dekervin

Thanks for the answer ! I'll continue the debate because I think it's worth exploring.

The problem is effectively nuclear proliferation. And in my opinion the two links you provided are embryos of solution.

In the future, it will be legitimate for any medium size city in a developping country to have its own nuclear reactor. At that point the whole procurement process becomes a matter of national security for every neighboring country. Like who is deciding which design is better ? Who gets to pick the winning offer ?

For exemple let's say Germany propose a safer design to a small country with the one time refuel feature, but Turkey propose another design and the buying country has better relationship with Turkey. What standing do you have to make them pick what you deem the better design ? The only recourse is to extend the legal framework and coercition power we use for arm sales. Same regarding nuclear material smuggling.

Except those framework work at the moment because, few country have any use for nuclear material and even fewer want to make a go at it. Once it becomes business as usual to trade nuclear material, it will simply exhaust the monitoring capacity of any international framework. ( At least that's my opinion )

As for the second part of the argument: >> Consider this bad metaphor: as we are writing more and more software, some of them are increasingly critical to users, therefore, we invest in different levels of guaranteeing software is working as intended (e.g. formal methods, etc.).

The question is who the we is ? Energy plant maintenance is closer to server farm maintenance than software building. To twist your metaphor, if many countries were to handle the data infrastructure their economy depend on, they would collapse. That's the crux of the issue, and one of the subliminal teaching the public got from Fukushima. If Japan, the country of the famed six sigma, made a serie of decisions that led to an accident, chances are it's bound to happen to most other (developping ) countries, given long enough time. And I am intentionally not delving into the specifics of those decisions.

With these two sides of the issue in mind, it feels unreasonnable that so many commenters on the web at large are rooting for Germany to fail in the nuclear free direction.

Edit: >> Unpopular opinion: I do not think it is possible to get rid of the inherent risk of nuclear proliferation, even without building nuclear reactors in non-wealthy countries.

I just wanted to add that I commend you for that (blunt) sentence and it really should be part of the standard issues discussed when talking about nuclear.

The nuclear issue is fascinating to watch unfold, over the years. I didn't expect the rational pro-nuclear to be almost as religious as their opponents. Which makes them also refuse to engage in debate.

So, here is one of the thoughts that crossed my mind (and I am well aware there are counter arguments to it ). With its high density of energy and perceived higher potential to harm its surrounding environment, nuclear power requires a level of State Capacity and stability that is not found over half of the planet. It is not obvious that it can be a widespread, long term alternative for most of the world economies.

With that in mind, isn't it better if some of the wealthier countries basically front the cost and explore completely alternative (nuclear-free) systems for all the others ? Even if we globally end up with an energy mix ?

Curious to hear opinions with that point of view in mind.

Thanks for reminding me of /r/askhistorians. I had not registered it in my mind as a source for general consumption. But what the heck is r/anime_titties/ about :) ? The feed is interesting , but I can't make up my mind on what the main topic of interest is.

On lesswrong, from memeory and in my very humble opinion, the ratio insights to (pompous?) lengthy sentences is way too low. But I will take a look again.

I wonder if there is a place on the internet with the format of HN and a not so dissimilar quality of comments but focused on World events, philosophy, art, science ( excluding politics because it's too prone to flamewars).

By the way (off topic), sometimes there are threads on HN, that superficially look interesting, but that feel kind of "primitive" if you are used to read philosophy. I notice them probably because on other forum I just expect the thread to be not interesting at all.

I don't have an example at hand, but in those occasions it made me think there must be some kind of corollary of the "Gell-Mann Amnesia effect"[0] at play.

[0] https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/

> anything that might be relevant to analyzing news in general

I am curious to know what you mean by that ?

I second that. It's a bubble with great breadth of topic vs insightful comments ratio. But in the grand scheme of things, it's still a bubble.

There was a similar trend in 2017 I think, but it died off with the bear market. It has scents of the original dotcom bubble. Slap a .com extension on your brand, collect the cash.

Yes indeed, it can be liberating to feel vindicated if you have a particular hunch about a market and it's validated externaly. Were you in the driving seat, like a founder, when it happened or in an employee position trying to stir the ship in the right direction ?

I am sorry if it came off like fighting. I didn't consider it fighting, but just arguing. I am indeed interested in subjective opinions. But most of the first answers were answering by explaining what was "the right" way for others to react, and doing it authoritatively.

What I was trying to argue is both reactions are valid and felt forced to take the other side. I was doing it in the hope that anybody that read this thread would find her reaction in a similar situation legitimate and offer it to us whatever that reaction is. I didn't want them to be inhibited if they were going against the grain.

And since I am interested, I replied to every answer that was interesting, like yours :)

By the way muzani was the first to offer a first person account of a similar situation. Now re-reading the original post, I probably didn't make it obvious enough that I was interested in "subjective" opinions based on first person experience ! I sincerely hope this reply doesn't read like it's combative, it's really not my state of mind.

Edit: I had those kind of stories in mind when asking the question https://www.folklore.org/

Well it is not really a war, so much as a rebalancing of power dynmics within Tradfi circles. You can look at the impact of computer on capital markets since the early eighties through the evolution of the social structure of investment banks labor force. It slowly became less and less blue blooded thanks to the need for quantitative skills.

But there was still a massive moat for institutions due to the need for trust, backed by a regulatory framework. And entrenched institutions means entrenched elite. What crypto provide is a temporary workaround for a faction of the financial elite to build rival institutions.

But the crucial thing is member of the new "crypto" elite are for the most part "junior" (in the status sense) members of the Tradfi elite. So for the rest of us peons, it will stay business as usual !

Both fair points. But at very least it shows that feeling slighted is within the range of possible reactions.

Regarding the original Iphone, once you get to the level of product decisions, it's perfectly legitimate to consider Steve Jobs one of the main innovators. Especially if you consider the decisions of what not to include on the device which was a matter of taste. And Again, Android in its pre-Iphone version is the perfect control group.

I think Jobs was in the perfect position to realize how much "creative" work Google was borrowing for free and he felt it was is duty to do something about it whether he was within his rights or not. I am just guessing some of the technical people below him must have felt the same.

I honestly didn't think it would be a controversial opinion. I was merely asking for some insider, foot soldier account. But I'll bite.

Let's say you are a bicycle making company and you come up with a completely new form factor for a bicycle, with an innovative design that required a lot of breakthrough in thinking. On monday morning, You go to market .

Then on tuesday morning you just learn that, a hat making company, heretofore friendly with you and that had some small side business painting bicycles, completely turned its line of business upside down to copy your product and make it one of its core line of products.

Are you telling me you wouldn't have some negative feelings? If after toying with that hypothetical situation you still think that you would be unmoved, my guess is you don't know yourself well enough.

But we don't even have to speculate. The CEO of Apple at the time "vowed" to make Google pay for it. He was battling Cancer and still felt exacting that punition was one of the most important thing he had to do before leaving us.[0]

"I don’t want your money. If you offer me $5 billion, I won’t want it. I’ve got plenty of money. I want you to stop using our ideas in Android, that’s all I want."[1]

"* will spend my last dying breath if I need to, and I will spend every penny of Apple’s $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong. I’m going to destroy Android, because it’s a stolen product. I’m willing to go thermonuclear war on this.*"[1]

[0] https://venturebeat.com/2011/10/20/how-steve-jobs-felt-betra... [1] https://www.phonearena.com/news/Steve-Jobs-vowed-revenge-on-...

Regarding "sincerest form of flattery", I think how you copy and when you copy matters.

For example, if you copy something that is still in its infancy because you are privy to some insider talks from the creators. I don't think they would take it as flattery.

See my other comment elsewhere on this page [0].

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29596238

I don't think your first paragraph support your second paragraph the way you seem to think it does.

I agree all smartphones today are Iphone in disguise, but it is not a fact that is part of common wisdom. Therefore, there is no direct cultural "dividend" for Apple, contrary to how we "know" Newton expanded on Galileo.

Also, but for a few wrong moves, Apple could have never enjoyed the "capitalistic" dividends of its forward thinking, embodied by a sky high stock price. To be clear, I am not pondering whether it's fair or not. I am saying it must cause a few nightmares at night at least.

PS: I just found a quote from Steve Jobs dating from that time, and it seems he didnt take it lightly either. "I will spend my last dying breath if I need to, and I will spend every penny of Apple’s $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong."[1]

[1] https://venturebeat.com/2011/10/20/how-steve-jobs-felt-betra...

Yes. exactly. You are kind of making my point. There is a comment, in another thread on this page saying: I can't imagine how any of that could have been "soul crushing",... I expect it was the exact opposite feeling, actually.

Yet, do we expect that it wasn't "soul crushing" for those inside Xerox, when Apple pivoted to GUI lite, ?

I would add that, the specifics of what is copied, how it is copied and at what stage it's copied, matters a lot on how it is felt.

See, that's why I made the difference between "business consequences" and emotional impact. When you say "being copied means you're correct", you are talking like someone with 10 thousands feet view of the situation.

If you are toiling in the trenches, I think it still feels like a punch in the stomach. More so, since they copied Apple without "saying" they copied. I mean If you didn't follow the situation closely, you might think that all the design decisions taken by Apple were obvious. While the complete opposite is true. They were carefully weighted decision and often went aginst common sense.

Last, I still remember clearly all the business articles claiming that the luxury niche strategy of Apple was doomed. Had it been the case, being correct would have meant nothing in the end, wouldn't it?

This is so mean ! Yet it's probably the game plan, to be in the best position to adapt to whatever Apple we'll do.

Blockchains has been solving my "problems". The issue is he has a very limited set of "problems" in life. and that's fine too.

if you are joking, I hope you realize you have stumbled on a real epiphany, and keep pulling the thread.

And that's also why a lot of Architecture Astronaut that looooved Java, didn't see Python coming.

The practical result is trauma (about doing math ) passed from generation to generation to everyone involved teachers, parents, students...

A little personal itch to scratch. I wanted to know what was the predictive power of hacker news job postings. If Only for career decisions and maybe market trends !

Facebook CEO exposes his vision of computing platforms competition for the next 10-15 years, starting in 2015.

For one they are YC alums. Now that I read your answer after reading the others, it honestly makes more sense this way. Especially if some people where on the fence.

Interesting set of answers. I will jump to the most interesting one.

2) It's easier to think of Airbnb as a good idea now, but back then the idea that you could even make a business out of it was mind blowing. A lot of concepts that subsequents startups borrowed where introduced on a big stage by Airbnb. How you attacked 2-sided consumer markets. How you monetised it, .how a better UX than craigslist translated to a great, business,... And even YC back then was still a novel thing.

If you compare to the FlowClub-FocusMate situation. FocusMate had a good insight about the market, guts to go for it, good implementation, ingenuous BeachHead. They surely wheren't first to think about it but they delivered at a time when a lot of developpers fumbled around. And They were Genuine.

Which brings me back to my curiosity around FlowClub YC pitch. Do they have a particular insight about the market, or are they confident in their ability to outraise FocusMate ?

In 4) Could those be 2 different markets with one being 100x bigger than the other? I have no idea but seems small things like that could actually make a big difference. , I guess It's true and it it's woth a shot from the entrepreneur side. But from my armchair, while doing some amateur quaterbacking, it feels weird to see the incubator with the most cachet pick the not genuine product. As if YC had backed studivz after Facebook came ( it's easy to say in hindsight of course ).

If there is a YC member here, would be interesting to know why Flow Club got in and not for example other startups like https://www.focusmate.com/ which in my mind deserve all the credit for the first really good implementation of the concept. Extra points if you remember other applicants with the same concept that didn't get in ! ( Btw, applicants, if you reading this, I would love to hear from you !!! )

I don't understand why discussions on remote work don't start and end with the evaluation of its effect on greenhouse gases emissions.

In 2021.

With 1.5°C expected increase of global temperature by 2030.

I totally disagree, bayern 2020 made every pass and run with the intent to score, almost never to hold the ball. Every pass is intended to open your defense. If you react well they try something else. If you don't well ... sorry for you.

Just look at their chapions league final goal. Or even look at their 2021 first match against PSG. Barcelona was in the strangulating business. Bayern was in the smashing things open business.

You can think of different football styles as differents areas of a multidimensional space. Depending on your players strength, an area is better suited for your team. But the thing is, each of those area has a local maxima.

You excelently described barcelona style circa 2010. But to play it and expect to win you need Iniesta AND Xavi BOTH. because you have to be able to take advantage of those 4 to 8 opportunities in a match against a top opponent. Those player must have the psychological strength to not flinch when the opportunity present itself, must have the technical ability to execute what they want and you need at least 2 of them if you want to pursue intelligently whatever tactical advantage you gain. In the spanish team you had iniesta, xavi and silva.

Those player are exceedingly rare and are not simply good technical players, the share a common understanding of the "chess game" they are playing . The danger is if you don't recognise you don't have those player, possession football puts you at a disadvantage against a team with offensive talent, organisation and defensive will ! ( think France 2018 )