In 1981, weather disasters caused $3.5 billion in damages in the United States. In 2023, that number was $94.9 billion (https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/time-series). The National Weather Service spends billions annually on its network of weather balloons, satellites, and aircraft sensors – generating hundreds of terabytes of data every day. This data, called observation data, is fed into massive supercomputers running advanced physics to produce global weather forecasts. Despite this cost, there are still places in the US where we don't know what the temperature will be two days from now: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/interacti.... And for the rest of the world that lacks weather infrastructure? There’s always the Weather Rock: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_rock.

The most important data for these forecasts come from vertical data ‘slices’ of the atmosphere, called soundings. Every day 2,500 single-use latex radiosondes are launched across the globe to collect these soundings. They stay aloft for about two hours before popping and falling back to Earth. Launch sites for these systems are sparse in Latin America and Africa, and they’re completely non-existent over oceans. This leaves about 80% of the globe with inadequate weather data for accurate predictions.

The coverage gap became painfully evident to Max and Alex during their time at Urban Sky. While building balloons for high-altitude aerial imaging, they kept running into a problem: no matter what weather forecast they used, they couldn’t get accurate wind predictions for the upper atmosphere. They tried all of the free and commercial forecast products, but none of them were accurate enough. Digging into it more, we learned that a big part of the problem was the lack of high-quality in-situ data at those altitudes.

To solve this problem, our systems ascend and descend between sea level and 65,000ft several times a day to collect vertical data soundings. Each vehicle (balloon + payload) weighs less than a pound and can be launched from anywhere in the world, per the FAA and ICAO reg. Here’s one we launched from Potrero Hill in SF, https://youtu.be/75fN5WpRWH0 and here’s another near the Golden Gate Bridge, https://youtu.be/7yLmzLPUFVQ. Although we can’t “drive” these balloons laterally, we can use opposing wind layers to target or avoid specific regions. Here’s what a few simulated flight paths look like, to give you an idea: https://youtu.be/F_Di8cjaEUY

Our payload uses a satellite transceiver for communications and a small, thin film solar panel array to generate power. In addition to the weather data, we also get real-time telemetry from the vehicles, which we use to optimize their flight paths. This includes maintaining the optimal spacing between balloons and steering them to a recovery zone at the end of their lifespan so we can recycle them.

These systems spend most of their time in the stratosphere which is an extremely unforgiving environment. We’ll often see temperatures as low as -80°C while flying near the equator. Throughout the day, we experience extreme temperature cycling as they ascend and descend through the atmosphere. We’ll often encounter 100mph+ wind shears near the boundary with the troposphere (the tropopause) that can rip apart the balloon envelope. These conditions make the stratosphere a very difficult place to deploy to prod.

The real magic of what we’re building will come into play when we have hundreds of these systems in the air over data-sparse regions. But even now, we can do useful and interesting things with them. Some of our early customers are companies who fly very big, very expensive things into the stratosphere. They use our balloons to give them a clear idea of what conditions are ahead of their operations, and we’re working on a forecast product specifically designed for the stratosphere.

The combination of long duration and low cost is novel. We can theoretically maintain thousands of balloons in the atmosphere at any given time for a tenth of the cost of one useful weather satellite. We’re also using the data we collect to train AI models that produce forecasts with better accuracy than existing numerical (supercomputer) forecasts. Because we’re collecting totally unique data over areas that lack observation, our models will maintain a consistent edge versus models that are only trained on open data.

We’re really excited to be launching Sorcerer here with you! We’d love to hear what you think. And if you find one of our balloons in the Bay Area: Sorry! It’s still a work in progress (and please get it back to us).

I’ll leave you all with a bonus video of Paul Buchheit launching one of our balloons, which we thought was pretty cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sngF9VvDzg

Re: Protests against Policy Brutality in Macedonia (June 2011)

Dear Facebook,

We are writing to express our concern over the swift deletion policy that has been imposed on the facebook pages and events that we as participants in a protest against policy brutality in Macedonia are currently dealing with. We have been made aware by the press secretary for the Ministry of Interior that their administrators are responsible for reporting the groups for calls for violence and hate speech, but considering that we know the content of those pages and deny the allegations made by press secretary Kotevski, we wonder how your administrators confirm those allegations before you delete the pages. Do you confirm them at all?

The systematic deletion especially of events that bring people together in peaceful protests adds significantly to the climate of fear created by those we are protesting against, so we felt compelled to explain a few things which we hope you will take into consideration next time you receive a request from the Macedonian Ministry of Interior to kill one of our events or pages. We will try to explain in brief the background of the protests, as well as the nature of the protests with the hope that someone out there will realize how detrimental your policies are for our peaceful, non-violent cause.

Background:

In the early hours of June 6th, shortly after midnight, a 22-year-old boy was beaten to death on the main square in Skopje in front of hundreds of bystanders. Witnesses who were there believed that the perpetrator was a member of the special police forces, but found no evidence of it in the media the next morning. In fact, the only story that was published the next day by a Macedonian news agency merely reinstated what the Ministry of Interior had published in their morning brief: that a young man started feeling sick on the main square the night before and passed away shortly after.

The outraged witnesses and their friends called for a protest to demand more information. The first day was marked with confusion, as the boy’s identity had not been confirmed and no one was coming out with official statements, other than to say that they have no information on the case. Fortunately, enough people had come out on the streets that first day, in peaceful protest, to demand more information, so that more than 40 hours after the killing occurred, the police were left with no other choice than to admit it was one of their own who committed the crime.

The Protests:

The public outrage that followed the official confirmation from the Ministry of Interior helped the protest that occurred on the first day gain momentum. More people came out the next day and even more the next, culminating in a 5000 strong protest a few days later. We have now been walking and blocking the streets of Skopje for 11 days straight and have no intention of backing down until our demands are met. The protest has since turned into a massive protest against police brutality, marked above all by a peaceful, non-violent stance. Which brings us back to our original question: why are our pages and events being deleted? And why has no one in your camp bothered to check the facts before approving requests made by the Ministry of Interior – the same people we are protesting against? The Republic of Macedonia is by no means the best functioning democracy in the world, but we are a democracy nonetheless, and our people still have the right to peaceful protests. In these past 10 days police officers have been walking the city side by side with us, helping us exercise our constitutional rights. Our protests are not violent and we do not use hate speech, and yet our events and pages are still deleted. They are deleted after we have proven time and again that we CAN be peaceful, after various local and international news agencies have covered the protests, mostly in praise of the power of the people. Our protests have been legitimized by locals and foreigners alike, legitimized even by those we are protesting against, as evidenced by the fact that the Ministry of Interior has taken the time to respond (poorly, we have to add) to our demands.

If everyone has legitimized our protests, facebook, why haven’t you?

As a gesture of good will, we have decided to add descriptions in English to our events to make your decisions easier for you. We urge you also to get more informed on our protests (I have added a number of links from credible news sources that confirm what is stated in this letter) and demand that our pages and events are left intact from this moment onwards. I can additionally confirm that the administrators of our pages and events have been very thorough in dealing with any posts or comments that violate the code of non-violence adopted by the protesters, which is a practice that we will continue to employ. By doing so, we are compliant with the provisions from the contract in which we have entered with you as individual facebook users. If there are any violations that we are committing unaware, we would appreciate additional information on what these are and they will be addressed immediately. If not, then let us be and let us plan peaceful protests uninterrupted by those who are powerless on the ground and have been using you to do what they cannot.

Learn more:

Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/hundreds-protest-macedonian-beating-death/2011/06/07/AGwsJHLH_blog.html

Al Jazeera: http://stream.aljazeera.com/story/macedonia

Global Voices Online: http://globalvoicesonline.org/2011/06/06/macedonia-alleged-killing-of-young-man-by-policeman-sparks-protests/

More links in English and other languages: http://protestira.me/?page_id=236

By Alex Horton and Missy Ryan

"the conversation that occurred over an unsecure, commercially available messaging platform."

My understanding has been that Signal is actually well out ahead of other platforms in terms of respecting user privacy, so this seems confusing to me. Has Signal failed an audit that I'm unaware of?

Prime ministers of both Sweden and Finland are holding a joint press conference starting in a few minutes at the time of this writing, just a few hours before Finland's official assessment.[2]

Swedish media is currently buzzing with unconfirmed statements about plans of joining in June of this year at the NATO meeting in Madrid,[3] as well as a previous prime minister of Sweden stating that if Finland joins, Sweden's "main argument" against joining will fall.[4]

Public opinion around one week after the invasion showed that the "No" demographic in Sweden had shrunk from 40% to 27%.[5]

[1]: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/13/nato-finland-sweden/

[2]: https://omni.se/1210-andersson-och-marin-om-natofragan/a/ALwb9r

[3]: https://omni.se/uppgifter-andersson-vill-att-sverige-gar-med-i-nato-i-juni/a/ALwbMq

[4]: https://www.dn.se/sverige/bildt-om-finland-gar-med-i-nato-faller-sveriges-tyngsta-motargument/

[5]: https://www.svt.se/nyheter/inrikes/nastan-halften-av-svenskarna-vill-ga-med-i-nato

A resource which plots backbone servers and major datacenters on a geographical map would be especially helpful. The only two half-decent (emphasis on 'half') resources we've found so far are:

http://www.colotraq.com
http://www.datacentermap.com

It would be nice if there was a Google Maps mashup or something better than DataCenterMap, but apparently that is (was?) considered a part of our nation's obscurity plan: http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A23689-2003Jul7

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/08/15/twitter-x-links-delayed/

Source: https://themarkup.org/investigations/2023/09/15/twitter-is-still-throttling-competitors-links-check-for-yourself

There's a textbox in the TheMarkup link above to test

I am considering joining the coast guard reserve for a few reasons, maybe bad ones. I'm actually posting this under a sockpuppet because my friends in real life were completely revolted by the notion that I could even consider this. Here are my thoughts...

- I'm not going to get shipped to afghanistan in the coast guard.

- I like boats and the ocean and would be able to get paid (minimal amounts) learning more about them. Normally, this hobby can be very expensive.

- a while back the sfbay craiglslist actually had many job listings for the coast guard. This makes me think that I'd be able to stay in the bay area, rather than shipping off to a base in west virginia or somewhere else far away.

- I would be able to get health insurance through the coast guard

- I'd meet new people.

- It sounds like fun...

and lastly: I just read an article about a guy in brooklyn who joined the army reserve and received a $150,000 small business loan only available to people in the armed services. he then used the loan to open two really hip bars in Williamsburg.

This seemed like an interesting way to get funding, and if the guy got $150K to start a BAR, surely I could get funding for a technology business.

I'm not sure if I can even do this, I may have a physical condition that disqualifies me from any military service.

But, I was wondering if anyone on HN was in a military reserve unit, or was in the past, and can offer any insight.

edit: here's the link to the small business loan, and an article about it:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/13/AR2007061301116.html

http://www.sba.gov/patriotexpress/

Any comments are appreciated. Especially appreciated if you've been in the armed service and can say why this is or isn't a good idea.

Write-up: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2015/01/05/you-can-now-play-nearly-2400-ms-dos-video-games-in-your-browser/

Link to games:
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos_games/v2

I wonder how they could do this? The WP article does not mention copyright issues. This includes premium titles of the time including Dune, Prince of Persia, Oregon Trail, Wolfenstein, etc. They are hosting the complete game to play right in the browser (see second link.)

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=Musk&sort=byDate&type=story

Here are the most recent results ... is this really the best topic for HN to spend it's attention on? Seriously?

   Elon Musk Trolls Twitter(https://www.bloomberg.com/tosv2.html?...

   “Temporarily on hold” is not a thing. Musk has signed a binding contract(https://www.bloomberg.com/tosv2.html?...

   Matt Levine Blog: Elon Musk Trolls Twitter(https://www.bloomberg.com/tosv2.html?...

   Elon Musk Trolls Twitter(https://www.bloomberg.com/tosv2.html?...

   Elon Musk Trolls Twitter(https://www.bloomberg.com/tosv2.html?...

   Elon Musk says Twitter deal is 'on hold'(https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/elon-musk-tweets-that-deal-for-twitter-is-on-hold)

   Elon Musk puts Twitter deal on hold over bot numbers claim(https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/13/musk_twitter_on_hold/)

   Elon Musk tweets Twitter deal ‘temporarily on hold’(https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/05/13/musk-twitter-bid/)

   Elon Musk says Twitter deal ‘temporarily on hold’(https://nypost.com/2022/05/13/elon-musk-says-twitter-deal-temporarily-on-hold/)

   Musk Says His Twitter Takeover Is ‘On Hold,’ Then Says He’s ‘Still Committed’(https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/13/business/elon-musk-says-his-takeover-of-twitter-is-on-hold.html)

   Elon Musk puts Twitter deal on hold over fake account details(https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-61433724)

   Elon Musk is putting his Twitter deal on hold because bots(https://thenextweb.com/news/elon-musk-twitter-deal-hold-bots)

   Elon Musk says Twitter deal ‘on hold’ after spam/fake account report(https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/13/23070306/elon-musk-twitter-deal-on-hold-spam-inauthentic-accounts)

   Elon Musk says his deal to buy Twitter is on hold(https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/13/tech/twitter-deal-on-hold-elon-musk/index.html)

   Twitter takeover temporarily on hold, says Elon Musk(https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/may/13/twitter-takeover-temporarily-hold-elon-musk)

   Elon Musk puts the Twitter deal on a temporary hold(https://www.teslaoracle.com/2022/05/13/elon-musk-puts-the-twitter-deal-on-a-temporary-hold/)

   Twitter Deal Temporarily on Hold(https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/twitter-deal-temporarily-on-hold-tweets-elon-musk-2972524)

   Elon Musk says Twitter deal on hold pending details on fake accounts(https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/13/elon-musk-says-twitter-deal-on-hold-pending-details-on-fake-accounts.html)

   Musk puts $44bn Twitter deal ‘on hold’(https://www.ft.com/content/a0aa177e-607c-4f3c-b2af-ac74535e2d26)

   Elon Musk puts Twitter deal on hold over fake account details(https://www.bbc.com/news/business-61433724)

   Musk $44B Twitter deal temporarily on hold(https://www.reuters.com/technology/musk-says-44-billion-twitter-deal-hold-2022-05-13/)

Your time is limited, and cannot be replenished. "Spending Time" is not really a metaphor,
it's a reality.

I'm choosing more carefully how I spend my time. I've spent this time in the hope that a few
of you who are significantly more skilled and able than I might reconsider how you spend yours.

Its not realistic for me to manually compile a list of them all by myself. How did the popular news aggregator sites build a comprehensive list?

Today Putin announced Russia developed a nuclear powered missile with unlimited range [3]. The missile was reportedly tested in late 2017. Did Russia spew radioactive jet waste over their country during a field test of their nuclear powered missile?

News Sources:

1. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/11/10/563286253/mysterious-radioactive-cloud-over-europe-hints-at-accident-farther-east

2. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/11/21/that-harmless-radioactive-cloud-over-europe-did-come-from-russia-after-all

3. https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2018/03/01/590014611/experts-aghast-over-russian-claim-of-nuclear-powered-missile-with-unlimited-rang

I want to understand why social media companies don't seem to look as though they are taking responsibility for moderating extremists and coordinated hate groups trolling on their platforms. This problem has been escalating exponentially for years, especially over the US election cycle, and is a critical issue. Why does Silicon Valley feel as though it must not take a position on this?

Twitter, Facebook in my belief are no longer politically neutral organizations when they allow vindictive trolling and misinformation to proliferate and serve the agenda of alt-right hate groups. Do the people working at these companies ever ask themselves these questions or are they purposely oblivious to what's going on?

But Baidu, like everyone else, has a responsibility to ensure their network isn't used to attack others. Yes, China is a large and powerful malicious actor. But Baidu is a global presence - this entire attack uses their outside-of-China audience - and a NASDAQ listed company $BIDU. There are many things Baidu could do to ensure its network aren't used to attack others, most obviously locate servers used by customers outside China inside a secure network where they can not be compromised, i.e. outside China. This may be difficult, but that does not change the fact that it is still Baidu's responsibility to stop their networks from being used to attack others.

Until such time as Baidu have taken active steps to prevent their networks from being used to attack others, we should drop their packets and consider their network compromised.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/02/16/want-to-get-more-responses-for-your-emails-write-like-a-third-grader

[2] http://www.boomeranggmail.com/privacy.html

There are still a lot of problems and as stated in this article, we need some killer apps.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/12/09/heres-why-volatility-isnt-a-big-problem-for-bitcoin/

I want to ask HN about what apps/services/infrastructure would be needed to make bitcoin happen? What would the ideal bitcoin landscape look like from mobile payments to saving accounts?

More effective, I think, would be a site that lets a relative upload some photos and matches them via facial recognition to data on her son, if available.

This could also help Ukraine fend off later accusations of violating the Geneva Convention, which says governments must protect POWs from “insults and public curiosity." https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/03/telegram-russian-war-dead-ukraine-pows/

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/12/21255870/facebook-content-moderator-settlement-scola-ptsd-mental-health

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/us-to-relinquish-remaining-control-over-the-internet/2014/03/14/0c7472d0-abb5-11e3-adbc-888c8010c799_story.html

The instigation for this move is apparently international distrust of the US gov't following Snowden. People have claimed that, through the control of the DNS root zone, an international ICANN could censor swastika imagery (e.g. France), political dissidents (e.g China), or dubious trademark infringement (e.g. US). Others have said that ICANN has essentially no power, and that all of this is a political distraction with minimal real-world effect. Still others have said that, by opening up the process, ICANN will become more transparent than when controlled by an imperfect US.

What are ICANN's actual abilities, and what are the possibilities for international control to lead to good or bad outcomes?

The preprint: https://connect.medrxiv.org/relate/content/181

It seems good to opt out, but also that this kind of thing will get even more out of control with time and regular people will need some kind of strategy adjustments. I'm curious what you have to say.

OK, maybe I am an idiot and need to learn how HN does linking...in progress... then wil. fix.

If it's not lobbying, is it votes? Is someone's vote really going to be swayed by their representative restricting assault rifles? Do these things really serve any other purpose then being toys or "safety" against a radical government? Could we come up with some sort of straw polling app to help politicians see that it might actually help their cause?

Sorry this post lacks any sort of statistics or depth. I just don't understand what the problem is. The NRA donation amount seems so small and media continues to talk about the NRA lobby having such a stronghold.

Hi NAME

I am writing to inform you that, regrettably, from August 16 we will no longer be delivering in Germany. This was not an easy decision and one we have not taken lightly.

At Deliveroo we’re on a mission to create the very best food delivery service in the world, and at the heart of this is offering a service that works brilliantly for our customers, riders and restaurants. Where we cannot do this to the level that we expect and you deserve, we won’t operate. Therefore, Deliveroo’s focus will now be on growing our operations in other markets around the world.

Thank you for ordering with Deliveroo - we have enjoyed being able to bring you amazing food from some of the many brilliant restaurants in Germany.

The service will be available as normal up until August 16.

If you have credit on your Deliveroo account we’ll refund this amount to your bank account on August 19. Depending on your bank, this will take 5 - 10 business days to reach your account.

We want to thank you again for using Deliveroo, and we hope to see you again soon.

The Deliveroo Team

UPDATE

News outlets picking it up now:

* https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/food-delivery-app-deliveroo-to-stop-serving-germany/2019/08/12/1d172c16-bcf5-11e9-a8b0-7ed8a0d5dc5d_story.html?noredirect=on

* https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2019/08/12/world/europe/ap-eu-germany-deliveroo.html

* https://federalnewsnetwork.com/world-news/2019/08/food-delivery-app-deliveroo-to-stop-serving-germany/

* https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2019-08-12/food-delivery-app-deliveroo-to-stop-serving-germany

Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/entertainment/game-of-thrones/

If the DOJ were to force Google to open its technology and had to create a platform similar to "Nvidia NIM" (for example), here are some SearchApps I would like to use or connect with my developments:

* Choose whether or not; to show ads based on curated searches from third parties.

* Refined results from Hacker News, Stack Overflow, Reddit, Quora, etc. Without magic like "site:http://..."

* Search for graffiti, urban art, street artists, etc.

* Explore among tens of thousands of recipes without ads ← filter by regions, historical periods, allergies, budget, routes.

* Specialized search in manga, anime, animation ← by period, style, directors, language, etc.

* Limit to fiction literature, for example. "I need you to show me stories of dystopias written by authors from Eastern Europe between 1940 and 1960"

* Movies: "List and/or show all scenes where Martin Scorsese makes a cameo" | vlc

* Only news from reputable sources[2]. Improve the search in the historical archive of: NYTimes, WSJ, FT, Bloomberg, etc. Combined outputs related to historical events: global or just at the birth of my child ← what news happened that day? What films were showing in theaters? Improvement in information visualization.

* Medical cases similar to "this file"

* Information on trials and legal documents by region, period, judge, lawyer, litigant, etc.

* Specialized in engineering and/or industrial design: parts, DIY, tutorials, manuals, hacks, suppliers, etc.

* Search engine for 'Verified Facts,' filtering only Wikipedia, Britannica, Nature, Our World in Data, etc.

* Specialized searching for vintage and collectible items: including auctions, buying and selling, rentals, stores, bartering, and exhibitions.

* IoT: "Search for sensors that provide telemetry data on seismic activity along the coast of California during this period"

* With BASH commands, pipes and redirections, regular expressions, or SQL.

Each type of SearchApp may charge or not. It may show ads or not. It may be open or not. What would be undeniable is that Google would charge for it... or not. :‑)

The difference with LLMs is that Google already has all this data recorded. It doesn't need to reprocess it. Additionally, they have Gemini. Moreover, Google would only be required to open the technology, not to stop offering its own search service. So, if you don't like any of the new SearchApps, you can continue using the regular Google as always.

The important question is: what other SearchApps can you think of?

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/08/06/google-antitrust-lawsuit-illegal-monopoly/

[2] Whatever it means for the user.

1. DPS, Texas' state police, wearing camouflage uniforms. [a]

2. The disproportionate use of antagonizing force used against peaceful protestors without provocation. The protestors were young, semi-untrained, and largely more or less harmless.

Notes:

a. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/07/20/mark-hertling-police-portland/