flueedo's comments

flueedo | 9 years ago | on: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

I've been off of facebook for years now, but I doubt nowadays most people see the "like" buttons as an instrument for teaching the website algorithms to help keep themselves open minded. (Assuming this stratategy indeed works, since it's known this isn't the only variable they consider)

And I don't think this isn't the purpose of feed 'customization' either. It's about making money by assuring advertisers that their ads will be paid some attention to. In order to do that, they need to try and keep people's eyeballs glued to the screen as much as possible.

flueedo | 9 years ago | on: How to empty the ketchup bottle every time and improve power plants too

I would imagine that in the sense of "usable product" for costumers, things will level out somehow.

But waste would certainly be lessened within certain steps of production. For example, sometimes you have containers used for long distance transportation, which you can't remove all of a product from, and you have to wash in between refillings.

flueedo | 9 years ago | on: Cartoon Laws of Physics

According to Wikpedia the all countries which haven't adopted the Metric System are: USA, Liberia, Myanmar.

flueedo | 9 years ago | on: The Linux Foundation Unites the JavaScript Community for Open Web Development

Yep, and, not that having to learn and become acquainted with shortcomings of new sets of languages/tools every other year isn't a fact of life for many devs that one ought to just accept. But having something run just (or as close as possible to) the same across many platforms make it more likely that that knowledge you acquired will remain among your best options when approaching a wide range of problems for a longer time.

flueedo | 9 years ago | on: How Anxiety Warps Your Perception

I too watch from the sidelines, but I think that if I were a voter I would either not vote or vote third candidate. I wish there wasn't so many troubling things about Hillary's deals and ties.

flueedo | 9 years ago | on: The Most Popular Online Course Teaches You to Learn (2015)

I think that once one has accepted that he/she must start at that moment no matter what, and it will a long time till finishing, then starting with the hard stuff makes all the sense. You might be feeling drained by the end, when you were to take on those hard problems/subjects. Or the easier stuff you can attack at other times, during breaks, while it might be difficult to advance on the harder stuff without a bigger more comfortable time frame.

flueedo | 10 years ago | on: Breaking the communication barrier between dolphins and humans

If you put a bunch of humans (children) together, each with no previous knowledge of language, on an isolated island, they will in all likelihood come up with one. (Something close to this, as a live example, is a documented case I remember having read years ago of an all-new sign-language that emerged spontaneously among a large group neglected deaf-mute children at an institution a few decades ago. I think this was in Nicaragua or some other country in that region) What I mean is, our linguistic ability isn't dependent on culture (though tremendously enriched by it), it's biological. Why wouldn't the same hold for dolphins. I think they're very smart, but I don't believe they ever had something we could decently call a language.

flueedo | 11 years ago | on: We need more STEM majors with liberal arts training

And what do businesses say when they actually need people with some quality? It is usually a natural consequence of your skills being in high demand that you'll be able to ask for a higher salary. Business may be saying that only because those are expensive as you charge, but if however they are actually in need of certain skills those would probably be expensive just the same.

Considering that 1)Scientific knowledge is so important for everything in our global society and 2)The US stats in science education are below those in other developed economies, I'd say probably the demand is real.

flueedo | 11 years ago | on: Is it really 'Complex'? Or did we just make it 'Complicated'? [video]

Yeah but being a translator is a different kind of activity from being an engineer, architect or craftsman. It feels to me that being a Software Engineer -- though currently I've been working with something else -- is kinda like (grossly simplifying it) a really complicated game of Lego or Tetris, where the 'pieces' (APIs, routines, functions, protocols, legacy code, etc, etc) don't always fit where/how they were supposed to, sometimes you can tweak them, but sometimes they're black boxes. Sometimes you have to build some pieces, after giving up on trying to make do with what you got. I think that's what the OP means by time wasted. We waste a lot of time getting the pieces to fit and (as much as we can verify) work as they should when we should be spending our time focusing on what structure we want built after all the pieces are in place.

Engineers, architects and craftsmen don't work, nor waste anywhere near as much time, with as many "pieces" (if any) that behave in such erratic ways.

flueedo | 11 years ago | on: Writers Say They Feel Censored by Surveillance

I think 'illegal' isn't the best word here. In the US and the other 'five eyes' nations, it seems to me, agencies have a much broader scope than that. Things you say aren't strictly illegal (after all there's the first amendment, and similar laws in the other countries), but they are classed as threatening in other ways. Also, anything we say might not get us in trouble today, but since it's hard to predict what the future holds -- laws may become harsher for example --, it might indeed get us in trouble two or even five years from now, (possibly after it no longer represents our current opinions even) since it's all recorded.

About China I agree, and think they and other similar nations stayed competitive because they have where to 'borrow' innovation from (i.e. the freer nations). If we ever get to a place where the whole world is totalitarian/authoritarian this will stifle innovation everywhere.

flueedo | 11 years ago | on: Inside the favela too violent for Rio’s armed police

There's a propagated distortion regarding the meaning of human rights here in Brazil, it seems to me. There's this idea that human rights is synonym with being soft on crime, not actually punishing wrongdoings, treating criminals better than honest working folk. So, understandably, a lot of people start seeing "human rights" as part of the problem.

Crime can be solved in two ways, one of them is through the kind of policies you've mentioned. The other -- which may only work with crime committed or allegedly committed by the poor -- is by widespread oppression and institution of elements of a police state (the drawbacks are many as you can imagine). Brazil currently does not have the infrastructure to follow the former so it seems to be courting the latter; It doesn't seem to be in the best interest of politicians to work towards the better option. Possibly, who knows, because it would be the harder and riskier approach regarding whether it could bring them immediate votes and popularity.

flueedo | 12 years ago | on: Ask HN: Help. I need to go away from here

I read all other comments, nothing much for me to add. Except for: If you feel that you need to leave asap, to put distance between you and your home city, just so you don't feel so trapped anymore and can maybe think more clearly, then consider that there isn't such a requirement to only move after you've been hired by some great company. Go to Berlin or some other northern big city and get any job that will pay your rent while you search for a job you really want. For example a night job as a waiter while you hunt for interviews, remote programming work,freelances,etc during the day.

flueedo | 12 years ago | on: How can I verify whether my new laptop has been tampered?

My suggestion is that you ask this question at security.stackexchange.com , also browse the website for similar questions already answered.

My answer: A laptop usually can trivially be taken apart completely and then put back together without any signs of the operation remaining, internally or externally. Same thing with smartphones. Checking BIOS integrity usually isn't possible without specialised physical tools.

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