Hacker News Reader

burgerson Man builds 3D printed concrete castle in his own backyard

Are there building codes that allow for full structures built with non-reinforced concrete?

burgerson Microsoft Defies Court Order, Will Not Give Emails to US Government

> Judge Preska of course feels differently, and she has consistently agreed with the prosecution argument that the physical location of email is irrelevant because Microsoft controls the data from its base in the United States.

I find this bit very interesting. As opposed to Microsoft being a US company, it is that it's operations are located in the US. I wonder what effects this decision could have on the US labor market if companies relocate operations in the same way they relocate certain things for tax avoidance.

burgerson Inside One of the World's Largest Bitcoin Mines

I don't know enough about Chinese politics to be able to reliably comment on their intentions, but buying dollars like this could help push down the price of the Renminbi compared to the Dollar. That has been part of China's economic policy for a long time. Also, when you think about how China is under international pressure to allow the Renminbi to start naturally moving up in value, these types of currency pressures would certainly make a nice way to keep the Renminbi low without having to responsibility for it.

burgerson Inside One of the World's Largest Bitcoin Mines

Especially if said miner could pay to the chip makers offshore bank account with his offshore bank account funded by bitcoin mining.

burgerson Inside One of the World's Largest Bitcoin Mines

To add to another reply, the big perk of bitcoin mining is that you can launder your money through the purchase of equipment, real estate and power directly into US Dollars.

It's as that comment said, basically just a way to turn Renminbi into Dollars without the Chinese government knowing about it.

burgerson If You Want to See Inequality in the U.S. at Its Worst, Visit an Impound Lot

Cars are not so much expensive to operate as much as they are very risky to operate. From accident deductibles to accidentally taking a right on red because you missed the sign to stuff like getting towed because you didn't catch the no parking sign. I've spent most of my adult life without a car and it's amazing how much stuff is set up to extract income from car owners. Life without a car provides a lot less "accidental fees" as I call them. Things that you can't insure against but could cost you unexpected expense.

burgerson Detroit Is America’s Emerging Market

I'm just not sure how Detroit ever comes back as any type of manufacturing / industrial center in the NAFTA era.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada%E2%80%93United_States_Au...

There is no longer any real benefit to dealing with the additional expense of the weather issues with current trade agreements. Add to that the continuing expansion of contract manufacturing in Mexico. It just doesn't make sense for companies compared to Texas, Alabama, Mississippi etc.

It's a great story, but I just don't see how it is possible beyond a small boutique city center for special cases.

burgerson Mozilla rolls out sponsored tiles to Firefox Nightly’s new tab page

When the tiles first rolled out with Facebook etc a little while back I thought it was going to feel cheap or annoying, but I haven't really noticed. Because of that, I'm not really sure how this is going to generate much revenue either. The go away so quickly after a few minutes of browsing that I almost feel like at some point they'll need to start mixing in a couple ad tiles on each view to generate any meaningful revenue.

burgerson The criminalisation of American business

The thing this article misses is that the companies push for these settlements. If anything you could make a case that the prosecutors have more leverage than they are using and getting smaller settlements than they could have in court. That the threat of damaging the economy from a negative market reaction to a large punishment has caused the justice system to go easy on companies.

burgerson The Expanding World of Poverty Capitalism

While "sweat equity" is a fun ideal, in reality it is not very similar to passive equity. That is in essence what wealth in capitalism is. Income via passive equity.

When one is dependent on "their minds & muscles", what that actually means is that they are forced to work in government approved income activities(nothing illegal) or face imprisonment or death. That doesn't sound much like liberty to me. On the other hand, those with enough passive equity no longer need to work in government approved activities provided by the asset class, and very much do enjoy the benefits of liberty.

That said, it is very obvious to are tied to an ideology(likely because it benefits you a great deal personally), and I won't spend any more time trying to enlighten you.

burgerson The Expanding World of Poverty Capitalism

"Liberty" is definitely not a part of Capitalism. In capitalism liberty only applies to those with capital, just like liberty only applies to those with power in any system.

burgerson Mozilla Unveils $33 Intex Cloud FX Smartphone

How about OdinMonkey for asm.js?[1]

[1] https://blog.mozilla.org/luke/2014/01/14/asm-js-aot-compilat...

burgerson Mozilla Unveils $33 Intex Cloud FX Smartphone

Have you used a 320x480 phone recently? It is still very usable for web browsing. It isn't super sharp, but in my experience there was rarely(honestly, I can't remember one but there likely was some) a time where the resolution prevented me from being able to read something.

burgerson Mozilla Unveils $33 Intex Cloud FX Smartphone

Speaking of eBay, I grabbed my Open C for $45 with "Make an Offer". I've since loaded 2.1 on it and couldn't be happier. That said, my smart phone expectations are not that of the iPhone / Samsung variety.

If you are not into spending the time compiling there is a very solid build on xda[1]. I needed to apply a font fix[2] when I tested it, so keep that in mind if your fonts look strange.

I'm curious about which things you felt "scraped by". I definitely felt that on my original ZTE Open, and I immediately updated my Open C to 2.1 so I'm not sure if 1.3 is the difference there.

One of the toughest things for this phone, in my opinion, is going to be websites that use a lot of memory.

[1] http://forum.xda-developers.com/firefox-os/general/zte-c-2-1... [2] https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Firefox_OS/Developer_pho...