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jflatow

592 karma · joined January 31, 2011

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/jared; my proof: https://keybase.io/jared/sigs/odSVRtxUB8-t0hO5pAppnruZ0YoxVSO5ZCpcKnaLLg8 ]
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jflatow··on 2023 UFO Claims by David Grusch
not a secret perhaps, but actively suppressed and noised up https://www.theblackvault.com/casefiles/the-ufo-files-of-mus...

also not necessarily the first one either

jflatow··on FCC: TikTok is unacceptable security risk and should be removed from app stores
The US government is not your wife no matter where you live
jflatow··on My First Impressions of Web3
You need to know what NFT you have, it's all about the contract.

e.g. the EtherFreakers contract is immutable and contains a git commit hash (line 83: https://etherscan.io/address/0x3a275655586a049fe860be867d10c...), so you can prove you have the code which generates your freaker.

jflatow··on Ask HN: Who is hiring? (August 2021)
Compound Labs | Senior Engineer | Full-time | Remote (US continental timezones) | https://compound.finance/

Compound is an interest rate protocol on the Ethereum blockchain, that lets developers create new financial applications that are global, safe, and open. The Compound protocol is one of the largest DeFi protocols on earth, with over $15 billion earning interest, and moving billions of dollars of assets every day.

At Compound Labs we develop the protocol and new tools, alongside a community of users and COMP token-holders. Learn more about our upcoming Gateway blockchain, built in Rust: https://compound.cash/

We're always looking for world-class engineers, currently we have the following positions listed:

* Senior Engineer: https://jobs.lever.co/compound-2/c23b741c-2f62-48f4-b81f-d40...

* Rust Engineer: https://jobs.lever.co/compound-2/436bfc13-2063-436a-85f6-c69...

We work in Rust, Solidity, Elixir, Elm, and whatever other programming languages and tools suit our needs (such as formal verification). We're always learning and optimizing what we build in the name of correctness.

At Compound, you will build high-caliber technology to propel the future of decentralized finance.

jflatow··on The Amiga Consciousness
I used an Amiga as a kid, and loved it. I am sure it had a profound impact on me. I never identified with a broader Amiga using community, until now. This is so cool, I'm excited to realize that the spirit lives on.
jflatow··on Shame on Y Combinator
In general, groups that want to suspend tolerance do so because they believe tolerating such behavior/people poses a threat to society. The people you are telling to read more liberal philosophy clearly believe that the real threat to a tolerant society is suspending tolerance itself.
jflatow··on Volapük: A Cautionary Tale for Language Communities
Which makes me think that the lesson of this story is not "avoid forking at all costs", but that building anything universal is a fragile endeavor. Anybody can just come along and obsolete your status with respect to that goal. As for being forgotten, it seems inevitable, if universality is your only selling point.
jflatow··on Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says
Also, congress hasn't declared war since WWII, which is required by law.
jflatow··on It’s cheaper to build multiple native applications than one responsive web app
'www' should stand for wild, wild, web. In many ways, the web is a technology frontier, with all the frustration and liberation that goes along with it.

I sympathize with the author. The problem is trying to tame the web, as opposed to embracing it for what it is.

jflatow··on Eric Holder says Edward Snowden performed a 'public service'
And when what's being said doesn't fit the media narrative, they just edit it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1SUQ1qtdb0

jflatow··on The Plan 9 Effect or why you should not fix it if it isn't broken
> The article almost makes it sound like UTF-8 was a Plan9 invention.

It more or less was: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UTF-8#History

jflatow··on Secret Text in Senate Bill Would Give FBI Warrantless Access to Email Records
The worst part is we just have to slowly watch it happen. As Snowden says, our ability to meaningfully oppose the state has been undermined.
jflatow··on Did the Clinton Email Server Have an Internet-Based Printer?
Who knows what she would have done if she weren't stonewalled.

Your explanation is no "simpler", you're just completely disregarding the facts. People didn't just play along, she got a lot of pushback, especially for someone in such a senior position.

In 2011, she was offered a FOIAble BlackBerry. Her team said it didn't make sense. The simple explanation is that she didn't want a FOIAble BB.

https://www.scribd.com/doc/295909737/Stephen-Mull-Emails-to-...

jflatow··on Did the Clinton Email Server Have an Internet-Based Printer?
What makes you think she did all important and confidential communication on paper? Everything I've read goes counter to that.

The administration didn't accept it - a lot of people questioned it and they were told never to speak of it again (read the IG report).

jflatow··on Did the Clinton Email Server Have an Internet-Based Printer?
This is the best case version (for her), and what her camp wants people to believe. Its hard to see that it's true though. The IG report is pretty clear that she willfully violated recommendations and warnings about security.

I'm inclined to believe accounts like this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9149363

Perhaps she wasn't furtively planning to take over the world, but the evidence points to more than her just wanting to use a Blackberry - it really seems (to me) like she took significant measures to avoid keeping records.

jflatow··on TrailDB – An Efficient Library for Storing and Processing Event Data
Its not really about SQL or NoSQL - I believe AdRoll internally has systems that map SQL queries onto TrailDB where its needed.

Its about efficiency. TrailDB compresses the hell out of event streams grouped by some key (typically user). I think it's generally something like 100x - it does so by making certain assumptions about your data. Similarly, when operating on your event sequences, many of those operations can be performed as integer instructions on the compressed data.

TrailDB gives you order(s) of magnitude of leverage. That's the difference between doing analytics on a single machine and a cluster in many cases. There aren't too many other databases that were designed to gracefully handle tens of trillions of events, so its really not surprising that you need a different tool for that job.

jflatow··on TrailDB – An Efficient Library for Storing and Processing Event Data
I'm so glad AdRoll finally open-sourced this. TrailDB is by far the easiest way to process trillions of events on a single machine. Can't wait for them to start publishing their internal ecosystem around it too.
jflatow··on FBI Wants to Exempt Its Biometric Database from Some Federal Privacy Rules
What I mean is that I wonder what the internal dialogue is over this. This is more out of curiosity than indignation, I would like to be a fly on the wall to understand how this happens.

It seems to me, no matter what the reason, this is the justification they would give, because its the only reasonable one. But the Privacy Act exists for a reason, so I wonder what prompted them to decide it was worth making this proposal, and the discussion that actually ensued with the lawyers, etc. before making it. In particular, did they weigh the costs/benefits of what they are asking for, or are they just pushing for whatever privileges they can get?

jflatow··on FBI Wants to Exempt Its Biometric Database from Some Federal Privacy Rules
Considering the government currently has the same power over citizens, I can't see how this argument holds up. Especially when the government is granted powers of total surveillance and mass hacking[1], there needs to be some accountability and balance of power.

[1] https://medium.com/@RonWyden/shaking-my-head-5c1b60db9086#.h...

jflatow··on FBI Wants to Exempt Its Biometric Database from Some Federal Privacy Rules
Sure, but there are many things the FBI could be doing to be more effective. The only thing stopping them is constitutional protection of civil liberties. So I wonder what the conversation sounds like when they determine in this case, they should be exempt from the law.
jflatow··on FBI Wants to Exempt Its Biometric Database from Some Federal Privacy Rules
> The FBI wants to block individuals from knowing if their information is in a massive repository of biometric records, which includes fingerprints and facial scans, if the release of information would "compromise" a law enforcement investigation.

These tactics have become so predictable, do the people proposing these things even realize how this comes across? I really wonder what the discussions inside the FBI that lead up to these "proposals" sound like.

jflatow··on Tech firms may violate Palo Alto zoning: Writing code not allowed downtown
I think this is largely about Palantir, there's been a lot of backlash as they've been slowly taking over the city. Their presence is at least an order of magnitude bigger than any other company downtown.
jflatow··on There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
I sort of buy this. Anyone that doesn't should put forward a definition of free will that doesn't contradict itself.
jflatow··on How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds
This just begs the question though, what is the right way to tax?

Assuming that you are redistributing wealth (as you describe above), taxing wealth instead of income has a profound effect. It creates an incentive for every individual to increase the total wealth in the system, no matter who creates it, or where it's created. When you tax income, it makes no difference to you whether the income was created wealth, or merely captured.

jflatow··on How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds
Yeah, I chalk this up to broken feedback loops. A separate but related problem, is that in most places it works roughly like G = TI, with a fixed T (tax rate), so that G (government budget) is a function of I (income). The tax just works like a resistance to accumulating wealth, no matter how much the government actually needs in order to function. It would probably help if we capped G instead, i.e. T = G/I.
jflatow··on How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds
I was about to post the same sentiment re: smoking.

Given that we see this type of behavior in all industries (not just tech), it seems to me it's actually a systemic problem. People / organizations are incentivized universally to optimize for their own selfish interest, because they do not incur the cost of their decisions on everyone else. In this case, designing your product to maximize e.g. addictiveness or time spent per user makes sense if the downside of that is paid by the user.

I think taxing wealth / property instead of (primarily) income actually solves this problem, but that's another story...

jflatow··on The blockchain is a threat to the distributed future of the Internet
And who is 'everyone'? Who decides who the next iteration of 'everyone' is?
jflatow··on The blockchain is a threat to the distributed future of the Internet
What's the benefit of being 'completely decentralized', if the individual joining the network still needs to decide which network and set of rules to trust? Answer: none, you've just pushed the question of trust / centralization to that of choosing the particular fork you want to use.
jflatow··on The slow death of purposeless walking (2014)
I tend to bite my nails, especially when I'm programming or deep in thought. Last year I decided to start walking whenever I reach that point where I am fidgeting and can't sit still. It's totally changed the way I work for the better. I walk between 10-20 miles per day, and can get a lot of work done on those walks. Highly recommended, especially for people living in places with good weather and beautiful scenery.
jflatow··on Hidden Microphones Part of Government Surveillance Program in the Bay Area
No, it's far more than two devices, and it went on for 10 months. They placed surveillance all around the 2 courthouses: light fixtures, a bus stop, bushes, poles, the steps, and inside several vehicles. And there's another similar case from last year with >200 hours of recordings in San Mateo.

http://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2016/05/11/...

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