Obama's Path From Critic to Overseer of Spying - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/16/us/obamas-path-from-critic-to-defender-of-spying.html <comment><USER2> The headline might as well be a more Onionesque "After gaining power, politician turns out not to actually hold the strongly principled views he expressed while campaigning".

I'd be surprised if Obama holds _any_ of the views he expressed during his campaign. A campaign is a marketing effort intended to install a team of people in power.

Generally speaking, the vast majority of power holders agree that aggressive spying is a good idea. This is closely related to their strong preference for maintaining the status quo across the board. We should not be surprised that Obama did not reverse any of Bush's controversial decisions _because they were not actually controversial_ among those with power or with the potential to gain power.

Generally speaking, when an issue is touted as being highly controversial between the major parties, it consists of 98% solid agreement and 2% hyped up disagreement. The disagreement and the "fray" are part of the choreographed propaganda undertaken by powerful interests to create the illusion of dissent.

<comment><USER3> " _A campaign is a marketing effort intended to install a team of people in power._ "

You've just described the current crisis of representational democracy.

<comment><USER4> It's not current and it's not a crisis. It's working exactly how it was designed to work. We changed, not them. The Internet disrupted the popular perception of democracy by creating a massive global communication channel that is not under the control of the people in power.

<comment><USER5> It is fascinating how people lay blame.

The most common thing I see is my fellow Americans blaming politicians, bankers, school teachers, lobbyists, cops, unions, almost anyone... except themselves. The truth is, the American people are the problem, and they've spent the last few decades doing everything possible to avoid personal responsibility for the shape of the country.

<comment><USER6> > It is fascinating how people lay blame.

Oh, yes, very much so! For example, you seem quite effortlessly to lay blame on three hundred or so million people, and that's only counting those alive right now, with no consideration for those who've predeceased us, at least some of whom presumably could be expected, in your formulation, to have had a hand in creating the situation you so readily decry.

But laying blame, while satisfying, rarely does anything to solve a problem. In blaming "the American people" for the current state of things, you imply that they, all three hundred million or so, could have acted, and presumably could _still_ act, to improve the situation. What would you have us do? -- all three hundred million of us, of course.

(For the sake of not seeing you wiggle out of the question that easily, assume in your answer that some method, not intolerable to the modern American sense of morality and ethics, exists of usefully coordinating the actions of almost half a billion human beings.)

<comment><USER7> > What would you have us do? -- all three hundred million of us, of course.

Vote. For for better people. That is the basis of any democracy. You don't blindly follow your leaders, and you don't blame them for their mistakes and carry on as if there's nothing you can do about it, because you _can_ do something about it. You can vote them out, and vote better people in.

The fact that those three hundred million Americans haven't done that, is entirely their own responsibility. It is the responsibility of the American people is that they allow themselves to be lied to. That you allow every single politician to break their promises, and re-elect them anyway. That you keep voting for the same two parties.

And yes, of course the first-past-the-post district system makes it a lot harder to have someone else win the vote. You'll have to mobilize a lot of people. But you have to start voting for different people. People unrelated to the big two parties. People who do politics in a different way. Find them and vote them into office.

<comment><USER6> A glib answer, to be sure. What do you recommend regarding the unelected civil service bureaucracy which has such a large hand in how the United States are administered? I can't imagine seeing any president take on the State Department, for example, but having seen at least one senator do so, I suspect I know who'd win.

<comment><USER8> One Senator wields 0.5% (ish) of the authority of a branch of government that State Department officials and staff don't (directly) work for. The President wields 100% of the authority of the branch of government that the State Department officials and staff work for. I think these things are different in both kind and degree.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> OK: once he got in office, it turned out that watching everyone seemed like a good idea.

But here's the thing: it's unconstitutional. It's illegal.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized".

Meaning: 1) You can't read my email without a warrant and 2) you need specific suspicions of me to get one.

Any interpretation that says the grocery list in my pocket is covered by the fourth amendment, but _every electronic communication I make_ is NOT covered, is insane. "Houses, papers and effects" was the writer's way of saying "everything I can think of belonging to that person." Email and phone metadata and GPS location weren't imagined, but can you seriously say they would have been excluded?

So: balancing security with privacy is a hard thing. It is. But pooping on the constitution isn't a solution.

You want to surveil everything? Say so openly, explain your case, and try to repeal the fourth amendment. We're America: _we decide by voting_.

Secretly discarding the highest laws of the land is tyrannical, whatever the justification.

<comment><USER10> This has been debunked to death. The issue isn't "houses, papers, and effects" not encompassing e-mail, but the "belonging to that person" aspect. Phone metadata doesn't "belong" to you. It belongs to your phone company. They generated it, they store it--you never even see it. It's also quite questionable how much of say your Facebook data "belongs" to you. Or your GPS location data. It's _about_ you, but much or all of it is generated by some company and stored by that company, and you are often even not aware of it nor do you have access to it. You have little to no recourse if they lose it, destroy it, or misuse it. You can't even make them let you see it.

Indeed, I strongly agree with your use of the word "belong" because I think the use of "houses" and "persons" purposefully puts the 4th amendment on a strong property rights foundation.[1] But viewing the 4th amendment through the lens of property rights (i.e. "everything I can think of belonging to that person") makes most of what the NSA is doing quite legal! Things that are _about you_ do not necessarily _belong to you_. If I write down every time my neighbor enters and leaves his house, that's mine, not his. Is Facebook tracks what you click on and your cellular company tracks your GPS location or your phone company tracks who you call, that's their data, not yours.

[1] The prevailing Supreme Court view of the 4th amendment is broader than this property rights view, but still embraces third party doctrine which makes much of what the NSA is doing legal. And certain Justices seem partial to the property rights formulation.

<comment><USER11> This is all true, but what if the government _compels_ Facebook to hand over it's data about you? Clearly _that_ is a violation of the fourth amendment?

<comment><USER10> A subpoena requesting documents relevant to an investigation is presumed reasonable under the 4th amendment. Generally, the government can compel you to turn over information relevant to an investigation of someone else. The subpoena power is very broad and also very old (predating the 4th amendment).

If the government hacked into Facebook's servers and took the data, that would be a violation of Facebook's 4th amendment rights, but it still wouldn't be a violation of yours.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Everything that's wrong with the current intelligence approach in a sentence: "And he trusts himself to use these powers more than he did the Bush administration."

This completely vindicates Snowden's point about the current system being one of policy instead of law, and of enabling turnkey tyranny.

<comment><USER13> I think it's a symptom of corruption of the system's built-in checks and balances. The executive branch is much more powerful now than it used to be, and is the only branch that is composed entirely of a single party. The only politically homogenous branch is now far-and-away the most powerful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> From the article: "Mr. Obama was acutely aware of the risks of being seen as handcuffing the security agencies. 'Whatever reforms he makes, you can be sure if there's another incident — and the odds are there will be in our history — there'll be someone on CNN within seconds saying if the president hadn't hamstrung the intelligence community, this wouldn't have happened,' Mr. Axelrod said."

And so, the wheel keeps turning...

<comment><USER15> If theres ever a time to do the right thing, it's in the President's second term: it's all downhill, what the pundits say doesn't matter to re- electability, since there is none (unless you plan on going to another office later on...)

<comment><USER16> > (unless you plan on going to another office later on...)

Just curious, has a president ever done that?

<comment><USER17> Yes. William Taft went on to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court after being President: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Howard_Taft](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Howard_Taft)

Reportedly, he hated being President and wished he'd never done it, but loved being a judge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> _"When you get the package every morning, it puts steel in your spine," said David Plouffe, the president's longtime adviser._

This strikes me as backwards. Seems that a president with a steely spine would be strong enough to maintain the rights of citizens in the face of such challenges.

<comment><USER19> I wonder if the real answer is to simply reject that workflow. I can't imagine functioning in an environment where I'm being daily bombarded with information about dozens or hundreds of potential "threats" which never become anything.

What if the president simply told his advisors that he would take a weekly instead of daily briefing on these issues?

<comment><USER20> He'll look bad when his failure to react to some threat on time leads to some unfortunate incident.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> What I'd really like to know is what process does the President-elect endure that turns him into an alien lizard from hell?

I mean, seriously .. its like black and white with Obama. Pre-Presidentiality, Obama was real. After-President'ness, he's become some obscure caricature of all other Presidents who came before him..

So is there some sort of secret Presidential chamber that all the past Presidents get to donate their DNA to, which gets injected into The New Guy, to make him into some sort of transformed hybrid clone, or something? I seriously wonder sometimes, if the enemies of the USA haven't realized that the _real_ backdoor to infiltrating America and bringing it to its knees is in the Presidential Training Program that goes on with newly elected victims. It sure seems like the President of the USA gets a new skin, anyway .. I've only been watching for the last 4 Presidents or so ..

<comment><USER22> > _What I 'd really like to know is what process does the President-elect > endure that turns him into an alien lizard from hell?_

A Truman-era bureaucrat coined the phrase, "where you stand depends on where you sit."

When Obama was outside the executive branch and had only a year of Senate experience before embarking upon his presidential campaign, he had a very different set of interests and responsibilities. As a junior, back-benching senator with no Washington DC experience, Obama had very few capabilities or political capital. People who are weak decry the power of the strong and seek to limit it.

When Obama became president and was given responsibility not just for Illinois, but for the United States and its allies, he assumed a very different set of responsibilities, interests, and capabilities. Obama entered office with a tremendous amount of political capital and the full panoply of executive branch powers at his disposal. The powerful do not generally seek to limit their own power or to accept limits placed upon them.

This happens to every candidate-turned-president, but with some it's more extreme than others. Some presidents enter office with executive branch experience, e.g. Bush Sr. or Eisenhower. Some enter with tremendous political capital and experience with DC politics, like LBJ a.k.a. the "master of the Senate." The transformation is not so great with these presidents.

Some enter with almost no political experience whatsoever, like Obama. The subsequent transformation is much more jarring, because the change in their power is much starker.

> _I mean, seriously .. its like black and white with Obama. Pre- > Presidentiality, Obama was real. After-President 'ness, he's become some > obscure caricature of all other Presidents who came before him.._

On the contrary, pre-presidential Obama was fake. He was in campaign mode from his entrance on the national scene in 2004 through 2008. You cannot honestly believe that the campaign image of a politician is the "real" version of that person.

Presidential Obama is the real Obama. Abraham Lincoln said, "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." This is who Obama is. There's a reason why presidents seem to feature greater continuity than change, and part of that reason is that the responsibilities of the office don't change according to the president, rather the president must change in order to perform the responsibilities of the office. Many wildly different personalities can occupy the office, but the office structures and constrains those personalities.

Idealists often have a consequence-free vision of what presidents _ought_ to do (a "deontological" ethic). But politics does not work that way. Max Weber contrasted the (deontological) "ethic of ultimate ends" with the "ethic of responsibility" in his essay "Politics as a Vocation," which I urge you to read. [http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/polisci/ethos/Weber- vocation.pdf](http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/polisci/ethos/Weber-vocation.pdf)

Responsibility is a different ethical standard than what individuals on their own would be held to. And what an individual _ought_ to do is very often different from what someone responsible for the lives of others _ought_ to do. And the actions a responsible political figure ought to undertake are often morally repugnant to the private individual. But it is a mistake to judge the leader by the standards one would use to judge a private citizen. Weber says as much:

> _" It follows that as far as a person's actions are concerned, it is not > true that nothing but good comes from good and nothing but evil from evil, > but rather quite frequently the opposite is the case. Anyone who does not > realize this is in fact a mere child in political matters."_

Isaiah Berlin in his famous article on Machiavelli ([http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1971/nov/04/a-speci...](http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1971/nov/04/a-special- supplement-the-question-of-machiavelli/?pagination=false)) puts it even more starkly:

> _If you object to the political methods recommended because they seem to you > morally detestable, if you refuse to embark upon them because they are, to > use Ritter's word, "erschreckend," too frightening, Machiavelli has no > answer, no argument. In that case you are perfectly entitled to lead a > morally good life, be a private citizen (or a monk), seek some corner of > your own. But, in that event, you must not make yourself responsible for the > lives of others or expect good fortune; in a material sense you must expect > to be ignored or destroyed._

> _To be a physician is to be a professional, ready to burn, to cauterize, to > amputate; if that is what the disease requires, then to stop halfway because > of personal qualms, or some rule unrelated to your art and its technique, is > a sign of muddle and weakness, and will always give you the worst of both > worlds. And there are at least two worlds: each of them has much, indeed > everything, to be said for it; but they are two and not one. One must learn > to choose between them and, having chosen, not look back._

> _There is more than one world, and more than one set of virtues: confusion > between them is disastrous. One of the chief illusions caused by ignoring > this is the Platonic-Hebraic-Christian view that virtuous rulers create > virtuous men. This, according to Machiavelli, is not true. Generosity is a > virtue, but not in princes. A generous prince will ruin the citizens by > taxing them too heavily, a mean prince (and Machiavelli does not say that > meanness is a good quality in private men) will save the purses of the > citizens and so add to public welfare. A kind ruler—and kindness is a > virtue—may let intriguers and stronger characters dominate him, and so cause > chaos and corruption._

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Sigh, I guess this is nothing new. Obama's the ultimate (in my mind) say one thing, do another. At least with Bush we knew he was just a bad guy that didn't give a shit for anything other that war, greedy buddies, and a good walk on the ranch.

With Obama, yah, he came in as the 'outsider' (typical of all candidates I suppose) with all these things he would 'Change' (Shepard Fairey anyone?). But alas, it's been one disappointment after another. Net neutrality, spying, _real_ universal healthcare, not going after politicians of the Bush area that blatantly broke all kinds of laws, etc. All a sham.

It's playing out like a sci-fi story where anyone can be an enemy of the state, just choose your own adventure: leaker, no fly list, dissident, downloader, photographer/videographer; the list goes on and one.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised as this isn't really a democracy anymore. Every law, decision pretty much has to have some 'but what about business/economy?' question. Excessive lobbying makes sure these decisions/rules will never change short of revolution. The fact that corporations are 'people' and that they have no donation limits anymore, pretty much ends what the founding fathers fought for - we the people.

The message of the 21st century america: get rich. Get above the law and above the fold of the 99%. Go where the rules don't apply to you. Go where you make the rules for everyone else.

<comment><USER24> "At least with Bush we knew"

The vast majority of people took Bush at his word for a long time, especially on matters of war. The recognition of the deceit in the mainstream came long after.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> "When you get the package every morning, it puts steel in your spine," said David Plouffe, the president's longtime adviser. "There are people out there every day who are plotting. The notion that we would put down a tool that would protect people here in America is hard to fathom."

That's the whole problem. The NSA spying is being sold as if it stops terrorist attacks. It does not. They have not cited a single incidence.

<comment><USER26> I'm agains the NSA spying as well, but saying they haven't cited anything isn't the same thing as proving they haven't stopped terrorist attacks.

Please don't read more into this than what I said.

<comment><USER25> The NSA existing in a state that doesn't stop terrorist attacks is the status quo (it's the same as them not existing at all). It doesn't need proving.

If they want to spy on everyone in the world all the time and their reasoning is that it makes Americans safer, then the burden of proof is very much on them.

<comment><USER27> _the burden of proof is very much on them_

But who do they have to prove it to? The public, or the people they actually report to?

<comment><USER25> They're salaries are paid in tax dollars. The public is who they report to.

<comment><USER27> Indirectly, yes, but you are oversimplifying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> My heart sunk when Obama won the election the first time; not because I wanted McCain to win, or that I had any actual hope that one of the third-parties could win; but because everyone was so happy.

I was in Burlington, VT; about as liberal a town as you will find in the USA; and there was a strong anti-war movement. That anti-war movement bought Obama's promises hook-line-and-sinker and the same people that were out holding signs and going to rallies were canvasing for Obama. There was a march through the streets when the counting was done; people cheered as if we were finally turning a new leaf.

I hope, so deeply, that people will have learned their lesson; that, if some politician you have never heard of suddenly starts getting a ton of press and magically enters your consciousness; he is being tapped by big players to do so. Obama, more than any other public figure in the last twenty years is proof positive that there does indeed exist a shadowy cartel that are fucking with us for power.

If you believe Obama started out pure-at-heart and was 'corrupted' after becoming president; you are naive beyond all comprehension. Remember early, early when Obama was asked about marijuana? One of the easiest, most obvious blatantly fucked up policies our government carries out.. something that every single non-political marginally liberal person is absolutely crystal clear on should be legal for adults: he laughs derisively like it's a terrible idea.

Why? What is it about Obama being so full of hope and change and feel-goody liberalness that makes him laugh at marijuana? Talk to 50 non politician democrats and you will find 49 think it's obvious to legalize marijuana. But talk to 50 politician democrats, and you will find _maybe_ half of them. The higher up you go, the less likely they are to be pro legalization. Why? Because their interests aren't _yours_.

If you think that there will be _ever_ be a 'main stream' candidate that will represent _your_ interests over the 'shadowy cartel' of government interest and lobbyists, you are sorely mistaken; and we all pay the price.

<comment><USER8> So, if your analysis is correct... what do we do about it?

<comment><USER28> vote third party only

<comment><USER8> In the shortest term, voting third party makes little to no difference for structural reasons. That's not necessarily an immediate condemnation of the policy, though - a pattern of people voting third party could eventually flip things if only enough people sign on... However, once third parties start getting some clout, what stops the Powers That Be from co-opting them just as effectively as they have co-opted the major parties? How do you see this actually fixing things?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> What's interesting is that the article suggests that Obama himself did not know extent of the NSA's activities. ("At the same time, aides said Mr. Obama was surprised to learn after leaks by Edward J. Snowden... just how far the surveillance had gone.")

If that's true, it seems to indicate that Obama is not an overseer at all.

Have our worst fears been confirmed? Is the NSA an unstoppable organization that reports to nobody except itself?

<comment><USER5> The military industrial complex has been running the United States since WW2. It's best to take Eisenhower's speech as the acknowledgement of that. It was a sitting President issuing a dire warning of what can only be described as a coup to a free Republic.

The political power, the money, the might, the lobbying, the military budget slush fund, the endless scandals, the wars. It's pretty clear the military- industrial combination has done the most to shape the last five or six decades of America's existence.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> >Mr. Obama was told before his inauguration of a supposed plot by Somali extremists to attack the ceremony[...]. _Although the report proved unfounded,_ it reinforced to Mr. Obama the need to detect threats before they materialized. "The whole Somali threat injected their team into the realities of national security in a tangible and complicated way"[...]

So a non-existent threat was what made Obama decide that the surveillance state was necessary. Great decisionmaking here.

</comment><comment><USER31> _"He has more information than he did then. And he trusts himself to use these powers more than he did the Bush administration," said the former Obama aide_

Okay, so given the trend of these powers is to increase, and he's not going to be in power after 2016, does he trust the next guy with even more powers, or the guy after that with even more than that?

 _When civil liberties advocates visited to press him to do more to reverse Mr. Bush's policies, Mr. Obama pushed back. "He reminded me that he had a different role to play, that he was commander in chief and that he needed to protect the American people,"_

The role of President isn't to follow through on the platform you were elected on?

</comment><comment><USER32> There is an interesting case of regulatory capture nobody seems to be discussing. From the article:

`"But they said his views have been shaped to a striking degree by the reality of waking up every day in the White House responsible for heading off the myriad threats he finds in his daily intelligence briefings.

`"When you get the package every morning, it puts steel in your spine," said David Plouffe, the president's longtime adviser. "There are people out there every day who are plotting....'

and then:

`Mr. Obama was surprised to learn after leaks by Edward J. Snowden...[we all know what]'

Every morning the president gets a propaganda dose from the very people he needs to reign in. OF COURSE they are going to tell him the sky is falling in and that they are the only ones holding it back. And since it's exciting and secret there is no cross check or balance.

He should be seizing the example of Snowdon's releases to realize that the books are being cooked. Instead he's been completely taken in by the briefing books. It's really no different from Joe Barton being taken in by BP.

Back in the Reagan era Alan Kay told me about his very short time as a white house advisor. Reagan's briefing book wasn't even a book, it was a three minute video. I'm sure it REALLY played up the Soviet threat, yet the security apparatus was as astonished as anyone else when the USSR collapsed.

</comment><comment><USER33> Just seems like a worse version of [http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/12/16/131216fa_fact_...](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/12/16/131216fa_fact_lizza?currentPage=all)

By the way if your getting most of your updates on this subject from HN, you're most likely out of the loop. Since a lot of the insightful content doesn't make it. IIRC there's even a penalty on this subject on HN.

</comment><comment><USER34> It is not probably a good idea surround yourself with the people you need to control.

Obama spends most of his time going to eat-dinner with the same rich people that benefit from printing money. The rest of the time it is with the praetorian guard that "protects" him.

Anybody believes he is going to make the same people he surrounds most of the time furious? The same people that put him in charge?

This people are the eyes and ears of the "king of the world". He is living in a bubble.

</comment><comment><USER35> The mere hand-wringing that current leaders are doing over this is so disturbing to me because of where I see it taking the country. It's not hard to imagine, say, Carl Rove or his ilk giving someone at the NSA a wink and a nod that they'll be taken care of if their candidate wins office. The NSA leaks or hands off information that tilts the election their way. Given that collection of all of this data is A-OK, no step in this process is blatantly illegal anymore. If I were Ron Wyden, this is what I'd be saying. "Do you want your representatives picked by the NSA? Because that's the logical path we're going down."

The ability read/listen to all electronic communication without warrants gives the NSA too much power for this not to happen.

</comment><comment><USER36> Mr. Obama hasn't changed more than would be expected over several years and, while I can't speak with certainty, I would be very surprised to find out that he was lying about his views during the presidential campaign (I don't know about his _promises_ ).

 _He has more information than he did then. And he trusts himself to use these powers more than he did the Bush administration._

Even postulating some revolutionary secret information seems to me to be unnecessary.

Obama has always trusted himself. Most people do. What's changed is that the president is now someone who is trusted by Obama. Everything that's happened up to this point falls nicely out of those circumstances.

</comment><comment><USER37> If this thinking, that "we will do anything to prevent another terrorist attack, including give up our liberties", is acceptable, then why isn't giving up guns acceptable to prevent the next school massacre?

<comment><USER38> What if I told you, that there is a large gulf of possibility between "doing anything" and "doing nothing"?

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> > At the same time, aides said Mr. Obama was surprised to learn after leaks by > Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, just how > far the surveillance had gone.

If this is meant to be taken at face value, and it's at least plausible given how the US government seems to operate, how can Obama not follow it up with _at least_ a strong commitment to making the American security apparatus more clear and transparent?

<comment><USER38> Probably because unlike crypto, this is one of those areas where "security through obscurity" really _is_ an aid. That has always been the tension between intelligence agencies and public oversight, it's not like NSA originated the problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> I just don't get why people don't believe politicians.

We are lied to all the time by them.

We don't need the US Congress. We don't even need the President in it's current version.

We can vote on legislation ourselves. We can approve a budget ourselves. We can veto stupid and corrupt laws.

We do everything else online, why can't we govern online?

The people in power don't want this to happen, so they convince us they are actually doing something.

</comment><comment><USER41> His administration's descent on this issue has been disappointing. I mean how is the quote any different than something that would have come out of the previous administration?

"There are people out there every day who are plotting. The notion that we would put down a tool that would protect people here in America is hard to fathom."

</comment><comment><USER42> What is it, do you think, that causes former critics of spying to become 'overseers'? The Presidency is limited to two terms, so it's not like it's being used to weild power. Are there honest intentions related to safety, or is it all about money/lobbying?

<comment><USER43> The Federal government is a byzantine web of regulation, conflicting rules, agendas and actions.

Big programs have tentacles so intertwined into things, it's difficult/impossible to unwind and even figure out what they are doing. Think of it from the President's perspective -- getting someone whom he trusts in a position to actually know anything about the programs probably takes a year.

Say you have someone on top whom you trust and the President says "dismantle X program". The bureaucracy is awesome and effective at slowing things down. Keeping up the pressure to do something that the bureaucrats don't want requires alot of energy. And with something like Intelligence, attacking the people running those programs means that they won't be motivated to make the President look good.

So from the President's perspective, you have to invest massive energy, take body blows when things don't go well and distract yourself from whatever it is that you ran for office for. It's a high cost, and the benefits are minimal -- nobody is going to carve your head into the side of a mountain for shutting down some Top Secret program that nobody knew about anyway.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Reminds me of this comic: [http://deep-hurting.deviantart.com/art/And-in-the- Darkness-B...](http://deep-hurting.deviantart.com/art/And-in-the-Darkness- Bind-Them-112729303)

</comment><comment><USER45> _Mr. Obama was angry at the revelations, privately excoriating Mr. Snowden as a self-important narcissist who had not thought through the consequences of his actions._

I could not disagree more with that sentiment.

</comment><comment><USER46> Like anyone ever in any kind of law enforcement position:

 _" it's okay when we do it"_

</comment><comment><USER47> The big lie is that surveillance has to do with nation security. It doesn't. You build a surveillance system to suppress political descent not stop terrorist attacks. Business has big plans and they don't want some republic to vote and screw things up for them. They have world to conquer. Follow the money.

</comment><comment><USER48> It is also good for the press, if he is going to do anything is another matter.

</comment><comment><USER49> What is honestly the point of even concerning ones self with politics anymore? There has been nobody I've talked to in real life that has their head in the game completely, who knows what they are talking about, myself included.

Nothing is going to change, it's a big boys club, debating it, writing about it, all fruitless.

<comment> brown9-2 This seems like a really sad and poor way to concern yourself with how our society governs itself.

<comment><USER49> There's just no way to do it from the bottom. All these protests, all this (sl)activism, it doesn't do anything.

You either need to dedicate your life to politics and get into the club and start working from the inside, and pray some holy fucking deity that there are others like you, or nothing will change.

Maybe severe violent revolt but I literally don't ever see that happening.

There isn't enough time in the day to concern yourself with shit that matters. Nobody wants to come home after working 8 hours with a two hour commute to dip their head into politics, _just to even begin to know what 's happening_.

Where do you go? The mainstream media? Where do you inform yourself?

The reality is people just want to go home, flick the TV on, spend some time with the kids, and maybe if they're lucky, devote a few extra hours to a hobby every week. This scenario occurs in the poor, it occurs in the rich.

It takes a very very special type of person to run a country. You need people who are basically insane. Who have no problem getting up every day and just doing that one thing they do, all day, every day. That isn't 99% of the population. If the top tier of our government is run by similar people at the bottom, we're screwed.

<comment><USER10> > Maybe severe violent revolt but I literally don't ever see that happening.

I always find this sentiment (or various forms of "wiping the slate clean") to be quite amusing. It is historically more likely for a society to be less free after violent revolution than the opposite. Radicals who believe in a cause strongly enough to engage in revolution also tend to be ideologues who, once in power, want to remake society in the mold of their own viewpoint.

The historically successful revolutions have been conservative ones. For example, the Glorious Revolution in which Parliament asserted its supremacy over the King of England. In another example, modern democratic Spain arose with the restoration of the monarchy!

<comment><USER49> World War I and II were settled over some whiskey and a game of poker right?

It's difficult to objectively say whether violent revolt works, because every single revolt has been in a very different context then the next.

The amount of people, artillery, the strength of the opposition, the cause, the location, the current government, the time.

You can't say whether a violent revolt is the way to go or whether it's not the way to go. It's not a black and white issue at all.

If my brothers and sisters see that giving up their lives for our country is a necessity, then I will dedicate my life and fight along side them.

It hasn't gotten bad yet, the moment it starts to really affect your day to day life, people will do something. Right now, to most people, if their instragrams and facebooks work they don't care.

<comment><USER10> > World War I and II were settled over some whiskey and a game of poker right?

It's interesting that you mention that, because at the meta level World War I and II were Germany's attempt to violently overthrow the status quo in Europe (which had long tried to maintain Germany as a divided non-power). The revolution failed and the status quo won.

> It's difficult to objectively say whether violent revolt works, because > every single revolt has been in a very different context then the next.

Sure, but you can see patterns. From France to China to Russia to Afghanistan, etc, etc, violent internal revolutions are more likely to result in oppression than freedom.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Does anyone have the same problem as me regarding ATT customer service? - <AUTHOR>

Few months ago, I talked to one ATT customer representative on the phone to unlock my previous iPhone 3gs. After chatting ~50min, they told me I need to provide my original receipt. I bought the iPhone from att 4 years ago and lost the receipt unfortunately. So I can't unlock my phone. That's fine.
And few minutes ago, I called ATT to unlock my iPhone 4s. After speaking with a CS representative for 40min, no solution was given and my call was dropped, suddenly. Nobody called me back. I tried to call the service number and find the lady I was speaking to and there is no way...
What a s*t company and service! <comment><USER2> I just switched to At&t today, so I can't comment on history of service. I would recommend using their automated system so that you don't have to call back and waste your time.

[https://www.att.com/deviceunlock/client/en_US/](https://www.att.com/deviceunlock/client/en_US/)

Secondly, if that doesn't work, your 50 minutes of time is definitely worth more than $5-10. There are a lot of alternative ways to unlock your phone that you might consider. I'm not going to post any links, but I know for a fact many exist.

Good luck to you, and I'm sorry about your bad experience. Your mileage definitely varies while talking on the phone to a huge company.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. I did submit a request before calling AT&T. Below is what I got. I just wanted to try some official way to unlock my iPhone. Given that AT&T provide that service, I think that's the right of a customer.

 _Request number: 391xxxx

Thank you for contacting AT&T Customer Care about unlocking your AT&T Mobile device. We are unable to process your request through this channel.

To submit a request to unlock your business AT&T Mobile device, please call Business Customer Care at 800-331-0500.

To submit a request to unlock your prepaid AT&T Mobile device, please call AT&T Customer Care at 800-901-9878. _

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Oh man, AT&T is my worst enemy. I have only dealt with their cell phone division, but in store and on the phone the customer service is awful. The manager at an AT&T store lied to my face just to get me out the door, as did a customer service provider I talked to over the phone.

The nickel and diming they do to their customers is crazy, and its kinda sad the competition is so similar (at least from what I gather from friends). Capitalism at its finest, right?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> What makes me feel worse is that I just upgraded to iPhone 5s and will stay with AT&T for another two years. I might can cancel the service but I know I don't have too many options to choose. The telecom companies are not like some e-commerce companies who can claim they're customer centric and do that.

</comment><comment> rush-tea Just paid $2-5 on ebay to unlock your iPhone. It will save your headache.</comment>


Show HN: Remarq.io – Beautiful documents for consultants - <AUTHOR> http://www.remarq.io/ <comment><USER2> I don't want to be _that guy_ but can someone explain to me how this is better than word with templates? Is it the markdown-import feature?

#Edit. Perhaps that I just don't see the value as it's not a "trivial amount" for me, and I'd much rather spend some time going the DIY route with software I already have.

<comment><USER3> Word doesn't export to .pdf very nicely. If you want the ease of use of word and pixel-perfect documents, you can buy Adobe InDesign. You can import word documents and fix the issues there, as well as better the layout. Once you nail down the export/import settings and a few macros, it's pretty easy. MS Office comes with a similar software called MS Publisher, but it offers a lot less than InDesign.

<comment><USER4> Print to PDF.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> What is the reason this is sold as a SaaS instead of a traditional program?

A traditional program would have many advantages for the user:

* No limit on documents per month

* works offline

* Reports (which may contain company secrets) are not uploaded on a third party server

While other SaaS offerings always have some kind if advantage like having integrated support, I'm wondering whether a document converter (this is basically what it is) is the right software for a SaaS.

<comment><USER6> It's sold as SaaS because you make more money selling it as such, you get a recurring source of revenue without having to sell updates which can be costly to push.

That said, as a personal user, I find the pricing very steep. I'm going to look for a free alternative.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've been beta testing this and it's been revolutionary — and saved me a bunch of money.

I spent ~$250 on a pages template to use for my reports. And because I write everything in Markdown, my workflow is:

• Write in Markdown

• Open up report

• Painstakingly hand copy and reformat Markdown to Pages

• Save as PDF

• Send to client

Now? I take that markdown, drop it into Remarq, and — BOOM! — I have a beautiful report that I can send to a client.

It's pretty awesome, you guys.

<comment><USER8> Did you try/consider pandoc?

<comment><USER7> To me, it wasn't an option. I'm not a developer — I'm an SEO and Outreach Consultant — and so using something off the shelf (at first a pages template, now Remarq) made a lot more sense.

I didn't want to build something DIY or right to customize something. Pages — and now Remarq — made it easy for me to get a beautiful output.

And, on top of that, there was an ROI consideration. How much time would I spend getting Pandoc working that I could spend growing my business, mapping out a campaign for a client, or relaxing?

To me, the cost of Pandoc was too high.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I suspect a bit of sock-puppetry on this thread. The demo PDF is nice looking, but there are many more ways to generate PDF from Markdown, via LaTeX or HTML. Most people willing to use Markdown instead of Word, Pages, etc. would know how to use tools like pandoc, I assume.

<comment><USER10> _I suspect a bit of sock-puppetry on this thread._

Based on what?

<comment><USER9> There are a few highly positive comments on this thread that read like advertisements or featured testimonials.

(This suspicion is primarily based on the average negativity and skepticism by the Hacker News community :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Nice designs, but my eyes almost fell out of my head when I saw the pricing. The regular price of the mid-tier is double the price of the highest Adobe Creative Cloud package!

<comment><AUTHOR> Think about the price in comparison to hiring a design consultant to generate these reports for you. If they charge you or your agency $50/hour, it takes them an hour to design a report, and you're producing 10 documents/month, that's $500/month.

If you're happy working in Adobe / Word yourself, that's awesome! I built Remarq as a tool to help freelancers and consultants generate high-quality, beautifully designed reports and proposals _without_ needing to invest in a designer for them.

<comment><USER6> The right comparison would be: how much do you need to pay a designer to produce a latex template. After that, it's only a matter of running pandoc.

<comment><AUTHOR> Also, if you know any designers capable of producing a LaTeX template, please put me in touch!

<comment><USER6> Touché :)

I've recommended the software to my consultant wife (since her company would be paying), but I'm cheap.

How does the pricing work if I want to do revisions to a document? Say it goes through a lot of editing, does each export count towards the maximum number allowed?

If not, what's to prevent users from doing entirely new documents under the guise of "edits" to an old document?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the recommendation!

Nope, edits do not count towards the total. You can make as many revisions as you want to a given document. At this point there's nothing to stop someone from doing exactly what you describe. I'm mainly counting on attracting customers that value their time enough that they'd find it silly to expend time and effort gaming that particular system.

<comment><USER6> You could also prevent editing the main title, once you pick it, it's set in stone (or limit the edits to a small Levenshtein ball). That way you can do as many corrections to the document as you wish, but it's much harder to cheat the system.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I uploaded a markdown file with cyrillic characters and got a pdf with plenty of whitespace.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh no! I'll take a look and see what went wrong.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Well done! Can we have a look at the markdown input source for the demo pdf? [http://www.remarq.io/remarq_intro.md](http://www.remarq.io/remarq_intro.md) returns a GitHub Page 404. (Also, that url in the marginal note, on page 4 of the demo pdf, is broke, likely because of line-breaking.)

Which flavour of Markdown are you supporting? Do you plan to support _full_ Common Mark?

What are you using under the hood as your typesetting engine and stylesheet syntax? Pandoc, (La)TeX, CSS w/ Prince XML?

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah, crap! Thanks for pointing out the broken link. Here's the input document for the demo.

[https://gist.githubusercontent.com/jagthedrummer/213b8a787b3...](https://gist.githubusercontent.com/jagthedrummer/213b8a787b3382777ce7/raw/dfc89d54a040bfaa0ba20d21cf5438eef2a07f82/Remarq- sample-markdown.md)

Under the hood is Pandoc/LaTeX. Pandoc flavored Markdown is what is supported at the moment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Confluence + word export? For similar price you get reports plus a wiki as well. I've been using that export recently and it works awesome. You need a word template, though, but that can be cheaply had through freelance designers ($20-50 tops). I'd consider this if this was a one-time purchase or like $5/month, but not for that price.

</comment><comment><USER15> Overall the software seems nice, but there are just too many limitations which make this a bit of a niche software, IMHO.

      * SaaS. OK if your documents contain text only data. Maybe it contains a way to include images (I just don't see that from screenshots and description), but really no way to automagically run R/python/whatever scripts to insert actual data on the fly. Probably solvable with an API.
      * Subscription pricing. If you have long running projects and publish [a batch of] documents less frequently than every month, pricing will start to really bite. I see that I am not alone that is concerned about pricing :)
      * Template limitation. OK if all your documents are your own and not your clients'. Out of luck if you need to prepare documentation for clients. Maybe template customization is that powerful, but again, examples do not suggest that.

Just my 2 cents though.

</comment><comment><USER16> Interesting, but not interesting enough to warrant such a steep pricetag, in my opinion at least.

Yeah, this caters to the people who don't want to fiddle with pandoc or some other Markdown-to-$format tool, but even the cost (in terms of time spent) doing that would still be probably significantly less - and result in a more valuable end-product (since there would be no arbitrary limits) - than the monetary cost of this particular service.

Yeah, it's cheaper than hiring a designer every single time I want to create a document, but who the hell would do that? I would opt to have the designer create a template _once_ , then use that template repeatedly, which would end up being much more affordable than this in the long run.

Nice idea, but the price is going to strangle this thing in the crib.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think it depends on what sort of rate you're able to charge as a consultant/freelancer. If you're anywhere near $100/hour (or more) you could very easily waste more time/money by trying to do it yourself.

<comment><USER17> I think by lowering your pricing you will attract more customers and make more profit.

It is an awesome idea but the basic product (i.e. non bespoke) needs to be cheaper. Although I know you look at the value you are adding, you also need to consider that another startup can easily copy your idea and outdo you on price.

On the value proposition side. Yes a designer is more expensive but they can design something custom to my brand. This can be done as a word template then I just type my next report into that and it's done for free.

As a comparison think about the autoresponder market. A $19 aweber plan should be sold for $1000 because think of all the envelopes / stamps you are saving? Well it isn't because of Getresponse etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I used Remarq when it was in pre-release mode, and it is super slick. Basically it lets you write in markdown, but easily convert that to good looking PDFs. Perfect for sending reports to clients/bosses/etc. I'm sure there are lots of other good uses for it too.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for being an early tester!

</comment></comment><comment> lost-theory Looks nice! The design of the example PDF is a bit noisy for my taste (the geometric shapes at the bottom of every page). And the demo PDF you generate by uploading a markdown file has a lot of whitespace. But I assume that's all tweak-able with a real account.

I got an "Oh no! We hit a snag processing your report. Markdown help." error without telling me what was wrong with the file. Seems like images break it.

For making these kinds of PDF I currently do this: 1. Write version controlled rst/markdown/creole. 2. Convert to HTML with a small script / command line tool (which also lets me do pre- and post-processing, like adding CSS). 3. Use chrome's print dialog to save the page as a PDF. This works pretty well for me.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah, yeah, I need a better message about images. They work fine if they're at a fully qualified URL.

The final output is indeed tweakable and there are 4 totally different templates to choose from.

I always encourage people to go with whatever system works best for them. I'm glad you have something that you like. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> As a consultant, I can see the value for someone who writes at least 1-2 reports a month. I tend to write a single proposal every few months so it wouldn't make sense for me personally on a month basis.

That said, I would recommend _not_ lowering the price to capture low volume customers like myself. You are often better off with fewer customers who can easily justify the price vs. a larger volume of "cheap" customers. The "cheap" customer are often more demanding when it comes to support so in addition to paying less in the first place, the cost you more to support.

</comment><comment><USER19> I don't suppose there's any plans for a Word export feature, is there?

Unfortunately, a lot of consulting jobs require all docs to be in MS Word format... Infuriating I know.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't have Word export on the immediate road map, but I'm not ruling it out. Sorry I can't give you anything more specific than that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Holy smokes, definitely try the demo if you haven't already (midway down the page). The amount of time this could potentially save me is pretty wild. Well done!

</comment><comment><USER21> My time isn't worth nearly that much right now, but Pandoc as a service is a great idea. Are you planning on buying LaTeX templates from other people any time soon? I've spent a ridiculous amount of time on mine: [https://github.com/vaibhavsagar/resume](https://github.com/vaibhavsagar/resume)

</comment><comment><USER22> Would really be great to show some examples of the beautiful documents that can be created right up-front. I assume that's a big selling point because nobody wants ugly documents. So, I'd take the time and display examples front and center (instead of the "icons" that are there now).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I think this is a good suggestion. I should definitely feature a real document more prominently somehow.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Looks cool! Will remember if I'm ever needing shiny documents. I agree with those who support a one-off transaction option. (For example, I love PlaceIt and don't pay them monthly, but they might be doing good business from people like me anyway. I see those in the same boat.)

</comment><comment><USER24> There's a typo in the browser tab title - I see "Remarq - Beuatiful documents" in my tab title which probably isn't what you want.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> This looks interesting - is there a gallery where you can see the reports created? Or are you only limited to the demo report?

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's a page where you can see most of the templates available. [http://www.remarq.io/articles/new-templates-now- available/](http://www.remarq.io/articles/new-templates-now-available/)

I should probably make a gallery page and link it somewhere prominently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> That's really nice but also really expensive.

<comment><USER10> That depends on how you value your time, though. If your time is worth three figures an hour and this saves you several hours a month, it has a huge ROI.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> This looks pretty slick.

</comment><comment><USER28> Wonderful, thanks.</comment>


How Much Money To Raise - <AUTHOR> http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/07/how-much-money-to-raise.html

<comment><USER2> A lot of discussion around dilution ignores the important aspect of the number of founders.

If you are a single founder, you might want to raise more money to hire a larger team and you would be fine with greater dilution since you own a bigger chunk to begin with. You are still going to own a meaningful stake even after the extra dilution.

If you are a team with 4 founders you need to be extra careful with dilution.

I find it strange that the standard advice on dilution often ignores this important aspect.

</comment><comment><USER3> None, if possible.

<comment><USER4> It all depends on the type of business you're trying to run.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Why is the question always framed in terms of "how much" rather than "if"?

<comment><USER6> As a guess: Because many modern people confuse value and money. Kind of like when I was a homemaker and some people viewed me as not really a contributing member of society because the work I did wasn't attached to a paycheck. Without a paycheck/dollar value attached to my name to signal to them what my contribution was worth, they figured it was valueless rather than priceless.</comment></comment>


Britain's Reichstag Fire Moment - <AUTHOR> https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/britain-proroguing-boris-johnson-parliament-suspension-richard-evans-weimar <comment><USER2> My full response to this article is too long to embed, so here's a link:

[http://txti.es/weimar-america](http://txti.es/weimar-america)

I think Richard Evans is showing his age as far as cultural disconnect from the youth is concerned (which has extreme importance in his analysis, as the Nazi Party was comprised of mostly of disaffected young adults).

 _" The level of political violence in the last years of the Weimar Republic was astonishing: in the first half of 1932, 84 Nazis were killed in street clashes with other armed groups, as were 75 communists. In the Prussian election campaign that summer, there were 105 violent deaths, and police counted 461 political riots with 82 deaths. This has no parallel in today's democracies, for which we should be thankful."_

The Internet is the new beer hall. We're only seeing the tip of the iceberg of the transition from digital spaces flame wars to meatspace brawls.

In short, Trump isn't Hitler and Bojo isn't Mosley. But they are certainly canaries in the coal mine for what these societies are trending towards. Or to put it another way, it took the Nazi Party six years to grow the war machine that took over Europe. But before it took power, earnest adherents of the Weimar Republic spent _13 years_ inadvertently sabotaging their own systemic predicates to try and stop Hitler and/or the KPD from spreading and seizing power.

<comment><USER3> I read your response. I'm curious, would you consider yourself to be a member of the class of young people that you mention? Because a lot of your insights presuppose a relatively close understanding of what it means to be a 'young person' and yet are written in a manner seemingly incompatible with being a 'young person'. Of course, this depends on what age range one would classify as young; personally, when I refer to young people without literally meaning children it is usually in reference to people younger than 30.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > A similar punitive conservatism can be seen in our own time.

Puritans, Calvinists, etc., were also punitively conservative, yet founded many of today's extant democracies.

<comment><USER5> What's your point?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> _But if Hitler's rise teaches us anything, it's that the establishment trivialises demagogues at its peril. One disturbing aspect of the present crisis is the extent to which mainstream parties, including US Republicans and British Conservatives, tolerate leaders with tawdry rhetoric and simplistic ideas, just as Papen, Hindenburg, Schleicher and the rest of the later Weimar establishment tolerated first Hitler and then his dismantling of the German constitution. He could not have done it in the way he did without their acquiescence. Republicans know Trump is a charlatan, just as Conservatives know Johnson is lazy, chaotic and superficial, but if these men can get them votes, they'll lend them support._</comment>


Knowing coworkers' salaries in a salary negotiation? - anonymous-dev

Hi,
I have been working for about 2 years at a startup (<50 people). The company made a mistake and revealed how much everyone is making for a living. Some of my coworkers may also have this information.
Compare to them, I have about twice as much experience in the company but get paid the same.
How can I take advantage of this knowledge to raise my salary ?
PS: Obviously, I will also have to prove I have performed well as well.
Regards, <comment><AUTHOR> What do you mean by "twice as much experience"? Does it makes you twice as productive? or just twice as much "time"?

If you are more productive, you can try to get more- but take into consideration:

1\. You should have hard evidences that you are more productive- developers tend to _think_ that they are better/have more experience then others at their level.

2\. You should know your market value outside of the company and act according to that, not just your co-workers salary.

<comment> anonymous-dev "twice as much experience" is inaccurate. I meant "twice as much time" and I am not twice as much productive.

(1) For the experience, I have more experience than some (maybe not twice as much) for the following criterion:

\- documented code/api \- always seeking to improve my coworkers' productivity (via documentation or automation) \- well designed interfaces \- fairly on time for deadlines.

Though the first 3 criterion are not really sought after by other devs.

(2) How can I find out my market value ? What are the criterion ?

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> I think your coworkers salaries give you a scale of what your company is willing to pay for the service you provide.

I like to feel whole for my efforts, and get paid what I'm worth. If you can demonstrate your quality, and feel as if you are not being adequately compensated for your work, then you should try to change that.

</comment><comment><USER3> How did your company reveal this information?

<comment> anonymous-dev On the bank slip.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Peer to Peer Ticket Place for Music Events - <AUTHOR> http://www.queuein.co queueIn offers peer-to-peer secondary ticket marketplace for music fans. queueIn lets fans connect directly and complete ticket transactions for free, no commission or service fees charged. <comment><USER2> "Scam? You can count on us! We will back you up if there is an issue, if any."

This isn't the most reassuring statement I've ever seen.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi there, we do our best to validate and verify users on our platform, we can't guarantee that all tickets are valid at this moment. However, in case there is a dispute, we will do our best to investigate and once it's confirmed a scam (with sufficient proof) we will prohibit the scammer user from using our platform and also issue the party at loss a full refund by queueIn.

<comment><USER2> (since you're the founder, you may want to add 'Show HN:' to the post title)

well, now I'm curious - within a p2p marketplace, risk only exists for sellers. if a buyer is 'scammed' (i.e. seller does not deliver) they can issue a chargeback - though the procedure with digital goods can get annoying. no equivalent process exists for sellers.

what kind of protection do you offer sellers?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the tips, appreciated!

In most cases, buyers are considered more vulnerable since they pay money upfront. However we do offer the same protection for sellers as well. First we will ban the scammer user. And then we will help the seller contact the venue/event organizer to void his/her tickets so that the other party can't make use of them. Next step will be try to get the seller new tickets (usually in this case will be will-call pick up) or issue seller the full amount of the face value of the tickets.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> looks cool</comment>


After alleged 'bait and switch,' Nevada DMV cancels $78M IT contract - <AUTHOR> http://statescoop.com/after-bait-and-switch-nevada-dmv-cancels-78-million-it-contract <comment><AUTHOR> Audit: [http://budget.nv.gov/uploadedFiles/budgetnvgov/content/IAudi...](http://budget.nv.gov/uploadedFiles/budgetnvgov/content/IAudits/About/AuditRpts/C18-01%20DMV%20Audit.pdf)

This one is extra bad. Not even a communication plan? They did manage to spend $13 MILLION on Oracle shit though. The best part is the solution they sold, which is not even working in New Hampshire, and was built on DynamicsCRM (not portable to oracle)

The grand finale:

"The contract was amended in February 2017, which extended the termination date for an additional year for maintenance coverage. It also increased the maximum amount of the contract by $3 million, primarily for additional hardware and software."

That person needs to be fired immediately and probably arrested.

<comment><USER2> Unsurprisingly, the work was outsourced to an Indian company, "Tech Mahindra".

Nothing against Indians as a people, but Indian outsourcing companies are known for the terrible product quality.

<comment><USER3> I just don't understand why public works should ever go outside of the local economy, globalisation or not. I don't just want my tax dollars to give me a new thing, I want that new thing to be built in my state. If we don't have the skillset then let that money stimulate growth there.

Recently our government outsourced some naval ship building outside the country at the last moment after having expressed they were going to have them locally built. The reason for the switch was cost. To shave a million or two off the price of a many hundred million dollar project they decided to completely remove our local economy from the benefactors.

Private projects? Do what you like. Global times. But a governments role is to grow the economy and welfare of its people, public works are excellent ways to stimulate that.

<comment><USER4> Or local universities[1]. I think they had their then current staff train their replacements --what gall.

Now, imagine if the faculty president thought "hmm, I bet we can save a bunch if we do remote teaching. We'll get super large interactive displays in every classroom and we'll have faculty in [some country] teach our students. We'll save millions!"

[1][http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/UCSF-to- outsource...](http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/UCSF-to-outsource- dozens-of-tech-jobs-to-India-10414432.php)

<comment><USER5> Anyone who's ever seen a University budget can see why they'd never do that.

Slippery slope, if you outsource/fully digitize the teachers...administration comes next.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's kinda crazy how much money gets thrown around by an org you wouldn't think twice about. If a group of engineers from HN got together and secured a deal like that, they could easily retire with that kind of money.

<comment><USER7> Never underestimate the complexity of those projects: I'd bet that the requirements would fill a bookshelf, and simply navigating the hurdles to bid & convince them that you have the resources to deliver would rule out a group of engineers below the triple digit range.

(Yes, that's not a good way to build things successfully. Welcome to enterprise IT.)

<comment><USER8> In theory the requirements fill a bookshelf in practice nobody checks them that closely outside of fairly basic automated tests for things like 508 compliance.

<comment><USER7> This is both untrue – maybe they don't check 100% but everyone who put something on that list is going to notice if you leave their needs unmet – and it doesn't matter unless you know which things won't be checked. Otherwise you have liability for not delivering, which probably means you take on the same level of complexity as requested even if much of that effort is wasted or counterproductive.

<comment><USER8> It's true that a range of stakeholders care about different things, but the solution is to demo the project regularly to verify it fit's basic needs and covers everyone's pet issue.

Gov software projects are on a pass fail scale, and people have minimal expectations despite what they may hope to see. The waterfall approach of gather a bunch of details > build something is more about budget than a black and white must meet 100% of every specific req.

<comment><USER7> The problem is when people are restricted by policy or law from not using waterfall. So many bad government outcomes are caused by attempts to prevent a past mistake on a different kind of project and changing those policies is harder than trying to muddle through any one project.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Prior version of the system used PowerBuilder. That figures.

My fly-by of PowerBuilder 20 years ago made a deep impression. Like, I never wanted to even _think_ about that hunk of garbage again. It's right up there with PeopleSoft. If you're ever offered an opportunity to work with these systems, just run away.

The state didn't know how to buy or develop software then, and it doesn't know how to buy or develop software today.

<comment><USER10> Experienced developers know that a mess can be made in any platform.

One issue with a position and maligning statement like the above against any platform is that it actually enables said charlatans to charge way more for a sub standard developer base who end up being over paid, because skilled developers are not as readily available to fix, and ideally refactor the system.

Hardest of all to imagine is systems that have had legitimately tens of millions of dollars of mission critical and hardened infrastructure that manage more complexity than many of us will ever handle.. are written in platforms like Powerbuilder.

I have personally never used Powerbuilder. I know some ace developers who spent a lot of time (among other things) using Powerbuilder and they have said it's like any other language or framework - lots of messes, some good stuff too.

Still, I won't ever stop noticing the kinds of hateful comments people throw at others because of what stack they work in. It's sheer overlooking of opportunities.

Comments like the above are like saying all wood is bad because we saw a house built poorly out of wood.

This approach excludes folks from the real huge innovation projects that are coming due as these platforms and projects are gradually renewed or refactored.

<comment><USER9> I've worked with many programming environments, and PowerBuilder stands out as one of the worst. I remember exchanging emails and doing phone calls with the developers about some howling bad bugs in their COM support, bad enough that we wound up ditching PB despite the market it represented. Judging from the bugs I was finding and the release notes that I was reading (which covered issues that included how to avoid writing code that would crash the compiler), PB was a mess under the hood.

I don't abide by broken tools, but I do respect humility and realize that bugs and flawed designs happen. However, I will have no truck with companies that ship buggy, crashy products and then do the whole "manage customer expectations" dance in an obvious attempt to avoid remedial engineering. When I used it, the product was several major releases old, and they seemed to think they could trade workarounds and sophistry for fixing bugs.

Hateful? Probably. Undeserved? Definitely not.

<comment><USER10> I agree Powerbuilder isn't the best tech - the point I was trying to make is every tech has it's pro's and cons, and older techs have more to maintain while trying to stay current and get ahead, just like newer platforms can suffer from a lack of maturity. Powerbuilder didn't do itself any favors by trying to rest on it's existing marketshare.

The kind of hair pulling I heard from buddies working on otherwise interesting systems in PB was quite deep, several nights a week in it's height. The issue of using an older version of PB seemed to make things worse.

Still, it seems relevant to look at a technology in it's time compared to what else was available, and wonder if this is where today's language+framework apologists may end up in the future when one could no longer explain away their current favorite platform in 2018 as a flavour de jour.

My last comment is not not directed at you in any way - You articulated a depth of experience: Opinions based on hearsay or surface interactions about a tech is not much different in the venom spread than than judging a group on the color of their skin based on one interaction and an underlying propensity to find fault. It's harsh, but maybe it's not recognizable that it's a similar muscle.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I wish code for america would take these kinds of things on. I assume the DMV rules are sufficiently similar that most/all of them could benefit from opensource.

[https://www.codeforamerica.org/](https://www.codeforamerica.org/)

<comment><USER12> I'm guessing it's actually the humans that cost $$$ not some source code.

<comment><USER13> They spent $5M on Oracle software. That's a LOT of someone else's source code they paid for.

<comment><USER14> And at one point Oracle was just using open source software, adding on some things and calling it something with a $10k/cpu cost. They may still do this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> How does this happen?

Who in their right mind thought it was a good idea to outsource the development of this critical system to a foreign contractor? Did anybody stop and think about what might happen to all of that public money if the contract is breached?

<comment><USER16> You can can tell from the auditors report that the RFP or other solicitation was fubar. Many of the deficiencies there are standard contract terms that were probably missing.

It also sounds like the project was getting done on the cheap. The actual dollar figure is buried a bit... it sounds like they got their hands on a big wad of cash and went on a spending spree. I bet they bought a new mainframe, lots of of network crap, etc.

The poor procurement practices led to the state ending up with some two-bit bodyshop that just tried to job out the work. My guess is that the state program side is barebones and some political hack pushed this through.

<comment><USER12> Interesting. In my teeny tiny company our insurance policy states that we must have all contacts over a certain value reviewed by an attorney. Wondering how a vast beurocracy somehow isn't subject to that rule?

<comment><USER16> Lawyers will tell you if things are legal. They won't generally stop you from doing dumb, legal things.

<comment><USER12> In my experience that is absolutely not true. Perhaps you need a better lawyer?

<comment><USER17> A lawyer who will tell you that a hybrid cloud/on-premises solution using Oracle isn't using today's industry-insider (read: us) agreed best practices and might waste a bunch of money?

Good luck finding and having enough money to pay that lawyer.

<comment><USER12> We're talking about completely different things. My comment was a follow on to this:

>Many of the deficiencies there are standard contract terms that were probably missing.

Lawyers exist to make sure you don't sign a contract that is missing standard contract terms.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> According to the audit document, the company was Tech Mahindra.

I am genuinely surprised when a 8 to 9 figure software project ever succeeds.

But I'm also amazed that the government spent $25mil before they realized they got completely bamboozled. There's something shady going on here.

<comment><USER19> As someone who has worked with state funding contracts I disagree that this implies anything shady. Hourly rates for consultants at exorbitantly high. It also depends on how the project is big, fixed feed versus hourly bulk. Regardless, the amount of hours quoted and the rates are inflated based on politics.

It's not shady, its just incompetent people signing contracts to promise tech companies bags of money.

<comment><USER20> From the article: "the project was not managed by the state's Enterprise IT Services division, and was managed solely by outside master service agreement contractors hired through the DMV's internal IT department."

If that is not shady I don't know what is.

<comment><USER14> It's not shady, its politics. The DMV IT department didn't want to deal with "corporate" aka Nevada Enterprise IT. Perhaps Nevada IT was too busy digging out of a debacle with healthcare IT systems to be bothered with DMV stuff.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I feel like I could provide the Nevada DMV with whatever it needs for significantly less than $78 million.

<comment><USER22> Only one way to find out! There's so much opportunity to improve the "non- sexy" work of governments and institutions and the interface between them and the people they help/serve/administer that it's crazy there isn't more start- up attention focused there.

<comment><USER23> In reality, there is very little realized opportunity to improve the 'non- sexy' work of governments and institutions, because you're up against either big names like Oracle or <insert official's nephew's name here>.

<comment><USER22> I won't argue that Oracle isn't optimized to meet and take advantage of public institutional procurement policies but if you've ever seen one of Oracle's offerings, it's easy to surpass their quality and given their rates, trivial to come in cheaper.

My mom was an instructor with the community college system in Colorado and about ten years back they rolled out an Oracle based-and-delivered student enrollment product that failed during its first enrollment after being deployed because it had been set up to only allow 100 concurrent connections to the state-wide persistence solution. Oracle was of course 'earning' something like $90,000 every day the outage continued despite it being their own direct fault.

I can't stress enough how incompetent or over-priced Oracle solutions are for pretty much anyone.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> $78m over 5 years for 25 (probably average) developers and a few licenses is excessive. Not sure what massive tech problems the Nevada DMV is trying to solve, but I doubt it's much more than a DB cluster with a web app or two thrown in front of it. Tech Mahindra's developers may be average, but their marketing department seems to be exceptional!

<comment><USER25> Integration with existing/external systems is likely a huge part of the cost. If the DMV integrates with the police systems (so police can run license/registration), they need to be integrated. If they have license plate scanners that do the same, they need to be integrated (or replaced). Point of sale terminals for things like license renewals might need integration.

No system exists in isolation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> This type of waste occurs in all levels of government. My last employer was spending over $1,000,000/year maintaining some horrible SharePoint sites that were rarely used.

<comment><USER27> This sort of problem is not limited to government. Private companies waste money on all sorts of dead-end nonsense - all the time.

It's why IBM and Oracle are still in business.

<comment><USER28> In all my years in tech, I have literally never heard a single person (that wasn't part of a flashy ad campaign) exclaim that IBM or Oracle offered their company a solution at a good rate, got it setup in time and that it works well and solved their problems.

<comment><USER29> I think I have read one anecdote: Apple stores and Oracle. I read somewhere that Steve Jobs was happy with the point of sales software and that there is some Oracle in it (and that Jobs and Ellison knew each other)

Only positive Oracle anecdote I know of.

<comment><USER30> They didn't just know each other:

"Ellison's idea was to buy Apple and immediately make Jobs CEO."

"Jobs proposed what Ellison called "a more circuitous route." He would persuade Apple to acquire Next, and then join Apple's board."

"After Jobs was CEO of Apple again — interim CEO initially — Ellison joined Apple's board."

[https://www.recode.net/2016/5/13/11672932/larry-ellison- stev...](https://www.recode.net/2016/5/13/11672932/larry-ellison-steve-jobs- oracle-apple-usc)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I'm sure that money will find its way back to America, in political donations to be exact. Kind of gullible to think these 'failed to deliver' accidents keep happening on accident after half the budget has been spent.

</comment><comment><USER10> I would love to see how much of the purchasing and decision making committee was composed of people who didn't understand technology, let alone how to procure and implement technology.

At the highest levels, there is a self-preservation disease permeating most organizations where CxO's try to fake it till they make it with the IT/Systems decisions they take on, and it turns out like this.

</comment><comment><USER32> Ah the good old responsibility dodging and blaming following legacy modernization project gone off the rails. At least they got out spending only $27 million. The state says bait and switch, I wager the contractor never got requirements or basic documentation for the project.

I'm at a company now that's planning one of these projects for a core system. I'm looking forward to having a front row seat!

<comment><AUTHOR> Read the audit i posted above. The contractor didn't even show up LOL

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Tech Mahindra contractors, not surprising. An acquaintance of mine came in on a job with them- they pay all their guys salary which is kind of crazy. That guy was doing better than the hourly contractors with family time and pay. Something sketchy is up with them.

<comment><USER34> Not that odd. A lot of contracting companies do that, then bill you out at a day rate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> I am currently working on a largish COBOL codebase which the company has tried 4 times to port to Java, each time by porting all at once. It cannot be done all at once.

</comment><comment><USER36> It's stories like this one that make me want to pivot and go work on projects for the government. I KNOW I can contribute something useful.

</comment><comment><USER37> I wish there was a collection of these.</comment>