Hacker News Reader

douglas_kon First floating wind farm, built by offshore oil company, delivers electricity

So, they plan on putting in a 1MWh battery to even out the power production. I often wonder how long the batteries in such a large installation will last. Does anyone here know?

douglas_kon Canada's 'secret spy agency' is releasing a malware-fighting tool to the public

CSIS likes very much to not be in the news. They seem to actively work to stay unknown. I've heard, but cannot verify, that they are the only government agency that is not required to have a "Government of Canada dept X" sign outside their buildings. They do have them outside some buildings, but not all buildings.

douglas_kon Canadian 'freezeway' could let residents skate to work

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA512

I'm in Ottawa. I really need to get around to skating this year before it melts away. Thanks for the post and the reminder to get out there!

(Yes, I'm playing with my Keybase.io account / tool) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: Keybase OpenPGP v2.0.4 Comment: https://keybase.io/crypto

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douglas_kon Monarch butterflies could be declared an endangered species

In some areas, one of the monarch's main food sources, the milkweed plant, is considered a noxious weed. The number of areas (In Canada, at least) has gone down over the years, which I expect is a plus for the monarch butterfly.

douglas_kon Why you can't get 4K Netflix and Amazon

DRM was sold to the politicians and public alike as a means of getting great content to customers and preventing piracy.

I suspect it won't be long before the DRM being used for the Amazon and Netflix 4K TV streams are well and truly broken like they were for HDMI and other "secure" measures before it.