interests -- as well as view and purchase history
-- to determine the best products to display.
I definitely appreciate any feedback you may have, and am happy to answer any
questions!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Legislation proposes paying Americans $2k a month - freediver
https://www.news4jax.com/news/national/2020/04/15/legislation-proposes-2000-a-month-for-americans/
======
millstone
This is a good idea. Congress should commit to such ongoing payments, and the
Fed should back it with a commitment to unlimited borrowing.
Borrowing money is _incredibly_ cheap at the moment, perhaps even negative
cost! Three reasons:
1\. Interest rates are very very low. Borrow when it's cheap.
2\. With these payments, sick people won't need to go to work to have an
income.
3\. Universal payments can keep people out of programs such as SNAP, state
unemployment insurance, etc. These are currently overwhelmed and typically
have high administrative costs, plus human costs in terms of means-testing and
other shortsighted cruelties (would you like to prove you have been looking
for work?)
The article doesn't go into details about the sunsetting provisions (which
ought to be tied to infection rate, deaths, etc) but the idea of "the govt
borrows until the health crisis is over" is correct.
------
lcall
I will try to explain why this is a really harmful, bad idea; that we should
help each other, and there are better ways to do it, and that there needs to
be the basic incentive of working, in life, to live.
To the extent that we remove the connection between choices and consequences,
we harm everyone. This applies in so many ways. This includes things like
lifestyle, including habits, striving to learn & build good family ties,
honesty, choosing to pursue education and service, more than just
entertainment and pleasure (but with appropriate balance), trustworthiness,
avoiding self-destructive behaviors, etc etc. All which greatly affect
employability!
But if we make it easily survivable to live on the wrong side of those...what
do we encourage? At ever-greater cost to everyone... Think we have a drug
problem now?
Some consistently very bad experiences with medicare's and SSA's
organizational incompetence (as reflected in ability to provide remotely
useful information over many weeks and months, etc) make me definitely not
want the federal government to take ever-more resources and control of our
economy and lives.
I do believe we are responsible (before God, and if one doesn't believe, then
at least to our consciences) to care wisely for one another, and with personal
sacrifice to do so -- but not by force.
I also believe, with a fair amount of observation and study among myself and
family, that things resembling forcible socialism (or the fed. government
solving everyone's problems instead of being strictly limited to its
constitutional role) are also harmful to everyone and have been proven many
times to be a disastrous failure (Soviets, Venezuela, etc etc).
Charity by force is wrong and foolish, from Christian principle, long
historical observation, and (to me at least), logic.
Charitable service done voluntarily by individuals, organizations, families,
communities, maybe even states who can then learn from each other what works
vs. not, can be wonderful, and I and many others have seen it work in long-
term multifaceted practice. But when we force a system on everyone -- bad
things happen, in the short and long run.
We can go out and do good and solve problems, by joining with others, using
persuasion and fundraising, creating jobs programs (not federal), promoting
good ideas, seeing what has worked well elsewhere, but not by forcibly taking
control of others people's money (which represents their time and energy,
planning and preparation) and thus a loss of freedom for all. Every crisis
should not be an excuse to expand control by some, over others.
I have written many more details about this & related subjects at my web site,
which is in my profile.
I very much hope we can promote principles over politics, such as: earned
trust matters; opportunity, honesty and the Golden Rule matter; charity is
important, charity by force is wrong, and breaking the link between choices
and consequences harms everyone.
------
nodesocket
330 million americans at $24,000 a year comes out to $7.9 trillion dollars a
year. How exactly are we going to afford that?
~~~
kennywinker
> The bill, known as the Emergency Money for the People Act, would issue
> monthly payments of $2,000 to individuals and families for six months, or
> until the U.S. economy recovers from the coronavirus outbreak.
and then:
> Every American adult age 16 and older making less than $130,000 annually
> would receive at least $2,000 per month.
So every single number in your back-of-the-envelope is wrong.
1\. We're looking at some number between $12k and $24k / year.
2\. The number of americans who qualify is going to be much lower than 330mil.
Since many americans make more than $130k/year, and also many americans are
CHILDREN which only qualify for a $500/month check for their parents.
~3. For MANY of the americans who qualify, a significant chunk of the of up-
to-$24k would be eaten up by taxes.~ edit: apparently it is not going to be
considered income, which suggests it's not taxable. That differs from the
canadian strategy.
Canada is doing this now. It is absolutely the correct thing to do. You can't
tell people not to work to help other people, and not support them in doing
that.
~~~
dmitrygr
_> and also many americans are CHILDREN _
only approx 18.7% [1]
.
_> Since many americans make more than $130k/year_
Actually, approx 90% of americans make _under_ 130k/yr [2]
.
_> a significant chunk of the of up-to-$24k would be eaten up by taxes._
"Under the proposal, the payments would not be considered income"
.
So we can calculate approximately:
(1 - .1) * (1 - .187) * 330M = 241M people
241M x $2000 x 12 = $5.8T/year = A LOT
.
[1][https://www.statista.com/statistics/270000/age-
distribution-...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/270000/age-distribution-
in-the-united-states/)
[2][http://theglitteringeye.com/u-s-income-distributiona-
chart-t...](http://theglitteringeye.com/u-s-income-distributiona-chart-to-
contemplate/)
~~~
kennywinker
10% of americans is 33 million people. That is many.
You're still using 12 months in your calculation. The act says at least six
months, or until it is not needed. So some number equal or greater than 2.9T
Thinking about it as an annual expense seems very wrong. Even if it takes 18
months to recover, I wouldn't say it cost x/year + 1/2 * x/year I would say it
cost the total cost over the 18 months.
Fair point about it not being considered income, I missed that detail in my
haste to make sure the only comment wasn't such a blatant misrepresentation of
the cost of a program like this.
edit: now I'm just nitpicking your math, but 10% of americans make over $130k
and 18.7% of americans are children. I have to think a VANISHINGLY small
number of those two percentages overlap (children making over 130k) so your
calculation:
(1 - .1) * (1 - .187) * 330M = 241M people
should probably be:
(1 - (0.1 + 0.187)) * 330M = 235M people
Which is not materially far off your number, but it is 6M * 2k * 6 = 72B saved
for the american taxpayer ;)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Has anyone had success with Canada's startup visa? - arash_milani
I wanted to know if anyone here has success with "Canada Start-up visa" program:
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/business/start-up/index.asp<p>And if so can you share your experience here? they time it took or any info that you think it is useful for others interested in this program?<p>Thanks
======
a3camero
Very, very few people have been awarded visas under this program. This article
from two months ago says that in the 21 months the program had been running
only five people were accepted: [http://www.techvibes.com/blog/canadas-
startup-visa-program-2...](http://www.techvibes.com/blog/canadas-startup-visa-
program-2015-01-08).
Here's another article from the summer in which the government trumpeted their
acceptance of a total of two people in the first sixteen months of the
program: [http://metronews.ca/news/canada/1098581/immigration-
minister...](http://metronews.ca/news/canada/1098581/immigration-minister-
promotes-entrepreneur-visa/).
~~~
gordjw
If they're promoting such small numbers, I wonder if it's lack of interest
rather than process issues.
------
nojvek
The visa just got started recently but last I heard they are still working out
the details.
I applied for CEC (Canada Experience Class), paid >$4k for lawyer fees but
application got rejected saying quota is fulfilled even though the website
notes that its less than half filled.
Trying now on express entry but I doubt I'll get anywhere. I feel its a broken
system which caters to very expensive lawyers as they know the hacks.
~~~
raquo
Canadian immigration rules are changing multiple times a year nowadays, and
they're doing so without much regard for anyone currently in the process.
While the rules themselves are on par with Australia / NZ (= much easier than
US), the transition is not well thought out. CIC's CEC quota screwup of late
2014 is just one of many examples. Students, PNP nominees, TFWs have all been
screwed in different ways in 2014. While CIC touts shorter processing times
for select categories, they're often using MagicMath. For many categories of
applicants processing times doubled to quadrupled last year.
------
hackerboos
I don't see why the startup capital should be limited to Canadian investors.
I thought about it, but noticed that I had enough points to qualify for the
Federal Skilled Worker program, so went for that prior to the revamp.
The stability offered by Canadian PR visas are much better than almost any
other visa I have read about.
------
bstar77
Can anyone say if there's a benefit to moving my startup to BC? I'm currently
registered in Delaware, but I plan to move to BC within a year (my wife is
Canadian and sponsoring me).
The tax situation looks better, but I'm wondering if someone with actual
experience running a business in both countries could give me some insight.
~~~
throwaway88640
I'm a dual-citizen who has done software startups in both countries.
The advantages of Canada are:
\- free health care, especially important for self-employed
\- retirement plan easier to contribute for self-employed
\- easier tax preparation (no AMT, no IRS 20 rules, etc.) resulting in lower
overall taxes for self-employed with deductions
\- cheaper to hire educated people
\- no federal deficit, so no looming financial crisis
\- virtually no police shootings, SWATing, executions
\- French/English divide is not an issue outside of Quebec
\- good to excellent public schools, few discipline problems
\- no global income reporting.
\- no Selective Service for you or your kids
\- Toronto is an interesting combination of finance/software/mfg, great place
for robotics, makers, etc.
\- Canadian Tire money can really add up!
\- if you're middle class, it's good to be the king!
Advantages of USA are:
\- much easier/possible to get venture investment
\- Silicon Valley
\- often the dollar is higher, though I'm not sure why
\- if you like guns or are far rightwing, welcome home
\- good place to practise trauma medicine/prosthetics
\- if you're the 1%, it's good to be the king.
Same in both countries:
\- 401k and RRSP are very similar
\- same ACH network
\- same timezones.
\- same urban housing prices
\- same culture, but the USA has guns and Canada has politeness.
~~~
hnnewguy
_no federal deficit, so no looming financial crisis_
Huh? Canada's debt-to-GDP is as bad as the US.
~~~
latch
It isn't uncommon for Canada to quote a debt-to-GDP ratio based solely on
federal debt. It isn't how most countries calculate their debt. Depending on
exactly what you do include, Canada's debt-to-GDP is anywhere from 80% to a
little over 100%.
Also, Canada has much higher household debt. It's well past 150% now.
------
AlexBlom
Feel free to shoot me an email (on profile) and I can share details / connect
you with some involved.
I'm an Australian who has been in Canada since 2009. The current iteration of
the startup visa has some odd restrictions on Canadian capital imo.
You are generally better doing WHP to FSW
Disclaimer: ianal
~~~
robertely
> Disclaimer: ianal
May be one of those times not to use an acronym...
~~~
pimlottc
Despite its unfortunate acronym, "IANAL" is an extremely common and well-
understood term going back many years.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IANAL](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IANAL)
------
xbeta
My question is why not go to SV if you are going to leave your home country
for startup anyway.
~~~
dataker
Generally, he would have to either:
1)Invest 1M+ of his own money
2)Be a superstar with hundreds of publications and experience
3)Come as a tourist and pray everything works fine in 3 months
4)Fall in love and get married(...in the Valley?)
~~~
Finbarr
5) work for a company until you get a green card.
~~~
rahulvarshneya
Which could take anywhere from 7-10 years! Easier said than done!
~~~
largote
It doesn't take that long unless you're from India or China.
[http://travel.state.gov/content/visas/english/law-and-
policy...](http://travel.state.gov/content/visas/english/law-and-
policy/bulletin/2015/visa-bulletin-for-march-2015.html)
------
MichaelCrawford
If you'd like to immigrate to Canada for any reason whatsoever, I cannot
possibly recommend my own immigration attorney M. Lee Cohen highly enough:
[http://www.mleecohen.com/](http://www.mleecohen.com/)
His main focus is human rights work (political asylum and refugees) however he
finances that by charging completely reasonable fees for regular immigration
applicants such as myself.
Real nice guy and he knows his stuff.
~~~
sraquo
Thanks! I myself could use a recommendation for Vancouver area.
~~~
miraj
Kyle Hyndman at [http://www.mccrealaw.ca/](http://www.mccrealaw.ca/) \- they
do NOT recommend the 'Startup Visa' program to clients; but would be happy to
discuss other options.
and another Vancouver are firm: [http://sulemanco.com/](http://sulemanco.com/)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
“The Guardian's reader funding model is working” - lemming
https://www.theguardian.com/membership/2018/nov/12/katharine-viner-guardian-million-reader-funding
======
lemming
I've been a monthly donor to the Guardian for a long time now. Their opinion
pieces have been getting more hysterical over time but I just don't read them,
and I think their news coverage is really great.
~~~
aFanOfYou
Agreed. I subscribe to The Guardian Weekly, because The Guardian performs good
investigative journalism and offers good free news. Their opinion pieces
(Comment Is Free) are disappointing, however.
------
milanmio
Mark Curtis used to write for them, but he hasn't been very 'supportive'
lately. Their coverage on war in Yemen and Julian Assange is far from what
journalism should be.
some of his retweets
"This sub-heading is a microcosm of what a joke the Guardian is. After over 3
yrs of UK govt's total backing of mass murder in Yemen, the paper has the
temerity to equate UK policy with easing humanitarian suffering. The state
could not ask for more"
guardian article: [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/nov/05/uk-backs-un-
ca...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/nov/05/uk-backs-un-call-for-
saudi-arabia-and-houthis-to-end-yemen-bloodshed?CMP=share_btn_tw)
[http://www.medialens.org/index.php/alerts/alert-
archive/2018...](http://www.medialens.org/index.php/alerts/alert-
archive/2018/885-how-to-be-a-reliable-mainstream-journalist.html)
I know this thread is not about quality of journalism , but this opened my
eyes before I was going to pay them.
------
mcfunk
The respect for the user here is huge. Every time I would get to the bottom of
an article I would think, you know, I read that whole article, you're right, I
should consider donating. Am a monthly donor now. The lack of a paywall or
obnoxious popup went a long way towards getting my loyalty even though I
historically haven't read it particularly regularly.
~~~
Yaa101
The lack of a paywall is important to enable people to read real news, the
fact that most serious news organisations are hiding behind a paywall enables
less scrupulous sources to poisen the collective concience.
------
ID1452319
The question is whether their subscription model can make up for the fall in
revenue from sales and adverts. Last year their revenues grew by just 1% and
they managed to half their losses by cutting costs.
Whether they can cut another £20m of of costs (or increase revenues) in order
to break even remains to be seen.
------
mark_l_watson
I am also a monthly donor now. I think their coverage is fair and they cover
stories I don’t see elsewhere.
------
toomuchtodo
Also a monthly donor.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
News Corp. Q4: MySpace Profits Down - kennyroo
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/8/news-corp-q4-as-promised-decent-except-for-tv-which-is-terrible-nws-
======
kennyroo
Anybody know what "new features and costs associated with the startup of new
ventures" means?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Eloquent Javascript (ebook) - heseltine
http://eloquentjavascript.net/contents.html
======
robertmrangel
Doesn't scroll when viewed using an iPad. You have to use two fingers.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Amazon to install at least 50 solar systems on its fulfillment centers by 2020 - gordon_freeman
https://www.amazon.com/p/feature/3g9pdpvmnx3f9rf?pf_rd_p=406a6ab1-1ebf-49e9-b90e-7656c8521d51&pf_rd_r=KC5JGXBWT17KDZJ81ATM
======
godmodus
"solar systems" had me scratching my head there for a minute.
solar power grids. excellent!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Ekho, a simple way to add voice interactivity to your site - ppymou
http://ekho.io/
======
sarvagyavaish
Nice implementation!
~~~
ppymou
Thanks!
------
timonovici
for chrome? seriously?
~~~
whacker
I am sure other browsers will be supported in future. Why would a developer
spend time testing other browsers if the project is not even known to succeed?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
I Went Vegan Keto. Here's What Happened to My Body - troydavis
http://blog.insidetracker.com/vegan-keto-body-changes
======
sp332
Good overview of a lot of related factors and a complex conclusion. A problem
in the first paragraph though: glucose is not the same thing as ATP.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Living on a cruise ship cheaper than renting in London - neverminder
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/cruises/news/living-on-a-cruise-ship-cheaper-than-london/
======
easytiger
Where/how are you going to earn £10k a month on a cruise ship?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A Billionaire Mathematician’s Life of Ferocious Curiosity - yagibear
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/08/science/a-billionaire-mathematicians-life-of-ferocious-curiosity.html
======
yagibear
For discussion see later submission
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8004244](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8004244)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: How common is co-founder break-up at pre-launch startup? - tnsn
Working on an early stage start-up now and everything that can go wrong, seem to go wrong. One co-founder recently bailed, another (part-time) co-founder isn't willing to go all-in. I've been blaming myself for this, particularly my judgment of who to work with.<p>How common is this? Would love to hear some thoughts and hopefully, encouragement!
======
muzani
I can't find the exact source, but I recall YC/Paul Graham saying that co-
founders are the hardest part. Break ups early on are likely. It's so hard
that it's probably the biggest factor an investor looks for; it's like how
real estate investors look for location. You can change the type of building,
but not the location. And you can pivot a startup, but not the founders.
Hiring employees is hard, finding co-founders is harder.
My first business was done with a former best friend, the type I'd trust with
my life. But these things happen. People have different values or priorities.
And some don't commit fully. We had different values - he wanted a Ferrari and
I wanted to create high quality jobs. He wanted something to boast about to
friends, and I wanted something that wouldn't be a part of my identity.
Eventually met a great co-founder - he was a stranger I bought a book from via
Facebook. When I asked him to be my co-founder, that was the second time I met
him in person.
It's a lot like dating and marriage. Every mentor I met put it that way. It's
a mix of luck and hard work that puts you in a position to be lucky. Some
people get lucky early, some never, most never really figure it out.
Eventually you just settle for someone who isn't perfect, and a big part of it
working is to put in the effort to make it work.
It also only works if you're a giver and find someone who is similar. If
you're the type who takes as much as you can (most people in business and
elite jobs are), it's going to be really tough. There's just too much gray
area, too many prisoner's dilemmas.
------
Axsuul
Very common, especially with friends. Everyone goes through these pains. It's
easier to talk than to walk. Don't be so hard on yourself about it, just adapt
and move on :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Tim O'Reilly: How I Failed - gruseom
http://radar.oreilly.com/2013/09/how-i-failed.html/
======
DanielRibeiro
I guess this is a recurring one:
_I complained, but I eventually gave in. As we grew, it was harder and harder
to maintain our informal processes. (I remember a real inflection point at
about 50-60 employees, and another at about 100.) We gradually gave up our
homegrown way of doing things, and accepted normal HR practices — vacation and
sick days, regular reviews, annual salary adjustments — and bit by bit, I let
the “HR professionals” take over the job of framing and managing the internal
culture. That was a mistake._
The original process reminded me of Bryan Cantril's (bcantrill on Hacker
News[1], creator of DTrace and VP of Engineering at Joyent) recent post on
_Leadership without Management: Scaling Organizations by Scaling Engineers_
[2], and of Yshan Wong's (former director of engineering at Facebook, and
current CEO of Reddit) writtings on the topic[3].
[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bcantrill](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bcantrill)
[2]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6387649](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6387649)
[3] [http://algeri-wong.com/yishan/engineering-management-
process...](http://algeri-wong.com/yishan/engineering-management-process.html)
~~~
agumonkey
I wonder if there were companies that instead of growing as a single entity
created early spin-offs to diversify aside without losing the core spirit.
It's so common to see success become bloated and resist death by all
commercial means necessary while newcomers bring something fresh to the table.
~~~
hugs
I've wondered for a long time if that's exactly why George Lucas intentionally
created separate companies while he made all his movies (e.g. ILM, Lucasfilm,
LucasArts, THX, Pixar). I wonder if there's either a good book that goes into
detail about that, or if anyone on HN knows him close enough to ask him
directly. :-)
~~~
eatmyshorts
It could be an implicit understanding of Dunbar's number -
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number)
~~~
agumonkey
I remember being told about some companies and government agencies built under
150, but never heard Dunbar's name. Thanks
~~~
rubinelli
You will probably find this book interesting:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maverick_%28book%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maverick_%28book%29)
There are a few other companies organized as "business cells", but Semco is
relatively well-known.
------
coldtea
Well, for me, a consumer, O'Reilly failed in other regards.
1) It started producing mediocre books by the dozens. Gone are the days were
the O'Reilly tomes (like the Perl books) were THE definitive books on a
language.
2) It started promoting all sorts of half-though marketing/visionary crap
(Thomas Friedman means Alvus Toffler style), on Open Source, Web 2.0 etc.
3) The Safari bookstore (which I was on and off subscriber over the years) had
BS restrictions and a bad UI. I haven't even bothered to check if they provide
a good tablet story nowadays.
~~~
iooi
What publishers do you recommend? I've been a real big fan of No Starch Press
lately, though they don't have that many books yet. Syngress also isn't bad.
~~~
InclinedPlane
Manning[1], the Pragmatic Bookshelf[2], and Apress[3] have been the best in my
experience. They cover relevant topics and technologies, the books are
typically written by experts and written well, there are ebook versions of
everything at reasonable-ish pricing, and sometimes you can get early access
to books before their finished.
1: [http://manning.com/](http://manning.com/) 2:
[http://pragprog.com/titles](http://pragprog.com/titles) 3:
[http://www.apress.com/](http://www.apress.com/)
------
Toenex
Nice to read a real veterans perspective rather than the usual "What I learnt
since I started my business last Thursday". Tim admits what he got wrong but
you know that he got so much right and built a sustainable business. Most of
us have favourite O'Reilly book.
~~~
mkramlich
agreed. HN often has too many "yet more oh-so-wise life advice from
20-something white male programmers living in an US city in 2013"-type
articles.
~~~
toyg
Double-agreed: "20-something white male programmers" with great paid-for
education and early access to capital...
------
educating
If Tim reads this:
Tim, _you_ didn't fail. The industry has failed. For the past few-to-several
years, books on technology have been obsolete by the time they are written-
not just published, so you can't make money off of selling even digital copies
of books. Developers read about the latest technology in project readme's
(markdown formatted in GitHub), a wiki, one or more blogs, StackOverflow, and
so on.
What else could your company do to stay relevant? I really have no idea. Posts
on your site that come up in Google are often outdated, so O'Reilly to me is
at most a place where developers that want to give talks and lectures can
publish a book, which probably won't sell much. Maybe it will boost their
resume or help them get more contract work? I really have no idea why people
give talks and write books anymore. It seems like a waste of time that could
be spent developing. Developing good code makes you relevant now.
I just feel sorry for the whole situation. I would have hoped will all of the
publishing money from the 1990's and early 2000's, you'd own your own island,
where you'd be on the beach drinking Coronas. But instead, the company has
apparently tanked. That sucks. I liked the animal-covered books.
~~~
iyulaev
Good observation but I disagree, to some extent. Technical books that teach
low-level knowledge and technologies will always become obsolete quickly. But
books that enable the reader to understand _deep concepts_ rather than
_shallow technologies_ have a much longer half-life. This is similar to the
complaint that engineering school is always "behind the technology curve"
which is nonsense. You don't go to school to learn technology, instead, you
learn the basis underlying it. This latter knowledge changes much more slowly.
A good technical book should aim to teach the same.
~~~
chx
Indeed. When do you think SQL and Relational Theory will be outdated? And, do
you think you can learn that from a wiki or a blog?
~~~
VLM
Even deeper, something like regular expressions, how do they work?
Or shallower (sort of?) you can't sell a cookbook of "whats the regular
expression in perl to match the first word of a sentance" because we have
google for that, but you can sell a style guide type book like "Modern Perl"
where you probably could google everything in that book, but it would take
1000 different searches and not have a common voice.
------
DanielBMarkham
This essay left me unfulfilled, and I'm not sure why.
I was leery of taking so much time reading it. Most times when people write
essays about "How I failed" they're full of self-promotional bullshit, the end
of which is usually something like "I was just too awesome", or "We tried too
hard" or some other pointless throwaway.
Here there's a fair bit of patting himself on the back, but Tim is honestly
trying to get somewhere. Where, I don't know. In parts it reads like he's
finally figured out that he was way too loosey-goosey with feel-good ideas
that he wasn't ready to fight for. In other parts it feels like he's compelled
to make lists of people or groups he should have treated with more attention.
In short, it needs an editor. I'm plowing through 3000 words where a better
structure could probably cut that in half. Is there a thesis? Or is this just
a mashup? I'm betting on the latter, but I'm still not sure.
I love the ideas Tim espouses but not because they make me feel all warm and
fuzzy. I get the feeling this is his criteria. I love the ideas because they
_work_ , they have functional and financial value. Not sticking with them
would be like not paying the electric bill because it was inconvenient.
I liked the essay and voted it up on HN. But I can't recommend it. It's
rambling, it's honest, and it's missing the kind of structural and cognitive
analysis that could have turned a thoughtful recollection into something more
consumable and immediately usable. Sorry to be so negative. It just hit a
weird spot with me where I know there's something really good in there, but I
don't believe the author hasn't done the work of teasing it out for himself,
much less the rest of us.
~~~
mjn
> In short, it needs an editor. I'm plowing through 3000 words where a better
> structure could probably cut that in half.
Ah yes, like an O'Reilly book...
~~~
knxvil
Good luck with that. I worked in the editorial department and most of the copy
edits were outsourced. There's a house style guide that's loosely followed at
best, and other than that, this is what potential authors get for direction:
[http://oreilly.com/oreilly/author/intro.csp](http://oreilly.com/oreilly/author/intro.csp)
That page hasn't changed or really been updated in a few years. Sigh. Moved on
to greener pastures...
~~~
yuhong
I wonder what happened inside. Did Tim know?
~~~
knxvil
I met him once in person, but never heard him talk about the editorial
process. We went through an office reno in my time there that eliminated
cubicles and most offices and created a one-room "collaborative" workspace--
for people who all worked with headphones on. I see what was intended, but
without more editorial structure (i.e., distinct acquisition, development, and
production levels with accompanying procedures and staff), the book-producing
process--and accountability for missteps--was a blur. A distinct contrast was
O'Reilly's contract with Microsoft Press: Those books received special
handling as opposed to O'Reilly-branded titles, and MS provided massive
amounts of documentation for editors to use, as opposed to the O'Reilly mantra
of "preserve the author's voice." It was, at best, a confusing place to work
for someone with a background in traditional book publishing.
------
WestCoastJustin
> _We started Safari Books Online as a joint venture with our biggest
> competitor ..._
If you do not know about _Safari Books Online_ [1], do yourself a favor and
check it out! You pay a smallish monthly fee, and get access to digitized
books. Want to learn about XZY tech, just head over to Safari Books Online and
read the latest and greatest books, pick the chapters you want, and move on.
Most university libraries will have access agreements, so this will most
likely be free, or ask your company about a corporate membership!
I am not affiliated with them, just a very happy customer. This is the perfect
use case for me, since I typically will read tech books only once, never
looking at them again, and just google from that point on.
[1] [http://www.safaribooksonline.com/](http://www.safaribooksonline.com/)
~~~
ebiester
The problem is, they're not putting out the best books anymore, and I find
myself going there less and less. Right now, I think I'd rather have access to
Manning's titles, even though there aren't nearly as many.
There's something that just... isn't there anymore with most of the oreilly
books.
~~~
Stratoscope
Just checked and I see 173 Manning titles listed on Safari Books Online right
now.
~~~
ebiester
I should say manning's MEAP program, of which I have been buying a few
recently and don't believe make it to safari.
------
davidy123
As much as he's done great things, there's a bit of "O'Reilly promotes
neoliberalism and business as the only answer," the kind of thing that should
ideally go away at some point in free/open/participatory society.
~~~
drewda
c.f. O'Reilly as "The Meme Hustler" (in the words of Evgeny Morozov):
[http://www.thebaffler.com/past/the_meme_hustler](http://www.thebaffler.com/past/the_meme_hustler)
~~~
selimthegrim
Jaron Lanier makes the case a bit better.
~~~
aridiculous
I'm not sure Lanier goes after O'Reilly as strongly and directly.
Morozov's article is a complete roast of O'Reilly. Though certainly
entertaining in style, the real gem of the The Meme Hustler is Morozov's basic
theory of PR: Those who control the "discourse" (the words and phrases used to
describe and name new phenomena in books, magazines, blogs, newspapers) have
incredible influence across industries — especially when there's little
opposition. As a niche publisher in the esoteric (but simultaneously
important) field of bits and bytes, O'Reilly has capitalized on this and has
faced little criticism from other industries.
Politicians and Fortune 500 CEO's face pushback to their BS all the time,
sometimes initially led by Critical Studies departments. This Baffler article
was one of the the few times I've seen a technologist explicitly called on his
ideology (beyond the profit motive).
I suspect Mr. O'Reilly wasn't too pleased about it.
------
drewda
Like the teaser ads leading up to a reality TV show's new season, this
confessional "tell all" is probably part of the promotional rollout of
O'Reilly's new conference series:
[http://cultivatecon.com/cultivate2013](http://cultivatecon.com/cultivate2013)
~~~
thu
This is a well-written and articulated article. It is as much a teaser ad as
picking 3 chapters out of 15 of a consistently good book and making them
available for free. I mean that, even if making them available for free is
part of the promotional plan, writing them was genuinely done for the content.
Edit: Another way to look at it: Don't you get value out of it by reading it
even if you don't attend the conference ?
------
smoyer
I've got about 84" of my office shelves devoted to O'Reilly books and while
Tim may be able to see failure in hindsight, the only thing I want to convey
to him is my thanks ... I wish my failure was so grand.
------
kriro
O'Reilly strikes me as the company that could "disrupt" the dreaded academic
publishing industry.
They have solid experience in classic publishing and online publishing and a
culture rooted in openness. They also have the brand to attract enough peer
reviewers and the like.
And they know how to "fill the gas tank" via conferences if they want to go
that route so maybe they should just prototype a couple of academic
conferences and see how it goes.
------
hexis
They write some great ads over there at O'Reilly.
------
fallous
Failure #7: The Founder needs to STFU:
Your customers at the end of the day define your business, because they spend
the money that enables you to continue. While you believe you have great
thoughts, as a commercial entity you do not have the luxury of such things
because the market speaks louder than your own ego.
I like Tim, a lot, but at the end of the day he vainly spoke as O'Reilly media
and not as Tim (a guy who has some smart things to say but is independent from
a company) and that has an impact. If Gates spoke as MS HMFIC about
vaccinations he would get roasted in the market, but Tim never divorced
himself from the company and thus made the company suffer for his own personal
conceits. If you're a sole propietorship then you can afford such luxury, but
Tim had a larger vision for the company yet confused himself with that vision.
~~~
forgottenpaswrd
"The Founder needs to STFU: Your customers at the end of the day define your
business, because they spend the money that enables you to continue. While you
believe you have great thoughts, as a commercial entity you do not have the
luxury of such things because the market speaks louder than your own ego."
You have someone that understands the market way better than you do, as his
extensive track record supports.
Who are you to talk to him like this? I mean the insulting part "Shut the fuck
up".
I admire this person because I have a company and I know how incredibly hard
is to do what this man has done, he is talking about the real problems that
real companies have. You talk about luxuries as if what this person has was
given to him in a silver plate.
"Tim never divorced himself from the company and thus made the company suffer
for his own personal conceits"
When you have a company your company always suffers from your personal
conceits, whenever you realize it or not. For example if you made a company
your beliefs about "what the market wants" will be as subjective as Tim's,
only that probably Tim's will be better adjusted to reality, because he has
proven that he is good at it and you don't.
Everybody believes to be more objective in his decisions that others, like
everybody believes to be more intelligent than everybody else. It is very easy
to see the straw in someone else's eye.
What is your point? That nobody is perfect?
------
mrbill
I have "UNIX in a Nutshell" and "Essential System Administration" (the better
1st and 2nd Editions, not the 3rd which was ..eh) to thank for my career.
~~~
ezequiel-garzon
What disappointed you about the third edition? I don't know the previous ones.
I imagine they were probably more concise?
------
psadri
This is a really nice, reflective post that represents a lifetime of lessons.
I'd encourage people to read it carefully.
Tim O'Reilly changed the trajectory of my life and probably countless others
how self-taught themselves using the famous O'Reilly books into a job or often
much more.
------
lifeisstillgood
> Financial discipline matters. It really matters.
oh god yes. money is like a blind spot to me - but this line speaks to me best
in a whole article that reeks of good advice.
thanks Mr Oreilly.
~~~
S_A_P
Money likes to flow. It feels "good" to let money flow. Using discipline is at
odds with almost every natural instinct that most people have. When a windfall
heads your way it is easy to think it is endless. Treating them with respect
is probably the best business lesson an entrepreneur can learn.
------
beat
This, considering that he succeeded so wildly - not just in building a
successful business, but in making the culture of the software industry so
much better.
------
philbarr
For me, as a perpetual employee that would love to run his own business one
day (and is working towards that), this is quite an insight, but I'll bet it's
hard to do it another way:
\-------------------------------------------------------------
The only raises we had were merit raises, as you improved your skills and
impact. You were expected to manage your own time, with no set hours, and the
only responsibility around vacation time was to make sure that no balls got
dropped.
Eventually, I hired an employment lawyer to review my draft, and he said,
“That’s the most inspiring employee manual I’ve ever read, but I can’t let you
use it.”
I complained, but I eventually gave in. As we grew, it was harder and harder
to maintain our informal processes. (I remember a real inflection point at
about 50-60 employees, and another at about 100.) We gradually gave up our
homegrown way of doing things, and accepted normal HR practices — vacation and
sick days, regular reviews, annual salary adjustments — and bit by bit, I let
the “HR professionals” take over the job of framing and managing the internal
culture. That was a mistake.
\-----------------------------------------------------------
------
tom_b
_Failure #4: Tolerating mediocrity
We ended up building a culture where managers too often compensated for the
failings of employees by working around them, either working harder
themselves, hiring someone else to fill in the gaps, or just letting the
organization be less effective._
As an employee, observing these indicators should probably push you to change
to a better situation.
------
Flenser
It's encouraging to read this having read Stephen Few's blog post "O’Reilly
Media Has Lost Its Soul"[1] earlier this year about his troubles publishing
Information Dashboard Design through O’Reilly Media and choosing to publish
the second edition without them and how difficult they made it.
[1]
[http://www.perceptualedge.com/blog/?p=1521](http://www.perceptualedge.com/blog/?p=1521)
------
eli
Michael Lewis talks about how students used Liar's Poker as a how-to guide in
the preface to The Big Short. (Both are excellent books; he's a talented
writer.)
------
jonstokes
I think StackOverflow is probably the true "spiritual" successor to O'Reilly
(especially the animal books).
SO : O'Reilly :: web : print
------
kfk
I see not many here are commenting on the _Treat your financial team as co-
founders_.
~~~
mcguire
Or, "We even discovered several cases of fraud! That goes back to my point
above about the importance of a crack financial team — _one of their key jobs
is to have strong controls in place_."
~~~
kfk
Yeah, it is very sad this and also my and your comment got no feedback at all.
My opinion is skewed, because I work in controlling, but most of these guys
are sometimes so focused on "growth" and other myths that they forget to build
an actual business.
------
moron4hire
"I complained, but I eventually gave in. As we grew, it was harder and harder
to maintain our informal processes. (I remember a real inflection point at
about 50-60 employees, and another at about 100.) We gradually gave up our
homegrown way of doing things, and accepted normal HR practices — vacation and
sick days, regular reviews, annual salary adjustments — and bit by bit, I let
the “HR professionals” take over the job of framing and managing the internal
culture. That was a mistake."
I worry about this with my own "company". I have two different projects right
now, one that brings in money and I'm starting to add people to, one that has
a couple of people and might soon bring in money. I see them separate only in
so much as the people of the second one aren't interested in the work of the
first one at this time. There will be opportunities in the future to merge the
two.
I started working for myself because I hated working in modern office culture.
I was always interested in being more than just a code-monkey. I wanted to
understand the business and work practically and efficiently to create good
_value_ for our clients. I saw that a lot of programmers where architecture
astronauts and a lot of project managers were unchecked salesmen and I thought
I could be the best of both worlds by being honest with both the customer and
myself about what could and couldn't be done. I didn't want to delay releases
just because I was more interested in scratching an intellectual itch than
getting the work done. But I also didn't want to over-promise on deliverables
knowing that it would lead to an even bigger argument in a month's time when
we didn't get 6 months worth of programming done.
And I got sick and tired of my health issues, fundamentally created by my
overly demanding employers, being treated like they were a personal problem
that I shouldn't bother them with. I'm sorry, you keep me in the office
overnight, I'm not coming in on time the next day. It's not "unprofessional"
for me to fall asleep in a meeting in which I'm not even expected to
participate the day after you dumped last-minute changes on me, changes I know
you kept to yourself because I overheard you on the phone talking about it and
how you knew it would be easier to convince me to stay if the situation seemed
dire. The chemical depression I experienced as a result of the poor nutrition,
lack of sleep, and lack of sunlight you imposed on me through feeding me at my
desk and holding my job over my head _was_ fundamentally your fault, as was
the resulting complete lack of productivity. You can't work someone 100 hours
one week and expect them to be as fresh as a daisy the next.
Ahem, sorry, got lost there for a minute.
The last thing I want to do is be responsible for creating a business that
becomes the very thing I despise. But I won't be able to oversee everything.
I'm going to have to hire people who will be responsible for hiring more
people. The fundamental structure of the company will have to be built on the
understanding that treating employees with respect is not just a phrase for
the promotional material.
The problem is that it's a whole litany of problems. You can't just focus on
the vacation time or core hours or snacks and games in the break room.
Frankly, even when I was in my early 20s I didn't care for snacks and games at
work. I wanted to work at work and play at home. It's hiring practices, it's
how you communicate with your customers, it's how you organize work, it's who
you hire for work, it's the sort of work you do, it's 100% of everything that
a company does, and if any one part of it is out of whack it's going to
corrupt it all.
In O'Reilly's example of his "Rules of Thumb" manual, he hired the wrong
lawyer, a lawyer that was only interested in viewing the problem through the
lens of common corporate lawyering. He needed a lawyer that was just as
devoted to recreating the work place as he was and understood that it was his
(the lawyer's) job to protect that environment, not completely destroy it just
because it wasn't easy to protect it.
And it scares the shit out of me. How many of my former employers started
their own companies because they hated working for their own former employers?
How do I avoid being ultimately responsible for someone's terrible work-life
balance?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
About CSS corners - niyazpk
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2010/03/19/the-css-corner-about-css-corners.aspx
======
daleharvey
add css animations, gradients, multiple backgrounds, tranforms, text shadows,
box shadows
then ill be impressed about improving an edge case on a feature other people
implemented 5 years ago.
~~~
billybob
I agree, but still - hooray! IE has been slooooooowww to change for a long
time, while other browsers have innovated rapidly.
If IE does something better than everyone else, no biggie - they'll catch up
quickly. Meanwhile, IE is actually aware that they have to compete on
standards. That's a wonderful thing to see.
Of course, without Firefox, Chrome, Opera, and others kicking their butts,
Microsoft would never have done any of this. Competition helps the user. And
now maybe it will flow the other direction a little.
~~~
fnid2
You know, philosophically speaking, I'm not sure competition really _does_
help the end user. Is a constant search for something better good? Is life
_now_ bad? Do we really _need_ it to be improved? Perhaps the idea that it
_can_ be improved -- or even _should_ be -- is _itself_ a negativity creator.
Beyond those questions, some of the tactics and strategies used by competitive
companies don't lead to better lives. For example, if VHS had never been in
competition with BetaMax, our lives would be better because Betamax is better
than VHS. Perhaps if there was less competition, many of the startups that are
put out of business every day would survive longer and provide even _more_
better life. Sometimes competition destroys the _best_ alternative.
Little things like that make me wonder about our conviction that competition
is better.
Further still, imagine if all the energy spent competing was spent
_collaborating_! Imagine if we all focused on a better life, rather than two
separate teams focusing on two separate paths to that better life. Mozilla
team + Chrome team _could_ be a better scenario than Mozilla team vs. Chrome
team.
So, my point is, It's not really that clear cut that competition makes our
lives better. Another example, in many countries around the world with single
payer health care systems, the people live longer, have lower infant
mortality, and disease than in the U.S. where there is competition for health
care provision and insurance.
So I'd like to see some evidence for the claim that competition makes lives
better and products better. And, even if they do, does it matter that those
products have become better? Does the fact that our lives will be better 10
years from now mean we can't be happy today? Should we not focus on being
happy with what we have? If competition weren't the status quo, _maybe_ there
would be something existing right now to make our lives better than our lives
currently are, but we simply _don't know_ about it. It's _not_ here. It
doesn't exist. If it did exist, perhaps our lives would be better, but we only
_believe_ they are better because we can compare our lives with this thing
existing with our lives when it didn't exist.
Would our lives be better if we could colonize mars? Would we have been able
to colonize mars if we had worked _with_ the Russians during the cold war? How
much more progress would have been made if we had collaborated? Instead,
competition has led to nuclear proliferation -- is that a _good_ thing?
If there were only one browser, my life would be better. I wouldn't have to
develop for four... wait, _five_ browsers. I'd be able to spend more time
focusing on the features and requirements of the system, rather than IE
showing a div a little higher or than Firefox. Or Chrome throwing an error on
an Ajax call. Or adding IF statements to handle key presses.
Take it to the logical extreme. What if there were 20 browsers each with 5%
market share? Would life be _even_ better _still_?
~~~
mhb
Your argument focuses on whether incremental improvements produced by
competition make us happier and, with respect to those, you might be right.
But, in the larger view, competition is what made anyone invent Betamax at
all. Or flat panel TVs instead of CRTs or cell phones instead of telegraphs.
~~~
khafra
Competition is why we're walking, talking, and building tools, instead of
being one-celled creatures without a nucleus. The question of which state of
being is better is left as an exercise for the reader.
~~~
fnid2
It's also why we are creating a spaceship earth that is uninhabitable by
humans, but plenty fine for single-celled organisms. The future of humanity is
left as an exercise for the reader.
------
latch
IE's implementation seems to be the best. Unfortunately, the post kinda comes
off as being one big "our implementation is the best"
~~~
romland
Yeah, in the comparisons they did, IE definitely came out on top. But I didn't
really have a problem with the attitude of the post, "look at our shitty
implementation" is not really worth writing home about.
------
Shorel
IE needs to lose a lot more of marketshare.
Microsoft always produces great software when they are the runner ups.
------
thwarted
_First specified back in 2002, border-radius was already supported by Firefox
1.0 in 2004 as –moz-border-radius. Almost three years later, Safari 3.0
followed with –webkit-border-radius. In December 2009, the specification
became a Candidate Recommendation. A few weeks ago, Opera’s 10.50 release was
the first to add support the property without a vendor prefix._
This kind of wording continues to perpetuate that vendor prefixes are bad.
Opera should only have implemented the property without the vendor prefix
(although, technically, there's no such thing as a "property without the
vendor prefix" and "a property with the vendor prefix", they are really two
different properties with, by design, potentially different implementations)
if it conforms to the agreed upon standard (I don't know if it does, Opera is
good about that, so I assume it does). I don't expect anyone else to provide a
bare border-radius property that doesn't conform to the standard, if they
can't conform to the standard, they should be using vendor prefixes.
You know what we haven't seen enough of is vendor prefixed property names that
provide different implementations so that developers and designers can try out
different things in the same browser as a way to move towards a standard.
-moz-foobar-a and -moz-foobar-b could be two implementations of the same
property, that perhaps render differently based on an ambiguity in the
proposal and which one gets picked for the foobar property is based on actual
in-the-wild-use based on developer needs.
------
mtarnovan
Unfortunately, the time when 95% of the users will have a decent browser is
still years ahead of us. I wonder if by the time IE9 with rounded corners
support is widespread, they'll lag behind the other browsers on css
transforms...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
e7: a new Lisp dialect inspired by Python - paul
http://e7code.org/doc/progress-report.html
Also see <a href="http://e7code.org/" rel="nofollow">http://e7code.org/</a>
======
jey
I ran into the author of this a few months ago at a SuperHappyDevHouse party.
He's a pre-IPO Googler and is now working on developing this Lisp dialect.
I'd like to propose the "Graham-Tiedemann Law": All Lisp hackers who get rich
will go on to create their own Lisp dialect.
/ _dislodges tongue from cheek_
------
dpapathanasiou
If you're in NYC next month (Aug. 14, to be exact), you might be interested in
Perry Metzger's presentation:
_"Otter, a new dialect of Lisp. Otter is strongly influenced by Scheme and
Python, with some bits of inspiration from Common Lisp, Perl and other
languages thrown in, as well as some strange ideas Perry came up up with on
his own."_
(see the LispNYC site for details on the meeting:
<http://lispnyc.org/home.clp>)
------
mattculbreth
Cool. Interested in PG's take on it.
------
paul
Also see <http://e7code.org/>
------
palish
What's PG always say..? Something along the lines of, "If competition springs
up around what you're doing, you're doing the right thing"?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Human Password Manager v0.1 - n1000
https://github.com/nheeren/humanpass/blob/master/README.md
======
Tomte
The salt is nasty to remember, the position of the salt is nasty to
remember... just use the "XKCD scheme" or Diceware and get on with your life.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
C#: No, you don’t get to use the “as” operator any more - Indyan
http://badcodemonkey.wordpress.com/2011/04/29/no-you-dont-get-to-use-the-as-operator-any-more/
======
snprbob86
Many language designers, including many on Microsoft's Managed Language teams,
consider null reference and invalid cast exceptions to be huge blunders.
The "Nice" language shows that it's pretty easy to statically avoid this:
<http://nice.sourceforge.net/safety.html>
The sad fact is that the Java and .NET base class libraries were designed
before (1) generics and (2) a generic "Nullable" (aka "Option") type were
available. Anyone designing a statically typed environment today should
certainly include both and design a compiler to enforce their usage and
safety.
~~~
ssp
The main problem with non-nullable types is that the static analysis involved
doesn't work for object fields., so you can't write code like this:
if (object.some_field != null)
object.some_field.foo();
because the compiler is unable to prove that it's correct. Instead you have to
do a clumsy workaround like this:
SomeType some_local;
some_local = object.some_field;
if (some_local != null)
some_local.foo();
~~~
Groxx
That seems like it would be a trivial thing to do in an early compilation
step... why is the workaround necessary?
~~~
ssp
The problem is that if the code looks like this:
if (object.some_field != null) {
some_unrelated_call();
object.some_field.foo();
}
proving that some_unrelated_call() didn't set object.some_field to null is
very difficult.
~~~
kenjackson
In _general_ , it's also difficult to prove that 'object' doesn't get set to
null too.
~~~
ssp
Depends on what you mean by "general", I suppose, but if 'object' is a local
variable in a Java-ish language, then there is a fairly straightforward data
flow analysis that can do a good conservative estimate.
~~~
kenjackson
_but if 'object' is a local variable in a Java-ish language, then there is a
fairly straightforward data flow analysis that can do a good_
But if it's not, and/or if it can be adress taken...
------
mendicant
Yes, null refs are bad.
But so is an InvalidCastException -- Which is what your new code could throw.
~~~
ondrasej
I guess the point of the article is that when you're doing an invalid cast,
you in fact want to get an InvalidCastException, not NullPointerException.
~~~
iramiller
Actually you don't want to ever use exception driven development. The use of
the as operator is a simple metadata check. Throwing exceptions in .Net is
expensive.
Just because I felt the need to check my own facts (Friday afternoon?) I wrote
a simple console app with two classes Class1 and Class2 : Class1. Using a
Stopwatch object I checked the elapsed ticks for an 'as' an 'is' and an
invalid cast exception check.
'as' = 5 ticks
'is' = 4 ticks
'invalid cast' = 147990 ticks
Note this was just enough test to validate my assumption and that I never
condone my developers taking an optimize first development approach... But
there is still a right and a wrong way to do the job sometimes and exception
driven development is not the right way.
~~~
masklinn
> Actually you don't want to ever use exception driven development. The use of
> the as operator is a simple metadata check. Throwing exceptions in .Net is
> expensive.
it doesn't matter, it's throwing an exception when the caller code is broken.
That's ok, it's an error.
------
jasonkester
It's best if you think about the reason that "as" was added to C#. It's so you
can do this:
Customer c = person as Customer;
if (c != null)
{
// do something
}
else
{
// not a customer. must be just a regular person. do something else
}
instead of this:
if (person is Customer)
{
Customer c = (Customer)person;
// do something
}
else
{
// not a customer. must be just a regular person. do something else
}
... and that's it. It's just somebody's idea of a little cleaner syntax, not
having to cast twice to get where you want to be.
In that light, the author's second example is closest to correct. It's just
missing the "else" bit to handle the case where the base object you get passed
is not be the exact type you're looking for.
------
singular
EDIT: Actually, yes, _ahem_ , I see - if e.NewItem is actually null you're
going to get confused between what the problem actually is here, and that
might not be repro. Perhaps I posted a little too soon... but assuming you
check for that separately, the point stands :)
I have to disagree here - I prefer the initial code example. It's cleaner, and
as soon as you get to the line of code in the debugger you'll know exactly
what's up regardless of the on-the-surface-misleading null exception. So what
if it's initially confusing?
In any case both examples are wrong, and I don't think that's made clear
enough - you should be _actively_ looking to check for exceptions, not
passively accepting that they might happen.
As an aside, I've always found it cleaner to say:-
var cust = e.NewItem as Customer;
if(cust == null)
throw new BlahException("blah blah blah");
cust.Save();
Compared to, say:-
if(!(e.NewItem is Customer))
throw new BlahException("blah blah blah");
var cust = (Customer)e.NewItem;
cust.Save();
(Note that in the second case that a thread could jump in and spoil your day
anyway, not to mention that .NewItem could be some crazy property which
randomly decides to return null in the second case, and you'd get the same old
nasty exception, as mentioned in other posts)
So I think the 'as' operator has value in this alone as handy sugar.
Obviously the real problem is that null exceptions happen at all, or that
anything actually returns null, and by God is the Option discriminated union
in F# a joy (union of Some/None) after dealing with all that shizzle.
------
noblethrasher
I would make the public version of Save a static method on an abstract class
(or a static method in a utility class) and avoid the whole worry over null.
It's only a bit more work up front.
abstract class Foo
{
public static Result Save(Foo foo)
{
if(foo != null)
foo._Save();
else
{
//Do Stuff...
}
}
protected abstract Result _Save();
}
Then use like so,
foreach(Foo s in xs)
{
Foo.Save(s); //or s.Save() if Save() is an extension method.
}
~~~
jbrechtel
This misses the author's point. In his example the bug you want to detect is
that the referenced object in question is not a Customer (or a Foo in your
example).
In your else block you can't report anymore information than the
NullPointerException in the author's original example reported.
If you still use an 'as' operator at the callsite then you've lost all useful
information. If you do a cast then you'll at least get an exception with WHAT
it was you were trying to cast.
~~~
noblethrasher
I don’t think that I’ve missed the author's point; but any time I see an if
statement and polymorphic code used near each other, I question whether or not
the programmer understands OOP. His example is not _exactly_ using polymorphic
code, but he is basically dispatching based on the runtime type.
We know that a method that accepts parameters that are reference types should
check to see if they are null. Since instance methods cannot check their first
parameter (the this pointer), we make it impossible for outside code to call
instance methods. Now callers never have to worry about the runtime type of an
object or whether or not it’s null.
If you’re going to circumvent the type system with explicit casts then, of
course, you’re going to get invalid cast exceptions, but that’s for the client
code to deal with.
------
scottdw2
Actually... he misses a big use case (stolen from haskell)... Using extension
methods (which accept null receivers) and "as" you can get pretty readable
straight line code... something like:
name = (obj as Customer).LiftName() ?? "Guy Incognito"
Interestingly, built in support for this (w/o the need to write a "LiftName"
extension method) almost made it into VB 2008, but it ended up getting cut.
------
singular
There are subtleties to it too -
[http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericlippert/archive/2009/10/08/what-...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericlippert/archive/2009/10/08/what-
s-the-difference-between-as-and-cast-operators.aspx)
:-)
------
tomjen3
I tend to use it because it makes it reading from left to right feel right
instead of jumping back and forth.
And really, don't give me null objects unless I specifically say I can handle
them.
------
InclinedPlane
((e.NewItem as Customer) ?? Customer.NullObject).Save();
Edit: The idea being, you have a sub-class of Customer which implements the
Null Object pattern, which you instantiate through a static member on Customer
or a Property method or what-have-you. The great thing about this is that you
can tailor the behavior in this situation to whatever you want. Want to throw
an exception? Sure, throw whatever exception you want from
CustomerNullObject.Save(). Want to log an error and otherwise silently fail?
No prob, easy peasy.
------
k2xl
strange... ecma script allows it...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Hiring Great People (and rules for how we do it) - borski
http://blog.tinfoilsecurity.com/hiring-great-people
======
tptacek
_I’m not sure who originally told us about the Sunday test and the Caller ID
test, but if they remind me I would certainly like to thank them. These two
very simple ideas have kept us from making some very bad hires, and have
convinced us to make others that were great. The Sunday test is as follows: if
the candidate is in at the office alone on a Sunday afternoon, would you be
more likely to come in and work with them? That answer has to be yes. We want
to be excited by our colleagues, and not feel like we’re holding them up or
they’re dragging us down. The Caller ID test is equally important, and is as
follows: if the candidate calls you on a Friday night and wants to spend time
hanging out or working, are you more likely to pick up or let it ring to
voicemail? If you wouldn't pick up the phone, that candidate is the wrong
hire._
Argh. These rules are toxic. You are unlikely to predict your best hires. A
lot of evidence suggests that engineers are uniformly bad at making subjective
judgements about future performance. The "Sunday" and "Caller ID" rules
basically put a deceptive veneer on the most subjective of all criteria: the
"gut check".
That's bad enough, but both rules also have a pernicious culture effect. In
companies full of 20-something Red Bull drinking 11a-9p gamer nerds, the rule
gets you more gamer nerds. In companies full of 30-somethings with kids, you
get more people with kids. This is exactly what you don't want to have happen;
a real culture adapts to any positive competent person you find. Good cultures
figure out down the road how to get people to hang out outside of work. They
also accept people who just don't want to spend their out-of-work time with
their officemates. Why would you want to filter those people out? That
property has no known correlation to ability or performance.
Finally: do you really want to be the hiring manager who says out loud that
you have a rule built into your hiring process that involves people working on
Sunday? _Don't make people work on Sunday_.
The sooner we kill the "Sunday rule", the better.
~~~
ainsleyb
This is an interesting take. For us, it's not about age, but about
personality. We have a financial controller who is 20 years older than
everyone else on the team and we'd bring her on full-time in a heartbeat if we
needed a full-time controller. She has a great personality, is fun to have in-
house, and knows what she's doing.
How I look at the Sunday test is less of a "are they like me" and more of a
"will I get along with them many hours a day"? We work anywhere from 7 hours a
day, up to 18 (especially during major code pushes) - we try to avoid this as
much as we can, but sometimes (for us at our stage), it's inevitable.
I do have to enjoy working with my colleagues, and someone for whom I won't be
willing to come in on a Sunday has a higher chance of bringing me down on a
regular basis. That doesn't mean we work Sundays (we're typically in the
office M-F), but it's important to be able to get along with people and it's a
good litmus test, imho.
~~~
freework
I'm the opposite. I don't want to work with people who I "get along with". I
want to work with people who will tell me I'm an idiot when I do something
idiotic. I want someone who puts all their effort into creating great
technology, not someone who puts all their effort into being liked. I have
thick skin, so it doesn't bother me to work with an abrasive person.
That, of course, only applies to programmers. On the other hand, if I'm hiring
a salesman, I'd want that person to be the kind of person who puts all their
effort into being a likable person. The same goes for hiring managers. Being a
likable person will get you far in many positions in a business. Programming
is not one of them.
~~~
borski
We all have thick skin at Tinfoil - we don't want to hire someone who is
necessarily liked by everyone, or who won't tell us what is on his/her mind
and be honest. We're incredibly transparent, and whether or not we like
someone is certainly not the /only/ reason we would hire someone. Honesty and
straightforwardness is a trait we value a lot.
~~~
tptacek
For some reason this thread makes me think of this old HN thread:
<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2030433>
'iamelgringo (who I miss!) is telling me that just because I feel like I get a
good night sleep on 5 hours or whatever it is I get, doesn't mean my sleep
quality isn't horrible due to apnea, and that maybe over the long term the
apnea might kill me.
I think it's the same with hiring. Everyone thinks they do it well; you look
around you, feel like you like everyone you work with, and then write up the
process that got you there. What's dangerous is if your current success is a
fluke, and the process you set up is a recipe to become insular, or a
stepping-stone job for SFBA people, or (worst of all) one of those companies
you can't work for if you're a mom --- and I know you personally don't want to
be any of these things!
You are awesome and I'd love to work with you someday. I just hate the way you
say you hire. :)
------
freework
I'm going to tell a story that describes why I don't like "Sunday tests".
Before I became a professional developer, I was a professional pilot who
programmed as a hobby. Right after graduating college in 2006, I got a job
right out of school working for a flight school. The school specialized in
training Chinese people to fly.
Anyways, this was back before the economy exploded. There was a shortage of
instructors at my school. I was assigned 4 students that I would be teaching
mostly one-on-one. Three of the four students were really cool and very
likable. The fourth I didn't like at all. Lets just say we didn't get along
well. The guy was very difficult, and hard to communicate with. The other
three were a joy to work with.
If I had the luxury of dumping that fourth student onto another instructor, I
would have. But this was back in 2007, and the economy hadn't tanked yet, so
there was an instructor shortage, and I had to grit my teeth and deal with
this guy.
Fast forward to a month later. The tables have turned completely the other
direction. The fourth guy who I hated at first was my favorite student. The
three students I had liked at the beginning now were the ones giving me the
most greif. The extroverted easy to work with likable guys were pleasant to
deal with, but they weren't very smart, and I had a lot of trouble teaching
them stuff. The fourth guy was hard to deal with, but he was extremely smart
and I barely had to teach him anything, he learned everything on his own.
Once the economy got bad, the student/instructor ratio fell. The flight school
hired a bunch more instructors and got less students. Every instructor got 2
students instead of 4. I made it a habit to go around to all the new
instructors and ask them if they have a student they they don't really like
working with. 4 times out of 5 the instructor would tell me "yeah I have this
one guy..." My last 6 months at that job I had 8 students that basically
taught themselves. That was easy money.
I've found the best way to deal with unlikable people is to just let them go
off and do their own thing. The act like that (unconsciously) because they
resent you getting in their way.
~~~
hkmurakami
A friend of mine is like the 4th student you describe: very smart but comes
off as standoffish and cold until he warms up to you. He was actually let go
from a well known (everyone here would know the name) startup in SF/SV wiht a
noted brogammer culture after a few months since he "wasn't a culture fit".
He's now thriving at a place that suits his character much more.
In the end I think both parties "won" by his dismissal, but companies hiring
for culture fit should be aware that they're willingly constraining their
talent pool by doing this. (I don't think it's necessarily wrong either -- I
expect to have some form of latent character filter if I'm in a hiring
position as well. However, I'm much more fond of the introverted, "difficult"
types than the average person).
------
loteck
It seems like this could more accurately be entitled: Hiring Likable People.
The tests they are touting are basically: do I want to be around this person?
That is, indeed, a good criteria to consider when hiring.
They also claim to want to hire people "smarter" than they are. I am not
running a business, but isn't the danger here that "smarter" people take your
projects/clients in a direction that your management is unable to provide
leadership on, and then just bail, taking the project/client with them?
~~~
borski
Interesting point. We hire people that are smarter than ourselves in some
domain. Typically, I'm still better in some ways than the rest of the company,
in certain domains. We just need to be impressed by their intelligence
consistently. Does that make sense?
~~~
loteck
It does make sense, especially for your boutique business. You're looking for
folks that bring something to the table, who are likable. While hardly
revolutionary, I'm glad it's working for Tinfoil.
------
epoxyhockey
Unless working weekends is a business necessity and asked of all applicants,
it is illegal/inappropriate to ask in an interview.
Source:
[http://www.gsworkplace.lbl.gov/DocumentArchive/BrownBagLunch...](http://www.gsworkplace.lbl.gov/DocumentArchive/BrownBagLunches/IllegalorInappropriateInterviewQuestions.pdf)
~~~
borski
Right, and we never ask it. The metaphor is not a literal one.
~~~
seanmcdirmid
IANAL, But just documenting this in a blog post makes it public record and
potentially opens you up to lawsuits to anyone you didn't hire in the past.
------
peacewise
How about leaving your employees alone on Friday nights and weekends.
~~~
borski
We don't force any of our employees to hang out with us (or work) on Friday
nights and weekends. Often, I want to hang out with the team, because they'are
awesome, but none of it is forced. We don't work weekends except in (rare)
major pushes.
~~~
peacewise
In that case, I don't think it is super effective to focus on cases that
rarely happen.
Interesting read:
[http://blog.prettylittlestatemachine.com/blog/2013/02/20/wha...](http://blog.prettylittlestatemachine.com/blog/2013/02/20/what-
your-culture-really-says)
~~~
borski
The metaphor is not meant to be taken literally. It's a way of checking
whether the person excites you and is someone you look forward to working with
/ being around.
------
borski
For the record, this apparently isn't novel. These tests are very similar to
the 'airport test': <http://www.asanet.org/journals/ASR/Dec12ASRFeature.pdf>
------
tokenadult
What kind of work-sample test do you look at for hiring the people you want to
be sure are smarter than you are?
<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5227923>
~~~
borski
We typically provide a realistic scenario in which we work with the person to
see if they are impressive. As in, we work with them on a project unrelated to
Tinfoil for a few hours to a day, and see how it goes.
~~~
tptacek
Do you provide the same work-sample test for every candidate, so you can build
a history of how people handle it and then look to see how your best hires
did? We did that (it was Cory's idea, not mine, for what it's worth) and it's
been immensely valuable.
If I could get one new hiring process adopted in tech, it'd be that one: come
up with a graded work-sample test that will generate a history you can mine
for data down the road.
~~~
borski
Indeed we do. And I agree. Honestly, with most of the people we end up
interviewing it doesn't even get to the end. It's a hard challenge, but we
prefer it that way.
------
stephengillie
What are your criteria for hiring people smarter than yourselves?
~~~
borski
They need to have done something impressive. It's honestly not too far from
what pg has described looking for in companies to fund - we're looking for
people that impress us and we can learn from; not necessarily in /everything/,
but at least in /something/. For example, hiring someone who has a /ton/ of
experience with administering databases (something I personally am only 'ok'
at) would be impressive.
------
borski
Just updated the post to clarify:
"[UPDATE] Just to clarify the above, we do not mean that we ask candidates
these questions. These are questions for the existing team when evaluating a
candidate, and it isn't about forcing people to come in on a Sunday, or
convincing ourselves that candidates are just like us. It is simply about
hiring people we would want to work with, be around, and help / be helped by,
no matter what the occasion."
------
SonicSoul
i think i see where you're going with this. in a small company you do want to
work with people you like being around.
the test metaphors can use some work though ;) i don't see how Monday test
would be any different than Sunday test? you're still working with that person
right?
i've been in a situation where i've made recommendation to hire because the
candidate aced the interview, but i knew i had no interest in spending too
much time with them on personal level. it was conflicting to say the least,
but in the end he ended up making some good work contributions. It is almost
impossible to tell how well the person will behave long term (i don't care
what Gladwell says).
~~~
borski
Right, this works for us because we're such a small team. And you're also
right that Monday is no different - we didn't mean for it to be taken
literally, but it's a way of checking whether the person being a part of the
team excites you or not.
~~~
epoxyhockey
I used to work for a small company where most employees enthusiastically spent
time hanging out with the founder on various weekends, going to sporting
events and dinners.
The critical point to be made is that the founder signed our paychecks. Until
after the company dissolved, you couldn't tell who was doing it for _office
politics_ reasons or out of genuine friendship. Today, only 15% of those
employees still speak to the founder.
In my opinion, it's best not to approach hiring in the same manner as dating.
At the end of the day, it's a business arrangement and it's about getting high
quality work done in exchange for money.
~~~
borski
I could see situations in which this would matter, but most of our early
employees feel super-invested in the company such that they don't see me as
'founder' or 'boss' or feel the need to indulge in office politics. We're
pretty good at sniffing out 'politically savvy' folks, especially since many
of us are not the greatest at 'office politics.' We have a 'no bullshit'
attitude, and I get called out a lot, and I call people out a lot. There's not
much hidden at Tinfoil.
------
alan_cx
This is all about "like", what about "respect"?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: How to get motivated to code? - cmstoken
Hello HN,<p>I haven't touched code in a few months. In the beginning, it was because I got burned out. I realized I needed to take a break so I did -- had a little vacation away from home for a bit. I'm back now but I still can't get myself to write even a line of code. How do I get started? I need that initial motivation. How do you guys do it?
======
nartz
Start by finding something you want to code. Then think about it for a few
days, and let the pressure build up. Then one day, instead of turning on the
tv or going to HN, remove distractions and commit to 10 minutes of coding with
no distractions. If you're like me, you'll start working for an hour or so
before you get interrupted, but by that time you'll be back in the groove.
------
ollyfg
For me, I think for a while until I find something that I really want to make,
or something that bugs me that I can fix, and even if it's something really
very small, that motivation powers my first steps back into coding. It doesn't
matter if someone's done it before, just do it _your way_.
------
wydyl
When I get burned out with what I'm working on, I just look for whatever
fascinating is happening around the tech space, and try to implement a simple
yet crazy something. I might not finish it but kind of gets me going.
------
blueflow
When im unmotivated, i just open some file, look around my code and somewhere
i find something i really, really want to change/fix (i have tons of
unfinished private projects). And thats my 'initial motivation'
------
bemmu
Make just some tiny edit or write one line of code. Tell yourself that you're
just going to do this one line. It gets you over the initial resistance and
usually I end up writing a lot more than I intended at first.
------
alphagenerator
The code doesn't matter. You have to want the end product. The reasons for
wanting it are personal, but you have to want it.
~~~
notduncansmith
This. Code is a (rather enjoyable for many people) means to an end.
------
staunch
Start with something easy and fun. Don't worry at all what it is. Give
yourself time to build up momentum again.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Should you use JavaScript or CSS - d3v3r0
http://alexsblog.org/2014/07/27/should-you-use-javascript-or-css/
======
mattdw
My approach is (1) use CSS for as much as I can, (2) fill in the important
compatibility gaps with JS (polyfill style) then (3) use JS to layer on any
extra behaviours. That approach seems to play the best with the widest variety
of configurations, and everybody gets something at least 80% usable. (With
exceptions; I'm not talking about pure JS 'apps'.)
My thinking with the above is that CSS code paths in the browser are (with a
very few exceptions) going to be a lot faster than trying to do the same in
JS, and you don't have to wire up e.g. onresize handlers yourself.
Some things I'll just ignore; if your browser doesn't support border-radius or
text-shadow, you get square corners and flat text; if your browser doesn't
support box-sizing, the layout will be wrong but at least everything will
still be visible.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
AMD's Six-Core Phenom II X6 1090T & 1055T Reviewed - ukdm
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3674/amds-sixcore-phenom-ii-x6-1090t-1055t-reviewed
======
ukdm
"The better way to look at it is to ask yourself what sort of machine you're
building. If you're building a task specific box that will mostly run heavily
threaded applications, AMD will sell you nearly a billion transistors for
under $300 and you can't go wrong. If it's a more general purpose machine that
you're assembling, Lynnfield seems like a better option."
------
ukdm
Engadget also has links to 5 other reviews here:
[http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/27/amds-3-2ghz-hexacore-
phen...](http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/27/amds-3-2ghz-hexacore-phenom-
ii-x6-1090t-comes-out-for-a-
review/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+weblogsinc%2Fengadget+%28Engadget%29)
------
ableal
That 6 core die photo is worth a centerfold poster (I'll be hitting tineye.com
for a larger version ;-)
I'd note that AMD's "more-for-less approach" has not been just about number of
cores - little 'details' like ECC RAM, VT instructions, or even half-decent
graphics in the chipset, have come in at lower price points, nearly down to
the budget versions.
P.S. TinEye doesn't seem to have the pic yet; a search for large images of
"amd six core phenom die photo" gets hits (many fake, cf.
[http://aceshardware.freeforums.org/phenom-
ii-x6-1090t-3-2ghz...](http://aceshardware.freeforums.org/phenom-
ii-x6-1090t-3-2ghz-with-3-6ghz-turbo-at-125w-t991.html)).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Timeleft – See how much time is left of the hour, week, year - raouls
https://aoueon.github.io/timeleft/
======
pabue
I really like the design. Well done!
One thing: After clicking one item it would be nice if using the browser
navigation (back button) would show the overview again. Currently it only
changes the url.
~~~
raouls
I'll do that. Thanks!
------
proc0
Nice, I made a command line version earlier last year, and displays hours
until the new year.
[https://github.com/proc0/cucoo](https://github.com/proc0/cucoo)
------
ecesena
I could see this to be really useful for sprint/milestone/quarter for product
teams.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
One of the less horrible of the many dystopian futures visited by Time Traveller - alvis
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00855-2
======
blendo
WTF? In _Nature_?
Loved it, though.
~~~
fpoling
15 years ago I subscribed to Nature for a year. The last page of each issue
was a short SF story. Some of them were really good.
~~~
interestica
Why only the one year? And what triggered the subscription at the time?
~~~
fpoling
I do not remember what triggered the subscription. I stopped it because most
articles were not of my interests and arxiv.org and other resources became the
thing. But I did miss the short SF stories.
------
pmiller2
This future sounds like a post-scarcity socialist society. I like it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
GPT-3: Language Models Are Few-Shot Learners - baylearn
https://github.com/openai/gpt-3
======
fouc
Duplicate thread at
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23345379](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23345379)
(with arxiv link)
~~~
dang
We've moved the comments thither. Thanks!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: I Made a Massively Multiplayer Board Game to Test Django Channels - miiiiiike
<a href="http://codewords.io/" rel="nofollow">http://codewords.io/</a><p>I've been trying to get permission to run a game of it from the publisher and designer (CGE & Vlaada Chvátil) but I haven't heard back. I've found demonstrating that there's interest in what you're doing is the best way to get ahold of people. So..<p>Anyone interested in trying a massive game of Codenames over Twitch? Not quite "For Science!" more "For Engineering!" Which, let's be honest here, has a much better ring to it.<p>If you'd like to know more, I put up an FAQ up here: <a href="http://codewords.io/faq/" rel="nofollow">http://codewords.io/faq/</a><p>If you'd like to sign up to help, there's a form over there: <a href="http://codewords.io/" rel="nofollow">http://codewords.io/</a><p>Screenshots and a game play overview can be found somewhere under this: <a href="https://imgur.com/a/3xtZC" rel="nofollow">https://imgur.com/a/3xtZC</a>
======
elijahwright
I think this is pretty awesome, but it might just be because I think the game
Codenames is fantastic.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fast.ai releases new deep learning course, libraries, and book - amardeep
https://www.fast.ai/2020/08/21/fastai2-launch/
======
tosh
I do recommend getting the book that just came out (I did, it is fantastic)
[https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Learning-Coders-fastai-
PyTorch/d...](https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Learning-Coders-fastai-
PyTorch/dp/1492045527)
that said: fast.ai also released a draft of the book available here (including
the notebooks)
[https://github.com/fastai/fastbook](https://github.com/fastai/fastbook)
edit: if you can afford it, getting the book is a great way to support the
authors
~~~
amrrs
I do recommend getting the book to support authors who've put one of the best
Deep Learning content (completely for beginners) for Free of Cost. I know
that's the open source culture but someone doing it with education seems
highly appreciable to me!
~~~
jph00
Honestly we don't get much of a cut, so don't worry about it too much either
way. Although it's nice to support O'Reilly, since they were kind enough to
let us make it all available for free.
Frankly though, there are much more important areas right now that could
really use some extra money, so I'd rather see folks donate to a good cause,
if they don't actually need the paper or kindle book... :)
I've been giving my teaching stipend from university to the Fred Hollow
Foundation: [https://www.hollows.org/](https://www.hollows.org/) . They can
give sight back to many people that are blind, for around US$25.
~~~
paultopia
Thank you! This is such a great service to the community, really, all of it.
While you're here---do you have advice on the course vs the book? I'm a person
who really prefers to learn via writing rather than via video, but if there's
stuff in the course that people who use the book can't really experience...
~~~
jph00
Use both. The book will encourage you to work through the notebooks. You can
watch the first video and see if it adds anything for you - if it doesn't,
skip the rest.
They cover basically the same material. (Except that the course covers only
half the book - the rest is planned for a part 2 course later.)
~~~
paultopia
Thank you!
------
tosh
for those unfamiliar with fast.ai:
it is a practitioner-style style deep learning course that instead of starting
with the fundamentals starts with examples and results and then over time,
layer by layer reveals what it is all about and how it works in detail until
you ask yourself "that is all there is?". a great way to make a seemingly
unapproachable topic approachable.
you don't need big data, you don't need a GPU, you don't need to install a ton
of dependencies, you only need a browser (to access jupyter notebooks).
last but not least: this is kind of the "definitive version" of the course as
it now comes with a book, a new version of the library (re-written in a more
thoughtful way) and with new versions of recorded lectures/lessons based on
the book w/ way better audio quality (compared to the previous ones).
If you ever were curious about deep learning but did not find the time to take
a look or thought it was unapproachable: now is a great time to dive in and
this is a great course (& book & library & community) to do so
~~~
abraxas
Would it teach principles of deep learning in the same depth as if I slogged
through the YouTube videos of cs231n?
A legitimate question as I'm considering embarking on one of these two paths.
As most of the people here my programming skills are more honed than my math
skills so the fastai path looks like the easier road to take but I'm not sure
if they both lead to the same place.
~~~
The_Amp_Walrus
No. I think the hands-on approach of fastai would probably help you
contextualize the theory you learn in CS231N and elsewhere.
~~~
mrfusion
I’m considering something like this too. I need a way to keep it fun though or
I probably won’t follow through.
------
losvedir
Oh, neat! I went through an earlier version of the online course when I was
just trying to understand what this "deep learning mumbo jumbo" was all about,
and it was the clearest, and easiest to follow, and most interesting one
available, by a long shot! One of the assignments had you train an image
recognization model based on google image results, and after a shockingly
small amount of work and time I had a model that could distinguish a picture
of a game of Go from a game of Chess almost perfectly. That was a huge eye-
opener for me.
That was maybe 1-2 years ago at this point and I had wanted to take another
look. What a perfect opportunity! And I'm excited it sounds like there might
be a little more discussion of non-DL ML and applications in tabular data
(where I'd have the most likely use for it), as well as the nitty gritty like
deployments and use in production!
Any progress on the Swift front? Is that mentioned / used / discussed at all
in this new course?
~~~
tmabraham
Sylvain was working on fastai for Swift, but he became busy with the book and
course and also has left for HuggingFace. Jeremy has not been working on
Swift. No lectures on Swift in the course. The Swift4TF team is still active,
though Chris Lattner has unfortunately left.
Another project that is similar is Fastai.jl, a port of fastai to the Julia
language. It is still in active development:
[https://github.com/FluxML/FastAI.jl](https://github.com/FluxML/FastAI.jl)
------
cube2222
Not interested much in deep learning, but wanting to be somewhat on top of it
to understand it well, I've done a few courses and skimmed a few books which
are available.
The fastai video course was, with a big gap, the best, most understandable,
most practical and most enjoyable of them.
Just wanted to say this. Thanks so much for creating it and regularly keeping
it up to date!
~~~
andreilys
Seconded. It was one of the few MOOC's I've actually completed because it was
so engaging and fun.
I hope the top-down style of teaching spreads because for some people (such as
myself) it's one of the best ways to learn and get excited about a subject
------
fpgaminer
A question for Jeremy, perhaps. For the longest time the fast.ai courses have
used Adam and one-cycle, at least for CV tasks. More recently Ranger and flat-
cos have been dominating the Imagenette leaderboards. I guess I'm curious if
fast.ai intends to switch over to teaching that policy instead of one-cycle?
I guess more generally I'm curious what criteria the fast.ai team uses for
deciding what techniques to teach. My feeling is that the courses have always
taught the training techniques that are a healthy mix of SOTA, generally
applicable, and easy to use.
Ranger + flat-cos has seemed like a really robust combo, and easy to use. So
yeah, just interested in whatever internal discussions fast.ai may have had
about it and other potential replacements for Adam + one-cycle.
~~~
jph00
Yes it's a great combo. I think fastai is the only library that actually has
both of these built-in.
However, because the LR warm-up is built-in to Ranger, it's actually a bit
more fiddly to use - i.e. you really need to understand what it's doing. It
doesn't work great with `Learner.fine_tune` and gradual unfreezing more
generally, since you don't really want a full separate warmup for each phase.
So I don't see it becoming the default or main optimizer shown in the course.
But it's great to learn and use.
------
colmvp
I took fast.ai a few years ago, and then again a year or so ago. I like their
lectures and their methodology of teaching which enabled me to meet a lot of
interesting people in my city, but I ended up just building models using
vanilla PyTorch instead of using their library as an added layer just because
it felt like they were tweaking and revamping their code so often that at
times it was kind of hard to connect the docs with the latest code.
~~~
jph00
Yeah that makes a lot of sense. It's why we took a year off from teaching to
try to make the definitive version of the deep learning framework we really
wanted - and even wrote a peer-reviewed academic paper about the design we
came up with.
So today's fastai library really doesn't have the issues that we had a year or
two back - it's a really carefully designed piece of software. Amongst other
things, we've made sure works with the book, which means it has to last for a
long time.
~~~
ggrelet
Are you Jeremy Howard? If so, thanks a lot for your courses and framework,
it’s really great!
~~~
jph00
Yup that's me. You're welcome :)
~~~
bananaface
Thank you! I also took your course recently and it was outstanding.
------
punnerud
Took this course two times, first when they used TensorFlow and afterwards
based on PyTorch. Like how it is practical from early on and updated on new
research. Recommend trying to build networks from scratch in combination with
the course, so you don’t become to dependent on the fast.ai framework.
~~~
jph00
In the new course and book by the end we show you how to build everything from
scratch - including implementing gradients, creating a data processing
library, writing all the equations out for loss and activation functions,
building a resnet from scratch, etc...
~~~
punnerud
Jermey, this sounds great! I now have several servers at our loft with GPUs,
to run training and avoid noise from the laptop. You helped me have a good
experience learning machine learning and enjoying learning+solving new
problems.
My output from my new powers are several papers together with others and
solved problems within the green tech energy market. We detect and forecast
usage within timeseries data (energy consumptions).
Keep doing what you are doing! And thank for all the hours you put down into
this.
~~~
jph00
Oh awesome! There's a really great fast.ai time series study group BTW, who
have between them built a lot of great projects and (IMO) are more familiar
with deep learning for time series than any other group I've come across:
[https://forums.fast.ai/t/time-series-sequential-data-
study-g...](https://forums.fast.ai/t/time-series-sequential-data-study-
group/29686)
------
burke
Bought the book and trying out the lesson 1 notebook, but man, I can't seem to
make this work. Colab can't import fastbook with the GPU runtime, and the TPU
and CPU ones are too slow. Gradient gets a little further, but fails with
"self.recorder already registered" on the "#id first_training" cell. Maybe I'm
too dumb to be a data scientist, but I didn't expect to have to do this kind
of debugging right off the bat.
~~~
unoti
> I didn't expect to have to do this kind of debugging right off the bat.
Stick with it, and consider setting up your own machine instead of trying to
use Colab. I say this because literally the hardest part about the previous
course for me was _getting started_ and doing the setup. Once you're able to
actually run the notebooks I promise it'll get much easier. I can promise this
with confidence because the lectures are excellent, and I've been through what
you're talking about on the previous version of this course when I was first
starting with AI.
------
TinyBig
This course and the accompanying libraries were very good when they were
released and have only improved over the past several years. I will echo what
others have said - the courses are very approachable and practical.
Fast.ai changed the course of my career and helped give birth to deep learning
as a practice at my place of work. Thank you Jeremy!
------
tmabraham
People have had a lot of negative things to say about fastai v1, claiming it
is not very flexible and intuitive and only good for the certain Kaggle-type
problems. I would recommend them to check out fastai v2 as a serious
competitor to other PyTorch-based frameworks like PyTorch Lightning, Catalyst,
Ignite, etc. It's very easy to work with default deep learning problems, but
for more complex and unique problems, the mid-level/low-level API and
callbacks make it quite painless to use fastai in your workflow. Plus there's
tons of community support (forums.fast.ai + Discord), even for a package
maintained by only a few people. Check it out!
------
naveen99
Jeremy should update his JavaScript course as well. He might be one if the few
people to make it look less messy than it is everywhere else. The fast.ai
course is wonderful. Definitely recharged my own interest in deep learning.
~~~
studentinvestor
I scoured the web but wasn't able to find the JavaScript course that you're
talking about. Can you share it here?
~~~
naveen99
Here is one video on crud apps using asp.net and angular js:
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja2xDrtylBw](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja2xDrtylBw)
~~~
studentinvestor
Thank you!
------
pandemist
Has anyone gone through a career change (to something in data science / ML)
after going through courses like fast.ai? If so, how difficult / easy was that
change?
~~~
jph00
Yes lots have - it's really common. Check
[https://forums.fast.ai](https://forums.fast.ai) for many stories. There's
also some linked from [https://course.fast.ai](https://course.fast.ai).
It's a lot of work and requires tenacity - the same amount of tenacity that's
required to reach a high level of competence in any field.
------
mrg3_2013
This is great! Looking forward to trying it out. I explored it while back when
I was looking for a deep learning library that can take a tabular data file
and build a multitask predictive model involving different datatypes (for
example, some columns may be be text). Uber's ludwig library does it. Would
love to check it out.
------
kriro
Amazing news. I pre-ordered the book a while ago and am a bit surprised
(positively) it's over 600 pages now. The German Amazon page still says 350
pages btw.
Worked with fast.ai for a couple of projects starting <1.0 and with the first
MOOC. You're doing great work and it's really appreciated.
~~~
perch56
Interestingly my ordered book from bookdepository.com also says 350 pages.
Could there be 2 versions of the book?
------
Abishek_Muthian
Hi Jeremy, congratulations on the new releases and thank you.
I see that the original _ML_ course[1] link has been removed from the home
page. Does it mean it's been invalidated due to integration of ML lessons with
the DL courses?
I was pointing those who wanted to learn ML but don't have good access to
proper Internet to the old ML course with custom scripts to make installation
of requirements for those course in inexpensive SBC like Jetson Nano or
similar. I was planning to make those setup public, but should I refrain from
doing that because of Fast.ai v2? If so, is the cloud compute de facto first
class citizen now?
[1][http://course18.fast.ai/lessonsml1/lesson1.html](http://course18.fast.ai/lessonsml1/lesson1.html)
------
aliljet
As one of the folks that took this course, I was thoroughly engaged. I
wouldn't start masquerading as a data scientist after learning this material,
but this is a highly-practical approach to deploying new engineering tools.
------
imranq
Jeremy Howard and Andrew Ng are the two teachers who got me into ML and
eventually as a career. Amazing to see so much progress! Because of FastAi I
can see ML being used around the world just like Excel or python
------
fareesh
Looks great - will probably pick up the book
In Lesson 1 they talk about use-cases where Deep Learning is the best known
approach. Are there any popular use-cases for which it is not the best known
approach?
~~~
jph00
Yes - the lesson on tabular analysis focuses on decision tree ensembles, since
that's what most people use (although we also use deep learning for it - and
we ended up getting a more accurate model that way). We discuss the pros and
cons of the approaches in some depth in that chapter.
Also, of course, there are many things that aren't really amenable to any kind
of machine learning...
------
aladine
Though not related to the content of post, I found that the favicon of fast.ai
is a H character, which is not related to AI. Somebody should update it.
FYI, letter H comes from theme Hyde in Hugo:
[https://themes.gohugo.io/hyde/?search-
input=menu%3Dmai#sideb...](https://themes.gohugo.io/hyde/?search-
input=menu%3Dmai#sidebar-menu)
------
lumberjack
I am trying to get into ML in general and I am having a bit of a problem. I
don't know what is what and I lack a basic trajectory. Fortunately I have all
the mathematics prereqs so I can just jump in. What I need is some sort of up-
to-date overview of everything ML so that I know what topics to study in which
order. Does anyone know of such a thing?
~~~
lexandstuff
Yes. I would recommend the fast.ai course linked above. It covers all the
essentials of deep learning and some classical machine learning. You'll have
enough breadth of knowledge to know which areas you'd like to explore in more
depth and all the skills you need to build practical projects.
------
embiggenerd
I got a little ways through the very first course way back when. I am planning
to learn ML/DS in my spare time, but I have a particular end goal - self
driving cars/computer vision. Does this course cover those topics?
------
Lucasoato
Hi Jeremy, thanks for your awesome library! I've followed the last online
course and was pretty impressed by how effective is your top-down approach.
Are multi-gpu setups supported in this version of fast.ai?
~~~
jph00
Yes, although I'm planning to work on making them simpler to use in the coming
weeks.
------
spinlock_
Any recommendation on how to approach the course? Is it better to read the
chapter in the book before you watch the lecture(s) covering the content of
the chapter or vice versa?
------
saurabp
Is there something similar for deep reinforcement learning ?
~~~
flooo
Not entirely the same, but this may be helpful
[https://spinningup.openai.com/en/latest/user/introduction.ht...](https://spinningup.openai.com/en/latest/user/introduction.html)
Previously discussed on HN: 1\.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18408360](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18408360)
2\.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24184270](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24184270)
------
phmagic
I took the fast.ai courses and highly recommend them for anyone who really
wants to learn ML.
Are there any plans for courses on reinforcement learning?
~~~
jph00
No, there isn't.
~~~
oxygenoxy
Could you elaborate on the reasons why not?
------
wasdeekrub
I wondered why fast.ai still stick with unet for segmentation task.
------
yogodojo
can anyone suggest MOOCS similar to Jeremy's teaching style? I really like the
way he teaches.
------
jph00
@dang or someone - I wonder if you can fix the title so it's not just "Fast.ai
releases new deep learning course"? The article is just as much about the
release of the fastai v2 software library as it as about the course.
The original title was "fast.ai releases new deep learning course, four
libraries, and 600-page book", although "fast.ai releases new deep learning
course and library" would probably cover what most people are interested in,
and is quite a bit shorter.
~~~
TallGuyShort
Thank you for all the work you've put in to your MOOC and all these other
resources. I love your teaching style and have gotten immense value from all
this.
I'm excited to get my print copy of the book delivered tomorrow!
~~~
jwuphysics
I've just received mine and I must say I find it so much nicer to learn using
the print copy book! It forces me to type out (rather than copy and paste) the
code, and I like being able to scribble all over the book. Given the thousands
of dollars of value I've gained from the courses, I have to say that spending
another $60 for the book was well worth it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Why Are We in the West So Weird? A Theory - pw
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/12/books/review/the-weirdest-people-in-the-world-joseph-henrich.html
======
haspoken
[http://archive.is/7qN8i](http://archive.is/7qN8i)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: How do you use Parse.com? what about performances and scalability? - tiboll
Hi all,<p>I currently bootstraping a new project (a mobile app) witch will require me to handle a basic user profile, some categories for each profile and a advanced search based on these categories/criteria and the user location.<p>I also want to track the usage of the app, and probably be able to send some emails to inactive users.<p>To be able to launch an MVP quickly I'm thinking about using Parse.com but I don't see much feedback from project who might use it.<p>Does anyone have some experience to share?<p>Thanks a lot!<p>Thibaut
======
jamesjyu
Hey Thibaut! Co-founder of Parse here. I think your use case is perfect for
Parse. But, don't take my word for it. You might get more responses if you
post in our google group: [https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/parse-
developers](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/parse-developers)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
JQuery finds its way into Microsoft and Nokia stacks - qhoxie
http://ajaxian.com/archives/jquery-finds-its-way-into-microsoft-and-nokia-stacks
======
wayne
Wow, that's a pretty big deal. It's totally unlike Microsoft to ship a not-
invented-here API set, as-in, in the box.
~~~
henning
Scott Guthrie's team is one of the most forward-looking groups at Microsoft,
and I think the developer division makes the best Microsoft products to begin
with: Visual Studio and a few essential plugins is a much better IDE than
Windows is a consumer operating system.
~~~
maxklein
What plugins do you consider essential for Visual Studio?
~~~
StrawberryFrog
Resharper
------
mkn
At a high level, jQuery has two main things going for it:
1) It has awesome functionality. 2) It's indistinguishably close to being
browser-independent
It looks like MS has adopted jQuery for (1), and their developers will get (2)
for free.
Of course, (2) may also have figured into MS's (apparent) decision to adopt.
If that's the case, more power to 'em. Nothing would please me more than
seeing (one division of) MS get a clue.
------
ironjeff
This is great news! I was just about to post this but you beat me to it.
A good follow up post about it:
[http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2008/09/28/jquery-
and...](http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2008/09/28/jquery-and-
microsoft.aspx)
~~~
wayne
And a post from Scott Hanselman about it:
[http://www.hanselman.com/blog/jQueryToShipWithASPNETMVCAndVi...](http://www.hanselman.com/blog/jQueryToShipWithASPNETMVCAndVisualStudio.aspx)
And the original announcement on the jQuery blog:
<http://jquery.com/blog/2008/09/28/jquery-microsoft-nokia/>
------
qhoxie
Congratulations to the whole jQuery team. They are constantly amassing success
stories and they could not be any more deserving. They put out a great library
and foster one of the nicest developer communities on the web.
------
subbu
I think Microsoft is offsetting the pain developers face in trying to make web
pages work in IE/JScript by promoting jQuery. Without a library like
jQuery/Prototype its really difficult to get IE to do what you want. Good
news.
I really hope they make IE conform to standards.
------
rgrieselhuber
Very cool. JQuery is one of the primary reasons I really started to enjoy
JavaScript.
------
dmose
Fantastic news. MS's libraries are crude and far behind the existing open
source alternatives.
~~~
maxklein
What 'libraries' are you talking about in specific? Or are you just rehashing
stuff you read on slashdot?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Petition to release Cameron D'Ambrosio - ck2
https://cms.fightforthefuture.org/teenager/
======
aqme28
A lot of people on Reddit, etc... seem to be misinformed about what illegal
free speech is, so here's some relevant case material:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_v._Ohio>
_"Court held that government cannot punish inflammatory speech unless that
speech is directed to inciting, and is likely to incite, imminent lawless
action.
...In this case, the court found that Hess's words did not fall outside the
limits of protected speech, in part, because his speech "amounted to nothing
more than advocacy of illegal action at some indefinite future time,"[1] and
therefore did not meet the imminence requirement."_
From Cameron's case: _"The Methuen Chief of Police even stated: 'I do want to
make clear he did not make a specific threat against the school or any
particular individuals...'"_
Vague threats are not illegal.
~~~
bradleyjg
_Brandenburg_ lays out the incitement exception to the First Amendment. If I
understand the allegations correctly (and that's made more difficult by the
lack of the actual lyrics) the prosecution claims that the speech would
instead be unprotected under the true threat doctrine.
The leading Supreme Court case on that doctrine is _Virginia v. Black_ 538
U.S. 343 (2003)[1], but unfortunately it's neither as clear nor quotable as
Brandenburg. Here's the gist of the rule:
"'True threats' encompass those statements where the speaker means to
communicate a serious expression of an intent to commit an act of unlawful
violence to a particular individual or group of individuals. The speaker need
not actually intend to carry out the threat. Rather, a prohibition on true
threats "protect[s] individuals from the fear of violence" and "from the
disruption that fear engenders," in addition to protecting people "from the
possibility that the threatened violence will occur." (internal citations
omitted)
[1] [http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-
bin/getcase.pl?court=US...](http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-
bin/getcase.pl?court=US&navby=case&vol=000&invol=01-1107)
------
rayiner
It should be noted that it's not the feds holding this kid, it's the police of
his small-town Boston suburb. See:
[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/03/cameron-
dambrosio-b...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/03/cameron-dambrosio-
bomb-threat-boston-terrorism_n_3204149.html).
"Police learned of the threats after a student alerted a school official, the
Herald writes."
"'When we're just recovering from what occurred in Boston, to make a threat
and use what occurred in Boston to enhance your threat, is extremely alarming
for us,' Methuen Police Chief Joseph Solomon said at a press conference after
D'Ambrosio was apprehended."
Also: [http://www.eagletribune.com/local/x326078366/Judge-Hes-a-
thr...](http://www.eagletribune.com/local/x326078366/Judge-Hes-a-threat).
"Cameron D’Ambrosio was in Lawrence District Court yesterday in a suit, tie
and shackles for a hearing to determine whether and how he could be released
from custody after being arrested May 1."
Not that it excuses the local police department's actions, but small-town shit
like this has always happened. News of it just moves at light speed now thanks
to the internet.
------
kunai
I get two inferences from this:
A) The people of this society are turning into safety-obsessed, overly
politically correct weaklings
or
B) The two sides of the political spectrum exist to distract us while they
both behind the scenes exist to remove our freedom
Unfortunately, I'd have to say I think both A and B are true.
~~~
betterunix
You missed (C): That the overwhelming majority of politicians in power right
now sit on the same side of the political spectrum, and that the debate has
not been two sided for a very long time.
~~~
shawndumas
only one party believes that an unborn human has rights and protections under
the law regardless of whether or not the respective mother wants them.
only one party believes that two adults in love can be married under the law
regardless of whether or not the respective people are of the same sex.
if nothing else just those two diametric positions seem to indicate an
important and meaningful distinction between the two parties.
~~~
btilly
Even such an obvious litmus test as this is imperfect.
According to polling data, over 20% of Republicans self-identify as pro-choice
and 34% of Democrats as pro-life.
There are plenty of Republicans who support gay rights. In fact did you know
that the end of Don't Ask, Don't Tell stems from a lawsuit about the matter
filed by gay Republicans? Yes, I know that Obama publicly takes all of the
credit for that one, but the bill that he pushed for took effect on September
20, 2011 while _Log Cabin Republicans v. United States_ forced an end to
enforcement on July 6, 2011.
There is no simple litmus test. Each party is a coalition of people with
enough common interests that they prefer one tent over the other.
------
Blahah
Poor kid - his only crime was being a terrible rapper.
~~~
Buzaga
and living in USA
~~~
sdfjkl
The UK is not far behind and using the recent Woolwich incident as an excuse
to rapidly catch up: [http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/may/26/theresa-
may-m...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/may/26/theresa-may-measures-
combat-terrorism)
------
jrockway
Can I read the other side of the story somewhere? I feel like I'm not getting
the full truth.
~~~
ChrisAntaki
Sure. Here's a more complete version of his lyrics:
[http://www.bostonmagazine.com/news/blog/2013/05/23/a-methuen...](http://www.bostonmagazine.com/news/blog/2013/05/23/a-methuen-
teens-rap-lyrics-have-kept-him-in-jail-for-three-weeks/)
"[Bleep] a boston bominb wait till u see the [bleep] I do, I’ma be famous
rapping, and beat every murder charge that comes across me!"
He's talking about beating murder charges too.
I love the 1st amendment, don't get me wrong! This dude was crossing the line
though.
~~~
adventured
By this standard, nearly every rapper from the last 30 years should be in
prison on terrorist charges.
------
ChrisAntaki
<http://youtu.be/-wbJTHkdBMc?t=38s>
From his rap: "Every day with a life of crime, and I'm always screwing up my
life"
Yeah!! That's pretty accurate.
------
rasur
Hmm, free speech in the USA seems to be quite a costly exercise these days.
~~~
youngerdryas
I'm sure he'd be fine in Europe.
~~~
derleth
Unless, of course, he "insulted Turkishness" in Turkey or insulted the
Holocaust in Germany.
~~~
vacri
_insulted the Holocaust in Germany._
Eh? Deny, yes, but 'insult'? What?
The Holocaust and Nazism are special things, by the way. You can still speak
out against Germany.
------
marcamillion
I am sorry....I feel no sympathy.
People need to understand that words have meaning. Just because 'free speech'
is protected by the constitution doesn't mean that you can (and should) say
any crap, at any time, without thinking about the consequence.
When you say stuff like:
_fuck a boston bombing wait till you see the shit I do, Imma be famous for
rapping and beat every murder charge that comes across me._
Let's take a step back here, and assume for a minute that he REALLY was
planning something - and not just talking tough. If he did it, and he posted
this stuff on Facebook, and the FBI didn't do anything about it.....what would
the fracas be then?
The FBI is incompetent....they knew he would do it, yet they did nothing, etc,
etc, etc.
It's really a lose-lose for them. They can either take preventive measures, or
do nothing in the name of 'free speech protection' and risk the chance that
this latest bozo is actually going to follow up with action.
Kudos to the FBI for taking this seriously and showing people you can't just
say crap like this without any consequence. Living in a free society comes
with a cost. Not saying that a recent terrorist event was "nothing" is one of
those costs.
It's simple really.
Also, if you think you aren't living in a free society, try moving to Saudi
Arabia, many countries in Africa, Cuba, Bolivia, many S. American countries,
many eastern european countries, etc.
~~~
mindcrime
_Also, if you think you aren't living in a free society, try moving to Saudi
Arabia, many countries in Africa, Cuba, Bolivia, many S. American countries,
many eastern european countries, etc._
Just because other countries are _less_ free hardly proves that we are living
in a free society. Maybe there is no free society on Earth?
_Kudos to the FBI for taking this seriously and showing people you can't just
say crap like this without any consequence._
I can't even begin to understand this mindset. In fact, it makes me a bit sick
to hear somebody talk this way. But I suppose you think that if we all just
sit back in the shadows, embrace fear, behave and do as the all mighty
benevolent government tells us, then everything will be alright.
~~~
marcamillion
I know it's an unpopular thing to hear....but freedom is a relative concept.
You are only as free as compared to someone/something else.
The world is a rough place, and is not a utopia. The fact is, people want to
hurt the Western freedoms that many take for granted. Ignoring it, doesn't
make those dangers go away.
I am not defending everything the gov't does in the name of security, but the
fact is that these challenges are not easy. They are doing the best they can.
If they didn't act on it, and this kid did in fact do something, we would be
having a COMPLETELY different conversation now.
The reason these things are so tricky is because many of these attacks happen
by 'lone wolves' which are almost impossible to stop.
So as I said, this could have gone the other way - at which point I am sure
you would be cursing the FBI for incompetence.
~~~
mindcrime
_I know it's an unpopular thing to hear....but freedom is a relative concept.
You are only as free as compared to someone/something else._
That is the single most ridiculous thing I've ever heard uttered on HN.
Freedom is binary, you are either subject to coercive force being applied to
deny you your freedom of choice, or you're not. You can't be "sort of free"
any more than you be "sort of pregnant".
_The fact is, people want to hurt the Western freedoms that many take for
granted._
Aaah, the "they hate us because we're free" bit. I hear that a lot, but
haven't heard a plausible justification for it yet. From what I've seen, most
of the non-westerners who are out to attack the West are mostly pissed off
because we occupy lands they consider holy, invade their countries, depose
their elected leaders, stage coups, supply weapons and training to "Group A"
this week, then switch to considering "Group A" our enemy when it suits us,
and generally meddle in their affairs.
_So as I said, this could have gone the other way - at which point I am sure
you would be cursing the FBI for incompetence._
No, exactly because I am fully aware of how difficult it is to prevent a
single "lone wolf" actor from doing Bad Things. And as regrettable as that is,
living in a free society has certain dangers that come along with it. Maybe in
some hypothetical Unobtanialand you could impose a draconian dictatorship /
totalitarian government sufficient to prevent all violent crime... but would
anybody actually prefer to live there? I'm guessing "no".
I don't know what it is with people today... as far as I'm concerned, "Give me
Liberty or give me Death" isn't just some archaic catch-phrase to study in the
history books... it is the very definition of what it means to live. If we
aren't free, what else could matter more than trying to become so - even if it
means dying in the process?
~~~
reinhardt
> That is the single most ridiculous thing I've ever heard uttered on HN.
> Freedom is binary, you are either subject to coercive force being applied to
> deny you your freedom of choice, or you're not. You can't be "sort of free"
> any more than you be "sort of pregnant".
Now _this_ is the single most ridiculous thing I've ever heard uttered on HN.
Any human population with size > 1 has to compromise on this inane idealistic
notion of "absolute freedom" for individuals, for the simple reason that your
freedom to blast the music at 3am conflicts with my freedom to get some sleep.
"Sort of free" is the best we can hope for.
~~~
marcamillion
Exactly...plus....what you consider 'freedom' someone else may consider
tyranny, etc.
So it is always relative.
For instance, some people think living with their parents is freedom. Others
think it is akin to jail.
It's all relative.
------
QuantumGood
Threats can be hard to parse because for the speaker, the point can be a very
emotional self-expression, rather than some kind of accuracy of intent.
One interpretation is:
I'm going to do something insane that will make the news. It may involve the
White House, and it will be worse than the Boston bombing. There will be
multiple murder charges against me.
Or: I'm going to publicly murder people in a fashion worse than the bombing.
The last Facebook lyrics before he was arrested:
_I’m not in reality, So when u see me [bleeping] go insane and make the news,
the paper, and the [bleeping] federal house of horror known as the white
house, Don’t [bleeping] cry or be worried because all YOU people [bleeping]
caused this [bleep]._
_[Bleep] a boston bominb wait till u see the [bleep] I do, I’ma be famous
rapping, and beat every murder charge that comes across me!_
The whole alternate interpretation (it's an insufficiently specific threat,
and primarily rap braggadocio) hinges mostly on the interpretation of the
inclusion and placement of the line "I’ma be famous rapping."
The problem is that the kid is clearly talking about himself killing people.
The whole rap perspective doesn't fix that sufficiently, especially as Rappers
talk about and threaten real murders, as well as merely "bragging" about them.
It certainly seems _likely_ that he's merely trying to "sound like a rapper"
rather than threatening actual harm, but the words don't really absolve him of
the threats contained therein. It is difficult to parse legally:
1\. Legal: It lacks imminence (Brandenburg)
2\. Illegal: It does _communicate a serious expression of an intent to commit
an act of unlawful violence_ (Virginia v. Black)
3\. Legal: It is not directed _to a particular individual or group of
individuals_ (Virginia v. Black)
4\. Illegal: _The speaker need not actually intend to carry out the threat...a
prohibition on true threats...protect[s] individuals
from...fear...disruption...[and] the possibility that the threatened violence
will occur_ (Virginia v. Black)
If there was a middle ground legally for people who's intent was less harmful
than their speech it would benefit this kid, but how would you prove that? And
it would muddy the law's ability to fight against true threats.
~~~
davorak
> It certainly seems likely that he's merely trying to "sound like a rapper"
> rather than threatening actual harm, but the words don't really absolve him
> of the threats contained therein. It is difficult to parse legally:
It did not seem that hard to parse, but I am not a lawyer.
> 1\. Legal: It lacks imminence (Brandenburg)
No deadlines, so nothing showing anything soon. "I’ma be famous rapping," but
first he needs to be a famous rapper which suggest no time soon.
> 2\. Illegal: It does communicate a serious expression of an intent to commit
> an act of unlawful violence (Virginia v. Black)
Threats in the lyrics are no different then threats and comments in many
rappers famous and non-famous and more often then not seem non-serious( are
not carried through, evidence of planning is lacking etc.)
> 3\. Legal: It is not directed to a particular individual or group of
> individuals (Virginia v. Black)
He only mentions the white house, no specific individuals or groups. If he had
mentioned individuals or party or a subcommittee it seems like it would still
fall under political free speech which in general is heavily protected because
it is supposed to at the root or a foundational pillar of the US's democracy.
>4\. Illegal: The speaker need not actually intend to carry out the threat...a
prohibition on true threats...protect[s] individuals
from...fear...disruption...[and] the possibility that the threatened violence
will occur (Virginia v. Black)
I see no evidence in the rap lyrics I have read that he was trying to cause
disruption in the government or to change a group or individuals actions
through threat.
> If there was a middle ground legally for people who's intent was less
> harmful than their speech it would benefit this kid, but how would you prove
> that? And it would muddy the law's ability to fight against true threats.
Normally in the US, at least, you do not have to prove some one's innocence.
The state has the burden of proving guilty.
------
mxnakqozlsjannl
Disgusting, also, how can anyone not see how all this shitty things your
government does tends to make people like it even less? maybe breeding more
'terrorists'? That's the most recent terrorism problem, no? American citizens
turning against their own country or something?
I've got to be honest on one thing here, I don't plan on shutting my mouth
about how much I think this things are terrible, and I guess I must also not
plan to set foot around there anytime soon, would I get locked up for hearing
"Paris - Bring it to ya" and posting it to my Facebook? I certainly COULD,
apparently, so I won't be going there... before, I thought it would be nice to
know California, where most of my favourite bands come from, go to the Burning
Man, do a road trip and know the country and all the famous places but I'm
giving those up.
------
trustfundbaby
It unfortunate, but the kid is an idiot. how you can post lyrics like that and
not think it would set off alarm bells all over the place after a kid (right
around the same age did something so terrible) just weeks before is beyond me.
Hopefully he walks but I hope he finds the experience harrowing enough to
learn a lesson or two about applying a little common sense to the concept of
free speech.
------
greenyoda
Prior discussion here: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5748053>
------
Steko
Oh no, white kid from the suburbs too? Time to get outraged.
~~~
im3w1l
I think the statement implicit in your post definitely sounds plausible, but
is it true? Can you point to an individual from another group being given
similar treatment for similar action, where people did not become outraged?
~~~
Steko
Are you asking me if there are other people who:
(1) make random threats against the POTUS or the WH or other public figures or
places
(2) aren't actually a clear and present danger to carry out those threats
(3) that still get the full monty by secret service/fbi/local cops/prosecutors
(4) don't get to the top of HN
Yes, there are probably a lot of people like that. And everyone says the same
thing about most of those people, "Christ, what an idiot".
Now I don't want to trivialize that this kid is clearly innocent and the
victim of some injustice. I certainly don't think he "deserves it". But
there's lots bigger injustice in the world to get outraged about and I think
threads like this make decent platforms for calling the HN community out over
it's blinders.
------
dattaway
His previous documented criminal history of physical violence was used as
evidence.
~~~
rasur
You mean the biting claim in an 8th grade fight and a fight with his sister
(who appeared in court in his _defense_ for this current infraction) for which
the Police were called (so, a domestic incident in other words). Yes, quite
the terrorist - off to Gitmo with him! :-|
~~~
dattaway
This is the way the law works and should not be a surprise. He has an
established documented history of harming people and the court failed to see a
legitimate artistic merit of his case. Fortunately, he can take these
arguments to the appellate court.
~~~
gt7570
Your first claim was documented criminal history. Where is it Sherlock?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
What is WebAssembly? (2015) - VeilEm
https://medium.com/javascript-scene/what-is-webassembly-the-dawn-of-a-new-era-61256ec5a8f6
======
castell
What's the difference between asm.js and WebAssembly?
"The initial implementation of WebAssembly support in browsers will be based
on asm.js and PNaCl". PNaCl?
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebAssembly](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebAssembly)
, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asm.js](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asm.js)
So is WebAssembly mere an asm.js v2 where all browser vendors agreed on a
standard?
~~~
antome
More specifically, asm.js can be seen as WebAssembly alpha, and will exist as
a shiv until most browsers can run WebAssembly. Both WebAssembly and asm.js
can be compiled through emscripten.
------
jacobolus
Note, this is from last June. It was submitted a few times, but apparently
only one had a comment:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9742556](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9742556)
------
jlebrech
I just want a web framework that works like QT or GTK, or even a framework as
a desktop that can be styled/themed independently of function.
WebAssembly should give us opportunity for this.
~~~
moron4hire
No, that's not really what it's about. Perhaps you're think of something more
like NW.js or Electron.
~~~
robmcm
I think they mean a framework that is like QT to build web apps, not a web
framework to generate native apps like QT.
------
_alexander_
I read this article several times, however I still have't understood how JS
and WASM will be live together?
If I can use C/C++ with static typing(of course if I can do DOM manipulation
from my C/C++ program) why I should use JS?
~~~
spicyj
Why would you ever use any language over C/C++? Different abstraction levels,
type systems (or lack thereof), ecosystems of libraries, even syntaxes all
contribute to a decision in choosing a language.
You might not like JS personally but there are plenty of things to like about
it and many other people do.
In practical terms, browsers will support JS forever for backwards
compatibility even if all new code is written in WASM.
~~~
_alexander_
Personally I really like JavaScript and I use it many years.
------
barrkel
FTR, Turbo Pascal also allowed you to write in assembler - the built-in
assembly was well integrated with the language, too, doing things like
referencing record offsets symbolically. If you could live with the
limitations, it was pretty nice.
------
amelius
> No built-in automatic garbage collector
This is cool, because this means people will implement their own garbage
collection mechanism, which could lead to interesting innovations.
~~~
golergka
> interesting innovations
Modern computers getting slow at 20 tabs of typical news sites articles is
already pretty interesting. But I can't wait to see how can we innovate this
even further!
~~~
ethbro
_> 20 tabs of typical news sites articles_
I'm impressed you can read 20 articles at once! (Said only half jokingly. I do
the same thing, but optimizing my behavior is probably the better solution to
slowness)
~~~
golergka
That reminds me of an awully old joke: "I wish I had enough disc space for
2-gigabyte swap file. — Why the hell do you need a swap file so large? — I
don't. I just need the space."
------
kristaps
I read the news back in June, but haven't followed WebAssembly since, any
interesting developments lately?
~~~
csvan
The V8 team recently announced that they will be implementing WASM.
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/v8-users/PInzACvS5I4](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/v8-users/PInzACvS5I4)
------
shultays
>A new language: WebAssembly code defines an AST (so does JavaScript)
represented in a binary format. You can author and debug in a text format so
it’s readable.
Heh, since every binary executable has a non-compiled source code somewhere
out there, can we call them readable too?
~~~
Manishearth
I don't think that's what they're saying; they're saying that wasm has a
somewhat-readable textual representation. Not a precompiled/decompiled
program, a one-one mapping from the AST to the text format. Or something.
Think of it like how assembly is to machine code, but probably more readable.
~~~
Rusky
The intent is exactly like assembly/machine code, though they haven't really
nailed down the format yet. Current implementation(s?) just use s-exprs,
though I don't think they want that to be the final form.
------
IvanK_net
I am still a little skeptical about this new language. It is not so hard to to
write optimizable JS. And when you need a real performance boost, most of such
tasks are parallelizable, so you can use low-level WebGL or WebCL.
~~~
nv-vn
This isn't meant to replace the code you're writing, but rather serve as a
target architecture for compilers. It may also end up speeding up your
JavaScript if you compile it down, but the biggest difference will be to the
current "compile-to-javascript" languages (TypeScript, Elm, Dart, etc.)
------
crdoconnor
Sounds like it's opening up a whole new world of potential exploits.
~~~
Rusky
No more than the typical bounds checking done for asm.js byte buffers. It's
nothing like NaCl.
------
neikos
Another thing to block in my browser I suppose.
~~~
wtetzner
Why? It's functionally equivalent (at least for now) to asm.js, which is just
a subset of JavaScript.
------
msandford
This sounds great, but it's going to make it so, so much easier to spy on
people and hide all kinds of nastiness in web applications.
Worse is that tons of web applications that get exploited won't be understood
by the people who run them. Wordpress is a total minefield right now and it
gets hacked all the time. What'll happen once they have a module that compiles
up web assembly output for all the other modules running to speed things up?
EDIT: wordpress the thing you install yourself, not wordpress the hosted app
~~~
spyder
First:
WebAssemly will have a readable text format for view-source functionality:
[https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/TextFormat...](https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/TextFormat.md)
Second:
_"...so much easier to spy on people and hide all kinds of nastiness in web
applications."_
What kind of spying and nastiness? WebAssembly will not have more access to
your data than the JavaScript API. It will have access to the same API as
JavaScript. For example if it wants your location it will call the same HTML5
location API and with the same restrictions, with the permission popup. Or
setting cookies will also call the same API. And thanks to the built-in
developer tools in browsers you can check the outgoing requests to see what is
sent and to where.
~~~
msandford
Readable text format at a much lower level of abstraction than javascript
currently is at right now. Different is different.
It's not so much about spying on your computer and gaining extra access, it's
obvious (short of implementation bugs) that you won't gain any additional
privileges that way.
But what you will gain is a way to obfuscate _extremely well_ "report such and
such to some webserver" in a way that's difficult to detect. For example, you
can hide the entropy inside of a fairly innocent looking URL and without a lot
of digging you won't know _what_ that entropy represents. It can look like
just a plain jane resource request and the webserver can serve up the exact
same resource no matter what the entropy is, but also record that entropy for
a back-channel way of exfiltrating information from your browser.
Finally, it opens up a whole new world of compiler attack. Right now the
attacks against wordpress involve writing some information into a file and
making it look "weird but I don't know what it does so I'd better not touch
it".
What happens when breaking into a wordpress install means that you can execute
the equivalent of the untraceable compiler login exploit insertion attack? You
can't perform this attack without 1) a compiler and 2) a low level target
that's hard to understand. You don't even need to perform a stage 3 attack
which is the most sophisticated, a stage 2 would do fine.
[https://www.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thomp...](https://www.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thompson.pdf)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
REI to sell sprawling new and unused headquarters to shift to remote work - helloworld
https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/13/business/rei-sell-campus-coronavirus-trnd/index.html
======
chives_yo
I know personally at least two employees who left REI when they announced
plans to move to these headquarters a few years back. Then, remote work wasn't
an option for employees and they didn't want to have to start commuting
through Bellevue traffic (previous location was in Kent) or move to Bellevue
(a significantly more expensive area). The attitude seemed to be that the
wealthier people in upper management made the decision to move at the expense
of "regular" employees. Glad for their current employees that this is
happening, but it seems a little late.
------
refresher
Assuming more and more large corporations begin to do this, is there a
particular sector that can take advantage of all of these empty office
buildings?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Your best passive income sources? - buf
Previous post 1 year ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4639271
======
dangrossman
Depending on what you consider passive...
My "best" passive income source would be subscription revenue from SaaS
businesses. I run several, with no employees, with growth from existing
marketing and word-of-mouth outpacing churn, and no active management needed
other than answering customer e-mails. Everything that can be automated is
automated, from backups, to monitoring, to lifecycle and dunning e-mails.
Improvely ([https://www.improvely.com](https://www.improvely.com)) is the
newest, just over a year old now, and passed $10k/mo RR not too long ago.
If that's still too much to qualify as passive, the stock market contributes
the next largest chunk of revenue. Of the money I put in equities, 2/3rds are
in index funds (primarily total market stock and bond indexes), and 1/3rd in
hand-picked tech companies. The market's been good since the recession crash;
better than a 25% annual return.
My most passive income is from revenue sharing affiliate/referral agreements.
I work with a lot of small businesses with websites, and refer them to vendors
for merchant accounts and advertising services as both publishers and
advertisers. For all three, I found good companies to work with that pay a
percentage of referrals' spending for the life of their accounts. There are
businesses I referred for credit card processing almost 8 years ago I'm still
getting a monthly commission check of several hundred dollars a month for,
each.
~~~
DougWebb
I just skimmed through the Improvely website; it looks great. I'd never guess
that there was a single passive developer behind it. Can I ask what your
investment was in building it?
------
spiredigital
Drop shipping eCommerces sites. I've been doing this for 5+ years full-time.
Starting out - like anything - you need to do a lot of the legwork yourself
but now I only spend a few hours a week managing my team and it provides a
healthy full time income. And with drop shipping, all the fulfillment,
purchasing and warehousing is handled by someone else.
I know drop shipping can get a bad reputation, but when done correctly it can
be an effective way to create a passive income streams. If you can program
well, I'm not sure if I'd recommend it over a SAAS based approach. You'll
likely be able to make more money with SAAS as you're creating your own
products vs. selling an existing one. But the long-term upkeep is generally
less for eCommerce vs. SAAS (guessing here, as I've never run a SAAS
business).
Margins are a bit lower with DS, so it does take a while to build some organic
traffic and marketing buzz. But once that starts to gain some traction, it's
not too much work to get a team in place and automate things. And if you're
willing to put in the time to make a high-quality site that addresses customer
questions and buying hesitations up-front before the sale, it's even easier to
automate on the back end for support.
But you do have to be careful about niche selection. Because drop shipping
markets are fairly competitive (low barriers to entry), you have to be really
selective about what nniches you get into. Specifically, I like to see really
confusing niches where I can add lots of informational value, plus lots of
accessories I can sell to increase overall margins). For anyone who is
interested, I wrote a blog post on the three crucial things I look for when
picking a niche for eCommerce and drop shipping:
[http://www.ecommercefuel.com/anatomy-of-profitable-
niche/](http://www.ecommercefuel.com/anatomy-of-profitable-niche/)
------
gmays
Residential real estate investments, mostly in San Diego, CA. I bought during
the dip '08 to '12 and rent them out. Property managers take care of all of
them for me. Most are condos, which are significantly better for cash flow
than single family homes.
I got pretty lucky with them. One one I distinctly remember I bought for less
than half of what the people losing it (short sale) still owed. They were all
in pretty good condition, I just replaced the carpet, painted, made minor
repairs, and replaced appliances.
------
contergan
Social welfare sponsored by the tax payer.
------
throwaway889955
I enjoy having side projects and currently have 4 active ones that could
realistically make at least a some money. But as a foreigner in the US (came
as student, now on H1B visa) it's the unfortunate reality that it is illegal
for me to pursue money-generating side projects. I am curious to hear if other
foreigners have found ways to legally pursue their side projects while living
in the US.
~~~
iamben
I have absolutely no idea how this works, but can't you just put it through a
bank account/company you set up in your home country and pay tax on it there?
------
gfodor
fixed income. muni CEFs are trading at a 10% discount to NAV. overall fixed
income is under pressure due to fear of rising interest rates and fed
tapering, so future interest rate hikes are partially priced in both in NAV
terms and in discount. if you don't have any plans on selling your bonds (and
hence, don't really care about the day-to-day price fluctuations of bond
funds) and just want an income stream you could do worse than loading up on
discounted, diversified CEFs that pass the smell test of being able to sustain
their distribution.
the main risk here is inflation risk. if inflation in the country takes off
your 5% yielding (likely 30% leveraged) bond fund is going to start to see its
real return get eaten away quickly.
the alternatives are equities though. and right now the stock market is pretty
scary to me.
~~~
mjn
I'm no bond expert, but aren't munis discounted in part due to default
worries? There's a fear that a second wave of municipalities that survived the
first wave of post-crisis bankruptcies may still succumb, since many avoided
default by doing miscellaneous stop-gap and accounting tricks that may not be
repeatable. Hence a risk premium.
~~~
gfodor
Yes this is likely part of the reason but in general the discount arose due to
the fed tapering issue since the discounts on all fixed income have widened
together since. Regardless, a particular muni fund will be exposed to
thousands of municipalities, so default risk is essentially diversified away,
particularly if you invest in a managed fund where the fund managers have a
track record of understanding the municipalities they invest in. Unless you
are a devout believer in the efficient market, one could argue that the
discount could in part be due to irrational investors selling their munis to
buy equities in a media environment where scary headlines about Detroit going
bankrupt are on CNN and Facebook stock doubles since it's IPO.
------
zachlatta
I sell bitcoin on localbitcoins.com with a 5% profit margin. I wrote a set of
scripts that automates the entire process for me, making it completely hands
off. I've only been doing this for a month or two, but I've made a decent
amount.
------
ElbertF
Not completely passive but I run
[http://wappalyzer.com](http://wappalyzer.com) which is very low maintenance
and a decent secondary source of income.
------
brk
Server hosting. $50/u. Bring your own 1u box. The datacenter I'm affiliated
with handles any hot-hands stuff. It's 99% passive for me.
------
gesman
Affiliate commission checks from services who pay recurring commissions for
referrals. These are truly passive - about $100/mo
~~~
wmaiouiru
What is your website? Who did you get started?
------
BennyH26
After making nearly $0 per month for the first year (yes, you read that
correctly), [http://www.pingmate.com](http://www.pingmate.com) now generates
excellent RR, though the first year was far from passive.
------
sourabh86
Two Android apps I made on weekends. $50/mo ad revenue with just admob.
------
cko
Single family rentals (SFRs) which cash flow. I put 20%+ down on properties in
solid locations (strong population/job growth, safe neighborhood, etc.). I
save about 80%+ of my after-tax income.
~~~
iamchmod
I second the Single family rentals (SFRs). Follow the 12% rule which is that
the house HAS to rent on an annual basis for at least 12% of purchase price.
For example a $100K house has to rent for at least $12K per year
($1000/month). So put 20% down ($20K), get a 30 year fixed for $80K. Your
expenses on monthly basis are mortgage + prop tax + prop manager + prop
insurance = $500-$600. Rental income = $1000 per month. So you clear $400-$500
per month ($4800-6000/year) per rental property. With 20% down ($20K), that's
a ROI of right around 20% before any property appreciation. Note: I didn't
include closing costs which fluctuate a fair bit depending on lender and where
the property is.
------
lukio
Games. I release one browser game (kinda like Travian or eRepublik, but
simpler) pretty much every other month and they are actually a very good
source of income. They pay all of my bills.
------
vocatus
Bitcoin mining.
~~~
Artemis2
Is that still working? With with hardware?
~~~
vocatus
Ten friends bought in with me on a bunch of BFL hardware way back in the day,
so we were fortunate enough to be ahead of the curve. It is quickly becoming
less profitable though.
------
Artemis2
CodeCanyon. Not very much, but that's cool to get 100$ each 2-3 months.
------
Ryel
AirBnb ebooks hosting reseller (singlehop)
------
Kranar
Buy shares of SPY and collect dividends.
------
latch
dividends
------
davidsmith8900
\- Freelancing
~~~
rbchv
This isn't passive.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
France Begins Shutting Down Alternative News Websites - doctorshady
http://yournewswire.com/france-begin-shutting-down-alternative-news-websites/
======
CM30
And so it begins.
Yet another government rushing through poorly thought out laws that shuts down
freedom of speech and expression to 'protect people from terrorists'.
It's especially sad given that A, this is France we're talking about and B,
this sort of fear is exactly what the terrorists want people to feel.
------
wwayer
Can some French readers of Hacker News please weigh in on this? Why are you
tolerating this sort of thing after witnessing the damage the United States
did to itself after 9/11?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Quiche – An implementation of the QUIC transport protocol in Rust - jgrahamc
https://github.com/cloudflare/quiche
======
dochtman
I still don't quite understand why Cloudflare is going their own way rather
than joining our Rust implementation
([https://github.com/djc/quinn](https://github.com/djc/quinn)). So far the
primary maintainer told me "I quite like how quiche has turned out, and we
already started integrating into internal stuff", which I haven't found very
satisfying.
Perhaps they just want to strategically own their own stack, but it seems to
me aligning with the broader Rust ecosystem and getting features for free from
the community would also bring some value.
Initially I thought it was mainly about integrating with BoringSSL rather than
_ring_ and rustls, but even the promise of pluggable crypto didn't seem to
affect their decision.
Would be nice to have more clarity on this.
(Previously they were happy enough to use Quinn for their Noise experiment,
although without crediting our project explicitly in the resulting paper.)
~~~
jgrahamc
Fundamentally, we wanted an interface to QUIC that we could integrate with our
existing server systems. Our servers, naturally, have their own methods of
handling a wide range of things like: socket addressing; events state; memory
management; TLS handshake processing; request and response processing; and we
needed our QUIC implementation to be as independent of these notions as
possible. Looking at a library like quinn and some other QUIC implementations,
we see that these APIs are tied to many of these external notions, and
specific implementations of these notions for that matter, one example being
the core protocol objects in quinn that directly link to specific socket and
address and even event loop reactor objects - and these objects strictly in
Rust to boot.
It was obvious from our experience with our first QUIC proof of concept, and
from our evaluation of options for our continued QUIC offerings, that existing
solutions available right now would not be able to offer the level of
flexibility and abstraction we need, nor would they likely be able to add the
interfaces we need in a reasonable timescale, nor would they likely tolerate
our requests to do so.
~~~
downsideup
I'm one of the engineers working on QUIC projects at Cloudflare.
This response from jgrahamc just came to my attention. His comments are based
on a discussion I had with him about our first QUIC project and then
additionally what I knew of quinn. I described how quinn was arranged and that
it provided an interface that was oriented towards the tokio IO library. What
I seem to have failed to communicate was the IO specific interfaces were not
the only interfaces provided by quinn, and that more abstract interfaces do
exist. This mistaken impression seems to have been bundled with the multitude
of reasons that we did not choose various other QUIC implementations.
I'm sorry that this this mischaracterisation was made against your work, and
hope anyone reading this thread does not take away the same impression.
------
marceloneil
Why use BoringSSL? I was under the impression that it was not recommended for
third-party use.
~~~
ocdtrekkie
Extended opinion on this by someone formerly Google and currently Cloudflare:
[https://github.com/sandstorm-
io/sandstorm/issues/3036#issuec...](https://github.com/sandstorm-
io/sandstorm/issues/3036#issuecomment-366792583)
tl;dr is that Google is not supporting features in BoringSSL that Google
doesn't need, but it's probably adequate for a lot of other projects.
~~~
tialaramex
Really we should learn to expect that "I don't support that" is the default
unless somebody's _actual_ business is supporting you doing whatever it is.
Which it rarely is these days. This obviously matters most for security, but
it's true everywhere.
Another security example is that a tremendous amount of stuff ultimately
decides whether to trust a certificate based on Mozilla's root trust
programme.
That seems fine right? Well, kinda. It's definitely better than "I found this
file named CA_TRUST.Z on an old Solaris machine in 1997 and so that'll have to
do" as a policy.
But it's different from two things you or end users might expect you're
achieving.
1\. This isn't "You know, the same Certificate Authorities trusted
everywhere". There is no such thing. The big root trust programmes have a fair
amount of commonality, which is fine if you're out to obtain a certificate for
a web site (pick anyone in the common set) but they aren't even close to
mirrors. Mozilla's list is significantly different from Apple's which is
likewise different from Microsoft's.
2\. This also isn't "Like in Firefox". This problem is more subtle, after all
the Firefox build process consumes the same file, ultimately, as your code
does. But, Firefox has a long list of extra rules beyond whether or not
something is in Mozilla's published trust store and your application would
need lots of extra work to implement all those rules and track updates to
them. Did you do that work? No you did not.
This probably won't bite you, and likewise relying on bits of BoringSSL that
Google doesn't care about probably won't cause massive security problems in
your code. But only probably.
------
aboutruby
I thought they were doing Go whenever possible.
~~~
jgrahamc
We do have a lot of Go but we are not religious about languages as that would
be silly. Rust has some interesting properties and compiles readily to
WebAssembly. We'll continue to use Go and Rust for projects. We also have lots
of Lua, PHP and C++ in production. Plus lots of Python and other languages.
------
funkythings
I hope rust becomes more mainstream in companies. At the moment it seems like
a lot of smaller components are implemented in rust, to allow employees to get
familiar with it.
~~~
pornel
Rust is mainstream at Cloudflare. It's used for many new projects. New
projects naturally start small.
There are millions of lines of existing production code in other languages,
but they won't get rewritten. Even if they would be better in Rust, there's a
high opportunity cost of rewriting existing code that works, instead of
spending the effort on adding value elsewhere.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Deaf man sues Pornhub over lack of closed captions in violation of the ADA - elmar
https://abcnews.go.com/US/deaf-man-sues-pornhub-lack-closed-captions/story?id=68354500
======
threatofrain
If a company doesn't have the kind of technology to effectively transcribe
their large volume of videos and the daily rate of uploads, then must they
simply start taking down videos? If a company started hiring inhouse to
develop such tech, how long would it take?
~~~
michaelt
Given the performance of Google's auto-captioning, I suspect developing
worthwhile auto-captioning is pretty difficult; according to [1] the better
Youtube channels use gig economy captioning at $1 per minute.
Of course, there would be some scope for efficiency - no need to pay for
captioning when the performers aren't speaking!
[1] [https://www.wired.com/story/problem-with-youtubes-
terrible-c...](https://www.wired.com/story/problem-with-youtubes-terrible-
closed-craptions/)
~~~
lowdose
While Youtube auto captioning has a superior performance compared to Google
Translate output. In youtube translations there is much more language specific
nuance. In many European languages a more formal word for the English word
"you" exists, in German it is "Sie", French "Vous".
Correct interpretations of these nuances are applied by Youtube, Google
however translates "you" by default to the most formal option.
So to me $1 dollar per minute sounds like an awesome deal because there is not
much to adjust.
Out of curiosity, can you link to such a gig company?
~~~
uncle_j
Youtube auto captioning doesn't work for British Accents especially anything
Northern English, Scottish or Welsh.
The same with any voice control, It doesn't work with my west country accent.
------
chrxr
Relevant precedent: Harvard recently settled with National Association of the
Deaf, resulting in all videos made publically available after Dec 2019
requiring captions, and a required 5 day turnaround for captioning of older
videos. [https://dredf.org/2019/11/27/landmark-settlement-with-
harvar...](https://dredf.org/2019/11/27/landmark-settlement-with-harvard-to-
improve-online-accessibility/)
~~~
Myrmornis
That sounds positive. In contrast, a similar situation at Berkeley had a
disastrous outcome -- all Berkeley's historical non-captioned videos of
lectures were taken down.
~~~
drewbug01
> That sounds positive. In contrast, a similar situation at Berkeley had a
> disastrous outcome -- all Berkeley's historical non-captioned videos of
> lectures were taken down.
It's worth re-iterating that it didn't have to happen this way: Berkeley could
have captioned the videos; but there's no indication that they seriously
considered this option. In fact, I cannot find any indication that Berkeley
tried to find any sort of compromise with the DOJ - despite the letter from
the DOJ strongly urging Berkeley to work with the department towards a
solution.
The DOJ letter is also worth a read, in that they find the management of UC
Berkeley did not seriously attempt to enforce any sort of compliance with
accessibility standards.
It would have been expensive, sure. But it's wise to keep in mind that the UC
system operates with a yearly budget exceeding nine billion dollars - and as
much as we want to worry about the cost of transcribing those old courses, at
the end of the day it is a drop in the bucket of their overall expenditures.
------
breakingcups
Does anyone with more experience with this law know whether the ADA would
apply to _all_ video content on a website or just a subset?
Otherwise YouTube would also have a huge problem. Their auto-generated CC's
are laughable most of the time.
~~~
aequitas
I find their CC to be pretty accurate most of the time with sometimes some
words misunderstood. It's not perfect, but for me it often is very usable as
aid in a noisy environment (mind you I have no hearing disability, just don't
want to crank the volume to 11 when my kids are playing in the same room).
~~~
tpaksoy
Until someone with an accent appears on the screen.
And I don't mean someone from France or Turkey for instance. But Brits, and in
particular Scots, usually break the automatically generated CCs.
~~~
ghaff
TBH, even human transcribers have their limits. I often get transcripts of my
podcasts. But if I have someone with a strong accent, I’ll often skip because
I know I’ll be charged for a difficult transcription especially around
technical terms and I’ll still have to do a lot of cleanup.
Surely the ADA requirement isn’t for a near perfect transcript.
That actually makes me wonder re podcasts and other audio. Is there any reason
they’d have a different requirement or are these lawsuits specifically about
video for some reason?
~~~
extra88
> Surely the ADA requirement isn’t for a near perfect transcript.
The law requires "reasonable accommodations" to provide a equivalent
experience. Expecting perfection would not be reasonable. Also with heavy
accents, the hearing audience probably doesn't understand every word so if
some words in the transcript were wrong, the hearing impaired have the same
experience.
There's nothing special about video, the law can also require podcasts and
other audio-only content to provide transcripts. But the law doesn't apply to
everything and everybody, it applies to "places of public accommodation," and
many podcasts are personal projects, to which it doesn't apply. The legal
precedent for what is a place of public accommodation is evolving, even
including anything online is not universally held, I don't know what counts;
having an ad spot in a podcast is probably not sufficient to suddenly make it
a business to which the law applies. It almost certainly applies to an
operation like Gimlet.
~~~
ghaff
And it’s possibly complicated by the fact that many podcasts don’t even carry
advertising but are clearly content marketing for businesses. Mind you for SEO
and other reasons, transcripts are often a good idea but probably the vast
majority of even quasi-pro podcasts don’t do them.
------
raxxorrax
Some people do indeed watch it for the story.
The phonetic alphabet would probably be helpful here, given the "text"
material. Quite a challenge. But since this is for pornography, I do not doubt
it will exist in a short amount of time.
------
dbetteridge
Honest question here If you are building a system that is focused on a
specific audience, i.e you're building a video site not intended for those
with disabilities, how does that work?
Can you be forced to provide additional content outside of your systems
intended use case?
We build sites to meet WCAG standards when doing Government work, but for
other sites that are personal/startup projects do these same rules apply and
if so why do they apply?
As a somewhat contrived example, are Spotify required to provide
captions/lyrics with each song they stream?
~~~
extra88
> If you are building a system that is focused on a specific audience, i.e
> you're building a video site not intended for those with disabilities
That in itself would be discriminatory, excluding people belonging to a
protected class (i.e. people with disabilities).
The law does not apply to personal sites, it applies to "places of public
accommodation." Most court case outcomes have agreed that it's not only
physical places, websites and apps of businesses are included.
A private club might be exempt but I'm sure there are limitations on what can
be a private club; i.e. Dollar Shave Club can't call themselves a private club
so their website can be inaccessible to people with disabilities.
> As a somewhat contrived example, are Spotify required to provide
> captions/lyrics with each song they stream?
Probably lyrics, which are basically a transcript, they wouldn't have to be
synchronized to the music, as captions are. The law requires "reasonable
accommodations" to be made and lyrics to songs are readily available from the
rights holders; if those rights holders wanted a lot more money for the lyrics
along with the songs, that could be an undue burden on Spotify and mean they
don't have to do it.
I thought Pornhub hosted videos uploaded by users. If they're just a platform,
they shouldn't be liable for the lack of captions. The article mentions there
is a section for captioned videos (though I wonder if they're actually
subtitles translating a language, not captions for the hearing-impaired) so I
assume their video player supports caption files.
------
grzm
From 4 days ago (40 points, 34 comments):
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22077649](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22077649)
------
qwerty456127
This is funny (who cares about what do they speak in porn, really? I know some
people learn German just to understand that but that's hardly essential for
the experience) but there have been more alike case which were sad:
universities removing (!) freely-available lecture videos as there were no
subtitles (even those published on YouTube, I don't know why generated
subtitles wouldn't qualify).
~~~
michaelt
_> who cares about what do they speak in porn, really?_
The article says one of the videos in the complaint was "hot step aunt"
If you remove the audio from incest porn, doesn't that turn it into regular
vanilla porn?
~~~
StevePerkins
Yes, thankfully.
------
chmaynard
Porn videos are best left un-captioned. The court should advise the plaintiff
to use his imagination.
------
FerretFred
You mean people actually watch porn with the sound turned on? (pardon the pun)
------
mrbonner
Now, this would be a very high bias, low variance ML problem to tackle :-)
------
reallydontask
There is a closed caption category in pornhub. Well, at least, that is what I
have been told.
Not to mention that this is actually mentioned in the article
------
levosmetalo
Why only Pornhub. Many Videos on Prime don't have captions. Why not just sue
Amazon?
------
bilekas
How will he ever know if the new tennant ever got the plumbing fixed !
This is just pure discrimination. :)
~~~
buboard
spoiler alert they never do.
~~~
qwerty456127
Perhaps they do but we can't see that because PornHub doesn't have the full
movies. E.g. I've actually done both the jobs once when I was a [real] cable
worker.
~~~
buboard
thats a good point. always a cliffhanger
------
gushie
"Oh oh oh oh ooooh" just about covers it.
------
tw1010
Curious: why isn't all porn sites sued for this? I don't quite get why they're
only going after PH? Is it because it's harder to win a case against 1000
websites? Is it because it's more overhead to go after multiple sites and they
expect the biggest return on investment only going after the biggest one?
Anyone smarter than me who has a take?
~~~
jascii
Precedent: a conviction against one will encourage the others to do the right
thing while avoiding the cost of having 1000's of defendants.
~~~
jeroenhd
If "doing the right thing" means banning videos from all online platforms
except those with the capability to automatically translate sound into
subtitles, I'd rather they don't do the "right thing". The end result will be
lawsuit money for a few disabled people and the end of most alternative video
platforms.
~~~
scarface74
No the result will be a lot of money for lawyers and a few pennies for the
actual litigant.
------
Beltiras
I think it's just transparently obvious that the plaintiff is right. Youtube
is autogenerating CCs.
~~~
azdacha
World cannot laugh enough about this. Let's be transparently honest about
this!
~~~
Beltiras
It must be because I have worked with advocates for disabled people. I don't
see the funny aspect. I'm glad for the laws. Either they apply or they do not.
Either our hearing-disabled brothers and sisters are equal or they are not.
It's juvenile to somehow factor porn out and say it shouldn't count there.
~~~
pyr0hu
Yeah, but what about the case that @threatofrain mentioned? If a company has
no resources to auto-generate CCs for every video uploaded, then it should be
punished and sued? (Of course this case does not apply to PH)
~~~
PudgePacket
I think in real life these things are on a sliding scale, similar to business
obligations as the business grows in $ and employee count.
So if the mum & pop corner store has a video on their site without captions
it'll slide, but if a bank doesn't have captions they're in trouble.
~~~
leppr
It's a very bad thing if in real life, everyone has to be in illegality in
order to function. This is when the rule of law loses meaning and becomes a
mere weapon to be used by those in power.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Baggage claim: Trading your excess airline luggage-allowance - edward
http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2016/09/baggage-claim?fsrc=scn%2Ffb%2Fte%2Fbl%2Fed%2Fbaggageclaimtradingyourexcessairlineluggageallowance
======
desdiv
>Grabr largely skirts this conundrum by having the courier do the purchasing
and packing.
On the US customs declaration 6059B form[0], question 14 is:
_I have commercial merchandise: (articles for sale, samples used for
soliciting orders, or goods that are not considered personal effects)_
Truthfully answering yes means you waste an extra 15 to 60 minutes dealing
with customs and paying import duties on whatever you're bring (personal
exceptions doesn't apply for commercial goods). That's assuming you're a US
resident. If you're a non-resident then you better plan on sleeping in the
airport that night.
Lie by answering no and 99.99% of the time you won't be caught. But 10 years
down the road if the government ever have an axe to grind against you, they
can just look up that confirmation email you got from Grabr and match it
against the 6059B form you filled out and they got you on the hook for making
false statements (18 U.S.C. § 1001)[1].
[0] [http://www.immihelp.com/immigration/sample-us-customs-
declar...](http://www.immihelp.com/immigration/sample-us-customs-declaration-
form-6059b.pdf)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Making_false_statements](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Making_false_statements)
~~~
Cpoll
Use a throwaway email for Grabr, there's not much they can do short of a sting
operation.
~~~
joecot
If they know where to look they could issue a warrant for that info, and Grabr
have your credit card information.
~~~
aboonaboo
> If they know where to look they could issue a warrant for that info, and
> Grabr have your credit card information.
Bitcoin funneled to paypal cash?
------
THE_PUN_STOPS
> Airmule, a rival, sets standard fees for deliveries: $40 for packages up to
> 5lb (2.3kg), or $60 if the “mule” departs within 48 hours, plus a $5 fee if
> the mule has to travel to pick up the package.
Uhhh.... They actually named it Airmule? Is this satire?
~~~
anexprogrammer
What could possibly go wrong?
"did you pack your bags yourself? Are you carrying anything for anyone else?"
"Well I'm carrying an Airmule(tm) package. They packed it. They texted a photo
to prove it was totally legit."
"Um, really sir? Please come with us"
~~~
r00fus
"You've earned a free body-cavity search!"
Hope no Airmule users plan travel to the Philippines...
------
peterbonney
One big thing the article leaves out is the delivery logistics on the other
end of the trip.
Let's consider the $5 watch example. For such a low-value parcel, how much
time and effort will each party put into delivery/receipt? As a courier, for a
mere $5 there is _no way_ I'm going to go out of my way drop off the package
to anyone. So the recipient is going to need to retrieve it from me at the
airport. Are they willing to wait around for hours (or pay someone else) for
me to arrive, clear customs, etc.? Because I'm certainly not going to hang
around at the airport for hours for _them_ if I'm only getting $5 - so they'd
better be there on time. And that means they are going to have to pay for
transportation to/from the airport (usually pretty far from the city center)
on top of the cost of shipping.
All in all it seems like a pretty hard sell - mail/package couriers have
already sorted out these logistics and will deliver stuff straight to your
door, usually quite cheaply.
The only way I can see the economics working is avoiding import duties in
countries where they are prohibitive, which of course means shifting an
unacceptable risk to the courier.
~~~
disordinary
Actually, if they wait for me and throw in a lift to town and I might be
tempted. Airports can be seriously costly to get from/to.
------
disordinary
Completely not worth it, against airline and government policy and an easy way
to recruit drug mules. "Here, buy this thing from that suspiciously empty shop
and take it across international borders."
Also $5 to buy a watch is hardly worth the time, unless your literally buying
it at duty free.
------
pavel_lishin
> _For bringing a Citizen watch to Vu in Ho Chi Minh City, you can make $5.
> Franz in Munich is apparently unsatisfied with the quality of coffee there,
> and will pay you $15 to bring him a box of San Francisco’s Blue Bottle
> beans. Ahmed in Cairo has seemingly spotted a good deal for an Apple Macbook
> Pro in Dubai, and is willing to part with $100 to have someone bring one to
> him._
The trouble of even downloading the app and signing up for an account isn't
worth $5 to me.
~~~
maerF0x0
Me neither, but we're part of a disappearing slice of the world where we cant
be bothered. Much of the the labor force will do anything to make more than
minimum wage.
~~~
disordinary
Those people aren't flying internationally. If you spend hundreds on an
airline ticket then you wont care abbot $5
~~~
chrischen
Tell that to hostel-ers around the world.
~~~
disordinary
I spent several months backpacking around Europe, through Russia, and then
China, and a friend of mine is pretty much a professional backpacker well into
his 30's. It can be tough, and you take odd jobs when you can get them. But
realistically $5 is not going to buy you a nights sleep in a dorm, it might
buy you lunch, it will just buy you a coffee in some airports.
Not worth the risk for the money on offer. Knowingly being a drug mule, on the
other hand, pays better.
~~~
chrischen
You can get hostel beds for $15-$20 in Hong Kong, even if it doesn't get you
all the way, it's a significant chunk, so little bits from various places will
add up.
~~~
disordinary
You can get a hostel for $25 in most places, seasoned travelers are not going
to be taking unknown packages around. The people that do that sort of stuff
are the people going on their first trip overseas.
------
pmontra
"Did you pack your bags yourself?"
Be careful about what you answer. "No" is a bad answer and "yes" is OK only if
1) the content of the bag is OK and 2) you really packed it.
------
bko
I can't see this as a long term viable market. Airlines obviously won't like
this and it's only a matter of time until they lobby politicians to make this
illegal because "terrorism"
It's a shame because I believe that loosening restrictions of airline tickets,
specifically allowing for transferability would be a huge opportunity. If
tickers were transferrable, the seemingly arbitrary shifts in pricing would
fall considerably. The same restrictions could apply such as visa restrictions
and perhaps even a limit to transferability such as 24 hours before the
flight. It would be a huge win for the consumer but sadly I doubt this will
happen any time soon.
~~~
SilasX
Similarly, it's ridiculous how they charge for checked luggage.
Now, wait, let me finish! I don't mean in the confused sense of "lol
everything should be free!"
What I mean is, checked luggage is _inconvenient_ for the passenger (less
access, have to wait), while using the _least scarce_ part of the cabin --
they can't sell tickets to fly in the cargo hold, while they want to allocate
whatever passenger-usable space they can for paying passengers.
So, if anything, they should charge for carry-on luggage while making (some
level of) checked luggage free.
The system we have now -- the opposite -- creates perverse incentives all
around: passengers are encouraged to _avoid_ using the perfectly usable cargo
hold, and instead, cram increasingly absurd amounts into their carry-on
allotment, testing the unwillingness of airline employees to say, "sorry,
you're over your limit, you'll have to check that". And then people have more
pieces to deal with, choking up the loading and deplaning procedures, and
bringing more of their (potentially dangerous) items through a security
checkpoint...
Every time I fly, I notice a sea of people toting enormous bags, as if to say
"tell me can't take this on. Just try."
~~~
jschwartzi
This assumes they don't make any money from selling space in the cargo hold
for air mail couriers.
~~~
SilasX
Right, but if we assume passenger space trades off one-to-one for cargo hold
space [1], then the airline could reallocate the overhead bins to cargo (e.g.
raise the floor). Then they could sell out even more cargo space as mail. So,
in equilibrium, passengers should have to "compensate" (pay a premium) for the
airline's lost opportunity to rent out the space.
Instead, everyone gets some of that premium, human-usable space for free. But
if people are going to get some lump of space for free, why not make it the
cargo hold, which is less constrained (doesn't have to be human usable) and
thus cheaper? They're effectively letting people with more expensive
requirements (must be able to access my stuff during flight) be subsidized by
people with less expensive requirements ("I can wait until after the flight to
access my stuff").
[1] which is probably true enough to a first approximation; you could redesign
the interior to have more cargo space and less passenger space
~~~
detaro
Is floor height (and thus window positioning, ...) something an airline can
order customized? (genuine question, I always thought of that stuff as fixed,
but I could very well be wrong)
------
pfarnsworth
No thanks. The laws are so brutal in some countries, there's no way I would
ever risk it. In Japan, Sudafed is illegal, which is something I would not
have known if not for my friend who ran into this issue years ago.
And in some countries like Singapore and Indonesia, even a small amount of
drugs will get you executed. Too much risk for so little return. Who knows
what they are packing in their package, and it really seems like drugs and
other illegal items would be relish at the opportunity to use this service.
------
carpathiani
Shipping with a contract carrier provides lots of benefits. The method
described here only increases risk for all parties.
------
CodeSheikh
Given the current political climate and default skepticism and fear that comes
with air traveling, I would not take $50 to take someone else's goods. Heck I
double check if one of my friends of family member try to send an item with me
(that has happened like 1 out of 1000 times I have traveled). This app has
funding from Russia and it might be a success there. Sure they just wanted a
media footprint catapulted by US media outlets.
What I would like to see is airlines encouraging me to check in a few
days/weeks earlier and state how many bags I am planning to check in
(international travel as domestic airlines dont allow free check in bags
except southwest ). If none or less then I should be compensated in some sort
of air miles. Then the airline can sell the extra space to a private shipping
company. No need to turn travelers into Uber for taco bells for a nostalgic
digital nomad living in Reykjavik.
------
tmaly
cool idea, but I just imagine someone getting in trouble for transporting
something that is not allowed.
------
jacalata
Interesting - I was expecting this to be about trading your luggage allowance
with other passengers on the same plane, which is a much tinier audience but
might avoid some of the risks.
------
bronco21016
This is exactly something I could see low paid employees at a US regional
airline doing to make some extra money.
------
post_break
I've watched enough Australia border security episodes to know I would never
use this service.
------
jbmorgado
This seems like a very big risk. You are actually putting your name on a
baggage that is passing trough a high security/high traffic control situation.
I would never do this for someone I didn't trust personally.
~~~
maerF0x0
You didnt read the details. You're also tasked with provisioning and packing
the thing . Eg: goto walmart and buy me M&Ms, fly them to london to deliver to
me.
~~~
adamio
not with Airmule, with them the packages are pre-packed
~~~
maerF0x0
Gotcha, because it was first mentioned I was thinking the article was about
grabr. But I see now its about the whole idea in general. Yes, taking an
unknown prepackaged ("ticking"?) container onto the plane for a stranger seems
to either be 1) stupid or 2) vastly undercompensated.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Cassandra: Fact vs fiction - ropiku
http://spyced.blogspot.com/2010/04/cassandra-fact-vs-fiction.html
======
didip
Based on our usage, I think Thrift is the Achilles' heel for Cassandra. Some
of Trift problems that we've seen:
* simple port scan can crash Thrift.
* Malform data can crash Thrift.
* inserting data too fast can crash Thrift.
Any of the 3 above cause NoServersAvailable error.
That said, do you guys have road-map for replacing Thrift? Apache Avro
perhaps? Are there anyone actually happy with Thrift (besides Facebook)?
~~~
jamie
This is in the Summer Of Code roadmap:
[http://spyced.blogspot.com/2010/03/cassandra-in-google-
summe...](http://spyced.blogspot.com/2010/03/cassandra-in-google-summer-of-
code-2010.html)
------
kunley
Yeah I like this guy's tech-stuff-plus-marketing style, still it would be more
honest to at least mention points where Cassandra has its rough edges (and it
has quite amount of them)
~~~
jbellis
This isn't "intro to cassandra 101," this is just fud busting.
------
chime
Maybe off-topic but does anyone know of a Cassandra hosting service? I'd love
to try out Cassandra and hopefully put it to production use but I'd rather not
deal with managing the servers.
~~~
rbanffy
I don't know about putting into production, but it took me a couple minutes to
get a 4-node cluster as virtual servers under Debian and OpenVZ. It's very,
very easy.
------
earle
Seems pretty biased. What about the flip side of this article?
------
justinsb
Clever marketing: include the objections which are false, ignore those are
true.
~~~
pquerna
what objections are true?
(i've not seen them raised anywhere?)
~~~
justinsb
I meant this comment in a positive way: I genuinely think this is smart
marketing.
I think the real objections would be things like (and I'm not necessarily
saying these are true/false, just that they're the ones that people should
really be thinking about):
* Are NoSQL databases the object databases of the modern era?
* Is our pain big enough that we're willing to be a guinea pig for any new technology?
* How will making this technology choice impact our future ability to hire and to work with future technologies?
* Is this the right time to adopt a new database, or will the world be so different in 3 months that we should limp along until then?
From my viewpoint (@ FathomDB), that last point is the most interesting. We're
seeing the start of NoSQL convergence; I expect both rapid development and
serious teething issues. We see FathomDB & VoltDB announcing early
availability of scalable relational databases. Rackspace hired the core of the
Drizzle team, so this project will likely start to bear more fruit. To borrow
from the wife-selection problem, it feels like immediately getting married to
the first attractive person you meet on your first day at college, when
there's a freshman mixer that evening.
~~~
skorgu
None of these can be definitively affirmed or rejected by facts.
They're interesting questions but they're either unanswerable (time, oodb) or
entirely application dependent (pain, hiring).
~~~
Semiapies
Nor are they "objections".
~~~
justinsb
They're certainly fairly big reasons not to use Cassandra, and as such I'd put
them in the objections bucket. If you're objecting to the fact that I phrased
them as questions, just pretend we're on Jeopardy :-)
~~~
jbooth
No they're not, a "big reason not to use Cassandra" would be "it has critical
bug X" or "it's missing critical feature Y".
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Superhuman: Read Statuses - DVassallo
https://blog.superhuman.com/read-statuses-bdf0cc34b6a5
======
dkhenry
No one who is outraged by this didn't know this was going on with almost every
email tool out there. I don't understand how this manufactured outrage gets
hyped, when literally every email tool in existence does this as standard
practice. Every marketing email you get from a brand has this tracking. Every
customer support email has this tracking. Every feedback form has this
tracking. Every receipt for every purchase has this tracking. Every signup
form for your kids friends birthday parties has this tracking. Every single
pull request notification you get from GitHub has this kind of tracking. Go to
your inbox right now pick any email message and view the source. You will most
likely find a 1px by 1px tracking pixel.
I imagine anyone who works at any company that uses any kind of digital tool
uses this exact same method to track people, so why the outrage here. Go tell
your marketing departments to turn off email tracking in Salesforce, or to
stop the marketing team from running campaigns with tracking in them.
~~~
danShumway
Story time! Recently, I've been thinking back to when lack of SSL was a huge,
widespread problem on the Internet. This was back in the mid 2009-2010's, and
at that point, one company in particular was lagging: Facebook.
So some random person made a browser extension that automatically collected
the login credentials of everyone who opened Facebook on whatever public
network you were connected to.[0] Then they publicly released it for free.
Ironically, the very first comment in the article I link here is, "Okay, it's
evil, but how is this news?"
But the Firesheep plugin was a really big influencing factor in forcing not
just Facebook, but a number of companies to switch their entire sites to
HTTPS.
The point I'm trying to make is not that you should go out and blow up the
world to make a statement -- it's that it's possible for there to be a problem
that's trivial to exploit, and that is regularly exploited by criminals and
businesses, and that is widely known to be exploitable, and for some reason
people will still ignore it.
But if it's personal, if your next-door neighbor or your weird coworker can
suddenly start doing it, then something clicks and people realize, "Oh, this
is actually a real problem."
There's no technical difference between what Superhuman was doing and what
every other marketer is still doing, but people are weird about what exactly
they're willing to care about, and if the Superhuman controversy can be used
to direct some of that anger towards structural, useful goals, then is that
really a problem?
I understand that sometimes the specific triggers that make people care are
stupid, but my response to that is never to ask people to care less. It's
already hard enough to make people care about things.
[0]: [https://lifehacker.com/firesheep-sniffs-out-facebook-and-
oth...](https://lifehacker.com/firesheep-sniffs-out-facebook-and-other-user-
credential-5672313)
~~~
stevenjohns
> But if it's personal, if your next-door neighbor or your weird coworker can
> suddenly start doing it, then something clicks and people realize, "Oh, this
> is actually a real problem."
What is "it"? Knowing I read an email they sent me? That's not what criminals
and businesses are doing; criminals and businesses build extensive
personalised profiles of who you are, what you like, what times you're active,
where you go, who your friends, family and coworkers are and what your
personal trigger points are all for the goal of exploiting you. They use email
tracking as a single metric among dozens of others, and the way they evaluate
the metric is completely different to how an individual would evaluate it.
That data is usually then sold to other groups that do the same thing.
How is that anywhere even close to an individual with email read receipts?
I don't think anyone would say "this is actually a real problem" besides
people manufacturing a problem out of nothing. I'm also willing to bet that
99.9% of the people that are outraged are totally willing to establish, work
for, or implement an extensive user tracking system for a company that
actually acts on malicious grounds (such as monitoring users or for the
objectives of making sales).
This includes you - by the way - a quick look through your resume shows that
every single company you've worked for _heavily_ participates in tracking and
the first personal website of yours I accessed at reset-hard.com includes
Google tracking which is dozens of times worse than a "weird coworker" knowing
you read an email they sent. This is literally contributing to a global
database of user tracking which we _know_ is used for malicious purposes.
> I understand that sometimes the specific triggers that make people care are
> stupid, but my response to that is never to ask people to care less. It's
> already hard enough to make people care about things.
When people care about the wrong things is when we end up with homosexuality
being criminalized, prohibition or terrorist groups. So hopefully in this case
- just like many others - people would focus their energy into things that
actually matter. And personal email tracking is not one of them - and will
never be.
~~~
danShumway
We could break down each of your personal accusations: some of them are fair
and some of them aren't. But you don't really care about any of that. You're
not trying to make a point here beyond, "you're hypocritical and therefore
your obsession over privacy is unimportant."
The only thing worth saying on that topic is that it matters very little what
you (or anyone else) thinks of me, whether it be good or bad. I don't even
judge myself that way; I only care about trying to be better tomorrow than I
am today. Anything else is a waste of time. And certainly, my response when I
encounter hypocrisy is to try and fix the hypocrisy. Not to throw up my hands
and say, "well, I guess none of it matters then."
The above out of the way, I want to try and engage with the deeper argument
you're making in good faith.
What you're missing here is that all of the business tracking and personalized
profiles you bring up as the real problem are using the exact same technology
as these read receipts. The point is not that read receipts are the worst
thing in the world (although I think they're unhealthy and they show a lack of
respect for the person you're communicating with). The point is that they
illustrate the broader pattern of tracking in a form that regular people
understand and emotionally connect with. That's a good thing.
The other thing you're missing when you talk about criminalizing homosexuality
and prohibition is that pervasive tracking is a tool that allows powerful
people to oppress less powerful people. Pervasive tracking outs people's
sexual preferences, it allows companies to illegally target individuals based
on protected characteristics, to advertise to people at their most vulnerable
moments, and to exclude them from opportunities that they would otherwise
have. Far from being a nothing issue, privacy is fundamentally tied to
people's ability to express themselves without fear and to hide from
companies, governments, and even individuals that want to harm them.
Fixing personal email tracking has a pleasant side effect of also fixing the
tracking that happens in both phishing and corporate emails as well. Like you
quoted:
> I understand that sometimes the specific triggers that make people care are
> stupid, but my response to that is never to ask people to care less. It's
> already hard enough to make people care about things.
Yes, sometimes people can be encouraged to care about things that are actually
unimportant, or even outright wrong. But privacy isn't unimportant; privacy is
an essential tool to help protect individuals and marginalized groups from
mobs, governments, companies, and individuals that don't have their best
interests in mind.
~~~
stevenjohns
My point is that this is manufactured outrage from people who don't actually
care. They're just caring because it is today's flavor of the day. There are
real steps people can take to support user privacy but they don't do them.
People happily and voluntarily engage in objectively worse conduct for privacy
day-to-day. This includes myself too -- my employer had me add not one but two
separate tracking scripts on my company's homepage. I "care" about privacy yet
here I am participating in stripping it away from people.
> using the exact same technology as these read receipts
What technology people use doesn't matter, what matters is how they use it. If
I were to implement a system that tracked actions users do in a way that was
ethical and completely not personally identifiable, then it doesn't matter -
there is no problem, regardless of what technology is used to do it.
> Fixing personal email tracking has a pleasant side effect of also fixing the
> tracking that happens in both phishing and corporate emails as well
I don't think so. At all. This is like banning plastic straws to save the
planet.
It is mutating what is basically a porch security camera into a discussion on
oppressive government surveillance. The two are not the same. Personal email
read receipts have almost no bearing on privacy at all. This is perhaps the
point that is being missed by most people.
~~~
danShumway
So, there is a part to this argument I agree with -- which is that getting mad
exclusively at _Superhuman_ ultimately accomplishes very, very little. Because
you're right, this is absolutely everywhere, and literally every non-personal
email you get has these same trackers.
My hope with this whole controversy of the week is that it leads people to
disable loading remote images by default, and it leads email providers to
change their default settings. I don't want to see people riled up just for
angers sake -- I want to see that anger directed towards making changes that
help with the entire spectrum of email pixel trackers.
This is where I think we disagree:
> _What technology people use doesn 't matter, what matters is how they use
> it._
You make a good point that Superhuman isn't doing anything unique, and you
make an (arguable) point that what Superhuman is doing isn't even that bad on
its own terms.
But if you have to trust companies or 3rd parties to be responsible with a
technology, you're still leaving yourself open to less ethical attackers. The
safest fix is to get users onto platforms where _no one_ can track them, even
if those trackers are deployed in responsible ways.
Think of it this way -- you make a completely reasonable assertion that
including Google Analytics on a web page is a personal violation of
privacy[0]. When I get around to removing Analytics from Loop Thesis, that
will be an improvement. But I'm not under the illusion that doing so will
affect anyone other than my visitors on my site.
There are two steps to this process. One is to be personally responsible about
what we do. The other (equally important) step is to empower users such that
they don't need to rely on us being responsible -- by encouraging them to
install ad blockers, by building browsers that resist fingerprinting, and so
on. I want to respect people's privacy, but more than that, I want them to be
private _regardless_ of whether or not I'm trustworthy.
Encouraging products like Gmail or Fastmail to block images by default is not
the biggest step in the world -- it certainly doesn't fix everything. But it
is a step, and it makes things slightly better. There is no short checklist to
fix omnipresent surveillance; it's a long, arduous road where we hope that
things gradually get better over time. The outrage over Superhuman will be
beneficial if it encourages some people to change a setting in their email
clients that they didn't know existed.
[0]:
[https://gitlab.com/danShumway/site/commit/c294dc81ae330ec432...](https://gitlab.com/danShumway/site/commit/c294dc81ae330ec432133252b3b2c489e0fc9da9)
------
danShumway
Put me in the camp that this is not out of the ordinary for what most
marketing emails are already doing. Also put me in the camp that it's
unacceptable.
My takeaway is that Superhuman is a scuzzy company that I want nothing to do
with, but my takeaway is also that Superhuman backing down doesn't really
solve the problem. Everybody does this -- and I don't care if Superhuman is
worse than everyone else, _none of it_ is acceptable.
An immediate partial solution is for us to push very hard for email providers
not to load remote images by default, and (better) for image providers to load
remote images one-by-one, rather than in a single batch (which would make it
less likely that a user will accidentally turn the tracking pixel on with a
single click). An email provider loading images by default should be derided
the same way that loading a blog post over HTTP currently is. Have good
defaults that protect your users. There should be a swath of email providers
on Twitter right now reassuring their customers that tracking pixels won't get
loaded by default in their clients.
If you're upset about this, I don't want you to be less upset. But I want you
to think about being _also_ upset about stuff like Amp for email, which will
make it even easier for companies to pull this crap. I want you to _also_ be
upset about email providers that don't turn off images by default, or that
don't do any background caching to obscure IP addresses.
There's a large number of obvious improvements to make in this area, and a lot
of discussion to be had about non-obvious improvements. If people are only mad
at Superhuman, then the overall machine will continue as normal, and all that
anger won't actually accomplish much in the long term.
Superhuman is calling this a critical feature, so they're not getting rid of
read receipts. My perspective is that their business model is built on a
technology that _shouldn 't_ work. They're speculating whether there could
possibly be a technology to support consent. I couldn't care less about
theoretical consent technologies, I want their entire business model to stop
existing.
~~~
danShumway
Just to follow up on this, I currently use Fastmail for email. I like
Fastmail, a lot.
But why doesn't Fastmail block remote images by default? Yes, they have a
setting, but why isn't it turned on for new accounts? If I tell my parents to
sign up for Fastmail, I don't want to have to worry about whether or not their
default settings are safe.
~~~
troydavis
FastMail does block (well, decline to load) remote images by default:
[https://www.fastmail.com/help/receive/remotecontent.html](https://www.fastmail.com/help/receive/remotecontent.html)
If you aren't using FastMail's webmail, it's your email reader's
responsibility. FastMail quite reasonably doesn't rewrite email content.
~~~
bigiain
gmail does this too.
(which just means you've chose to leak your privacy to Google instead of
Superhuman...)
~~~
danShumway
I'm not a fan of Google, but to me leaking your privacy to a mail provider you
chose to sign up for belongs to a different privacy category.
It's very good that Gmail proxies images, it's one of the few features that I
wish everyone else would copy. Now, on the other side of that, unless their
policy has changed since the last time I checked, Gmail still loads images by
default and it doesn't cache them, it only proxies them.
So it's good that Gmail obscures your IP address, it's bad that Gmail still
loads images from remote servers by default when you open a message, and it's
bad that it will reload them every time you open it in a new
client/environment instead of serving them from a Google cache.
Read receipts do work in Gmail, and Google should be shamed for that. I didn't
call out Gmail in particular because I don't think Google cares about privacy
enough to change anything. I'm hopeful smaller companies like Fastmail might.
~~~
kbenson
> Read receipts do work in Gmail, and Google should be shamed for that.
Work how? There's a responsible way to handle read receipts (where the client
notifies you the remote side would like a read receipt, and offers the choice
to send it), and if it's done in that manner, I'm not sure why they should
need to be shamed.
I'm not sure what Gmail does, but I see stuff when searching about how to
configure it for G Suite accounts to always/never/selectively respond, and
about how to disable Gmail's _nagging_ about it, so I'm not sure the current
status.
~~~
danShumway
> unless their policy has changed since the last time I checked, Gmail still
> loads images by default and it doesn't cache them, it only proxies them.
That's a read receipt, in practice if not in name. I put a unique tracking
pixel in the email, and when you open the email by default Google proxies it
from my server. It's uncached, so unless the browser itself decides not to re-
fetch it, I'll also know whenever you reopen the email.
Google also allows you to request a read receipt the responsible, official way
that you're thinking of, but why would I ever use that feature when I can just
give you a tracking pixel instead? The responsible read receipts require
consent, and tracking pixels don't.
Again, I haven't checked Gmail's default settings in... probably years. So
maybe this has changed, and it doesn't load images by default anymore. But any
client that loads images by default has non-consensual read receipts, and they
should be shamed for that.
~~~
kbenson
> Google also allows you to request a read receipt the responsible, official
> way that you're thinking of, but why would I ever use that feature when I
> can just give you a tracking pixel instead? The responsible read receipts
> require consent, and tracking pixels don't.
Read receipts (as opposed to email tracking through images, let's not overload
terms here) have the benefit that they might be returned by clients that don't
load images by default. That's probably a relatively small portion of clients,
but it is only one setting change away on Gmail.
> Again, I haven't checked Gmail's default settings in... probably years. So
> maybe this has changed, and it doesn't load images by default anymore. But
> any client that loads images by default has non-consensual read receipts,
> and they should be shamed for that.
A client that loads images by default does what 99% of people desire. That
Gmail does so in a safer way than many others is a good thing, and maybe
_shame_ is a strong word for transparently making people's default behavior
slightly safer while doing what they want (showing emails as they were
visually intended and looking nice).
------
ocdtrekkie
Honestly: This was... pretty fast, the response is not just a statement of
belief, but a clear list of changes they intend to implement quickly, and I
really have no major complaints about how they've handled this.
If someone wants to use tracking pixels, they'll find software that does it,
so I'm really okay with them keeping the feature in... with the removed
location information. (I am going to block it anyways, let's be honest.) And
most importantly, they recognized the power of defaults for setting how people
tend to behave. Making the feature non-default will crater it's use percentage
across their customer base.
~~~
bigiain
> the response is not just a statement of belief, but a clear list of changes
> they intend to implement
Sure. But it's also an indication of what their team thought "this is fine!"
about, before an internet shitstorm rained down upon them.
In my mind they're always to be suspected of being either naive or actively
evil in their use of personal data.
Anybody who launches "a powerful business tool", and then later tells us "We
did not consider potential bad actors. I wholeheartedly apologize for not
thinking through this more fully." is not someone I'd want running _my_
business tools. I'm now wondering if they considered "bad actors" finding
their open MongoDB databases on Shodan? Or their public S3 buckets with their
backups? Or their production API keys and secrets in their pubic GitHub code?
Or all those other mistakes that everybody goes "but nobody except idiots
would do that!" and yet we read about it multiple times per week anyway...
Maybe these guys have a great Email tool. I strongly doubt they have an
entrenched culture of "considering bad actors" and appropriately investing
effort and securing all the non customer facing infrastructure...
~~~
ocdtrekkie
To be honest, I would suspect a large percentage of tech startups had failed
to consider bad actors until the last year or two.
Don't get me wrong, it's not perfect, but I've seen far too many companies
respond to controversy with how they care and will think about how to make
things better, while not making any significant changes at all. This is a big
step above that.
------
harryh
_" Recipients of emails cannot opt out....I would love to find better
technology to solve this problem."_
How about...put a notification of tracking in emails that contain it rather
than making it invisible and then include an opt out link? That seems....not
hard.
~~~
ljm
It doesn’t seem to me like a problem worth solving. What’s so bad about
sending an email and trusting that the recipient will get around to it? Send a
follow up email if you need to. Or use old-fashioned read receipts (which
depend on the recipient to enable them).
Tech shouldn’t really be creepy by default, nor should it really establish
needy/clingy behaviour, which is what I think non-consensual read tracking
tends towards.
I mean, personally, I would consider it a significant invasion of my privacy
if anyone who sent me an email knew when I opened it and, roughly, where,
without me knowing.
The problem with the internet and tech companies now is that there is an
established pattern of you being able to consent on behalf of other people
purely by virtue of giving access to your contact list, or using a certain
mail client. You are giving away their data, not your own.
~~~
enraged_camel
Meh. I'll risk the downvotes and say that I fully support tracking pixels in
emails.
One of the reasons I use WhatsApp heavily is the read statuses. A single
checkmark underneath the message means it was sent. Two checkmarks mean it was
delivered. When the checkmarks turn blue, it means the recipient read the
message.
I love, _love_ this feature. If I could wave a wand and instantaneously make
it standard for ALL methods of communication, I would do it in a heartbeat.
~~~
orangecat
Conversely, I would gladly push a button to make such tracking technically
impossible. The idea that sending me an unsolicited message entitles you to
any information about my activity is absurd.
~~~
enraged_camel
> _The idea that sending me an unsolicited message entitles you to any
> information about my activity is absurd._
What about for solicited messages? Just curious.
~~~
ljm
I think read receipts solved this problem already. If you want someone to know
when you open their messages, enable it. Disable it and they don’t find out.
If you want to improve that setup, enable read receipts for a whitelist of
contacts. People who you do want to notify when you open their message.
I think a mistake was made when some messaging apps turned it into an opt-out
and also made it punitive, in that opting out would mean that other people’s
read receipts would be disabled.
I don’t think it would be so bad if every single data point wasn’t hoovered up
and sold to third parties. They’re probably using this read status feature to
measure engagement and decide how to target more ads. They can infer a lot:
who you respond to quickly, who you don’t... who is intimate and who is an
acquaintance. Who is important, who isn’t.
------
minimaxir
Discussion yesterday of controversy:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20336762](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20336762)
Highly visible blog posts are indeed the best way of effecting change,
although the investors who were criticizing the original article now look very
silly.
~~~
lanrh1836
Yes, not even a few hours ago a VC at Founders Fund tweeted “...there's a
strong correlation between the people outraged by privacy and the people that
I think are dumbasses in the valley.”
Source:
[https://twitter.com/zebulgar/status/1146430814374117376?s=21](https://twitter.com/zebulgar/status/1146430814374117376?s=21)
~~~
hadsed
Amazing to find a VC who not only isn't concerned but actively derides
concerns around privacy. Maybe he has a terrible personal opinion (in my
opinion), but this seems like a poor perspective from someone who should be
worrying about existential threats to companies. Someone should tell the US
Senate that "capitalism baby" is an appropriate response to privacy
violations!
------
wmab
I don't think Superhuman should have caved to this criticism as quickly as
they did. Good that they kept the feature, albeit dumbed down. People pay for
a power user email client because it's exactly that - a power user tool, which
should be fully featured. If you remove read receipts then there are a whole
host of other email clients that will gladly give you that feature (bye-bye
revenue). Is someone going to write a Medium post calling out each of these
companies too? There is also a bunch of companies that aren't primarily email
clients - like CRMs (Pipedrive etc) that offer this feature out the box, as
it's exceptionally useful for sales teams.
If there really was such mass hysteria regarding read receipts in emails
(WhatsApp has it by default too?) then it should be your email provider that
should be leaned on to secure their system. Google has known for a very long
time about this, and has changed the loading of images to stop location
tracking, presumably the only thing they actually think is controversial with
read receipts.
~~~
Spooky23
Read receipts for email are the worst. Groupwise shops used to often have an
awful culture about waiting on/complaining about when mail was opened.
------
lanrh1836
Now the CEO is getting praised on Twitter but this doesn’t address the main
complaint which is the read status itself. Yes, location made it worse, but
that data was mostly bunk anyway because Gmail (and probably others) will show
the location of the Gmail server and not the user themselves.
~~~
kasey_junk
It does address it. He specifically says that it is table stakes for his
software and that they are leaving it in. You may not like that but it is
addressed.
Personally I like that response, though I think they have legal problems in
some jurisdictions. They didn’t try to weasel word their way out.
------
kareemm
It's remarkable that he was able to quantify the demand for his feature: "at
the time of writing only 32 out of 26,000+ requests [was for turning off Read
Receipts]".
There's a lot of Superhuman skepticism in the comments, but their CEO owned
the decision and responded quickly. If you assume good intent, it's remarkable
in its comprehensiveness, transparency, and speed.
If you don't, well, you probably wouldn't be satisfied by anything other than
ripping the feature out. Which wouldn't make sense for the business given the
demand from its primary customer segment.
~~~
vageli
> It's remarkable that he was able to quantify the demand for his feature: "at
> the time of writing only 32 out of 26,000+ requests [was for turning off
> Read Receipts]".
A company managing customer feature requests is suddenly remarkable? For a
tool aimed at professionals? I would take that as par for the course.
~~~
kareemm
It's remarkable to track 26k requests. That's non-trivial. Especially with the
ability to drill down to a single feature request.
I know this is non-trivial because I run a business that helps product teams
do this. I talk to PMs at companies you've heard of and probably use that
struggle with this.
~~~
gnicholas
I don't know what tool they use to get user feedback, but it would be trivial
for me to find out how many user requests we've gotten for a feature like read
receipts: just do a search for "read receipts" in our contact email inbox.
Might it miss some requests that didn't have the exact phrase? Yes, but it's
in the CEO's interest to have a count that is very low, since he's trying to
say that their users haven't asked about this much.
So it might be hard to get an exact count of how many people asked for some
feature (particularly if it doesn't have an agreed-upon name, like "read
receipts", but if you're just looking for one phrase and don't mind erring on
the low side, this should be a pretty easy exercise.
~~~
kareemm
Or on the high side: “read receipts are awesome!”
I think my broader point stands: given their 26k requests (which you can’t
figure out using your method) it’s impressive to know that N of them are for Y
feature.
------
nexuist
"I am so very sorry for this. When we built Superhuman, we focused only on the
needs of our customers. We did not consider potential bad actors. I
wholeheartedly apologize for not thinking through this more fully."
Rare to hear such honesty from a CEO. I don't think I've ever seen a corporate
leader admit they didn't consider product security. Concerning? Maybe - but I
think it's miles better than the usual "we value your privacy and use industry
standard blah blah blah.." canned spiel everyone gets in their inbox after a
breach goes public.
~~~
vageli
> "I am so very sorry for this. When we built Superhuman, we focused only on
> the needs of our customers. We did not consider potential bad actors. I
> wholeheartedly apologize for not thinking through this more fully."
> Rare to hear such honesty from a CEO. I don't think I've ever seen a
> corporate leader admit they didn't consider product security. Concerning?
> Maybe - but I think it's miles better than the usual "we value your privacy
> and use industry standard blah blah blah.." canned spiel everyone gets in
> their inbox after a breach goes public.
A company that has access to your email did not consider bad actors, and that
is a "maybe" of a concern for you?
~~~
nexuist
Perhaps I should have included the full context:
"1\. Location data could theoretically be used nefariously
This criticism is the most severe. Upon reading the commentary, I have come to
understand that there are indeed nightmare scenarios involving location
tracking. I should note that we deliberately do not show cities — we only show
states or countries — but a determined attacker could still misuse this
information.
_I am so very sorry for this. When we built Superhuman, we focused only on
the needs of our customers. We did not consider potential bad actors. I
wholeheartedly apologize for not thinking through this more fully._ "
This isn't a case of them having invalid SSL certs or improperly validating
data sent to an endpoint. This is them building a feature that could have been
used in bad ways and not realizing it. To that end, I am not very concerned
about product security in this instance, because I have no reason to not trust
their honesty.
------
Dwolb
Super on brand response: personal, quick, and well thought-out. Kudos to the
team for their ability to handle a crisis.
On the topic of read receipts, I'm glad this is opening up a broader
discussion about (pretty common) industry practices that track individual user
activity across the web. IMO this will be a whole set of behaviors that will
be viewed as having been on the wrong side of history:
We'll look back in 50 years and wonder why we would have ever legally let so
much invasive tracking technology into our lives (we didn't know! but everyone
was doing it!).
------
hashkb
It's tracking without consent, plain and simple. Forcing users to choose
between HTML email and being tracked is nefarious. Users by default do not
assume they're being tracked. Just like unsub, highly visible opt out of
tracking should be the law. Morally there's no question.
------
voidmain
The technical solution to tracking pixels isn't to disable remote image
loading, it's to load all remote images when receiving the mail over smtp, and
embed them in the mail. That way the sender gains no information whatsoever
that they didn't already get from the smtp exchange.
------
shafyy
Can't believe the amount of jabronis here saying "what is the big fuss,
everyone tracks everything anyways".
Companies (and individuals) should act ethical and in good faith, regardless
of what others do. So, if you have a chance to improve something, you should
do it. Make a superior product that also doesn't track users without explicit
content. Superhuman definitely acted the right way with this decision.
------
Rainymood
Some food for thought: Imagine how crazy it would be if we would have these
tracking devices on _real life physical mails_ , you'd get a letter in the
mailbox and you open it and read it. Without you knowing the sender has put a
tiny device in there to track whether you opened it or not.
When framed like this, I can't help but feel we are all kind of crazy on the
web!
~~~
gerikson
You used to send sealed letters with the reasonable expectation that it would
arrive intact and unread. Now everyone[1] sends the equivalent of a postcard -
the vast majority of which are actually read/scanned by the entities doing the
delivery.
[1] apart from the weirdos who use encryption
------
sterlind
Shot in the dark, but could tracking pixels fall afoul of wiretapping laws?
It's a single bit of information, but it is a 1-bit recording gathered without
the other party's consent.
~~~
kasey_junk
Tracking pixels have been a normal part of the email ecosystem for more than
20 years. If an esoteric use of the law was going to stop it it would be done
by now.
~~~
netik
This is basically what GDPR is designed to stop.
~~~
kasey_junk
That’s not reusing old law, that’s a law designed purposely to stop this.
------
tsieling
When these things happen, to me the more important thing is what will
leadership do to change the thinking that led to the problem. Issuing a patch
is a solid step, but it's a symptom that points to a need for change in how
features are vetted and thought through.
------
mrhappyunhappy
Please have your email solution tell me that you are tracking opens, so that I
will never correspond with that sender again.
I think tracking opens without notifying the recipient is a blatant privacy
violation. If that’s where society is heading, I want to part of that.
------
xwdv
This pisses me off more than it should. I used to be interested in Superhuman,
but after they backed down I no longer care about getting an invite.
It’s nobody’s business what email client I use. I would like to see a bold
email client that offers all these extensive tracking features and makes no
apologies. Call it Supervillain for all I care, there is a market for it. If
you don’t want to be tracked, don’t accept images from me or anyone else.
Simple as that.
------
drevil-v2
The quality and depth of introspection from the leadership of an organization,
when they get caught with their hand in the cookie jar, is a truly epic
spectacle to behold.
The more cynical among us might even think they knew exactly what they were
doing but did it anyway for their own profit and to the determent of others
and the only thing they are actually sorry for is that they got caught.
------
sandGorgon
how is this working ? Gmail caches pixels -
[https://help.litmus.com/article/166-how-are-gmail-opens-
repo...](https://help.litmus.com/article/166-how-are-gmail-opens-reported-
within-email-analytics)
> _When Gmail automatically downloads and caches images, those cached
> images—including open tracker pixels, like the ones used with Email
> Analytics—are stored on Gmail’s servers. Gmail then loads the same images
> from the same servers for everyone—regardless of whether they open using
> Gmail in a web browser or a Gmail Android or iPhone /iPad app._
~~~
weavie
Presumably every email gets sent a unique pixel name.
~~~
sandGorgon
Even so. It will get cached, so the analytics should fire only the first time
it's opened. Not subsequent times.
------
oh_sigh
Why do 'power users' care if people read their emails?
------
techslave
how about a browser or email extension that repeatedly and randomly loads the
pixel. for bonus points, through a wide set of proxies.
------
netik
Sadly they followed the path of nearly every surveillance capitalism startup
out there.
1\. Breach user trust by acting without user consent. 2\. Market it as a
service. 3\. Eventually get caught. 4\. Offer an apology.
Rinse, Repeat.
I don't have any real complaints about the steps they took to correct this. I
have complaints about the fact that they did it in the first place and didn't
consider the users. I also take offense at their investors who continued to
invest while knowing this was going on.
------
lrpublic
Surely this a massive breach of GDPR ?
~~~
kasey_junk
‘Massive’? I’d be surprised if they have anywhere near the incidents of
tracking pixels that a bog standard small ad network has.
No one will be able to tell accurately until a ruling comes down but I believe
this is a gdpr violation but one they won’t be fined for if they do basic
location filtering for their tracking pixels.
~~~
talaketu
A "bog standard small ad network" does not typically have the email address of
the ad viewer.
------
foobiekr
Every statement ever made by a tech company that went over the line and
decided to step back from it should automatically, in your mind, be appended
by "for now."
Superhuman is getting rid of this _for now_.
Also works for mobile carriers and pretty much any statement they make ever.
------
kixiQu
I didn't expect this, but it's actually everything I would have reasonably
wanted from them. Dang!
------
Skunkleton
I really don't get what the fuss is about here. You are being tracked online.
Why get upset about this specific instance?
~~~
stevenjohns
I have no idea either. I track every email I send out. The issue with
tracking, when done by companies, is what they use that data for. People don't
want to have sales profiles built on them or have their literal privacy - in
terms of their personal web traffic - being invisibly tracked and potentially
exploited by bad actors.
On a personal level, I send emails for a variety of reasons, and I haven't
found a good reason why I wouldn't want to know when they were accessed.
1\. I've sent legal correspondence and it's important for me to have a record
of when and how frequently it was accessed in case it ever reached court.
2\. When I send emails to my staff, I'm less interested in whether or not they
reply and more interested in whether or not they read the emails at all. If
not, then I can use alternative and more immediate forms of communication.
3\. Sometimes I'm ignored by people that owe me money for one reason or
another (in one particular case, I was almost scammed out of $40,000). Knowing
that the correspondence I was sending was being accessed but was being ignored
allowed me to take more immediate action.
I'm not building profiles on people, I'm not trying to sell anything. And I'm
not going to apologise for it either. My intentions are not malicious, so
that's where it starts and stops for me.
~~~
orangecat
_My intentions are not malicious_
In scenarios 1 and 3, your intention is to spy on people to gain an advantage
over them in legal proceedings. That's going to qualify as "malicious" from
their perspective.
~~~
stevenjohns
You think having a transactional log to stop people from lying in court is a
_bad_ thing and has me doing harm? What unfair, malicious gain do I receive by
being able to present evidence that says that someone did in fact read
correspondence?
Respectfully, you’re in a very small camp there. You might as well call
security footage or fingerprint evidence malicious as well. The same goes for
snail mail that has delivery confirmation.
If anything, this thread has just reinforced my belief that I’m doing the
right thing.
~~~
orangecat
_You might as well call security footage or fingerprint evidence malicious as
well._
Security footage of your property is fine. Embedding a hidden camera into a
package that you mail to someone is not.
_If anything, this thread has just reinforced my belief that I’m doing the
right thing._
And it's reminded me to verify that image loading is disabled on all my
clients. Win win, I suppose.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Zuckerberg summoned to House Of Commons inquiry - sjcsjc
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-43474760
======
forkLding
I think most Americans comments in this thread is displaying bias.
To put in perspective, if Alibaba's partners was caught collecting massive
amounts of customer data through Alibaba and using it to spy (in part for
Chinese govt) and perform experiments/tactics on the American people, would
they first summon the highest American branch leader of Alibaba in hush-hush
manner or the most notable founder himself/herself with the most voting power
on changing and directing the organization?
UK isn't USA, if they feel that the liberties of their own people is being
tampered with, they would want to talk directly to the big man, the UK-based
CEO would rather be just a horn through which Zuckerberg and his team talks
through so it would be more direct to talk to him.
Moreover whole situation is like a Catch-22, if Zuckerberg doesn't go, it
would betray him more.
~~~
equalunique
This analogy seems out-of-proportion, IMO.
With Cambridge Analytica, the customer data wasn't used by any government, but
by a political party. To me, this really is the legitimate status quo of
advertising. As a US citizen, it's not clear to me why this is wrong or bad,
only that people "don't like it."
I for one am grateful that these services target me with _relevant_ adds. Is
that something we want undo? What is the strategy here? Is the objective to be
less informed and be directed to information that is non-relevant to our
interests?
Now, I'm not saying that the ideal utopia wouldn't be a Facebook-less
interlocking combination of privacy respecting, free open source software,
decentralized networking, and federated identity. I just feel weird how it
seems like "fears of election interference" and "muh democratic system" are
being used to effect arbitrary changes in how Facebook does business.
~~~
bkor
> As a US citizen, it's not clear to me why this is wrong or bad, only that
> people "don't like it."
Hacker News had various articles explaining that the EU soon will have
something called the GDPR
([https://www.eugdpr.org/](https://www.eugdpr.org/)). UK is going to exit the
EU, but it's not about that in particular. If EU citizens didn't give explicit
permission for this data to be shared Facebook is not following this law. As
UK is questioning this behaviour it seems they'll probably have something
similar to GDPR after they leave the EU.
Further, this was NOT about providing ads, instead the data personal
information was shared with a third party without this being explicitly
consented to. People have been profiled without this been explicit, further no
consent was given. That's what is not ok.
All the other questions seem like strawmans.
~~~
Kpourdeilami
Didn’t the third party collect data after users gave explicit permission to
the third party app to use their data? From my understanding, users didn’t
read the short text explaining the information the third party would receive
before pressing the “okay” button.
~~~
Angostura
Users gave the app permission. The app also harvested the data of their
Facebook Friends, who hadn't given permission.
~~~
thomasfortes
They should take a lesson from the spotify API, friend listening feeds are out
of reach for third party apps.
Since facebook apps request these fields so much, they could implement it as
an opt-in/out checkbox "Do you want your data to be accessible by 3rd party
apps without your consent through your friends?"
This way, if an app request friends access, they would get data only from the
ones that allowed it.
It probably would remove a lot of value that can be extracted from their
users, but facebook itself would still have all this data to use internally to
target ads and they would limit the amount of data that can be exfiltrated to
malicious 3rd parties without the consent of users.
~~~
azernik
Facebook already made this change; however, they changed these things _after_
the data was fetched and stored.
~~~
thomasfortes
Thanks for the info, I was not aware of that.
Good for them to make this change, bad for them because it was after the data
was collected for abuse.
~~~
azernik
I think the takeaway is that these decisions are irreversible; it's very hard
to recall data you've shared, so you need to err on the side of sharing
_less_.
------
MistahKoala
'summoned' ◔_◔
For a moment, I feared we were treading the same path beaten by the US
Congress with parliamentary extra-territorial over-reach, but it turns out
it's just the BBC using the wrong words; the chairman of the select committee
has merely requested that he give evidence before the committee:
[https://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-
committees/cultu...](https://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-
committees/culture-media-and-
sport/180320%20Chair%20to%20Mark%20Zuckerberg%20re%20oral%20evidence.pdf)
~~~
labster
I think it's a fair trade if you want to continue to run a business in a
country, that country has a right to summon you to explain what your business
is doing.
~~~
hannibalhorn
The right to summon the local corporate representative, legal team, etc.?
Sure.
Does every country have the "right" to summon a multinational CEO? That'd get
crazy really quick, and I doubt it'd benefit anybody (beyond politicians.)
I had the same reaction as the parent comment - to "request" his presence is
perfectly fine, but a "summons" would be a bit much...
~~~
jeswin
If you've compromised the details of millions of citizens, then summoning the
CEO doesn't seem inappropriate.
------
jcoffland
> How to protect your data on Facebook
...
> Use an ad blocker to limit advertising
Wow, this is awesome. I did not know the BBC was officially recommending the
use of ad blockers.
~~~
roryrjb
Well the BBC does not advertise, so this isn't really unexpected.
~~~
robjan
The BBC worldwide service is funded by advertisements. If you browse their
website from outside the UK, you get redirected to BBC.com which is plastered
with ads.
~~~
Angostura
It's almost as if the journalism is decoupled from the commercial arm.
------
sol_remmy
Ongoing discussion at:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16626318](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16626318)
------
philfrasty
Curious about this scandal: is the bigger play here (by some unknown actors)
to damage Zuckerberg's reputation in order to hinder him running for president
in 2020? Or this is purely about violating privacy?
~~~
danso
What about this situation makes you think there is a "bigger play" that
requires a conspiracy?
~~~
djsumdog
In the other HN discussions, people have talked about how this type of Data
Sharing has been known about in our community for years.
Hell, I've seen product demos from 2012 that showed big players offering
private FB/Twitter post analytics for targeting ads/marketing. It's been going
on for a long time.
So that does raise this serious concern: why are we making such a big deal of
it now? One whistle blower?
A hundred other people groups _discovered_ the continents we call The Americas
long before Columbus. His timing was right to gain the popularity he did.
So it could be coincidence, or it could be intentional. That 2nd thing should
be thought of as a crazy conspiracy theory. Our media/TV is tightly
manipulated and controlled. I mean if anything, this leak should make that
more obvious than anything! So it's not so far out there as you might think.
~~~
danso
> _this type of Data Sharing has been known about in our community for years._
> _why are we making such a big deal of it now? One whistle blower?_
The "we" who are making a "big deal of it now" is _not_ the HN community.
> _Our media /TV is tightly manipulated and controlled. I mean if anything,
> this leak should make that more obvious than anything! So it's not so far
> out there as you might think._
It is far out if you have a limited view of current events and how the world
works. Zuckerberg is already eating shit from all sides in America, including
questioning by Sen. Wyden [0]. So who are these "unknown actors" who have the
power to control not just the U.S. Senate, but a totally separate governmental
body? And why the hell would these "unknown actors" risk organizing that kind
of conspiracy when it is completely _unneeded_? Don't you think that pulling
strings at that level has some costs and baggage associated with it? But
"unknown actors" are willing to risk it to add a little more bad PR to someone
who is not even yet near the initial stages of a candidacy?
Why is that all more reasonable than the boring explanation that: most people
don't know the details about Facebook's data hoarding/sharing, and now that
high-profile investigations have come to light, people are more inclined to be
pissed than complacent? That's how politics and public outrage work. It hasn't
even been a week since another U.S. Senator proposed legislation and wrote a
similarly angry letter to United Airlines because a dumbass flight attendant
caused a puppy to die [1]. Where's the conspiracy behind that?
[0] [https://www.wyden.senate.gov/news/press-releases/wyden-
quest...](https://www.wyden.senate.gov/news/press-releases/wyden-questions-
facebook-on-misuse-of-users-private-information)
[1] [https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/14/politics/dog-death-united-
ken...](https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/14/politics/dog-death-united-kennedy-
letter/index.html)
------
fwgwgwgch
Serious question no snark:
How does this work? How does UK know who Zuckerberg is? Shouldn't they be
dealing with Facebook UK ceo? Zuckerberg is a private US citizen as far as UK
is concerned, no?
Edit: stop being smartasses (to the no longer top voted replies). I am asking
from a legal perspective. Facebook UK is the only entity UK law should know of
(acc to my limited understanding)
~~~
TallGuyShort
Based on my admittedly limited understanding of the UK's particular brand of
parliament, the House of Commons is essentially a panel of experts and
advisors from various fields and they hold little direct legal authority in
and of themselves, but they're supposed to be very influential to the people
who do. I interpret this as trying to understand the problem better, not
prosecute someone, in which case it's not who's-legally-responsible, but who-
gets-Facebooks-DNA-and-vision-for-the-future.
~~~
vidarh
The House of Commons is, in terms of authority, one of the most powerful
parliamentary chambers in the world.
Most places there are constitutional limits on what parliament can decide
and/or qualified majorities and other constraints needed to change
constitutional law. In the UK, a central principle is that parliament is
entirely sovereign. That is, parliament is not bound by any law decided by
past parliaments, but can revoke or alter any of them (they are bound as long
as they let a law stand, though) with a simple majority.
While your comment elsewhere that they need things to pass through House of
Lords is sort of right, consider that the House of Commons powers are
bootstrapped - e.g. the UK Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949 severely curtailed
the Lords powers, and both were passed as a direct response to the House of
Lords being seen as obstructing the House of Commons. The Lords failed to stop
both, because they knew in advance of the 1911 act that the government had
threatened to simply stuff the Lords full of sympathetic new peers (lords).
As such, while the UK has a bicameral system, the Lords exceedingly rarely
stop laws, it usually only delay them or cause negotiations over revisions, as
if the Commons decide to push something through over the objections of the
Lords, they generally get their will, and coupled with the lack of
constitutional hindrances, they're more powerful than even most unicameral
legislatives.
> I interpret this as trying to understand the problem better, not prosecute
> someone, in which case it's not who's-legally-responsible, but who-gets-
> Facebooks-DNA-and-vision-for-the-future.
This is true. It's not in any way a court proceeding. In this respect it's no
different from being summoned to attend an inquiry in any other parliament.
~~~
giobox
What you've written is what UK constitutional lawyers would refer to as a
"Dicey" or "Dicean" (named after the British legal scholar most associated
with the principle of UK Parliamentary Sovereignty) view of how Parliamentary
Sovereignty works.
The reality is somewhat more complex once you consider the UK's treaty
obligations, many of which are hard to reconcile with "pure" Dicean
sovereignty, but it's a good starting point. As a counter example, the UK
can't practically legislate in a manner that breaches the ECHR (European
Convention on Human Rights - completely unrelated to the EU). Similarly, while
still a member of the EU the UK, like all EU members, has to accept the
primacy of EU legislation over domestic statutes in the areas in which the EU
has the competence to make laws.
Studying the uneasy relationship between dicey style sovereignty and EU
legislation (hello "Factortame" cases...) was a core component of a law degree
in the UK for the past few decades, I assume this will change shortly given
recent history!
~~~
vidarh
The treaties do not change the underlying principle, though. They change the
application of them, in that the only way for parliament to breach the ECHR
for example would be to leave the treaty, but that is no different from other
laws - the only things that is different is the complexity of the process of
doing so.
So, yes, it's more complex. I don't think anyone would suggest parliament
_would_ just rewrite arbitrary laws on a whim, because there are complex
dependencies (hello Brexit). The point is there is no legal hindrance to it,
and that is almost unique (I write "almost", but I don't know of a single
other country where parliament has so unfettered power - I'd love examples).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Proposed SEC Rules Could Shake Leveraged ETFs - humbleMouse
http://www.nasdaq.com/article/proposed-sec-rules-could-shake-leveraged-etfs-cm555410
======
humbleMouse
Here is the link to the actual SEC press release:
[http://www.sec.gov/news/pressrelease/2015-276.html](http://www.sec.gov/news/pressrelease/2015-276.html)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Try Our New Landing Page Builder - CRMRoy
What’s better than a CRM that includes both sales and marketing automation? A full-service SaaS app that also includes a landing page builder! We’re excited to announce that Agile CRM’s new Landing Page Builder is now live in the app. Try out the beta version today and start capturing more leads, impressing current customers and increasing conversions.
======
rman666
URL?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google has issued a statement about its months-long mystery barge project - lukashed
http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/06/google-says-its-using-mystery-barges-as-interactive-space-where-people-can-learn-about-its-technology/
======
Raphmedia
So, it a place to learn?
Floating schools?
I'm a bit confused here.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Infinity Is Launching Flexible Alternative to Trello - kefffalo
https://medium.com/infinitypm/is-infinity-better-than-trello-3b8ef7437022
======
Biba89
Trello UX is outdated, but still the simpliest tool to use.
If Infinity solves flexibility and stay simple to use it can be a big shot.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Learning Statistics? - avindroth
What is the best resource for learning statistics, intuitively?
======
wizzerking
As an Applied Mathematician I just used books that talked about probabilities
but for explaining my work to co-workers who were not trained I found the
following to be helpful [http://www.wikihow.com/Understand-and-Use-Basic-
Statistics](http://www.wikihow.com/Understand-and-Use-Basic-Statistics)
For actual learning the following may be helpful
[https://blog.udemy.com/learn-statistics/](https://blog.udemy.com/learn-
statistics/)
For open Source Books
[http://www.intechopen.com/search?q=statistics](http://www.intechopen.com/search?q=statistics)
[http://freecomputerbooks.com/search.html?cx=partner-
pub-5976...](http://freecomputerbooks.com/search.html?cx=partner-
pub-5976068913745703%3A4325807428&cof=FORID%3A10&ie=UTF-8&q=statistics&sitesearch=freecomputerbooks.com&keywords=statistics&x=0&y=0)
HAve fun, and remember the famous quote From Mark Twain
[http://www.twainquotes.com/Statistics.html](http://www.twainquotes.com/Statistics.html)
------
Mz
A couple of good books:
_How to lie with statistics_ (Good intro to concepts, light on actual math)
_The cartoon guide to statistics_ (the first chapter or two covers what I
learned in my college _Intro to Stats_ class -- the rest is over my head)
~~~
isuckatcoding
Just started reading "The cartoon guide to statistics" based on your
recommendation. Really interesting and fun. Thanks!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
An Analysis of the ProtonMail Cryptographic Architecture [pdf] - zahllos
https://eprint.iacr.org/2018/1121.pdf
======
protonmail
It seems Nadim (the author of this paper) took it really badly when we called
him out for intentionally spreading fake news this weekend. Putting aside the
author's personal biases for a moment, the difference of opinion with Nadim
can be boiled down to a couple elements.
The key question being debated is whether or not web applications can
constitute end to end encryption. Nadim's opinion is that, as he writes, "no
webmail-style application could". His viewpoint is that E2EE is not possible
with web clients, period, end of discussion. This is a rather extreme position
to take as it would also apply to the web versions of Whatsapp or Wire, for
instance.
ProtonMail, like Whatsapp and Wire, offers apps on Linux, Windows, MacOS, iOS,
and Android. Like Whatsapp and Wire, we also offer a web app. The major
opinion Nadim is expressing here is that we should offer all the above, minus
the web-app, because in his opinion, you can't do end-to-end encryption in a
webapp. Obviously Whatspp and Wire do not share this opinion. Signal
coincidentally does share this opinion.
We do understand Nadim's arguments, and agree that web-apps are less secure
than say a native iOS app. Where we differ in opinion is that we don't believe
the threat model of web-apps is so fundamentally different from an iOS app,
that we need to take the step of not offering a web-app at all. When it comes
to mobile apps for instance, the situation is really not so different,
particularly since automatic updates are the norm and recommended for
security.
There are definitely design decisions that we could have taken to make
ProtonMail more secure (no passwords, only passphrases, sync keys between
devices using QR codes, no web app etc), but this could compromise usability
to a large degree, which runs contrary to our goals.
Disagreeing on design decisions however, does not indicate that the
cryptography is unsound or improperly implemented, as this paper seems to
imply. That's why this paper reminds us a bit of the now retracted story in
the Guardian about Whatsapp's "security flaw", which was in fact a design
decision. It is also a bit disingenuous to claim that ProtonMail doesn't meet
it's "self-professed security goals", when we have fundamentally different
interpretations of those security goals.
~~~
tonic-music
Where is this Windows app of which you speak? I don't see it linked on your
website.
~~~
protonmail
protonmail.com/bridge
------
tonic-music
Just sent this bug report (from the Android client, lol). Will post their
response here:
What is the official response to this report?
[https://eprint.iacr.org/2018/1121.pdf](https://eprint.iacr.org/2018/1121.pdf)
I'm not a cryptography expert but I am a web developer and even I can figure
out that typing my password into a web app reveals my private key to you if
you want to steal it.
The author is right in one respect: the online and self- updating nature of
the web app makes it impossible for anyone to verify what code you're really
running.
Reading this report also makes me question your response to the recent
hack/extortion incident. Now, I'm not really convinced about your response.
There's nothing in my PM account that's secret and I don't really care if you
were hacked. I use PM to avoid being tracked for advertising. But I do agree
with the author of this paper that you shouldn't make these security claims
which aren't true.
Thanks in advance for your response.
\-- D
~~~
protonmail
See our response above, hopefully that gives a bit more insight into why we
have decided to continue offering a web-app.
------
tonic-music
Very interesting, especially in light of the recent claimed hacks to
ProtonMail. I've just switched to PM recently and, while I'm no cryptography
expert, it did seem unlikely that typing my password into a browser app could
ever be considered very secure -- certainly not "invisible" to PM since, as
the author points out, you can't see or validate the code running in the
browser.
~~~
trash_panda
You can actually see what code your browser is running, you have view source
and all the developer tools to analyze the JS code.
This is their main defense, they will probably post a link to their GitHub
page where the code of the front end application is hosted.
The thing is, to validate that the code published in GitHub is the same one
that you're running right now while you're logged into ProtonMail, requires a
dynamic analysis challenge that is quite not achievable.
So if ProtonMail decides to go rogue, or if an attacker compromises their
servers, it would be doable to send all users, or some targeted users, a
modified version of the webapp which steals your password, retrieves the
decrypted key, etc, etc, etc.
~~~
tonic-music
I think we all know about view source. The risk lies exactly where you
described it. I've never heard of being able to diff a running web page
against a set of source repositories. Perhaps another HN reader will go invent
that.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Twitter vs. Disqus - shanehoban
http://www.startupcrusade.com/twitter-vs-disqus/
======
manicdee
How do you moderate a Twitter feed?
How do you have a discussion thread when each post is limited to 140
characters?
~~~
marklyon
Additional metadata - a tweet could attach to a specific URL, which the URL
owner could reject if needed. So, I could build a post form on my site to
submit a tweet that shows as a comment, or you could use the API to attach a
comment to my page, and I could accept or reject them as desired. Perhaps even
have different rules for tweets posted from my form than from the API, etc.
Tweets don't have to be limited to 140 characters. I believe Twitter has
kicked around the idea of longer ones. I'd personally be in favor of upping to
200-256 and then even allowing a paid tier (either monthly or per tweet) to go
to longer lengths, attach more media, etc.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Czech bitcoin exchange Bitcash.cz hacked, up to 4,000 user wallets emptied - vlastik
http://www.coindesk.com/czech-bitcoin-exchange-bitcash-cz-hacked-4000-user-wallets-emptied/
======
cs702
Every new day seems to bring another new Bitcoin scandal -- whether it's a
hacked exchange, stolen wallets, frozen funds, collapsed Ponzi schemes,
arrested illegal-market operators, or who knows what else.
Yet, despite all this, Bitcoin keeps appreciating, recently reaching an all-
time high.[1]
\--
[1] [https://blockchain.info/charts/market-
price?timespan=all](https://blockchain.info/charts/market-price?timespan=all)
~~~
smtddr
These stories of hacks & scandals and your link showing increasing-value only
increases my desire to buy bitcoin. Also, this wild story[1] makes me want
bitcoin too. What if I just want to buy $500 USD worth of bitcoin and just sit
on it? Maybe 10 years from now it'll be worth close to a million, or maybe
bitcoin will be shutdown and it'll be worth nothing. I think I can risk it.
Who's trust-worthy these days if I want to make that purchase?
1\. [http://now.msn.com/kristoffer-koch-norwegian-man-buys-
apartm...](http://now.msn.com/kristoffer-koch-norwegian-man-buys-apartment-
with-bitcoin-profit)
~~~
aianus
Coinbase.com is a YC company that's trustworthy and convenient if you have a
US bank account
~~~
zachlatta
Eh, I wouldn't recommend Coinbase. They deemed one of my purchases from them
as "high-risk" and have been holding my money hostage since. Support team has
been taking 3-4 days to reply to each email in the thread.
~~~
christiangenco
Yeah, their support department is absolutely awful.
~~~
Wingman4l7
They've been chalking that up to growing pains -- for the longest time, they
didn't even have a dedicated support guy hired; it was just the two founders.
Last time I checked they had just one member of staff dedicated to support,
although by now they might have one or two more.
------
honzzz
It might be interesting to note that someone in the discussion under the
original article (an unregistered user going by the name 'The one who knows')
claims that "the admin of bitcash.cz Carlos upset the czech hacker comunity
SooM.cz and accordingly to Blockchain
([https://blockchain.info/tx/44f66e60460926d1ac75667ce30604290...](https://blockchain.info/tx/44f66e60460926d1ac75667ce3060429000f7cbd30e9afe5a1f3af62cae7727f))
it looks like those hackers donated all the BTC that was on bitcash.cz to
wikileaks".
~~~
altero
If all BTC are on single place, it could be possible to recover them. Seems
like well documented case, both parties are in civilized countries and court
could take it.
Soom.cz is not very reliable source. Also Czech Linux community does not
mention anything.
But according to some users it did not even used SSL!!!
~~~
saraid216
> But according to some users it did not even used SSL!!!
It's never going to stop amusing me that Bitcoin's big selling point is how
it's this amazing form of applied cryptography... and the people who actually
try to do this kind of thing cheerfully neglect security concerns that seem
rather basic.
It's not hard to explain this phenomenon, but it's still amusing.
------
LukeWalsh
Please. Please. For the love of god please.
[https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/How_to_set_up_a_secure_offline_sa...](https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/How_to_set_up_a_secure_offline_savings_wallet)
~~~
aqme28
How safe is this compared to using a brainwallet
([https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Brainwallet](https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Brainwallet))
with sufficiently strong password (say, a hundred secure-randomly generated
characters)?
A brainwallet sounds far far simpler to set up, at least.
~~~
GigabyteCoin
Brainwallets are never a good idea.
See here:
[https://www.google.com/search?q=brainwallet+(stolen+OR+hacke...](https://www.google.com/search?q=brainwallet+\(stolen+OR+hacked\))
~~~
meowface
Uh, no.
Brainwallets with _weak passphrases_ are a bad idea. Every case of a
brainwallet theft has been due to users coming up with predictable passphrases
to generate the key.
Most brainwallet private keys are simply a SHA256 hash of a passphrase, which
is fairly easy for a dedicated attacker to crack via bruteforce or dictionary
attacks, yes. But if you use, say, a 12-word sentence with completely random
words, like SHA256("fire pickle shipment lachrymose deity unwitting pernicious
obstacle kitchen tumbleweed mannequin erudite"), and maybe some random letters
or numbers at the end, it's infeasible that it'll ever be cracked.
One common problem is that many people will pick song lyrics, book titles, or
Bible quotes as their passphrase. Obviously attackers are going to scrape and
add those to their dictionaries (which will then also be permutated in many
ways), so it's critical that the words are picked arbitrarily and that there
are enough of them.
The idea itself isn't inherently insecure, except for the fact that SHA256 was
probably a poor hash function to use since it's fast.
I can guarantee that this will always be more secure than trusting any online
service to store your wallet instead. The only risk is you forgetting one or
more of the words, in which case you're in trouble.
~~~
aianus
Just wanted to add a note that you can come up with whatever deterministic
process you want to generate the keypair.
For example SHA256(MySuperSlowAwesomeLongHash("fire pickle shipment lachrymose
deity unwitting pernicious obstacle kitchen tumbleweed mannequin erudite"))
~~~
meowface
True. Many people appear to use
[http://brainwallet.org](http://brainwallet.org) or similar sites though; they
don't really understand what hashing functions are, so they trust these sites
to securely generate a private key.
Someone should really make an alternative with bcrypt or scrypt.
------
etherael
I'm getting somewhat tired of these kinds of stories, the stories _and_ the
responses here both follow identical patterns.
1) Security is compromised at an entity that deals somehow with bitcoins. The
security of the blockchain remains unimpacted, it is as relevant to the
fundamentals of the currency as much as someone getting robbed is relevant to
the fundamentals of the fiat currency they were robbed in.
2) Much whining and gnashing of teeth ensues as to how bitcoin is going to
collapse any second now because clearly it is just some crazy snake oil and
look at the rash of compromises as evidence, and by the way it also happens I
disapprove of it because it goes against my views on what a currency needs to
be.
3) People respond much along the lines I'm responding now.
4) It devolves into an ideological argument along the lines of the
characteristics of the currency itself and the potential death of fiat money
and its implications.
Conclusion; Some people are fundamentally ideologically opposed to bitcoin and
will use whatever they can to drag it through the mud at every opportunity.
Compromising the blockchain or the fundamentals of bitcoin itself is news,
even when it's overblown or exaggerated like the recent Cornell findings, some
venture getting owned because they failed to adequately secure their place of
business is par for the course and barely a footnote at this point in time.
For the first time in normal everyday business history, security _really
matters_ now. You can't just put up a banner with the legal penalties for
acting against corporate policy and actually expect to hold people accountable
via the legal system for ignoring your banner, the new rules are that you need
_real_ security.
Frankly I think that's a good thing and something that is far overdue, the
swiss cheese state of general security practices coupled with the apathy and
ignorance of general computer users has gone on for far too long, but because
the individuals in question were never held personally to account there was
never the motivation to really fix the problem.
Now there is, people need to accept this new paradigm if they want to deal in
this space.
~~~
yahelc
re: #1, don't you think it would be newsworthy if someone robbed a bank of
_all_ its customers' uninsured deposits? That doesn't really happen commonly,
and if it did, it would be huge news.
~~~
etherael
It was just as much news when Gox got owned, even though they covered the
losses. Also, Insured vs uninsured is irrelevant in this category because you
simply can't have an uninsured traditional bank in the fashion you're talking
about.
------
alecsmart1
This is the third story in two weeks. Either the hacking attempts are
increasing or the site owners are cashing out. Either way it's bad news.
Anyone with bitcoins must use an offline wallet.
~~~
fat0wl
It's been shown that it can happen, so it will continue to happen until it
becomes unprofitable or infeasible.....
------
antonius
First the Chinese exchange (GBL) and now this? Scammers have been hitting the
exchanges hard recently.
~~~
speeder
Of course, this is a prime time to get btc and sell it. Scammers probably are
not expecting the price to climb much longer in short term.
~~~
monsterix
On the other hand I see this more like a concerted attempt to build mistrust
against the virtual currency and its distribution network. Tinfoil hat anyone?
[Edit: Thank you for your lame negative votes, sad people. You can go further
and ask for more negative power to vote this down and then just die negatively
voting right here.]
~~~
vlastik
Another theory says that the webmasters are stealing the coins themselves.
Perfect crime ;).
~~~
monsterix
Sure, makes sense but why would I steal millions when I could do billions? -
though it's better to err on side of petty.
~~~
lmm
Once you get past about $5million you might as well cash it in there rather
than take any more risks - you're set for life either way.
------
disdev
I'd love to say there's some more nefarious work going on, like governments
trying to quash Bitcoin and executing these hacks...
But my guess is it comes down to poor security.
~~~
fembot__
I couldn't agree more. I took a cool seminar in college about web security, in
which a former senior security specialist for a government agency said that
there is no such thing as full security, just varying levels of insecurity.
Scary thought...
~~~
BlackDeath3
>there is no such thing as full security, just varying levels of insecurity
Six in one hand...
But it is good to realize that there really no such thing as perfect security.
If it can be accessed, it can be accessed nefariously.
------
kumarski
I think CoinMKT with its verification seems like the only solid place....
~~~
iancarroll
I think Mt. Gox, the most reputable exchange, is the only solid place. This
sounds like self advertising.
~~~
mithras
Sure if you like to wait 8 weeks for your money.
------
Nux
You mean, they weren't insured?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Meet Microsoft, the world's best kept R&D secret - matan_a
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2020268/meet-microsoft-the-worlds-best-kept-randd-secret.html
======
ChuckMcM
"Redmond spends more on R&D than Google and Apple combined. Think about that
the next time someone tells you Microsoft doesn’t have a future."
Two words, Xerox PARC.
At Sun there was a weird joke that Sun Labs was where good ideas went to die.
It was frustrating.
The point here is that good R&D is a necessary but not sufficient component of
innovation, the second is a willingness to productize your work. Strangely the
hardest thing about that is _not_ making a product out of it, the hardest
thing is making a product you can ship.
Good R&D isn't constrained, which is to say that you don't tell the folks
doing the research you are only researching things we can sell for a profit,
but that is a constraint on products. What happens is the 'Apple effect' where
you have a bunch of researchers who can't make a profitable product (Xerox
Star) and then a product guy comes along (Steve Jobs) who sees the essence of
the innovation, and can strip away the parts where it goes too far and ships
that.
Its really challenging to build something close to your vision and not ship
it, it seems like it is impossible to build something that is close to your
vision and then ship something only half as close as that. But that is where
the success can be. "Fumbling the Future" [1] is a fascinating read for that
reason.
[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Fumbling-Future-Invented-Personal-
Comp...](http://www.amazon.com/Fumbling-Future-Invented-Personal-
Computer/dp/1583482660)
~~~
pron
AFAIK, Microsoft Research and IBM Research, unlike Google Labs, do not operate
with the clear intent of ever productizing their work. What they do there is
much more similar to the work done in universities.
And if Microsoft Research is like IBM, then it's also only partly funded by
the corporation, and regarded as a semi-separate entity. I think they see it
more as a contribution to science and as a long-term investment rather than
product research.
~~~
dude_abides
You are right about Microsoft Research (MSR) but not about IBM Research. In
fact, MSR is the only true academic-style research lab left in the world; all
others either disbanded or became more product-focused. It will be interesting
to see how long the MSR model survives. Will be great to hear the views of an
MSRian on this.
~~~
jjcm
I'm not on MSR directly, but I am part of a future research team at Microsoft.
Internally things are interesting - you have the freedom to do pretty much
whatever you want, but you have to justify it's usefulness one way or another.
Microsoft is made up of thousands of tiny little teams that are mostly
autonomous - each team has to prove that there's a reason for it to exist
though. With research, especially things that will only come to fruition ten
or twenty years out, it's very hard to directly measure it's impact. One of
the things we end up doing is alternating between future and near reaching
projects so that we can justify our existence with projects that are tangible
in the present, but also contribute to future goals as well.
In a sense we are product focused as well, except our target market isn't
consumers, but rather people up on high within microsoft. We have to sell our
research to them one way or another, and it's often the research teams that
have the best advertising sense about them that end up doing the best.
------
aresant
In this article I see a MSFT strategy unfolding of skipping the current smart-
phone mobile battlefield, and leaping directly into full-bore cyborg
computing.
Bear with me, they've effectively laid out all the pieces:
\- A "omni touch" interface that allows for interaction without physical input
devices.
\- A variety of leaps forward for Kinect to map and translate your physical
environment to a data stream.
\- A "holodeck" and other tools that overlay interface design onto physical
objects.
\- Foveated 3d graphics and other leaps forward that would drastically reduce
hardware costs for graphic rendering.
Nearly every one of these projects are directly applicable to the "wearable
computer" concept.
I wonder if, looking back in 10 years, we'll see that MSFT's currnet weak
smart-phone entries were ultimately not that important to their overall
strategy.
~~~
JPKab
I agree with you here, but I don't think the "weak smart phone strategy" is
necessarily by design. Honestly, I think they have a solid smart phone
product, but were so late that they won't get the solid ecosystem of apps they
need.
My issue with this article is that it forgets about the ugly side of
Microsoft: delaying the sale of innovative new things to protect old profit
centers in the enterprise market. Does anyone really believe that Microsoft
CAN'T make editing hosted documents in Sharepoint as seamless and smooth as
Google Docs? I truly believe that they have chosen to neuter a lot of their
collaborative, web app based software to keep their old trusy desktop software
(Office) profit center alive and kicking. They benefit from this, in the short
term, in two ways: If the latest version of Office has new features, they sell
the upgrades and make bank. Because it's desktop, they can say "you need
Windows 8 (or whatever is latest and greatest) to run it Mrs. CIO." So then
they make the OS sale too.
------
TwistedWeasel
Spending money on research is always good, Microsoft Research has always had a
lot of good ideas and generated some truly amazing prototypes and research
papers. It's a good thing for the community in general the have people working
on this stuff but it's not necessarily a good business investment for MS if
they can't leverage the work into viable products.
Many companies like to fund R&D divisions as a means to attract the best minds
from the academic community in the hopes that they will benefit from their
talent in some way. It's often not directed work but more of a recruitment
tool. The best professors bring with them the best students and many of those
students end up working on products not just research.
However, in my time at Microsoft I worked with the research team on a couple
of occasions trying leverage their ideas into real products with little
success. We would send them some interesting problems (in one case we asked
them to spend some time on snow accumulation algorithms for a snowboarding
game) and they would disappear for months and return with a cool demo that was
impressive but usually failed to meet the given criteria that allowed it to be
used in a shipping product. e.g. speed, memory efficiency, data size
requirements etc.
~~~
zaidf
Curious:
What precise things were problematic? Their disappearing for months? Their not
communicating enough? Them royally ignoring practical guidelines from you re:
speed, memory etc?
~~~
TwistedWeasel
All of the above, but most of all not keeping within the required parameters
that would have made their solution usable.
------
mtgx
> "Redmond spends more on R&D than Google and Apple combined. Think about that
> the next time someone tells you Microsoft doesn’t have a future."
More like Microsoft _wastes_ more money on R&D that doesn't convert in
revolutionary products more than both Apple and Google combined.
We've always known Microsoft spends a lot on R&D and they like to make those
"20 years from now" videos, but I haven't seen much come out of it. Last year
they even bragged about how they had the idea for the iPhone 20 years ago. But
so what? How did that help them? At best it helped them create Windows Mobile
and the PDA's 10 years later, but that was a niche market, and Microsoft never
had much market share with Windows Mobile in the smartphone market, which was
a lot smaller than the current smartphone market back then.
So I guess the moral of the story is that "lab inventions" don't mean much,
and you could waste a lot of money on them, and with very little to show for
it in the market. I'm pretty sure the $2 billion dollar Kin project was part
of that R&D spending, too.
~~~
DanBC
> More like Microsoft wastes more money on R&D that doesn't convert in
> revolutionary products [...]
This sentence is weird to read here.
We have a big company spending money on science that is not tied to what they
can sell. That is a good thing. I am disappointed that anyone on HN can say
anything different.
Of course, we could have a discussion about the difficulties of running pure
research alongside a commercial arm. But that's not what your comment is
doing.
~~~
enraged_camel
I don't think research whose results do not see the light of day is valuable
in any shape or form. This is especially true for corporate-sponsored
research, where the results are either kept as trade secrets or patented by
the corporate lawyers, which means scientists elsewhere cannot build on top of
that research later.
~~~
liftthatback
You are very, very mistaken.
Microsoft sponsors many top people in computer science and allows them to
spend time on pure research and to publish academic papers. Ever heard of
Simon Peyton Jones or Sir Tony Hoare?
How can that be bad?
For example, Microsoft pays most of the top Haskell developers to research and
develop Haskell. There's no patents on that, and the source code and papers
are all freely available. Microsoft isn't turning it into a product, it's just
doing it to better computer science, to increase their standing, and to inform
their other products such as C#.
And you say that's bad? Fuck you.
~~~
enraged_camel
I see that you're new here. Please remain civil. This is not Reddit.
It is true that a portion of the research sponsored by Microsoft is published
as academic papers, but I'd suspect that, in relation to the vast amount of
money Microsoft is spending on R&D, those papers represent less than 1% of the
results. We never hear about the hundreds of millions spent where the results
never saw the light of day.
~~~
liftthatback
My problem with what you've said is that you've accused Microsoft of placing
patents on their research, and of not publishing their results.
These accusations are false. MSR does not generally patent their work. I'm in
language research and have not encountered any of their work that they've
patented. Also, MSR's researchers and evaluated and appraised based on their
publication record, so the only incentive is to publish. Microsoft's people
publish a huge amount. Most university researchers are envious of how much
they manage to publish, which they achieve through very high quality people,
properly compensated, with lots of resources and being left alone.
Why do you "suspect" that only 1% is published? Where do you get that number
from? Have you worked there? Have you collaborated with them? If they're only
publishing 1%, the research would be superhuman.
You have put a false accusation to a group of people, and that pisses me off.
It's not even like it's a difference of opinion - you've clearly not worked
with these people or studied their publications, and are just making
assumptions.
~~~
enraged_camel
I went to UW for my undergrad. I know people who work in MSR and talk to them
on a regular basis. You're definitely right about them being high quality
people and being very properly compensated, but wrong about everything else
you said. Language research, for example, constitutes a tiny minority of MSR's
total budget. Most of it goes to graphics and multimedia, hardware and
devices, and human-computer interaction, with smaller portions going to
software development and security/anti-piracy research. Everything else is
breadcrumbs.
>>If they're only publishing 1%, the research would be superhuman.
Well yes, they spend over $10 billion on research. Of course it is superhuman.
Perhaps you are lacking this context, which is why you find it hard to believe
my suspicion that they publish a tiny percentage of all research findings.
~~~
rossjudson
When I look through MSR's papers, I see a pretty massive level of output,
across many of the domains you say get most of the money. Of course there's
going to be information that isn't published. There's lots of information not
worth publishing.
As a matter of defense against patents, though, MSFT has a strong interest in
insuring that its basic research is thoroughly documented in public,
establishing prior art.
------
mav3r1ck
This should come as no surprise to those that are familiar with MSR (Microsoft
Research). I've had the fortune of visiting the place a few times and it is
amazing, especially the people they get to come in for research (even the
interns are geniuses).
Even if you don't know of MSR, this should be of no surprise if you have any
recall of the news you read over the years. A lot of the work they do has
appeared in the NYTimes and such. For example, I remember very clearly that
about 6 years ago, Bill Gates basically said that robots are the future. It
didn't take me long to find articles and website to remind myself of what he
said (see link below). Although Bill Gates is no longer CEO, he is still
chairman and you can certainly bet that MSR will be leading the way in this
research.
[http://tech.blorge.com/Structure:%20/2007/01/07/bill-
gates-r...](http://tech.blorge.com/Structure:%20/2007/01/07/bill-gates-robots-
microsoft-robotics-studio/)
------
asimjalis
Microsoft’s 9B R&D budget is mostly an accounting convenience. They include
all product development in R&D.
~~~
sek
Also the video at the end is just a marketing video from the Office
department.
At least it's not just a marketing vehicle like IBM Research and they build
real products like Kinect. But that was also a bought company afaik and didn't
come out of MS R&D.
------
joezydeco
My irony sensor gets kind of pegged when I see all these interesting Microsoft
research projects using the Kinect and Kinect-related sensing technologies,
but Microsoft had to go and _buy_ the original tech from PrimeSense.
[http://www.cultofmac.com/67951/how-apple-almost-got-
microsof...](http://www.cultofmac.com/67951/how-apple-almost-got-microsofts-
kinect-game-controller/)
~~~
mousetraps
PrimeSense provided a low cost chip, but Microsoft:
\- did the product design and put it into a friendly package (take apart a
Kinect some day, they did some neat stuff in there)
\- developed the body tracking algorithm
([http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/145347/BodyPartRecognitio...](http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/145347/BodyPartRecognition.pdf)).
\- developed the microphone array, speech recognition algorithms
\- provided developers the resources they needed to take advantage of the
device
\- applied it well to gaming and quickly brought it to market
\- put the technology in the hands of millions, triggering even more
innovation
~~~
joezydeco
So what was in the SDK that PrimeSense was packaging with their reference
design before the launch of the Kinect?
<http://pr.cs.cornell.edu/humanactivities/data/NITE.pdf>
~~~
mousetraps
They had skeletal tracking, but it wasn't reliable enough for consumer
applications:
\- OpenNI requires a calibration pose, while the technique Microsoft uses
allows players to walk in and out of the frame. Kinect would not have
succeeded if people had to calibrate it all the time.
\- Microsoft does predictive analysis so it's much better in non-optimal
environments (e.g. a living room) or in cases where it loses track of a body
part because it's behind something.
\- Also. To train it. Microsoft generated and processed millions of depth
images from mocap data taken of people of all sorts of different shapes in
sizes in all sorts of environments. It's insane. And of course they needed new
algorithms to manage that...
\- Lastly - no audio/speech or 3D facial expression tracking in NITE
------
brisance
Microsoft is this generation's Xerox PARC if they can't ship whatever is in
their R&D labs.
------
manojlds
"As far as 99.9 percent of the world population is concerned"
I bet a large percentage of the population in the world doesn't even know
about Microsoft.
------
sytelus
You can see Microsoft Research's contribution to shipping products at
[http://research.microsoft.com/en-
us/about/techtransfer/produ...](http://research.microsoft.com/en-
us/about/techtransfer/product-development-contributions-2011.aspx). You will
be surprised how much stuff has came out of MSR.
------
robomartin
If the tech world has proven anything at all it is that:
huge budget != disruptive innovation
At least not as a rule.
Think about how most (all?) of the top tech companies you know about started:
garages, dorms and kitchen tables. HP, Apple, Microsoft, Google, eBay,
Facebook, Twitter, etc.
Sure, some needed huge money to scale, but the genesis of the idea-turned-
product did not require millions or billions to generate.
Sometimes you have to wonder if hunger is far more valuable than money to spur
innovation. I happen to think so. And, while I do not diminish the work being
done at companies like MS, sometimes I feel that they are just throwing money
at PhD's who are having a great time playing with interesting tech but simply
don't have the drive, hunger and urgency to make something more than a great
research gig out of it.
~~~
tellarin
Research != innovation
Research != R&D
Not trying to antagonize you, just pointing an issue that seems pretty common
in this article discussion.
------
bediger4000
I'll grant you that my personal anecdote is a few years old, but...
Maybe 8 or 9 years ago, I talked to the Dean of the University of Colorado
Comp Sci department. I could only remember Benjamin Zorn as a faculty member,
so I dropped the name. By then, Zorn had gotten hired away to Microsoft R&D.
The Dean of the Comp Sci department made a number of references to Microsoft
R&D as a "research roach hotel" - researcher's go in, but no papers ever come
out.
If Microsoft R&D is a secret, then it's Microsoft's own problem, I assume.
~~~
brudgers
Here you will find 10,000 publications from Microsoft Research:
[http://research.microsoft.com/apps/catalog/default.aspx?t=pu...](http://research.microsoft.com/apps/catalog/default.aspx?t=publications)
That appears to be about four orders of magnitude more research than that used
to fact check your story.
~~~
marshray
I look forward to reading
[http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=1795...](http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=179572)
this one about Halo combat skill development:
_Using these ratings from 7 months of games from over 3 million players, we
look at how play intensity, breaks in play, skill change over time, and other
titles affect skill._
------
sbuccini
As a current student, these are the types of projects that made me want to
study this field. Does anyone know if it's even possible to get a job at one
of these R&D centers with just an undergrad degree? What sort of things can I
do to make myself a more viable candidate for one of these research labs?
~~~
munchbunny
No, not really. I've heard of a few exceptions in the past, and in all cases
these were people with highly successful careers spanning at least a decade.
That said, if you ever become a PhD candidate in CS, you should apply to MSR
for a summer. It's an amazing place to expand your network as a researcher.
------
at-fates-hands
"The point here is that good R&D is a necessary but not sufficient component
of innovation, the second is a willingness to productize your work"
This is my biggest beef with MS. They consistently wait for other companies to
innovate, then wait to see if the market will support it.
Only when they see an advantage to developing their own version of a product
will they enter a market. You can look at their MP3 player the Zune, you can
also look at how long it took them to get into the smartphone and tablet
markets.
I'm wondering if there are any concrete examples of them releasing a product
which has utilized their arm of R&D for a specific product and pointed to it
as a reason why it's available to the public. Similar to how Google always
touts their R&D teams for developing a myriad of their products.
~~~
kapnobatairza
I am not quite sure if I buy this argument.
Microsoft certainly attempts to "productize", they simply fail on execution:
When the iPod was still "only" an MP3 player, Microsoft was pushing video
capable PMPs through their PMC software.
Microsoft was betting on the tablet long before Apple.
Windows CE based Wizard style PDAs predate the Apple Newton, and Pocket PC was
largely successful and shows Microsoft have been trying to get a Mobile OS
into your pocket for nearly 20 years. It was largely Palm and Microsoft that
built out this space.
The PocketPC iPaq even had a GSM jacket that allowed it to be used as a phone,
making it a smartphone that predates even the earliest Ericsson/Nokia
smartphones. Not to mention Windows Mobile which predates iOS and Android by
many years.
Microsoft has been working on WebTV, Media Center and Xbox to get into your
living room long before AppleTV or Google TV.
Microsoft has certainly attempted to productize on the ideas that come out of
Microsoft Research and is almost always on the cutting edge of technology, and
in many cases years ahead. The problem is that they don't have the same
unified vision many other companies do, so when they execute they do so
poorly: With incomplete products in an incoherent package.
Microsoft's problem isn't that they aren't making enough products, it is that
they are sometimes too big and disorganized to make them good enough that
people can see the underlying value.
~~~
mikestew
> Windows CE based Wizard style PDAs predate the Apple Newton
Newton came out in '93 and WinCE came out in '96. But that nitpick doesn't
take away from your general point. MSFT seems to be good at coming out with
things that have potential, but then let's them languish. Their mobile
products were a prime example. On the last WinMo phone I had (2006-ish), the
OS had dialogs that were (I assume) user-drawn and going on ten years old.
Those dialogs looked like it, too. Apple comes along with a platform they were
willing to pour the company into, and MSFT has been playing catch-up since.
You say they don't make their products "good enough", I'd argue that Microsoft
doesn't stick with their products long enough to make them good enough. Their
wireless home phone system (can't find a link) was an example. V1.0 was rough
around the edges, but useable and forward-thinking for the late 90's. v2.0 was
going to be great, except there never was a 2.0.
~~~
kapnobatairza
Good catch, somehow I thought the Newton was released later, thanks for the
correction. Upon further research, Microsoft seems to have begun their
handheld efforts with WinPad and the Pegasus project in 1994, which finally
materialized as WindowsCE by 1996 in real consumer products. Apple Newton
development seems to go back as far as 1987, with a consumer product out by
1993.
I also think what you say about them failing to support their products in the
long term is very true. Until recently, Microsoft has been willing to let a
lot of its products languish both aesthetically and in terms of functionality.
I think this ultimately still comes down to Microsoft's large disjointed
nature and stubborn commitment to support legacy hardware/software, which made
it less dynamic than a company like Apple that had a strong top-down unified
decision making process that allowed it to push out cutting-edge products and
aesthetics.
------
gjmveloso
If this P&D budget was splitted on long-term-10-years-go-to-market products
and really useful and fast increments on current Microsoft products, maybe
Microsoft could be the current Google. Or Apple ;)
It's weird a company have the funniest R&D labs and its main product - Windows
- still sucks with 80' Windows Registry structure or a file system which
fragments a lot.
------
rbanffy
People have to realize it's not how much money you spend, but how well you
spend it, that matters.
------
Nano2rad
Microsoft is part of US military and weapon manufacturers like Boeing, and
doing projects for them. Most of MS research is related to military if you
look close. Also now it is protected from any acquisition.
------
__abc
Awesome, now bring it to market. Until then, as a consumer, I could care less
about Microsoft.
All their amazing R&D didn't make W8, their phones, or their tablets any more
enjoyable or purchasable.
------
ilaksh
Interesting to see such an amazingly positive article on the front page at the
same time as the scathing Forbes piece. I wonder if that's really a
coincidence.
[http://www.forbes.com/sites/rogerkay/2013/01/02/microsoft-
is...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/rogerkay/2013/01/02/microsoft-is-fast-
turning-into-a-sideshow/)
Since most of these revolutionary systems aren't available as actual products,
I have to assume that Microsoft buys people and ideas mainly to keep them from
interfering with their monopolies.
------
ndbos
Whats even more clever is that the 9.6 Billion only actually "cost" 4.8
Billion (R&D Classified Work is a 50% tax deduction)
------
ianstallings
I love their R&D department. If only they could mutate Ballmer into a human
being using bio-engineering..
------
ucee054
What academics (eg Microsoft Research) mean by "innovation" is "what lets us
publish papers".
What ordinary people mean by "innovation" is "what cool new things can be made
available that noticeably change Grandma's life".
Most academic work is _USELESS_ for this because it ignores too many
constraints, making the market hostile to it. Richard Gabriel did a piece on
this, called "Money through innovation reconsidered".
Don't buy academic hype.
~~~
stinos
So what is your actual point here? Research is useless? Academics are only
about publishing and nothing more? Doesn't make sense.
How do you expect eg low-level brain research to be useful for your grandma?
It can't, but that does not mean at all it cannot be innovative or that the
researchers only care about the next paper.
~~~
ucee054
I have two points.
Point1: Nothing that Microsoft _ever_ does will blaze a new trail of products,
they are not an original sort of company. They will always be playing catchup.
EG Kinect to WiiMote
Point2: Nothing that CS conferences or journals _ever_ publish will blaze a
new trail. They too will always be playing catchup.
EG first came Facebook, and only afterwards the whole social networking
research craze in academia.
I exaggerate Point2 _a little_. There are 1 or 2 Academics who actually make
stuff, like Michael Stonebraker. But overall the record is pathetic.
Don't buy the hype.
~~~
pm90
_> Point2: Nothing that CS conferences or journals ever publish will blaze a
new trail. They too will always be playing catchup._
Actually, it was a lot of this published work that resulted in: Internet,
Networks, Filesystems, OS(Unix), Compilers(LLVM) etcetc.
Granted, a lot of research does not result in any useful product, but that
isn't what research is all about. Its about exploring the boundaries of our
knowledge. Trying wild ideas that you couldn't do within the time and budget
limits of a company... because some of those wild ideas do work spectacularly
in the end
~~~
ucee054
Please get your facts straight. If the papers had never existed we would still
have the Internet, Networks, Filesystems, OS and Compilers.
Those things are not exactly difficult to do at a basic level (the 0to1 level)
although at an advanced level (1toN) they might be.
So you will find that how those things got onto the market was by some
engineer figuring out how to do it and hacking it together, not the work of
some professor.
The two examples I am familiar with are filesystems and OS. Our filesystems
today are the result of descent from FAT12, which came from discussion between
Marc McDonald and Bill Gates.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_Allocation_Table>
Our operating systems are the result of descent from CPM, which came from Gray
Kildall deciding to write a RAM tester.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CP/M>
And that applies to 90% of the market. "Look ma no research!"
I can find you similar examples for compilers and networks as well, though in
those fields the examples will not be so outright embarrassing to academia.
What research is about is mostly chasing trends in conferences and funding
bodies.
Don't buy academic hype.
~~~
pm90
_> Please get your facts straight. If the papers had never existed we would
still have the Internet, Networks, Filesystems, OS and Compilers._
That is a question without an answer. Probably, they would have been invented,
probably not. The ideas themselves were played around and worked on by
academics though. You can't deny that they helped to usher in the technologies
much quicker than otherwise.
_> So you will find that how those things got onto the market was by some
engineer figuring out how to do it and hacking it together, not the work of
some professor_
Professors don't (usually) sit down and write code, they hire others to do it
for them. As I said before, the point of research isn't to produce a product,
ready for use. It is to try out ideas that wouldn't be tried by the industry.
Its good that Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina were hired to code what later
turned out to be the Mosaic web browser.
_> Our operating systems are the result of descent from CPM, which came from
Gray Kildall deciding to write a RAM tester.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CP/M> _
MSDOS, true. Unix, false. Unix descended from MULTICS[0] which started much
before CP/M[1]
_> I can find you similar examples for compilers and networks as well, though
in those fields the examples will not be so outright embarrassing to
academia._
I wince at your choice of words. "Embarrassing"? Why? If the industry produces
an idea or technique that solves a research problem, academics have no trouble
accepting it. See for instance: how quickly AWS, CUDA etc are being adopted by
academics for their research.
So, in total, you have given one "fact" which turns out to be untrue. And you
say you can give more examples in networks and compilers. Please do. I am
genuinely interested to see what it is that has so tarnished your views on the
work of academia.
_> And that applies to 90% of the market. "Look ma no research!"_
Clearly.
Here, take another famous example: relational databases originated in a paper
by an academic, E.F. Codd[2].
I see that you are hell-bent on showing that academic research has made no
contribution at all to the development of modern computer science. I haven't
got the time or inclination to argue, so this will be my last comment on this
matter
[0]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multics>
[1]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CP/M>
[2]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_database>
~~~
ucee054
I gave you 2 facts, referring to CPM and FAT, which apply to the Windows 90%
of the PC market.
Unix is irrelevant; nobody used Unix until Android came along. Unix is in fact
the other 10%.
Furthermore, relational databases are the work by Professor Stonebraker, that
I already conceded in my original post.
_I haven't got the time or inclination to argue_
No, what you lack is the time and inclination to apply reading comprehension
to my posts.
------
chayesfss
They should throw some money at making adfs a better product
------
lionspaw
This is silly. Microsoft doesn't have the culture for any kind of innovation
at this point.
-ex-microsoftie
------
BobWarfield
Microsoft Research was founded by Nathan Myhrvold. Maybe it's just a patent
trolling scam?
Cheers,
BW
------
orionblastar
Microsoft should have spent some of that money improving the quality control
of their software.
To learn that changing the GUI of Windows 8 was not that good of an idea.
Microsoft should have used R&D to make products more affordable.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Favorite subreddit? - tmaly
I read /r/programming and /r/golang and have found some really nice gems over the years.<p>What are your favorite subreddits that you have gained some really valuable insights from?
======
baccredited
[https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/](https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/)
------
Mizza
[https://reddit.com/r/SyrianCivilWar](https://reddit.com/r/SyrianCivilWar)
Takes a lot of lurking to really be able to _really_ read what's happening,
but I honestly think that this sub is quite possibly the best war reporting of
all time.
The sub has even been publishing its own high-quality journal/magazine, "The
Week In Review", ex:
[http://imgur.com/gallery/SdsG2](http://imgur.com/gallery/SdsG2)
~~~
sputknick
I'll check it out, but can you give us a high level understanding of what you
have learned about the war?
~~~
s_baby
The whole truth is probably more fluid and multifaceted but these are some of
the interesting claims I've seen on there.
1\. Al Nusra a branch of Al Qaeda is embedded amongst the moderate rebels and
were the main fighting force in Aleppo.
2\. Allies Qatar and Saudi Arabia have been flooding Syria with weapons to
anyone who will take them including radical groups. SA sees situation as
opportunity to spread Wahhabism to the region.
3\. Early on the coalition had been using a funneling strategy that involved
bombing locations peripheral to ISIS with the goal of forcing them to move
into civilian regime territory.
------
dfederschmidt
/r/memeeconomy
People giving and asking for "investment advice" for memes. It's the kind of
subculture where I was truly amazed how far the Internet has taken us in terms
of social interaction and humour.
Funny thing is, the verge even reported on it [1].
[1] [http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/10/14223264/meme-economy-
redd...](http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/10/14223264/meme-economy-reddit-stock-
market)
------
J-dawg
This is possibly controversial, but /r/TheRedPill has helped me a lot
recently.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/theredpill](https://www.reddit.com/r/theredpill)
~~~
nameless912
I'm attempting not to pass judgement. Can you explain why it's helped?
~~~
J-dawg
It has helped me understand why my marriage failed and made me realise how I
need to behave differently when I start dating again.
I must admit, a lot of the commenters there have extreme views and some of
them come across as misogynists.
However, for some reason I persevered and started reading some of the theory.
What I read aligned so accurately with my previous experiences and the way
I've been treated by women that I couldn't ignore it, and I've been hooked
since then.
Thank you for at least attempting not to pass judgement!
~~~
AznHisoka
what are some of those extreme views you disagree with?
any you agree with?
~~~
AznHisoka
Hello? Which ones do you disagree with?
~~~
J-dawg
Because of the subject matter, there's a lot of anger and bitterness in that
subreddit, and people make a lot of sweeping generalisations. There's not much
point getting into my specific opinions, everyone has to make up their own
mind.
All I know is the theory discussed there, and links to "manosphere" blogs have
been useful to me. I mentioned it here in case it's useful to other people
too.
------
rayalez
[http://www.reddit.com/r/rational/](http://www.reddit.com/r/rational/) \- a
community discussing rational fiction (sort of like hard SciFi). This is one
of the best communities (aside from HN) that I am aware of, a lot of extremely
intelligent people, I'm sure you guys will like it.
~~~
tmaly
would this include works like Sherlock Holmes?
~~~
jswrenn
To quote rationalist fiction author Eliezer Yudkowsky: > But when you look at
what Sherlock Holmes does - you can't go out and do it at home. Sherlock
Holmes is not really operating by any sort of reproducible method. He is
operating by magically finding the right clues and carrying out magically
correct complicated chains of deduction. Maybe it's just me, but it seems to
me that reading Sherlock Holmes does not inspire you to go and do likewise.
Holmes is a mutant superhero. And even if you did try to imitate him, it would
never work in real life. [0]
A hallmark of rationalist fiction is that it invites the reader engage with
the story by thinking rationally. A tactic employed by Yudkowsky is to pause
just before the climax of the story and prompt online readers to use what they
know to get the protagonist out of their current bind, or else, Yudkowsky
promises, the protagonist will meet a less-than-ideal end.
Yudkowsky's stories [1] are a great introduction to the genre. I'm
particularly fond of "Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality", which
makes a habit of preying on the reader's sentimentality.
[0]
[http://lesswrong.com/lw/3m/rationalist_fiction/](http://lesswrong.com/lw/3m/rationalist_fiction/)
[1] [http://yudkowsky.net/other/fiction/](http://yudkowsky.net/other/fiction/)
------
mhink
Perhaps surprisingly, /r/dndbehindthescreen. They're one of the few subreddits
I've found that has a subscriber count in the tens of thousands, consistently
high-quality content, and an active community of people that actually
contribute.
/r/roguelikedev is a fun community, as well- I love the opportunity for cross-
pollination of ideas, since everyone's doing a rather similar thing, but with
different languages, libraries, and so forth.
------
zumu
[https://www.reddit.com/r/DepthHub/](https://www.reddit.com/r/DepthHub/)
It's a curated list of in depth submissions(posts and replies) from many
subreddits.
~~~
dhfhduk
Not meaning to criticize your taste in subreddits, but I didn't have the
reaction I thought it would. I was looking forward to it, but a lot of the
posts seemed like links to megatrolling or something.
Maybe I picked the wrong ones to take a look at or something, but I found it
disturbing more than anything else, sort of like "the best that reddit has to
offer, by those who think they are offering it."
I have sort of a love-hate relationship with Reddit, though, so I think it's
touching some deep buttons for me.
~~~
zumu
I generally agree with you.
To enjoy this subreddit, it's best to think of it more as a collection of in
"depth" posts, than it is of "quality" posts. That means it often offers some
really bad, but very long and detailed content. It's something I subscribe to
and occasionally find gems in.
Most importantly, I enjoy that the content is all original discussion as
opposed to articles I will probably find elsewhere.
------
ahoy
/r/askhistorians is always a delightful read
~~~
Daishiman
The most strictly moderated community I've seen, and thanks to that it has the
highest signal-to-noise ratio of any online forum.
You could _easily_ make a magazine out of the dozens of incredibly posts each
week.
------
tscs37
/r/selfhosted - it contains several selfhosted gems of applications, a very
interesting sub.
/r/netsec - to feel a bit paranoid
/r/homelab - for the homelab needs
/r/golang - overall friendly community and lots to learn
/r/programming - good sub for all needs
/r/polandball - I cannot come up with a good justification why this subreddit
is one of my favorites.
------
ljk
[https://www.reddit.com/r/wholesomememes/](https://www.reddit.com/r/wholesomememes/)
------
networked
I like
[https://www.reddit.com/r/sixwordstories/](https://www.reddit.com/r/sixwordstories/).
A good place to start with it is
[https://www.reddit.com/r/sixwordstories/top/?sort=top&t=all](https://www.reddit.com/r/sixwordstories/top/?sort=top&t=all).
------
mikeleeorg
For me, it's:
[https://reddit.com/r/UpliftingNews](https://reddit.com/r/UpliftingNews)
The media is too focused on sensationalized news nowadays, which often
translates to negative news. It's hard not to be jaded and cynical. This sub
helps give me perspective.
Also, as someone else already mentioned, /r/askhistorians is a truly
delightful and interesting read.
------
aeikenberry
[https://reddit.com/r/unixporn](https://reddit.com/r/unixporn)
------
Inconel
I mostly use reddit for more non serious discussion so my favorite subreddits
are primarily visual.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/cableporn/](https://www.reddit.com/r/cableporn/)
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Welding/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Welding/)
And a user from HN introduced me to
[https://www.reddit.com/r/conduitporn/](https://www.reddit.com/r/conduitporn/)
------
mindcrime
A few of my favorites include:
/r/machinelearning
/r/artificial
/r/semanticweb
/r/electronics
~~~
Someone1234
Is semantic web just a branch of SEO? I don't really understand the point
aside from making your site nicer for e.g. Google/Bing.
~~~
Leynos
Semantic web is about making the meaning of your content easier for machines
to extract. The idea is to have a single HTML document that is readable by
people, but is also marked up with microformats or similar rich markup to
enable easy acquisition of data by machine (i.e., without being dependent upon
the structure of the HTML).
The BBC's Programmes web site was a good example of this for some time, but I
think this seems to have fallen by the wayside somewhat. Here's an instance
though, where the broadcast times are marked up with XSD datetime information
in addition to the human readable times:
[http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b016ljx7/broadcasts](http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b016ljx7/broadcasts)
------
AznHisoka
/r/nofap - even if you don't believe in the "science", it's amusing to read
the experiences of people attempting this.
------
miguelrochefort
/r/onebag
/r/minimalism
/r/ultralight
/r/frugal
/r/keto
/r/zerocarb
/r/personalfinancecanada
~~~
hackerboos
I love PersonalFinanceCanada but Canadian subreddits are very hostile to
newbies.
------
jetti
/r/TIL
/r/programming
/r/woodworking
------
zxckvm
Haven't gained any insights from these subs, but love browsing them every once
in a while.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/aww/](https://www.reddit.com/r/aww/)
[https://www.reddit.com/r/dogpictures](https://www.reddit.com/r/dogpictures)
------
Zikes
/r/skookum is a pretty great community of engineers & DIYers with a sense of
humor. I particularly like their subreddit rule #3:
> Users are strongly encouraged to submit posts for technical assistance.
> /u/datums personally guarantees that all possible resources will be
> mobilized to provide assistance if necessary.
------
searine
/r/ArtefactPorn
/r/ArtisanVideos
/r/NYC
/r/SpaceX
/r/wikipedia
/r/DestructiveReaders
------
khein11
[https://www.reddit.com/r/fitness](https://www.reddit.com/r/fitness)
------
riffic
shameless plug for
[https://www.reddit.com/r/moldedplywood](https://www.reddit.com/r/moldedplywood)
------
ohazi
/r/corgi
------
aaronky
r/dataisbeautiful r/EDC
------
richmt
/r/CadenMoranDiary
~~~
tmaly
I am not quite sure what that is about. Can you elaborate?
~~~
richmt
The useful links on the sidebar explain it best I guess. Just a lot of in
jokes between a handful of regular posters.
------
ilaksh
rad_decentralization
permaculture
sustainability
ethereum
nim
futurology (quite a bit of spam though)
Not all of them are really insightful but still cool
foodporn
startups
conspiracy
shittykickstarters
proceduralgeneration
agi
mountaingoats
marshallbrain
DIY
simulate
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Managing weekly income with monthly bills just got easier - drewlanghart
http://forecashapp.com/
======
CtrlAltEngage
The forecast sounds good but why not monthly salaries too?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Weber and Fechner – An Inquiry into Human Sensation and What Is Wrong with Sliders - boramalper
http://explorables.boramalper.org/weber-and-fechner/
======
boramalper
Hey, author here!
If you have any comments, criticism, or questions, I would be happy to reply,
response, and answer! I was really frustrated with the brightness controller
in Ubuntu 16.04 and I decided to write an explorable explanation[1] about it.
Although it's very elementary, I hope that you'll still find it better than
reading Wikipedia pages. =)
[1]: [http://explorabl.es/](http://explorabl.es/)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Whom to follow on Google+? - tilt
So, I started "Following" Fred Wilson in one of my Circles<p>https://plus.google.com/103112588675637065591/posts<p>Do you have more interesting accounts to follow?
======
tilt
Paul Buchheit
<https://plus.google.com/111732375221065535359/posts>
Harjeet Taggar
<https://plus.google.com/110400433392368673860/posts>
Michael Arrington
<https://plus.google.com/102178700954286324866/posts>
Chris Sacca
<https://plus.google.com/114790574178411061829/posts>
Chris Dixon
<https://plus.google.com/105400903062771750089/posts>
David Lee
<https://plus.google.com/111138510438291281890/posts>
Fred Wilson
<https://plus.google.com/103112588675637065591/posts>
------
chalst
Matt Cutts <https://plus.google.com/109412257237874861202/posts>
He's sharing a lot of links.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Project Ares Open Beta (IDE for writing Mojo apps for WebOS) - ronnieliew
http://pdnblog.palm.com/2009/12/project-ares-open-beta/
======
megaduck
Anyone who's interested in HTML5 should give this a look. Ares heavily
leverages things like the <canvas> tag to provide a rather nice development
environment.
More importantly it's a web app, so your tools are always up-to-date. The
moment that Palm releases a new SDK or device, it'll be available via Ares.
I've been playing with it during the Alpha period, and I've been _really_
impressed by the speed of development. New functionality and bugfixes have
been pushed regularly, and the Palm developers have been extremely responsive
to bug reports and feature requests. They've been iterating incredibly
rapidly, which bodes well for the future.
------
rajasaur
All I get is a blank screen (thats trying to load bootstrap.js) after logging
into <http://ares.palm.com/Ares/index.html>
FTA, it looks like the UI is based on bespin which uses canvas. I tried on FF
3 and Opera 10. Could that be a problem
~~~
megaduck
It is indeed based on Bespin, which means no IE support. Scuttlebutt from the
Ares dev team is that they're trying to support all browsers that are HTML5
compliant, but abandoning the ones that aren't.
~~~
rajasaur
Found this in the docs:
Ares has been tested on:
* OSX: Safari 4.0+, Firefox 3.5+
* Windows: Chrome 3, 4, Firefox 3.5+, Safari 4.0+
* Linux: Firefox 3.5+
------
gregstoll
As someone whose written a few WebOS apps, this shows great promise - building
UIs is much easier than doing it by hand. Looking forward to trying it at home
where I have the emulator installed!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google is buying Fossil’s smartwatch tech for $40M - toufiqbarhamov
https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/17/google-is-buying-fossils-smartwatch-tech-for-40-million/
======
stcredzero
UX discussion here. Is there any UX/design/functional reason to have a round
watch face on a smartwatch? Analog watches were round to fit the display
technology available at the time, the watch dial, which is inherently round.
RGB pixel displays are naturally rectangular.
My wife thinks that even the smallest latest Apple Watch is way too large for
a watch. I wonder if there's some matter of comfort in a relatively flat
backed round form factor for a watch? A relatively thick rectangle with a
rounder back is going to have a center of mass that is further away from the
wrist. It comprises a very small cantilever, which is still quite large on the
scales of the traditional watch. (By something like a factor of 3 or so.) The
slightly taller rectangular shape will also tend to funnel the motion such a
cantilever experiences in an arc parallel to the forearm. None of this was at
all an issue for most traditional watches, simply because they were much
flatter.
Something has always bothered me about Apple Watches when trying them out in
the store, and I think it's this. They're not bulky, but there's something
about them which seems to keep them from disappearing from my awareness. Even
my dad's old Rolex, which isn't huge, but isn't small for a watch, seems to
sit on my wrist more comfortably. Even the Tag Heuer, which I think is a bit
too big, seems to sit more comfortably on my wrist. Even the big old school
watches just didn't have this stick-out-y character.
~~~
com2kid
> UX discussion here. Is there any UX/design/functional reason to have a round
> watch face on a smartwatch? Analog watches were round to fit the display
> technology available at the time, the watch dial, which is inherently round.
> RGB pixel displays are naturally rectangular.
Ex-Lead UI developer from the ex-Microsoft Band here.
UX wise, rectangular and square form factors make a lot more sense for the
types of media consumption smartwatches are used for. Every time I see a text
message clipped on the sides with only 3 lines showing on a huge circular
display, I cry a little inside.
Apple went with square-ish for a lot of good reasons.
You can do some cool, innovative, and impressive looking things with circular
form factors of course, especially when it comes to graphical displays of
data. But humans are very bad at judging magnitudes in pie shape forms, and at
the end of the day, a lot of information is textual. This limits you.
> My wife thinks that even the smallest latest Apple Watch is way too large
> for a watch.
Honestly the Microsoft Band being worn on the underside of the wrist was
brilliant (I may be biased). It is much easier to hold up in a comfortable
reading position, and the dual body design meant the mass was split across the
top and bottoms of the wrist.
The problem of course was fitting all those electronics in a much narrower
form factor. The entire device ended up being too wide for some people's
wrists. At the end of the day, all those electronics and sensors, and of
course the display, had to go somewhere.
In regards to the article, I'm guessing Google is buying a team for the
factory contracts, supply chains, and perhaps the ME/EE talent. Having all of
that come in one big package is nice, building up those supplier relationships
especially can take years of painful miscommunication.
~~~
m0zg
>> media consumption smartwatches are used for
Huh? Smartwatches aren't used for "media consumption". I primarily use my
Series 4 Apple watch as a watch and heart/activity monitoring device.
I do think the rectangular form factor is better in a watch, but this comment
may reveal why Apple is crushing everybody else: they understood the user and
sold that user a _watch_ rather than a "media consumption" device.
>> Microsoft Band being worn on the underside of the wrist was brilliant
Another misunderstanding of what watches are about. They're on the upper side
of one's wrist because they're also a fashion accessory. That's how you get to
charge $450 per unit sold.
~~~
brlewis
> this comment may reveal why Apple is crushing everybody else: they
> understood the user and sold that user a _watch_ rather than a "media
> consumption" device.
On the flip side, if Apple _isn 't_ crushing everybody else, it's because they
misunderstood typical users and thought they wanted a tiny phone on the wrist,
rather than a watch.
Disclosure: Fitbit employee, but I don't speak for Fitbit. My opinion that
Apple isn't crushing everybody else isn't based on any inside info, but on the
article below that reported that less than half of Holiday 2017 Apple Watch
sales were the then-current model. Most of their sales were discounted old
inventory, so usually they _didn 't_ get to charge $450 per unit sold.
[https://investorplace.com/2018/02/holiday-apple-watch-
sales-...](https://investorplace.com/2018/02/holiday-apple-watch-sales-
record/)
~~~
malshe
Where did you see this statistic in the article?: "the article below that
reported that less than half of Holiday 2017 Apple Watch sales were the then-
current model."
The only place where they do any such split is the graph and it shows total
number of units sold in 2015-2017.
~~~
brlewis
"Canalys says Apple Watch sales for the holiday quarter alone were 8 million,
and nearly half of those were the new Apple Watch Series 3 — which we’ve
already pegged as a game-changer."
------
UncleChis
Didn't Fossil buy Misfit for like $200M to start its smartwatch department?
~~~
vatueil
Close: $260 million. Though it appears Fossil is only selling part of its
portfolio (mostly IP plus some R&D) and they very much plan to continue
producing smartwatches.
Curiously, it sounds like Misfit's involved in whatever it was that Google's
interested in:
[https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/google-
buys-40-milli...](https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/google-
buys-40-million-worth-of-smartwatch-tech-from-fossil-group/)
> _According to a [report]([https://www.wareable.com/fossil/google-fossil-
> wear-os-smartw...](https://www.wareable.com/fossil/google-fossil-wear-os-
> smartwatch-big-deal-6922)) from Wareable, McKelvey stated the deal will
> bring about a "new product innovation that's not yet hit the market." This
> is reportedly based on technology that Fossil acquired from wearable company
> Misfit when it [bought the startup for $260
> million]([https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/11/fossil-acquires-
> misf...](https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/11/fossil-acquires-misfit-to-
> bring-connectivity-to-more-fashionable-accessories/)) back in 2015._
In the Wareable article, Google Wear VP Stacey Burr says they want to bring
this unnamed technology to the wider Wear OS ecosystem.
------
SomeHacker44
I love my Fossil Q because it does one thing many other smart watches just
don't: tells the time, all the time, no motion required, in a high contrast
fashion.
All I really want out of a watch is that, plus long battery life (weeks at
least, months preferably), self-charging, self-time setting, and, if I am
lucky, some sort of "hey look at your phone" alert.
I get most of these with the Fossil Q. Others with my Citizens and Seiko non-
smart watches, one of which has an e-ink display. Nothing has them all. Oh
well.
I wonder if Google will make a Fossil Q which has it all. I do not need a
display, health monitoring, etc.
~~~
NoPicklez
Sounds like you are looking or the hybrid smartwatches.
Garmin do a very good job of displaying the time in high contrast, but I'm not
sure if they give you the option of being able to have the display on all the
time.
~~~
sand500
Yep, most of their watches have the display on all the time. The term to look
for is "transflective memory-in-pixel" in specs.
This was the main reason I loved my pebble watches as iirc all android wear
watches couldn't do this.
------
zubiaur
Patents? If I remember correctly, Fossil launched one of the first smart
watches, running Palm OS.
~~~
opencl
They also made some SPOT watches back then (Microsoft tech that pushed things
like weather/news/emails/stocks/etc. to watches over FM radio).
I had one of the PalmOS watches. Very cool but battery life and inputting text
were horrendous. I imagine Palm got most of the patents around that but maybe
Fossil got some too.
~~~
amysox
Yes, I had a Fossil Abacus WristPDA (PalmOS 4.0) also at one point. I agree
with both your criticisms, especially battery life; that thing drank juice
from the battery like an eight-armed alcoholic, and you had to use its special
USB cable with added power supply to recharge it nightly.
Jamie Zawinski once suggested that I turn PalmOS DaliClock into a "watch face"
app, but, once I researched how those worked, I realized it would kill the
battery _even faster,_ and wouldn't even _work_ right as watch face apps only
got periodic CPU, about once a minute to update their display.
------
jordache
damn FOSL really need the cash huh? $40M and they said yes!?
~~~
ce4
probably yes. The Apple watch has eaten into their market - the lower priced
fashion watches. Not sure why they'd get rid of their smart watch division.
Maybe because only one watch can have wrist time at a time (maybe except for
Buzz Aldrin) and Apple catches a big portion of the market by default already
(almost all of the iPhone userbase).
[https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/smartwatches-fossil-
apple-...](https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/smartwatches-fossil-apple-
update-2017)
~~~
jethro_tell
isn't fossil owned by swatch? They have a generally successful actual watch
business, and they probably just decided it's time to stop losing money on
this since it's not actually a core business.
~~~
notatoad
Pretty sure fossil is independently owned.
------
matmo
Is anyone satisfied with their Fossil watch? I have a Fossil Q Explorist and
it's so slow and laggy that I almost wonder if I got a lemon. It takes like 3
taps to click or swipe before anything registers. I'm pretty sure my original
Moto 360 is faster. I only wear it because it looks decent and occasionally
works. I really wanted to like it, but my experience has just been ... bad.
~~~
arthurcolle
Maybe try to RMA the device? Sounds like it might have just not gone through
very good quality assurance.
Totally unrelated but I have a fenix 5x (Garmin) and it is just amazing. Sure,
the display quality leaves a little to be desired and it was really pricey,
but the information density is just off the charts.
------
PM_ME_YOUR_CAT
So...more WearOS Fossils or more Fossil-y WearOS?
~~~
johneth
Given Google's attention span, I'd bet on the former.
------
davidwitt415
Hopefully it's to get more control over the hardware, especially the chipset.
Qualcomm is dragging down WearOS with their glacial pace and underwhelming
commitment to the platform.
------
mkbkn
Case study: Sailfish Watch
[https://blog.jolla.com/watch/](https://blog.jolla.com/watch/)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailfish_smartwatch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailfish_smartwatch)
------
glbrew
Fossil out-teched Google?
~~~
dajohnson89
Purchase the competition and extinguish it. There's a term for this -- acquire
and stifle? Something like that.
~~~
harlanlewis
Embrace, extend, extinguish
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish)
~~~
itwy
He's kidding.
------
icodemuch
Hopefully this means that my Fossil Q Wander is going to be on the cutting
edge of Google's software updates now. Big fan of this watch by the way, only
complaint is that it doesn't led itself to workouts as well as some other
watches.
------
gaara87
I feel real good about my Fossil Sport :)
Impressive to see Google's aggressive push into the hardware market. Here's to
hoping that a Pixel watch is good enough to set a bench mark like what the
Nexus/Pixel phones have done.
------
solarkraft
There's a good chance they'll run it into the ground.
------
hema_n
Try for fitbit
------
Hippocrates
40MM doesn’t sound like a huge deal for Google but I still cannot fathom why
they would purchase this. I’d rather have a pimple on my forehead than a
fossil smartwatch on my wrist.
An appropriate name for Google’s smartwatch line would be “caprolite”, which
means fossized excrement.
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