ldar15

Bollocks. If javascript wasn't the language of browsers, nobody would use it. Its got nothing to do with javascripts awesomeness. Indeed, that it took so long for the community (or in this case Mozilla and Google) to finally say "fuck it, this is the shitbag we're stuck with so at least lets make it faster", just tells me how much they wanted something else to be the standard.

The only argument for NodeJs etc is that programmers can code the same language on client and server. Was there some "foresight" that made javascript the language of browsers? No.

That said, why fuck with it? There are ways to encapsulate fields and methods in javascript. There are also ways to get around it. Just as there are ways to get around private and const in C++.

If private and const really float your boat use GWT.

Also, how does your encrypted-fs affect HDD performance?

No, it requires that the weighting (probability * consequence) is greater in the second case than the first.

FTA:

1. But, small as this probability is, it isn't anywhere near as small as 3^^^^3 is large.

2. If the probabilities of various scenarios considered did not exactly cancel out, the AI's action in the case of Pascal's Mugging would be overwhelmingly dominated by whatever tiny differentials existed in the various tiny probabilities under which 3^^^^3 units of expected utility were actually at stake.

I disagree with statement 1. If the author's definition of Occam's razor is believed by the AI, then the probability that the mugger is telling the truth is given by the inverse of the complexity of the system that incorporates our world, the other world and in addition the ability to simulate 3^^^^3 deaths. So it doesn't matter if X is 3^^^3 or 3^^^^^3, because the very probability of it being so is the inverse to the damage done.

  Our world: A
  Outer world only: B
  Temporary 3^^^3 death world: C

Potential consequence: kC

Weighting for mugger telling truth: C/ABC = 1/AB

Complexity when mugger is lying = A.

Weighting for mugger lying: 1/A

Since A and B are staggeringly large numbers, the AI must choose 1/A over 1/AB.

Then there's a whole bunch of other stuff, such as, even if the AI was certain that the mugger could carry out its threat, should the AI yield to threats of violence? Another question: if life can so trivially be created and destroyed, what does it matter? Can we trust the mugger?

But the main issue, and this should be the response of anyone threatened with some claimed ability to cause harm and suffering in "the next world", is "prove it".

Or maybe that the country exists because of government tyranny.

Or because the government arrests people just for showing up to the wrong meeting.

Or because they have studied International Relations at Cambridge University and have an understanding of world history. (that one is probably quite rare, but its very effective).

I think IE has a very good argument to make in its favor for this specific case

Great. What is it?

If the 302 status code is received in response to a request using the POST method, the user agent must not automatically redirect* the request unless it can be confirmed by the user, since this might change the conditions under which the request was issued.*

http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1945.txt

IE does redirect automatically. So IE isn't doing it right either. Since nobody is doing it right, I'd pick the guys doing it wrong that make the most sense. What a surprise: that's not microsoft.

So thanks for your single data point of an angry person who was also a sociopath.

Your post is equivalent to writing: "We had a technical guy. Very polite. But he was black. When we asked him to do something he deleted all our work. Turns out he did this at the next five jobs. Be careful hiring black people".

Being black, or white, or martian, or having anger management issues, are not relevant. Being a sociopath is relevant.

Stopped reading right there.

"I am a technical person who also has ability Y, therefore all technical people should have ability Y."

This is the thinking that would sit Magic Johnson down and say "Your ball game is pretty good, but your golf game is awful. Stop working on your basketball skills and start golf training."

Bottom line: customer support requires ability, certain personality traits, and training. Do not let anyone (technical, non-technical, CFO, anyone) handle customer support if they are not qualified. It will end badly.

  1. Microsoft vendor says so.
  2. Windows blogger says so.
  3. Person *hired* by Microsoft says so.

That you would even make these arguments, when counter-arguments are so immediately obvious, is why you will fail. Its like playing chess, but you can't see even one move ahead. You are basically arguing that h5 is a really silly place to put the queen because look, you can put your knight on f6 and attack it. [1]

You are engaged in a war of escalation, and yet you cannot even iterate strategy and tactics on paper. If you can't even imagine how someone might exploit the situation you describe, then you will forever be surprised when you encounter the exploit in the wild. You have no chance of proactively preventing any kind of cheat.

Your enemy is not the muggles. Your enemy is not your average programmer. Your enemy is someone who lives for winning the meta-game: of outwitting your programmers, not your games designers.

EDIT: For entertainment value:

Observe how I predicted what my "enemy" would do: Feel free to argue that this will require more than just replacing BNEs and CMPs with NOPs or JMPs. Or indeed making the executable bigger. Or indeed many other things that are "hard".

And how you did it anyway: Also note that hexing functions as opposed to flipping a value is very different.

Very different for you. You see, you replied anyway thinking that your statement demonstrated support of your argument. Whereas I wanted you to respond that way, because your statement actually supports my argument, which is that you are hopelessly outmatched and dont even know it.

EDIT: Adding link based on downgrade of expectation that the reference would be understood.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholars_mate

The rallying call of poor programmers everywhere.

Its not about ease of engineering. Its about consequences. The game designers wanted an invisibility card. There were two ways to program it, one easy and one hard (you're talking to HN, so I imagine a lot of people here can think of ways to implement a system with all of the constraints you describe).

They chose the easy one. Either because they couldn't think of the hard one, they didn't think the easy one would have consequences, or they were overruled. The OP's surprise seems to suggest a lack of forethought.

The "fix" has helped with PR: now the muggles are afraid to use it, so they don't feel so bad. But guaranteed the wizards are still using it.

This shenglong guy has zero credibility with anyone who has ever cracked a game. Judging by his inability to understand the programming issues, its entirely possible that his claims of "spies" are equally delusional and that Guild Masters are now telling him "No! No new cheat here!"

  if (visibility = no), then {player = visible} 

  if (visibility = yes ), then { request player name }

In addition, no one really knew how we were catching them

No: most people have no idea. The ones writing the attack know very well how you spot them.

You have succeeded in preventing the muggles from cheating and seem proud about it.

Instead there is moral hazard. The process is this:

  1. Get a job at USPTO. 
  2. Deliberately approve tons of awful patents.
  3. Leave and get a job at a patent law firm.
  4. Profit!!!!

Your appeal to "authority" requires the admission that Wikipedia actually supports the counter argument, while an Introduction to anything is hardly an appropriate authority for whether or not something is novel enough to be patented.

I'm glad you are responding to every single person claiming that their experience is wrong, because that provides ample opportunity to reduce your karma.

Why is that?

Because Nilay doesn't understand why these patents are obvious.

Which is the whole fucking problem with the patent system Nilay:

People like you saying "Well, these patents look reasonable to me, so why are you people who do this for a living complaining?"