Women, Men and the New Economics of Marriage - <AUTHOR> http://pewsocialtrends.org/2010/01/19/women-men-and-the-new-economics-of-marriage/

<comment><USER2> Carter and Glick, in their 1976 book on Marriage and Divorce, point out that the USA had the highest divorce rate in the world in 1900, when the divorce rate was 5%. Although it is difficult to get accurate numbers for 1800, the USA almost certainly had the highest divorce rate in 1800, as it was one of the few nations that had legal divorce in 1800.

The background history is that in all Western nations the trends followed a path driven by Protestantism. Till the Reformation, divorce was illegal in all Western countries. The early Protestant reformers, both Luther and Calvin and the others, argued that divorce was a right given to women by Biblical law (the only grounds for divorce being extreme physical abuse). So all of the nations that became Protestant during the 1500s legalized divorce. Divorce then remained legal for 50 to 70 years, till all of the original generation of Reformers were dead. Then divorce became illegal again. In most Western nations that were Protestant, divorce remained illegal until the late 1800s.

During the 1600s, only the most radical Protestant sects continued to argue that divorce should be legal. These were the sects that were the most likely to banned in their home countries, and thus they made up the bulk of people moving to the British colonies in North America during the 1600s. As such, early on, due to various religious factors, the USA had a culture that allowed for divorce.

Divorce remained rare in the USA till the mid-20th century, but the USA's background and history left it ripe for a cultural revolution that would allow for divorce to become much more common.

The Catholic Church in the USA has been effected by the overall trends of divorce in the USA. 90% of all the annulments that the Catholic Church grants, worldwide, happen in the USA.

</comment><comment><USER3> Until the late 20th century, marriage was an institution in support of human survival—which in the recent history translated to financial security. Divorce rates were low because survival was not only a practical limitation but also collectively valued very highly, and thus many societies didn't even allow divorces.

In the late century, marriage became primarily an opportunity to accelerate your growth as a human person and help your spouse do the same. In other words, two closely bound people teaching each other lessons in life. This bound is weaker than it used to be (lacking the survivalist element) and as singles can now feed themselves divorce rates are way up.

 _(With regard to the above, please remember that marriage in Western tradition has been commonly just disguised as romantic love; I maintain that romantic love has never been the deepest reason for two people deciding to bond together but merely an incubator for such a bond to form. Romantic love generally disappears from any relationship after the beginning phase unless actively maintained.)_

</comment><comment><USER4> As a guy, I sorta find the idea of getting married to a women who is also well educated totally awesome. Two solid sources of income are definitely better than one, if only for protection against catastrophic situations, but having nice things is also quite fun. I don't get why we didn't do this years ago >_<. It seems like so many stories report on how this is some kind of shift in the balance of power, role reversal, or the end of masculinity. Why not talk about how awesome it could be if money could now be less of a power issue between two people in a marriage (read: only one person traditionally controls the income now no longer being the case). I think that's completely and totally awesome and good for everybody.

Now guys have to be positive contributors to 'loving relationships' instead of just bringing home the bacon...lest women leave them. Whatever makes it harder to be a tool is fine by me. A rising tide lifts all boats.

Note: this entire post focuses on marriage between men and women. But I'm guessing the rising position of women could also benefit women in marriages, civil unions, or partnerships as well. I'm kind of outside my area of knowledge making that last remark, but it makes sense to me. Feel free to knock it over.

<comment><USER5> It actually makes very little sense for men to get married (in the USA, anyway) these days. It's simply far too easy for women to

1\. become "unhappy",

2\. get a no-fault divorce,

3\. be awarded primary custody of the kids (this happens somewhere around 80% of the time),

4\. take the house, and

5\. be awarded large child-support and alimony payments.

In the USA, somewhere around half of marriages end in divorce. There is evidence [1] that, among college-educated couples, the percentage of divorces initiated by women is approximately 90%. Many men are blindsided by them.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divorce#Gender_and_divorce>

Very few things in life can be worse for a man than having his kids taken away by a woman with the help of the family courts system. One day you're reading with them on the couch every night, the next you're seeing them only every other weekend. Devastating.

I know, I know. Your girl isn't like that. Well, women change when the kids are born and the real work begins.

<comment><USER4> While I don't feel like contesting the first few points, because I feel like they might be close to accurate, but your point after 5 is loaded and misleading. I feel you have cherry picked your numbers out of your own source. Here is a complimentary figure to your 90% of divorces instigated by women in scenarios where higher education is had by both couples.

"Success in marriage has been associated with higher education and higher age. 81% of college graduates, over 26 years of age, who wed in the 1980s, were still married 20 years later. 65% of college graduates under 26 who married in the 1980s, were still married 20 years later. 49% of high school graduates under 26 years old who married in the 1980s, were still married 20 years later.[27] Population studies have found that in 2004 and 2008, liberal-voting states have lower rates of divorce than conservative-voting states, possibly because people in liberal states tend to wait longer before getting married.[28] In 2009, 2.9% of adults 35-39 without a college degree were divorced, compared with 1.6% with a college education.[29]"

So maybe your 90% figure is true, but that is true in a largely reduced set of cases according to the same article.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Just skimmed over TFA so I may have missed it but it only addresses the _income_ benefits married men have compared to unmarried ones. What about the expenses ? Even ignoring the financially catastrophic for men scenario of divorce, I'm pretty sure for frugal single guys like me marriage would be a bad move economically with all the "necessities" married life comes with.

</comment><comment><USER7> I was going to post a tongue-in-cheek reference to nomarriage.com , but that site is being redesigned.

I think this is a cached copy of the original material on the original site... <http://nomarriage.flippertv.com/>

</comment><comment><USER8> Here in Finland it seems that marriage is seen as a "standard contract", as in the easiest way to organize common issues regarding inheritance (e.g. non- married couple: kids get their share by birthright, but spouse not without separate agreement) or possessions are divided in case of separation.

All legal avenues have been pursued. Everyone knows what to expect.

</comment><comment><USER9> What I find interesting is that, according to those pie charts, in 2007 men were less educated and yet managed to make significantly more income than their wives.

Note that I do not draw any conclusions. Just pointing out an interesting fact.

</comment><comment><USER10> divorce rate also increased considerably, not necessarily because of earning gap.

<comment><USER11> I would be willing to bet that the increase in general acceptability of divorce is the main factor.

<comment><USER12> 'the main' I wouldn't say. As women become increasingly economically independent, they open up the practical ability to get a divorce. Many women used to have to stay even in abusive relationships just because they had no other options. Women who can provide for themselves have the option to leave a relationship when they find it no longer in line with their life goals or desires.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This sounds a lot like the beginning of the movie Idiocracy. I think we're all doomed.

</comment><comment><USER14> I wonder how much these stats are influenced by the changing age differences between partners. It used to be typical for men to be older than their wives and very shocking/bizarre for a woman to much older than her husband. It seems to me that the older partner has had more time to get an education and build a career, so even if you were to compare their earnings and education at the same age and find it was terribly different, the older partner may still make more money currently. Since it seems like it is becoming increasingly common/acceptable for spouse's to be the same age or for the wife to be older, I wonder how much influence (if any) that has on these figures.

</comment><comment><USER15> I look forward to the day when the divorce rate is 100%

<comment><USER15> Is everyone here anti-divorce? Anyone care to explain the downvotes?

<comment><USER9> A divorce is a broken promise. Who would be pro-divorce?</comment></comment></comment>


Jordan Peterson Debated Slavoj ŽIžek - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/20/jordan-peterson-slavoj-zizek-happiness-capitalism-marxism <comment><USER2> A German magazine wrote that Peterson came "with a pocket-knife to an artillery fight".

</comment><comment><USER3> Victims of a culture of victimization. Good stuff.

</comment><comment><USER4> The Guardian once again makes itself the topic.

</comment><comment><USER5> "The size and scope of his fame registers more or less exactly the loathing for identity politics in the general populace, because it certainly isn't on the quality of his books that his reputation resides."

"because it certainly isn't on the quality of his books that his reputation resides."

Aaaaaand dropped, too petty. I do look forward to listening this though. I like some of what Peterson has talked about, at least from what little I have listened or watched and I've never heard of Zizek. Looks like a good Sunday.</comment>


Nvidia Titan X Pascal Review - <AUTHOR> http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/nvidia-titan-x-12gb,4700.html <comment><USER2> Impressive, and although I upgraded from a GTX 970oc to a GTX 1080 founders (stock) when I went from dual 1080p to a single 4k for a bit more room developing, and something playable... I don't think I could have talked myself into spending another $400-500 for it.

Definitely looks like playable 4K gaming with decent settings for this card.</comment>


GCC 9: Link-time and inter-procedural optimization improvements - <AUTHOR> http://hubicka.blogspot.com/2019/05/gcc-9-link-time-and-inter-procedural.html <comment><USER2> For one side GCC is becoming an impressive piece of technology, and for the other I loved how a full Linux distribution was used to analyze the impact of those optimizations.

This is why openQA and all the test coverage is so important.</comment>


The Genius in All of Us - <AUTHOR> http://www.salon.com/books/laura_miller/2010/03/07/genius_in_all_of_us/index.html

<comment><USER2> This sounds like a humanist reaction to the increasing amounts of research and evidence that intelligence does in fact have a large genetic component. Nobody says environment and hard work aren't vital factors for success, but it's already understood that intelligence doesn't equal success anyways. Still, that doesn't mean intelligence isn't by and large an innate quality. Stephen Pinker's The Blank Slate goes into this in detail, but his point was virtually the opposite of this author. He was instead making the case that much more about a person than most people expect is a direct result of their genotype, and that it's best if we face up to reality and talk about these things in the open rather than pretending that everyone is equal. As for success, it seems there is wide agreement that insane amounts of practice and perseverance are are sure fire recipe. I wonder how much the ability to persevere in the face of difficulty is affected by a persons genes?

<comment><USER3> I agree. One thing that came to mind is that if we take a pure scientific view then humans are 99% like apes, and apes are reasonably intelligent and can learn. Are we to believe we can extrapolate and say that environment has more to do with the intelligence averages of apes than genes, and further, that they too can potentially be geniuses?

<comment><USER4> It's a more scientific view of the human genome to focus on the genetic differences that are "fixed" in distinction between the genomes of Pan troglodytes (or Pan paniscus) and Homo sapiens. There is something profoundly different about the intelligence of any human being as contrasted with the intelligence of any chimpanzee (or gorilla, or more distantly related animal).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The studies most favorable to Shenk's position put the heritability of IQ at around 0.5. That is, parents account for 50% of their descendant's IQ variance. Environmental factors would account for the other half. More recent meta-studies ([http://www18.homepage.villanova.edu/diego.fernandezduque/Tea...](http://www18.homepage.villanova.edu/diego.fernandezduque/Teaching/PhysiologicalPsychology/zCurrDir4200/CurrDirGeneticsTraits.pdf) for instance) put IQ heritability at around 0.8.

Even if the studies most favorable to Shenk are correct, the best way to be smart is still to choose your parents. Parents determine genes and a large amount of environment, which together are the largest influences on intelligence.

This is a bit off-topic, but I want to point out a distinction that is often overlooked. Heritability is not quite the same as genes. Genes definitely influence intelligence. If you could edit someone's genes, you could quite easily make them very sharp or very dumb. Scientists have identified individual genes and groups of genes that drastically influence intelligence. Down's syndrome is an obvious one. Single genes affecting intelligence include GDI1 (<http://hmg.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/11/21/2567>) and ALDH5A1 ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldehyde_dehydrogenase_5_family...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldehyde_dehydrogenase_5_family,_member_A1)). There are others that cause problems such as autism and schizophrenia. ([http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v455/n7215/full/nature0...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v455/n7215/full/nature07458.html))

I really think the "ignore genetics, work hard to succeed" people are going about their argument the wrong way. Instead of disregarding the evidence, they should acknowledge it while stressing a caveat: Intelligence, to be useful, _must be used effectively_. The smartest person in the world might not be best-suited to solve a problem; similar to how the strongest person in the world might not be the best fighter.

<comment><USER4> _heritability of IQ at around 0.5_

Heritability of IQ has nothing whatever to do with malleability (or, if you prefer this terminology, controllability) of human intelligence. That point has been made by the leading researchers on human behaviorial genetics in their recent article that I cited in the first reply to this submission on HN. It is a very common conceptual blunder, which should be corrected in any well edited genetics textbook, to confuse broad heritability estimates with statements about how malleable human traits are. The two concepts actually have no relationship at all. Highly heritable traits can be very malleable, and the other way around. It looks like the author of the new book mentioned in the submitted article has gathered a lot of evidence about malleability of human intelligence, which I will check as I read the book. (I've read other writings on this subject, and regularly participate in scholarly discussion of the latest research on this with Ph.D. psychologists.)

 _Intelligence, to be useful, must be used effectively._

I do agree with this point.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "Instead, 'one large group of scientists,' a 'vanguard' that Shenk has labeled 'the interactionists,' insists that the old genes-plus-environment model (G+E) must be jettisoned and replaced by a model they call GxE, emphasizing 'the dynamic interaction between genes and the environment.' They don't discount heredity, as the old blank-slate hypothesis of human nature once did. Instead, they assert that "genes powerfully influence the formation of all traits, from eye color to intelligence, but rarely dictate precisely what those traits will be."

That's a pretty good summation of current human behavioral genetics research. An earlier comment of mine here on HN

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=842315>

cited and linked to a recent publication on this issue,

Johnson, Wendy; Turkheimer, Eric; Gottesman, Irving I.; Bouchard Jr., Thomas (2009). Beyond Heritability: Twin Studies in Behavioral Research. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 18, 4, 217-220.

with some interesting new ideas from researchers who have been working on human behavioral genetics longer than most HN readers have been alive.

<comment><USER6> Agreed. GxE is certainly better then G+E, but that doesn't mean there's a genius in all of us.

I see this kind of response to progress in science all the time. If you change the way you conceive of a problem, like genes and environment, people suddenly think that all the beliefs about genetics from the past are wrong. But GxE doesn't mean that genetics isn't important all of a sudden, simple because in the days of G+E it _was_ important. In fact, I would argue that GXE makes G MORE critical.

In a computer science class I took, our professor would multiply our homework and our exam grades instead of adding them. This way, even if you aced your homework, a 0 on an exam would give you a 0 overall (a solution to the inherent problems of team projects). The same is true for genetics- you can have all the good environment you want, if you ain't got the genes you're screwed (Down's syndrome). Of course, the same is true for environment; take a child with the best genes in the world and put it in a box during the early periods of its life, and it will never learn language well enough to even take an IQ test.

This reminds me when epigenetics started getting a lot of press, IDers were coming out in droves saying, "look! Richard Dawkins is wrong! The evolutionists are wrong!". But epigenetics doesn't mean evolution is wrong any more than GxE means that genetics aren't pretty damn significant.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> _According to Shenk, we are erroneously led to believe that stars like Tiger Woods and cellist Yo-yo Ma were born to climb to the top of their fields, when in fact the environments they grew up in are just as responsible (if not more so) for their spectacular feats._

I would love to see this Shenk guy raise a Tiger Woods/Yo-yo Ma 2.0. Do that and you have an immensely more powerful argument, otherwise you're just another wave in the ocean.

<comment><USER8> I would say László already won this argument:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judit_Polg%C3%A1r>

 _She and her two older sisters, Grandmaster Susan and International Master Sofia, were part of an educational experiment carried out by their father László Polgár, in an attempt to prove that children could make exceptional achievements if trained in a specialist subject from a very early age. "Geniuses are made, not born," was László's thesis. He and his wife Klara educated their three daughters at home, with chess as the specialist subject. However, chess was not taught to the exclusion of everything else. Each of them has several diplomas and speaks four to eight languages. Their father also taught his three daughters the international language Esperanto._

<comment><USER6> So you're saying that László and Klara were poor genetic material?

This kind of anecdotal evidence means nothing. Undoubtedly these girls had great genes, in addition to being trained quite well. If both G and E are high, the product of the two is quite high.

I'd like to see him try this with a kid he adopted.

<comment><USER8> _So you're saying that László and Klara were poor genetic material?_

Where do you see me say anything of the kind?

No, what I would say is the myth of genius being a special constellation of traits that the gods bestow upon that rare soul, which can only be seen ex post facto, is false. High G is quite common. What isn't is a specially tuned E.

If someone known to be a mediocre chess player can thrice create chess grandmasters, then that is a strong argument, and frankly, anecdotal is about as good as you can get with this stuff.

I suppose if you're arguing for "genius" in the ex post facto sense, you could say "wow, what a coincidence that he had 3 children with that amazing chess grandmaster gene." To me, saying anyone with high G could be Einstein given the correct E says something very different about genius than the idea that Einstein was one of a kind and had some innate, unique genetic gift.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> META: I would just like to point out to all potential commenters that the degree to which IQ is genetic is one of the most controversial unresolved recurring topics on Hacker News. The arguments never really seem to go anywhere.

</comment><comment><USER10> The 'great man' theory of history is ingrained into most of us in early childhood as we learn about larger than life historical figures such as Christopher Columbus, George Washington, Abraham Linchon, and the like (obviously I'm an American, but I imagine other nationalities have similar figures). A lot of people consider themselves 'normal', and thus not capable of great things. This is of course bullshit... While everyone may not be able to be a 'genius' as the article claims, most people are capable of a whole lot more than they think.

</comment><comment><USER11> > Instead, they assert that "genes powerfully influence the formation of all > traits, from eye color to intelligence, but rarely dictate precisely what > those traits will be."

Man, eye color is a bad one to pick if you're making the case against genes being predictive of traits. I reckon you could get something like 60-80% of the world's eye color right based on knowing the descendency of their parents.

<comment><USER4> _eye color is a bad one to pick if you're making the case against genes being predictive of traits_

Not so, actually. The author of the article did research before writing that rather than just misremembering something taught in school based on obsolete research. Eminent geneticist Victor McKusick developed his interest in human genetics in large part because eye colors of his immediate family members were not always as expected on the basis of naive views of the inheritance of eye color.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_color>

<http://www.thetech.org/genetics/ask.php?id=29>

<http://www.bookrags.com/research/eye-color-gen-02/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> 404 for everyone or just me?</comment>


Nixon OKs $5B Space Shuttle Project - <AUTHOR> http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/150-years/sd-me-150-years-january-6-htmlstory.html <comment><USER2> (January 1972, 45 years ago this month)</comment>


The UK Ruby Contract Drought Is Real - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@louisror/the-uk-ruby-contract-drought-is-real-27-feb-2015-fbac443b81da <comment><USER2> The truth is not nice, but here it goes:

A lot of companies got burnt on ruby related projects. Especially anything rails related. There is a steady pipeline of work right now for skilled developers to migrate services and code from ruby to go, Scala, java - basically anything else except ruby.

I have earnt quite well doing such gigs, although I tend do more erlang/elixir stuff these days.

I would always ask the clients what happened, and why they want to migrate rather than maintain or even build out their ruby code bases, and the answer was always the same - the developers in the ruby space were mostly sub-par. Often several degrees below java developers in terms of skill and ability. I would say it tallies with my experiences too.

It is also for this reason they are not using node js - because it was seen as the next shiny, all the half-devs from ruby jumped onto it, and the risk of crap codebases from the same amateurs is ever present.

<comment><USER3> Ok let's be serious what does burned mean? My impression is that most people use Rails because it allows you to be very productive very quickly. Presumably that means you know you're trading performance for productivity. Maybe you'll have to do a re-write of parts of your app in another language for performance reasons or because you need to perform some operations concurrently, but you know up front you're not choosing the language strictly because of its technical performance but instead because of business constraints.

Keeping that in mind, were those companies really burned by Rails or were they making lazy decisions and not being honest about what their plan was for their software?

<comment><USER4> I don't think it's about performance. It's about the glut of inexperienced, underskilled Ruby devs landing seemingly simple gigs where they patch together unmaintainable Rails spaghetti - ultimately saddling clients/employers with a heap of technical debt and hobbling future devs who come to these projects.

<comment><USER5> This is a case of getting what you're willing to pay for. Great work is expensive because it takes a lot of experience to do, and there are a lot of opportunities for those with a lot of experience. But if you're willing to sacrifice the "great work" part, there are plenty of people out there with less experience doing (potentially) less great work for less cost. Everybody would like above market work for below market cost, but it doesn't tend to work that way.

<comment><USER6> I see what you're getting at but when Ruby/Rails was all new and shiny a couple of years back I knew an awful lot os junior/inexperienced devs who quite permanent jobs to go freelance/consulting for ruby/rails jobs because the money being paid was way above that for other similar level devs. It was pure hype, and to be fair to everyone who did this, the saw the writing on the wall and rode the wave. I even knew one SEO Exec who switched to ruby/rails contract dev work; if that isn't a warning sign, I don't know what is!

Just to note, I'm a PHP dev who works in SEO, and have done for years, during the great SEO boom, so I know bad code and I know snake oil salesmen. But I think in about 12/18 months time, once all the charlatans have moved on, the ruby/rails devs left will be experienced, battle hardend legacy devs, and the respect will begin., much like the SEO industry now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Obviously the author has more of a historical overview, but, anecdotally, I am getting the same quantity of contact concerning roles as I have ever done, but there seem to be more and more recruitment companies moving into the ruby space. I would say it is also possible that what the author is seeing is less of a slowdown in the ruby market and more of increased competition in the recruitment market.

Having dealt with the author previously (though never having taken a role through him) I hope his approach of specialising in a technology stack and pursuing that as a specialist, gaining knowledge of both the hirers and potential contractors, wins out over the LinkedIn profile fishers.

</comment><comment><USER8> "Scrum Masters...The main issues in the Scrum Master market are that lots of Project Managers and people from somewhat similar disciplines doing the two day certification and are repackaging their careers on their CVs and jumping on the current Scrum Master bandwagon."

Well that pretty much confirms my perception of "Scrum Masters".

</comment><comment><USER9> My anecdotal impression (I lived in the UK for 3 years) is that not enough companies that adopted Ruby in it's hayday (i.e. 2006-2012) have survived today. Which means, it never caught on with the "enterprise" in the UK, and most of the companies that _have_ survived are still using .NET/Java/PHP.

Generally speaking (again, my anecdotal experience), the UK as a whole are tech laggards compared to the US. They'll wait until it gets developed and fixed here, and then adopt it when it's ready. However, as soon as it is ready, they do tend to adopt very quickly (and become quite good). It's no coincidence that Node.js and the startup scene are now synonymously popular right now in the UK and Ruby isn't.

<comment><USER10> In my experience Ruby has become a niche thing. It never moved on to the enterprise at scales that all the hype-men wanted it to almost 10 years ago. And the startups have found other tools.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> No idea if this applies to the UK, but in the Netherlands the word is that bigger companies have been switching from outsourcing to agencies and contractors to creating/expanding their own in-house teams.

With online services now fully established at senior management level as part of the core business (software eating the world etc) and no longer seen as "projects", this is natural development.

And it's not just contractors that feel the consequences, it's also the specialized agencies that can no longer get those big fat contracts building web apps for established companies.

</comment><comment><USER12> Can't comment on Ruby, but in relation to Node.js in London it's very much a seller's market at the moment; good developers with commercial experience are contracting at £550pd, and very few are interested in taking permanent roles.

It's a good time to be a software developer in London, and not so good if you're trying to recruit one.

</comment><comment><USER13> I'm a UK-based contractor (albeit mostly working with Python) and without fail I have at least 10 new recruiters add me on LinkedIn every week. What are the chances this author is in a flooded recruiter market?

Edit: The last time I sat in an office in Shoreditch there were contractors there doing frontend, project management, design and product ownership. There was a conversation one day where the eluded to 'backend contractors always being in work' and it being a bit of struggle for the others to always find work. Have the Rails devs here felt they were always in work in the past?

<comment><USER14> I've had the same experience with a constant stream of freshly minted recruiters want to add me on LinkedIn each and every week.

I've done contract Rails dev in London for the past 2 years now, before that I had clients in the South of England, Dublin and Belfast. Apart from holidays I've not spent any considerable time out of work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> My thought of the day is that Ruby is good to know for Chef and Puppet, the market seems high for these. Ruby On Rails is brilliant for startups and prototyping. I hear devs talking down about Ruby On Rails, taking into example LinkedIn that has moved away from Rails to Scala and NodeJs. The thing is, when you scale like LinkedIn, servers become more expensive than developers. In that sort of situation, it becomes a lot more interesting to move to Scala. Scala and Ruby are both in a sweet spot, but both in a different market. Of course there will always be the fashion of the latest skewing the market, and that can make it hard to see the effect these could have on the long term. I also hear devs talking down about the Java market. As if Java was going to disappear anytime soon. I don't think so. All languages suffer from programmers that have no interest to improve their skills and have a "can do" attitude. No matter which language we are talking about, they are all bound to be spaghetti code at the end of the day. That's why there are conventions and software architects. It is like building a house, getting painters, plasterers, masons and electricians to build a house, just that there aren't any plans. I am learning now Ruby, but I don't think I would stay there for big applications. My problem is not the language, but the lack of tools, or to be more precise, the quality of those tools. C# got Visual Studio, PHP works great with Netbeans, Java got Eclipse and Netbeans. Ruby might be good on Visual Studio, but I got a Mac.

</comment><comment><USER16> It's all about .Net in the UK. Go learn it. I can walk out of a contract on a Friday and start another on a Monday and it's been like this forever and the market demand is increasing and the staff supply declining.

Can't lose.

<comment><USER17> What about pay, though? Here in the US, at least from my perspective, .NET contracting is slightly better than PHP contracting. That is, most of the .NET jobs are (relatively) poor paying with the kind of cheap, demanding client we've all had horror story experiences with. Exceptions would be in finance, where you get to be treated like shit because you aren't a tradeer.

One of my colleagues lumped "webdev" (of the sleazy WP theme shop variety) and .NET jobs in the same category as a "cesspool". I can't disagree.

<comment><USER16> Pay is good. If you're good at it, it's pretty amazing. You can pull £650/day on contract if you know your shit. If you don't but can drive Visual Studio, £400/day is easy.

<comment><USER10> Please add a note to that £650 - financial experience required. I can pull £800 with Scala and Java.

Though I am not about to sell my soul for the £200 difference to spend that on psychotherapy afterwards.

<comment><USER18> How much / what sort of financial experience is required?

<comment><USER16> Incidentally bugger all in most cases I reckon unless you're working in trading. There's a bit of a vacuum at the moment so standards are low. Most orgs are willing to drag you through the relevant training.

In all my years of working in the financial sector (NOT trading I will add!), about as complex as it got was numeric precision, rounding, equation of a line and curve fitting which was all pretty easy. Oh and deciphering lots of poorly written regulation and rules.

Don't hit trading unless you like snorting coke and 100 hour weeks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> As a prospective new developer, is ruby/rails still a good bet or are the skills not going to be required in a year or so? Less worried about contracting rates for the moment, keen to work in startups which is where I understand rails is being used constantly.

</comment><comment><USER20> I suspect part of the problem is the "flood of contractors", due to low salaries for permanent jobs. A "senior java developer" job in the North is advertised as 45k, which is ridiculously low; if I were in that position, I'd be very tempted to just quit and go contracting, where you can make 20k in a single month. But of course, if everyone does that, the contractors market gets saturated.

<comment><USER21> How is that ridiculously low?

The UK has always lagged well behind America in dev pay and has only been accelerating in pay for the last 5 years. 5 years ago a senior dev position outside London was around 35k. Now it's up to 45k and I'm starting to get emails with 50ks mentioned.

To make '20k' you would have to earn £900 per day, when the going rate outside London is £300 p/d, and even as recently as a year ago it was £250 p/d.

You earn £900 p/d consulting, not developing.

I've always blamed the 'BBC micro' effect for our lower pay, we had a lot more exposure to computers as kids in the 80s and so reached 'peak developer' a lot later than the Americans did. Also in the UK the idea that the peons could be worth more than the managers was anathema until the last decade, a class divide throwback.

<comment><USER22> There are lots of contracts in London with 500-700 GBP per day rates...Java/Ruby/Node and more. Those are for dev roles, not consulting roles.

<comment><USER10> No, there are not. There are a lot of ads with those rates, but most roles are ~ £450. Please note that a single contract goes out to many agencies that post the same contract, so you might think that there is a lot of £600+ roles. While in reality there is a lot of people posting the same role X^N times.

Some of those posts are not even real roles - new guys in agencies need to collect a lot of CVs, so they post bogus £600 contract and collect your CVs as "stuffing" for their "portfolio"

£700 are rates for an experienced core Java developer with investment banking or FX experience.

<comment><USER2> Rates in london for developers are usually under 500 day for non-finance, and anywhere between 500-700 for finance, and maybe 700-800 if you have some quant dev work in finance. You can get higher rates outside dev, for example Project Mgr is around 700 day, and Programme Mgr around 900 day.

Occasionally, there are much higher rates (1k-2k) for very short urgent roles, but not that common.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Hey, I wrote the article, really appreciate the discussion.

Just want to reiterate that until this point, the market has been healthy and I'm expecting it to recover. The tone of the discussion here is a bit doom and gloom. I still think its got at least 2 more healthy years before it becomes how PHP is now.

<comment><USER24> Louis or anyone else can you share your thoughts about PHP contract market in London please? I'm perm PHP developer thinking to start contracting. Is that market so bad?</comment></comment>


Stop fighting Node.js in the enterprise - <AUTHOR> http://wintellect.com/blogs/dbanister/stop-fighting-node.js-in-the-enterprise

<comment><USER2> JavaScript isn't a fad. Node.js is.

<comment><USER3> I don't see Node as a fad. We're still early in the enterprise adoption of JavaScript on the server which means it may quickly develop real competition. Similar to how jQuery effectively beat out Prototype, MooTools, etc. Node could potentially lose out to another JavaScript server, but I don't see any competition coming. Microsoft is a major contributor to Node. Node uses Google's V8 which doesn't preclude Google from getting involved, but why would they? If you're arguing that running JavaScript on the server in general is a fad, then you're missing the parity, resource reuse, community, hiring capability, and run anywhere arguments from the original post.</comment></comment>


Growing Sales with Smarter Systems - <AUTHOR> http://blog.voltagecrm.com/growing-sales-with-smarter-systems/ A new partnership between humans and machines will open opportunities for people to focus on uniquely human strengths. Higher level "sense-making" skills will be increasingly valued as we leverage data to create unique insights critical to decision making. The CRM system is evolving beyond the database. We envision the future of sales software as being a truly "Smart Application" that will tie together all the tools of the trade and automate the non-value adding processes.<p>This state of true sales automation will create the next generation of super-human salespeople by enabling them to outthink and outwork their competition while doing less work. <comment><AUTHOR> This article is meant to highlight the goal of brining together the multiple different systems a sales team must use to in order to streamline their job and allow them to focus on the skills that are uniquely human.

</comment><comment><USER2> Collin email me at ckluis {at google's email} for tips on how to revamp your blog for conversions.

<comment><USER3> Great offer!</comment></comment>


A story about Upwork and freelancers - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/MattFnWallace/status/1060659941491363841 <comment><USER2> While the communication should have been clearer, this may not be a matter of Upwork wanting to upsell the client, but rather Upwork being under legal pressure from the IRS or state employment-protection agency (eg: California EDD) to classify workers as "W-2" employees rather than "1099" contractors – no matter what the workers or employers prefer as being in their own best interests.

The government bureaucracies prefer this, and have at different times and in different jurisdictions cracked down on whatever other sorts of work-matching arrangements startups have attempted to use, for themselves or as a clearinghouse for others.

The likely threshold for the "compliance issue" could have been that Wallace (the tweetstorm author) had few or no other clients, and was billing this single client full-time hours over a significant period. That full-time exclusivity is a major factor in the tax/regulatory authorities wanting someone to be classified as a salary- or wage-employee.

Now, the very reason that the ultimate client prefers to use Upwork, rather than contract directly, is the headache of complying with these rules. They figure: we might screw up the 1099s, or cross some fuzzy compliance barrier, and then be hit with an enforcement action, if we try to handle our own freelancers. But if we use Upwork, well, they're the experts in ensuring "compliance", and have such a large roster of capable freelancers that neither we nor they would be at risk of appearing to be in an exclusive employment relationship.

Thus: the ultimate villains here are the tax/employment-regulation authorities. They've made the sort of arrangement that both Wallace and the client prefer incur extra legal risks. Upwork has just been clumsy in communicating that, and helping those on its platform navigate the rules.

<comment><USER3> I wouldn't be so quick to call the tax/employment-regulation authorities villainous. The reason these regulations exist is to prevent employers from treating people who "should be" employees as contractors where they get fewer benefits.

The regulatory environment isn't set up to handle a situation where an employee would rather be a contractor, because that's relatively rare.

Ideally there would be some way to take the worker's preference into account, but things just aren't set up that way and so the assumption is that contractors need to be protected from employers who want to screw them.

In any individual case an employer could probably document an employee preference for a certain classification and be fine. But UpWork and state employment regulatory bodies are built for handling scale, so processes will tend towards working for the most common situations.

<comment><USER4> Making it possible for the worker to document their "preference" would defeat the entire purpose of these regulations. Companies would simply fire anyone who doesn't have a contractor preference

<comment><USER5> So instead we're ram-roding everyone into the wage-slavery model. With health insurance linked to your employer, it's no wonder people are afraid to leave their cubicles.

I think "big evil corporations" like this setup just fine.

<comment><USER6> > So instead we're ram-roding everyone into the wage-slavery model.

Companies like upwork do absolutely nothing to solve that problem. In fact, they make it even worse by not even considering the idea of offering any healthcare service to any if their "contractors".

<comment><USER5> That's so naive that it makes me angry.

Companies like upwork provide a place for independents to find clients. I spent the last 10 years earning most of of my income from consulting. The hard problem is not getting health insurance (you can buy it, it's just expensive and paid with after-tax dollars). _THE_ hard part about being a consultant is finding people to pay you.

These marketplaces might not be perfect, but they're a step in the right direction. I want exactly one thing from them - the ability to find work and get paid.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is this Upwork trying to avoid falling afoul of tax legislation similar to IR35 in the UK? As far as I understand, it tries to crack down on people like OP who (in the view of the tax authorities) are essentially employees at a company but do the work freelance so both they and the company benefit from various tax perks.

[https://www.contractorcalculator.co.uk/what_is_ir35.aspx](https://www.contractorcalculator.co.uk/what_is_ir35.aspx)

<comment><USER8> Yes, my feeling it was something along these lines. From what I read on Twitter the hiring company would only use him through UpWork, which is fine for one offs and so on, but it sounds like they used him a lot, to the point where there was a question mark over the legal situation - that's why there are umbrella companies.

I would possibly blame the hiring company more than UpWork, but there's no doubt UpWork's communication could have been better. Most of my freelancing has been done through umbrella companies in the past, but increasingly it seems a better option to use Ltd. company in the UK due to employer those massive NI contribs.

<comment><USER9> Ltd companies are expected to also pay NI contributions if IR35-caught, though?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> With the raise of all these "platform" companies - basically some inbetween that solves some QA and paperwork issues, we see that (i) there are "natural" monopolies/monopsonies developing (e.g. people don't look further than Amazon marketplace, companies giving out all their work via upwork, people watching only Youtube videos) and then (ii) that these platform companies start behaving in abusive and/or arbitrarily damaging ways.

Does anyone else think that this should be an issue for targeted regulation? No one would accept a company taking over the road network and then randomly trashing people's cars for incomprehensible reason, yet people seem to be dreamy-eyed and naive about these new inbetween platform companies and seem to think that the market will solve itself. (Which is - as may be known - not the case with monopolies)

<comment><USER11> I'm always happy when someone brings up regulation in the context of IT. I'm a big proponent. Everything from closed-source to monopolies and ads. I find it weird that it's not talked about more often. I wonder why that is. In some ways it's a relic of the American free-market capitalism, but that can only be part of the picture.

<comment><USER11> If someone disagrees or thinks this is an inappropriate comment, I'd prefer an argument, rather that a downvote. I don't think that what I said has any negative effect on the discussion.

<comment><USER12> You seem to have a very simplistic view of how voting works. Why would you assume downvoting is a feedback mechanism to signal negative posts only? People downvote for all sorts of reasons.

I for instance downvoted your comment, for supporting a blanket regulatory attitude across the IT spectrum. It's tantamount to proposing a single programming language across the whole stack. That portrays a very narrow view of the world. Not to mention it can lead to being counterproductive.

Do note, human communication is a complex endeavor. We employ all kinds signals and techniques for information exchange and a simple downvote in an online forum is a perfectly valid signal, albeit an ambiguous one.

<comment><USER11> > blanket regulatory attitude across the IT spectrum

That's jumping to conclusions. I didn't elaborate at all what kind of regulation I support or how granular. I now feel that my comment wasn't up to the standard, because it has a bad mix of off-topic and terse "snarkiness".

As to the usage of downvotes, of course you can use it however you like, just like you can dismiss anyone you like whenever. I'm referring to a common _regulation_ in communities, that a comment shouldn't be dismissed if you don't like it, but only if it has a negative effect on the discussion.

What do you hope to achieve by downvoting those you disagree with? Force their opinions to the bottom of the discussion stack? I.e. silence them? That's what you're effectively doing, and it's not conducive to a healthy community.

<comment><USER12> I rarely downvote those I disagree with. And when I do, my goal is to have them reconsider and question their position and not at all to silence them.

I fail to see how I jumped to conclusions. You clearly stated that vis-a-vis regulation:

> I'm a big proponent. Everything from closed-source to monopolies and ads.

If this is not an extreme pro-regulation attitude then I don't know what is.

And just to be clear, comments are clearly superior to downvotes, though we'd hardly get any work done had we written replies to all comments we disagree with; thus, occasionally replying via downvotes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Rule #1 when working with/on a platform: Transform customers to your own platform. Do it in a way that does not violate the AUP of the platform but do everything you can to "own" the customer contact. Never become dependent of a single platform that temporarily may work in your interest.

This rule is somewhat universal and matches all business types and platforms: Amazon, eBay, AirBnB, Uber, YouTube, App Stores.

<comment><USER14> Unsurprisingly, Upwork expressly forbids this. "Keep contact with potential clients inside Upwork [... or risk account termination]".

[https://support.upwork.com/hc/en- us/articles/211067618-Freel...](https://support.upwork.com/hc/en- us/articles/211067618-Freelancer-Violations-and-Account-Holds)

I'd say once a good match between a contractor and a client has been established, both parties should swiftly move away from the Upwork platform, their rent-seeking "rules" be damned!

<comment><USER15> > Keep contact with _potential_ clients inside Upwork.

You can email, Skype, phone once on a contract.

<comment><USER16> True, but of course Upwork cant help you if a problem then arrises.

Not saying one shouldn't do it, but as Upwork is so flooded with shady characters I'd be hesitant to move clients off the platform too quickly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Twitter has such a crappy interface. Takes like 3 seconds to show anything at all, then half of the time it throws an error and asks me to try again, and when it works there's an unclosable banner asking me to join twitter.

<comment><USER18> Here's an alternative UI for this conversation [https://treeverse.app/view/FFBtBwxG](https://treeverse.app/view/FFBtBwxG)

(disclosure: Treeverse is a free-time project of mine)

<comment><USER19> This is really cool! One thing: Firefox content blocking somehow prevents avatars from loading - I get empty boxes.

<comment><USER18> Weird, desktop or mobile? They load for me in Firefox on MacOS (it's actually my main browser, despite Treeverse being a Chrome extension for now)

<comment><USER19> Desktop. I know why now. I had "Browser Privacy" > "Content Blocking" > "All Detected Trackers" set to "Always", the default is "Only in private windows". And because FF uses Disconnect.me list it means all embedded social networking load gets cut off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Upwork is partially automated. They probably use market position to manipulate users. I had some bad experience and no communication also. When you register account, Upwork "moderates" your profile and "decides" if you can start to work with clients. They have some kind of automated moderation with percentage pass value. It's not working great. If you aren't using in your resume a lot of words that they think are marketable you will be banned as not being eligible for working with Upwork. They will send you e-mail with misguiding information that you aren't good fit for them in nice words and that you can reapply in the future. Reality is that some bad data processing took place. For many people reading such type of e-mail that they send can be offending (if not depressing in cases when they didn't get what happened). In my case I just added some more keywords and tags because I was almost sure what happened and resubmitted profile. After a couple of hours my account was Up and Working ;) No sorry or any other information from them - not a nice way of starting bussiness with a client.

</comment><comment><USER21> I have seen a similar thing by Upwork happen. The problem also is that by accepting the first freelance job you agreed to a two year exclusivity contract on the platform, so not accepting their new terms of payroll means you cannot work with them anymore.

You might be able to work around it though by creating a new incorporation of changing juristiction, but that's a bit complicated. It's also not clear if Upwork's contract is legal or enforceable.

<comment><USER22> > by accepting the first freelance job you agreed to a two year exclusivity > contract on the platform

I think that is only If you want to work for the same client again [Maybe has being changed in the last years?]. After a few jobs some clients will try to circumnavigate the platform. In any case I wouldn't be very surprised if some of this clients were disclosed as upwork employees in the future pushing their own agendas.

After spending some time in the platform you can see lots of strange patterns repeating here and there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Unrolled: [https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1060659941491363841.html](https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1060659941491363841.html)

</comment><comment><USER24> Why are people still using Upwork? How many of these horror stories do we need to come across before people learn to ditch Upwork for good? Here was another horror story that I read sometime back: [https://hackernoon.com/why-you- should-never-use-upwork-ever-...](https://hackernoon.com/why-you-should-never- use-upwork-ever-5c62848bdf46) It has been two years since then!

Heck, everyone ditched Digg in a matter of weeks due to a UI redesign. How on the same earth are people still using Upwork despite issues that are for more serious where people's livelihoods are affected?

<comment><USER25> Some people don't have any alternatives to upwork. Even though the platform is shit it still puts food on the table. I still have an upwork profile but most of my business is word of mouth. The reason I keep it is because due to how I phrased my profile, once in a blue moon I get a good lead.

<comment><USER26> Freelancer here. I understand what you're trying to say. But this is simply not true. Freelancing existed before Upwork and will exist after.

<comment><USER27> If you've got a lot of experience and connections, finding freelance work on your own is easy. The thing that feeds sites like upwork is people with less of that, people that will work for pennies, often from third world countries. For me, a few years ago I was in school and wanted some income from programming. I managed to get some work on a site that has since been bought by upwork, worked for $10-15 an hour. If not for that site I'd have never gotten that work, and be much worse off now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> So, why didn't the company contract him directly in the first place? We want you to work for us but do so via a third party? Sounds fishy.

<comment><USER25> Obviously because they value his work so much.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> The amount of colossal horror stories I've heard about that company has made sure I don't go near it with a 9 foot pole. Their platform is designed to obscure process in lieu of exploiting workers - all whilst advocating to "serve the client". Utterly toxic.

</comment><comment><USER30> Adding back the middlemen beats the whole point of freelancing, which is to be on your own. I understand that sometimes the clients are using the "freelancers" platform(s). But if you trade independence for a little bit of convenience, don't be surprised to find you are being used.

<comment><USER31> It's not about a little bit of convenience. It's about being able to pay rent. You have to go where the business is.

The majority of the freelance jobs out there are on Upwork and cannot or will not afford benefits or competitive US rates.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Sounds reasonable to me.

The company can't employ him for full-time work as a freelancer, due to regulations that protect workers rights. Whilst that might be a problem: it's like one person doesn't like it and millions need it to protect their livelihood.

Upwork wouldn't inform him because it's nothing to do with him, he's a freelancer not an employee (the reason for the whole issue). If he were an employee obviously payroll (who Upworks represent in this case) would have to give notice etc..

So, in part he's complaining about not getting the protections that a full- timer does - notification of change of work, conditions, hours and such - whilst simultaneously arguing that he should be released from those same protections.

I mean who wants holiday pay, sick pay, employer pension contributions, job security, etc. ...

<comment><USER31> That company isn't going to hire him full time. It will cost a lot more. What this does is just take his biggest client away from him. They will just find another relatively inexpensive contractor.

So if these 'protections' are going to work out then they need to account for the financial situation of the employers some how and also prevent them from dropping misclassified employees when they become properly classified.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Reading between the lines a bit, it seems:

1\. Wallace was on Upwork to freelance.

2\. Wallace was working for one client so much that he was at risk of becoming an employment relationship, rather than a freelancing one.

3\. At no point was Wallace prevented from freelancing on Upwork; Upwork (as far as is known) presented all valid opportunities _to freelance_ to Wallace.

4\. Upwork communicated to the client that if they wanted to keep working with Wallace, they'd need to hire him.

5\. The client refused to hire Wallace, and tried to find ways to circumvent labour laws.

That seems to me to be a plausible interpretation of the facts from the twitter thread. In which case, the client seems to be the villain here, Upwork has done everything right, and Wallace seems to be a bit confused.

In particular: "The marketing company, as confused as I was, pressed @Upwork further. @Upwork would NOT tell them, refused to tell them what those supposed compliance issues were. [...] So for the marketing company to continue assigning me work, they have to enroll in @Upwork's 'payroll service' to do it."

This doesn't add up to me. Either Upwork is refusing to tell the client why they can't hire Wallace as a freelancer, __OR __they 're telling the client they need to hire him as an employee. They can't really both be true! I don't know who's lying/confused here (maybe the client's HR dept is lying to Wallace's contact at the client, maybe the client is lying to Wallace, maybe Wallace is just confused), but it seems pretty clear that Upwork _is_ angling for the "payroll service" upsell, and was telling the client very clearly that they need to hire Wallace. (That's not the story they told Wallace, but it doesn't seem like they really had Wallace's best interests at heart here, as they had a wide number of options available to them to fix this.)

And: "So @Upwork is insisting the marketing company make me an employee"

Yeah, pretty sure that's a legal requirement there buddy. And yes, I understand that both you and the client would like to circumvent it, but that's the point of labour laws; they only apply in cases where people wanted to do something they ban. Minimum wage laws have no impact on the engineer making $120k a year; they impact (for good or ill) the immigrant willing to work for $5/hour. Laws requiring firms to treat people working full time workers as employees were passed explicitly to cover the people who are happy to work full time as contractors.

<comment><USER34> Upwork wouldnt have visibility into any other customers he may or may not have had, so it doesn't seem like their call to make.

In Aus we have something sort of similar for contractors called personal services income. The rules are somewhat complex but it roughly boils down to the 80/20 rule - if you derive more than 80% of your income from a single customer, you have to treat that income as if you were an employee. Note that the burden here is on the contractor and enforcement is via the tax authority - as opposed to this case where the employer seems to be on the hook

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> This looks to be a typical problem with staffing body shops, especially those that bench their consultants without pay while having them wait for next gig. IRS and labor agencies look down on that sort of thing. There are similar more vague shops too MBOPartners (Randstad) and others, that have similar issues. Since they control all billing and contracts, they are basically this shady body shop that really needs to have its ass examined thoroughly and periodically by government.

Advice to consultants - avoid these places and sign your own contracts direct with customers, and invoice your customers yourself.

</comment><comment><USER36> PSA: The Supreme Court of California recently published a key decision on independent contractor versus employee classification, adopting an "ABC" test akin to the one adopted in Massachusetts.

[http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/archive/S222732.PDF](http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/archive/S222732.PDF)

> [A] worker is properly considered an independent contractor to whom a wage > order does not apply only if the hiring entity establishes: (A) that the > worker is free from the control and direction of the hirer in connection > with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the > performance of such work and in fact; (B) that the worker performs work that > is outside the usual course of the hiring entity's business; and (C) that > the worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, > occupation, or business of the same nature as the work performed for the > hiring entity.

</comment><comment><USER37> It's a bit in response to a change in California laws. California has always more strictly enforced employment regulations, especially with regards to contractor classifications.

[https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2018/09/04/cal...](https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2018/09/04/california- s-new-contractor-test-will-impact-the.html)

</comment><comment><USER38> In my country is illegal to have someone as a freelance doing the same as a full time job. So I see the point of upwork. If that company is your only client and you are working full time with them, they should hire you (at least in my country). In my country you have more rights if you are full time employee than if you are a freelance, as for example a monthly pay after they fire you to help you to find another job

<comment><USER39> Yup this seems to basically be co-employment risk mitigation. I have seen situations where there is a hard limit on how long we can hire a contractor for a task through an agency. I have also seen limitations in what we can specify, measure, reward and what we cannot.

The issue is basically that for contractors, you generally pay no benefits or retirement plans. However, if they are effectively employees, you do need to pay them that (ref. Uber driver cases where they are suing for classification as employees)

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> So Upwork actually recognized that this company is completely screwing him and he is mad at Upwork. Great.

If the company is hiring him for so many jobs that he is basically a full time employee there they are the arseholes not Upwork. That marketing firm get their shit together, hire him and pay him the money (and the extras) he deserves.

</comment><comment><USER41> This is fucked up but not because of a Government regulation which has good intentions and not because of Upwork who is trying to reduce its client's co- employment risk. All freelancers come across this situation over time and all are amazed but it is very reasonable.

The labor laws in place are to safeguard companies from using employees in a fulltime manner but treating them as freelancers so they dont pay the 10% employer tax, or sick leave or vacation or minimum wage or overtime. Once you start hitting over 30 hrs/week, and for more than 3 months workign for the same company- you are hitting the red warning flags that either the IRS is going to start asking questions about why they're not getting the employer tax, if th freelancer claims unemployment they are going to look for the last employer. and the freelancer might himself decide to sue the client claiming he was misclassifed as a contractor.

In this case all he has to do is enroll in the payroll service, pay a little more in taxes and reduce the co-employment risk to his client in exchange for more regular work. If not diversify your client base.

<comment><USER42> 1099 paid freelancers pay self-employment taxes, including the equivalent of all the social taxes. Why does government care? (there are no sick leave or vacation minimums in the USA)

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> Not to get off topic but if this guy owned his own agency he would have / should have been well aware of IRS' regs. That said, his agency went under. Not so sound nasty, but perhaps common sense and detail are not his strong suit?

<comment><USER44> Sure maybe. I guess my takeaway, is that a growing percentage of the workforce are locked into platforms for income - and how they are treated by those platforms can have a massive personal financial impact.

Back in my freelancing days, I made a conscious effort to own the whole conversation - not to use a platform - but to do my own marketing.

As an aside, I've found it interesting to watch youtube videos made by Uber, Ubereats, Deliveroo delivery people - by scooter chargers and how they all discuss how to make more money - or to complain about changes in policies having a financial impact on them.

<comment><USER43> IDK, those platforms are not agencies. They are a dating service meets escrow. They not in the relationship business. If the hiring company __and__ the freelancer don't know the law - and clearly both of themt should - is that Upwork's job? To give legal advice? Sounds more like Legal.com to me.

Upwork saw an obvious red flag and covered it's arse. I think they could have done a bit better, but the Twitter rant is foolish, at best.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> What's the best alternative to upwork at the moment? I almost put a job on there but they spammed the crap of me and the process was way to much for what we needed done.

<comment><USER46> mondo.com is recommended in the Twitter thread

<comment><USER47> Mondo is just a typical body shop. I did a very short contract through them once which was a nightmare. They took forever to pay and nobody seemed to understand the payment schedule so getting an answer as to when I was going to get paid was a constant punt of responsibility around the company.

Sure it's just one experience, but they are crossed off in my book. I still get their recruiters emailing me on occasion (often more than one of them for the same position which is its own kind of mess), but I set the domain to just go right in the trash

<comment><USER48> Hilariously I've gotten phishing and malware from Mondo domain because their recruiters keep clicking on malware, compromising their accounts, etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Is it true that we would never be able to do away with such middle-men like uber, airbnb, google search and instead use some sort of non profit alternate of these?

<comment><USER50> I imagine it is only a matter of time before we have alternatives to things such as Uber or Airbnb which arr driven by open source and cooperatively owned infrastructure.

It'll be so frustrating to watch the current leaders in these industries, the companies who are actively fighting for ways to get around regulation, as they suddenly begin to fight _for_ regulation to keep cooperative or community owned infrastructures out of the competition pool.

<comment><USER31> I have been saying stuff like this for a few years.

I think it is obvious that P2P distributed platforms will be leveraged to replace the monopoly company platforms. Things like cryptocurrency payments, Ethereum smart contracts, IPFS, Swarm framework, dat, WebRTC, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> I looked into stuff lole Upwork and Fiverr.

I'm not into projects that are under 3 months, so I didn't use these platforms.

But there are enough alternatives (CodementorX, Toptal, Uplink)

</comment><comment><USER52> Related: this is what I love about Twitter — people posting and getting support and the ability to shame publicly companies who are being jerks. Albeit I'm hearing only one side it seems that they're trying to force companies who want to use stellar upworkers by putting them behind their own payroll paywall. How lame.

</comment><comment><USER53> This was a systematic attempt by all three parties to defraud the Inland Revenue, Upwork is generally pretty sleazy but they blinked first this time.

</comment><comment><USER25> I put a job up to code me a web app for $200 and nobody replied. What a shit platform.

<comment><USER54> Try explaining that you're an "idea guy" looking for a programmer to implement your great ideas, and that you'll compensate them in equity when you make it big, because your ideas are worth so much more than anyone's execution.

<comment><USER25> Nice. Sell them on a vision. Of course, why didn't I think of that!</comment></comment></comment>


Disqus: Scoble, Winer and Fred Wilson Like it, Why I Don't - <AUTHOR> http://blogbusinesssummit.com/2007/12/disqus-scoble-winer-and-fred-wilson-like-it-why-i-dont.htm

<comment><USER2> As long as I can download and/or sync my comments elsewhere _and_ have the ability to completely remove my comments from their site, I'm happy.

For me the huge plus is receiving blog comments via email. Currently they are not sending the MessageID in the Reference field so messages aren't showing up as threaded, but they are aware of this. IMO blog comments should be handled like mailing lists/news groups.

</comment><comment><USER3> Personally, I don't really care where the comments show up on Google searches.

What I _do_ care about is the fact that it took about 30 seconds to sign up and add the Javascript snippet to my site's footer template. It couldn't have been easier.

Removing as many hurdles as possible is key.

<comment><USER4> Problem is Google penalizes pages with duplicate content by lowering their PageRank. If comments are duplicated on your blog as well as on discus.com, your blog could pay a price.

<comment><USER3> But they aren't duplicated, since the comments show up in a JavaScript generated iframe (although I admit that's not ideal)

The Googlebot doesn't execute JavaScript, or count iframe'd pages as part of the original page.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think this is a problem they are working on and will solve in time. And it's one I'm willing to put up with since in return I get kick-ass threaded comments that I can read and reply to via email.

</comment><comment><USER6> after having trouble integrating Disqus with sansj, I started using <http://js-kit.com/comments/?wow> and they claim that search engines index the comments on your site.

<comment><USER7> Sorry for the trouble - would love to hear about it though: email@example.com

Btw, search engines access j-kit's comments by indexing the RSS feed. You could probably fiddle with a DNS CNAME to have the RSS appear as if from "your domain."

This is far from a solution.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I emailed Daniel about this. One feature I'd really like to see is a way to "reuse" the user accounts I have on my own site. I don't want to tell users, oh if you want to comment you have to sign up for a new account over here..

I haven't given it enough thought to know if that is possible though :-(

<comment><USER3> If both Disqus and your site used OpenID you would get that for free :)

Unfortunately it appears that neither does :(

Anyone developing a new website should take the little extra time to support OpenID authentication, it would make the world a better place.

However, one nice thing about Disqus (like OpenID) is that you only have to register with Disqus once, and any blog using Disqus can use that one account.

<comment><USER7> We like OpenID and you'll see it show up soon.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Ruh-roh, Shaggy. Someone figured out that embedded iframes on your webpage doesn't make it your webpage anymore.

<comment><USER10> _"... Jason showed Disqus to me a few weeks back, and I seriously considered using it -- until I figured out that you don't own your comments anymore. ..."_

A quick check of the faq, blog and api disproves this. You do own your comments and better still you can extract them via xml.

\- <http://disqus.com/faq/#faq-7>

\- <http://disqus.com/developers/#api-methods>

\- [http://blog.disqus.net/2007/11/05/export-comments-to-xml- com...](http://blog.disqus.net/2007/11/05/export-comments-to-xml-community- forum/)

So you own your comments, can get access to the data. The only real data disqus can claim ownership is the right to infer from your data. It's this distinction that makes me think using the disqus service is valuable because they give you the ability to take your data away.

<comment><USER9> I've interpreted his concern as two folds:

1) He's worried that the comments no longer are in his control, ie, on his server.

2) He's worried that because the comments no longer being his server, can not be cached by Google. He wants that Google juice, but when the comments now reside on the disqus.com domain, it's harder to connect the two.

The second one is a biggie. For the power users, they won't like this at all. The blogspot/wordpress.com folks wouldn't care, but the ones that make it their business to blog professionally would.

<comment><USER10> _"... He's worried that because the comments no longer being his server, can not be cached by Google. He wants that Google juice, but when the comments now reside on the disqus.com domain, it's harder to connect the two. ..."_

Then suck the comments up via xml or at the api (at some time in future TM) and redisplay your documents. Of course the other alternative is to host your own comments and deal with the associated problems. I guess the pro's should earn their money and deal with the comments with their own tech, time & resources.

For the rest of the world there is always alternatives and this service is looking good because of the _"Freedom to Leave"_. Meaning you can stay because you are free to leave at any time. [0] So if you are a developer _"Lock-in is the new Lock-out"_. The ability to get your data out is a feature of lots of successful services that attracted early adopters.

[0] SImon Phipps, Zen of Free, OSCON 2006, [http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/advocacy/events/tech...](http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/advocacy/events/techdays/paris/Zen_Of_Free.pdf)

<comment><USER9> That seems so circular and stupid.

Hi guys: here's my page. Comment on it, it resides on a separate server.

Hi guys: every week I'm going to update all my pages with an XML file to update the comments that reside on a separate server.

Like I said, the power users will not want to cede as much control or deal with so much bullshit. They want the comments on their server reflected through Google crawl. So Disqus is left with a choice if they choose to pursue the power users, sell it as a plugin and give them the code, or get bought out by WordPress or Moveable Type.

<comment><USER10> _"... the power users will not want to cede as much control or deal with so much bullshit ..."_

Power users can code :)

 _"... So Disqus is left with a choice if they choose to pursue the power users ..."_

Is this the market they are in? I'm not sure but Dave Winer sure handles Disqus ~ [http://www.scripting.com/stories/2007/11/29/specificallyAbou...](http://www.scripting.com/stories/2007/11/29/specificallyAboutPodcastin.html)

Scripting News is about as power user as you can get. I'm not sure what the Disqus target market is but I don't think it's the power-users that will have the problems as you suggest.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Even if this guy had a point to make, he sure as hell did not make it with that example. That example seems to indicate that Jason's site isn't even indexed by Google, so of course it doesn't show up.

<comment><USER3> The point is the _comments_ aren't indexed as part of your site _because_ they are displayed in an iframe from Disqus's servers. They show up as belonging to Disqus, not you.

<comment><USER7> Comments are not displayed in an iframe.

Search engines do not index included JavaScript properly.

<comment><USER3> Err, yeah I guess just the new comment box is in the iframe, but obviously most web crawlers aren't going to execute the JavaScript that displays existing comments.

It sounds like your API addresses this, but as someone mentioned, what about the problem of Google penalizing sites with content showing up in multiple places?

<comment><USER7> Yeah, it's definitely a problem. It'll need SEO work on our end and that's what we're doing.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Proposed amendment to expand Patriot Act with warrantless access to web activity - <AUTHOR> https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/congress-plans-to-expand-patriot-act-with-doj-access-to-your-web-browsing-and-search-activity-without-a-warrant/ <comment><USER2> Proposed bills rarely go anywhere, so we mostly treat them as off topic on HN ([https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...](https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20bills&sort=byDate&type=comment)).

Is there something about this case that warrants special treatment? The article seems to be from an advocacy source, which is fine, but means it has an incentive to make this sound more likely than it is. The title is an example—"Congress to" is much stronger than "amendment introduced". (Edit: submitted title was "Congress to expand Patriot Act access to browsing/search history without warrant". I've changed it.)

Edit: after reading the article, I can see that this is more than an ordinary bill proposal. But I still can't tell if it clears the bar to be on HN's front page. See [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23172319](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23172319) below.

Edit: after all this, another article ended up taking the story to the front page: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23172870](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23172870). That was probably the best outcome.

<comment><AUTHOR> Just curious dang, how would you have edited the title to satisfy HN requirements?

Here's the original:

Congress plans to expand Patriot Act with DOJ access to your web browsing and search activity without a warrant

Here's mine:

Congress to expand Patriot Act access to browsing/search history without warrant

Seeing how you would edit this title would help me write better titles in the future. I just didn't know how else to edit this given the character limitation.

<comment><USER3> "Congress" as a body has done no such thing. Some members of Congress have introduced a bill. Congress is a bicameral legislature whose members debate and vote on a variety of proposed bills, many of which are at cross purposes to each other. None of these actions are the actions of Congress as a whole until the bill passes.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's fair, how would you concisely convey that in an HN article title?

Edit: my only point is that it's incredibly difficult to post articles on HN without title modification criticism. I don't disagree with your semantic point, but how do you post that article within the HN character limit while simultaneously conveying your point?

<comment><USER3> "Bill introduced to..."

Which really gets back to dang's point, which is basically, "so what?". Bills get introduced all the time and most of them don't go anywhere.

<comment><AUTHOR> > "Bill introduced to"

That's great, but how do you fit that into the original title? I encourage you to try it as an exercise, that title was incredibly hard to fit within HN's requirements. Your suggestion adds over a dozen characters over "Congress". Seriously, it's not easy to edit these titles sometimes.

> "so what?"

Well, if a bill isn't worth discussing until after it becomes law, then how do bills like SOPA or any other recent and unpopular bills get stopped? If you don't talk about it beforehand, how is discussing the bill after passage more effective?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> One of the more insightful passages in the unabomber manifesto (worth reading, especially for technologists) details how technology-driven encroachments on our freedom are inevitable because to stop this people must be continually motivated to avoid a bad thing happening to them, which will never be as powerful as how others are motivated to achieve a good thing happening to them. Privacy advocacy at this point is nearly 100% defensive; it really is exhausting to keep up with the various was in which it is being eroded, let alone participate in actually stopping this erosion from taking place.

<comment><USER5> "It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt."

– John Philpot Curran: Speech upon the Right of Election for Lord Mayor of Dublin, 1790.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Philpot_Curran](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Philpot_Curran)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> So 10 Democrats joined with the GOP to vote against the amendment from Wyden & Daines that would have prohibited the FBI warrantless surveillance of web browser history: Carper, Casey, Feinstein, Hassan, Jones, Kaine, Manchin, Shaheen, Warner and Whitehorse.

</comment><comment><USER7> The Senate is attempting to pass this. What are the chances that it'll pass the House?

This seems unlikely to be successfully blocked in the Senate (though it's still worth trying; different arguments might work with different senators, talk to yours). But it would help to rapidly talk to representatives to ensure that they vote "no" on the overall act.

Of course, the whole thing should be a "no" with or without this amendment; the Patriot Act should just die unrenewed. But if you can't convince your representative to vote no no matter what, try to convince them to vote no specifically if this amendment or anything like it is in the bill.

<comment><USER8> > the Patriot Act should just die unrenewed.

I'm confused as to why it doesn't. It seems like there is largely bipartisan opposition to it among the public, why is it still receiving support from both parties in congress?

<comment><USER7> This seems like as good a time as any to ask your congressperson if they're voting no, and if not, why not. (And report the answers so others can see them.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Seems like it didn't pass?

<comment><USER10> It's really hard to tell (this is very confusing: [https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/13/politics/senate-vote-fisa- aut...](https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/13/politics/senate-vote-fisa- authorities/index.html)) but it looks like the _amendment_ by a pro-privacy senator (Wyden, D-OR) failed, not the overall authorization of the Patriot Act, so the concern on behalf of privacy is still valid

<comment><USER11> Thanks, that is a good succint summary of what has happened.

The USA FREEDOM Reauthorization Act is the bill that would renew the Patriot Act and (anti-privacy) Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell added an amendment that would allow warrantless access to internet history. (pro- privacy) Senator Wyden tried to add another amendment requiring a warrant but that was defeated a few hours ago by 1 vote.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> james-mcelwain The legislation to block this was defeated by a single vote -- notably, Bernie Sanders was absent and could have voted to defeat this.

<comment><USER12> VP breaks a tie.

<comment> james-mcelwain Not a tie, 60 votes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Wish there was an insightful comment to make here about hope for the future but I just cant think of one

<comment><USER14> Just make a reference to 1984 or Brave New World, or copy-paste that Ben Franklin quote about trading liberty for security, that's what's usually done.</comment></comment>


How the Border Patrol Threatens Civil Liberties Far from the Border - <AUTHOR> https://www.texasobserver.org/checkpoint-nation/?src=longreads <comment><USER2> I always wonder why the FBI and state police agencies aren't up in arms over this. The CPB is conducting it's operations on their turf.

<comment><USER3> They don't have authority over immigration issues, and CBP will refer domestic crimes to the relevant police agency. Everyone's turf is respected except the citizens.</comment></comment>


Qi, arc competitor?  Qi is lisp for 21st century. - <AUTHOR> http://www.lambdassociates.org/ <comment><USER2> From Qi's designer, Mark Tarver

"Why I am Not a Professor OR The Decline and Fall of the British University"

<http://www.lambdassociates.org/blog/decline.htm>

<comment><USER3> A good read! Tarver writes extremely well. And while it echos the voices of what sounds clearly like a cynic, it's pretty convincing and concerning. Sad thing is those concerned few are usually those who don't play by the rules and you end up with little might. But what the hell, someone's gotta fight.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It sounds to be wasting a lot of time proving things about programming, when the spirit of Lisp is usually much more test-driven and not proving things. The stated goal is so that you can go about your normal business, but PROVABLY! I'd say this is much more in the spirit of ML than the spirit of Lisp.

</comment><comment><USER5> I don't like the case-sensitive symbols. Nor do I like the implicit quote on symbols...it doesn't make much sense to me but that might because there aren't many good code samples on the site.

Is it too much to ask for a nice looking website with lots of good code samples? And a reference link for all the functions that work in the language would be nice.

As much as some people dislike newLISP, it at least has a good clear/concise website: <http://newlisp.org/> The purpose is clearly stated, and right away you know on what it can run and where to look for comparisons to other Lisps.

Not much of a competitor to Arc in my opinion. But pg, please show us some more Arc code :P

<comment><USER6> I'm no lisper but it seems to me that the implicit quote and the resulting need to use square brackets to delineate lists would make it more difficult to write macros.

<comment><USER5> It depends on how he's defined the implicit quote syntax. You could make it so it doesn't have any effect in a def-macro call or something but that increases complexity just a tiny bit for a feature that doesn't do much for the developer.

Off-topic-ish: The square brackets are kind of neat but not for that purpose. If instead he allowed the interchange of square brackets and parenthesis, i.e. (+ 2 [ _3 2]), that would be neat and useful...it would allow someone to differentiate between nested lists slightly. And of course, it's easier to click [ instead of Shift+[ to get ( :p

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Any competitor is a good thing. It will either cause Arc to move faster, or just be better than it. The pattern matching simplifications seem quite slick.

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree, ML style pattern matching seems so elegant. My favorite pattern matching system is actually Mathematica. I wish more programming languages had 'em :)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This comment was started as a thread here:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=20012>

</comment><comment><USER8> Tcl/Tk? For the 21st century?

Ummm.. okay.

<comment><USER9> Tcl and Tk are very nice systems, which were done in by bad marketing and leadership.

See this article:

<http://antirez.com/articoli/tclmisunderstood.html>

<comment><USER5> It also looks _ugly_ by default.

<comment><USER9> Yes, "bad marketing". It's been possible for years to significantly improve the look and feel at the scripting level, but they never bothered. Also, the fact that it took them so long to figure out that Gnome and KDE were where Unix was headed and get with the times is not a good sign that they have the marketing skills necessary to stay current.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> They go on about type checking. The point of dynamically typed languages is that they're dynamically typed.</comment>


Ask HN: Maybe they don't want my help..... - <AUTHOR>

At what point do you just throw in the towel and say to yourself "this industry just doesn't want to be helped" just to watch later as your predictions become true?
(By the way, your not Steve Jobs.  You don't have his ability to convince anyone of anything.)
As a big example of this, let's say you have this cool way to distribute stuff like music/media/periodicals several years ago.  You figured out this great way of distributing media and a good way to make money off it to an industry you see will need this.  To make a long story short, after spending several years on this, everyone in the industry laughed at you and your idea of helping them make more money is in trouble because nobody there wants to buy your product or services because they see no need.
At what point do you throw in the towel and stop trying to be "nice" while help them as well as you become more successful?
At what point do you become the "big evil bad guy" creating that new technology that instead of helping them create a bigger, cooler, bigger business that instead starts destroying their core and they start sending lawyers and politicians after you? <comment><USER2> If your product can revolutionize a market and the existing players in the market have rejected it, then by all means you should try to create a new market even if it destroys the existing market.

Life is about evolutions, and just because someone does not see the next step in the process does not mean that you are being "big evil bad guy" by doing it without them. Even if it destroys them in the process. Take for example the RIAA, they rejected all kind of early solutions to the fact that their model was changing. Rather they adopted a wait and see and then rely on legal challenges to stall the market strategy. As such they spent far more money and lost far more power, than they would have had, had they chosen to participate in better ways to conduct business.

Does this mean that companies like Napster and Apple where evil in bringing their products to market, no it just means a business man saw a better way. It like the quote about the customer wanting a better buggy when the automobile was invented. Some times people either through not wanting change or other factors don't see the advantage of a better way. But that does not mean that the automobile companies where some how evil for killing the stage coach business. It just means a business man saw a market and others did not, to their peril.</comment>


How did/do entrepreneurs measure their productivity? Did they write down goals? - <AUTHOR>

Sometimes when I go to bed I kind of feel like I'm judging myself harshly on whether I did enough, or not enough. I once read that you shouldn't measure "being busy" with "being productive", and it seems like I'm living in panic-mode most of my time thinking about whether what I'm doing is productive.
So here is what I'm looking for....
I'm looking for techniques that past-entrepreneurs have used to track their success? Basically I want to know, what did they write down? How big were their goals for the day/week/month? How did they know if it was big or not big enough?
Also, did they have any advice on their time? In other words, did they spend 18 hours straight each day on business, if they took a break (say 1 hour each day) to watch tv/play video games, or even eating dinner with their families, how did they get over the "gee, am I being productive by doing THIS right now?" mentality? <comment><USER2> Completely fill your schedule and have a to-do list for when you have some spare time. As long as you have stuff to do and those things are the right thing, trust that you have done enough.</comment>


Ask HN: Developing/selling Wordpress plugins - <AUTHOR>

I'm thinking about getting into Wordpress development: specifically to develop a plugin (not themes, per se, since I'm more of a backend dev) that I could sell online. Anyone have experience in the Wordpress development arena? Pointers? Gotchas to avoid? Things to consider? <comment><USER2> First thing that comes in mind for me: how do you make sure no one publishes your code (since its plain PHP) on the web?</comment>