Hacker News: mkempe

New comment by mkempe in "Time to break up Google and Facebook, says New York attorney general candidate"

mkempe — Fri, 27 Jul 2018 14:29:07 +0000

Natch.

New comment by mkempe in "Site Reliability Engineering"

mkempe — Fri, 27 Jul 2018 03:55:33 +0000

nit: "pore over"

New comment by mkempe in "Time to break up Google and Facebook, says New York attorney general candidate"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 22:46:40 +0000

What a sad spectacle: the delirious lashing out at modern machines, the sarcastic capitals, the unhinged cries of "religion". Next time I chat with Richard we'll have a laugh as I mention how his name is invoked as a shibboleth by rabid Luddites.

New comment by mkempe in "Time to break up Google and Facebook, says New York attorney general candidate"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 20:53:02 +0000

Sounds like you want to smash capitalism! more than you want to destroy Google and Facebook.

I did notice you're not explicitly opposed to reusable rockets; although you seem to have a special place in hell reserved for Elon Musk. Oversight?

New comment by mkempe in "15 Years of SparkFun"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 20:37:49 +0000

Kudos!

If you have a chance to visit their building [edit: in Colorado, near Boulder], and even to take a class with them, it's impressive and great fun.

New comment by mkempe in "Time to break up Google and Facebook, says New York attorney general candidate"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 18:07:42 +0000

Please get a grip on reality. The average American has access to vastly better products, services, and health care than past kings couldn't even have dreamt of. Even the amazingly wealthy Rockefeller did not have access to the modern bounty that the average American can easily buy and use today, the bounty that is being created by entrepreneurs and people in the corporations you apparently envy so much.

New comment by mkempe in "Time to break up Google and Facebook, says New York attorney general candidate"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 17:55:14 +0000

Your diatribe is a complete distortion of economic history and facts, best crystallized by your use of "concentrated wealth" when what we have witnessed is an enormous creation of wealth.

Search engines, social networks, mobile phones, high-speed Internet, same- and next-day e-commerce, interactive maps, video streaming, 24/7 access to world-wide news and commentary, electric cars, cloud services, solar panels, wind farms, fracking, online banking, fitness monitors, 4K tvs, retina displays, tablets, e-book readers, voice-activated assistants, cleaning robots, advanced medical devices, tailored drugs, reusable rockets, etc. etc. are all created and those who create and finance the creation of these products and services deserve a) our accolades and admiration and b) reaping the rewards of their actions.

New comment by mkempe in "Mueller Examining Trump’s Tweets in Wide-Ranging Obstruction Inquiry"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 16:36:00 +0000

Mueller appears to be a modern Torquemada. Should every politician be hounded by a nemesis of their own?

In the spirit of "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes" -- politicians should be under constant surveillance and at risk of removal and punishment lest they always behave like angels. Isn't this the new standard in Western countries? In China, I have been told Confucian legal scholars recommended the threat of capital punishment for corrupt administrators.

New comment by mkempe in "Twitter is “shadow banning” prominent Republicans"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 03:14:46 +0000

If you are interested in the truth, how many of their Democrat colleagues have been shadow banned?

Answer: none. But according to you it "certainly doesn't seem to be based on political affiliation".

New comment by mkempe in "Twitter is “shadow banning” prominent Republicans"

mkempe — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 03:13:30 +0000

So, a group of notorious Republican congressmen are trolls and scammers? that's how you believe Twitter makes decisions?

New comment by mkempe in "Ask HN: Anyone think downvoting is starting to get out of control?"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 21:49:06 +0000

Make it a high karma cost. E.g. you must have been upvoted 10 times to be able to downvote once. That cost can climb up for people who generally don't significantly upvote more than they downvote.

[added] I've noticed that sometimes in a deep conversation between only two commenters -- where they cannot downvote each other -- one of them gets their comments downvoted within a minute of posting or so, suggesting that there are parallel accounts used to downvote as a method of intimidation or retaliation.

New comment by mkempe in "Twitter is “shadow banning” prominent Republicans"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 20:45:09 +0000

You are claiming that, in response to a news story, the intent to remove a shadow ban applied to notorious Republicans but not to any Democrats is "favoring" Republicans. [added: And you've been upvoted]. Natch.

New comment by mkempe in "Twitter is “shadow banning” prominent Republicans"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 20:27:56 +0000

Ok, what do the shadow-banned Republican representatives Mark Meadows, Jim Jordan, Matt Gaetz, and Devin Nunes have in common?

New comment by mkempe in "Twitter is “shadow banning” prominent Republicans"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 19:22:39 +0000

I'd like to understand what reasoning one goes through to embark on such an illiberal path.

(Note: not arguing that they can't legally do it, obviously a private business is free to promote or hinder various messages on its own platform. I'm wondering about internal justifications, and logical consequences. Ethics and morals, in other words.)

New comment by mkempe in "Live tracking of Amtrak trains"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 16:46:42 +0000

US government subsidies to airports and highways haven't stopped. They dwarf public subsidies to railroads.

New comment by mkempe in "Live tracking of Amtrak trains"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 16:43:47 +0000

Have you inquired into why they became unprofitable? Have you considered the massive government investments into and subsidies for the two other modes of transportation following WW II?

New comment by mkempe in "Live tracking of Amtrak trains"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 15:59:11 +0000

Nope. I'm saying that Americans are unfortunately missing out on what is elsewhere a great, modern transportation system. If the federal government hadn't used massive war-driven budgets to replace rail with highways, and continued to massively subsidize highways, you'd be there, too.

New comment by mkempe in "Live tracking of Amtrak trains"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 02:15:36 +0000

Indeed, I've travelled from NY to SF in both directions by road, rail, and air. The only experience that was much worse than my travels in Europe and Japan was by rail (namely Amtrak).

There are more people in Europe, there is more land in Europe, etc. Stop with the fake excuses.

Europeans enjoy all of it: cars, trains, and airplanes. The simple fact is that North America is lame and deficient in passenger rail transportation compared to Europe and East Asia, and the comparison keeps getting worse.

New comment by mkempe in "Live tracking of Amtrak trains"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 00:33:49 +0000

For our American friends who constantly claim that the USA is unique because of its size, or because of lower population density (whether the subject is Internet connectivity or railroads) -- Europe is 33% larger than the USA (contiguous 48); Finland has 16 people/km2, Sweden 23/km2, USA 33/km2, California 97/km2; Sweden is slightly larger than California, Finland is slightly smaller.

No excuses.

New comment by mkempe in "Live tracking of Amtrak trains"

mkempe — Wed, 25 Jul 2018 00:08:46 +0000

You are deeply wrong and need to look at proper maps.

Europe is 33% larger than the USA (contiguous 48).

[added] Note sure why this fact would be down-voted. We don't include Greenland or e.g. French Polynesian dependencies in the European total. Sweden is slightly larger than California, with 1/4 the population. Et caetera. Really, you should look at maps, population facts, as well as the extent and quality of railroads.

And quit pretending that there is no rail connection across Europe. [1] America is failing when it comes to 21st century pubic transportation. Angrily lagging behind European, Japanese [2], or Chinese [3] railroads is not a healthy path.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail_in_Europe

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinkansen

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail_in_China