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bynkman

49 karma · joined March 6, 2017

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bynkman··on Peacetime CEO / Wartime CEO (2011)
Related, I've seen many business leaders overuse sports analogies in talk. (I don't really follow sports that much.) The message ends up being very white male cis, and not inclusive. It muddies the message, especially in tech companies with a diverse group of employees.
bynkman··on How Anker is beating Apple and Samsung at their own accessory game (2017)
If Apple and Samsung's products were quality and durable, this probably wouldn't be an issue. But instead they're being greedy with undue markup and making cheep accessories. This probably wouldn't be a thing if it wasn't for cables that stop working.
bynkman··on More than eighty cultures still speak in whistles
If you can't whistle, there's a way to use an acorn or a bottle cap to do so. I can whistle, but not that loud, and often use a bottle cap to whistle loudly at venues. https://youtu.be/tydJLavu8Fc
bynkman··on Brood X Periodical Cicadas FAQ
Some broods are very localized and small. I believe Brood X is going to be a large brood for many areas East of the Mississippi. 2024 may be a bonkers year for SE Missouri/NW Kentucky, when two broods will come out around the Mississippi. I live in Kansas City, and 2014 was a brood year for the area. We won't be seeing much until 2024. Many of my friends have been posting about Brood X, here in KC. But I've been having to educate them about the locality of brood X.

The 2004 brood in KC was a good size. Totally freaked me out, since I had recently moved to the area, and had never seen a cicada in my life. At first, I thought they were alarms going off.

bynkman··on For every 1% increase in the number of lawyers, economic growth falls 3% (1986)
So 13,000 at the bottom of the ocean is a good start?
bynkman··on Ask HN: Why doesn't Amazon release a phone?
Thank you. I came here to call out this. I will say that implementing a phone is not easy. Just look at the issues Palm and Blackberry have had to stay relevant. Nokia did for a while, but finally went with Android. At least in the American market, it seems that Motorola, Samsung, Google, and Apple are the winners these days.
bynkman··on Learning to Program Is Getting Harder
I've had courses and classes which make sure that the students have everything installed that they need. And sometimes they also provide some sort of web interface to enter code.

Overall I completely understand where the author is coming from. It used to be that you could easily pick up programming in Basic, since it was installed by default. Now, not so much.

bynkman··on Dave Rubin Interviews Peter Thiel (2018)
I'm in the same boat. I discovered his channel about this time. Liked some of the in depth interviews. But then it quickly went weirdly political.
bynkman··on WTF? I cannot cancel my NYTimes subscription online?
That's one heck of a dark pattern.
bynkman··on Cyborgs and Space (1960) [pdf]
Sounds like an interesting course. I love Ian Banks and Peter F Hamilton books. I'll throw Alaister Reynold's Revelation Space series into the mix, though he has few if any future utopian elements.
bynkman··on Your cyberpunk games are dangerous (2015)
Great article. The Steve Jackson raid is the stuff of legend, and confusion. This article definitely clears up the fog of war regarding the ordeal.
bynkman··on The McDonnell Douglas-Boeing merger led to the 737 Max crisis
> Stonecipher seems to have agreed with this assessment. “When people say I changed the culture of Boeing, that was the intent, so it’s run like a business rather than a great engineering firm,” he told the Chicago Tribune in 2004. “It is a great engineering firm, but people invest in a company because they want to make money.”

Wow. In retrospect, this is an amoral path. Basically it's money over lives. Furthermore, this "intent" has cost them more financially.

bynkman··on What are those grids of glass in the sidewalk and why are they purple?
I know of a few places in Kansas City that have under sidewalk vaults. In some of those places they have warning signs about not parking. Here's one. https://bit.ly/36qPLvy
bynkman··on The Feds Get Permission to Seize Edward Snowden's Book Profits
If that's the case, maybe donate to the EFF.
bynkman··on 1950s Smart Homes and the Longevity of Design
Ha! I was just thinking of the house in the JoCo Museum. (I live in the KC metro too.)
bynkman··on Verified SMS from Google
I recently had to stop using Hangouts, having to change to messages.google.com. I liked the Hangouts web UI better. There's some unfriendliness to Messages. I understand Google wanting to consolidate messaging. I just wish they would have merged all their messaging in a sensible way.
bynkman··on Discontinued Microsoft Products
Microsoft Bob (1995-1996), R.I.P.
bynkman··on Why the ‘Queen of Shitty Robots’ Renounced Her Crown
Allowing ourselves to fail (and learn and have fun) is a powerful thing. I discovered this a few years back playing a (new to me) board game with friends. I didn't know it well enough to win, so took the point of view that I'd probably lose, but have fun at the same time, learning this new game. All too often we are told that we have to win, succeed, make a passing grade. This definitely puts in a level of not fun and anxiety. But once you give yourself permission to fail, that dynamic changes.
bynkman··on LA adds hundreds of EV chargers to streetlights
I'm reminded of the Watchmen comic book, with its ubiquitous recharging "plugs" on the streets. The future is here, just not evenly distributed.
bynkman··on Martin Scorsese: I Said Marvel Movies Aren’t Cinema. Let Me Explain
It's true, media and cinema have changed. Though it's through him and other directors of his generation (Lucas, Spielberg, Coppalla), the "Movie Brats" that helped change it. The old model, which he is being nostalgic for was failing. The Movie Brats came along and changed that, revitalizing the movie industry. Out with the old, in with the new. (New, lighter better film cameras in the 70s helped.)

And now, studio execs are geared towards profit. A franchise, big budget film is more likely to make a profit than a small film. So studios are less likely to fund small films.

Also, in the further pursuit of profits, studios take bigger profits for theater rights to show a film. Which is easier for big theater chains to do, and much more difficult for independent to do.

At the moment, there are very few solutions to these problems. Making small films are expensive. Independent film makers rarely make a profit.

bynkman··on We Never Paid for Journalism
The rise of Craigslist is one factor. But I'm surprised that nobody is talking about local advertisers vs national. National business and websites are more likely to advertise on a (local) news website, compared to your local business. For example, twenty years ago a local mom and pop pizza joint would be apt to advertise in a newspaper, due to a captive local audience. But today, they'd be less likely to advertise on a local newspaper website. So there goes that revenue. And you're not going to find them pushing ads to the Huffington post.

Also the rise of online business review websites (Yelp, Google Reviews, Trip Advisor, ect) are now more useful and specifically targeted to an audience looking for local eats. (And also killed the Yellowpages.)

bynkman··on Survey: Average American Hasn’t Made a New Friend in 5 Years
I guess I'm an aberration. I'm 40+ and I'm an introvert; and I've made at least six good, new friends in the last three years. I will say that all but one of those new friends can be attributed to hobbies and interests.
bynkman··on 100-hour MRI captures the most detailed view yet of a whole human brain
The average human brain is 1450 cubic centimeters. With a resolution of 0.1 millimeters, that's 100 * 100 * 100 data points in a cubic centimeter. For approximately 1.45 billion data points for one brain!
bynkman··on Less than a month to go before Google breaks links to Google+ Picasa albums
I'm glad somebody said this. I totally agree. I still use the Picasa desktop software. It's brilliant for picking out best pics and tweaking them. The web interface just doesn't compare.

When they announced that the desktop software was going away, I immediately downloaded the final version and archived it away. More than likely I will use it until Windows no longer supports it... unless someone "makes a better Picasa".

bynkman··on Minimum Viable Personality (2011)
Simon Sinek talks about this too, and uses Apple as the example.

Start with why -- how great leaders inspire action https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4ZoJKF_VuA

bynkman··on Parachuting Beavers into Idaho's Wilderness? Yes, It Really Happened (2015)
We shall not forget the Cincinnati Turkey Tragedy...
bynkman··on How to Land on Mars
In July 1997, I was temporarily unemployed and in the unemployed doldrums. I remember watching the day by day updates on Mars Pathfinder. Matt Golombek was the Pathfinder lead and face on TV (CSPAN?). He's a bit presuming but he quickly became my geek hero. Good to see that he's a lead on InSight, twenty years later.
bynkman··on Feynman Did you take the doors?
Time to re-read Feynman's books. It's been a long time.
bynkman··on Ask HN: What has the past 12 months taught you?
I hear you brother. I haven't cracked this one yet either. I've given up a bit, but I should know better... Nothing is going to change unless I keep putting myself out there.
bynkman··on The Growing Emptiness of the “Star Wars” Universe
A bit click baity. Solo delivered what was promised. But really, I think his big issue is really the big issue with Hollywood. But he doesn't really address that. Most new takes on regular tropes are being written for TV. Our trope vocabulary is bigger now than years ago. (Maybe seeing Upgrade on Sunday, will deliver. We'll see.) And really, we are in an era that has an embarrassment of riches. Which is probably why I've become more picky with my media intake.
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