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Ask HN: How are monopolies lost? | By a new technology that changes the nature of the value proposition, for customers.Warren Buffett seeks monopolies (like Coke). He avoids high technology because of the uncertainty of technology revolutions (they can still happen but less often; and even less likely to alter the nature of the value proposition - though note that coke, chocolate and chewing gum were new technologies at one time...).- Schumpeter's theory of "creative destructionism"[1] shows how innovations can make monopolies irrelevant.- Clayton Christiansen's "disruptive innovation"[2] is similar. He tracks the disk drive industry, and notes that incumbents retain their leadership through technology changes - unless they change the nature of the value proposition for customers. ie. no longer more of the same, but different tradeoffs. More precisely: a change in the ranking of benefits in the customer value proposition. e.g. Today's shift from HDD to SDD. [edit: he also predicted the 1.8 inch HDD to rise in a new market that valued its attribute ranking differently - pre-iPod]- Geoffrey Moore's "Crossing the Chasm"[3] is a more concrete analysis about the adoption of innovations. He notes that once a leader is enshrined as the leader, the market actively works to support them, granting them leeway never given to the also-rans. He gives lots of reasons, but mainly it's mainly derived from observation.This leadership has some of the qualities of a monopoly. It seems to be pretty hard to lose, except when the basis of it changes. i.e. when it "becomes irrelevant".[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Schumpeter#Schumpeter_an...[2] http://www.businessweek.com/chapter/christensen.htm[3] http://www.parkerhill.com/Summary%20of%20Crossing%20the%20Ch... | Windows was/is a great product in many senses. Great is not a word with a single application to an OS.Windows was great in that it allowed multiple hardware vendors to compete on hardware without having to also design their own OS. It was great in that it allowed multiple corporations to market the same platform. And as it grew, it was great in that it allowed developers to write an app once that ran nearly anywhere.There's a lot more to "great", as applicable to an operating system, than even usability, stability, graphic design. A lot of times the things you value, as a developer, aren't what the general public does. You might want an OS that's very much like Linux but with a much better GUI. Most people just want their PC to cost $300 and run any program they buy or have bought in the past.So Microsoft's OS was clearly great by far more people's definition of the word than Apple's, and it reaped the rewards. |
Ask HN: How are monopolies lost? | Windows was/is a great product in many senses. Great is not a word with a single application to an OS.Windows was great in that it allowed multiple hardware vendors to compete on hardware without having to also design their own OS. It was great in that it allowed multiple corporations to market the same platform. And as it grew, it was great in that it allowed developers to write an app once that ran nearly anywhere.There's a lot more to "great", as applicable to an operating system, than even usability, stability, graphic design. A lot of times the things you value, as a developer, aren't what the general public does. You might want an OS that's very much like Linux but with a much better GUI. Most people just want their PC to cost $300 and run any program they buy or have bought in the past.So Microsoft's OS was clearly great by far more people's definition of the word than Apple's, and it reaped the rewards. | How many monopolies were lost without government intervention? I wouldn't call Apple's OS a monopoly, and even if it were, it wasn't for 10 years since Windows overtook it in 1990.I'm trying to think of genuine monopolies that faded away without intervention and am coming up blank. |
Ask HN: How are monopolies lost? | How many monopolies were lost without government intervention? I wouldn't call Apple's OS a monopoly, and even if it were, it wasn't for 10 years since Windows overtook it in 1990.I'm trying to think of genuine monopolies that faded away without intervention and am coming up blank. | By bad dice luck usually, or by aunt Jane placing a hotel on Park Lane. |
Ask HN: How are monopolies lost? | By bad dice luck usually, or by aunt Jane placing a hotel on Park Lane. | Stronger substitutes would appear to be a significant factor. For example, the erosion of IE’s dominance following the introduction of Firefox and others (although the barrier of IE being pre-loaded onto the majority of personal computers means this dominance will continue for some time). In this case not necessarily new tech, but better tech. |
My Favorite Database is the Network | Technology, just like fashion, is cyclical. There are only so many configurations of communication patterns so technological constraints dictate usefulness.The two being contrasted here are the one centralized database (w/ master/slave, replica sets, etc of course) versus a peer-to-peer configuration.We've been in a centralized hub and spoke model as cloud servers have taken off. As clients get more powerful and network links slow[1], we're going to move more to peer-to-peer models.The concept described by the author is right in the middle: hub and spoke, but keep all the data on the spokes. Of course, the comments (EGreg) points out that this has a disadvantage of difficult access if the spoke is storing another spokes information.Adding a couple peer-to-peer connections can help with this and WebRTC is a good technology for doing it. Once you connect peers, you can move data from peer-to-peer without hitting a central server again. Now, the central server is merely orchestrating rather then dictating.The author (author of flask, werkzeug, ...) is probably on the forefront of things, so while you may not find that this model is useful yet, it's prudent to watch as it will become more prominent in the next couple years.[1] Phones are getting more powerful and computers/laptops already feel like overkill for the youtube/redditing etc that we do. Networks are not slowing so much as wireless connections are getting clogged as more people are overloading cell providers. | You really need to be careful how you implement the signing of these types of systems. I have broken several of these systems and extracted the secret key. If you can extract the secret key, you can essentially become anyone and do anything that is controlled by the state in the cookie. Properly implemented, this shouldn't be a problem. I recommend having a separate key for each client session and storing the sessions in something fast and ephemeral like memcache. This has the advantage of also giving you a place to store another secret key for CSRF mitigation. Storing information in the cookie is convenient but it isn't without its risks. |
My Favorite Database is the Network | You really need to be careful how you implement the signing of these types of systems. I have broken several of these systems and extracted the secret key. If you can extract the secret key, you can essentially become anyone and do anything that is controlled by the state in the cookie. Properly implemented, this shouldn't be a problem. I recommend having a separate key for each client session and storing the sessions in something fast and ephemeral like memcache. This has the advantage of also giving you a place to store another secret key for CSRF mitigation. Storing information in the cookie is convenient but it isn't without its risks. | Is this use of MD5 subject to the known length extension attack? If so, what would a better alternative use for an HMAC hash?Discussed here: http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6151 |
My Favorite Database is the Network | Is this use of MD5 subject to the known length extension attack? If so, what would a better alternative use for an HMAC hash?Discussed here: http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6151 | In other words, the "signed-secret cookie" session-store approach of Rails et al, but for data bigger than a user ID. |
My Favorite Database is the Network | In other words, the "signed-secret cookie" session-store approach of Rails et al, but for data bigger than a user ID. | Looks like this is only useful for storing objects related to a single session of a user. If you have more than one device accessing the same data on a server, the server needs to persist the data between requests.However, it would be interesting to get rid of the client/server dichotomy and use WebRTC between clients. |
The Payphone Project | This is awesome! I'm actually a little jealous.If you can get your hands on (or build yourself) a red box [1], you could even hack your own hack.[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_box_(phreaking) | I've been wanting to do this since I Asterisk-ized a 1975 Western Electric 500 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_500_telephone) I found at a garage sale.I vividly remember the last time I used a payphone like this calling my then girlfriend (became fiance, became wife) outside a 7-11 in rural virginia before the turn of the century. Nostalgia by the bucketful. |
The Payphone Project | I've been wanting to do this since I Asterisk-ized a 1975 Western Electric 500 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_500_telephone) I found at a garage sale.I vividly remember the last time I used a payphone like this calling my then girlfriend (became fiance, became wife) outside a 7-11 in rural virginia before the turn of the century. Nostalgia by the bucketful. | For those interested, Citizen Engineer (http://www.citizenengineer.com/) did the same thing a few years ago. The video was produced by Phillip Torrone and Ladyada, and includes additional notes. |
The Payphone Project | For those interested, Citizen Engineer (http://www.citizenengineer.com/) did the same thing a few years ago. The video was produced by Phillip Torrone and Ladyada, and includes additional notes. | This is a true Hacker project. |
The Payphone Project | This is a true Hacker project. | I recall needing to insert the proper toll into the payphone before dialing a number. He's added some instructions to work around that old limitation, so you can dial the number first, then insert the coins. |
Ask HN: When does programming start to make sense? | Alan Turing said that programming would always be interesting because the boring mechanical aspects could be automated (where "interesting" means "you don't understand it" - or else you could automate it.)
I daily run into issues that I don't understand. That's what programming is for me, I'm afraid; rather like science. It's a sequence of monsters. The best we can do is to be tackling new monsters, not the same ones.Of course, programming jobs do exist where you do the same thing over and over again. And there's a threshold of skill required before you can automate some classes of things; and you also need a clear understanding of the task, to see precisely which aspects are mechanical, and which aspects are configurable. It pretty quickly gets into compsci research. And sometimes it's not worth the effort (it can take a lot of effort.)But if you've ever called a method twice, instead of writing the code twice, then you have done some of it.I feel that your question "start to make sense" suggests your thinking is all-or-nothing. Does no aspect of programming make sense to you - or do some "trivial" aspects make sense but they "don't count"? Does a print statement make sense to you, to some extent? Does a loop make sense to you? There's a continuum of mastery. If you only acknowledge perfect and complete mastery as "mastery", then you won't feel any satisfaction in mastery of one small bit of it. And without the confidence and encouragement of that success, it's very hard to be motivated to continue. (oh yeah, plus, of course, it's impossible to have perfect and complete mastery of programming anyway, for Turing's reason.) | It took me a long, long time until I became reasonably confident that most problems would eventually succumb to my programming ability. Probably almost twenty years from when I wrote my first program, or a few years after college.I can't write code on my own, though -- unless the problem is trivial and the APIs I'm using I know like the back of my hand, I need an Internet connection to do it.Part of this issue is possibly that competent people are disproportionately stalked by the worry that they're secretly incompetent. |
Ask HN: When does programming start to make sense? | It took me a long, long time until I became reasonably confident that most problems would eventually succumb to my programming ability. Probably almost twenty years from when I wrote my first program, or a few years after college.I can't write code on my own, though -- unless the problem is trivial and the APIs I'm using I know like the back of my hand, I need an Internet connection to do it.Part of this issue is possibly that competent people are disproportionately stalked by the worry that they're secretly incompetent. | > Every time I try to learn programming, it feels painfully slow compared to other things I've picked up.It's probably slow because you're not having fun with it. You're probably not having fun with it because you're not solving a compelling goal.
Ask yourself whether you're learning "just to learn it" or are you trying to solve a problem and this particular language/api/compiler/implementation will help you achieve that goal.I might be presumptuous here (and I apologize if I'm wrong) but the times I've found myself stuck "learning" have been when I was just going through the lessons for the heck of it, without a real goal in mind, without something to accomplish.Also, have a look at this: http://railstips.org/blog/archives/2010/01/12/i-have-no-tale...
I found it inspirational. |
Ask HN: When does programming start to make sense? | > Every time I try to learn programming, it feels painfully slow compared to other things I've picked up.It's probably slow because you're not having fun with it. You're probably not having fun with it because you're not solving a compelling goal.
Ask yourself whether you're learning "just to learn it" or are you trying to solve a problem and this particular language/api/compiler/implementation will help you achieve that goal.I might be presumptuous here (and I apologize if I'm wrong) but the times I've found myself stuck "learning" have been when I was just going through the lessons for the heck of it, without a real goal in mind, without something to accomplish.Also, have a look at this: http://railstips.org/blog/archives/2010/01/12/i-have-no-tale...
I found it inspirational. | For what it's worth, it took me several years before I really understood programming. I distinctly remember thinking that I wasn't making progress, and that I was wasting my time writing silly programs that didn't do anything useful.However, eventually things start to click (though it took me several years). You'll get to a point where things make sense, and you can fathom how you'd go about writing most of the software you use on a daily basis. |
Ask HN: When does programming start to make sense? | For what it's worth, it took me several years before I really understood programming. I distinctly remember thinking that I wasn't making progress, and that I was wasting my time writing silly programs that didn't do anything useful.However, eventually things start to click (though it took me several years). You'll get to a point where things make sense, and you can fathom how you'd go about writing most of the software you use on a daily basis. | It took me about 5 minutes to get started writing code.For some people programming can make sense, for others it's just a craft that's in the hands. When I was at the university lots of people struggled with "understanding" programming and they wrote little code, trying to more to come to terms with what programming is rather than trying to do it. The people that succeeded in learning to program wrote lots of code even though it was hard to write the code and to understand. Some of the people that didn't never entered their programs into computers and just ran the code by hand on a piece of paper (to what practical use is that?).For me programming is in the hands. When I learn a new programming language it's total chaos for 1-2 weeks and then the new regime settles and I can understand what I have been doing. After half a year of being exposed to a new programming language even more of the teachings settle and I can begin understanding more, but programming it's a practical art. I suppose it can be different if you are more mathematically minded than I am.I suggest doing ALL the exercises in a programming book - as fast as you can without trying to really understand what is going on behind the scenes. The secret is that you don't have to really understand what the hell is going on behind the scenes, you just have to know enough to stay out of trouble and that knowledge comes from experience. In the beginning of a programming career it'll be impossible to guess what weird bugs might occur so just code and see what happens.In short, you have to have a lot of practical knowledge of programming to support your theoretical knowledge, otherwise you cannot do anything with either. A chicken and egg situation, so it's best just to jump into the deep waters and try to swim to the surface. |
More on the NSA Commandeering the Internet | I know nothing of Lavabit, but let's say he did comply with the order and then months or years later the company simply isn't profitable and he needs to shut it down. Could he shut it down then? Or would he suddenly find himself hosting lots of paid government accounts - enough to make it financially viable? (But define viable... Does "I'm not pocketing $1m/year from this business, so I don't care any more. Turn it off!" count?)Could he sell the business? If so, at what point does the new owner get to find out they have extra non-negotiable obligations to the government? | I feel like we've identified this problem to death.I think now the real question is, as an internet community, what are we going to do about it?Are we going to build something that 'routes around' this? Are we going to protest? Or are we just going to keep identifying the problem and complaining about it on Twitter?I'm not saying that I'm not one of those people too - I'm just saying we need to start thinking about action and not identification.I'm hoping that's the next article Bruce writes. |
More on the NSA Commandeering the Internet | I feel like we've identified this problem to death.I think now the real question is, as an internet community, what are we going to do about it?Are we going to build something that 'routes around' this? Are we going to protest? Or are we just going to keep identifying the problem and complaining about it on Twitter?I'm not saying that I'm not one of those people too - I'm just saying we need to start thinking about action and not identification.I'm hoping that's the next article Bruce writes. | Wow, I didn't realize that the lavabit guy had been threatened with prosecution for opting out of continuing his business. That makes me incredibly angry. The sheer audacity of it is baffling. |
More on the NSA Commandeering the Internet | Wow, I didn't realize that the lavabit guy had been threatened with prosecution for opting out of continuing his business. That makes me incredibly angry. The sheer audacity of it is baffling. | The idea of a National Security Letter, a device which strips the recipient of several basic human rights, is so blatantly unconstitutional that it should have never been allowed to exist at all, let alone persist as long as it has. It's a device straight out of the Cold War east bloc. |
More on the NSA Commandeering the Internet | The idea of a National Security Letter, a device which strips the recipient of several basic human rights, is so blatantly unconstitutional that it should have never been allowed to exist at all, let alone persist as long as it has. It's a device straight out of the Cold War east bloc. | Several months ago that tone would have sounded conspiracy crazed nutty. But post-Snowden and given that it's schneier, it's sad to realize we've come to realize how bad the situation is. I'm still inclined to not change any actions on my part because I'm not worried about being under surveillance. I'm neither interesting, nor engaged in anything interesting. However, I would like it if the spying were reduced to remove the bulk tapping of the internet. |
Ask HN: I'm a high school student. Is my job searching strategy flawed? | Think about it from their perspective. Imagine you are an HR person, maybe if its a start up the CTO, and you receive the application you've been sending out. How would you react? Would the application be memorable? Would it impress you and make you think, this person seems like they are really enthusiastic about working at our company and they have impressive skills?To this end, I'd say make sure you show them something you've built that's up and running and 100% completed. It only has to be just one thing, but make sure its impressive - something you're proud of and would consider your best piece of work. Send it as a link in your initial email.Anything unique and cool that makes you stick out is good. Why not strap up your resume as an interactive app designed specifically for that startup you really want to intern for? Or whoever said you had to send a standard resume word doc? Why not mock up a sweetly designed resume - even if you're a programmer it shows motivation and ability to think outside the box. (See this link for inspiration: http://dzineblog.com/2011/09/35-brilliant-resume-designs.htm...)Also, Looking over your resume I see a lot of stuff but nothing that looks like its completed (maybe it is but the resume doesn't show it). I'd also scratch anything from your resume that doesn't impress. The link to http://countervailinteractive.com goes to an expired domain, so I can't see what your skills are like, so I'd get that working or scratch it if you can't. Saying you built one website doesn't do much to get you in the door.Anyways, I hope I didn't sound to harsh, I like seeing young people enthusiastic about programming and would like to see you get that internship. Good luck :) | Some of my thoughts:It is very common for high schooler resumes to get no attention. After all, these companies want college interns. And to top it off, you're a high school sophomore. Most HS seniors never get internships either.I'll second what jfaucett said. It is much more important to show 1-2 projects that you actually shipped, rather than 10 projects you never finished. This should make intuitive sense.Things on your resume that are not very impressive: 1) Your GPA (high school GPAs are meaningless to a startup) 2) Software Dev Club VP (high school club leadership is meaningless to a startup)Honestly, it's a turn off when the first 3 things I see on your resume are that you're a sophomore in HS, your GPA, and a club leadership position, since I know how meaningless those things are. You should put your experience/projects at the top, since those are the most impressive. I'm not saying that you shouldn't include those other things (GPA, club), but they should be at the bottom of your resume.Some notes 1) Get your app on the Google Play store. 2) Add a link to your django-based news aggregator 3) Countervail is down. Get a version up on your own domain (randallma.com) and link to it just so you can show it off.In fact, you should get your personal website up and running so that you can have a digital resume that actually shows people your projects (with links and screenshots). A drab resume is not going to get past HR.Your Hackers&Founders description also has a grammar error.Finally, the high school students I know who got internships at software companies ALL had some sort of inside connection - typically through their parents or a family friend. See if your parents have any contacts they can leverage. |
Ask HN: I'm a high school student. Is my job searching strategy flawed? | Some of my thoughts:It is very common for high schooler resumes to get no attention. After all, these companies want college interns. And to top it off, you're a high school sophomore. Most HS seniors never get internships either.I'll second what jfaucett said. It is much more important to show 1-2 projects that you actually shipped, rather than 10 projects you never finished. This should make intuitive sense.Things on your resume that are not very impressive: 1) Your GPA (high school GPAs are meaningless to a startup) 2) Software Dev Club VP (high school club leadership is meaningless to a startup)Honestly, it's a turn off when the first 3 things I see on your resume are that you're a sophomore in HS, your GPA, and a club leadership position, since I know how meaningless those things are. You should put your experience/projects at the top, since those are the most impressive. I'm not saying that you shouldn't include those other things (GPA, club), but they should be at the bottom of your resume.Some notes 1) Get your app on the Google Play store. 2) Add a link to your django-based news aggregator 3) Countervail is down. Get a version up on your own domain (randallma.com) and link to it just so you can show it off.In fact, you should get your personal website up and running so that you can have a digital resume that actually shows people your projects (with links and screenshots). A drab resume is not going to get past HR.Your Hackers&Founders description also has a grammar error.Finally, the high school students I know who got internships at software companies ALL had some sort of inside connection - typically through their parents or a family friend. See if your parents have any contacts they can leverage. | In my humble opinion, firing off an email is a lost cause. HR folks are blasted all the time and it's really hard for them to "separate the wheat from the chaff" as they say.Your idea of getting in touch with the employees is the right direction. You need to connect with someone personally from these companies. Connect with them on LinkedIn, hit them on Twitter, friend them on Facebook. Be wherever they are.Also, consider posting your resume and cover-letter within a Hacker News posting asking for advice... oh wait... |
Ask HN: I'm a high school student. Is my job searching strategy flawed? | In my humble opinion, firing off an email is a lost cause. HR folks are blasted all the time and it's really hard for them to "separate the wheat from the chaff" as they say.Your idea of getting in touch with the employees is the right direction. You need to connect with someone personally from these companies. Connect with them on LinkedIn, hit them on Twitter, friend them on Facebook. Be wherever they are.Also, consider posting your resume and cover-letter within a Hacker News posting asking for advice... oh wait... | Well, maybe one approach would be to search Hacker News for popular tech companies and see names of people at the company and then e-mail them? Ethical? I dunno. Attention grabbing? Probably.Dropbox. E-Mail Drew Houston.
Twitter/Square. E-Mail Jack Dorsey.
Google. E-Mail Kevin Rose.I dont't know how much this would help but maybe worth a try...Kevin Rose also does a Foundation Podcast, a bunch of which are here in the bay area. Maybe review those for potential people to contact. |
Ask HN: I'm a high school student. Is my job searching strategy flawed? | Well, maybe one approach would be to search Hacker News for popular tech companies and see names of people at the company and then e-mail them? Ethical? I dunno. Attention grabbing? Probably.Dropbox. E-Mail Drew Houston.
Twitter/Square. E-Mail Jack Dorsey.
Google. E-Mail Kevin Rose.I dont't know how much this would help but maybe worth a try...Kevin Rose also does a Foundation Podcast, a bunch of which are here in the bay area. Maybe review those for potential people to contact. | See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4079567---EDIT: In short, open source contributions help a lot. (also: you'll have better luck finding not just jobs, but also valuable connections on HN, than anywhere else) |
Show HN: Distraction Free Reader/Writer | There sure are a lot of these now. There's Koi Writer [1], Dark Copy [2], Light Write [3], Quabel [4], Wabisabi [5], Write.app [6], Pen.io [7], (I like this one), Draft [8], and probably more.[1] http://www.koi-writer.com/editor/
[2] http://darkcopy.com/
[3] http://gun.io/w/yyhegyfn6
[4] https://quabel.com/
[5] http://www.wabisabi.cc/
[6] https://writeapp.me/
[7] http://pen.io/
[8] https://draftin.com/Then there's also native apps as well. For Mac, there's Focus Writer [1], OmmWriter [2], iaWriter [3], Writeroom [4], ByWord [5], Clean Writer [6], Writer [7], GrandView [8], and Texts [9] (I like this one)[1] http://gottcode.org/focuswriter/
[2] http://www.ommwriter.com/
[3] http://www.iawriter.com/mac/
[4] http://www.hogbaysoftware.com/products/writeroom
[5] http://bywordapp.com/
[6] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/clean-writer-pro/id478363291...
[7] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/writer/id405680527?mt=12
[8] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/grandview/id432436025?mt=12
[9] http://texts.ioSo I guess, whenever one creates a new distraction free writer/reader, I need to know: why should I use this* app?* Your app looks pretty clean and pretty nice, but what makes it better? I don't mean this comment to put your app down as it looks pretty appealing, but I think the key first step when joining such a saturated market is to differentiate yourself. | It's cool, I like it.Couple of points, it's a distraction-free writer but I've been quite distracted by a couple of things, somewhat OCD: The Twitter image isn't updated when you update your image on Twitter. It's also cut off at the bottom for me when I view the link.Also I was curious about the use of 'twimg', from the looks of it this is a service which tracks and sells user data. Care to comment? I have a tracker blocker which seems to take care of it.Having said all that I love the output and simplicity and I will be using it (provided the uptime is good- it was out earlier, possibly due to HN?). |
Show HN: Distraction Free Reader/Writer | It's cool, I like it.Couple of points, it's a distraction-free writer but I've been quite distracted by a couple of things, somewhat OCD: The Twitter image isn't updated when you update your image on Twitter. It's also cut off at the bottom for me when I view the link.Also I was curious about the use of 'twimg', from the looks of it this is a service which tracks and sells user data. Care to comment? I have a tracker blocker which seems to take care of it.Having said all that I love the output and simplicity and I will be using it (provided the uptime is good- it was out earlier, possibly due to HN?). | I wish there was a site that listed the most over-done web app and OSS ideas. I'm guessing todo lists apps, distraction free writing apps, css frameworks, weather apps, invoicing apps, etc. would be near the top of the list. |
Show HN: Distraction Free Reader/Writer | I wish there was a site that listed the most over-done web app and OSS ideas. I'm guessing todo lists apps, distraction free writing apps, css frameworks, weather apps, invoicing apps, etc. would be near the top of the list. | The entire workflow of managing more than one write-up needs some more work. Few examples:- if you come back and try to edit a write-up you'll have to first open the preview then remember the shortcut to edit it, not really another way around except maybe changing the URL.- if you have more than one write-up with the same name, you don't really know which one you are on right now.- deleting the write-up is kinda confusing too. and you
can't delete on the view mode.- shortcuts gets mixed up between control and option.But overall love it and will try to write more with your help! |
Show HN: Distraction Free Reader/Writer | The entire workflow of managing more than one write-up needs some more work. Few examples:- if you come back and try to edit a write-up you'll have to first open the preview then remember the shortcut to edit it, not really another way around except maybe changing the URL.- if you have more than one write-up with the same name, you don't really know which one you are on right now.- deleting the write-up is kinda confusing too. and you
can't delete on the view mode.- shortcuts gets mixed up between control and option.But overall love it and will try to write more with your help! | It might just be me, but the typewriter sounds are pretty distracting. Also, there is a bit of ironic juxtaposition in an app called "inkpen" that sounds like a typewriter. But it's neat, certainly, I just don't know why I'd use it over one of the native offline apps I already have. |
Combinator v1.1 - A simple Hacker News client for Windows Phone. | I don't own a windows phone and don't use any of these kind of apps, but doesn't the own existence of web site related apps represents a failure of said website to provide a decent web interface to mobile platforms?I'm not referring in particular to hacker news or to this app, but websites in general that "need" a mobile app to properly or easily use it. | Hi Miguel, you beat me to it :-).I just released my app today:
http://www.windowsphone.com/nl-NL/apps/c7c617bb-689b-476d-a3...Working on comments.... |
Combinator v1.1 - A simple Hacker News client for Windows Phone. | Hi Miguel, you beat me to it :-).I just released my app today:
http://www.windowsphone.com/nl-NL/apps/c7c617bb-689b-476d-a3...Working on comments.... | Very sexy. Wish I could get this for Android. |
Combinator v1.1 - A simple Hacker News client for Windows Phone. | Very sexy. Wish I could get this for Android. | This is nice. Would love to see a webOS version =)I usually use iCombinator but it seems that it times out quite a bit and the formatting is iffy (width) |
Combinator v1.1 - A simple Hacker News client for Windows Phone. | This is nice. Would love to see a webOS version =)I usually use iCombinator but it seems that it times out quite a bit and the formatting is iffy (width) | Looks nice, really very nice, but it has the same fundamental problem as other HN apps - too few items per page. I really want 20-30 headlines in teenie-tiny, but legible font. Content density is the main visual property of the original site and no mobile client has reproduced it faithfully yet. Still waiting... ;) |
The Talents of a Middle-Aged Brain | In my own experience, as a brain matures, it does not really slow down in its important functions but rather incurs occasional and seemingly inexplicable lapses - the "foggy moments" associated with entering into middle age. Nothing to do about them, since they are an inevitable part of aging. In my business, I do complex and strategic analysis all day long in innumerable situations involving often difficult problems and not once has any lapse of this type affected anything that really counts (I am in my late 50s).At the same time, there is a quickness in grasping large volumes of factual material when one is in his 30s or younger that does recede a bit in the 40s and 50s and beyond. That is why learning a foreign language becomes harder as one gets older - but, in that task, even a 12-year old has advantages over one in his 20s. There are just certain phases of life in which the brain is like a sponge and, if one is bright, all manner of detail can not only be pretty quickly absorbed but made to stick.The lesson here is not to take the quick-absorption phase of life for granted and squander it - that is precisely the time to throw yourself into the deep things of learning (in whatever field) and get the most out of them.Beyond that, though, there is no need to fret. In almost every way, in my experience, an older person is able to function "at a higher level" (to borrow a sport metaphor) in terms of thinking and decision-making than is a younger one. This may stem from other elements that supplement raw brain-power, such as experience, wisdom, and maturity. Thus, in spite of the occasional lapses and the loss of some of the old quickness, I would not trade my current mental capacities for those I had at a younger age even if I could.This piece makes excellent points about the importance of exercise and other forms of mental stimulation being not only helpful but also indispensable to staying sharp.Therefore, as long as you have prepared yourself well when you are young, the rest is a mere continuation of the old pattern, maybe not as vibrant but nothing at all to be dismayed about (at least until dementia sets in!). | As the owner of a middle-aged brain I think this is pretty much in line with my own experiences. I've always been bad about remembering people's names, and I don't think this has really gotten any worse over the years. My memory of trivial or unimportant things has eroded a bit perhaps; I rationalize this as my brain doing garbage collection.On the other hand I do think that I'm better at what I do than at any time in the past; I know more, I'm better at applying what I know; I know what approaches are likely to work and which ones have more risk. I certainly have not found that I "can't learn new things" though I am prone to being a bit more skeptical of fads and more appreciative of the time-tested and proven. |
The Talents of a Middle-Aged Brain | As the owner of a middle-aged brain I think this is pretty much in line with my own experiences. I've always been bad about remembering people's names, and I don't think this has really gotten any worse over the years. My memory of trivial or unimportant things has eroded a bit perhaps; I rationalize this as my brain doing garbage collection.On the other hand I do think that I'm better at what I do than at any time in the past; I know more, I'm better at applying what I know; I know what approaches are likely to work and which ones have more risk. I certainly have not found that I "can't learn new things" though I am prone to being a bit more skeptical of fads and more appreciative of the time-tested and proven. | "One of the most intriguing findings is that if you talk to people who disagree with you, that helps your brain wake up and refine your arguments and shake up the cognitive egg."That strikes me as truth. And a very inconvenient one at that. |
The Talents of a Middle-Aged Brain | "One of the most intriguing findings is that if you talk to people who disagree with you, that helps your brain wake up and refine your arguments and shake up the cognitive egg."That strikes me as truth. And a very inconvenient one at that. | Speaking from experience, yes I am stupider in terms of raw neuron-crunching. However, with the benefit of experience, I tend to do fewer stupid things. Still do more stupid things than I wish to. |
The Talents of a Middle-Aged Brain | Speaking from experience, yes I am stupider in terms of raw neuron-crunching. However, with the benefit of experience, I tend to do fewer stupid things. Still do more stupid things than I wish to. | The book's author was interviewed for an hour on Wisconsin Public Radio, this past Tuesday. (I haven't listened to it, yet.)http://wpr.org/kathleendunn/index.cfm?strDirection=Prev&...The following day, the same show interviewed another researcher on the differences between male and female brains particularly in children (it's less than has been thought, per the researcher; IIRC enculturation makes up part of the difference). I heard part of this one, which clued me in to the previous day's interview.http://wpr.org/kathleendunn/index.cfm?strDirection=Prev&...The (RealAudio -- sorry) streams are freely available. WPR members also have the option of an MP3 download. |
“The working group should not agree to freeze whatever syntax Chrome ships” | The problem is the standards process exists to keep people from swinging their weight to force rushed/poorly thought-out technologies into a platform some already accuse of fragmentation and bloat. And to people who "But this is Google!" Throwing the process under the bus today because you think your favorite tech company can do no wrong screws everyone later when management changes. Management will change. The process is here to protect the web's interests regardless of whether any one actor's intent is good or not. If Google steamrolls everyone today, who will steamroll everyone tomorrow? The MPAA is on the W3C too. | Here's the reply: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/2014Feb/0138.h...the money quote: "We feel the
standard is sufficiently advanced, the remaining issues sufficiently
small, and the benefit to authors sufficiently great to justify
shipping sooner rather than later."the Shadow DOM is pretty awesome, so I'll agree with the "benefit to authors sufficiently great" part. No comment on the rest. |
“The working group should not agree to freeze whatever syntax Chrome ships” | Here's the reply: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/2014Feb/0138.h...the money quote: "We feel the
standard is sufficiently advanced, the remaining issues sufficiently
small, and the benefit to authors sufficiently great to justify
shipping sooner rather than later."the Shadow DOM is pretty awesome, so I'll agree with the "benefit to authors sufficiently great" part. No comment on the rest. | So Google is taking their cues from the Internet Explorer playbook.Having been in (and out) of standards wars at Sun and NetApp it really cries out how challenging doing "standard" stuff is. The original IETF standards process was really powerful at keeping out cruft, it included "fully documented" and "two or three interoperable implementations, of which source code must be available for at least two of them." The goal being that someone could sit down and write an implementation, and two there were at least two pre-existing implementations they could compare against for interoperability issues/questions and testing.But standards break down when it comes to captured market share. If you're market share capture depends on your "value add", then you don't benefit if anyone can implement the same thing and you have to stay compatible with them. |
“The working group should not agree to freeze whatever syntax Chrome ships” | So Google is taking their cues from the Internet Explorer playbook.Having been in (and out) of standards wars at Sun and NetApp it really cries out how challenging doing "standard" stuff is. The original IETF standards process was really powerful at keeping out cruft, it included "fully documented" and "two or three interoperable implementations, of which source code must be available for at least two of them." The goal being that someone could sit down and write an implementation, and two there were at least two pre-existing implementations they could compare against for interoperability issues/questions and testing.But standards break down when it comes to captured market share. If you're market share capture depends on your "value add", then you don't benefit if anyone can implement the same thing and you have to stay compatible with them. | This is because Google are trying to turn Chrome into an app platform to rival Cocoa, while almost every other web player (except Mozilla) has a vested interest in keeping the web a document viewer platform.The recent arguments regarding Adobe's arbitrary region stuff were very enlightening on this. |
“The working group should not agree to freeze whatever syntax Chrome ships” | This is because Google are trying to turn Chrome into an app platform to rival Cocoa, while almost every other web player (except Mozilla) has a vested interest in keeping the web a document viewer platform.The recent arguments regarding Adobe's arbitrary region stuff were very enlightening on this. | Hah.Remember when Blink was announced, how some people said "competing engines would be good for the web"?And how the Blink team/Google paid lip service to improving the web going forward, better standards compliance, etc.Firefox is ahead in some ways, too burneded by BS like a plugin ecosystem (focus on browsing damnit) and non-native UI skins, on the other.IE is catching up but limping.Webkit is not updating that fast anymore.Opera, nobody but 10 people ever cared about. Besides, they're just Blink now.Anybody holding their breaths for full ES6 support? |
Google admitting defeat in 'direct to consumer' model phone sales | Google, don't lose heart. It's not you. It's just that people in US don't know that they can buy phones in open market without signing away a chunk of income to cell companies every month.There are bigger, more mature markets elsewhere. Go after them. You might even get more people to use your services (maps, etc.) on a mobile than they would on a PC.Also, $350-$400 (may be even $500 for topend) is a sweet spot for smart phones in India. And people do buy these phones in open market without a contract.All the best. Go forth and prosper./an iPhone and Droid owner. | I don't think it's likely, but I deeply hope that Google (or somebody else) can kill the US addiction to subsidized handsets. The market will be so much more efficient and flexible when we pay for phones as phones and pay for service as service. |
Google admitting defeat in 'direct to consumer' model phone sales | I don't think it's likely, but I deeply hope that Google (or somebody else) can kill the US addiction to subsidized handsets. The market will be so much more efficient and flexible when we pay for phones as phones and pay for service as service. | There aren't a ton of details in the post, but I really hope this doesn't mean the end of an unlocked Nexus One, or whatever Android phones will follow.That being said, Google needed to kill this. Along with the no retail try it before you buy it issues, Google isn't setup for being a retail company -- it just isn't in their DNA. I mean, people had to drop $500 for a phone, and then only support they get is a web forum, where they may or may not actually get an answer from a Google employee? Weird confusion over whether Google or HTC or T-Mobile was responsible for different support issues?I'm sure Google COULD fix these things, but it would take fairly significant internal effort. |
Google admitting defeat in 'direct to consumer' model phone sales | There aren't a ton of details in the post, but I really hope this doesn't mean the end of an unlocked Nexus One, or whatever Android phones will follow.That being said, Google needed to kill this. Along with the no retail try it before you buy it issues, Google isn't setup for being a retail company -- it just isn't in their DNA. I mean, people had to drop $500 for a phone, and then only support they get is a web forum, where they may or may not actually get an answer from a Google employee? Weird confusion over whether Google or HTC or T-Mobile was responsible for different support issues?I'm sure Google COULD fix these things, but it would take fairly significant internal effort. | I think one of the problems was that the phone didn't include the radio hardware to be truly portable. Sure, you can buy an unlocked phone, but there is no other network you can use 3G on. So you are locked to a single carrier anyway.If Google released a phone that supported both AT&T and T-Mobile and Sprint and Verizon, then it would be a great deal. Hate AT&T? Just port your number to Sprint and keep the same phone.The phone companies would hate this, and the extra radios would cost like five cents more, so I don't see this as ever happening. But that's what would be truly innovative -- a $700 unlocked phone just isn't very compelling when you have to pay the subsidy anyway. |
Google admitting defeat in 'direct to consumer' model phone sales | I think one of the problems was that the phone didn't include the radio hardware to be truly portable. Sure, you can buy an unlocked phone, but there is no other network you can use 3G on. So you are locked to a single carrier anyway.If Google released a phone that supported both AT&T and T-Mobile and Sprint and Verizon, then it would be a great deal. Hate AT&T? Just port your number to Sprint and keep the same phone.The phone companies would hate this, and the extra radios would cost like five cents more, so I don't see this as ever happening. But that's what would be truly innovative -- a $700 unlocked phone just isn't very compelling when you have to pay the subsidy anyway. | On one hand I'm sad to see the attempt of opening a direct sales channel called off. I still think it would succeed in time, as people in general become familiar with the handsets and Android.On the other hand, I've advised every (non-technical) person I know who is looking into a new smartphone to go try them out in person to see how they feel about the interfaces (along with pointing out the differences in application availability, carriers, etc.) |
The dumbing-down of programming (1998) | She beautifully explained what draws people like myself to GNU/Linux. I have tried to convey some of these ideas to colleagues who are serious about Windows programming, to no avail.It's not about Microsoft either. In my industry (flight simulation) there are some machines and systems where you can go deep and acquire design-level knowledge, and other systems where you're dealing with black boxes.Some people prefer the latter; when things go wrong, you cycle the power switch and then contact the manufacturer if the problem still exists. I think some people take comfort in the notion that they are not ultimately responsible for whether the machines work or not. Sorry if that sounds terribly arrogant. | "But what if you're an experienced engineer? What if you've already learned the technology contained in the tool, and you're ready to stop worrying about it? Maybe letting the wizard do the work isn't a loss of knowledge but simply a form of storage: the tool as convenient information repository."Right, and this is what a lot of code generation tools do. After understanding the problem, you write a tool which can write code to solve that problem in a more general sense.Almost all the software we write can be thought of that way; they are information repositories for problems we already solved.However, with a lot of things that require deep understanding, there are walls. These represent the places where a person can no longer fake understanding, and either have to stop immediately and develop some or give up. Before the days of wizards, users would encounter plenty of warning signs that their understanding was not enough well before hitting the wall. Example: your 100 line C program is segmentation faulting; time to better understand about pointers and memory allocation before you write a 20k line program depending on the same.The problem is that wizards are very undiscriminating on who experiences the easing. The output is mostly the same for the experienced engineer as for the non-engineer. The brick wall for the non-engineer still remains, however warnings of danger ahead are hidden being a easy-to-use interface. There is no encouragement for them to go understand better before progressing, and instead they rush straight on into the wall. The still need all the understanding once they get there, but the encouragement to develop it comes later, and so the rate at which it needs to be learned comes faster.The question this poses is really difficult: how do we abstract away the need to apply knowledge to the same problem repeatedly, yet avoid abstracting away the need to have that knowledge?Otherwise, very worthwhile article. She captures the spirit of curiosity that drives the need for deep understanding in me, and probably most people here. |
The dumbing-down of programming (1998) | "But what if you're an experienced engineer? What if you've already learned the technology contained in the tool, and you're ready to stop worrying about it? Maybe letting the wizard do the work isn't a loss of knowledge but simply a form of storage: the tool as convenient information repository."Right, and this is what a lot of code generation tools do. After understanding the problem, you write a tool which can write code to solve that problem in a more general sense.Almost all the software we write can be thought of that way; they are information repositories for problems we already solved.However, with a lot of things that require deep understanding, there are walls. These represent the places where a person can no longer fake understanding, and either have to stop immediately and develop some or give up. Before the days of wizards, users would encounter plenty of warning signs that their understanding was not enough well before hitting the wall. Example: your 100 line C program is segmentation faulting; time to better understand about pointers and memory allocation before you write a 20k line program depending on the same.The problem is that wizards are very undiscriminating on who experiences the easing. The output is mostly the same for the experienced engineer as for the non-engineer. The brick wall for the non-engineer still remains, however warnings of danger ahead are hidden being a easy-to-use interface. There is no encouragement for them to go understand better before progressing, and instead they rush straight on into the wall. The still need all the understanding once they get there, but the encouragement to develop it comes later, and so the rate at which it needs to be learned comes faster.The question this poses is really difficult: how do we abstract away the need to apply knowledge to the same problem repeatedly, yet avoid abstracting away the need to have that knowledge?Otherwise, very worthwhile article. She captures the spirit of curiosity that drives the need for deep understanding in me, and probably most people here. | We build our computers the way we build our cities -- over time, without a plan, on top of ruins.Yes, but didn't Christopher Alexander, the Pattern Language guy, praise the way we sometimes build (unplanned) things like villages? |
The dumbing-down of programming (1998) | We build our computers the way we build our cities -- over time, without a plan, on top of ruins.Yes, but didn't Christopher Alexander, the Pattern Language guy, praise the way we sometimes build (unplanned) things like villages? | Part 2 here: http://archive.salon.com/21st/feature/1998/05/13feature.html |
The dumbing-down of programming (1998) | Part 2 here: http://archive.salon.com/21st/feature/1998/05/13feature.html | Good article, but oh God, when she described the Visual C++ wizard I had these awful MFC flashbacks.//TODO: Shower. |
Why do people keep creating small useless apps in the weekend? | This is not new behavior, people have made small useless apps on the weekend for a long time.This is, however, the first time it's been possible to get such wide visibility of these kinds of projects thanks to HN and the rest of the Internet. | Why not? If it's fun and harms no one, I don't see why one shouldn't create "small useless apps" in her spare time. If anything, you should pat folks like that on the back for trying new things (assuming they're new to the person making them). |
Why do people keep creating small useless apps in the weekend? | Why not? If it's fun and harms no one, I don't see why one shouldn't create "small useless apps" in her spare time. If anything, you should pat folks like that on the back for trying new things (assuming they're new to the person making them). | You said it - just out of curiosityTry it sometime. It's fun. |
Why do people keep creating small useless apps in the weekend? | You said it - just out of curiosityTry it sometime. It's fun. | well, my intention was asking why such small things,
i think mvp is overrated, people can put together a meaningful set of features and produce a real product, probably not in a weekend but in a month or two or six... then it makes more sense for the audience to check the featureset and give more meaningful feedback. That's my opinion at least. Don't get me wrong, i appreciate and support all the efforts by these bright people, but... |
Why do people keep creating small useless apps in the weekend? | well, my intention was asking why such small things,
i think mvp is overrated, people can put together a meaningful set of features and produce a real product, probably not in a weekend but in a month or two or six... then it makes more sense for the audience to check the featureset and give more meaningful feedback. That's my opinion at least. Don't get me wrong, i appreciate and support all the efforts by these bright people, but... | who's to judge 'useless' |
What's the most popular Ruby standard library? | I'm really impressed by test_unit hitting #2. Most people who wander off into ruby bring back their TDD enthusiasm to the other languages they use. That's quite an impact for the entire industry when you think about it. Kudos to all involved for that :) | Nice write-up. I find this sort of thing fascinating. When are you guys thinking of tackling more languages? Maybe something that lends itself to static analysis a bit more?Also how long did that regex take to run on 5.0e8 lines of ruby? |
What's the most popular Ruby standard library? | Nice write-up. I find this sort of thing fascinating. When are you guys thinking of tackling more languages? Maybe something that lends itself to static analysis a bit more?Also how long did that regex take to run on 5.0e8 lines of ruby? | If I'm not mistaken, requiring the "date" stdlib wasn't required until Ruby 1.9, so that might account for its low spot on the list. I'm not sure but the same might be true for "time". |
What's the most popular Ruby standard library? | If I'm not mistaken, requiring the "date" stdlib wasn't required until Ruby 1.9, so that might account for its low spot on the list. I'm not sure but the same might be true for "time". | Very interesting. I'm now wondering if Travis CI is collecting any code usage statistics? I'd imagine that they would have a more application-centric view on the rubygems ecosystem. Also, since they are actually executing code, they could potentially collect data on constants and method calls, I believe. |
What's the most popular Ruby standard library? | Very interesting. I'm now wondering if Travis CI is collecting any code usage statistics? I'd imagine that they would have a more application-centric view on the rubygems ecosystem. Also, since they are actually executing code, they could potentially collect data on constants and method calls, I believe. | I think the title is a tad bit misleading, I saw this and immediately thought "Why would anyone even ask? It's obviously rails" then I checked the link and saw that they meant the Standard Library. |
News organizations respond to Fed lockup questions | The CNBC article has more information: http://www.cnbc.com/id/101056168It looks like there's plenty of opportunities for the information to leak out of the lock-up early - for example: Print reporters were told they were allowed to open a phone line to their editors at headquarters offices a few moments in advance of the hour, but not allowed to interact with people on the other end of the line until exactly two p.m.A print reporter could prearrange to call one phone number at their office for "taper" and another for "no taper". | There are several microwave radio networks built to link New York and Chicago for high-frequency trading purposes.
These paths are several milliseconds shorter than the fiber paths and are a few years old at this point. The article should have mentioned this instead of jumping straight from fiber to neutrinos.Some details: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230406570457742... |
News organizations respond to Fed lockup questions | There are several microwave radio networks built to link New York and Chicago for high-frequency trading purposes.
These paths are several milliseconds shorter than the fiber paths and are a few years old at this point. The article should have mentioned this instead of jumping straight from fiber to neutrinos.Some details: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230406570457742... | >Working off of a list provided by the Fed of news organizations participating in last week's lock up, CNBC contacted each of the news organizations that offer low latency data services to ask whether they transmitted any data out of the Fed's lockup room. A key question is whether or not any organization transmitted information out of the lockup room and into its own computer system before 2 p.m. If that was done, the data could have been moved to computer servers near Chicago before 2 p.m. and publicly released the information from there at precisely 2 p.m. – enabling subscribers of that data service to get the information milliseconds before others in Chicago relying on transmissions from the Federal Reserve in Washington to arrive.Sounds like the most reasonable explanation to me.But of course I'm not 100% sure what a lock-up room is. It's being described as reporters restricted from speaking before 2pm. Obviously, that has nothing to do with millisecond precision.http://www.cnbc.com/id/101056168 |
News organizations respond to Fed lockup questions | >Working off of a list provided by the Fed of news organizations participating in last week's lock up, CNBC contacted each of the news organizations that offer low latency data services to ask whether they transmitted any data out of the Fed's lockup room. A key question is whether or not any organization transmitted information out of the lockup room and into its own computer system before 2 p.m. If that was done, the data could have been moved to computer servers near Chicago before 2 p.m. and publicly released the information from there at precisely 2 p.m. – enabling subscribers of that data service to get the information milliseconds before others in Chicago relying on transmissions from the Federal Reserve in Washington to arrive.Sounds like the most reasonable explanation to me.But of course I'm not 100% sure what a lock-up room is. It's being described as reporters restricted from speaking before 2pm. Obviously, that has nothing to do with millisecond precision.http://www.cnbc.com/id/101056168 | I'll throw this out there: what if the clock in Chicago was just 5ms slower than the one in NYC. The logs would show the transactions happened at the same time, but they didn't.The NYSE mandates that business clocks never drift more than 1s from the atomic clock [1]. What is the resolution guaranteed between the two clocks being compared? After all, it's impossible to guarantee perfect synchronization of two clocks at any distance (bounded by the speed of light and the drift rate of the clocks) [2].The only retort I can think of is why do the other players react at the proper time.[1] http://www.nyse.com/nysenotices/nyse/rule-changes/detail;jse...[2] Cristian, F. (1989), "Probabilistic clock synchronization", Distributed Computing (Springer) 3 (3): 146–158 |
News organizations respond to Fed lockup questions | I'll throw this out there: what if the clock in Chicago was just 5ms slower than the one in NYC. The logs would show the transactions happened at the same time, but they didn't.The NYSE mandates that business clocks never drift more than 1s from the atomic clock [1]. What is the resolution guaranteed between the two clocks being compared? After all, it's impossible to guarantee perfect synchronization of two clocks at any distance (bounded by the speed of light and the drift rate of the clocks) [2].The only retort I can think of is why do the other players react at the proper time.[1] http://www.nyse.com/nysenotices/nyse/rule-changes/detail;jse...[2] Cristian, F. (1989), "Probabilistic clock synchronization", Distributed Computing (Springer) 3 (3): 146–158 | Previous discussion of what appears to be the primary source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6417511 |
India’s Leading Payment Gateway “CCAvenue” Hacked by SQL Injection | I am surprised on this. Why CCAvenue did not conduct a vulnerability test on their applications? It is standard practice to conduct a VA on production systems, which will certainly identify this kind of vulnerabilities.
A Payment facilitator going down because of an SQL injection attack is ridiculous.Indian market is paranoid about online security. This will bring down the number of online sales. Too bad for start-ups depending on CCAvenue. | CCAvenue CEO talks about this hack:
http://www.medianama.com/2011/05/223-vishwas-patel-ccavenue-... |
India’s Leading Payment Gateway “CCAvenue” Hacked by SQL Injection | CCAvenue CEO talks about this hack:
http://www.medianama.com/2011/05/223-vishwas-patel-ccavenue-... | If what is published in hackerregiment.com is true, this is the most irresponsible thing the company "CCAvenue" could have done - to store plain text passwords.They also claim to have PCI DSS 2.0 certified. In light of all the discussions happening repeatedly about need to regenerate passwords & not to store plain text passwords if they have it this way, this is so stupid. |
India’s Leading Payment Gateway “CCAvenue” Hacked by SQL Injection | If what is published in hackerregiment.com is true, this is the most irresponsible thing the company "CCAvenue" could have done - to store plain text passwords.They also claim to have PCI DSS 2.0 certified. In light of all the discussions happening repeatedly about need to regenerate passwords & not to store plain text passwords if they have it this way, this is so stupid. | more info. on the hack - when user tried to forgot password ,they got their original password back. If it was stored as encrypted then there is no way to decrypt them. And also in interview CEO claims they use "2.2.17" for past 5 months but http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/graph?site=www.ccavenue.com shows differently |
India’s Leading Payment Gateway “CCAvenue” Hacked by SQL Injection | more info. on the hack - when user tried to forgot password ,they got their original password back. If it was stored as encrypted then there is no way to decrypt them. And also in interview CEO claims they use "2.2.17" for past 5 months but http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/graph?site=www.ccavenue.com shows differently | Its plain stupidity to store plain passwords. Some user said,he tried forgot password ,it returned him 'his original' password. |
What Successful Bodybuilders And Successful Entrepreneurs Have In Common | Hrm. I'm a skinny insecure geek who sucked at dating, so my business must be doomed.Really, I understand where he's coming from but there's more types of entrepreneurs than the macho asshole. Sure, persistence and wits are a common trait, but there's really only one requirement for being a successful entrepreneur: You have to be able to get people to give you money.There's a thousand ways to do it, and it's not some kind of special exclusive club that requires a particular personality type. Frankly, I'm a little tired of the "This is what makes an entrepreneur" posts. It's self-indulgent and distracts from the real goal, which is generating cashflow. | The biggest connection I see between body builders and entrepreneurs is discipline and ambition. Deciding that you're going to maximize your body's potential is quite similar (in spirit) to deciding to maximize your earning potential.I think body building is about 100x easier though. Unless you're aiming for a pro card, there's really no uncertainty to deal with. That's the toughest part of entrepreneurship. There is no formula for success. Imagine exercising and eating according to a plan for 3 years and then ending up obese. |
What Successful Bodybuilders And Successful Entrepreneurs Have In Common | The biggest connection I see between body builders and entrepreneurs is discipline and ambition. Deciding that you're going to maximize your body's potential is quite similar (in spirit) to deciding to maximize your earning potential.I think body building is about 100x easier though. Unless you're aiming for a pro card, there's really no uncertainty to deal with. That's the toughest part of entrepreneurship. There is no formula for success. Imagine exercising and eating according to a plan for 3 years and then ending up obese. | This is the dumbest article I have ever seen on hacker news. |
What Successful Bodybuilders And Successful Entrepreneurs Have In Common | This is the dumbest article I have ever seen on hacker news. | I do not know about entrepreneurs, but just cursory look at this confirmed my long held belief that body builders are narcissistic ass-holes. I mean who would brag about their ability to steal someone else's girlfriend. |
What Successful Bodybuilders And Successful Entrepreneurs Have In Common | I do not know about entrepreneurs, but just cursory look at this confirmed my long held belief that body builders are narcissistic ass-holes. I mean who would brag about their ability to steal someone else's girlfriend. | # 16: Women are extremely rare and get to enjoy swimming against the current in a river of testosterone.:( |
The Markdown Mindset | If you like markdown you will LOVE using pandoc. I can't stress how wonderful things have been since I moved to pandoc.http://johnmacfarlane.net/pandoc/ | I'd feel a lot better about Markdown if it had an actual spec apart from a pile of perl regexes and a maintainer that hadn't abandoned it. I still use it because it's the lowest-common-denominator, but I have a hard time feeling good about it. |
The Markdown Mindset | I'd feel a lot better about Markdown if it had an actual spec apart from a pile of perl regexes and a maintainer that hadn't abandoned it. I still use it because it's the lowest-common-denominator, but I have a hard time feeling good about it. | The only quibble I have with Markdown is that it shows its web-oriented origins by making it difficult to insert page breaks. That's largely the reason I still use LaTeX for a lot of things. Other than that, though, I fully agree with the author. Plain text is great because 1) it'll always be readable and 2) it forces you to focus on the writing first and the formatting second. |
The Markdown Mindset | The only quibble I have with Markdown is that it shows its web-oriented origins by making it difficult to insert page breaks. That's largely the reason I still use LaTeX for a lot of things. Other than that, though, I fully agree with the author. Plain text is great because 1) it'll always be readable and 2) it forces you to focus on the writing first and the formatting second. | I use Markdown everywhere. Including places that don't even support it. My goal is to use it so much that it just makes sense for web-developers to implement it everywhere. Ideally replacing BBCode and such for forums. |
The Markdown Mindset | I use Markdown everywhere. Including places that don't even support it. My goal is to use it so much that it just makes sense for web-developers to implement it everywhere. Ideally replacing BBCode and such for forums. | Thanks for the article: useful. Until recently almost all of my writing has been plain text (really plain text, and plain text with bits of Latex for documentation and writing books).I have reverted recently to using RTF a lot for writing work notes, not feeling great about it, but there is a real convenience factor because OS X plays nicely with RTF for Finder instant view and using TextEdit. The bulk of my day to day (non-programming) writing is simply writing out copious daily work notes documenting everything that I do for my customers. I have found that being able to lightly style especially important notes is a large enough advantage to forgo the simplicity of plain text. Also, RTF pastes well into GMail if I want to send a styled text email (which I seldom do).Based on reading this article, I may try the experiment of keeping my work notes for a single customer in plain text + markdown. The Marked OS X app looks pretty nice, but I am concerned that having two windows open (for editing and for viewing) might slow down what is now a very low ceremony activity. |
Firefox 22 released | Not sure linking to the FTP mirror is all that useful. Here are the release notes: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/22.0/releasenotes/Highlights: WebRTC, asm.js, flexbox, and web notifications are present and enabled by default. | The OdinMonkey engine performance is impressive. The Lua VM benchmark[1] jumped from 110 points in Firefox 21 to 318 points in Firefox 22! Not to mention poor performance of Chrome.Next, have a look at the Epic Citadel[2], which runs very smoothly in Firefox 22. Well done![1] http://kripken.github.io/lua.vm.js/lua.vm.js.html
[2] http://www.unrealengine.com/html5/ |
Firefox 22 released | The OdinMonkey engine performance is impressive. The Lua VM benchmark[1] jumped from 110 points in Firefox 21 to 318 points in Firefox 22! Not to mention poor performance of Chrome.Next, have a look at the Epic Citadel[2], which runs very smoothly in Firefox 22. Well done![1] http://kripken.github.io/lua.vm.js/lua.vm.js.html
[2] http://www.unrealengine.com/html5/ | Oh yeah - short function syntax goes into the wild! let square = x => x * x
Time to move over to stalking the Chrome devs... |
Firefox 22 released | Oh yeah - short function syntax goes into the wild! let square = x => x * x
Time to move over to stalking the Chrome devs... | If you're a fan of Firefox I recommend using Aurora: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/aurora/
Aurora is basically the beta of Firefox. It seems to get incremental updates more regularly than Firefox. It very occasionally has issues with compatibility with plugins (usually when a version number is bumped) but I can't recall any stability issues in the few years I've been using it. |
Firefox 22 released | If you're a fan of Firefox I recommend using Aurora: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/aurora/
Aurora is basically the beta of Firefox. It seems to get incremental updates more regularly than Firefox. It very occasionally has issues with compatibility with plugins (usually when a version number is bumped) but I can't recall any stability issues in the few years I've been using it. | I've felt like Firefox has been pretty light on features in its releases since it switched to rapid release, but this one is packed with stuff. Awesome!It's becoming more and more rare for me to have to switch to Chrome to get a website to work correctly/acceptably, and I love it! Great job by the Mozilla team |
In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011 | Hitchens was essentially a Marxist (by his own admission) who was also in favor of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the foreign policy it represented. So there was very little I agreed with him on.But I'm terribly upset about this and I'll tell you why.Because of his willingness to debate. I'd literally scan right wing talk radio schedules for his name because you just knew it would be a great show. In a world where so many people in our modern society hide in their little cliques I think a smart person who is willing to have their ideas challenged is the most valuable person of all.Losing a voice like that is a true tragedy.So, with all due respect, I hope he is wrong in his beliefs about the after life because if there is a heaven he's surely earned his place in it.Edit: On that note this is awesome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4JJqXISBiI (though skip the first 4 minutes of the host self aggrandizement) | As a person of long-held religious conviction I am deeply saddened to see this worthy adversary go. He had an uncanny ability to go straight for your mostly deeply held beliefs with the most trenchant rhetoric and yet somehow made you like him anyway.I think it's because with Hitchens, you knew he spoke from the integrity of his own convictions. He was nobody's man, on no one's bandwagon, carrying water for no political agenda other than his own desire to see the world become a better place. His libertarianism or Marxism was just a function of where his own intellect led him, and he never compromised for fashion or acceptance. That gave him gravitas, ethos. How else could you go after Mother Theresa and not get run out of...the World on a rail?Only Hitchens. He was often compared to Orwell and H.L. Mencken, and he was one of the few writers for whom the comparison was as a peer rather than a distant echo of a greater time. Who will pick up his mantle? Who has the intellect, wit or courage of their convictions that compares with Hitchens?At the moment I simply can't think of anyone. |
In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011 | As a person of long-held religious conviction I am deeply saddened to see this worthy adversary go. He had an uncanny ability to go straight for your mostly deeply held beliefs with the most trenchant rhetoric and yet somehow made you like him anyway.I think it's because with Hitchens, you knew he spoke from the integrity of his own convictions. He was nobody's man, on no one's bandwagon, carrying water for no political agenda other than his own desire to see the world become a better place. His libertarianism or Marxism was just a function of where his own intellect led him, and he never compromised for fashion or acceptance. That gave him gravitas, ethos. How else could you go after Mother Theresa and not get run out of...the World on a rail?Only Hitchens. He was often compared to Orwell and H.L. Mencken, and he was one of the few writers for whom the comparison was as a peer rather than a distant echo of a greater time. Who will pick up his mantle? Who has the intellect, wit or courage of their convictions that compares with Hitchens?At the moment I simply can't think of anyone. | The first time I read Christopher Hitchens was his takedown of Mother Teresa - "The Missionary Position". It was emblematic of his writing - shocking, irreverent, but beautifully written and argued. The most intellectually honest pundit I have ever read - even when I disagreed with him. Sad to see him go. |
In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011 | The first time I read Christopher Hitchens was his takedown of Mother Teresa - "The Missionary Position". It was emblematic of his writing - shocking, irreverent, but beautifully written and argued. The most intellectually honest pundit I have ever read - even when I disagreed with him. Sad to see him go. | Above all, I really respect him for his piece on waterboarding. For those of you who didn't see it/hear about it, he wanted to try to settle the debate on whether waterboarding is torture or not.So he let himself be waterboarded.VF Article (site's getting hit hard): http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/08/hitchens...Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7u-Wk1aU-EThe title of the article? "Believe Me, It's Torture". |
In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011 | Above all, I really respect him for his piece on waterboarding. For those of you who didn't see it/hear about it, he wanted to try to settle the debate on whether waterboarding is torture or not.So he let himself be waterboarded.VF Article (site's getting hit hard): http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/08/hitchens...Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7u-Wk1aU-EThe title of the article? "Believe Me, It's Torture". | http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/dec/16/christopher-hitc...Hitchens gave short shrift to the "insulting" suggestion that cancer might persuade him to change his position where reason had not, arguing that to ditch principles "held for a lifetime, in the hope of gaining favour at the last minute" would be a "hucksterish choice", and urging those who had taken it upon themselves to pray for him not to "trouble deaf heaven with your bootless cries". |
Losing A Lawsuit In The Philippines | When in Rome...Dealing with the institutions in a country where you have no knowledge of how things are done and where who you know is as important (or even more so) as what the law says means you have to be vigilant from day one.The biggest error in this case was that they did alright on the 'trust' bit but they failed the 'verify' bit right from day one.If there had never been so much room for maneuvering in the first place then this would have likely never happened. It's sad but in situations like this you're setting yourself up for long term trouble if you do not actively seek to control things right from day one.I have a couple of cases quite comparable to this one in my immediate surroundings and some of it sounds eerily familiar.The OP is in good company, big corporations fall for things like this and usually it costs a lot more than it did here. Chalk it up to your educational fund.If anybody is in a position to attempt to replicate this experiment you may want to do the following:- incorporate through a lawyers office and if local law requires a resident or national as a director make sure they are accountable- prepare to go there when incorporating and get yourself educated with respect to the local situation (corruption, graft, how foreign companies usually get plucked)- be prepared to spend a lot of time in the target country from the moment that you incorporate- get your ducks in a row, don't put the responsibility of doing that in the hands of someone at arms length.- if you want to keep things simple do not create a subsidiary, instead aid someone else in creating a company and hire them for a service they provide. This makes departures so much easier to deal with. It removes all of the responsibility from your end but you keep control at the level of the customer. Not happy? Then deal with someone else.- spread the responsibilities over several people, make sure they check up on each other and report to you.- trust but verify, repeatedly, continuouslyThis is not meant as a 'Philippine people can't be trusted' line, or even a 'foreigners can't be trusted' one. The sad fact is that if you, a rich western company lands to do business unprepared in a foreign country you are simply a very fat goose waiting to be plucked. So you need to be aware of that and act accordingly.As these lessons come this one was remarkably cheap.I've had something similar happen and I wished I could take my own advice above retroactively, my lesson was a lot more expensive than the one detailed here:http://jacquesmattheij.com/stick-to-what-you-know-a-tale-of-... | There's two business lessons here, and neither are specific to doing business in the Philippines:1) Don't be sloppy (and don't get emotional, because that'll make you sloppy);2) Whenever you're dealing with a counter-party, try to understand where they're coming from.There was clearly a mismatch between how the author saw Karen's position and how Karen saw it, one that was undoubtedly aggravated by the lack of documentation. Look at the situation from Karen's side. She started out running the business in the Philippines. Joe came in a year later and took over, effectively demoting her. After discussing the situation, the owners proposed an 80% pay-cut and 4-month leave of absence, something most reasonable people would interpret as a signal that they were being pushed out. Depending on Philippine law, this could have qualified as wrongful termination (most countries are not as employer-friendly with regards to terminations as the U.S.) When Karen sued, the author assumed it must have been some sort of shakedown, because he couldn't see how it could be a legitimate grievance. This established the paranoia that ultimately led them to ignoring calls from their own attorney.If the authors had tried to empathize with Karen in the first place: 1) they could've taken actions to avoid the lawsuit; 2) realized that Karen had a pretty compelling case, and treated the suit with the seriousness it warranted. All this probably could have been avoided by some thinking and a severance payment that was less than the time and money wasted on the legal proceeding. |
Losing A Lawsuit In The Philippines | There's two business lessons here, and neither are specific to doing business in the Philippines:1) Don't be sloppy (and don't get emotional, because that'll make you sloppy);2) Whenever you're dealing with a counter-party, try to understand where they're coming from.There was clearly a mismatch between how the author saw Karen's position and how Karen saw it, one that was undoubtedly aggravated by the lack of documentation. Look at the situation from Karen's side. She started out running the business in the Philippines. Joe came in a year later and took over, effectively demoting her. After discussing the situation, the owners proposed an 80% pay-cut and 4-month leave of absence, something most reasonable people would interpret as a signal that they were being pushed out. Depending on Philippine law, this could have qualified as wrongful termination (most countries are not as employer-friendly with regards to terminations as the U.S.) When Karen sued, the author assumed it must have been some sort of shakedown, because he couldn't see how it could be a legitimate grievance. This established the paranoia that ultimately led them to ignoring calls from their own attorney.If the authors had tried to empathize with Karen in the first place: 1) they could've taken actions to avoid the lawsuit; 2) realized that Karen had a pretty compelling case, and treated the suit with the seriousness it warranted. All this probably could have been avoided by some thinking and a severance payment that was less than the time and money wasted on the legal proceeding. | Interesting case. I also live in the Philippines and I have been looking into starting a company here.I have been looking into info on "PEZA" - the Philippines Economic Zone Authority. It appears that for corporations which have 100% income coming in from abroad (which I assume you qualify for) you can get around many of the painful things that other corporations have to do.For example, your corporation could be 100% foreign owned. Could you have just started a new corporation and simply started all business as part of that new corporation without "Karen's" involvement?I don't think this is a PEZA item, I believe this is the case for any business in this situation.ETA:You probably can't answer this, but I noticed that if you are in a free economic zone with the same situation as above, you can get a tax holiday for X years. To get this, your business has to be physically located in one of these zones though. I'm wondering about the possibility of setting up a mail drop with a virtual office company which is located in a "PEZA" building.ETA ETA: I can definitely identify with the feeling you get when you believe someone is trying to rip you off. I think that's unfortunate and may hold people back. In some cases, I see foreigners lose their professionalism and take things way too personally. Good job on getting through this. |
Losing A Lawsuit In The Philippines | Interesting case. I also live in the Philippines and I have been looking into starting a company here.I have been looking into info on "PEZA" - the Philippines Economic Zone Authority. It appears that for corporations which have 100% income coming in from abroad (which I assume you qualify for) you can get around many of the painful things that other corporations have to do.For example, your corporation could be 100% foreign owned. Could you have just started a new corporation and simply started all business as part of that new corporation without "Karen's" involvement?I don't think this is a PEZA item, I believe this is the case for any business in this situation.ETA:You probably can't answer this, but I noticed that if you are in a free economic zone with the same situation as above, you can get a tax holiday for X years. To get this, your business has to be physically located in one of these zones though. I'm wondering about the possibility of setting up a mail drop with a virtual office company which is located in a "PEZA" building.ETA ETA: I can definitely identify with the feeling you get when you believe someone is trying to rip you off. I think that's unfortunate and may hold people back. In some cases, I see foreigners lose their professionalism and take things way too personally. Good job on getting through this. | Lost in court> We stopped returning calls from his office. We ignored requests... we simply ignored the situation and continued to grow our business.Really? |
Losing A Lawsuit In The Philippines | Lost in court> We stopped returning calls from his office. We ignored requests... we simply ignored the situation and continued to grow our business.Really? | It's very simple they tried to start on the cheap and when they saw things were working out they decided to incorporate. That's when they started doing everything wrong. The first wrong thing was not understanding Filipino culture. Second thing not knowing the labor and business law.Find out more here on how to register your business the correct way in the Philippines.http://www.dayananconsulting.com/philippines-business-regist... |
The History of Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” Album Art | This whole article reads like it's written by someone who has never been inside a library. "it would be nice to have an original copy of those 3 aforementioned works in front of me to see if they list any copyright". If only there were institutions that have copies of obscure works like "Scientific American" that allowed people to peruse them for free.Here's an animated, interactive visualization that looks like the Joy Division album cover, based on d3.js https://github.com/daliwali/unknown_pleasures | That was a long blog which essentially would have been pretty common knowledge for most Joy Division fans and/or people interested in astrophysics. And because of that I think the author missed out on raising a bigger and more interesting discussion: (I'll quote one of the comments on his site as that phrases is things rather well)Interesting, but the article misses the point in all kinds of ways. It was common knowledge (at least, to those familiar with Joy Division and Saville's work) that the image itself was appropriated from an original that was in the public domain. The interesting point here is not copyright, but the way in which an image can come to represent a concept such that it gains new meaning. When the intended audience sees this, they think, "Joy Division", not "pulsar". Hence, when you copy the image by way of Saville, you are appropriating the association that he has established. So, this isn't about stealing images, it's about riding on the coat-tails of a talented designer who managed to create a strong brand.A proper understanding of what's going on here makes this sentiment: "If you ever want to use the image for your own personal benefit, just make sure it’s clear you have no connection with Joy Division, Peter Saville, etc…" pretty shiesty. |
The History of Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” Album Art | That was a long blog which essentially would have been pretty common knowledge for most Joy Division fans and/or people interested in astrophysics. And because of that I think the author missed out on raising a bigger and more interesting discussion: (I'll quote one of the comments on his site as that phrases is things rather well)Interesting, but the article misses the point in all kinds of ways. It was common knowledge (at least, to those familiar with Joy Division and Saville's work) that the image itself was appropriated from an original that was in the public domain. The interesting point here is not copyright, but the way in which an image can come to represent a concept such that it gains new meaning. When the intended audience sees this, they think, "Joy Division", not "pulsar". Hence, when you copy the image by way of Saville, you are appropriating the association that he has established. So, this isn't about stealing images, it's about riding on the coat-tails of a talented designer who managed to create a strong brand.A proper understanding of what's going on here makes this sentiment: "If you ever want to use the image for your own personal benefit, just make sure it’s clear you have no connection with Joy Division, Peter Saville, etc…" pretty shiesty. | I once wrote a program in BASIC (on my C64) which would make such a display (it's straightforward). I lost that program, but recreated a lookalike in Python: -- --
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heuh... it looks a bit horrible in ASCII art ;-) import random
import math
canvh = 40
canvw = 60
tracecount = 16
canvas = [[' ' for col in xrange(canvw)] for row in xrange(canvh)]
def randomtrace():
sigma = random.uniform(4, 20)
mu = random.gauss(canvw/2, canvw/20)
k = canvw / (sigma * math.sqrt(2*math.pi))
s = -1.0 / (2 * sigma * sigma)
amp = 2.0
tr = [amp * k * math.exp(s * (x - mu)*(x - mu)) for x in xrange(canvw)]
# TODO: Random permutations, or Perlin noise.
return tr
for t in range(tracecount):
if t == 0 or t == tracecount - 1:
continue
y = t * canvh / tracecount
trace = randomtrace()
for x, t in enumerate(trace):
t = int(t)
top = y - t
if top >= 0:
canvas[top][x] = '-'
for i in range(t):
top += 1
if top >= 0:
canvas[top][x] = ' '
for row in canvas:
line = "".join(row)
print " ", line |
The History of Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” Album Art | I once wrote a program in BASIC (on my C64) which would make such a display (it's straightforward). I lost that program, but recreated a lookalike in Python: -- --
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heuh... it looks a bit horrible in ASCII art ;-) import random
import math
canvh = 40
canvw = 60
tracecount = 16
canvas = [[' ' for col in xrange(canvw)] for row in xrange(canvh)]
def randomtrace():
sigma = random.uniform(4, 20)
mu = random.gauss(canvw/2, canvw/20)
k = canvw / (sigma * math.sqrt(2*math.pi))
s = -1.0 / (2 * sigma * sigma)
amp = 2.0
tr = [amp * k * math.exp(s * (x - mu)*(x - mu)) for x in xrange(canvw)]
# TODO: Random permutations, or Perlin noise.
return tr
for t in range(tracecount):
if t == 0 or t == tracecount - 1:
continue
y = t * canvh / tracecount
trace = randomtrace()
for x, t in enumerate(trace):
t = int(t)
top = y - t
if top >= 0:
canvas[top][x] = '-'
for i in range(t):
top += 1
if top >= 0:
canvas[top][x] = ' '
for row in canvas:
line = "".join(row)
print " ", line | I can't really contribute anything to the discussion about the image and rights associated with it, but since I have to say I probably never would have guessed that one of my favorite bands ever would show up on HN, I guess I'm going to comment anyway. :)This was probably the first album that made me consider album art as real works of art. I still love Joy Division's music today and I will never forget this album cover and what I thought when I bought the album (I was a little late to discover Joy Division while Ian Curtis was alive, having discovered them through New Order around 1983 or so). Being interested in Astrophysics (as a lay person) and I believe I read that the band referred to this as "the death of a star" at the time. Love the imagery associated with that.Great album, great cover art, and great band, I really wish Ian Curtis could have graced us with more from his fantastic mind, I don't think I've ever experienced so much fantastic imagery from any other lyricist.EDIT: Oh, I forgot, the original CD insert that had this image on it wasn't simple paper as I recall, it was a sort of rough paper (don't know how else to describe it) with the image on it and you could feel the bumps of the lines.I think it was that, more than even the image by itself, the two together, which really fascinated me. I wish I would have kept that edition of the CD, it was an expensive import at the time and quite original, but I went through a few CD purges back in the 90's and that was a casualty of one of them. :( Oh well. I really wish I would have gotten the vinyl and kept that, but CD's were all the rage back then. |
The History of Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” Album Art | I can't really contribute anything to the discussion about the image and rights associated with it, but since I have to say I probably never would have guessed that one of my favorite bands ever would show up on HN, I guess I'm going to comment anyway. :)This was probably the first album that made me consider album art as real works of art. I still love Joy Division's music today and I will never forget this album cover and what I thought when I bought the album (I was a little late to discover Joy Division while Ian Curtis was alive, having discovered them through New Order around 1983 or so). Being interested in Astrophysics (as a lay person) and I believe I read that the band referred to this as "the death of a star" at the time. Love the imagery associated with that.Great album, great cover art, and great band, I really wish Ian Curtis could have graced us with more from his fantastic mind, I don't think I've ever experienced so much fantastic imagery from any other lyricist.EDIT: Oh, I forgot, the original CD insert that had this image on it wasn't simple paper as I recall, it was a sort of rough paper (don't know how else to describe it) with the image on it and you could feel the bumps of the lines.I think it was that, more than even the image by itself, the two together, which really fascinated me. I wish I would have kept that edition of the CD, it was an expensive import at the time and quite original, but I went through a few CD purges back in the 90's and that was a casualty of one of them. :( Oh well. I really wish I would have gotten the vinyl and kept that, but CD's were all the rage back then. | Interesting, I have always thought that image was from a Fairlight waveform display.http://machinesdontcare.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/fairligh...
http://myblogitsfullofstars.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/fl2x... |
Student sues Amazon after Kindle eats his homework | The fact that he is suing over his lost homework is almost totally irrelevant. It is just a brilliant way to hold Amazon responsible for their actions. Once a book is purchased he owns the rights to that material and he did not initiate or consent to the removal of the book.If you read the PDF draft of the lawsuit it clearly says that Amazon does not tell users in the Terms & Agreements that they have the ability to remotely delete e-books and in fact says that "...Amazon grants you the non-exclusive right to keep a permanent copy of the applicable Digital Content and to view, use, and display such Digital Content an unlimited number of times..."Amazon should never be allowed to change data on an individual's kindle without their express written consent. Its criminal. | I didn't realize that kindle users could make notes on books. That makes what amazon did even more egregious. |
Student sues Amazon after Kindle eats his homework | I didn't realize that kindle users could make notes on books. That makes what amazon did even more egregious. | According to the Wall Street Journal article (http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/07/30/lawsuit-amazon-ate-my...) about the suit, he did not lose the notes; he is upset because the notes are no longer linked (or whatever) to the text they refer to. >>Amazon didn’t delete the file containing Gawronski’s notes on the Kindle device. But since the book text "no longer exists, all my notes refer back to nothing," he said. "I can’t really use it for much."<<Also, they are supposedly suing to prevent Amazon from doing this again, which Amazon has already said they will not. This is just a sleazeball lawyer going for his own benefit and a teenager trying to stretchout his 15 minutes of fame. |
Student sues Amazon after Kindle eats his homework | According to the Wall Street Journal article (http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/07/30/lawsuit-amazon-ate-my...) about the suit, he did not lose the notes; he is upset because the notes are no longer linked (or whatever) to the text they refer to. >>Amazon didn’t delete the file containing Gawronski’s notes on the Kindle device. But since the book text "no longer exists, all my notes refer back to nothing," he said. "I can’t really use it for much."<<Also, they are supposedly suing to prevent Amazon from doing this again, which Amazon has already said they will not. This is just a sleazeball lawyer going for his own benefit and a teenager trying to stretchout his 15 minutes of fame. | More information at http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/07/30/lawsuit-amazon-ate-my... |
Student sues Amazon after Kindle eats his homework | More information at http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/07/30/lawsuit-amazon-ate-my... | Proof that children should not be able to bring suit until they are of age. Losing your homework is not reason for a lawsuit, if you get a device like the kindle you should learn how to make backups. And if your chosen device for your homework can not make backups you only have yourself to blame, you should use something else.Personal responsibility seems to be in short supply, blame somebody else is so much easier. Electronics can fail, the kindle is no exception. If you made your homework on a piece of paper I'm sure it would not be lost so easily, but then again pieces of paper can blow away, burn, get lost and so on. The kindle - and any other piece of complex tech - is not infallible. At that price point it can't be expected to be infallible. The fact that amazon initiated the failure is a systemic issue with the kindle, nothing to be surprised about. If you choose a medium with all kinds of weird DRM then you can't really blame the vendor.Is it frivolous lawsuit week or did I miss the memo ? First that real estate company over a tweet and now this.Personally I think amazon deserves a boycott for the kindles DRM but you can't really sue them over a 'feature' that has been well advertised. The kindle is broken by design. |
Android's Achilles' Heel (for the rest of the world) - The Sim Toolkit | I am actually subscribed to Sim Toolkit request/issue in Android issue tracker and each week it gets about 1-2 new requests. (http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=15070 and http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=6666). And currently is not a single response from anybody representing Android team there.My personal problem with this is that in Estonia MobileID (fancy way to authenticate yourself and authorize transactions in banks, public services and other web services - advertised as a more secure way comparing to username/passwords and one time tokens) works through Sim Toolkit. | It is a shame none of the modern smartphones support SIM Toolkit applications. They're used for example in the M-Pesa mobile payments system that is popular in Africa and elsewhere.I wrote something about M-Pesa when I was in Kenya over the new year: http://www.qaiku.com/home/bergie/show/5035411811ce11e088577f... |
Android's Achilles' Heel (for the rest of the world) - The Sim Toolkit | It is a shame none of the modern smartphones support SIM Toolkit applications. They're used for example in the M-Pesa mobile payments system that is popular in Africa and elsewhere.I wrote something about M-Pesa when I was in Kenya over the new year: http://www.qaiku.com/home/bergie/show/5035411811ce11e088577f... | >Build a browser that does wire compression before sending it downhttp://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2514020I don't know whether Android's browser is using SPDY yet, but it seems like an obvious step. |
Android's Achilles' Heel (for the rest of the world) - The Sim Toolkit | >Build a browser that does wire compression before sending it downhttp://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2514020I don't know whether Android's browser is using SPDY yet, but it seems like an obvious step. | If you want Android to be relevant anywhere apart from the West, then start thinking about how we live day to day.The point of Android is to sell search ads. So I don't think they want Android to be relevant anywhere but "the West". If you want to use Android and have it support your obscure legacy technology, bust out your IDE and start programming. If there is as much demand as you say, the money will flow right in. |
Android's Achilles' Heel (for the rest of the world) - The Sim Toolkit | If you want Android to be relevant anywhere apart from the West, then start thinking about how we live day to day.The point of Android is to sell search ads. So I don't think they want Android to be relevant anywhere but "the West". If you want to use Android and have it support your obscure legacy technology, bust out your IDE and start programming. If there is as much demand as you say, the money will flow right in. | Funny thing that Blackberry used to have a great support for STK, then they broke it in the OS 6. |
Obama: If you are a US citizen the NSA can’t listen to your calls | Obama is still treating this problem as though it's a case of privacy vs security. The real issue is trust. U.S. citizens can't trust what private U.S. corporations tell them if the government has the power to coerce and then muzzle them. This is a poisonous environment to do business in. International business is going to go elsewhere, and domestic business will also choose to outsource to more transparent countries. | the "US Persons" protection in general is a distraction from the power and danger of this system. Suspicionless surveillance does not become okay simply because it's only victimizing 95% of the world instead of 100%. Our founders did not write that "We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all US Persons are created equal."- Edward Snowdenhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-n... |
Obama: If you are a US citizen the NSA can’t listen to your calls | the "US Persons" protection in general is a distraction from the power and danger of this system. Suspicionless surveillance does not become okay simply because it's only victimizing 95% of the world instead of 100%. Our founders did not write that "We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all US Persons are created equal."- Edward Snowdenhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-n... | I guess I'm used to a more technical definition of "can't" than politicians nowadays.Apart from that, I'm German, and every time I read this "not to US citizens" excuse, all I understand is that they'll happily rape all my data without any questions asked. |
Obama: If you are a US citizen the NSA can’t listen to your calls | I guess I'm used to a more technical definition of "can't" than politicians nowadays.Apart from that, I'm German, and every time I read this "not to US citizens" excuse, all I understand is that they'll happily rape all my data without any questions asked. | Unfortunately the truth appears to be somewhat different. See: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57589672-38/snowden-nsa-sn...EFF's position (from the CNET article): "The evidence shows that the NSA seeks a warrant only after the communication is initially acquired and analyzed by computers according to algorithms designed by humans, placed in a government database, and reviewed by an analyst." |
Obama: If you are a US citizen the NSA can’t listen to your calls | Unfortunately the truth appears to be somewhat different. See: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57589672-38/snowden-nsa-sn...EFF's position (from the CNET article): "The evidence shows that the NSA seeks a warrant only after the communication is initially acquired and analyzed by computers according to algorithms designed by humans, placed in a government database, and reviewed by an analyst." | I think this interview perfectly illustrates the distinction Snowden mentioned between technical capability and policy.Note that the president says "if you're a US person the NSA cannot listen to your telephone calls" instead of saying "if you're a US person, the NSA isn't recording your phone calls".The word "cannot" in this context means "they aren't supposed to", not "it is technically impossible".He's saying that listening to your phone calls is "against the rules" but that doesn't mean this data isn't still being captured and put into an NSA data warehouse somewhere, in case circumstances change. |