Androsynth

The difference between the US and Zimbabwe is that if the US had a civil war and inflation ruined the currency, it would send the world into the second dark ages. Civil wars cant happen in the US? thats good to know, but i wont take your (implied) word for it.

What about if China suddenly asked for something in exchange for the tons of american paper currency they have accumulated? It is unlikely anytime soon, but they will only take it as long as it has value. So the more you inflate, the more you have to send to China to maintain the American lifestyle.

Our economy is becoming less rugged over time. A large shock becomes more and more likely to significantly disrupt our system. There is no redundancy or backup operations. Our cpu core's are all at 120% load.

<sarc>Also, its a good thing that stuff like population pressure and infectious diseases are a thing of the past (two of histories best methods for shocking a political/economic systems). You know, because the global population is under control and our climate is capable of withstanding everything we throw at it with complete aplomb. </sarc>

However when everything is going well, Keynesianism works well. I will give it that.

this is the only valid response to any techcrunch article on hn.

You are correct, but you can trisect that piece of wood an infinite number of ways. The logical equilibrium point is 3 even pieces.

The student chose a ratio of 1,1,1; which is the logical equilibrium point. your image shows 1.5,0.75,0.75; which is the second most logical ratio because it is in the form x + 2y = 3 (which can be trisected an infinite number of ways while maintaining that ratio). The third form would be x + y + z = 3; which can also be trisected an infinite number of ways and would be the least intuitive.

i am agreeing with you, i am just trying to show that it is illogical for it to be 'open for debate'.

There is a game theory term for this type of equilibrium, but i forgot its name. Its the same type of equilibrium as "there are three colors and a number, which one is different?" type sesame street problems.

I've always found arbitrage to be the best way to earn money in mmo's. I used to buy up all levels of cheap green items in the wow auction house, according to exact limits i came up with and stored in a spreadsheet. then i would disenchant them and sell the byproduct.

It was time consuming, but i made a lot of money and it took a long time before anyone else figured it out and joined in. the problem was it only took a few people on a server to skew the prices of the masses. but by then i had a lordship and manor in every city in the eastern kingdoms.

its about efficiency. There simply isnt a demand for tech workers in san jose to fill the residential high rises.

(Also the hardware industry has gone down significantly in the past 20 years. san jose will never have the 70's and 80's again)

i agree. the article is building up to the conclusion, not some stupid off-hand reference to star wars. Sometimes HN fills up with too many me-too comments.

reality tv + vigilantism = a new form of journalism?

im being glib, but there are some serious ethical journalism questions that deserve to be brought up. First of all, does every step of the investigation need to be broadcast? Is this reality tv (in internet form) or actual journalism? Can rampant vigilantism on the internet be stopped? Can real journalism prevail in the face of the instant-gratification ppl can get on reddit? Do people want real journalism?

The redditors are basically using the scorched-earth method of journalism, with no regard to who they accuse. Theyre causing considerably more harm than help, which is typical of vigilantism.

An interesting question is this: why is having reporters in vietnam a good thing while redditors following every move of the bombing investigation a bad thing (considered so by some of us at least)? (please dont answer that with a smug, poorly thought-out answer. sometimes its better to think things through and not just go straight to whipping out the epeen)

their profit is irrelevant. public companies are always under pressure to increase growth.

best response to a lay-off that I have ever seen

ignore them. The vast majority of people, on this board and otherwise, view the attainment of money as the single main goal of their life[1]. If you look at the comments they made towards you, one basically says 'why would you bash bitcoin when you already have mined bitcoins?' as if as long as you already have your stake, theres no moral ambiguities with the situation. Apparently criticism can only come from the "angst, self-hatred, jealousy" of poor people.

Personally I think you have valid criticisms. If I just want to convert dollars to btc and vice versa, why do I care what chain I am on? Bitcoin is just a brand, but the technology can be forked and new chains can be created. Granted you wont have a convenient exchange to use, but do you really think a Mexican druglord is going to transfer billions of dollars to you through mt gox for btc?

Perhaps the govt never stepped in to curtail bitcoin because they realized that speculation and greed would ruin this chain (and then possibly be in position to influence the next chain).

The tech is great but the pyramid scheme implementation is a critical flaw. Does anyone believe that the intrinsic value of having an alternative currency like btc outweighs the money being made by the prospectors?

[1] im libertarian, btw

a congestion charge would lower density. People wouldnt cram in, most would just leave. Obviously we have different goals in mind for the city.

The worst possible thing SF could do would be to completely change density and building heights in a boom period. The money is here now, so are the people. But are the entrepreneurs in soma going to stick around if the VC money dries up? Are the hip kids in mission going to stick around once their six figure tech salaries leave the area?

SF is a unique city on the west coast. It would be a travesty to let a bunch of out-of-towners come here for a few years, complain loudly enough to get their changes passed, then leave a barren and soulless modern wasteland once the boom dies down. Dont do radical expansion during a boom! The south and south-east bay will look like Detroit in a few decades, dont let it happen to SF.

Of course the politicians wont help. Brown and Newsom were so greedy/ambitious respectively, they would probably have loved to work with the tech crowd. Lee achieved what he set out to do the day he was elected; he will now most likely look to consolidate his financial situation and his power. I dont think theres been a mayoral candidate since Jello Biafra who has actually cared about the city itself.

Some of the problems SF would have if density increased significantly: -public transportation is made a for a much lower density than other big american cities. That wont be fixed until bart turns into a comprehensive subway system, which isnt happening while the state is broke. -highways and their off-ramps in the city are made for a much lower density city. -The zoning laws for big-box stores and (i think) grocery stores is pretty restrictive. That will need to change. Which is pretty significant. Maybe we dont want SF turned into SJ/LA?

My personal suggestion would be to impose a severe, severe congestion charge within city limits. This would help to separate the wheat from the chaff, but also to keep services in line with population. The problem is that city leaders are making so much money from tourism and the boom (and potentially development) that they have no interest in helping the city.

The hippies moved to haight because it was cheap and that was all they could afford. The techies moved to SF because it is a first world playground that hadnt been used up yet. Well congratulations, youll get there.

The post has nothing to do with one-way functions. The point was that its very difficult, if not impossible, to consider all the possible attack vectors in a system, even for someone with a lot of experience, even for a very simple system.

(also, its important to get as many eyeballs as possible to examine the system)

Relevant Marcus Aurelias quote:

"Think of your many years of procrastination; how the gods have repeatedly granted you further periods of grace, of which you have taken no advantage. It is time now to realize the nature of the universe to which you belong, and of that controlling Power whose offspring you are; and to understand that your time has a limit set to it. Use it, then, to advance your enlightenment; or it will be gone, and never in your power again." (Meditations 2:4)

You can become a programmer very quickly. But if you want to teach yourself to become a good one (something that no one else will do for you), you need to put in the time and effort.

The article isnt called 'become an entrepreneur' in ten years. I didnt see it as a response to anything. Its just a good article. One of the 5-6 that regularly get upvotes every year or two.

they werent built, but they sure as hell were expanded upon.

I hope thats not some dystopian sales pitch for Soylent Glue.

> (The baby boomers generation) really did a large portion of the work involved with building out the physical infrastructure that allows our economy to operate as it does today: buildings, roads, power lines, mining, machinery, warehouses, etc

> How can we forget there was an entire generation of people who turned the 1940's USA into the one of the 1970s?

The baby boomers were just entering the work force in the 1970s. You are conflating two generations.

Everywhere in the US that I am well familiar with (Portland Oregon, Minneapolis, Southwest VA, San Jose CA, greater Los Angeles) built most of their infrastructure between 1945 and 1970(schools, roads, highways, bridges).

Anecdotally speaking, the infrastructure that came after 1970 consists of strip malls, suburban housing and airports. some highways were built in LA and San Jose. The 85 is the only one i can think of off the top of my head though. Lots of road projects to widen, adjust and fix earlier mistakes though.

I think twist is inaccurate. More like it veers you from strongly believing one side, back to feeling uncertain about which side to believe.

Yes, it helps the flow of the thread. At least that way I know what line of thinking you are using. Otherwise, why even post?

'x is not a sound argument' is not a sound rebuttal.

If pilots had hangars and hangars full of free airplanes to choose from, I'm sure they would.

I think I we are saying the same thing.

I am saying that a transaction is public, not the details.

I am also saying that dominos will have that transaction tied to the delivery address. This is not intrinsic to bitcoin, its all done on dominos side as part of delivering a pizza.

So let me try again: If abc transfers bitcoins to xyz, and the FBI knows that xyz is a drug dealer, then it sees that abc transfers bitcoins to DOM, then it can subpeona dominos records and find the address of someone who purchased drugs from xyz.

The assumptions I am making: the FBI knows that xyz is a drug dealer. the FBI knows that DOM is dominos.

Are the assumptions wrong? Would the FBI be able to know that?

Im not an expert, but I will try (and if im wrong, let me know).

When you purchase something via bitcoins, it is public information. You have an address that is public that says abcdef bought this. abcdef cant be traced back to anyone unless you publicly announce you are abcdef.

When you buy a pizza, you are saying abcdef lives at this address. So anyone with a subpoena on Dominos records can tie your address to your previous purchases.

It probably wouldn't. Copyright in this situation isnt bad per se, but we've all seen how much its been abused in practice, so clearly the moral/ethical issues would be astounding.

Kinda late and maybe no one will ever read it, but I can answer this one of two ways:

What gives you the right to live the good life just because you were born within some semi-arbitrary boundary? Why do they have to live the life of poverty when they have nearly the same skill set as you?

It is inevitable. The only reason that the overseas programmers havent taken all our jobs already is that there is still too big a communication gap (language, culture, remote enviroments, etc). Once that barrier is reduced, web/mobile programming will go overseas.

Thats a very feudal attitude.

I was born on the inside of the city walls so I am richer than the serfs. God bless the Baron who keeps us rich and them poor

This is a good example of why patenting a process is acceptable, but patenting the end result is bad.

If Monsanto patented the process itself to create these dna sequences, the German farmers would not be infringing on their patent because they use completely different processes to produce the DNA: one is generated in a lab, the other is consummated in a sty.

If Monsanto found this strain of DNA and managed to reproduce it in a lab and developed a process of mass production, there is no reason they should not be able to profit from the endeavor. There is also no reason why they should be able to sue the farmers. The farmers aren't using their process for producing the dna sequences.

The fact that they could patent the sequences and sue the farmers speaks volumes about the broken state of patents. (As most everyone in tech already knew)

This case is a bit different than the Haber process because these seeds are used to produce organisms that manufacture more of the seeds. If you are patenting the process to manufacture this type of GM soybean seed, won't it cover any process that is used to manufacture these seeds, including plants in a field? It is a tricky issue, and I don't know what the precedent is.

However, if they did patent the organism itself, or the result of the process (as e40 said in a sibling comment), then I am against this type patent.

Personally, I think IP law should be small and narrowly defined. I think that patents are valid when it is a scientific (ie non-trivial) process that has a limited duration.

EDIT: After thinking about it, I think the distinction comes down to this: are they selling it? if so they have no ownership rights on the next generation of seeds. Are they licensing it? If so, yes they do have ownership of the next generation of seeds. In that case, they are licensing to you a manufacturing process where you are allowed to sell the output, but you do not own the process itself.