

Salmon is disappearing. - echair
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/09/opinion/09grescoe.html?em&ex=1213243200&en=bcdbd40adbca3a74&ei=5070

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Alex3917
I've linked to this before and not many people seem to appreciate it, but for
what it's worth:

[http://www.edf.org/page.cfm?tagID=1521&redirect=seafood](http://www.edf.org/page.cfm?tagID=1521&redirect=seafood)

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menloparkbum
Is the downvote arrow almost ready to go? This isn't "hacker" news. It isn't
even "news" if you keep up with current events or go to the grocery store.

~~~
walterk
It's a bit of a stretch as far as relevance to the hacker/entrepreneur
community goes, although this suddenly makes me realize that the same is true
for almost all of those astronomy and theoretical physics stories that get
submitted here. But they're more traditionally geeky subjects so nobody
complains. Go fig.

~~~
hobbs
Well, there's democracy and then there's mobocracy.

Democracy says that this place is peopled with hackers and if the hacker
citizens upvote a story then it is, ipso facto, of interest to hackers.

Mobocracy says that demi-hackers trickle in and start upvoting stories and
posting comments that attract quasi-hackers. The quasi-hackers then attract
non-hackers and you eventually no longer have a narrow community. The stories
that appeal to the lowest common denominator then rise to the top, due to
sheer statistics.

~~~
mlinsey
This suggests an interesting way of looking at the problem, namely "How do we
make the site _less interesting_ for non-hackers?"

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diego
Perhaps require solving a hacker-related "captcha" for submitting stories or
posting until your karma has passed a certain threshold. For example, fix a
line of code or enter the order of complexity of an algorithm.

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noonespecial
Sweet! Then we'd get major practice in for our Google interview as well. Don't
forget puzzles involving sparrows, rowboats, candles, and ropes for those of
us who might be elsewhere-bound.

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henryw
"To rid salmon of the lice, fish farmers spike their feed with a strong
pesticide called emamectin benzoate, which when administered to rats and dogs
causes tremors, spinal deterioration and muscle atrophy ... In other words,
the farmed salmon in nearly every American supermarket may contain this
pesticide"

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bprater
Salmon is or salmon are? A meese or a mouse?

~~~
iamdave
I was actually looking at that myself, and wanted to comment on it (but the
recent spree of downmodding folks for semantics kept me from saying anything).

~~~
ghiotion
Yes, I've noticed that. Seems as if people are feeling more free with the down
arrow in general. I'm not sure I like it. I'm no karma whore, but I do like my
karma points.

Personally, I reserve a down vote for comments that are particularly stupid of
4chan-y.

I too wanted to comment on the salmon is/are thing. I enjoy the vagaries of
all languages, programming or otherwise.

~~~
allenbrunson
i agree with that. i've often curbed my commenting lately, because these days
i seem to get downvoted capriciously for any little thing.

i think our original community values are getting diluted.

~~~
ghiotion
I posted an Ask PG submission about the use of downvote.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=214398>

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hobbs
Damn! That's why I can't get into Twitter again!

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jimream
I vociferously disagree. This is social hacker news. This article talks about
the externalized costs of buying salmon that are not represented accurately
enough, thus highlighting a huge problem/unmet need.

This is the community, if one exists that has the ability to create the
technical hacks necessary to create social change. We can create tools/systems
to solve problems like these, e.g., measuring externalized costs that prices
do not/cannot account for. Until we more accurately represent costs/effects in
our behaviors/purchases, it will be difficult to effectively promote positive
behavior, i.e., solving the big problem.

~~~
hobbs
Hmm... does ballet count as social hacker news? No? Oh well, I can link to
several sci-fi book reviews on Amazon instead.

(Move along. Nothing to see here. All of you redders and diggers can go back
home now.)

