HNHacker News
TopNewBestAskShowJobs

samdfonseca

28 karma · joined March 7, 2016

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/samdfonseca; my proof: https://keybase.io/samdfonseca/sigs/agv1IYsHsMR_PNngvH66o2GstTS4nVYubBGgbyDWVW0 ]
submissionscomments
samdfonseca··on Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines
The article is what communicates facts. The headline is just an advertisement to draw the user in to read it. Optimizing the headline means the article is able to inform more people; in line with the mission of the organization. NYT wants to increase subscribers, not ad revenue, so it's incentivized to not confuse and disappoint readers with clickbait headlines.
samdfonseca··on Sweden Drops Julian Assange Rape Investigation
Just to be clear, 1600 of my coworkers are journalists, so I'm pretty confident in my support for journalists creds. Assange is not a journalist. Journalists don't encourage sources to break into classified systems and absolutely don't help them with it. When journalists get a stack of classified military docs, they don't indiscriminately release them to the public, they negotiate with the WH/DOD to avoid jeopardizing national security, weigh the public interest, and remove names to avoid putting people's lives at risk. See https://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/world/26editors-note.html.... If you visited a newsroom, you might be surprised to find out that the overwhelming majority of journalists don't support Assange and his "I'm a journalist" defense.
samdfonseca··on Sweden Drops Julian Assange Rape Investigation
All of the following can be true at the same time:

- Sweden dropped the charges after the US pressured them to

- The US has been seeking his extradition for years

- Sweden is extremely servile to the US in security/foreign policy

- He raped a girl in Sweden

samdfonseca··on Sweden Drops Julian Assange Rape Investigation
His actions are entirely undemocratic. Sweden and the US have both democratically built a system of justice that we all agree to subject ourselves to. He decided to evade that system to serve his own self-interest. What about defending the liberty of the alleged rape victim? Do they only have the right to their day in court if the accused is ok with it?
samdfonseca··on Sweden Drops Julian Assange Rape Investigation
I agree that standing trial for rape must be terrifying, but that doesn't mean he's being persecuted. We've agreed upon a system of justice that best protects the rights of both the accuser and the accused, and he decided to deny the alleged victim their day in court. He was free to leave the embassy, he was free to defend himself from humiliation, but he chose not to.
samdfonseca··on Sweden Drops Julian Assange Rape Investigation
> "arbitrary confinement in the Ecuadorian embassy, to his oppressive isolation, harassment and surveillance inside the embassy, and from deliberate collective ridicule, insults and humiliation"

Not only hyperbole, but it's entirely self-imposed. He wasn't confined to the embassy, he chose to stay there rather than face trial. He chose "deliberate collective ridicule, insults and humiliation" over defending himself against the accusations.

samdfonseca··on The New York Times course to teach its reporters data skills is now open-source
So you just decided you were gonna find something to criticize before you even clicked the link, eh?
samdfonseca··on Audit suggests Google favors a small number of major news outlets
what?
samdfonseca··on Crypto Market Roiled by New Allegations Against Tether, Bitfinex
This is correct, raising taxes would increase demand for dollars. Supply is greater than the tax demand, but much of the additional demand comes from the tax in dollars requirement. Since businesses have to pay sales tax in dollars, they're inclined to only accept dollars to avoid complex accounting and exchange rate liability. Being able to transact with US businesses is a large source of dollar demand.

It's also worth pointing out that income doesn't always translate to inflows of physical dollars. Complex corporate accounting standards often result in recognizing revenue before any cash is received, and non-cash transactions that affect income.

samdfonseca··on Show HN: Flipadelphia flips your features
it's a feature flip/toggle service http://martinfowler.com/bliki/FeatureToggle.html https://code.flickr.net/2009/12/02/flipping-out/