I'm curious why it should stay secret when it's literally world-wide public knowledge they have it.

What would be at risk by sharing what is absolutely known to exist?

Knowing the details is very different from having access to the physical evidence that led to that knowledge. The latter can very often be used to trace intelligence operatives and expose the methods they use - either of which could have life or death consequences for the operatives themselves, the informants and dissidents they work with, and Americans working in the area in general.

For example, when it was exposed that the CIA was using a vaccination program in Pakistan to test for the DNA of known terrorists, their associates, and families, the backlash led to the death of many aid works and a massive drop in vaccinations in the country.

The LAFD might be the most admired municipal organization in the city. They have a very difficult range of environments and handle them very well.

From afar it seems the LAPD has a horrible reputation. So the LAFD must seem like saints by comparison.

Sort of like the big con in the movie The Sting, but real.

I was also a sales engineer 20 years ago. There was a ton of drinking involved, but never anything wilder. I was honestly a bit surprised how tame the after-hours excursions were given what I'd heard from friends at other companies with similar clients. Ability to drink heavily was a requirement of anyone on the sales team though.

I did get a lot of nice dinners and bbq lunches. Seriously, every client had a favorite bbq place they had to show off. Weird in retrospect.

As far as I can tell, that's what the people running the site want it to be. It's been a problem for years and years now and no action has been taken to stop it.

I prefer critical analysis to unthinking yes-men. To the extent that HN administration agrees with me, I appreciate them.

Why should it be stopped?

The most effective method is probably to spend a couple hundred a night to hire a security guard to sit with the hives while they're all so concentrated.

Google balloons still show up on ASD-B (aircraft transponder tracking) from time to time, but beyond that I dunno.

Yup, I saw one floating over Georgia recently. It floated over from the Caribbean.

I keep thinking I read Gibson said something along the lines of "Delany's Nova was his attempt to reach the heights of The Stars My Destination, and Neuromancer was my attempt to reach Nova."

But I haven't been able to find it again. Maybe I imagined it.

This isn't much different from say Lawrence, Kansas, much less any decent-sized American city.

Anyone who finds the cultural variety within walking distance of any point in Manhattan is comparable to a mid-sized city probably shouldn’t be in New York. (You’re overpaying if the experiences are comparable.)