mithaler

Why not? These are high-quality, well-designed apps based on excellent ideas.

The article is presenting well-cited scientific studies, with summaries and disclaimers where statistical issues have been correctly raised. Together, the article's point is that the "climategate" emails were a distraction that the media followed instead of all of the numerous studies coming out in the same year on the subject.

With that in mind, yes, it may be political advocacy, but no one here has raised any real reason why the research behind them shouldn't be taken seriously. If someone posted a list of articles coming out at the same time that rebutted their findings, I might think differently, but as it is I can't help thinking from observing the response here that the article's point may be truer than even its writers imagined. There's real science here! Discussion about the discussion is a distraction from it. If you think we shouldn't be discussing climate change, show me why you think the research is bogus instead of just telling me "political issues don't belong on HN". It's political because there's a lot of money at stake, not because the science is controversial; and please, if you think I'm wrong about that, show me why. I really, really, really want to be. Other scientific articles are fine on HN, so why not this?

Mind you, one definitely shouldn't argue from this that adopting Israel's airport security system would be a good idea for the USA (with, among other things, its much larger threatened area), as the article mentions. But it's important to note it, because it shows that there are effective options for securing air travel that don't cause such a devastating invasion of privacy and/or provoke molestation accusations.

Without that, his argument that Google is in some sort of "decline" because of their introduction can't be taken seriously, and the article is nothing more than a rant about how he dislikes them. This is a fact about John C. Dvorak, not Google.

The only way I know of to pull contact info from Facebook is to use my Droid's excellent contact syncing, and even that's one-way and can't add any data to my Google Contacts.

While you didn't use that phrase yourself, the implication that it could be applied to Apple's offerings reeks of co-option to me--I think Gruber's right about that, since Apple appears to focus on providing the best experience for each individual device (and devices from other vendors aren't even an issue for them--why should they be?). That said, however, I think you're right in that it would certainly be sensible from their perspective to make it easier for developers of one of their platforms to pick up development for their other ones.

I know basically nothing about who actually looks at the apps that get submitted. Nor do I know anything about what apps typically get rejected. I've never worked with the App Store personally, as a developer or a consumer. But I understand developers should expect a time period of anywhere between an hour and two weeks before getting approval, during which presumably a human looks at it, right?

I just can't imagine any adult of sound mind and typical socialization (and presumably having gone through training that explained what Apple's internal policy is toward app approvals) wouldn't realize that that app is offensive. Thus, the only explanations I can come up with are either a) whoever approved it genuinely didn't notice its content (possible but highly unprofessional and careless, to a degree I normally wouldn't expect from a company with Apple's reputation) or b) Apple's famously stringent approval policy contains nothing that forbids this content.

Hell, it's possible I'm expecting more stringency from them than actually exists. Most of my knowledge of the App Store comes from the tech press. But there's no getting around the fact that a human looked at this and approved it. We are thus in the second scenario you mentioned: someone has seen your pants and very likely your unbuttoned fly, and the situation has not been rectified. Consequently, I feel I do have standing to hold Apple accountable for this, and as you say, more so because of their apparent position in the past in support of their LGBT employees.

It was last updated Oct 7; no idea how long before that it existed. They've had plenty of time to notice this. With that in mind, I can't think of it as anything other than an endorsement.

Also, not saying you're making this up, but do you have a citation for the tax breaks over benefits thing? I'd never heard anything about Apple's Q?LGBT[A-Z]* policy, and I'm curious.

In any case, he doesn't answer the central question that arguing for anarchy inevitably provokes: once we take away the power monopoly of government, what's to stop someone from seizing power by force and being far worse than any government that preceded them?

The problem with the Hitler example is that that's pretty much exactly what Hitler did. Weimar Germany was far from a model of sane government; it felt powerless after the war, it was crippled economically and it lacked real leadership. The spirit of nationalism that had made Germany such a powerful force before WWI had been broken by its defeat, and Hitler took power by stepping in to fill the void that it left.

In other words, the Hitler example is exactly what a sane government prevents. The problem there wasn't the fact that there was a government in power; it was that there wasn't one. Anarchy was the problem, not the solution.

The only real solution I would be able to offer him is to make an account himself--a real one--and never use it (much like I do with my account these days). That assumes, however, that Facebook has some means of verifying that someone is not an impersonator and is in fact the real one. I'm no expert on that--do they?

If it were up to me, it'd be git, with separate branches for production and beta for easy merging.

> The subtext to a lot of homophobic thinking is the idea that gays will try to get straight people into bed at the first opportunity, or that gays are looking to "convert" straights. Freud called this concept schwanzangst; the U.S. Army calls it Don't Ask Don't Tell.

I haven't really heard any arguments from those people that made any sense, but all the same this came across as an uncomfortably large leap.

But when a client makes a request like this, often unaware of what may actually be easy or fast or simple or consistent, I can't say no to it. Saying that we need to take more time to write tests and document it properly would likely come across as similarly unprofessional and reflect badly on the company. And the consequences are every bit as bad as you say they are: the code rots and becomes volatile and obnoxious to maintain.

That's why it hurts to read this post--it feels so painfully true. I'm lucky in that at my company, my project managers are coders themselves who understand the programmatic constraints and the danger of software rot--but my clients usually aren't. I have no solution for this; it's a fine line to walk.

I'm really curious about his setup. If it's Windows, I've been able to make long-used Windows machines feel much snappier by trimming cruft annually or so. One of the reasons I love Ubuntu so much is that I don't have to do that.

Personally, I think the issue is deeper than the way they're selling it; it's that their values are fundamentally not in line with the communities they're trying to sell IE9 to, and thus, their only recourse is PR--which technically-minded users and developers are quick to pick apart and call bullshit on. RoR, PHP, jQuery, etc. are all open-source free software projects; on the most basic level, selling IE9 to those people is going to be hard, without even mentioning the historical baggage the IE name carries. Hell, most of those people don't even use Windows, and thus literally can't directly benefit from IE; making sure their websites render properly in it can only be seen as a nuisance at best and an outright hindrance at worst.

> You don’t really have to understand what these questions mean, but throw them into the conversation and then act interested when he answers. (Actually, this works for pretty much any topic.)

Do you really think this is what most geeks would want in someone they're married to? Do you think this would be the basis for a healthy relationship?

I don't care if anyone wants this. It's bloody awful advice.

Assuming you're defining "successful" as "making money", you're simultaneously claiming that the iOS App Store is too draconian for developers to succeed, and that it's more successful.

Furthermore, I haven't seen evidence that the two issues--stringency of policy towards developers and potential for financial success--are correlated.

Many of the enduring criticisms of Android I've seen are pointed at the Market. No matter how much merit those criticisms may have--inadequate policing, malware, weak categorization, whatever--separate distribution channels are exactly what's missing from the mobile app ecosystem, forcing distributors to compete, learn from each other and improve.

I'm excited to finally see Android's strengths being taken advantage of. The fact that Amazon can do this and still have a thriving platform to target speaks to its strength. And hey, if it fails, someone else can try again and maybe do better.

Write it yourself? If you did it well, maybe it would help other people understand your point.

But I agree that Wikileaks has been editorializing too much. I liked it when they were acting as journalists, not activists.