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13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

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Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#111

Post by losvedir »

ColinWright wrote: post #88
llambda wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All I'm asking is that if he wants more quality he contribute more quality. Yes; I'm doing what I'm complaining about him doing, however I've done it exactly once, how many pages and pages of his comment history are filled with these aforementioned comments?

I already contribute items I believe to be of quality, both submissions and comments. Ceasing to comment on duplicates and breaches of the guidelines won't change that.

Oh, wow, I didn't realize it has been you doing all this serious cross referencing to previous discussions. THANK YOU. It has been a huge help to me in the past, especially when I land on Hacker News results from a Google search.

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#112

Post by wanderful »

colanderman wrote: post #77

I don't get what his results have to do with the Fibonacci sequence. Between his "control" and the design he was testing, he changed: 1. panel heights 2. panel angles 3. whether panels were stacked or not I would guess that any of those three things matter way more than the position of the "leaves" following the Fibonacci sequence. He needed to compare his design to a similar tree-shape whose "leaves" were, say, unif…

Wouldn't "rough" equate to more leaves at more angles, which in a way confirms his hypothesis?

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#113

Post by losvedir »

llambda wrote: post #87
tokenadult wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's really a cheap shot after Colin's kind reply to your informational question from just the last month. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2831538

And I really appreciated that. It was the first time I had read a comment by him that wasn't putting down someone's submission or complaining about there being a similar article. I wish he'd spend more time contributing comments like that. By the way, thank you for your comment there Colin. I truly was glad to see you don't only make comments on dupes.

> * that wasn't putting down someone's submission or complaining about there being a similar article*

You're getting downvotes galore by the folks here, but on the off chance you're not a native English speaker or something, I don't read his comments that way at all. I actually checked through every one of your links posted above and I don't take his comments to be mean spirited at all. More like he's designated himself the friendly community cross referencer.

This one[1] in particular, is about as good of a comment as you can get. Cross referenced to other submissions, interesting links raised in the HN discussion, and a comment of his own.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2896827

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#114

Post by llambda »

scott_s wrote: post #108
llambda wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Colin, It seems a great deal of your comments have begun to fall into either the "this has already been posted" or "you're not following the rules" category. Do you see the problem with "contributing" material on top of material you see as less than satisfactory? You're only adding more cruft to the cruft. We get it. You don't like reposts. We get it. You don't like it when people don't follow the rules to a "T". Gue…

Pointing out where other discussion on the same topic happened, or is currently going on, is a Good Thing. You are confusing helpfully pointing out where more discussion exists as a complaint.

The implication of spamming a list of links over and over and over again (paired with the blatant admission in his profile that he mostly doesn't read HN anymore due the amount of dupes) is that Colin is dissatisfied and is trying to make a point which in doing so is only contributing more of what is evidently causing him distress (lack of richness in content); it can't be argued that bludgeoning posters and readers over the head with a wall of links is comparable to real discussion imo.

See why I'm having a problem with this?

I don't see it as a good thing. I see it as more shit to wade through in order to get to the content I'm after. Unfortunately, it's something I'm seeing more and more often, over the course of the past several weeks... Colin isn't the first person to do this and I believe the consensus before was that ultimately it's a disservice to the community, well intentioned or not. (RiderOfGiraffes had a script that did something similar I think?)

Edit: As I can't reply to you directly yet Scott, I'll add this here:

"It is not itself discussion, but it points readers to discussions."

You understand exactly how I feel! :) You're absolutely correct: it adds nothing to the discussion and is therefore misplaced in the comments.

Now if there were a way to add some kind of list of similar or duplicate articles to an article that was independent of the comment threads, I would definitely be in support of this! But as comments, they feel like more spam. :(

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#115

Post by colanderman »

wanderful wrote: post #112
colanderman wrote: post #77

I don't get what his results have to do with the Fibonacci sequence. Between his "control" and the design he was testing, he changed: 1. panel heights 2. panel angles 3. whether panels were stacked or not I would guess that any of those three things matter way more than the position of the "leaves" following the Fibonacci sequence. He needed to compare his design to a similar tree-shape whose "leaves" were, say, unif…

Wouldn't "rough" equate to more leaves at more angles, which in a way confirms his hypothesis?

His hypothesis had nothing to do with the angle of the leaves but rather with the Fibonacci sequence. For some reason he also decided to angle the leaves in his test, which I suspect were the true cause of the efficiency gain.

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#116

Post by LukeRB »

llambda wrote: post #61
ColinWright wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In part, this is why it says in the guidelines: In Submissions ... Please submit the original source. If a blog post reports on something they found on another site, submit the latter. http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Your last link has now been submitted by someone as a separate item and is just so much better. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2902496

Colin, It seems a great deal of your comments have begun to fall into either the "this has already been posted" or "you're not following the rules" category. Do you see the problem with "contributing" material on top of material you see as less than satisfactory? You're only adding more cruft to the cruft. We get it. You don't like reposts. We get it. You don't like it when people don't follow the rules to a "T". Gue…

If you perceive that Colin is repeatedly linking to dupes or calling out policies, isn't that a flaw in the UI and UX of HN rather than him just being a complainer? If someone picks up an Android phone and is confused by what the menu button does, and someone kept telling them that they're doing it wrong, wouldn't we be missing the point? If the user doesn't get what the menu button is, it's not the other person's problem for pointing out what it is; It's the manufacturer's problem for not making it clearer. I, too, see Colin's contributions as helpful, and I wish there was a "mark as duplicate" or "redirect" option so he didn't have to type the same stuff every time.

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#117

Post by scott_s »

llambda wrote: post #114
scott_s wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pointing out where other discussion on the same topic happened, or is currently going on, is a Good Thing. You are confusing helpfully pointing out where more discussion exists as a complaint.

The implication of spamming a list of links over and over and over again (paired with the blatant admission in his profile that he mostly doesn't read HN anymore due the amount of dupes) is that Colin is dissatisfied and is trying to make a point which in doing so is only contributing more of what is evidently causing him distress (lack of richness in content); it can't be argued that bludgeoning posters and readers…

RiderOfGiraffes did it by hand, and he was similarly driven away by what I understand to be a minority of people who did not like the practice. He was our semantic dupe-checker, and losing him was bad for the community.

I've explained why I see it as beneficial: it connects related discussions. It is not itself discussion, but it points readers to discussions. So, no, I do not see why you have a problem with it.

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#118

Post by ColinWright »

llambda wrote: post #91
ColinWright wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, OK. I'll stop. Despite lots of people saying they appreciate it, you've convinced me. I won't cross-reference, I won't point out when people break the guidelines, I'll just silently downvote and flag, leaving people - often newbies - with no idea why their contributions disappear or get negative karma. That might or might not lead to still more bewildered posts saying they don't understand, but that's OK. There'…

Colin, As civil adults and in all seriousness, would you stop? Do you see why I've complained? Cruft is cruft is cruft. Clearly your strategy to mend the dupe problem isn't having a positive effect. Maybe this is because new users aren't aware of the rules (but there will always be new users) maybe it's because people are willfully ignoring the rule (but in this case why should they pay you any attention?) or perhaps…

I wasn't going to contribute further to this, but after considerable thought, I've decided that you have me confused.

When do you get afflicted by this "cruft"?

If it's in the item that is a duplicate of an earlier item, isn't it better to have the cross-reference?

If it's in my comment history, why are you looking there - it's full of "cruft."

It seems to me that the only times you'll come across it are when you actively seek it - and that's no basis for a complaint - or when it helps you avoid splitting a discussion, and that's surely a good thing.

But no mind, never matter, I'm not doing it any more.

=======

ADDED IN EDIT: For what it's worth, in the current top 30 items on the "newest" page there are 5 duplicates of previously submitted items. If people start a discussion on those then they will be missing out on the discussions that have already happened. I think that's a shame, and it offends my sense of "taste" as an engineer.

(also edited for typos)

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#119

Post by pedalpete »

I find it amazing that with all the interest in bio-mimicry, this hasn't been tried before. Did nobody ever ask why all plants share a very similar architecture?

They've even made solar cells that look like leaves before http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/english/NEWS_EN/20080527/152443..., but nobody bothered to test if a tree-like structure gathered more energy.

Re: 13-Year-Old Makes Solar Power Breakthrough by Harnessing the Fibonacci Sequence

#120

Post by run4yourlives »

colanderman wrote: post #98
jobu wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sure you're missing the point. This kid is 13, and he went and did his own research and experimentation, and followed through with a patent and a very well-written letter to the American Museum of Natural History. My kids are younger, but I would be happy if I could give them the sort of environment/encouragement to follow their curiosity even half as well as this kid.

Oh I get the point. I hope he reads my message because that's the kind of feedback he needs, not the deluge of "oh you're so smart for a kid!" comments he's probably getting. (Disclaimer: I get paid to teach engineering to precocious youngsters part of the year. I'm quite familiar with the demographic.)

I hope you realize then that there is much more to teaching than telling a child - no matter how precocious - "pfft, that ain't so great."

Being an asshole is never excusable. While I understand your point about not over-praising, this actually is something that few of his peers are able to do. Proper praise for the boy would be to appreciate the effort, applaud his commitment to the problem and recognize that he may be able to make the solution "better".

Once you do that you can point out areas for improvement.

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