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

'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

abc7news.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 177 posts

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#121

Post by [deleted] »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #111
ethanbond wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

False information like Q: Who is buying this land? A: XYZ Shell Corp (no connection to who is actually effectively buying and coming into control of this land)? Obviously your argument will be "it's not false that XYZ Shell Corp is buying it," and sure, but it's obviously misleading in a way that affects the transaction, as it is specifically designed to do.

I don't even think it's misleading. You don't know what XYZ show Corp does or will do with the land. It's a mystery not a deception. On the other hand, if the buyer is called XYZ Fun Center and tells you that they're going to put in a nonprofit for Orphans, that would be deception. It all comes back to the idea that saying I won't tell you what I'm going to do with the purchase is not a lie. It's perfectly honest

[deleted]

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#122

Post by mcphage »

diogocp wrote: post #67
numbsafari wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should the sellers be shortchanged?

If the increase in value of the sellers' land is wholly due to Disney's development of its land nearby, the sellers would simply be benefiting from a positive externality created by Disney. Thus it would be Disney being shortchanged if it was unable to capture the value of that externality. From an efficiency standpoint it is also preferable for the developer to capture the value, as naturally that increases incentiv…

> If the increase in value of the sellers' land is wholly due to Disney's development of its land nearby, the sellers would simply be benefiting from a positive externality created by Disney

Isn't that true of any price increase due to increased demand? It seems like you're saying a seller shouldn't be allowed to raise their prices as demand increases, because they'd simply be benefiting from a positive externality created by the buyer.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#123

Post by vuln »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #85
vuln wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm sad to hear that the house was never torn down afterwards though and likely has squatters in it. I wish they would have done that for my grandparents. You’re sad that the government would not allow your grandparents to continue living in an area which is designated for plane crashes? I lived in VB for over 20 years, family in the military and such. I’m very interested in where your grandparents house was. The h…

North landing road. They had a blue vegetable stand outside, if you were familiar with the neighborhood. I too remember covering my ears every time a jet flew overhead when I was a kid. They were loud!! I'm more sad the navy didn't destroy the home after purchasing it because it's fallen into disrepair and there's nothing really keeping squatters out. The house and surrounding farm was designated for plane crashes ma…

I know exactly where you’re talking about. I agree, they should have torn it down. I apologize for my rude wording.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#124

Post by barbazoo »

lazide wrote: post #71
barbazoo wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this all part of the current "culture war" or why would you shoot yourself in the foot like this?

who is the ‘you’ in your question?

I mean jurisdictions that ban use of what could be considered "green" technology

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#125

Post by Arainach »

ryandrake wrote: post #107
bravoetch wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it okay for the buyer to lie, but not okay for the seller to ask for the truth and adjust their price accordingly? This 'anything goes' market ideology is the same framework that leads us to deceptive subscription systems, anti patterns etc. Deceiving people to make a buck is shitty behavior.

I’m pretty shocked by the whole “profiting from a deceptive transaction is ok if the counterparty believes you” attitude here. I guess I expected more out of HN. I feel like I’d have to keep my hand on my wallet and my eyes over my shoulder if I ever visited any of these guys’ businesses.

HN has for a long time (longer than I've been here) had a strong libertarian streak, and like all libertarians they always seem to believe they're the ones who would come out on top in anarchy despite all historical evidence to the contrary.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#126

Post by s1artibartfast »

bamfly wrote: post #120
s1artibartfast wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Define fair price? Fair prices when a buyer and seller agreed to as long as no one's lying. The fair price has nothing to do with how much money the buyer or seller make more lose.

When I read your comment above, I wondered if you'd gotten here by defining "fair" circularly. And... yep.

Nothing circular. It's just a definition.

I think consent and honesty make something Fair. Nobody has refuted this and The only other counter argument I've seen is that full disclosure would mean the seller gets more money. What is getting more money have to do with fair.?

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#127

Post by bamfly »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #126
bamfly wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I read your comment above, I wondered if you'd gotten here by defining "fair" circularly. And... yep.

Nothing circular. It's just a definition. I think consent and honesty make something Fair. Nobody has refuted this and The only other counter argument I've seen is that full disclosure would mean the seller gets more money. What is getting more money have to do with fair.?

You're taking the very much not-universally-shared position that concealing something you know would make a big difference counts as "honest".

[EDIT] I retract the "circular" claim—you're right that it's not that, it's the definitions of "lying" and "honest" that are making the difference.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#128

Post by jlund-molfese »

abeppu wrote: post #13

If you were spying, surely you wouldn't need that much area? And if you were doing something nefarious, wouldn't you use more than one company to make the purchases?

Yeah, right, it's not like they need to build a 20km long telescope. Plus there are hundreds of thousands of people living close by; this isn't Area 51.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#129

Post by danpalmer »

nonameiguess wrote: post #81
danpalmer wrote: post #3

Maybe a bit off topic, but my first thought was wondering whether the OSINT community would get any further with figuring out who it was, but I then realised, the OSINT community often look successful because they publish, but we don't know if "closed source" intelligence knows the same things or is even more successful, but just doesn't publish. Does anyone have any evidence one way or another? Are OSINT thinking ou…

By "closed source," you mean government clandestine intelligence services? I used to work on ground processing software for the NRO and NSA, and yes, they know a lot more than the Internet, a lot more than law enforcement, and a lot more than they ever admit to knowing. Not revealing what you know is an intrinsic part of the spy game to prevent opponents from inferring your collection capabilities and current scope o…

Yes I was looking for a better term but thought "closed source" fit in the context.

Thanks for the insight, I thought this would probably be the case.

Do you think traditional intelligence services have any blindspots that OSINT are managing to make headway? Even if overall the balance is far more in favour of traditional players?

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#130

Post by danpalmer »

zmgsabst wrote: post #23
danpalmer wrote: post #3

Maybe a bit off topic, but my first thought was wondering whether the OSINT community would get any further with figuring out who it was, but I then realised, the OSINT community often look successful because they publish, but we don't know if "closed source" intelligence knows the same things or is even more successful, but just doesn't publish. Does anyone have any evidence one way or another? Are OSINT thinking ou…

Also, traditional intelligence services do a lot of OSINT (which is about source, not publishing). “Open Source” in this context is about publicly available information — a source in the open.

Thanks, I was somewhat unknowingly conflating the openness of the data (I know a bit about how Bellingcat sources their data for example) and the public service nature of the open reporting. I get the impression that "OSINT" is typically used to mean both, even if it technically refers to the former (rather akin to software where it refers to both source availability and licencing, but in casual use often refers to the former).
Post reply on HN