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snomad

1,690 karma · joined June 5, 2011

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snomad··on Manual for a popular facial recognition tool shows how much the software tracks
That is an odd statement. Do you believe non-capitalist societies can't put forth a hundred justifications for facial recognition?

If so, how do you explain communist China's extensive surveillance / camera system? How about socialist countries in Europe?

snomad··on After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'
If you haven't heard of him before, you may want to read up on Harry J. Anslinger[0]. Joe Rogan also has a really in depth episode on him. He was deputy commissioner of the federal department that oversaw prohibition. when that ended, he went on to narcotics enforcement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger

snomad··on What is the Fourth Dimension? (1884)
> Honestly what confuses me is what special distinction does time get to make it not considered a dimension like the others?

My less-than-a-layman understanding is that it really is just a physical point/plane - but as 3-dimensional creatures it will appear to us as time.

Sagan's flatland video shows the 3-d apple moving through 2-dimensional as transitory slices; the 2-d creatures don't see the entire apple because they are fine tuned for 2-d existence.

snomad··on Bitfinex, the Italian network behind the boss that makes Bitcoin tremble
The whole thing feels like scammy / tulip mania, but I think it is worth pointing out that Bitfinex repaid $550 million Feb 5. Though nothing comes up right away, I think the next trial date w/New York is Sept 2021.
snomad··on No Qualified Immunity for Cops Who Made Stuff Up to Justify Phone Seizure
Or, they just do a better job of covering up for each other, choose to enforce the law less frequently, arrive to reported crimes slower, etc...
snomad··on The worst of the two worlds: Excel meets Outlook
BTW, they do have a JS API. Been using it a lot recently, fairly easy and straightforward

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office/dev/add-ins/develop/...

snomad··on New 10 Terapixel Image of the Night Sky Contains 1B Galaxies
Off topic, but only 2 weeks until perseverance reaches mars https://www.nasa.gov/perseverance https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tITni_HY1Bk&list=PLTiv_XWHnO...
snomad··on Turn to RSS Feeds to Regain Control of the World Wide Web
Nitter has RSS feeds. Better UI too
snomad··on Why Robinhood disabled buys but not sells
Similar explanation was posted Jan 28 on twitter by Silent Cal[1]. This article and the twitter thread do paint a very plausible explanation. And is easy to accept.

OTOH, a potentially far more nefarious, yet plausible, underlying motive was posted on /r/wsb today [2] that links GME to counterfeiting shorts.

Given Steve Cohen's numerous scandals through the years as detailed on wikipedia [3], needing to cover up for counterfeiting shorts also seems like a plausible explanation.

I hope the finance committee investigations AOC called for take place and consider both points.

* - Not invested in GME, and prohibited from doing so by my employer. No intention of committing suicide and happy w/life.

[1] - https://twitter.com/KralcTrebor/status/1354952686165225478

[2] - https://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets/comments/l97ykd/the_...

[3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Cohen_(businessman))

snomad··on ‘Meme stock’ rally rescues AMC theaters from $600M debt
> What's funny is this is pointing out big holes in the "but it's 150% shorted" story.

Not sure I follow. The hedge funds are shorting the stock, debt holders are converting to stock, Retail (and plenty of big players) are buying and holding. 3 different parties.

snomad··on Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy
Agreeed. And there are several obvious laws without touching 230. Off the top of my head

- Ban businesses engaged in online advertising from compiling real world data / mixing physical world data with the online profiles of users

- Ban businesses engaged in online advertising from building profiles of people who have not opted into their platform; require permanent removal of all data within 30 days of any user leaving their platform

- Require businesses provide human based appeal process to any user or business that spends or earns $1,000 in a year before suspending or terminating an account

These could even be done at the state proposition level, absent state authority

snomad··on Discord bans r/WallStreetBets server, subreddit went private for a while
Are they not familiar with the euphemism treadmill?

http://www.cambridgeblog.org/2020/08/ableist-language-and-th...

snomad··on Amazon presses for in-person voting for unionization election
https://whdh.com/news/amazon-pushing-for-milestone-union-vot...

Amazon said that at its Bessemer facility, 2.88% of Amazon’s 7,575 employees and third-party workers at the facility — or 218 people — tested positive during the 14-day period ending on January 7. Amazon rejected the idea that this would be considered an outbreak.

snomad··on No one knows how much the government can borrow
A McDonalds double cheeseburger meal costs $8.

I remember when that was 3.99 not too long ago. Somehow I doubt that price difference is captured by the official 1 - 2% inflation rate.

snomad··on One hull crack located in ISS, another one suspected
Seems we have dialed back manned missions, but the rovers on Mars, the satellites orbiting Jupiter (Juno) and Cassini, reaching Pluto (New Horizons), and asteroids (Hayabusa) and soon to be James Webb Telescope are all very exciting and represent significant progress.
snomad··on 75% of the original Disney+ executive team is no longer at Disney
works the same way at the president / provost / dean level at universities
snomad··on Facebook Admits It Was Used to Incite Violence in Myanmar (2018)
At a certain level of daily MAU, (say 100k?), every single post most be manually checked before becoming available to the public. They should be checked for a) child porn b) violence c) doxxing

They are free to run algos to auto reject, sort whatever order.

This would likely be too burdensome, and the socials would almost certainly have to start charging for access, which in of itself would probably remove much of the problem.

snomad··on Over 73% of U.S. Adults Overweight or Obese
It is not simply that the USD is the reserve currency; the US has also changed how it measures CPI (to the benefit of the government and detriment of those on social security). This investopedia article is a pretty good summary

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/07/consumerpriceindex....

snomad··on The Capitol Attack Doesn’t Justify Expanding Surveillance
CHAZ and and the Minneapolis Autonomous Zone indicate it was far more serious then your post indicates.

On Tuesday night, a cop killed a man in Modesto - it was the 4th person killed by the same cop [1]. As you say, their are serious questions to ask about the police force and militarization. However, the racist/right wing thing is far too reductionary and fails to capture lack of proper training, lack of proper post-shooting responses, etc.

1 - https://www.reddit.com/r/ActualPublicFreakouts/comments/krng...

snomad··on Arrests of Hong Kong democrats shows why EU must reject China investment
Highly recommend this one https://www.amazon.com/Burying-Mao-Richard-Baum/dp/069103637...

Here's the author's obituary, it does a nice job summarizing his expertise on the subject https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-richard-baum-...

snomad··on Apple has threatened to ban Parler from the App Store
People regularly threaten NFL players on twitter... what is a real solution? It has been going on since at least 2012...

2020 - https://foxsportsradio.iheart.com/content/2020-11-23-nfl-pla...

2012 - https://www.nfl.com/news/david-akers-closes-twitter-account-...

snomad··on Sealed U.S. Court Records Exposed in SolarWinds Breach
> Under the AO’s new procedures, highly sensitive court documents filed with federal courts will be accepted for filing in paper form or via a secure electronic device, such as a thumb drive

Aren't thumb drives (USB) also vulnerable?

snomad··on Librem 5 Evergreen vs. Pinephone
Would love a phone w/out a camera. I do not know why they are seen as necessity.
snomad··on Show HN: DotComAgain – Find free dropped .com domains
Nice idea, and nicely done.

This is where an endless list does NOT work. I want to know the total # results for my search, so I can better decide judge if I should add more words to the search query.

My workflow would be to compare a bunch of saved choices, would be nice to make it easy to add bunch to a cart/list of some sort then

snomad··on WTF Happened in 1971? (2019)
This video has a nice summary of all the changes in the 1970s, and how many other prominent authors have documented that radical shift. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gEz__sMVaY

The author believes the problems can be traced to the US congress switching from closed (anonymous) to open voting on January 3rd, 1971

Somewhat related, this post shows how the US congress has grown incredibly divided over time https://www.realclearscience.com/journal_club/2015/04/24/pol...

snomad··on Don't use third party auth to sign in
Uniqueness of browser plugins creates unique signature specific to user.
snomad··on WordPerfect for DOS Updated
Reveal codes.

They had a box below main editor that everyone used to go in and edit codes for outlines, indentation, page breaks, etc. Super simple.

https://images.pcworld.com/reviews/graphics/125257-2406p075-...

snomad··on YouTube-dl source code encoded in two images
Some negative points highlighted below but I think this is right tract still. Maybe an updated GPL with prohibition against DMCA?
snomad··on ProtonMail CEO calls Apple's forced in-app purchases 'Mafia extortion'
It sounds like they weren't taking any payments via phone. Purchase only happened on the web, and Apple reviewers found text that led to web.

It would be one thing if they were selling phone and skipping Apple that way. But if their are no phone payments, and only non-obvious links, it should not be required (or maybe I am misinterpreting this)

snomad··on Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?
I like Dan Millman's lesson in a Peaceful Warrior

What time is it? Now Where are you? Here

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