bitops

See his content here: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cletus

The best thing to do is to find a solution that pretty much sets itself up and don't tweak the knobs unless you need to. Probably someone on here can suggest a nice solution.

Also, being a smart programmer has nothing to do with skill in setting up servers, which is more of an Ops task. It's one thing to write good code, it's a completely different skill to walk through installation manuals and editing config files.

Most likely the vast majority of drones and drone owners will use them responsibly (yes I am being hopelessly optimistic here) and a few will abuse them. Periodically we will see horror stories about misuse of drones (e.g. Newtown) but short of a whole city being wiped out very aggressive restrictions will not exist.

What I do think is very interesting about Bitcoin is that it is a harbinger of things to come. It won't replace greenbacks anytime soon, but I think it's an indicator of where the world is heading.

I believe the global and historical trends we are seeing right now is away from traditional authorities acting as monoliths, in favor of empowered individuals. We are most likely at the very beginning of the trend - I doubt anyone reading this board in 2013 will be alive to see the transformation completed. But we will be alive to see some very interesting changes. Generally speaking, all centralized authorities, be they monetary, political, technological, etc. are fracturing in favor of empowered individual actors. That poses challenges as well as opportunities.

For example: consider a technology like Square coupled with a store of value such as Bitcoin. (In this example, the terms "Square" and "Bitcoin" are just placeholder values for mechanisms and tools). Oversimplifying greatly, if we take these technologies to their logical extreme, we have the tools for an individual to completely bypass banks and traditional governments. You have some goods that I want, I have some Bitcoins, we do a point-to-point transfer; you get the money, I get the donut, end of transaction. Truly savvy users in this system will have their own way of transmitting the money from themselves to the merchant. I'll choose to trust someone like Square to do it safely and securely for a nominal fee.

Whether or not you agree with the mechanics of how this happens isn't really the point. The point is to show that we are heading towards a future where two individuals can transact freely without a middleman "getting in the way." For the purposes of this discussion, "getting in the way" means limiting the freedoms of those individuals to transact as they please.

Of course, there are problems with this. If there are no rules, inevitably someone will game the system or take advantage of someone else. That'll be unpopular, and so people will seek to band together to transact in a network of trust. The idea of a network of trust is important today, it's value will only increase over time. I can't remember the exact term, but I read a wonderful book some years ago called "Anarchy, State and Utopia" which dealt with the philosophy around these types of issues (it's a pretty academic book, but here's a link in you'd like to see - http://amzn.to/18883MU - and yes, that's a kickback link).

Boiling it down, the main argument I took away from that book was that, even in a world where there are no "governments" as we're used to thinking about them, we'll never achieve true 100% freedom because there'll always be those who are stronger who take advantage of those weaker than themselves. For this reason, people join together and form mini-states. Within those mini-states and associations, rules will exist that people choose to live by, limiting individual freedom to provide security.

I think people are right to be excited about Bitcoin, but I'd be cautious about heralding any brave new world within the next 25 to 50 years.

I think the notions of 'sex-positive' and 'sex-negative' are kind of weird, personally. When I read those terms, my mind tends to translate it into "people who think mainstream pornography is fine" and "those who think mainstream pornography has issues."

I guess what I feel is missing from the comments you've made so far is your personal attitude towards pornography. It's easy for all of us to criticize this or that thinker, but it's much harder (and more painful) to introspect and consider what our own attitudes say about us.

Let me volunteer to go first: I've consumed a great deal of pornography in the past, and it's only this year that I stopped in earnest. Looking at pornography made me feel depressed, disconnected from my feelings, and I noticed that it made it hard for me to relate to women in my daily life. Not 'hard to relate' like I couldn't talk to them, but in that I felt uncomfortable talking to somebody as a human being when I'd just watched images that really degraded them.

Now, I was raised in a very liberal Scandinavian country, and my parents are far from prudes. Neither of my parents demonized sex, and growing up, they always said "it's okay if you do it, just make sure you use protection." So the discomfort I felt in looking at porn didn't come from being raised in a moralistic, Bible-thumping household.

When I read Gail Dines book, I find my own thoughts reflected back to me. I find your label of "shrill moralising" somewhat offensive, but you may also be offended by some of the things that I am saying.

Also, and this is important to me, I think it's very possible to get too rational about the whole discussion. You referenced "rational sex negative critiques of porn." I am fine with logic and reason, but I often notice that people who focus too much on rational arguments are avoiding a frank discussion about their own emotions or the emotions of the women being discussed.

Anyway, if you've read this much, thank you. Hopefully you have a better understanding of my perspective now.

If you're going to choose to ignore a comment by someone who's actually bothered to read her 165-page book (which includes 200+ references) in favor of googling some web articles that support a position of ignoring feminist critiques of porn, in all likelihood you don't care about improving society for women.

I am taking a strong tone because your comment seems to say that if you believe feminism is bad, giving time to thoroughly investigate feminism is clearly a waste of time.

Well, at one point, we were "allowed" to stand next to the manure pit, which was a cylindrical tank with no top. I poked my head over...

Did you know that some stenches can be so intense that they actually have wet vapor and can sting your eyes? I didn't know until that day. But after that day, I never forgot.

I would much rather own a self-driving pod with a comfortable couch where I could work or relax without thinking about driving. Or even enjoying the view! Driving is fun, but for day-to-day stuff, I'd much rather get online as soon as possible to get my work done.

I tend to think of time in a car as time wasted, unless I just happen to be in the mood to drive.

Only if you're fickle and lack conviction. People are talking a lot about "is Tesla at a fair valuation" and I personally believe that it's impossible to know what a fair valuation is until a few more years have elapsed.

I could reasonably see Tesla bouncing back to $300/share over the next 18 months or staying at or around $200. The current drops are more likely related to general market unease and opportunism rather than anything endemically wrong with Tesla. Also, with "momentum" stocks I'm sure some people got in looking to make a quick buck and also some people are surely taking advantage of the general shutdown-related cacophony to short the stock so they can buy it at lower prices (I would).

Fluctuations like this illustrate why one of the most important qualities an investor can have is patience. If you're trying to get rick quick, you'll be in trouble. But if you invest in solid companies that you understand, you should do well. Provided you do your homework, of course.

I'll reiterate Peter Lynch's excellent advice from "One Up on Wall Street" - if the stock drops but the fundamentals still make sense, stick around to see how the story develops.

More likely it's just bad timing. This week we have a shutdown of the US gov't, and there's a video of a Tesla car on fire. Combine these with one analysts pessimism and it's easy to see why the stock would fall.

Remember Peter Lynch's advice from "One Up on Wall Street" - if the price drops but the fundamentals are still good, hang on or buy more.

I'm not holding my breath though. On the topic of women, Hacker News is a depressingly conventional community.

[EDIT: true to expectations, this comment got downvoted. Better find another community that actually values a frank discussion about real problems in our society.]