Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

blogs.microsoft.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 110 posts

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#31

Post by erlehmann_ »

obstinate wrote: post #25
erlehmann_ wrote: post #12

> As part of her work, Zhang researched the root cause of tremors. She spent six months, off and on, building prototypes. She sometimes worked in her London home, soldering wires to PC boards and tinkering with coin cell motors to create vibrations. She tested early versions with four other people with Parkinson’s, producing promising results for three, spurring the idea forward, she says. This paragraph reads like t…

Yeah, I will say that I downvoted you. Your expectations (source code, that the results would be documented to your satisfaction after a trial of size N=1) seem unreasonable to me, to the extent that I personally think it is downvote worthy. I don't think, "where's the source code," contributes to the site, especially in situations where one would not reasonably expect to have access to it. ---- I have definitely see…

In the article, Hayan Zhang is described as a researcher. She (claims to have) created a device that improves the quality of life of people who have Parkinson's. The device seems to have been built with easily obtainable components. Similar effects to the one she exploits have been described scientifically [0], although it seems questionable if the result comes from the vibration [1].

Expecting publication of source code from a researcher seems appropriate to me. From another article about the “Emma device” [2]:

> Haiyan has no plans to commercialize the technology, but hopes other researchers will take on the project and run with it. “I think it warrants more trials,” she noted. “It definitely works for Emma. I’m amazed how well it works for her.”

How can others improve on her work when it is not published? To me it looks like this invention is milked for PR as much as possible, while details about implementation are scarce. That device helps only one person right now, while potential is there to help a lot of people.

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20037223

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23939405

[2] https://mspoweruser.com/microsoft-researcher-creates-wearabl...

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#33

Post by aerovistae »

erlehmann_ wrote: post #12

> As part of her work, Zhang researched the root cause of tremors. She spent six months, off and on, building prototypes. She sometimes worked in her London home, soldering wires to PC boards and tinkering with coin cell motors to create vibrations. She tested early versions with four other people with Parkinson’s, producing promising results for three, spurring the idea forward, she says. This paragraph reads like t…

No, I think your other comment was getting downvoted because it didn't really make any sense and people disagreed with it. No conspiracy there.

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#34

Post by obstinate »

erlehmann_ wrote: post #31
obstinate wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I will say that I downvoted you. Your expectations (source code, that the results would be documented to your satisfaction after a trial of size N=1) seem unreasonable to me, to the extent that I personally think it is downvote worthy. I don't think, "where's the source code," contributes to the site, especially in situations where one would not reasonably expect to have access to it. ---- I have definitely see…

In the article, Hayan Zhang is described as a researcher. She (claims to have) created a device that improves the quality of life of people who have Parkinson's. The device seems to have been built with easily obtainable components. Similar effects to the one she exploits have been described scientifically [0], although it seems questionable if the result comes from the vibration [1]. Expecting publication of source…

I can see where you got your expectations from. You should reach out to the researcher. Maybe they can tell you why it's not OSS. I'd not be surprised if it was some mix of medical devices being a special case, and the IP being owned by Microsoft.

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#35

Post by thefreeman »

erlehmann_ wrote: post #12

> As part of her work, Zhang researched the root cause of tremors. She spent six months, off and on, building prototypes. She sometimes worked in her London home, soldering wires to PC boards and tinkering with coin cell motors to create vibrations. She tested early versions with four other people with Parkinson’s, producing promising results for three, spurring the idea forward, she says. This paragraph reads like t…

One thing that is virtually guaranteed to get you downvotes is complaining about downvotes. Which you do twice in this comment.

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#36

Post by petversen »

zevv wrote: post #29
erlehmann_ wrote: post #12

> As part of her work, Zhang researched the root cause of tremors. She spent six months, off and on, building prototypes. She sometimes worked in her London home, soldering wires to PC boards and tinkering with coin cell motors to create vibrations. She tested early versions with four other people with Parkinson’s, producing promising results for three, spurring the idea forward, she says. This paragraph reads like t…

I have a nagging feeling about this project as well. It is simply too good to be true: first we see a lone engineer fiddling with some wires on a prototyping board, and a few months later poof the girl can write again. She is defying years and years of experience by a large number of experts in the field, this just does not sound realistic. Why is this 'breakthrough' presented as the effort of an individual? The only…

Zhang was at Lift when she saw that they invented the spoon that compensates for Parkinson tremor during eating. That's where she got the idea. The wrist device was built by electrical engineers, not her.

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#37

Post by Lewton »

erlehmann_ wrote: post #12

> As part of her work, Zhang researched the root cause of tremors. She spent six months, off and on, building prototypes. She sometimes worked in her London home, soldering wires to PC boards and tinkering with coin cell motors to create vibrations. She tested early versions with four other people with Parkinson’s, producing promising results for three, spurring the idea forward, she says. This paragraph reads like t…

New comments always start at the top

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#38

Post by erlehmann_ »

thefreeman wrote: post #35
erlehmann_ wrote: post #12

> As part of her work, Zhang researched the root cause of tremors. She spent six months, off and on, building prototypes. She sometimes worked in her London home, soldering wires to PC boards and tinkering with coin cell motors to create vibrations. She tested early versions with four other people with Parkinson’s, producing promising results for three, spurring the idea forward, she says. This paragraph reads like t…

One thing that is virtually guaranteed to get you downvotes is complaining about downvotes. Which you do twice in this comment.

It was not my intention to complain, as I neither feel pain, dissatisfaction or resentment against those who downvote me. I wanted to point out that my comment asking if this is PR was downvoted to the bottom. I remember such a voting pattern from only one other thread on HN. I just looked for it and it was also on a thread about Microsoft [1]. I can not remember such voting patterns for any comment not about Microsoft.

I will probably not respond to further comments about those downvotes, as it seems off-topic; dang has already commented extensively regarding previous astroturfing accusations against Microsoft [2]:

> If MS "infiltrated" HN, it's news to me and I'd like to know about it. If anybody did anything to HN that could fairly be described as "infiltration", we'd be pissed. It's our job to protect the integrity of this place for the community and we take it seriously. When we see gaming and manipulation we crack down on it hard. But actually the BigCos aren't the ones who do such things, probably because they're (rightly) too risk-averse.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12319829

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11844253

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#39

Post by khazhoux »

Looks like nice work. I think. I couldn't find the details and didn't want to spend the full 15 minutes reading.

This style of writing is very frustrating.

1. Introduction. We set up for something dramatic. In this case, a Parkinson's sufferer is about to see her life changed. In another recent story, a maternity nurse is about to birth her first child, and we were teased she would die after giving birth. Now we're at the moment of truth. All we have to do is...

2. CUT TO BACKSTORY. When X and Y first met in 1997, they were first drawn to each other by a shared love of whatever. Eventually, their travels led them to find out...

3. DEEP BACKSTORY. When X was 9 years old, she found a thing that immediately interested her. She kept at it because...

4. FAMILY BACKSTORY. Her grandfather fought in WWII/Korea/Vietnam for the US/British/Japanese/Australian army, and he tinkered on the side in whatever endeavor X would go on to work in...

5. MAIN TOPIC. And we get a paragraph or two of what we originally were interested in reading about, but not before...

6. CUT TO ORIGINAL BACKSTORY. Flesh it out a bit more. Finish it out. College, grad school, first job, moved across the country, landed current job. And now, finally...

7. NOT SO FAST. Let's finish out the grandfather's story, and his reaction when he learned what X was working on. Ok, now...

8. BACK TO THE ORIGINAL STORY ITSELF. And we get the five last paragraphs, which could just be joined with the first 3 paragraphs to tell the entire story. But then we woudn't hit our word count.

I just wanted to learn how this bracelet works. With that other article, I just wanted to know how the nurse died. Do I need to be teased for 27 paragraphs?

Re: A prototype watch, raising hope for Parkinson’s

#40

Post by yzmtf2008 »

erlehmann_ wrote: post #38
thefreeman wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that is virtually guaranteed to get you downvotes is complaining about downvotes. Which you do twice in this comment.

It was not my intention to complain, as I neither feel pain, dissatisfaction or resentment against those who downvote me. I wanted to point out that my comment asking if this is PR was downvoted to the bottom. I remember such a voting pattern from only one other thread on HN. I just looked for it and it was also on a thread about Microsoft [1]. I can not remember such voting patterns for any comment not about Microso…

> dang has already commented extensively regarding previous astroturfing accusations against Microsoft

dang has also commented that there is no special status for Microsoft on HN.

Post reply on HN