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dsomers

417 karma · joined September 9, 2012

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dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2019/08/28/apple-apologizes-for-lis...

This. Is there any reason I should think this is not accurate?

dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
It seems like it was changed.

https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2019/08/28/apple-apologizes-for-lis...

I was just asking a question, I wasn’t attempting some sort of gotcha. I really don’t care that much.

dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
What are we talking here, 1 in 1 billion. I just can’t care that much unless there’s real evidence that the error rate is really high.
dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
It’s a bit of a stretch to say generating a hash from a file is scanning. Most computer science terms like this are metaphors, but when I create a scan with a ‘scanner’ I can create an exact copy of what was scanned.

Since creating a hash from a file is a one way process that you cannot reproduce the original file from the hash output, I would not call this a scan. All you can do is match to known child porn files.

But yes, go ahead, make more pedantic excuses on why we should protect people that hold child porn.

dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
Yeah, they absolutely were not scanning photos and anyone with basic knowledge of how hashing works should know that. I was really disappointed with some of the reactions a saw coming from this community, which totally lacked any nuance or acknowledgment of how serious the issue of child abuse is.
dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
This was changed as far as I know. Do you have evidence otherwise?
dsomers··on Ask HN: Private Alternatives to Alexa?
What’s the strongest evidence you have that proves this?
dsomers··on E-Shotgun
I’d say 5” racing quadcopter might not be a bad home defensive weapon either. I’d probably go down if you ran it into my head at full speed.
dsomers··on DocuSign Shares Plunge 42%
From the page you linked to:

> For documents signed with a non-qualified electronic signature (e-signature), the Dutch Supreme Court confirmed that the signature must be ‘sufficiently reliable’ for the document to be classified as binding evidence. If the documents are not classified as binding evidence, additional evidence may be required to demonstrate the authenticity of the e- signature.

Apple preview is not sufficient in itself and needs additional evidence to support the reliability of it. I never said that it could not be used as evidence, but it’s not sufficient in itself.

Again bro, reading skills, work on them.

dsomers··on DocuSign Shares Plunge 42%
Lol, exactly
dsomers··on DocuSign Shares Plunge 42%
I don’t think you read or understood the link you posted or my original comment?

You know I was saying that in the context of gp asking if it’s legal to sign in Apple preview which is essentially appending a picture of your signature to a pdf with no guarantee from a third party if it’s you that signed it.

I don’t know, maybe English is not your native language, in that case, you’re mistake is understandable.

dsomers··on DocuSign Shares Plunge 42%
You know I was saying that in the context of gp asking if it’s legal to sign in Apple preview which is essentially appending a picture of your signature to a pdf with no guarantee from a third party if it’s you that signed it.
dsomers··on DocuSign Shares Plunge 42%
I just had this conversation with my lawyer, in the Netherlands, and probably most or Europe, signing digitally is not legally binding. I’m sure this will be different for different jurisdictions.
dsomers··on Ask HN: Advice about aging parents
A little further south west, Sarnia. To be honest, it’s cheaper than London, but I don’t think by a lot. There’s also the option of living in Corunna, close to Sarnia, but even smaller and less expensive.

Here’s a semi recent article to give you an idea of the prices https://www.theobserver.ca/news/local-news/home-prices-conti...

The lake is nice in the summer and you’re close to Detroit for a weekend of cheap entertainment.

Good luck!

dsomers··on Ask HN: Advice about aging parents
Toronto does not equal all of the west. There are a lot of low cost of living parts of Canada where you can affordability arrange that exact living situation. My home town in Ontario which is around 80k people has had a lot of Indian-Canada families move from Toronto to my home town in the last decade for that exact reason.
dsomers··on Debit cards are hidden financial infrastructure
Totally agree, the Canadian banking system is a corrupt cartel the levies it’s own tax on every Canadian. This was made even more clear to me when I moved to the Netherlands and every banking fee was suddenly 1/3 as much as in Canada for the exact same service.
dsomers··on Workers in Portugal could see healthier work-life balance under new labour laws
> I'm an EU citizen as well as an American one. If you go to the suburbs in the outskirts of Paris, you will see what I am talking about. (the so-called "banlieue")

I’ve been there, thanks, and it’s not nearly as bad as the poor parts of Chicago or Detroit where I’ve also been. You’re completely detached from reality if you think otherwise. Have you even actually been to a poor area of a large America city? You’re also about 10x more likely to be murdered in those cities than in Paris.

> The US is going to have more obvious poverty also because they are more accepting of immigrants from impoverished countries.

Bullshit, there are basically zero first generation immigrants in Detroit. All Americans pretty much. Unless you don’t consider oppressed grandchildren of slaves as Americans?!

>> Look at the average lifespan of an EU citizen that’s almost 10 years longer than an American citizen. Laughably false. A 10 year difference would be ridiculous!

Fair, I was more thinking Italy specifically because I’m half Italian, but the average European still lives three years longer than the average America, which is pathetic considering the wealth in America.

> You can look up everything that I am talking about. The (non-European) immigrant communities in Europe are incredibly poor, but kept out of sight because European development models involve affluent city centers and pushing minorities out to the suburbs, rather than the reverse which occurs in the US.

If you’re selective about data like that, I can be selective about data too, and show you how black and brown oppressed communities in America have way worse social outcomes than the average American. What you’re saying about Europe is no different in America, it’s actually more extreme in America and more violent because of lax gun control.

> The US certainly has problems with these sorts of things, but headlines like: https://www.newsweek.com/french-activists-39-percent-paris-t...

Yeah, you’ve definitely never worked in a major midwestern city, because stuff like this still happens all the time, the racist have learned to just not be blatant about it. All you have to do is look at the C level executives at most American companies to see it. I’ve seen it first hand when I’ve tried to hire non white people in Canada and it was a battle for me. I have no idea why you think this is exclusive to France. I get that Bay Area companies are sometime more progressive, but companies in cities like Huston or Chicago, not so much, there’re still plenty of racists.

dsomers··on Workers in Portugal could see healthier work-life balance under new labour laws
Where have you been in Europe or the US? I have family on both sides of the Atlantic and know both continents quite well from personal experiences. The crime is letting people die from preventable illness because of unwillingness to provide universal healthcare, and a segregated system that makes higher education difficult to attain and keeps poor people in poverty.

On your second point I wholeheartedly disagree, I’ve been in small villages in Serbia, and I know people from there very well. I also grew up 10 minutes from the Michigan boarder and have friends and family there too. From my experience, the poorest people in Serbia are less at risk of abject poverty and dying from preventable diseases than the poorest in Michigan. Sure if you look at the average salary for someone in Michigan vs someone in Serbia, Serbia is way lower, but if you actually look at quality of life factors for the bottom 10% of both those places I’d bet Serbia pulls way ahead.

Edit: and I just use Serbia as an example because it’s one of the poorest countries in Europe and I still think it’s better than a lot of US states in how it helps its poor. When you look at health, safety, and educational outcomes of middle income and rich European countries they are often far ahead of the US averages. Christ, not everything is about maximizing GDP. Look at the average lifespan of an EU citizen that’s almost 10 years longer than an American citizen.

dsomers··on Workers in Portugal could see healthier work-life balance under new labour laws
True. I’m probably paying 60% of my income in tax living in Amsterdam. I could easily relocate to somewhere like Chicago or Austin, and pay way less and have cheaper living expenses, but I’ve seen enough of American cities to know I find their wealth divide so cruel I personally consider it a crime against humanity. It’s just plain depressing to live in a society like that.
dsomers··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
It’s not just a one off though, I’ve used windows everyday, at home or at work since windows existed, I also used Linux on the desktop full time for about eight years, it wasn’t a couple months of me trying something and not liking it. Now I’ve been using windows and Mac OS on desktops at home and at work for the past 11ish years —- while still working with Linux and windows servers everyday for the past 20 years. I’m pretty familiar with the strengths and weaknesses of all of these systems, and I agree, if you value configurability a lot, Linux can be a nice desktop —- but I’m not wrong for not valuing that. What I want is a desktop experience with fewer rough edges than what I’ve gotten from Linux so I can just write my app code and not worry about drivers or whatever. I think you’re being pretty silly if you’re trying to tell me Mac OS hardware support on macs has a comparable number of rough edges to Linux on random x hardware — because no I haven’t had Mac hardware incompatibility issues with Mac OS, that’s almost the whole point of what they do, and the knock on effect is their limited hardware options— but that’s a trade off that works for me, and it works for a lot of other people.
dsomers··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one that never uses any kind of port for anything but charging. But I’m glad people are glad!
dsomers··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
Well, once I bought a laptop with integrated intel graphics because it was supposed to have good Linux support. Suspended/wake didn’t work, and 3D didn’t work, I spent months on mailing list trying to figure out the problem, and I ended up being the one merging the fix for Ubuntu, you can probably still find that on launchpad.net

I get it, that was over ten years ago, and maybe things are better, maybe not according to this guy. I’m just tired of this kind of finickiness and would rather focus on hacking on server code.

dsomers··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
Cool! I definitely learned a lot about Unix and how OS’s work in general because of Linux, and I really appreciate that. What I also learned is I don’t care about configuring my desktop and rather spend time hacking on Web Application code.
dsomers··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
This makes me glad I switched from being a Linux desktop enthusiast over a decade ago. I’m still a Linux server enthusiast, and I greatly appreciate all the hard work volunteers put into Linux desktop software — but the hassle and lack of polish keeps me on the Mac for desktops. It was fun for a while Linux Desktop, I wish you the best but I’ve moved on.
dsomers··on An underwater mystery on Canada's coast
Yeah, he definitely did not word it well. I’m from Canada, and how you describe it as North America having micro states is also kind of true. There are states, territories and provinces, across North America with a lot of local control, but there are also local native reservations that have a lot of sovereignty. For example, there are plenty of tribal lands close to where I grow up that have completely separate laws from the provenance that they are in, they deal directly with the federal government and even do their own policing. Although you almost never see those boarders on maps, there’s a strong argument that they’re a type of micro state, and Canada probably has multiple dozens of them if not hundreds with different languages and laws.
dsomers··on An underwater mystery on Canada's coast
This is kind of debatable through, sure there are national laws, and even EU wide laws. However, Germany has its states, Berlin has different laws than Hamburg for certain things, same as Italy and Spain have their regions with various levels of autonomy. Every municipality all over Europe has control of some of its local laws, too. We don’t just have one European wide law, or even German wide law for every aspect of law.
dsomers··on The void in Calgary: How office towers emptied in a once bustling downtown
As someone that grew up very close to Detroit, I’m afraid your analysis will be right. Sometimes you stop going from boom to bust to boom, and you just stay at bust.

At lest I hope Albertans will get enough transfers from the fed to run decent medical and education systems, I wouldn’t wish on anyones children the things I’ve seen young people in Detroit have to live through.

dsomers··on The Not-So-Special Relationship
I still disagree. There’s a lot more cooperation with the US and Canada in Canada on both of those fronts. Small US military contingents train in Canada with our military and vice versa. Furthermore the United States has provided intelligence information multiple time now that have stopped terrorist attempts in Canada. I don’t believe there’s a similar depth of cooperation with the UK — what could the UK even provide to Canada that the US doesn’t already.

Furthermore we’re integrated with the US in ways that we aren’t with the UK, Canadians can stay in the US visa free for six months and when a Canadian enters the US by air they use the US immigration line, whereas UK citizens would not. There’s also freer movement between Canada and the US in that designated professional classes can get NT work visas easy and can be continually renewed with no limitations.

The Canadian UK relationship is just about tradition, and us being polite. At the end of the day, in modern times, countries like Japan or Germany have more sway in Canada simply because we invest and trade more with them. I know some British really want to believe it’s possible to bring back the empire, but it’s really not, Canada is a completely different country now from what it was 80 years ago.

dsomers··on The Not-So-Special Relationship
It’s really not though, I’m from Canada, and the fact is we do 75% of our trade with the US and 3% with the UK. When push comes to shove, Canada would never prioritize the UK over the US.
dsomers··on The Not-So-Special Relationship
As a Canadian that grew up on the boarder with the US, and has family on both sides, this is exactly true lol

Anyone that thinks the American political establishment cares about Canadians, British or Australians are delusional. I’m not convinced the Americans political establishment even cares about Americans.

As that one French guy said “Countries don’t have friends, they have interests.”

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