I fear App Review is getting too powerful (2015) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/015127.pdf <comment><USER3> Wow. I am the author of this email. I have no idea how it resurfaced after 5 years, I was only made aware of this when a friend emailed me the HN link.

The sad thing is it was not just my company which was targeted, but Apple removed this entire product category. We never knew the real reason why, or if it was bigger than just a random app reviewer trying to apply Apple policy, until May 2019.

That's when Bloomberg interviewed Phillip Shoemaker, who ran app reviews from 2009 to 2016 - regarding how Apple systemically removes whole categories of apps. I subsequently spoke to Phillip Shoemaker, who confirmed that Apple executives ordered the elimination of apps that drove downloads to the App Store. He said "Your app drove download volume. Apple doesn't want any outside sources to drive ratings. So yeah, we got rid of all app recommendation apps." He said he thought it was unfair, but this was something Apple set out to do, and even as Senior Director of App Store (person directly in charge of App Review), he could not stop it.

The other thing that was hard to understand, is we used to have a great relationship with Apple. We were not flying under the radar. Since the App Store first launched in 2008, we used to be invited to all Apple events to see the new product launches, we met with the iTunes team to discuss upcoming initiates for the App Store, our apps were featured on the devices inside of many demo units into Apple Stores. It felt like a complete 180, and until this day I never got a formal conversation on what they actually objected to, beyond being pointed to a vague rule which was applied arbitrarily. They became a brick wall in terms of communication, and this is why I resorted to emailing Tim Cook. I assumed nothing would come of it, but it was the last thing I could think of.I never received a response, and never knew if he even got it, so I was shocked to see it again today from his inbox.

<comment><USER4> 1) I worked at a game company 2011: kicked out of facebook (quizzes restrictions were added to the toss)

2) I worked at a mobile ads company 2013: kicked out of apple store

3) I worked at a mobile hosting company for small shops 2015: salons, restaurants, etc: kicked out of apple store

4) I worked at a mobile social network company (2017): kicked out of apple store.

5) I built an app where people can promote their github projects (2017): account suspended by github

6) Built another app to help locate doctors: blacklisted by google

<comment><USER5> Dude, you win today's unluckiest developer award. Most of those were good ideas to work on, right up until they were banned.

The flip side is, you've been involved with a _lot_ of projects. And that's often a big advantage. Some devs stay with the same company for 5 to 10 years.

<comment><USER6> > Some devs stay with the same company for 5 to 10 years.

Depending on how you play it, that doesn't have to be the worst thing in the world. The megacorps have an incredible diversity of roles you can try out.

<comment><USER5> Absolutely! I only meant to encourage them / focus on the silver lining. It's true that there are some wonderful megacorps to work for.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I mean, there's a point to be made about how much monopoly power Apple holds, and it's now clear these questions weren't asked until now because lawmakers were really sweet on the maker of their shiny iPhone - but this letter ain't it.

The author is grovelling to the point of it being honestly pitiful. The amount of derogatory references to the web and Android also make it really hard for me not to question the motivation behind this letter.

It's transparently from an author who built their entire business on the shoulders of a single third party and is now horrified in realising it's been taken away.

If anything, the lesson to be learned here is that if your business depends exclusively on another company for its survival then it's not _your_ business.

To the authors point - yes, Apple can change it's policies whenever it likes, and can use those policies to kill other companies it views as competing with it's own interests.

This in itself isn't news. Dropbox got flat out told by Steve Jobs to sell immediately for whatever he felt generous enough to give them or he'd crush them with a competitor. There was a podcast recently wherein someone who sold to Apple (I'm sorry I can't remember who it was, will try to dig it out and update) got his deal reduced by 25% or so by Steve Jobs in person - <USER2> accepting it and flying out to Cupertino just because Jobs could and he wanted to make a point.

This isn't new information or a new policy, although maybe it'll be a fairer playing field now that the hornet's nest has received a good kicking.

<comment><USER8> Your point, that nobody should make iOS apps as a business because that puts them in a lousy situation, is fair but not actionable. Sure, it's a risky proposition, but there are something like 20 million registered iOS app developers out there, and so we've moved well beyond whether this was a good decision on their part. Now we have to figure out how to make society work well for these 20 million people.

<comment><USER7> To clarify what I meant, I think devs should absolutely build for iOS. I just think they should consider the future very carefully before building _exclusively_ for iOS.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I fully agree with the author, and "App Review is getting too powerful" was an extremely prescient thing to say back then - let alone today.

I've had my own share of similar experiences with Apple in the past, one of which was here on HN recently: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23585682](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23585682)

Apple currently has an unreasonable amount of control not only on _what_ apps can be available on their devices, but also on _how_ they look, work, and generate revenue. They allow 3rd-party innovation to occur only down specific paths that they deem beneficial.

On top of everything, Apple is also _systematically erasing all App Review rejection communications_ [1] and keeping most of this abuse in the dark, thus buying themselves more time to stay in this dominant position.

Something definitely needs to change here, hopefully sooner than later.

[1] [https://www.change.org/p/apple-let-us-browse-all-our-past- re...](https://www.change.org/p/apple-let-us-browse-all-our-past-resolution- center-communications)

<comment><USER10> I'll just repost what the top comment said. But I see it as really disingenuous to try to put what you are trying to do, in the same category as Basecamp/Hey, whose side I completely support.

 _Here 's the thing: why should anyone trust that you will actually honor this 3-day money back guarantee, or that even if you honor it now that you will continue to honor it in the future? Part of the benefit of the App Store payment system is that it puts the user in control of their trials and subscriptions and lets them easily manage, cancel, and request refunds in a way that is guaranteed. But if your refund form magically disappeared one day, no one would have any recourse against that._

<comment><USER11> What does the parent comment have to do with payments? What are they "trying to do" that's relevant to that quote?

<comment><USER10> He linked to his initial complaint about why Apple rejected his app.

 _My app has been repeatedly rejected because I do not offer free in-app trials (but offer money-back guarantee on my website) and also do not offer in-apps purchases. I asked if I offered in-app purchases, would the app be approved? No, since I offer 3-day money-back guarantee on website-based purchses, I must ALSO offer a free trial in the app. But I don't want to offer free trials. I'm ok offering a 3-day money-back guarantee, but Apple says that's not an option for apps. They insist that I (1) change my business model from 3-day money back guarantee to free trial and (2) purchase a shit ton more infrastructure to handle the audience that free trials attract (I've tried free trial business model and it created a lot of use but no more revenue than 3-day money back guarantee). The money-back guarantee seems to weed out a lot of free loaders, at least in this domain — not necessarily others._

<comment><USER11> Now I get what happened...

Look again: He (/u/egocentric) linked to his HN submission of his twitter thread about his experience. What you are referencing is the _top comment_ in the that discussion, by someone else (/u/TedDoesntTalk) talking about _their_ app. So your (understandable) ire is directed at the wrong person here.

<comment><USER10> You are correct. Handlers were always a little bit more confusing than pointers....

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > It's very weird to be in love with and scared of the same thing: Apple.

Sound like an abusive relationship, and like what an abused partner would say to try to rationalize the fact that they're economically dependent on the abuser.

<comment><USER13> While I try not to use that phrase publicly (because I know it will offend some people who see it as exaggeration), thinking of an Apple developer/customer as being in an abusive relationship is exactly what convinced me to get out & stop using/developing for Apple platforms. It took me a few years to see it, and nudges from friends ("Why do you put up with them treating you like that?") but it was a very useful perspective on Apple for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I think the worst part of this letter is the date; over 5 years ago and nothing is really different in any of the areas raised.

Yet the same execs that were CC'd are in charge. I'm glad they had some great "thoughts" on the matter.

</comment><comment><USER15> I don't really understand why Apple is allowed to have the amount of power it has today: it provides the hardware, the operating system, the software store (which they make sure is the only way to get software for most users), _and_ gets to decide whether any particular piece of software is allowed on the store? Surely there needs to be some separation of powers? e.g. a third party (could be set up by the government or in some other ways) will review the apps and Apple only maintains the software store without having much power over the contents in the store.

It was understandable at the time when everything was uncharted territory so Apple got to do whatever it wanted, but now that smart phones are so tightly integrated into the lives of many people, it seems Apple shouldn't be allowed to hold on to all those power. Is anything being done in that direction that might become effective?

<comment><USER16> Because the gov should not control what a private business could do unless it's against the laws? The debate is whether Apple is a monopoly, until we conclude that Apple should be able to run their store as they see fit. Personally I would say Apple is not a monopoly, but Apple + Google is a duopoly and maybe gov should do something about BOTH of them.

<comment><USER17> People are saying that what Apple is doing should be against the law.

When talking about ethics and regulation, it's not enough to simply say the status quo should be preserved.

<comment><USER16> I'm simply replying to GP's point about the legality of Apple's action. Until a court found Apple's action is against the laws, or new laws are written to make it so, Apple is free to operate the store as is. Tim Cook talks a lot about ethics and whatnot but Apple's profit (and share price) always come first.

<comment><USER18> > Until a court found Apple's action is against the laws, or new laws are > written to make it so, Apple is free to operate the store as is.

"How far can we go before we get fined?" is ethically dubious and isn't behaviour that should be rewarded.

<comment><USER16> I do agree and I want the App Store to change, I personally have been rejected many times for random reasons by Apple. But we must be pragmatic and realize users don't care, and as long as Apple can sell iPhone and services to users, they won't change.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> It has a real "serf begging his lord" feel to it.

</comment><comment><USER20> What is the context for this being hosted at house.gov? I didn't follow the hearings THAT closely. Was this particular letter discussed?

<comment><USER21> The hearings the other day were just one part of the subcommittees anti-trust investigation.

This constitutes the evidence gathering/discovery part of the investigation.

<comment><USER22> How did the House find this email? Did one of the recipients leak if to the committee, or did Apple have to deliver all emails of this type?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Man, from the title I was really hoping this was an internal Apple doc written to Tim Cook by an Apple higher-up, or that it would maybe include a response from Tim Cook but, nope, it's just a well-written complaint expouding on the chokehold Apple has on their walled garden ecosystem.

<comment><USER24> Saying that would be tantamount to openly admitting they have a monopoly, which, morals aside, any CEO at that level would never even hint at. At most they would change the rules and say something like "we can serve our users better by increasing the openness of our ecosystem".

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> The App Store was always a walled garden with notably tall walls. The power Apple has over who gets into the App Store has been described as the primary virtue and attraction of iOS devices for years. Users love that it is a curated collection with a very high bar for quality, and many are willing to accept the trade-off that not all apps (even technically legitimate ones) will be published there.

This is why the web is so important. More to the topic at hand: this is why Apple purposely, broadly second-classing the web on iOS is so important, and needs to stop.

On Android, a directory-style app would be trivial to distribute on the web as an installable PWA that eventually becomes indistinguishable from a native app from the user's perspective. It's 2020; this is a sub-basement level of capability that all platforms should include by now. Let's stop pretending that ceding all the publishing power to one company is a trade-off that makes sense in the long-run (this goes for Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon and all the rest).

<comment><USER26> Have you seen the web lately?

<comment><USER25> If you don't like the web, nobody is forcing you to use it.

But, your decision not to use it shouldn't come at the cost of someone else's freedom to distribute legitimate software or creative works to those users who seek it out.

Speaking for myself, most of the "apps" I use on my phone and desktop on a daily basis are PWAs, and they are generally indistinguishable from the native apps I use in terms of quality.

<comment><USER27> I don't think the above poster was critiquing the quality of the web, but rather stating that the web has the same problem of generally being consolidated into the hands of a few big players (Google/Facebook).

If you make a website and Google decides to remove you from their search index for whatever reason, the financial effects on most companies would also be disastrous. Perhaps even comparable to being removed from the App Store.

<comment><USER17> Google is basically providing free advertising. If they remove you, then you can just use paid advertising.

There are many verticals in which Google cannot drive traffic to anyone except the top players, so everyone not in the top 10 uses other means. Being in the top index, is a perk of being already being famous and successful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> > I fear App Review is getting too powerful. It's no longer about keeping > iDevices safe or protecting the user's best

Its amazing that people right here on hackernews, 5 years later, actually think it is about keeping iDevices safe when they see these legislature and regulatory movements against Apple

I'm glad to see your email now

<comment><USER29> I actually think it's about keeping iDevices safe.

However I'm also someone who thinks app recommendation apps are a good thing and should be allowed on the store.

I think the author of the PDF is not only trying to provide a valuable service, but is also right in pointing out that there are problems.

These things are not mutually exclusive.

<comment><USER30> > _I actually think it's about keeping iDevices safe._

How are Hey or xCloud about keeping iDevices safe?

<comment><USER31> xCloud deliberately avoids the app review process AIUI by allowing it to be an umbrella for any game.

<comment><USER30> Yeah, but the technology used for all of the games is the same isn't it? It's just streaming.

And if it's about content, I doube Apple is pre-approving every Netflix show. I bet some of the offerings on Netflix even show female nipples.

[https://www.businessinsider.com/why-instagram-bans- freetheni...](https://www.businessinsider.com/why-instagram-bans- freethenipple-2015-9)

<comment><USER32> are you really comparing video to executable code?

<comment><USER30> Am I comparing streaming video to streaming video? Why yes, I am.

<comment><USER29> You keep repeating this, but at this point it's hard to imagine that you really see no difference in either the technology or the experience between what Netflix does and what xCloud does.

Do you really not see that there is a difference between watching a movie, and controlling a remote video console which is playing a fully interactive video game?

<comment><USER33> There's a difference but it's relatively pedantic. Netflix has interactive shows and the play/pause is necessarily controlling a remote server as well.

<comment><USER29> It's not pedantic to say that movies and videogames are different.

Most people in the world would think you insane if you said you perceived them to be the same thing.

<comment><USER33> You're misreading me. I'm saying that the technological distinction does not justify the policy distinction. I don't at all believe they're the same thing.

The comments you're replying to suggest that executables are being streamed or something, and they're not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Can we correct the title? 2015 is not the correct date of public publication; this document was published as part of House antitrust discovery, I believe this year, and was private communication before that. Finding the precise date is beyond my brief Googling efforts, though.

</comment><comment><USER35> This is an impressive letter. It makes solid points, and it walks the fine line between emotional and reasonable.

</comment><comment><USER36> One thing missing from this discussion is: where is academia? The WWW was created inside academia, and it's because of that that it's still open and competitive. The internet itself was created in the military. Where is the equivalent for mobile apps? It's a problematic category that is wholly dominated by 2 actors, one of which isn't even interested in phones. We need a common set of standards for mobile development in order to open up the competition

<comment><USER37> Why not use the web as the standard? I mean progressive web apps can do nearly everything that 95% of the apps do, they can present notifications, have a local persistent storage, there are even proposal to let them access bluetooth, USB and other hardware.

But of course now Apple is trying to oppose PWA by imposing stupid limitations.

<comment><USER21> they just aren't good enough. even on android, with google supposedly being the patron saint of PWA, native apps just offer a better experience.

<comment><USER38> OTOH more effort hasn't been put into PWAs (by developers and Google) precisely because these won't work properly in iOS.

<comment><USER21> What doesn't actually work properly on iOS? Like what are the specific APIs that are missing (because PWA isn't actually a real thing, it's just a collection of APIs), or are buggy? IIRC you can't prompt for "app" "install", and service worker support for background activity is limited (as it should be IMHO).

It's funny Apple gets this bad rep, when on the UI front they've actually had some really good APIs much earlier than Chrome. CSS Snap Points, backdrop- filter, and position: sticky on iOS all have been really great at creating more native-like experiences on web.

But really, despite being a web developer, I just have very little experience in trying to compete with actual native apps which will always inherently be more capable and performant. This isn't really due to the platform being supposedly hindered by a particular company, but more down to the inherent free for all nature of the web where there's very little _authorised intent_ you can express.

<comment><USER38> > _Like what are the specific APIs that are missing_

Push notifications and background sync for instance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> The legislation I'd get behind is to enforce _import_ / _export_ of data across platforms a la. Google takeout but better where you can both _export_ and _import_ with a single click.

That is, rather than getting into some abstract arguments on what an App store should or shouldn't do the focus should be on lowering the cost of switching mobile / wearable computing platforms down to a _single click_ of a button.

There is no issue with making an ecosystem more appealing by making them well integrated but there has to be an out of some kind for the consumer.

All those "Their app store, their rule" arguments don't hold water if you compare it to, say, AT&T holding your phone number hostage and claiming that they're not a monopoly and you can switch to another carrier but need to use a new phone number if you do.

<comment><USER40> Isn't that issue orthogonal? I don't think the iPhone has the userbase it does because it takes more than 1 click to switch to android. Many people have expensive devices that they like along with the software they prefer.

The fact that android and iOS compete for users is irrelevant to the fact that Apple has a monopoly over access to iOS users and Google has a monopoly over access to Android users. If you want to access people on mobile, you must interact with one or both largely disjoint monopolies.

<comment><USER39> Monopoly over iOS or Android is a bit murky definition IMO. They are both creations of those companies and it seems fine for them to have a monopoly over them.

Ring devices by Amazon or Nest devices by Google can have a monopoly over the devices in their ecosystem but no one cares [yet].

Mobile computing is what Apple and Google have created and of course you need to go through them to access the users there. You have to go through MS and Sony for example to access game console users, duh!

The issue is if for example tomorrow a new company builds a nicer hardware and software package there's no easy way for users to migrate. The migration cost is super high. That company can't emulate iOS or Windows to be compatible with the existing apps. I don't think they can do a clean room reimplementation of the OS calls either. The users would need to repurchase all the apps, music, games, movies and other media they've already paid for even though none of those content were created by the platform owners.

Imagine running a web server on Azure VMs and try to migrate to AWS to GCP but then realize you need to repurchase all the stock images you used in your website and any other software you run on your servers.

I think for popular enough platforms like iOS, Android, Windows, etc. the cost of switching should be regulated. That way the quick feedback loop from consumers will ensure the platforms owners are always kept on their toes to keep all the consumers happy without relying on the moat they've built.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Since this is a recent release from the house investigation, I'm not sure if it should be marked 2015 or not. But it was sent in 2015. I also wonder if it had any affect. If anyone knows more details, that would be great to hear.

</comment><comment><USER42> I feel happy that aside of doing couple of small contract things I've never had to deal with App stores and their respective owners. I just can't tolerate that kind of control over my products hence refuse to participate.

</comment><comment><USER43> We're in the process to leave the App store ecosystem ourselves by migrating our Apps to a WebApp, responsive, PWA, HTML5.

Surprisingly, somehow, it is actually based on Steve's amazing Thoughts on flash Open Letter, that emphasizes HTML5

</comment><comment><USER44> I honestly feel the best option would be for spotify, netflix, microsoft, facebook, epic, and all other companies who have been burned by apple to pull their apps indefinitely.

Sort of like a hunger strike. I am confident apple will cave first.

<comment><USER45> I actually don't think it will make a difference. Apple users are used to accepting weird compromises. Iphone 4 was notorious for bad reception during calls. Apple's solution: hold it correctly. People buy apple h/w for the shine, not any specific use, whose absence would make them buy something else. So they will just endure without Fortnite, MS Word, Google Maps, Youtube etc.

In fact I'm sure many people will blame Microsoft/Google/Epic and say that Apple is in the clear, just look at this thread.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> The first time I read the guidance documents for branding and submission of apps to the Apple and Google App stores, I had to look around and ask myself why no one else was calling it out as anti-competitive. I know what a free market looks like, I also know when onerous requirements are being place on something just to get in. Both companies have done the same things. When you see as many companies acquired and killed as has gone on in the last 20 years or so it becomes pretty damn obvious what is going on. It's just amazing it has taken this long for traction to develop in that regard.

</comment><comment><USER47> Don't all users understand this before giving Apple money?

No sympathy here. Make people use web apps instead of feeding the beast.

<comment><USER48> Good luck with web apps on iOS. Safari is a shitshow with more serious bugs than anything else I know of. You can report bugs, and maybe someone working on WebKit will look at it in 5 years, and maybe it will be fixed in 10 years. And then probably appear again in the next iOS version.

Either Apple is incompetent, or they're making/keeping it bad on purpose.

<comment><USER47> Can't you install chrome?

<comment><USER49> All browsers on iOS use a Safari webview. iOS does not allow the installation of competing browser engines. So, no. It may be called chrome, it may look like chrome, but it is Safari, with all the limitations that implies (and a few extra limitations as a webview, just for good measure).

Apple does this on purpose to push people to use native apps, and then they lock down access to a market of 1 billion people to their whim of the day.

Edit: another poster pulled the trigger at the same time as me, will leave my comment for good measure.

<comment><USER50> And even Microsoft let people install browsers that didn't use IE as a base.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> How did we get from the attitude that web apps will be everything and native is backward to spending a lot of time concerned with App/Play Store monopolies?

I guess my question is, why do native apps suddenly matter so much?

<comment><USER52> At least on iOS, native apps matter because Apple suffocated web apps by blocking a lot of functionality (APIs, PWA support).

<comment><USER53> > _Apple suffocated web apps by blocking a lot of functionality (APIs, PWA > support)_

Rightfully so: I, as a user, do not want the web to have anywhere near the functionality that Google grants it; and absolutely not without clear and explicit permission.

The unfortunate flip side is that native apps sidestep that whole paradigm anyway.

<comment><USER54> So just add a manifest to a web app, like in KaiOS, the third largest phone OS? A permission model isn't hard to implement

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> I'd be curious to see the letters written directly to jeff@amazon by small businesses (3rd party merchants) which were suspended. Would be interesting to see if they:

* went out of business * took predatory loans * were given loans directly by Amazon [1].

[1] [https://web.archive.org/web/20200416132704/https://sell.amaz...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200416132704/https://sell.amazon.com/programs/amazon- lending.html)

</comment><comment><USER56> "We believed the web was dead"... well there's your problem.

</comment><comment><USER57> Here is the list of more such documents from the hearing: [https://judiciary.house.gov/online-platforms-and-market- powe...](https://judiciary.house.gov/online-platforms-and-market-power/)

</comment><comment><USER58> Coincidentally, iOS 13 updated iBeacon in a way that also made it a lot less useful to developers (although there was a clear privacy benefit for users.)

</comment><comment><USER59> Can we get a (2015) tag on the title?

<comment><USER60> The letter is from 2015, the fact that the US house of representatives is looking at the letter appears to be current and the main point of the submission.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> >> We didn't even have a web version of the product because we believed the web was dead

Well he deserved what he's got...like all the people pumping up dictators because they are "good" for a short period of time just to find out later they are not so good anymore and they have no way to change that.

</comment><comment><USER62> I wonder which of Cue, Schiller, or Federighi replied, and what their thoughts were.

</comment><comment> awinter-py oh man dissing hololens on the last page! AR has come a long way in 5 years

</comment><comment><USER63> Am I the only one that is creeped out that this email is public?

<comment><USER3> As the author I was shocked to see it out there, and seeing my emotions out there like that made me feel something, I'm not sure what. But ultimately I am happy that this conversation is finally happening. I have a good feeling things are going to change for the better soon.

<comment><USER38> > _I have a good feeling things are going to change for the better soon._

I hope you're right.

What do you think will happen? Apple will be forced to allow other app stores on iOS?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> Who redacted this email? Apple, or the House?

</comment><comment><USER65> > When I was really upset I picked up an Android phone and after 5 mins I > couldn't handle how they completely missed delighting the user over and over > again

How many times does this guy expect to be delighted in 5 minutes?

<comment><USER66> At least a few, presumably?

</comment></comment><comment><USER67> Am I the only one that supports Apple here? As a smaller indie dev they have been great to me. The best developer support I've experienced from a company and I don't mind the 30% cut.

<comment><USER68> The email wasn't complaining about Apple's cut of profits, but rather having their app being killed seemingly arbitrarily when Apple decided to kill a category of apps from the store.

Folks can have a good experience with the app store, until they don't. There's survivorship bias in creating an app unaffected by the ever changing app review policies.

This isn't exclusive to Apple's walled garden either.

</comment></comment><comment><USER69> > In November last year the App Review team made it clear that our apps were > not welcome in the Store anymore as they actively removed our main app from > the Store. They pointed to the rule (2.26) created just a couple of years > ago about what kind of apps can recommend apps other than its own (by the > way I still believe my apps fit the description). We of course have been > aware of this rule since it came out, as we already had a healthy business > and significant payroll doing app journalism. When we saw some apps get > removed, it made us more steadfast in our mission. Because we believed the > fact that we were not bothered is because we were doing it the "right 11 > way. We were really serving the user and the App Store. Not selling fake > "recommendations" as deceptive ads. We literally turned down millions of > dollars in revenues, as developers repeatedly asked to pay per install to be > featured in our app (outside of tradition advertising). It was hard to turn > down the money even though we knew it was not right to users. One thing that > made it easier is our belief that playing it straight would keep us in the > App Store and in Apple's good graces.

The rule exists for precisely the reason this email notes: to prevent the selling of deceptive in-app ads. How are App Review personnel supposed to know if the in-app links to other apps are there to really "serve the user" or as paid advertising? They can't, hence the rule. I don't see this is a problem, I see this as a good thing - I don't want to be exposed to deceptive advertising.

<comment><USER70> You seem to not be interested in living with your right to install any app you want on your device, which is fine. But do you also believe that other people should not have the right to install software that has not been blessed by an authority on their devices?

Do you think that general purpose computing devices, which an iPhone is, should no longer have the capability to run software without third-party auditing and approval?

You are free to stay in the walled garden if you wish, but I think there is something disturbing about rallying for others to also lose the rights that are not important to you.

<comment><USER71> > But do you also believe that other people should not have the right to > install software that has not been blessed by an authority on their devices?

If they did thirty seconds of research in the market they would see that there is a large ecosystem of devices that allow unsigned apps to be installed by the owner that they could have chosen.

<comment><USER70> This argument keeps being repeated, and it's basically just "if you don't like it, find a different platform". Do you think that's how our rights should be preserved, by hopping to places and platforms that respect our rights?

Where do we leave those who have to live with their devices, or simply lacked the knowledge to make that important distinction at the time, or things have changed and now they need to install apps that have not been approved by Apple. Wouldn't the solution be to offer people that need to live with their right to sideload apps on their devices an escape hatch, instead of telling them to change platforms?

<comment><USER72> Why would you buy a device where much of the value it provides is derived from its walled garden, then complain about the walls around the garden?

<comment><USER70> People can have devices without explicitly choosing them, or understanding the consequences if they get to have a choice, and the rights of those people are needlessly restricted.

<comment><USER73> > are needlessly restricted.

Its equally correct to say, "the rights of those people are needfully restricted."

If people cannot choose their devices, or are miss-informed that is a big issue and should not be tolerated. Meanwhile, allowing Apple to build an amazing, curated customer experience for me is why I choose Apple's ecosystem for me and my family. I don't want my parents or future children getting misled into downloading malware, or berated by ads, or giving out their credit cards to an un-trusted application disguised as "verified by Apple".

The walled garden is a feature, with tradeoffs. Not different from my shower head or fridge making feature based tradeoffs. If you don't like the energy bills for your washing machine, suing or regulating the company to improve it isn't the right strategy. Just buy a different brand that matches your needs.

If you want sideloading on iOS (beyond what the web offers), buy an Android.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Congressman to Introduce Bill to Declaring Bitcoin A Currency, Not Property - non-sense http://newsbtc.com/2014/04/08/congressman-stockman-seeks-introduce-bill-congress-declaring-bitcoin-currency-property/

<comment> non-sense If introduced and passed, this will be huge deal for Bitcoin!</comment>


Oracle CSO mocks customers for finding security flaws - <AUTHOR> http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/security-it/backlash-after-oracle-it-security-executive-mary-ann-davidson-pens-nutty-3000word-rant-mocking-customers-for-trying-to-find-its-security-flaws-20150811-giwymy.html

<comment><USER2> She referred to being sick of sending these notes to those who are reporting bugs.

How many bugs do they have that there were that many notes coming in. I mean aside from the stupid attitude that they've retracted, what does this incident tell us about their quality?

Or maybe that's not news for their customers?

</comment><comment><USER3> Extensive prior discussion here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10039202](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10039202)</comment>


Douglas Crockford of Y! about Software Quality (video) - <AUTHOR> http://yuiblog.com/blog/2007/05/16/video-crockford-quality/ <comment><USER2> Thanks for posting this. I can't believe nobody else voted you up. I agree that lines of code is irrelevant. It shouldn't be five lines of code, of course, but the actual amount doesn't matter.</comment>


Why I'm not using Lisp - <AUTHOR> http://www.dreamersrealm.net/~tree/blog/?p=111

<comment><USER2> I know it's 2 years old, but it's fun to look back and see where we were, not too long ago.

His #1 need is "Outstanding Unicode support", and he's switching to Python for this. Just today there was a blog post that made the rounds, "The Truth About Unicode In Python" ([http://www.cmlenz.net/archives/2008/07/the-truth-about- unico...](http://www.cmlenz.net/archives/2008/07/the-truth-about-unicode-in- python)) that gripes about Unicode in Python!

One of the gripes about Python was that its internal representation is UCS-2 by default. In comparison, SBCL uses 21 bits internally, and his Python example works fine in SBCL (on the Mac, no less):

        * (characterp #\MUSICAL_SYMBOL_G_CLEF)
        T
        * (char-name #\MUSICAL_SYMBOL_G_CLEF)
        "MUSICAL_SYMBOL_G_CLEF"

I wonder if he had to make the choice again on a fresh project today which he would choose. Things change fast.

<comment><USER3> (But note that CL implementations also don't provide clever sorting or any kind of regexps at all. SBCL and Allegro _do_ get case conversions right -- at least for Latin characters with accents. I'm too ignorant to test more exotic characters.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The article is over two years old at this point. SBCL works fine on Macs now, and OpenMCL (now called Clozure CL) supports Unicode.

(NB: I am employed by Clozure)

<comment><USER5> does OpenMCL run on 32bit intel chips yet?

<comment><USER3> Nope. (Runs like a charm on 64-bit Intels though.)

<comment><USER5> if you buy me one I'll give it a try ;) Barring a gift I'm stuck with my 32bit macbook pro for a while.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> He could have just said "I only use stuff well-supported on OSX". This isn't about Lisp, really. He'll face this dilemma "X vs OSX" over and over and over again, where X can be anything, from latest vim goodies to some arbitrary libraries.

I was in the same situation and I simply ditched OSX: it just can't rival Linux as an ultimate programmers' world exploration vehicle. Ironically, it was Python and some Python libraries that drove me to Linux.

I have a Mac too, of course, as an ultimate Safari+Photoshop machine.

<comment><USER7> Picture, thousand words, etc etc..

[http://lh4.ggpht.com/_gGwo1YUVIQg/RpYpNTwgJUI/AAAAAAAAApM/my...](http://lh4.ggpht.com/_gGwo1YUVIQg/RpYpNTwgJUI/AAAAAAAAApM/myMNYEX_6lI/IMG_2740.JPG)

<comment><USER8> On the picture: Guido van Rossum (the author of Python) uses MacBook.

Therefore the above comment implies that Python _should_ work on Mac OS X.

<comment><USER9> He could be running linux or freebsd on it.

<comment><USER6> Probably Debian, most serious hackers are all on Debian - what else can it possibly be?

I seriously doubt he's running Windows on a Mac...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Clojure might be a good choice.

Implemented out of the box, it should get Java's Unicode support for free.

<comment><USER11> I actually just decided to start learning Closure. I was really impressed by this introduction: <http://clojure.blip.tv/file/982823> and <http://clojure.blip.tv/file/982957>. I've _tried_ to get into Lisp a number of times (largely because of the arguments/enthusiasm expressed for it in Hackers & Painters), but have not found an implementation that seemed worth pouring large amounts of time and energy into. My first impression with Clojure is that it could become the first "mainstream" Lisp.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Uh, what? SBCL + SLIME works fine on OS X. In fact, the canonical SLIME video uses that exact combination.

I haven't use CLISP on a Mac... but I'm sure it works fine.

I also think it's interesting that he describes Python as having "outstanding" Unicode support. There's an article on the front page right now about how poor Python's Unicode support is. (There's some support, but it's not _outstanding_. Merely acceptable.)

<comment><USER13> Might be considered outstanding when compared to no support at all. You're right though, Unicode in Python could be much better, but on the other hand I've never had Python's Unicode support get in my way.

<comment><USER12> I will be sure to apply that logic to other situations ;)

"You know, I'm outstandingly attractive when you compare me to nobody at all!"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Older article by the looks. Could be powerPC thing.

I'm using SBCL and Slime (aquamacs) on my Macbook right now - or more accurately I would be if I wasn't procrastinating on HN ;)

<comment><USER15> I think OpenMCL works fine on the PPC architecture. Not sure about SBCL.

</comment></comment><comment> daniel-cussen The good news is all the problems mentioned were had to do with Lisp's lack of popularity.

<comment><USER13> Why is that good news? Are you still waiting for Lisp to get popular and to make all these problems go away?

<comment><USER16> I think the point is that the problem isn't in the language core, but in more superficial things like libraries.

<comment><USER17> Well, libraries may be superficial, but I few times now I've started in LISP, needed something that I just can't find, can't build myself (I'm not _that_ good) and switched to Python because I needed to _get stuff done_. I am slowly but surely assembling all the LISP pieces I need (CLSQL being the latest piece of the puzzle). But the truth is you can install Python, be doing something useful within a day and writing production code within a week. LISP requires much more upfront investment before you (well, me) can be productive in it. That's not a criticism of LISP itself, but the lack of a "batteries included" distribution.

If only ActiveState made an ActiveLISP...

<comment><USER18> What have you needed that you couldn't find?

<comment><USER17> OK, here's one example. I have an app that receives email, processes it, and sends it back. I need to get all its attachments, do work on them and build a new message. In Python parsing an email is:

import email

msg = email.message_from_string(sys.stdin.read())

How easy is that? The subject is msg["Subject"]. Iterating over the MIME parts is 2 lines of code. I could build all the scaffolding very quickly, and concentrate on the problems I needed to solve. Maybe this is just as easy in LISP - if you already know where to get all the bits, and I don't, and I'm not good enough to write a production-grade RFC822 handler in a day.

I like LISP a lot and am trying to use it where I can, but at the end of the day, I have to get stuff out the door as quickly as I can...

<comment><USER7> I think more than anything else, this is probably the largest problem with Lisp adoption. Maybe Clojure will have better luck in this space because of its ability to drop into the JVM to get libraries.

<comment><USER16> I suspect the biggest problem with Lisp adoption may just be that people find s-expressions terrifyingly incomprehensible. Though there's always some reason the median programmer doesn't want to use Lisp, the reason changes. In the 1980s people said Lisp was too slow. Now it's libraries. This kind of variety is the signature of reasons people offer when they're avoiding something out of fear or laziness.

<comment><USER18> I started writing something similar: I think the real reason most people don't like Lisp is because most people don't like to think in s-expressions. (Then I thought nah, nobody's going to like that, so I deleted it and just left the bit about libraries - foolish move!)

It's not only fear or laziness; I know two very good programmers who have tried Lisp and don't like it. Interestingly, both are Smalltalkers, though one was of the original generation that migrated to Java.

I wonder if it's that some people like thinking in trees and some don't. Human language has barely any nesting. Putting one parenthetical phrase inside another is already rare and that's just two levels. Parenthetical nesting is so difficult for humans to process that there's even a well-known hypnotic induction based on it (that essentially creates a stack overflow in a person's brain).

One of the guys I'm talking about has a programming style that's markedly linear (though not procedural). He likes chaining expressions together almost like noun phrases in English. For example, where in Lisp you'd write

      (min y (max x 0))

he might write:

       x.atLeast(0).atMost(y)

It's a trivial example, but enough to imagine more complex ones. The difference is dramatic if you think of a tree with many levels and the comparable unwound form. Of course, not all trees can be unwound in this way.

The converse is true, though: all chains of this form could be converted to s-expressions, so it's easy to imagine embedding this style into Lisp with a macro. That's the sort of thing that gets talked about naively, but never catches on. I think it would be a losing proposition. You'd lose Lisp's regularity, which is one of its greatest advantages. And the resulting programs would still have plenty of s-expressions, so you'd end up driving away the same group of people after all.

<comment><USER7> I advise anyone who meets someone afraid of s-expressions to send the fearful here:

[http://www.cs.brown.edu/~sk/Publications/Talks/SwineBeforePe...](http://www.cs.brown.edu/~sk/Publications/Talks/SwineBeforePerl/)

It doesn't address the s-expr situation directly, but Dr. Krishnamurthi plays a devious trick to show you why they aren't scary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> So, it would take W hours to get Lisp working well. He will spend X hours writing and maintaining his python over the next Y years. And if he used Lisp instead, after the initial W hour investment, he would save Z hours on less maintenance and coding time thanks to Lisp's power.

Is Z greater than W, or less than W? That's the critical question for him.

How can he decide which approach is best without estimating the hour values of each variable?

Edit: of course there's some other issues. maybe he'd spend 80 hours on python maintenance vs 100 writing lisp unicode support. the numbers are made up, but the point is that maintenance probably isn't much fun, so one might choose the lisp path even if it takes a bit more time. besides fun, one might learn more that way.

<comment><USER13> Why are you automatically assuming that the maintenance costs of a Lisp app are lower than of a Python app?

Lisp as a concept is very powerful. The current dialects, their implementations, respective libraries and package management systems on the other hand have often gotten in my way. For example take a look at <http://article.gmane.org/gmane.lisp.cclan.general/807>

<comment><USER19> More powerful language -> shorter, DRYer code -> less maintenance.

(Plus a few other reasons. See PG's essays, PG's Lisp books, and SICP if you don't know the other reasons.)

If you don't believe this, don't use Lisp. The guy writing the article does seem to believe it. He likes and respects Lisp. So he ought to analyze in the way I said.

<comment><USER20> So it's lack of faith that is his problem? But yeah I agree with you, the more powerful the language, the shorter code you can write.

Though python is a pretty powerful language in it's own right, it's got a repl console and sweet little list comprehensions and more, so is the difference really that great between python and lisp? Python is not assembler after all. To know that I suppose I should have to learn lisp myself, which I haven't had the time to do yet. Surrounded by java zealots at work as I am though, and that clojure seems to be the best working non-statically typed language on the JVM I just might.

The issue with utf-8 seems to be solved by now from reading the comments around here. But there are always problems working with utf-8 with libraries written by people that have never needed to work on non-ascii text, the code has simply not been tested thoroughly on the problem of working with utf-8 text so while it might be production quality regarding to ASCII there are weird bugs that pop out of the woodwork when working with musical notes.

On a related note: I've written a few programs in ruby where I've really run into trouble not having decent unicode support in the language. With iconv you can easily make it work if you are working with characters that map to an 8-bit character set. But if you are working with characters that map to several european languages at once, and need the euro symbol, you're in the cold. You can have utf-8 strings in ruby yes, but if you pry them apart, or make changes to them, they loose their utf-8:ness and look like shit. This is an issue that should really be solved at language level, if you don't want to have roughly similar the same abstraction level dealing with strings as you have in C. I love ruby, but I hate working with utf-8 strings in it just now.

<comment><USER19> > unicode is an issue that should really be solved at language level

with lisp, you don't need anything to be built in "at the language level" because you can modify the language much better than with python or ruby. many "built-in" lisp features, that would be language-level in other languages, are just built-in macros, and you could have written them yourself exactly the same. for example, loops are done this way.

<comment><USER17> What you say is true, of course, but at the same time it's true of any Turing- complete languages, and therefore, meaningless. I'm not a _bad_ engineer because I don't have time to start every project from the bare metal. Runtime and libraries make a _huge_ difference in the real world. Sure I'd love to spend the time really diving deep and making LISP into the perfect DSL for me, but the truth is, I can just use Python and go.

<comment><USER19> it's not the same in any turing-complete language. lisp makes adding new "language level features" easy, and python makes it hard.

i'm not saying you should always use lisp for everything. but for this particular issue lisp has a major advantage.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


TSA eliminates all invasive X-ray machines  - <AUTHOR> http://www.nbcnews.com/travel/tsa-eliminates-all-invasive-x-ray-machines-6C10138818 <comment><USER2> "..all US airports scanners equipped with the ability to produce the penetrating images will now only show a generic outline of a passenger to the operator. "

The headline is incorrect. The TSA did _not_ eliminate the machines. The machines have been modified to show less detail, that's all.

<comment><USER3> Correct! The machines still take dirty pictures of you -- they just provide an abstraction layer and a human ostensibly doesn't view the raw image. They removed one of the two types of machines, only because the backscatter scanner vendor couldn't provide the abstraction layer in time. The millimeter wave machines are still in place.

I heard a TSA agent basically tell a nervous traveller this when I was in the U.S. last: "Oh no, we go rid of those machines, these are totally different -- see it just shows me a picture of where any hidden items are. Not any different than are old metal detectors! Safe as can be!"

Millimeter wave machines still violate your privacy, and still expose you to radiation. But, freedom, amirite?

<comment><USER4> Uh, you're exposed to radiation all the time, by that definition. Much more so when you step out into the sun (despite the bears being outside I do hope you try to brave the solar radiation every so often).

As it happens millimeter wave machines are a fancy way to say "EHF radio", which is very much non-ionizing and is not known to be harmful.

One caveat is that _any_ radiation beam that the body is not fully transparent to can be harmful at high power, but that is from the heat effect, not anything inherent to the radiation (i.e. it's the same hazard as standing under a heat lamp for too long).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The TSA's claims about these machines have repeatedly been shown to be false.

The article does not provide much reassurance that this time will be different. Who is making the determination about "potentially forbidden items"? An AI?

</comment><comment><USER6> I always refuse to go through them and opt for the pat down. At this point I know the routine better than the TSA employee.

</comment><comment><USER7> There is still evidence that those particular wavelengths can cause genetic damage, and as someone who already has a propensity for sub-dermal tumors, I will still opt out.

Ref: [http://www.technologyreview.com/view/416066/how-terahertz- wa...](http://www.technologyreview.com/view/416066/how-terahertz-waves-tear- apart-dna/)

</comment><comment><USER8> Ugh, even just seeing that _picture_ of an airport security checkpoint makes me angry. I cannot believe we are collectively so dumb as to require the waste so many hours, so many billions of dollars, and so many lives on this ridiculous security theater. We pay morons in blue outfits to actively make our trips less convenient and our lives less safe. The cost is staggering. So many politicians claim they want to "repair our crumbling infrastructure", presumably so we can get where we're going faster and more safely, yet this option is constantly overlooked: abolish the TSA. Leave security up to the airlines and passengers. That one change would do far more to improve our transportation network than any bridge or road project, and it costs nothing - it would _save_ money. And time, and lives.

Forget trimming the leaves on this tree - we need to find _some_ way to hack at the roots and the trunk.

</comment><comment><USER9> Nothing the TSA has ever said about this program has turned out to be true, so I'll believe that the machines are gone when I stop having to opt out of them.</comment>


App Engine 1.6.3 Released - <AUTHOR> http://googleappengine.blogspot.com.au/2012/02/app-engine-163-released.html This release has plenty of exciting changes to keep you busy on your extra day this year. <comment><USER2> Well, the ease of implementing A/B testing should keep patio11 happy... I've noticed he seems almost religiously fanatical about it, and probably for good reason! Looking back at a quick search, it seems he's been doing it for several years...

Hopefully it will go further than what he's anticipating: _And yet when we check back on who A/B tests here in February 2013, do you know what we're going to see? A few articles about it, with wise comments like "A/B testing can only get you to a local maxima" and "Didn't we read an article just like this on Smashing Magazine in 2006?", and fairly few companies who actually have someone do it every week, even among the savvier folks._

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3639365>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3646669>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1404083>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=764508>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=484668>

<comment><USER3> It is also good for staging new version of apps that you only want some users to have access to. I have been doing this manually by having the new version called 'staging' and setting it in the user session to redirect.

You could also use this for browser testing, where your test client sends a header that will redirect it to a clean datastore with the new version

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I posted about it yesterday <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3647991>

OOT: Maybe I'm hellbanned so my submissions are not visible (I don't think I wrote anything illegal so far, but after the hellban discussions, I'm always afraid "it might happen to me anytime without warning"). How do I check that without creating new account to see how other users see me?

<comment><USER5> Hellbanned users' comments are only visible to themselves and users who enable showdead, so they disappear when you clear your cookies or logout. You aren't, by the way. Blogspot just didn't send a redirect to canonicalize the slightly differing URLs, so HN doesn't know they're really the same posting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I was talking about continuous deployment with some colleagues earlier and we were wondering whether we'd be able to deploy a version of the app to only a subset of our users on app engine.

We didn't think it would be possible, but it looks like this Traffic Splitting feature could be (ab)used to make it happen after all.</comment>


Feeling Zuckerpunchd? Ditch Facebook and use Tonido - <AUTHOR>

Tweet by Tonido User: Feeling Zuckerpunch'd? Ditch Facebook and use something like Tonido to privately share your photos and files with your friends.<p>What do you guys think? <comment><USER2> Why should we trust Tonido or any other such site?

Yes, given Facebook's history and its top dog's demonstrated ethical ... limitations, many companies will likely be better, but....

I guess one thing I'm wondering is that for those who take the step of removing themselves from Facebook, has the latter already poisoned the well?

To take that further, I and many others have removed ourselves from Facebook not because we've been harmed but out of principle and/or we can see that this is unlikely to come to a good end and we want no part of it.

What happens when "regular" users start leaving because of actual harm? How much will that poison the well?

<comment><USER3> Suppose there isn't any central site?

[http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/diaspora_project_buildi...](http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/diaspora_project_building_the_anti- facebook.php)

<comment><USER2> Sounds technically very hard, especially at scale.

I guess we can wait and see if they or someone else pulls it off.

<comment><USER4> Dude. The concept fundamentally side-steps the issue of scaling by turning each user's computer into a server: <http://tonido.com/images/tonido_cloud.png>

Tonido looks like iApache* + dynamic DNS for those whose IPs aren't static.

* I imagine iApache as an Apple-like approach to a personal web server.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Join the Boycott Facebook movement <http://fightskillz.com/2010/05/boycott- facebook/>

</comment><comment><USER6> zuckerpunched, heh.</comment>


By Welcoming Women, Python's Founder Overcomes Closed Minds in Open Source - happy-go-lucky https://www.forbes.com/sites/oracle/2018/11/20/by-welcoming-women-pythons-founder-overcomes-closed-minds-in-open-source/ <comment><AUTHOR> The article says that Guido thinks that taking specific action to encourage more women to participate in open source projects, and the Python project in particular is a good thing. I will assume that Guido as a public figure isn't just overtly signalling his subscription to the diversity zeitgeist, but also has some sort of quantifiable reason for thinking this.

There are two broad categories of questions which can be asked about diversity in open source projects: one is about the effect of diversity on the project and the other is how the project members' behaviour effects diversity. I would like to ask a couple of questions inside these categories which should be easy to answer in terms of hard data:

1\. Can anyone name an open source project which has taken measures to increase diversity of gender and has had a measurable effect on diversity of gender?

2\. For any such project, can anyone point to a measurable increase in quality e.g. commits, lines of code, increase in market share, which has resulted from increased diversity in gender?

3\. What portion of female developers have experienced frustration with the behaviour they have seen from the members of open source projects and have decided to use their time on other things?

4\. Of those female developers, what sort of behaviour has caused this frustration, and what portion of male developers have been pushed away by this same behaviour?

<comment><USER2> 1, 3, and 4 are great questions. I'm going to focus on 2.

> _can anyone point to a measurable increase in quality e.g. commits, lines of > code, increase in market share, which has resulted from increased diversity > in gender?_

Did you perhaps mean "measurable increase in engagement" rather than "measurable increase in quality"? If you only focus on the product, it's very easy to lose sight of the fact that the fundamental point since FLOSS's inception has always been caring about other fellow humans, _not_ increasing market share, on the premise that the metric that really matters is how much you choose to not shit on people. This is why talking about free software instead of open source is so important to many of us, why inclusivity is so important to many of us, and why codes of conduct are so important to many of us, toxic rockstar coders be damned.

( I'm not a woman, but based on conversations among women in FLOSS that I've been privy to, my best answer for #3 is close to 100% of the ones I know. )

<comment><AUTHOR> People mostly create software with the objective that it be useful to humans. FLOSS has its own ideas about how software should be written and shared, but the objective remains the same.

Market share doesn't necessarily mean how much cash software makes. Firefox for instance was once a big, very useful open source contender in the browser market.

I agree that there is a large number of arseholes in the open source software market and that it would be better for everyone if that problem were solved. There's also a huge number of great people who I at least can thank for introducing me to the world of programming and open source as a kid. I'm also not completely white and western, and I never remember my weird-sounding name being a problem in these communities.

I find that the focus on diversity for its own sake misses the point, and I haven't yet seen any evidence that its encouragement matters to open source projects' success.

Why not just try and just make a nice environment and let the diversity come naturally if it wants to?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Wait, how were women unwelcome before? How did anybody even know?</comment>


Ask HN: What strategies or tools that helped you to write regularly? - <AUTHOR> Hi!
I recognize that communicating via writing in the online world is an essential skill, just like coding.
I'm trying to learn to write and to do it regularly, but I always have a problem with a writers block and/or impostor syndrome and end up never writing. I can stare at a screen for minutes or hours, put things off, procrastinate on important things, because I know I have to write.
I've even hired a writing coach, who is also versed in therapy and can help from that angle, but even with that I am truly struggling.
If you were in a similar situation and were able to overcome, what has helped you to become a better and more regular writer?
Thanks! <comment><USER2> I've struggled with this issue myself. I've found that if I want to write a lot, I need to have something unique I want to say, and I need to enjoy saying it. I find rehashing something that has already been written is a joyless task. Similarly, I find writing in a conservative style, or from a detached perspective is also joyless.

Some simple steps that may help:

1.) List the things you're really passionate about

2.) Identify ways that you can talk about those things that is unique. If you're having a hard time with this, think about how aspects of those things relate to unusual aspects of your personal story, and why you care about those things in the first place.

3.) Try to write in a way that is distinctly you. Instead of sanitizing yourself out of the words, find ways to inject yourself into them as much as possible. Be playful, and have fun! Don't worry too much about following style guidelines initially, you can tighten things up later.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you. I can totally identify with everything you said. And, in fact, my writing coach recommends almost verbatim what you have said :D

I guess I am just trying to force it past that. And force myself to write about mundane things. Maybe that is the real problem. But on the other hand, how do other writers do that? How do writers for hire, or ghost writers are able to write about whatever topic is assigned to them?</comment></comment>


Show HN: Self-hosted, privacy-friendly and open-source analytics for WordPress - <AUTHOR> https://www.kokoanalytics.com/ <comment><USER2> I have zero interest in running Wordpress but I just wanted to say congrats for releasing something that ticks a lot of "objectively good" boxes otherwise: open source, self hosted by design, and privacy friendly.

Well done, and good luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> Hah, I somewhat understand the former and fully agree with the latter. For what it's worth, I hoped building it for WordPress would allow me to reach the most people who would otherwise be left-out by other self-hosted tools (by a lack of server skills or interest). Anyway, thanks for the kind words!

<comment><USER3> we've been considering building a wordpress plugin, how was the developer experience?

<comment><AUTHOR> I've been doing it for the last 10 years and have built other analytics tools before (Ana in 2016, then Fathom in 2018) as well, so it was super easy to build for me.

But if you're new to WordPress, I think the process won't be that enjoyable. Users are usually on EOL PHP versions and WordPress itself is very different from modern day PHP projects.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Reminds me of the programs that would make summary pages from your web logs.

(Webalizer)

[http://www.webalizer.org/](http://www.webalizer.org/)

But how does it work if you are behind a cdn like cloudflare is the usual question, but since Wordpress creates each page dynamically it might work.

<comment><USER5> You can make it work with cloudflare, just a bit configuration needed so CF is sending you the real visitor IPs, otherwise every hit looks like it's done by distributed CF machines.

<comment><AUTHOR> The plugin doesn't use IP addresses at all, so this isn't needed. There is an option to determine returning visitors using a cookie (easiest, realiable) but it can be turned off.

When not using a cookie, the plugin will look at the `document.referrer` value to determine whether a visitor is returning and whether a pageview is unique (less reliable, but should be good enough for some).

IP addresses are not looked at at all (let alone stored).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Speaking of self hosted analytics, I used to use Piwik and it was great. It's called Matomo now [https://matomo.org/](https://matomo.org/)

<comment><USER7> > ... I used to use...

I recently actually __started __using matomo (away from google analytics)...So I 'm curious why you seemed to no longer use it?? Is there something that i should be wary about now using matomo?

<comment><USER6> Oh, no, I just have no use for it now :)

I expect Matomo to be even better, after all this time.

<comment><USER7> Ah ok, understood; whew. Thanks for the clarification!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Looks lovely - I'll be testing this out on a few clients websites for simpler stats experience viewing for them.

I do have Google Analytics running on them but GA can be complicated for some users (especially starting out a basic blog), and they love being able to see everything in one place. I've tried a few "display GA stats in WP admin" plugins but they always feel a bit half-baked.

</comment><comment><USER9> This is a great alternative to Google Analytics. It's free and it works as soon as you activate the plugin.

Most bloggers set up Google Analytics without thinking too much but never use much of the data it collects and tracks.

This plugin has all the basics that the average bloggers cares about and it does it without adding extra load and without collecting intrusive and behavioral data.

</comment><comment><USER10> > Option to not use any cookies while still being able to determine returning > visitors and unique pageviews.

This strikes me as a potentially non privacy-friendly feature. How is this implemented? I assume some form of fingerprinting must be used?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey, glad you ask because I feel strongly about this!

We're absolutely against fingerprinting as I believe it's better (for the visitor) to just use a cookie in those cases, since they retain control that way. (Delete cookie = be forgotten.)

That's why we opt for a cookie by default, as I believe it is more in "the spirit of the law" than fingerprinting the visitor and storing information about them server-side.

So, when you disable the cookie the plugin falls back on checking the `document.referrer` value for determining returning visitors and unique pageviews. It's a lot less reliable obviously, but some price has to be paid if you do not want to rely on storing something client-side.

<comment><USER11> I don't think it's at all clear from the term that returning visitors wouldn't include someone who visited your page from a search page, went back, made a new search, and clicked on a different page on the same site. That seems contrary to the industry standard definitions. I'd encourage you to call it something else

<comment><USER12> I agree. A returning visitor is someone who visited your site before and now they're back again. The "return" in returning visitor is the fact that they left and came back.

What they're talking about is usually described as tracking unique sessions. So, I would see the use of the referrer as a low-complexity, less reliable, but more privacy-friendly way of tracking unique sessions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, this is indeed what I meant to say. Will update the text!

<comment><USER11> Do you store it as the same record type as the cookie-based metric? If I decided to stop using cookies that would make aggregates of the data very misleading.

<comment><AUTHOR> We do - I'll see if we can add in a warning message if changing that setting while a lot of data has already been tracked. Or perhaps mark it in the graph, so the difference comes with an explanation. What would you do?

<comment><USER11> I'm not sure. It seems like they are totally different metrics and visitors who came from another page on your site might be an interesting metric to cookie users.

What if you completely separated them, and tracked and displayed both for cookie users? Users who disable cookies would then have historical data in the same unit.

Or a warning would probably work fine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The only downside I see is for people who plan on selling their website at a later time. The industry standard is GA and people want access to this before buying a website, many don't trust other stats.

<comment><USER14> > many don't trust other stats May I ask what's exactly wrong with other > stats?

<comment><USER13> Maybe trust wasn't the best word. Most marketplaces where you can sell a website has an option to link your GA account directly to the sales page, showing the site stats directly on the page. No other stat program is offered this option.

Since people are not familiar with other programs and they can't be confirmed, it may make them skeptical

<comment><USER15> For the unfamiliar, what marketplaces exist? I don't think I've come across these.

<comment><USER16> Think he's referring to flippa.com?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This looks really great. Thank you for making it. Will be trying it out on a WordPress site very soon.

</comment><comment><USER18> Looks really nice. I wish there was kind of the same thing for static website. A super simple, minimalist, privacy-friendly statistics tool.

</comment><comment><USER19> A necessary plugin for the moment we live in, thanks. I just got the translation for Brazilian Portuguese done.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's how I feel too. Thank you so much for your contribution, I'll make sure to get it reviewed soon so the language pack can be shipped.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> When a wordpress site is required, I use the REST API to build the front end so that its not bloated to hell the WP's own theming system, is this plugin available to those using this methodology? IE can i put a tracking code for it into my pages?

<comment><AUTHOR> With the plugin active, you can load the tracking script manually and it will work. That said, it could probably be made easier. How would you like to see this?

<comment><USER20> A JS or PHP include depending on how it works would be grand.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I tried Koko on two of my blogs. I really like it. You just need a current PHP version.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! Current though? The plugin supports PHP versions all the way back to 5.3 (which has been EOL for nearly 5 years).

Although I certainly recommend running a current PHP version of course.

<comment><USER21> Yeah, I know. I'm a bit late on updating. The service I host the blog on is also not the best one obviously or they would take care of PHP.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is really great. I'm trying it now on my local dev environment.

I'm looking for a GDPR-friendly analytics solution for a media property I am building so I am very excited in this space.

For something like this to be viable for us (am not saying we are your target user type) there are some notable things missing which I'm guessing you may add over time.

      * Browser type / UA
      * Viewport/Screen sizes
      * Time on site/page
      * Bounce rate
      * Pathing

The other thing that you should look into is custom dimensions. So I can label certain templates as a page-type (say 'posts' versus 'pages' versus 'homepage' vs 'tags' etc).

There is more beyond that (event based metric like subscribing to a newsletter) but that would within reach without too much extra effort.

Given the code is available, I'm going to dig into the plugin to see if I can help on that.

</comment><comment><USER23> Nice! I use WPStatistics currently. You should do a side-by-side comparison explaining why I should make the switch.

</comment><comment><USER24> Looks really nice and neat, excited to try it!

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey, developer here. Thank you, would love to hear your thoughts and suggestions for it.

PS. Since this is brought up all the time: in case anyone wonders why this feels similar to Fathom Analytics, it is because I built the initial open- source version of Fathom too.

Koko Analytics is my attempt at a truly open-source and self-hosted tool that is easy to install (ie not just for those who know their way around a server).

<comment><USER25> Well since I saw in hn all the fuck-fest with fathom v2 and the founders talking down to legitimate users asking about the open source version, I'm glad you released it, will try in my new WP site, will work with woocommerce too?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure, without issues. All (standard and custom) post types are supported!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> It still uses JavaScript. I'd rather see something completely server-side that sets Etag evercookies.

</comment><comment><USER27> Installed this on a few sites I run, its really seems like exactly what I want for simple "is anyone viewing this page" type of info. I had previously left GA and analytics all together around the time GDPR passed.

One question, does this plugin have the ability to filter out traffic from web crawlers? The sites I run are low volume, so a non-trivial amount of traffic comes from crawlers and other bots.

<comment><AUTHOR> The plugin issues a tracking request using a tiny client-side JS script, so most of those bots will already be omitted (as lots will most likely not be executing JavaScript or have `navigator.doNotTrack` enabled).

That said, I believe some of the smarter ones may still be tracked right now so I will add some user agent filtering to the script to make sure they aren't!

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Ever thought of using ClickHouse for data storage?

<comment><AUTHOR> Not really. What problem would it solve?

<comment><USER28> It's a database precisely designed for OLAP and web analytics in particular. It's what empowers Yandex.Metrika.</comment></comment></comment>


Intro to Stream Processing and Conduit (distributed processing in Clojure) - <AUTHOR> http://intensivesystems.net/tutorials/conduit-motive.html <comment><AUTHOR> FYI, Jim's doing a talk on Conduit at Strange Loop in St. Louis, Oct. 14-15th, tickets still available. <http://strangeloop2010.com/talks/14497></comment>


YouTube Ready to Eliminate Ads [video] - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/video/youtube-ready-to-eliminate-ads/2A658513-4028-4578-ADD0-242532294D40.html <comment><USER2> A bit of a misleading headline - they're exploring subscription models as additional monetization, not about getting rid of ads altogether.

<comment><USER3> The biggest issue with ads on youtube is the gross misapplication of targeting.

Where I live, it's been nothing but the same negative political attack ads for the last 4+ months. It's gotten to the point that I want to NOT vote for any of these people because I've heard the same ad from them 50+ times to the point of annoyance.

Google, is of course happy to take your ad dollars and let you alienate your potential customers all day long, which is a broken model in and of itself.

Nobody would think it was a good idea for a company to buy EVERY ad block during an NFL game and run the same ad in each, but that's exactly what is happening with targeted ads on youtube now.

In theory, with appropriate targeting, I should see stuff that I'm actually interested in, or care about. If anyone can do that, it would be google. Issue is, they leave it up to the advertiser and in most cases it would seem that the entities running the campaigns are not competent.

<comment><USER4> > Where I live, it's been nothing but the same negative political attack ads > for the last 4+ months.

Its been much the same with _broadcast TV_ where I live.

> It's gotten to the point that I want to NOT vote for any of these people > because I've heard the same ad from them 50+ times to the point of > annoyance.

Political attack ads are _intended_ to make you not want to vote for people. Political ads that are intended to make you want to vote for people aren't attack ads.

This is _not_ because Youtube is mistargetting, it is because political campaigns are deliberately (perhaps mistakenly, or perhaps because they have a really good understanding of the _overall_ effect of doing that on the behavior they care about then) conducting saturation campaigns through a variety of media channels.

> In theory, with appropriate targeting, I should see stuff that I'm actually > interested in, or care about.

That assumes you are paying for the targeting. If the advertisers are paying for the targeting -- which, to be clear, they are -- then with "appropriate targeting" you will hear what someone wants you to hear about. Now, with typical commercial targeting, there is a considerable overlap between what people want you to hear about and what you want to hear about. That's less true with political advertising, and especially less true with political _attack_ ads.

<comment><USER5> "Political attack ads are intended to make you not want to vote for people. "

Are you saying attack ads are actually designed to keep you away from the polls altogether? That's what the OP was getting at, I think.

<comment><USER4> > Are you saying attack ads are actually designed to keep you away from the > polls altogether?

That's usually an acceptable result, yes. They are intended to make you not vote for the target of the attack. Usually, the people behind them have some other candidate that they'd rather you vote for then not voting at all -- but getting you to do that _isn 't_ the point of the attack ad. Attack ads are popular in the US (with its ubiquitous use of duopolistic first-past-the-post voting) elections because getting people to not vote for your opponent (even if it means not voting at all) is itself a viable route to victory.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Paying for it would be worth it, the ads are ridiculous nowadays. 30-second ads in front of 35-second videos, etc. So, mission accomplished.

Unfortunately, after paying for the subscription you would have to make sure you were always signed in whenever you hit a YouTube link -- across devices, browsers, etc. Plus, I dunno about you guys but I have a Google identity for work and a personal one. Plus, imagine hitting a YouTube link in a Twitter app on your mobile device. Et cetera.

So the chance that you'll be signed in with the right identity would actually be pretty low. So in reality, you'd pay them and then continue to see ads. Lovely.

<comment><USER7> If you have two google accounts, you should use browser profiles. In chrome, I have two windows one for work and one for home which both have their own settings, plugins, cookies, history etc. You can set that up by going to Chrome's settings and adding a new user.

<comment><USER8> Not everyone uses chrome. I ditched chrome 3 months ago and happily recovered hours of my battery life.

Not coming back till chrome stops taking 30% off my battery life... Only VMware Fusion uses more battery life on my laptop.

<comment><USER9> Firefox also has profiles. I use one explicitly for YouTube, because I disable all the things YouTube needs to work in my primary profile.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> If they really make it possible to view youtube ad free, it will be huge. At least for me. The advertisement based internet drives me crazy, on a philisophical and practical level. I would sign up for a subscription immediately.

<comment><USER11> > I would sign up for a subscription immediately

Oh really? How about every other site on the net you visit? nytimes? buzzfeed? facebook? other-random-content-site? You're telling me you'd rather pay for each and every site you visit? If not, tell me how else they can make money without ads?

<comment><USER12> Ya, really. Of all the sites I visit and get valuable content from, most of them I pay for. The only outstanding ones I can think of are google search, gmail, and HN. Facebook? NYT? Buzzfeed? Not really in my interest areas.

I'd also waste a lot less time on random stuff if I had to pay for it, so I'd be more productive and make more money!

<comment><USER13> But that goes against the very grain of a free and open internet, where anyone of any income level can access information. When you start creating paywalls, you start creating scarcity of information to justify people to pay those fees.

I find the whole "internet ads are bad" argument silly and specious at best - I don't care that Amazon shows me pictures of wallets I might want to buy if that means a poor kid in Eastern Europe can read CNN or BBC news for free.

<comment><USER12> I also don't care if they show me pictures of wallets I like over wallets I don't like.

I do care when any third party knows where I've been, what I am interested in, and otherwise monitors my activity.

Like everything, it's a tradeoff. However, I acknowledge my primary concern is myself -- if not tracking me costs other people a slight chance at an opportunity, I'm must conclude to not include that in my calculus. (In fact, it would be to my advantage if I believed it were a zero sum situation.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I fully support that it's a good idea to offer a product where you can pay something and not see the ads.

But I have to say that it's almost as if they made the ads more annoying than they had to be in order to insure that when they offered an ad free product people would be more likely to choose that option.

<comment><USER15> This is a very fine line to walk, but I hope they manage to walk it successfully. The product is the pay option. Ads are a way to get a discount. Up to the customer if he wants to go through the trouble of watching ads. A form of price segmentation, and easily confused with a racket.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> The price point and how wide the subscription applies are key in whether this is at all desirable.

For a couple of comparison points: Netflix is roughly $9/month for streaming service, Pandora radio is $36/year ($3/month) for their unlimited plan (which is more of a radio service), and Spotify's unlimited plan is $10/mo.

Youtube as a service is probably most directly comparable to Spotify or Netflix, but their content doesn't come from the same sorts of old media sources, so that would definitely put a pretty firm upper cap on a reasonable price at $9.

<comment><USER17> I wonder how they'll distribute the money to the content creators ?

<comment><USER16> A naive approach would be to have a portion of the subscription cost set aside and then distributed based on each customer's views, I'm sure that approach would have plenty of problems thouhg.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I don't know - YouTube has become synonymous with short clips, funny videos, music, etc. At least right now, it isn't a Netflix competitor. I don't see the value in paying to remove ads. The same people who would go through the process of entering payment information and subscribing could just as easily take 20 seconds to click "install" on AdBlock. Now, if they provided access to much more content, especially movies and TV shows (as part of the subscription), I could see this taking off.

<comment><USER19> Really? Maybe I am in a niche but I watch more YouTube now than literal TV (although, yes, Netflix, Hulu+, etc are consumed).

Most things I watch are 7-10 minutes. I have a healthy subscription list of new content almost daily. I watch minimum 30-60 minutes of YouTube a day, more on weekends and holidays.

Additionally YouTube already has my payment information and I already use it to rent movies (via the Play Store, which plays on YouTube).

I don't use AdBlock because I want to support the people who I watch. If I block the ads they have to go get a job and they stop producing original content which I enjoy watching.

I won't claim I would definitely get a YouTube subscription, but I'd consider it (devil is in the details and all that). If it meant I was funding people who I watch daily better (a la Reddit Gold) I very well might.

<comment><USER20> > I don't use AdBlock because I want to support the people who I watch. If I > block the ads they have to go get a job and they stop producing original > content which I enjoy watching.

You need to actually buy the advertised products in order to "support" the producer. Otherwise the ad has been wasted on you and the advertiser might of well have not paid for it.

<comment><USER21> That isn't how YTs revenue sharing program works. You do get paid per views. Also there is value in a non-clicked ad e.g. building brand awareness. The majority of ads you see are non-actionable.

<comment><USER20> I understand it is not CPA but if the views don't eventually lead to you buying something then the ad is wasted. In other words, technically all advertising is CPA.

So if you don't actually buy the advertised goods or services the ads have no value to the advertiser and they should stop using them, at least on you (and will if they are able to measure the effect).

Therefore viewing an ad for something you are not going to buy is just trying to fool the advertiser into giving money to the producer. So if you think not view ads is "stealing" from the producer then viewing them but not buying the products is "stealing" from the advertiser.

<comment><USER22> Personal experience - I buy ads for my videos. The ads link to nothing but the video I'm advertising.

Why? To build up brand recognition using the cream of the crop videos we produce (and in our case subscribers). It's a slow process but it'd be a lot slower without putting up ads.

In a purely money sense though I guess I'd rather no adblock using users see the ads I put up, there's no way they'll ever see any future ads as subscribers anyway and I'd lose out in the long run

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> The thing that always drives me nuts with YouTube ads is when I look up an ad (usually a movie trailer) and then I am forced to watch another ad before I watch the ad I wanted to see.

I've always thought YouTube should charge corporations to host their content. Then instead of placing ads in front of Aunt Sally's cat video, the corporations more aggressively make ads that are interesting on their own (Like Old Spice. People look up their ads, they don't need to be held hostage to view them).

</comment><comment><USER24> I KNEW this was coming, it's too successful of a model on twitch, I don't see why subscription and ads can't live side by side though.

</comment><comment><USER25> I don't mind YouTube ads on most videos . The only time I truly mind YouTube ads are on any video where the main target is under age 5. Nothing is worst than having to tell my 1 year old son he has to wait 30 seconds for the ad to finish until he can watch his show that he already saw the thumbnail preview to . I would gladly pay a resonable subscription for that to stop.

</comment><comment><USER26> The video mentions netflix adding ads. Is that real? That sounds terrible. Would that be for a free, non-premium version?

</comment><comment><USER27> I normally don't mind ads, especially if they are well done, but what is really annoying is that most Czech ads are unreasonably loud. I really have to skip those, because it tears my ears through headphones, even though I usually wouldn't skip.

</comment><comment><USER28> Hmm, personally I wouldn't pay for that, but I do pay for Netflix. I suppose the difference is that I find the content on Netflix to be much more valuable. I don't visit youtube regularly, and every time I do I find it's getting more and more polluted with trash. Of course there is some good content somewhere, but you have to know what you're looking for.

</comment><comment><USER29> The ironic moment when the video starts with an ad...

</comment><comment><USER30> autoplaying videos on web pages are Evil(TM)

<comment><USER31> What happened to 'Click to play'? Shouldn't HTML5 videos have similar restrictions? (guess you could get around that with javascript though...)

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Youtube doesn't have adds. Or at least I haven't seen one and I have watched it for years almost every day.

I'm completely serious, I haven't seen an add on youtube _ever_!

You don't have to believe me. :-) I enjoy not having to watch them.

I must say this is an interesting response.

<comment><USER33> Are you running AdBlock?

<comment><USER32> No, only NoScript but you have to enable a couple of scripts to watch it.

I do have a very extensive list of blocked names in my hosts file.

<comment><USER34> I don't know why this is downvoted, because it's interesting if it's true.

<comment><USER32> Give me a couple of youtube videos that display adds for you.

<comment><USER35> Before I commented I wanted to make sure I wasn't crazy, so I actually tested it with ABP off. This video [1] played a 30s Coors Lite commercial for me after I disabled ABP and refreshed. Any corporate/official type channel will likely be heavily monetized and feature ads prior to starting.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXRN_LkCa_o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXRN_LkCa_o)

<comment><USER32> Video started immediately, I didn't touch anything. The video ended uninterrupted at 4:30.

An small annotation link to a different song appeared for a couple of seconds, at the bottom left. Those annotations can be disabled in the ui. Of course that as any other annotation, didn't pause the video.

Apart from that there were no adds.

( choose a better song next time please :-) )

<comment><USER35> If you disable NoScript do you see an ad prior to the video?

(I didn't look closely at it -- was in a "popular videos" cluster and VEVO stuff will always have ads)

<comment><USER32> No ads if I disable it.

<comment><USER35> My last guess is that you're in a country advertisers don't care about. Other than that, I've lost interest and hope you enjoy your loophole ;)

<comment><USER32> Thank you; I pretty sure they care about my country though, especially since adds were displayed on a friends computer on the same network.

I'm sure that careful readers( not that many apparently :-) ) will spot the cause.

<comment><USER22> Yeah you have the ad domains in your hosts file which causes the ad load to fail. Pretty caveman technique but if it works it works

<comment><USER32> I would have to say it is very elegant and simple. Besides the missing adds I had no problems with anything else.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Loopt patenting location sharing - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=EWeoAAAAEBAJ&dq=loopt

<comment><USER2> Software patents are terrible.

<comment><USER3> This attitude is really self-defeating. Even pg has software patents. It'd probably be in your self-interest to start thinking about why patents _aren't_ terrible.

<comment><USER4> Agreed. They certainly aren't terrible if you own the patent. Great companies like Intellectual Ventures simply could not exist without them. Software patents open up a lot of innovative business models without the need to spend all the boring time and effort building stuff.

<comment><USER5> To be fair, Loopt does seem to be one of the pioneers in location sharing. And they have built a product. IV, on the other hand..</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why Bots Are the Next Industrial Revolution - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@kipsearch/why-bots-are-the-next-industrial-revolution-4f4093a400eb#.ubru4iqh4 <comment><USER2> I'm somewhat worried about this upcoming wave of bots replacing jobs. There seem to be 2 paths forward:

1\. Star Trek outcome: People will have time to pursue interests outside of their job.

2\. Mad Max outcome: Money and resources are hoarded by the people who own the bot industry, everyone else suffers.

3\. ??

<comment><USER3> 3\. Kafka outcome: we all get bureaucratic meaningless jobs digging holes for others to fill.</comment></comment>


Show HN: A browser add-on to add red flag keywords (like "anthrax") to every URL - <AUTHOR> https://flagger.io

<comment><USER2> Wondering if this tags in Google Analytics like a lot of spam has been doing recently.

</comment><comment><USER3> Why?

<comment><USER4> According to the video, it is for "trolling NSA".</comment></comment>


Coinbase wants to sell blockchain analysis software to the IRS and DEA - <AUTHOR> https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/67551/coinbase-irs-dea-analytics-neutrino <comment><AUTHOR> Definitely it is not the place to be if you want some privacy.</comment>