Hacker News Reader

trentnixon Can a $310M startup avoid due diligence?

But the same people excluded by the government from investing in early stage tech companies are encouraged by the same government to buy lottery tickets and visit casinos.

trentnixon Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

First of all, at 35 you're still a baby. Tap the brakes on your anxiety around running out of time.

Second, most everyone is recommending other self-interested pursuits and I don't think you'll find the best fulfillment there.

For me, the answer to "what's the point?" is: kids. After I pursued all of my self-interested goals (resulting in a mix of failure and success depending on who's keeping score) I had kids and realized none of that stuff I pursued really, truly mattered. In fact I wish I'd had kids sooner, as young children (I've got three) are an especially thorough ass-kicking for a 40+-year-old.

Having kids with a like-minded, selfless partner is literally the very best thing I've ever done. And it's the best thing I suspect you'll ever do if it comes to pass. As a friend of mine (who also had kids later in life) says, you have kids and you realize "oooohhhh, this is the whole point".

trentnixon Delta CEO wants U.S. to put unruly passengers on 'no-fly' list

Are you arguing with me? You must be argumentative. I'll bet you go to school board meetings. That makes you more likely to cause an incident on the plane. You must go on the list. Expect a visit from CPS to check on the welfare of your children. They may be in danger. /s

trentnixon Delta CEO wants U.S. to put unruly passengers on 'no-fly' list

Seems pretty awful to suggest that the government-managed 'no-fly' list should be used for anything after watching how poorly it was used and abused as a security measure. But considering the airlines look to the government to solve their financial problems, it's no surprise they would look to the government to solve their passenger problems as well. I assume begging for government intervention has become an airline CEO reflex, at this point.

Bureaucracy, security theater, and airline/airport ineptitude has turned flying into a painful, regrettable process. Add shrinking seat space and airport and airplane booze to the mix and you've got a recipe for stress, discomfort, and short tempers.

I suspect booze is actually the primary culprit. I've flown a few hundred flights in my time and only witnessed two, rather tame, incidents that caused people to be kicked off flights or caused in-air arguments. In one case the culprit was very drunk. The other case the culprit was very hung over.

trentnixon Can computers cope with human races? (1989)

I can agree with that. It might be uselessly imprecise. But the parent suggested asking one’s race was fundamentally racist. That’s absurd.

trentnixon Can computers cope with human races? (1989)

You’re being pedantic.

trentnixon Can computers cope with human races? (1989)

I agree. But that’s a problem with how one’s race is being asked, not whether it is out-of-bounds to ask.

trentnixon Can computers cope with human races? (1989)

You don’t seem to understand what race, as it’s used in this context, actually means.

trentnixon Can computers cope with human races? (1989)

It has helped politicians. And that means if the problem is ever solved, politicians won’t benefit anymore. So lots of tax money is spent but the problem remains purposefully unsolved.

trentnixon Can computers cope with human races? (1989)

There are genuinely different risk factors and biological predispositions that are impacted by one’s racial background. The idea that we should pretend race is only a social construct is completely unscientific and absurd.

To argue asking about one’s race is racism will absolutely, positively have negative outcomes in providing quality healthcare. A good physician should never be ignorant of such things. And there’s no such thing as a good physician who is willfully ignorant of such things.

trentnixon No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

Apples and bowling balls. As I said in another comment:

While substance abuse is an illness and should be treated as such, it's not leukemia or muscular dystrophy. It requires an active participant to make a concerted effort to obtain and abuse an addictive, destructive substance. So it's no surprise that substance abuse might not be given the same level of sympathy.

trentnixon No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

Once again, I think that's a fun thing to see because it's always nice to dunk on the broader culture, but that's genuinely not been my experience. People are generally very understanding and considerate of substance abuse situations and the carnage that surrounds it.

And it should be noted that while substance abuse is an illness and should be treated as such, it's not leukemia or muscular dystrophy. It requires an active participant to make a concerted effort to obtain and abuse an addictive, destructive substance. So it's no surprise that substance abuse might not be given the same level of sympathy.

trentnixon No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

While we're at it, let's de-stigmatize the abuse of substances and treat it like a real mental health issue.

Literally everyone involved in the treatment and support of substance abuse does that, whether it's treatment facilities or social groups like AA and Al-Anon. As they should. Every family I know has been affected in one way or another by drug or alcohol addiction and has firsthand knowledge that substance abuse must be treated like an illness and to forgive (but not forget) the damage it causes. So I'm not exactly sure your statement reflects reality.

trentnixon The Texas electric grid failure was a warm-up

This is generally true. And I assume the reliably liberal Texas Monthly spares no opportunity to gore conservative oxen, so I expect this article does so with bias and glee. But Texas politicians have spent a decade laughing at the power woes of California and other over-regulated hellscapes, so the 2021 winter storm and subsequent outage was a bit of a comeuppance.

It turns out that power grids don't really care much about your political philosophy. They still require competent engineering and maintenance and planning and accountability. And that requires smart people doing their jobs with adequate resources, which isn't guaranteed whether you've voted for the deepest blue or the brightest red government you can get.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

It’s not useful because it’s not really an indicator of one’s ability to perform and can’t really be affected through training. It’s primarily affected by genetics and weight.

That said, it does provide some correlation to an athletes performance “ceiling”, and you’ll typically find elite endurance athletes are naturally blessed with an impressive Vo2 max. You’re not going to win the Tour de France with a Vo2 max of 50 no matter how hard you train, just like you’ll never play Center in the NBA if you’re 6’1.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

Not at all! And CDA deserves to be spelled correctly, anyway. All good.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

At that effort, close to 0. Maybe 20% for someone with great genetics.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

When I started I was able to run a 5k and that was about it. I trained for 21 or 22 weeks.

I think my marathon was a 5:30 or something like that. Lots of walking, but I never stopped moving.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

Sure, but my point was really to suggest I’m just a regular guy who did an Ironman very slowly. There are physiological freaks at Ironman events, but I was certainly not one of them. Regular people with a plan and appropriate training can do it.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

Yep. Sorry for transposing a few letters. It’s a tremendously beautiful and friendly place. I’d love to go back one of these days.

trentnixon Portable replacement for a $60k VO2 Max machine

This is really great. For those who aren't familiar with what these machines can do, the calculation of an athlete's Vo2 max really isn't all that useful. However, a breakdown of the fat and carbohydrate calories burned at various efforts can be incredibly useful for helping an athlete learn how to fuel correctly for performance over distance.

I'm not a physiologist or physician (and I'm sure what I'm about to say may be max cringe to the bonafide experts that are around), but my basic understanding is that when expending effort, you burn calories from fat stores and from glycogen stores. Glycogen stores store around 2000 calories, and expending one's glycogen stores results in hitting "the wall" - your body simply doesn't have any fuel to proceed. Your fat stores, on the other hand, provide access to tens of thousands of calories.

People are generally fat-inefficient - any effort immediately biases towards consumption of glycogen. And when you're out, that's it. Your day is done. So knowing the rate you're burning carbohydrate calories can inform an athlete how often and how much to fuel.

Some people are born "fat-efficient", meaning they can access their fat stores easier. Fat efficiency can also be improved through low-intensity endurance training with improved diet. So athletes will periodically do a VO2 test to stay in-tune with how their body is using the fuel sources available to it.

Many years ago I did an Ironman (Couer d'Alene) and a Vo2 test indicated I needed to aggressively consume calories (at the effort I was planning to ride) on the bike. After all, you have to get off the bike nutritionally prepared and hydrated to run a marathon. So that's what I did, and I had a good day considering I really wasn't all that fit.

Endurance and ultradistance events aren't really tests of toughness. They are science experiments. It's all about figuring out how to take one's fitness and stretch it over the distance of the event.

One additional note - there are machines much less expensive than 60k available, but they are still pretty expensive (in the thousands).

trentnixon World ocean temperatures in 2021 were the hottest ever recorded

Bet.

trentnixon Google doesn't want to pay Sonos for technology it copied

And Amazon paid a number of talking heads and tech luminaries to help them with the blowback they were getting at the time for such a trivial patent. Scumbags, all.

trentnixon Milton Friedman’s Interest Rate Fallacy

While there are plenty of close-minded conservatives, in contrast Milton Friedman was genuine, engaging, and patient with all interlocuters. There are hundreds of hours of video available showing how not only was he gracious and humble, he was an excellent listener as well.

But despite this track record of affable behavior, he's demonized. But he's demonized not because he was a polemic, but rather because he was effective. And that's the unfortunate reality of today's political discourse.

For those who don't know about Milton Friedman, I highly encourage you to watch one of the many Youtube videos where he's being interviewed (such as when he was interviewed on the Phil Donahue show). You can judge for yourself.

trentnixon DuckDuckGo Traffic

I’ve been using DDG for a few years and rarely find myself using Google anymore. I don’t feel like DDG has gotten much better, but Google results definitely seem like they’ve gotten worse. But I could be wrong.

Either way, I’ve come to loathe Google. Now if only a viable YouTube alternative would emerge…

trentnixon Canon is telling customers how to override counterfeit cartridge warnings

I bought extra HP cartridges off of Amazon years ago for my business so we would have extras. Imagine my surprise when, after installing the cartridges about a year later, I learned they were the wrong “region”. Turns out HP region locks ink like they are Blu-Rays or Nintendo games!

I had no idea I was buying “out-of-region” ink cartridges and I also had no idea such a thing could possibly matter. I called HP and the tech support person had the gall to tell me they have different ink for different regions because the climates are different. I nearly swallowed my teeth at the stupidity of such a claim.

They offered nothing until I started telling my story on Twitter, and suddenly a Support person messaged me on Twitter offering free replacements. So not only do they have an indefensible strategy of region-locking ink cartridges, they also train you to whine as loudly as possible to get any sort of recourse.

The entire printer industry appears to be running one scam or another.

trentnixon Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

Let them eat cake!

trentnixon Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

> It’s pretty simple. They are more likely to get sick and more likely to infect those whose care they are entrusted with.

In a vacuum, that makes sense. But in the midst of genuine shortage of healthcare professionals, it's myopic foolishness. And I'd guess your comment about the lasting effect of actual recovery is going to turn out to be very wrong and already contradicts most everything I've seen recently regarding the immune response to reinfection after Covid recovery.

edit: Here are a few links that contradict your statement that immunity doesn't last very long:

https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting...

https://www.futurity.org/covid-19-survivors-immunity-viruses...

trentnixon Belgian scientific base in Antarctica engulfed by Covid despite strict measures

They could start by not terminating perfectly capable doctors and nurses who have decided, for whatever their reasons may be, to refuse vaccination. I’m vaccinated (and boosted) but I cannot understand why it was okay for these people to be on the frontlines of the fight for over a year but suddenly they are no longer acceptable. And I find no convincing argument as to why actually recovering from infection counts for nothing, but the vaccine does.

The decision to terminate unvaccinated individuals reeks of bureaucracy, not an understanding of science or medicine.

trentnixon 25-Dec. Shout-out to everyone else at work

I worked at a convenience store when I was in high school and worked several Christmas Day shifts. Although I haven’t done it since, it gave me an immense respect for those who do show up and keep the gears on this machine going. Tip of the hat to all of you, and Merry Christmas!