[ptek]

Former Australia scaffolder here: The bamboo scaffold is used to hold people mainly and to act as fall protection not support weights like steel scaffold (i.e They won't be storing I-Beams on it temporarily or shifting wheel barrows full of cement). Weight difference in people. When I was scaffolding in Australia, I was 70Kg and 178cm tall. I was working with people who were 100-120kg+, Those people would have been carrying 4-5 steel boards about 80-100kgs on their shoulder, I was carrying 3-4 steel boards 60-80kgs. Light duty scaffold, is 2 boards wide (450mm) and 3m long bays. I could pass another person my weight, but some one who is 100-120Kg+ I would struggle on scaffold. Most of it is build at heavy duty steel which is 5 boards wide + 2 board hop ups and 2.4m long (Standards say it should be 1.8m long). After 45M high, scaffold has to restart again and they use I beams inside the buildings and U heads under the screw jacks before they start building again. I prefer buildings 4 storeys high (1 ground + 3 levels), that is you get the sun in the winter and if the shit hits the fan even if you jump from that high you may break bones but you should still be able to live depending on what you land on.

[dogman1050]

You never know who you'll meet on Hacker News. I recall a comment thread where someone challenged another's assertion about a mathematical concept by saying that only a recipient of certain mathematical award would be qualified to make that point, and it turned out they had. Busted!

[tux3]

The Putnam incident: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35079