robbrown451

Well we have some serious short term issues.

To me, the internet is to the First Amendment as nuclear weapons are to the Second. Neither were anticipated when the Bill of Rights was written.

In the 18th century, no one knew people might invent weapons that could kill on such a scale and at such distance. No one knew people could make a beheading video and instantly share it with millions. No one anticipated algorithms that could amplify the worst human impulses to such a degree.

I'd love to see these problems solved in a better way. Here at Hacker New we have a half decent algorithm for promoting quality content based on upvotes and downvotes and flags and karma and such. When that fails, we have Dang's good judgement as a backup. That's censorship too, and it makes this a better place. It's not perfect, but if you were to take the approach of "any censorship is wrong" approach, Hacker News wouldn't be very pleasant.

YouTube is at a much larger scale, but they have a right to do something. Presumably you are ok with them disallowing beheading videos. What about videos encouraging suicide and providing "help"? What about videos telling people how to make chemical weapons? What about videos planning government overthrows? Where do you draw the line?

I don't necessarily have a long term solution, but I support them taking some short term measures.

In that video, Pierre Kory uses his credibility as a medical doctor, to claim "mountains of data have emerged from all, from many centers and countries around the world, showing the miraculous effectiveness of ivermectin. It basically obliterates transmission of this virus. If you take it, you will not get sick."

Later, Pierre Kory himself contracted Covid, from his daughter. Both of them had been on Ivermectin, obviously. He doesn't mention this publicly. Only thanks to someone who was watching closely do we now have proof this even happened.

So no, this isn't "in a very scientific manner." He creates a good illusion of being scientific, but he's not.

These are dangerous falsehoods, that are used by millions as part of their justification for not getting vaccinated, which allows the virus to continue spreading. YouTube isn't perfect, but they are making an attempt to compensate for all the lies that are spread on their platform and others. This is important during a crisis that has already killed 700,000 Americans. I get the "freedom of speech" thing, I really do. But Americans are still dying at a rate of 2 fully loaded 747s a day crashing, and YouTube would prefer not be contributing to that.

So I support YouTube's decision on that one.

I agree, mostly. I grew up in a house that had them (in the 70s), and always thought they were dumb -- even though they were on almost every house in that area. Looking on google maps, I see the current owners have recently removed some of them, and it looks really weird.

https://www.google.com/maps/@38.7722788,-77.219379,3a,75y,26...

I think you need some kind of trim on windows, but agree that obviously fake shutters are kind of dumb.

I want to know if it is a hard G as in Git, or soft G as in magic.

Ok, soft G might be the best choice.

It's useful when someone asks things like "will machines ever be able to think?"

And you might say "well, define 'think' ". In other words, that's not that interesting a question, since it is more about semantics than about reality.

Or you say it as Djykstra did, which I think is pretty clever.

And yes, your example about how words differ in different languages does a good job of explaining how this is just semantics. If a question becomes moot in a different language, it is a good indicator that the question is less about reality than it is about semantics.

His point was that we might say "submarines aren't actually swimming" while saying "of course airplanes actually fly."

What's the difference? The only difference is semantic, we seem to have defined "swimming" to be arbitrarily restrictive (as in, only applying to animals), while we haven't done so for flying.

Meanwhile, we can say a magnet is attracted to metal, and no one says "wait, it can't ACTUALLY be attracted to it, since that takes a brain and sentience and preferences."

And then, most of us don't bat an eye if someone says "my computer thinks the network is down" or "my phone doesn't recognize my face" or even "the heater blowing on the thermostat is making it think it is hotter than it is." It's not helpful to interject with, "well, thermostats don't really think."

The point is, these are arbitrary choices of how we define words (which may vary in different languages), and they aren't saying meaningful things about reality.

I think you are missing the point.

A submarine "swims" in the same way an airplane "flies."

But for some reason, in English anyway, we seem to define "swim" such that, by definition, only an animal can do it. Or at least, it must behave similarly to a swimming animal...such as by flapping fins and the like.

Meanwhile we don't think an airplane doesn't fly simply because it doesn't flap its wings.

The point is that semantics tells you very little about reality. And debating semantics is not particularly interesting, or at least a good way of missing the point.

Walking bicycles? Well, ok. That's much more of a stretch, partly because of the fact that there is a human much more directly involved in the propulsion of a bicycle compared to things with actual engines (airplanes and submarines)

Yeah I didn't see the usage of "conservative" above as being a negative per se. It was only saying that the negativity expressed toward some modern architecture is very subjective.

I'll agree on your opinion on brutalist and typical suburban. Yuk to both. I like neighborhoods like many here in San Francisco, where a really modern house can be right next to a Victorian. Very close to me is this street, which is one of my favorites (let's just say I like "funky"): https://www.google.com/maps/@37.7399065,-122.4298453,3a,75y,...

"I would never want to live in a structure that pretends to be a castle. Or, more generously, one that is a vague echo of a style that once served a purpose."

That's a valid aesthetic choice, but I personally enjoy such callbacks to the past. Based on aesthetics alone, I'd love to live in a place like this: https://i.pinimg.com/564x/6a/9f/3e/6a9f3e7d4304c5f463ddf8c2b... (but only if they were rare, it wouldn't be nearly as fun if everyone had houses like that)

I think you are mistaking the word "conservative" for a political position. The parent is using it as in this definition "averse to change or innovation and holding traditional values." Steep roofs are more traditional.

I'm definitely not buying the idea that asymmetrical houses are "stressful" in any meaningful way. I mean, I guess you could say anything that is interesting and non-bland is stressful, but that is quite a stretch.

I'll admit my first thought, based on the wording, was that the articles were posted on a google service such as google docs.

I love Legos (ok, LEGO, whatever), but this seems like it deserves 3d printing. It's an ideal application of 3d printing, since many parts need to adapt sizewise, so injection molding doesn't make sense. Modularity is neat, but doesn't lend itself to practical designs that are strong and space efficient.

My hope is that prosthesis tech and robot tech converge. If we can make really good artificial limbs, cheaply, we can not only help people who are missing natural limbs, but we can, ya know, train them to fold laundry or assemble iPhones.

The field will take off in a big way when someone designs an arm that can play a large role in fabricating and assembling an arm like it.

"in return they will not sue."

The threat of a lawsuit counts as "teeth," to me. But only if it is significant likelihood that the lawsuit will be successful.

So the way I tend to interpret things is a bit less pedantic: "can they demand?" means (to me) "do they have a way of forcing compliance that is likely be backed by a court?"

This does have the effect of making the word "demand" less of a binary and more of a gray scale.

Seriously indeed. I can't read it, the whole page is just intimidating by being so many individual sentences without organization, and hurts my brain to look at.

I think this discussion applies to TikTok, Snapchat and Reddit as well. Facebook (along with Instagram) is probably the worst offender at the moment, but any laws that apply to Facebook would apply to others.

> This idea that you can ban Facebook and Instagram and suddenly the internet is safe for kids is just ridiculous.

Who said that? I don't think they should be banned, but I do think they should be regulated or otherwise held accountable. A big part of it might be being more transparent with their algorithm, and giving tools to users to control it more.

I think where we are is akin to back in the days where people realized that, no, we aren't going to ban buildings, but we are going to have building codes. We aren't going to ban food, but we are going to have an FDA. Etc. The free market doesn't address all problems.

I disagree. I don't think that solves the problem, at all.

One: Facebook is currently being accused of damaging democracy via misinformation and their "anger promoting" algorithm. That affects me, and my leaving Facebook doesn't solve that. Two: there is the monopoly issue (if that is the right word.... the issue I am concerned about lies on a spectrum, unlike many people's usage of "monopoly"). Prior to Facebook having dominance, I used to be in the loop of what my friends are doing, because they used phone, email, etc. Now they all use Facebook and my choice to not use it (which I don't, actually) results in my not being included in a huge number of things. In that sense, I think Facebook has become like a utility, like the phone company of old. I can't just find a social network product that I prefer, and use it instead.... my friends are not on it and other social networks are not interoperable with Facebook. (as phone providers and email providers are interoperable with one another)

Teens who use Facebook products are known to be harmed. Maybe you think they should just not use these products. That will cause even greater harm to their social lives than it causes to mine, since all their friends are using it and being connected with friends is very important to teens. Again, their simply not using the product doesn't address the problem. (and MY not using it especially doesn't help)

I think your comment is like saying "if you don't like constant robocalls, just cancel your phone plan rather than encourage laws to curtail them." Kind of throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

So yeah, I'll exercise my right to vote by actually voting. Luckily, many representatives are in agreement with my perspective on this.

I guess it is all in the definition of "demand." I interpret the word -- at least in this context -- to mean it has legal teeth, so to speak.

Even if they are enforcing their demand by way of banning users that don't comply, that may indeed be illegal. For instance, if Facebook made a demand that gay people may not declare themselves so on the platform or they will be banned, I'm sure they'd pretty quickly find themselves on the wrong side of the law.

But really, right now, something like this just gives Congress new things to grill Zuckerberg on, next time they bring him in. (which is inevitable, I think)

Please elaborate.

I understand certain terms (such as saying you can't hit the server more often than a reasonable amount), but much beyond that I push back. If the laws allow them to make such all encompassing demands of how I use their product, well, laws can be changed, and I vote.

I can't see how a monetary settlement would be the result of this.

I can't see her being a coder going forward. She is globally famous for taking a stand (from a very technically informed perspective) on policy issues. A smart company would hire her to be in a very public facing position, that will reflect upon themselves positively.

Obviously, a company that has a huge amount to hide isn't going to want to hire her.

She'll be fine. She is now globally famous for doing something an awful lot of people think is brave and admirable, and she has also shown off on TV how sharp and eloquent she is. There are a huge number of companies who will jump on the chance to bring her onboard.

She is taking a risk, and I salute her for it. But at the end of the day, it is likely her career will have a huge boost from this. And Facebook would probably be very foolish to go after her.

It's a very different issue. One important difference is that the children being harmed here are American children. Rightly or wrongly, it raises the priority since American parents are seeing their own children harmed.

I don't want to defend Nike, but still, the fact that people are poor enough to send their kids off to factories to make shoes isn't Nike's fault.

But again, very different issue. Worthwhile to think about, but I don't think it should detract from this one.

"Those of us who care don't use fb and refuse to work for that company or any of its subsidiaries."

Yes but that doesn't mean you aren't being harmed. If your mom uses facebook and dies because she believed a conspiracy theory about vaccines, for instance, you are harmed.

"She absolutely can and will be sued by fb for breaking her NDA."

That may not be smart on Facebook's part. She probably doesn't have a ton of money. All that will do is bring more attention to this issue. If her testimony before Congress is compelling (and I expect it will be), suing her is just going to piss off Congress. Not sure that's where Facebook wants to be.

No, but if fewer people want to work for Facebook that Facebook has to pay them more to get them onboard, Facebook has a financial incentive to do better.

Honestly, I got it from the at-the-time topmost comment on this discussion, which said she's not a whistleblower because FB didn't do anything illegal. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28742045 (I also replied to that comment directly)

I did look it up though, and the dictionary seems to suggest it needs to be illegal or against rules or something, as opposed to simply being harmful.

I did read it. The law says she is allowed to share documents with the SEC. I don't know if she is allowed to go beyond that, such as doing this interview. And I certainly don't know all the requirements for it falling under that law.

Regardless, my whole point is that what she is doing is a positive and I salute her for it.

Also, just saw this (which says what I was saying, that going to the press can put her at legal peril): https://www.npr.org/2021/09/30/1042012393/facebook-whistlebl...

No but what Facebook is doing is harmful, and what she is doing is embarrassing to the company and to those who work for them.

For all I know, what she did is illegal. But I'm glad she did it, it was very brave and she puts herself at a lot of risk by doing it. If Facebook goes after her, they will undoubtedly get bad press and encourage government regulation and possibly even antitrust action.

Facebook and other social media aren't inherently bad, but the incentives are certainly there for them to amplify the worst of human nature. This is most likely a problem that needs people outside of Facebook (and all these other companies) to solve. I am 100% in agreement with her that it is a solvable problem.

Whether or not what Facebook did was illegal and she technically qualifies as a "whistleblower", I salute her for what she has done and is doing by telling this story. People need to know about this, because it is harmful.

This doesn't mean it should be illegal. But it is something people should consider if they go to work for Facebook (or other companies), and hopefully it will inspire people to do something about the toxicity and divisiveness that social media is causing or at least feeding into.

It seems like the amount it will hurt Google is directly proportional to the amount it will hurt the owner of the site (assuming they want people to read their message).

I'm sure someone at Google is pretty happy that they don't have to show this page in their search results. Nobody can accuse them of bias against anti-Google pages -- the site owner did it to themselves.

Seems like as perfect an example of "cutting off nose to spite face" as I can imagine. (ok, refusing the vax and dying of COVID to get back at the left might be a better example, but this one is close)