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Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

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451–460 of 786 posts

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#452

I'm building a distributed network, called Aether, that allows people to create and participate in reddit-like forums anonymously. It's fully encrypted. Take a look at http://www.getaether.net It's cool because: * It's anonymous. The posts jump from one node to another with no author information except a nickname. They cannot be traced back to the origin. * It's encrypted with TLS_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA cipher suit…

Couldn't get your site to load on my ipad, constantly crashes safari.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#453

"open-source", IP-free anticancer drug candidate ( http://indysci.org ) We're launching in January (or possibly December) It's cool, because we want to disrupt the way that pharma operates. Biotech could learn a lot from the way that the software industry has been revolutionized by the open-source philosophy. The world could stand to also see tangible benefits if we succeed in (re)proving it's actually possible. Peop…

Thank you and awesome! Although I've seen some great projects scrolling down, this is the first that has elicited a comment. I wish you all the best in your attempt to disrupt pharma -- it needs it.

Thanks, I'm going to need a lot of luck! We're asking for a lot of money to give a level of security that this will work out (the balance of the funds at the end of the research term will be disbursed to city of hope - a hospital with a cancer treatment specialization). So there's the trickiness of fundraising, and figuring out the internet. The internet is a hard place. On top of that, science is always risky, and as much as I can craft a plan B and a plan C, and dynamically come up with plans, there's always the possibility of total failure.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#454

This thread needs more hardware. I'm making bike lights. First a little story. I was late to class one day in March, pothole season. I was cruising in the drops, when I came up to a T intersection. A van pulls up, and stops at the stop sign. As I approach the intersection, I see a pothole, swerve to avoid the hole, and the van pulls forward. I have about 1 second before I hit the van, land with my back on the hood, s…

It is hard to tell from the photo, but it looks like the the turn signal indication is the standard "blink on the side" style. When the lights are close together like they are with this design (as is practical for bikes), it's very hard to distinguish which side is blinking from even a short distance.

Could I suggest that instead of blinking on one side or the other, you turn the lights on in sequence heading toward the direction of the turn? For example, for a turn, you could illuminate light #1, then #1 and #2, then #1 and #2 and #3, then off and repeat.

That seems to me a much clearer indication of intention from the point of view of a vehicle some distance away looking through less than clean glass.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#455
post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I'm already sold on it, looks like a solid product; however my only questions now are: - How much? - International shipping? How much?

Thanks so much! The validation means a lot. How much? $54 Retail, but when we open on kickstarter next week, we want this to reach as many people as possible and are going to give it out at (almost) cost: 1 shirt for $34. 2 shirts for $64. 3 shirts for $90. US shipping included. International shipping: Add $20. Happy to answer any other questions you have.

Wow I'll be purchasing this.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#456

I'm building a distributed network, called Aether, that allows people to create and participate in reddit-like forums anonymously. It's fully encrypted. Take a look at http://www.getaether.net It's cool because: * It's anonymous. The posts jump from one node to another with no author information except a nickname. They cannot be traced back to the origin. * It's encrypted with TLS_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA cipher suit…

Couldn't get your site to load on my ipad, constantly crashes safari.

Sorry to hear that. Your iPad is running out of memory because of retina imagery, my iPad 3 works fine. I'll change it to serve non-retina assets to mobile devices, thanks for the notification.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#457
post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adversary model is pretty simple: If you have a computer that's not compromised (your keys are not copied, there is no keylogger), you should be anonymous at the point you post. A global passive adversary would be able to pinpoint the origin of posts if they had access to the wire-level data if posts were sent in cleartext, but all the connections are encrypted with TLS, so that's impossible. With no physical access,…

Thanks for your kind reply. Adversary model makes sense. I think security/privacy folk like reading up on them for a given project they might be curious about, perhaps consider putting this on the site? > A global passive adversary would be able to pinpoint the origin of posts if they had access to the wire-level data if posts were sent in cleartext, but all the connections are encrypted with TLS, so that's impossibl…

> Adversary model makes sense. I think security/privacy folk like reading up on them for a given project they might be curious about, perhaps consider putting this on the site?

I probably should put this out, yes. I'm the only person to have ever worked on Aether, I'm the architect, the builder, the designer and the coder (lately trying to be also the cheerleader, too) so I have a long list of stuff to do at all times! Currently I'm working on getting Windows version to work (it's working, I just need to make it work without asking administrator privileges), then I need to have some stability improvements on synchronization process—there are some subtle bugs and sync process sometimes gets stuck at indeterminate intervals, so I absolutely have no idea what's going on. I need to test for this. The app recovers from such errors, but it shouldn't happen in the first place. I'll eventually come up to start writing blog posts.

> Have you considered abstracting this to 'subscribe to this post/thread and be notified of any replies' functionality? (anyone could subscribe to posts, then (presumably with read access / however it works.))

This might be a little bit too much for large threads, but it might be a good surrogate for missing reply notification functionality.

Thanks for the encouragement, I would love to hear what you think after you used it!

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#458

This thread needs more hardware. I'm making bike lights. First a little story. I was late to class one day in March, pothole season. I was cruising in the drops, when I came up to a T intersection. A van pulls up, and stops at the stop sign. As I approach the intersection, I see a pothole, swerve to avoid the hole, and the van pulls forward. I have about 1 second before I hit the van, land with my back on the hood, s…

It is hard to tell from the photo, but it looks like the the turn signal indication is the standard "blink on the side" style. When the lights are close together like they are with this design (as is practical for bikes), it's very hard to distinguish which side is blinking from even a short distance. Could I suggest that instead of blinking on one side or the other, you turn the lights on in sequence heading toward…

Definitely possible, thanks for the suggestion. I'll consider it and do a visibility test.

There's 5 LEDs on the back - three reds and two amber turn signals. When blinking, the center red LED stays solid to provide a reference for the turn signal.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#459
http://60lbgloss.com (alpha stage) - database, community, and marketplace for magazine cutouts. ("60 lb gloss" is the type of paper that magazines are printed on) At the moment it's really bare, only I can add and sell the ads. So far I made a working site in 5 days. Next will be the community features like adding an Ad to your favorites.

I don't know why but I always thought fashion ads in Vogue were beautiful. They were art. And it pissed me off that others didn't see what I saw. I also love and admire Milla Jovovich and try to collect as many of her fashion/fragrance ads I see. I get really pissed when I can't have one. It's my collector's mindset. Even if the site fails as a marketplace and instead becomes the Pinterest of Magazine Ads, I don't mind. I just love scanning the ads in and organizing them.

So I thought why not have a marketplace where people can buy and sell their favorite ads of models and celebrities. There's tons of people who are obsessed with celebrities and collect whatever has their favorite celeb's face on it.

Re: Ask HN: What are you working on and why is it cool?

#460
post #324

I'm building a distributed network, called Aether, that allows people to create and participate in reddit-like forums anonymously. It's fully encrypted. Take a look at http://www.getaether.net It's cool because: * It's anonymous. The posts jump from one node to another with no author information except a nickname. They cannot be traced back to the origin. * It's encrypted with TLS_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA cipher suit…

Very interesting stuff. What are your thoughts on the I2P darknet, the Syndicate system, and why are they inadequate in your opinion?

I do appreciate their existence, but Aether is something different: it requires no configuration, and it tries to do one thing, and do it well. This is not a darknet. There is only two things you can do in Aether, to read and to write text. This is an intentional restriction that shapes all the design decisions. This is closer to BitTorrent than Tor.
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