Ask HN: Please help with an AB test. (Live results in comments.) - <AUTHOR> http://theplanis.com/app/mst

<comment><AUTHOR> My last day at my full time job was Tuesday, now I'm working on my own projects. It's a lot of fun so far (except for testing in Internet Explorer - this works in 8, haven't tried 7 yet).

I wanted to get something up quickly to test my tool chain/environments and I thought that running a simple experiment was a great way to do that. I'm AB testing two versions of requesting e-mail addresses from visitors and I'm happy to share the results with HN.

I'll post a more detailed (anonymous) breakdown later on but you can see the initial results here: <http://theplanis.com/app/abtestresults/>

<comment><USER2> just as important are users who DIDNT respond :) are you collecting that information?

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point, yes I am - It's not going into the live results but I'll put that data up too at an appropriate point.

(For the interested the short link points to a tiny Django web app that's doing both the tracking and handling AJAX e-mail uploads. Everything else is client side JavaScript.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> a/b testing is a great tool, but wouldn't telling people they are participating in an a/b test trying to determine a specific question 'requesting e-mail addresses from visitors' bias the results?

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm logging referrers so I can see how much of an effect that has - if it turns out to be significant I'll segment the results.

<comment><USER3> interesting..i await the results

<comment><AUTHOR> After 20 hours:

310 unique visits / 22 addresses captured (7%)

50% of traffic from news.yc - and generally didn't leave an email address at all.

Users from other sources were 10 times more likely to leave an addresses if shown the pop up on page load.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Managing Developer & SysAdmin Documents and Notes - <AUTHOR>

I have been using evernote and confluence to manage all my code snippets and notes. What are other alternatives? I like that evernote can work offline but I really like the syntax highlighting and ease of use of confluence. <comment><USER2> Hi, I normally handle my code snippets in a private git repository and my personal notes as well. Company related stuff goes straight into the business wiki or other company tools. I know git isn't for everyone but it works for me.

<comment><AUTHOR> Storing documents in git a code repo can be difficult. Isn't that just storing documents in plaintext? I haven't really used git so I'm not sure...

I've been using confluence as a wiki and it works ok. My biggest issue with it is that it cannot be access it offline - like evernote.

I guess what I'm looking for is an offline wiki that has good syntax highlighting.</comment></comment>


Deterministic Browser - <AUTHOR> https://arxiv.org/abs/1708.06774 <comment><USER2> I've been thinking about something similar: a deterministic bijection between the render-side CSSOM and the Javascript-accessible CSSOM. Page layout would happen twice: once with fingerprintable metrics for the renderer; and then once with deterministic metrics for the sake of metrics-juggling Javascript. On the Javascript side, you'd be handling "translucent number-like objects": things that act like numbers (you can do math to them and then pass them back into CSS APIs and the result will be correct), but where any conversion to regular integers or strings or anything else that could eventually exfiltrate will result in the deterministic (incorrect) version of the number instead.

So, for example, a Javascript word-wrap algorithm would still work; as would a Javascript scroll-bar implementation (because they're both taking opaque metric-objects, doing math to them without casting, and then passing them back to the CSSOM.) But any analytics Javascript that wanted to know anything about the browser would just get standard stats out.

The "deterministic output of casting metrics objects" is actually only necessary for legacy support, though. If you're willing to break things that cast/transmit .clientRect()s around, then you don't need the deterministic mirror-CSSOM; you just need an opaque Metric type you can do math to, with no option to cast it to anything else.

</comment><comment><USER3> There are other clock sources than the javascript builtin though. Could ask an external server.

Could intentionally create race condition and check who wins.</comment>


Illegal Memes? Weak Safe Harbor? Unpacking the Proposed EU Copyright Overhaul - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/06/illegal-memes-weak-safe-harbor-unpacking-the-proposed-eu-copyright-overhaul/ <comment><USER2> With this and GDPR the EU is seemingly begging to be cordoned off from the broader internet.

<comment><USER3> Gdpr is actually a good thing. It's at least weird that USA-based companies must follow it, but the law itself is very good thing for a customer and not that bad for companies until they like collecting data and doing dirty stuff with it.

<comment><USER2> I would have preferred promulgating a set of standards to be GDPR compliant, and allowing companies the option to choose whether to conform. Individuals in turn could choose whether to use GPDR compliant services or not. Rather than hitting all companies globally over the head with a hammer. Eventually this strategy of legislative aggression is going to blow up in the EU's face.

<comment><USER4> That's the argument for why health codes should be optional, that customers can choose whether or nor to eat in dirty restaurants and the market will settle the issue. Nope. I don't want to play that game. I want everyone to obey a mandatory set of minimum rules.

It's about information imbalance. Without mandatory minimums it is too easy for businesses to hide faults from consumers. I don't want websites to use business judgment when deciding whether to protect consumer privacy. I want them to fear massive retaliatory fines should they not do the bare minimum necessary to protect the public from harm.

<comment><USER5> "I want them to fear massive retaliatory fines " is exactly why America/Asia is currently dominating Europe in technology. No start up and innovation can happen in such an outwardly hostile business environment

<comment><USER6> No startup or innovation should happen at the cost of harming the userbase.

<comment><USER7> You can take the good with the bad or have neither in some idealistic world where only one exists. You can even limit the bad (oftentimes limiting the good as well), but you shouldn't say in absolute terms that innovation with some bad should never occur even if there is significant good.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have yet to see an informed discussion about this law anywhere. The "copyright" (if there were such a thing) reform is about regulating two things

\- display of StackOverflow, Wikipedia, news, and other (commercial) info content full-text in link previews of search machines and news aggregators and discussion boards

\- requirement for file sharing platforms to make an effort to check user uploads for "copyright" infringements.

I understand the latter is to fill a gap where file sharing platforms just shrug-away accusations of large scale copyright infringement by their users, yet receive all the economic benefit. Obviously, scanning upload content for infringement isn't technically feasible without also requiring publishers to somehow register content/hashes to claim commercial rights, and mechanisms in place for resolving disputes, etc. The law text as it is written seems also too broadly applicable. Because of these flaws, the content filtering part should maybe be unbundled into a separate law after further discussion.

I also believe the Web can come up with technical superior, more practical solutions. For example, using HTML metadata to tag content, embedding and linking content from an origin site, and/or exposing snippets as public syndication feeds. In fact, these mechanisms have been in place for such a long time that they might've been forgotten already.

I don't have a definite opinion yet. I guess if one accepts the EU is mainly an institution concerned with common _economic_ market conditions, it should strive to make the Web work better for content creators than it is now with very few ad networks raking in cash. OTOH, link preview and content scanning laws are obviously lobbied for by big media (the former by German newspapers as it seems, the latter supposedly by Hollywood and music publishers).

<comment><USER9> > Obviously, scanning upload content for infringement isn't technically > feasible without also requiring publishers to somehow register > content/hashes to claim commercial rights, and mechanisms in place for > resolving disputes, etc.

It isn't feasible at all. It's already common to upload encrypted zip files and distribute the passphrase with the link, as a method of privacy protection against the hosting provider. But that obviously also defeats any kind of hashing or fingerprinting system and would be employed universally by pirates as soon as any such thing was mandated. It's just a garbage law that imposes costs and yields no benefits.

</comment></comment><comment> gm-conspiracy Anybody building a colo facility in Antigua?

old: [https://www.wired.co.uk/article/antigua-legitimate- piracy](https://www.wired.co.uk/article/antigua-legitimate-piracy)

</comment><comment><USER10> Anybody else catch this delicious tidbit?

> Unpublished research carried out on behalf of the European Commission at a > cost of $400,000 suggests that unauthorized uploads are not a pressing > problem: "In general, the results do not show robust statistical evidence of > displacement of sales by online copyright infringements."

Unpublished, eh? Sounds like a whistleblower in the bureaucracy is trying to torpedo this turd. Pretty weak attempt though. Next, leak some memos or emails showing government apparatchiks plotting against citizen dissenters who've used clever memes against them and then we've got a bombshell story! ;)

<comment><USER11> Not a whistleblower, a member of the European Parliament with FOIA requests: [https://juliareda.eu/2017/09/secret-copyright- infringement-s...](https://juliareda.eu/2017/09/secret-copyright-infringement- study/)

<comment><USER10> Laudable citizen action!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> "By using this site, you agree to hold it's owners, management and developers harmless for any materials which users uploaded and did not have appropriate license to upload." Along with the Cookie, and GDPR notices.

In order to "scan" and report, you have to agree to said TOS.</comment>


Replacing The 2nd Amendment For Modern Times - <AUTHOR> http://www.iseff.com/post/52361848304/a-rant-replacing-the-2nd-amendment-for-modern-times

<comment><USER2> I argued something very similar in my blog post here [http://www.battle- school.co.uk/Blog/2013/01/14/the-second-am...](http://www.battle- school.co.uk/Blog/2013/01/14/the-second-amendment-in-the-21st-century/) That was following the suicide of Aaron Swartz, which is also the last time I saw the front page of Hacker News swamped with almost identical stories.</comment>


Facebook already has a Muslim registry–and it should be deleted - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/12/facebook-should-delete-the-muslim-registry-it-already-has/ <comment><USER2> And the NSA has slurped it all up - they won't delete it.</comment>


Ask HN: What hardware do you use to run your load balancer ? - <AUTHOR>

This is a follow-on to my post last month about what load-balancing software people use (see http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=180311)<p>I'm now considering what hardware to push this software onto :-)<p>- What hardware are you using to run Nginx / HAProxy / Pound on ?<p>- Are there any tips around how much memory / processor / disk you've gone for that you'd be happy to share ? <comment><USER2> Nginx/HAProxy/Pound probably don't care about disk access if they are balancing.

<http://haproxy.1wt.eu/news.html> shows that he got nearly 10Gbps on "cheap" hardware (excluding the donated NICs)

</comment><comment><USER2> I run Nginx/HAProxy/PostgresQL/Memcache/Mongrels/Solr all on a single box $200 box from serverbeach (2 cores, 3GB ram)

The site averaged 581,661 dynamic requests per day over the last 21 days, and my biggest problem with the server performance has been the rails production log analyzer. The parser hits something and spins.

(I rotate my logs hourly, and this hasn't been a huge issue so I've dealt with it by watching for log analyzing processes that take too long and kill them)

Sorry it isn't that exciting hardware wise. If traffic continues to go up, I'll be needed to expand to multiple boxes, of which softlayer a nice variety and I look forward to reading more about what I should be using here.

Probably stupid stats with the single box setup: every request hits nginx, and it uses on average 3 minutes of time per day (as report reported by ps), haproxy is forwarded every dynamic request and has 4 minutes of cpu time. I've not had to do much instrumentation of hparoxy/nginx since they are the lightest weight piece of my stack.</comment>


Ask HN: What to build into a better Social Network? - <AUTHOR>

Facebook will soon be a decade old and frankly, its starting to feel bloated and behind the times. I think I can do better.
Besides the fact that many people are already on FB, what would you be happy to see in a new social network?
I would like to go back to the basics. What's your opinion on more Privacy, more User Control and NO Apps & Games? <comment><USER2> Honestly, that so many people are on Facebook does little for me. (I mean, do users mind being the first to sign up for a new service? Don't many (an increasing number?) dig that?) But everyone I once knew from highschool wanted to add me on Facebook... And then we continued to not stay in touch with each other. It's not about social networks, but people instead go for the metagame of "friend accumulation" so they can pretend that they're Ashton Kutcher or something. Weird.

And actually, I closed my Facebook a while back. Well, I put up an image saying I was no longer responding there, but friends can contact me through other means listed in my profile. Close enough.

What do I want in a social network? Functionality that isn't about something trying to become the medium. That's what MySpace was and Facebook is, services trying to supplant the rest of the Internet. Messages, posts, walls, galleries, info, etc.? I have email, a blog, Twitter, IM, Flickr, a calendar, and a phone number for calling/texting people I talk to most often. I'm easily contactable for friends, as they are to me.

So all the problems that Facebook "solves"? Not really problems for me. And increasingly as more people use computers every day (yes, there are many who still don't,) those things won't be problems for everyone else either. These networks exist to help shoehorn those who aren't digitally literate (or those willing to sacrifice ability for ease) into the present. I honestly do think the need for this, will eventually start shrinking until it hits a base where people who are just uninterested in the Internet will be the only ones using them. Ironic, eh?

You want me to sign up for another social network? Offer some unique functionality I didn't realize I was missing, or build your network around something niche that I can't say "no" to. (Actually this reminds me of the "What would you do if you owned MySpace?" post from about a month ago: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2499250> )

<comment><AUTHOR> These are parallel to my thoughts: All fine and dandy but what's the point? I don't want to copy FB's business model. I'm looking for a new mission.

FB keeps adding features we didn't know we were missing. If what I build is better, it means going beyond functionality to build something that redefines what the Social Network is.

I don't just want you to sign up for some feature you'll detest in a year. Maybe the question I should be asking is "What do You Wish the Social Network Could Do for You"?

<comment><USER2> Ah man. I wrote a long-ass reply, but I lost it when trying to post. I'll try to quickly hammer out a readable version.

"What do I want a social network to do for me?" The only reason I ever actively used Facebook was to look up info on my friends. So, I suppose I want a passive "black book" more than anything. A universal contact list.

Let users enter their data for defined fields (personal email, professional email, personal phone, pro phone, address, IMs, popular sites) and then them also define their own fields for inclusion (in case I want to let people know a particular forum or new service I spend time on. It's a good way to see what your users use.)

Then display it in a very minimalist way. Ever used Passpack? It lists my services, and has a grid of icons. So, list my contacts, and their info. When they don't have that info, leave the grid blank or grayed out. When they do, offer a clickable link for the site/service. (A link to IM them on that service, or to their profile on a site.)

Also let me add labels to each service, and to my contacts. For example, my personal email would have "friends", "online friends", and "family" labels, allowing each person I assigned those labels to see my personal email.

And bonus points if people sign up with their email addresses or phone numbers, rather than a site-specific username. It's silly for people to have to jockey for those on another service, relegating themselves to bigThunder1452 or the likes.

Asking users for the passwords (but not storing them) to confirm they own the accounts they list is nice, too. If a user hasn't logged in within the past month, ask them to confirm their data upon login.

With a minimalist design of a banner at the top, a list of recent contacts at login, and ways to list people by label, alpha, letter, or by account type, Throw an ad at the bottom or on a side.

I'm betting many business professionals would keep that tab open like I currently do with Gmail.

Hell, I've even thought of a name. Call it FriendInfo, and use FriendIn.fo, with, of course, purchasing friendinfo.com and friend.info as redirects.

<comment><AUTHOR> _I want a passive "black book" more than anything. A universal contact list._ Got it. I like your thoughts. You've got what you want down to a science.

The summary in three sentences: Build a passive _blackbook_ with universally accessible contacts which allows ease of use and encourages participation with a points system. Layer a minimalistic design on top and lock it down with a bit of password security.

So simple. Did I miss anything?

<comment><USER2> Aside from how much I obviously like to ramble? ;)

I wasn't thinking a point system, more like, "Once you connect to other people, it your job to keep your information up to date, and what information others have access to."

Maybe ask people when signing up, "To help you stay in contact, we'd like to send you a reminder to keep this information up to date! Please choose a time frame for a reminder:" and let them choose 3 or 6 months. At least, I don't think an email once every six months (saying "your friends have this contact information from you:" If this is not up to date, please log in an update your contact info!) is spamming.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> _I think I can do better._

If you think you can do better than Facebook, then you have no reason to be asking us for advice. Clearly, you've already got some incredibly powerful idea that will get you enough traction to the "chicken/egg" problem for you, and compete with a company that has a user base of 600 million and billions of dollars in the bank.

So, don't waste your time chatting here-- go out and build it! And then, come back and show us, ok?

<comment><AUTHOR> I really do. Doesn't phase me because FB is turning into the slow moving monster that its founders once feared.

What you said is what I needed to hear. Thanks. Just catching some advice before building it over the summer. I'll be back!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The real problem is that even facebook seems aol-esque from he onset. It was not technologically revolutionary. Its niche was the cachet conjured from the marketing strategy (harvard -> ivy league schools -> colleges in general -> students in general -> public). Given that facebook has reached critical mass, its hard to imagine a solution that is incrementally better than facebook that could achieve critical mass.

Yes there was myspace / whatever other social networking sites, but the problem there was that none of them reached critical mass.

The only way you could build a better social network is if you really re- thought the problem. Thinking about stuff like privacy controls and apps is taking a facebook-like perspective on the matter, and you won't get anywhere.

You need to think about how a 21st century platform would behave. Define your niche.

And unless you plan on setting up a 501c3, you need to think about how this could be monetized. Ads? Now it would really be slick if you could find a better way of executing ads -- somehow 5 ads per page doesn't really appeal to me

<comment><AUTHOR> True. Love the minimalism but the "aol-esque" feel is lacking. Truth is, being socially revolutionary, not technologically revolutionary is what made FB dominant.

So, I need to really rethink the social problem. Maybe I should be asking "What Social Problem Needs to Be Solved to Reach Critical Mass?".

And, thanks for the suggestion. Looks like my solution will involve better ad execution or none at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Been there done that. I spent over a year to create something that was supposed to be better than facebook. It took that long, because whenever I believed i had an idea that topped facebook- they went ahead and bought out another startup that offered the exact feature you were going to offer on your site. So you think of something new, and pretty soon, your site becomes as bloated as what facebook is now.

Like many posters, Facebook isn't "technologically revolutionary" - it simply went along with the flow and had the right people at the right time.

The reason why my social networking site failed was because users don't find another reason to jump ship from facebook to yours. All your close friends would definitely go and invite people, but there's a limit to how far people go to collect users for you before it's considered spam.

The top response I got was " Oh another social networking site?"

<comment><AUTHOR> I feel sorry for you. I know I'm going to do this because I don't play by the odds. Mark Zuckerburg certainly didn't.

Do your homework and a project like this really shouldn't have taken you a whole year. Sometimes you've got to just ship the thing and get feedback. After all, its for the people, not for you.

Why didn't you release it to a certain college instead of starting from your friends? Like Barbara Corcoran stated on Mixergy, "never go to your family and friends to practice..." You should know why.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> "Besides the fact that many people are already on FB" as pg might say: "that is the ONLY thing you should worry about. Don't spend time on ANYTHING else until you solve this."

<comment><AUTHOR> Ok, you've got my attention. I didn't think I could control the number of people on FB until I've built something people want more.

Are you saying I should start building now or are you really saying that I need to solve this "number of people on FB" problem first?

<comment><USER6> You need to focus all your efforts on figuring out a way to get people's friends on the system. Without that, all other features are futile. How are you going to get people's friends on there? You should not worry about anything else.

In other words: is privacy going to get my friends on there? If not, drop it. Is "no games" going to get my friends on there? Is more user control going to get my friends on there?

<comment><AUTHOR> Got it. First, I need to the network effect. Everything else is just icing on the cake.

What I do next from the domain to the scripting language to the release locations will be focused not only on getting results but on getting the right results. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _What's your opinion on more Privacy, more User Control and NO Apps & Games?_

Sounds extremely boring to me.

<comment><USER8> Sounds actually useful and not like a time sink designed to force feed ads to users.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for grasping the point. More Privacy, more User Control and NO Apps & Games would simply be one way to solve the usability issue.

Right now, social networks are like junk food for humans. You know what I mean. I would like to solve that flaw sooner rather than later.

<comment><USER9> How is that a flaw? They have SIX HUNDRED MILLION USERS.

People want junk food. That's why everyone is fat and dumb. They watch junk on TV, read junk online, say junk to people on facebook, and eat junk at home.

0.000001% of people care about privacy and control and less apps & games.

Allow me to categorize my friends into work, friends, family, public categories and you're on the right track. Come up with a novel way to communicate with each other.

<comment><AUTHOR> You really believe FB will rule the world with under 50% of the world's * _current_ internet users? I foresee millions of "new customers" with different expectations in the next decade. FaceBook wasn't first and I don't believe they'll be last.

Junk food? True but I'd rather be Starbucks than McDonalds. If I do this, we're doing it right. I'll be back with something you can see this summer.

You want a simple _organized directory_ that makes communication with your _entire network_ dead easy? Got it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I am starting a brand new social network with two other developers on board. I would love to connect, even if it's just to bounce ideas off each other.

Don't worry I won't steal your idea my company already has in motion what we want in a social network :)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's cool. I'm willing to serve up ideas since I'm passionate about solving the social problem. What's your strategy? Release to the masses?

How far are you into the process? Do you have a domain yet? Why don't we wait until I start coding the project this Summer. I'll have something built by then so we can compare notes and structure.

Sound like a plan! I've got your contact info; I'll be in touch.</comment></comment>


ProIP Act Signed Into Law - White House Gets Copyright Czar - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/proip_act_signed_into_law.php <comment><USER2> this will be just as successful as the drug czar. Won't solve anything, but in the meanwhile will screw up many people's lives

<comment><USER3> I can see it now: it's a trilogy. The war on Drugs, the War on Terror, and the War on Copyright Infringement.</comment></comment>


Interesting analysis on the commercial malware industry [PDF slides]  - <AUTHOR> http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/malware_biz.pdf

<comment><USER2> Thats amazing. Even as I read this, I cant help but mention

<http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/187085.pdf>

for anyone looking for a read.

</comment><comment><USER3> _Internet._

Serious business.

The slide about not running if programmer/hax0r tools are found is interesting: it's almost like you get a pass from this crap if you're a computer smartypants.

</comment><comment><USER4> Thanks for this, I'm impressed by how thorough these slides are. I remain fascinated by those operating outside of the conventional boundaries of society.</comment>


New map of the US based on how dollar bills move - <AUTHOR> http://www.fastcoexist.com/1681677/a-new-map-of-the-us-created-by-how-our-dollar-bills-move#1

<comment><USER2> This is incredibly similar to a map of the twelve Federal Reserve Districts - so similar, in fact, that at first I thought that's what they were displaying: <http://www.federalreserve.gov/otherfrb.htm>

Note in particular the split in Pennsylvania, which represents the Appalachian divide - a divide that is both geographical and economic in nature.

<comment><USER3> That isn't a coincidence. The federal reserve district banks distribute the notes to commercial banks in their districts, and, as worded on wikipedia: "A Federal Reserve Bank can retire notes that return from circulation by exchanging them for collateral that the bank posted for an earlier issue. Retired notes in good condition are held in the bank's vault for future issues."

He effectively came up with a way to reverse engineer the district boundaries.

<comment><USER4> So in other words, the movement of dollar bills is caused mainly by the federal reserve district banks redistributing them, and not by traveling individuals? That sure makes this map useless. I thought that dark line between New York and New England was fishy...

<comment><USER5> It's not completely useless. For instance, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia and NYC are grouped together with only a faint line on the border of districts 3 and 5 and no line of the border of districts 2 and 3, with much stronger lines separating DC and Baltimore from the rest of district 5 and NYC from the rest of district 2.

Also, note the strong separation between Virginia and West Virginia, which are part of the same district, but no separation between West Virginia and any part of district 4.

You can definitely see the effect of the Federal Reserve districts on the map, but there are clearly other important factors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Click. Click. Ad. Click. Ad. Click. Click. Ad. ugh.

<comment><USER7> Running ad block, was confused why every 3 slides there was just this generic black and grey wavy pattern.

tl;dr install ad block

<comment><USER8> Sometimes ads are useful. In this case you still have the blank pages except they're blank, instead of being filled with a potentially useful ad.

<comment><USER9> No, they're not.

If I wanted to buy something right now, I wouldn't be reading HN, I'd be browsing Amazon or whatever site sells what I needed to buy.

<comment><USER10> It does, however, help pay for the content you're consuming.

<comment><USER9> I already covered that in another post: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5459646>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The researcher's explanation of his research: <http://rocs.northwestern.edu/research/wgstory.html>

Edit: this link doesn't explain this specific set of maps, but it does explain a little about how he got the idea of using wheresgeorge.com and what it allowed him to do (as of ~2009).

</comment><comment><USER12> I do research with professor Brockmann at Northwestern University, not on human mobility, but investment networks.

If you want a quick overview of the idea behind this mapping of the US and the algorithms used, you should watch this video <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn32vavZqvg>

</comment><comment><USER13> It´s very strange that Memphis is over one of the boundaries. It's the only big named city over a border.

I looked in the map, because I don't know the zone. (I hope I readed the map correctly.)

Memphis is in south west corner of Tennessee state but the city continues informally but smoothly to the south in the Mississippi state. On the west side the city is the Mississippi river, and crossing the river is the Arkansas state. This area has much more green fields and few building zones.

So Memphis is not on the border, it is just right next to the east side of that border.

Map: [http://maps.google.com/maps?q=memphis&hl=en&ll=35.01...](http://maps.google.com/maps?q=memphis&hl=en&ll=35.019875,-90.078278&spn=0.537587,0.977783&hnear=Memphis,+Shelby,+Tennessee&t=h&z=10)

<comment><USER14> Aren't there technically two cities, called "East" and "West" Memphis respectively?

<comment><USER13> At least in the map, West Memphis is much smaller than East Memphis.

Population from Wikipedia:

(East) Memphis: 672,277 (2011)

West Memphis: 26,245 (2010)

Memphis metropolitan: 1,316,100 (2010) (includes both)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The red linkage graphs would be much more comprehensible with edge bundling[1]. As it is, you get a ton of red lines that are hard to decipher. In order to show emphasis, some of the lines are orange.

[1] Something akin to [https://www.evernote.com/shard/s9/res/11fab8e3-d623-4b58-a8d...](https://www.evernote.com/shard/s9/res/11fab8e3-d623-4b58-a8dd- aaf24ac83edd.pdf). I'm sure there are libraries out that that will do this for you, but the algorithm in that paper isn't too hard to implement. :)

<comment><USER16> Your link yields "Access denied."

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> >normally someone in the audience says, 'Oh, this makes perfect sense."

This is exactly what I was thinking when I saw Pennsylvania cut in half (actually, I said "well no shit"). Those of us on the eastern side of that line generally regard western PA as a whole different state.

</comment><comment><USER18> The northwest region reminded me of Cascadia/Cascadiopolis from Metatropolis.

[http://io9.com/5169857/metatropolis-is-the-best-kind-of- urba...](http://io9.com/5169857/metatropolis-is-the-best-kind-of-urban- renewal)

</comment><comment><USER19> It's fascinating; in the areas I am familiar with, you can see the Portland- Seattle corridor and the Deseret region.

Reminds me of the cultural maps of the US.

</comment><comment><USER20> This only tracks _paper_ currency, so it is an odd measure.

<comment><USER21> Paper currency generally travels on a person from place to place (as opposed to being mailed), egro the oddness is exactly what makes it a surprisingly good data source for this kind of work -- paper currency is a proxy for human movement.

<comment><USER22> Actually, assuming this is using only dollar bills, this is likely following the movement of _poor_ humans. Credit and debit and large bills are typically in the hands of the middle to upper class.

To me this is an excellent map of how "trapped" people are in the situations they are in. The motility of the poor is something that has been restricted for thousands of years, and something we're supposed to be improving.

I understand this likely resembles a map of how far people will travel from major economic centres, but having grown up in an area of extremely high unemployment in the UK and having moved to an area of extremely low unemployment, making the poor willing to move has recognizable economic benefits. I know in Canada, where I now live, EI (unemployment) will pay moving expenses for someone to move to a lower unemployment area.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> What's the deal with Pennsylvania being cut in half?

<comment><USER24> Pittsburgh is closer in proximity and culture to Ohio than it is to Philadelphia. The Appalachian Mountains bisect the state, and the areas outside the Pittsburgh and Philadelphia metro areas have low population density. This area is sometimes called "Pennsyltucky"

<comment><USER23> Oh man, I forgot about the mountains. Most of the other non-state-border boundaries seem to be rivers, but I forgot mountains!

<comment><USER25> The border also roughly follows the path of I-81.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Proof of Cascadia</comment>


Great Research Papers by Google - <AUTHOR> http://labs.google.com/papers.html#category1 <comment><USER2> A couple of my favorites:

Limits of Anti-Phishing: http://www.w3.org/2005/Security/usability- ws/presentations/37-google

How to Design a Good API: http://lcsd05.cs.tamu.edu/slides/keynote.pdf

<comment><AUTHOR> I am slightly biased since my favorites were the onces that were applied to social networks: 1) A social network caught in the Web. 2) Evaluating similarity measures: a large-scale study in the orkut social network.

I also loved this other research paper I read yesterday on collaborative intelligence, "Item-based Collaborative Filtering Recommendation Algorithms" available at http://www.paulperry.net/notes/cf.asp

\- Jawad Shuaib</comment></comment>


New SteamOS beta allows for dual-boot installation - <AUTHOR> http://www.polygon.com/2014/1/22/5336044/steamos-beta-dual-boot-installation

<comment><USER2> is it even up to an OS to "allow" for a dual boot installation?</comment>


Ask HN: How do I "make the switch" towards becoming a director or VP - <AUTHOR> I have been reasonably successful by some standards at a big tech company, but don't quite think I could ever become a Director or a VP, given the rate at which I am progressing --- it is linear with time, which is not sufficient; I would like to aspire better. I am wondering what kind of things I need to switch about myself and about how I do things. There is the people aspect, and then there is technical aspect. Any thoughts on both of these? Are people willing to share how they overcame similar challenges and "made the switch"? <comment><USER2> I don't think you "make the switch"

I think the best way to get promoted is to first be the employee that managers want to copy and paste to build a team if they could. That doesn't mean putting in hard long hours (it can include that) but it means: Be exceptional at your job, be on top of the details, developing processes that other employees start to copy, create content internally, being a go to resource for other teams.

The second big thing is that you have to make it known to your boss that you want a promotion to management.

When a promotion is available they have an incredible employee, respected by peers and others, that has been improving the overall team that wants to be a manager.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, by "making the switch" I was not referring to just suddenly become director material. It is basically how I can change how I learn. What you have mentioned is useful, thanks, and I am trying my best to do all of those, but how I improve is linear at best. I see others who grow better than linear, and would like to emulate them. Ultimately my goal is not to just strive towards a Director, but to become a solid performer who strategizes/works like one.

<comment><USER3> Something I noticed about how you phrased the question: you've focused on things you can control (the people and the tech), and not on the things you can't (the opportunity). You can't ignore the people and the tech, but...

Folks I know who've shot up in their career usually shot up because they capitalized on a big one-off opportunity. Their boss left and they were the obvious replacement. A brand-new startup was getting hot and needed an experienced leader with their credentials. They talked to the right person and pitched a project that ended up becoming a big hit.

These individual events are random, but _hunting for them and jumping on them is not_. Folks who shoot up usually have a background process that spends about 20-30% of their time seeking out information from the world around them, filtering it, and evaluating whether there could be any big opportunities there. The folks who _really_ shoot up (Larry Page, Mark Zuckerburg, Steve Jobs, Peter Thiel, etc.) seem to spend close to 100% of their time evaluating opportunities, and delegate the people/tech stuff to others. Larry Page used to say that the hardest thing about his job was to get people to focus not on what exists, but on what _should_ exist that doesn't yet.

You may want to start developing this background process. How much are you aware of what high-level execs in your company consider to be top priorities? Who are the most creative product & UX people in your org, and what are they working on? Are you keeping tabs on new startups in your field? When was the last time you applied for a new job? Have you had a chat with an executive recruiter any time recently?

<comment><USER4> This observation of these events being random but the search/alertness to them occurring as _not_ random is quite insightful, and beats repeating.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> My anecdotal observations about people I know and LinkedIn profiles I've seen are that the best way to do this is to stick around at one company for like 10 years and continue picking up increasingly more responsibility. Eventually you're a team lead and then eventually you're whatever the position above team lead is at the company.

C-suite is almost always an outside-hire, though.

</comment><comment><USER6> Don't wait for someone to label you a leader.

Learn and understand the behaviors of effective leaders and implement them in your own work and relationships. So many people operate within the expectations, or what they precieve as the limitations, of their position. Stepping up and leading is about taking personal responsibility for making those decisions yourself rather than being told what to do.

No one is going to tell you to lead or if they do you aren't really one. Much of this comes from within. Having said that, a good mentor is valuable.

Lastly and most importantly, work on communication and social skills. Communication is how you operate as a leader.

</comment><comment><USER3> A bunch of people I've worked with have done this - my old boss's boss made it to SVP of Search at Google, another boss's boss (inserted into the management chain below the former, actually) is now CPO of Slack, one of the other manager's I worked with is now CTO at DropBox, former coworkers are heads of product at Asana and IPFS, my current manager is up for director, and a college classmate has been a highly successful C-level exec that took a company from series-B to IPO.

Some common threads I've noticed:

1\. Don't piss people off. Figure out what people's hot buttons are and avoid them. The exec team at Google circa 2007-2013 was notoriously combative. Who got the CEO job? Sundar, who was a very quiet, unassuming executive who presided over a string of low-profile successes and had a knack for translating Larry's visions into terms that the rest of the exec team could agree with.

2\. Be consistent. Successfully delivering base hits, one after another, is often better than striking a home run and flubbing your next project.

3\. ...but go after the high priority projects, and realize that priorities change. People who stick to their areas of expertise usually end up getting pigeonholed as ICs or first-level managers. People who rise through the hierarchy usually need to reinvent themselves every 1-2 years.

4\. Take people with you. Folks that rise through the hierarchy usually have a core group of high performers around them that they're loyal to and who are loyal to them. Oftentimes these people are folks who don't want to bother with #3 but are very good at what they do, and then their manager provides them cover from the rest of the org so they can keep doing that.

5\. Be open to opportunities outside your current employer. Of the folks I listed before, only 2 of them have risen exclusively within Google (and one of those was a high-performer at Sun before then). Everybody else needed to switch jobs. I was talking to the CTO of one of the companies I was applying to recently, and he said that he interviewed at 20 companies and this was the only one that wanted him. Your job search gets a lot less liquid the higher you get - if you're looking for a CxO job, you need to go to the company that is looking for a CxO with your particular skillset, and that may require moving to a different geographic area or considering companies that you wouldn't otherwise want to work for.

Also make sure you really want to do this. All the people I know that have rocketed up to executive levels basically live for their work. A lot of them never bothered to have a family, or if they did have a family, they downshifted their career for a while and only started accelerating again once their kids were in school. Several founder/CEOs I know have broken families - either they're divorced, or they hate their spouse and are just roommates who stay together for the kids. Most of them have friends, but they don't have the type of tight, regular dependable friendships that my friends who are in dead- end jobs have. It's probably that reason why this isn't really a path I'm going for - I had a choice between being a decent father or a decent founder, and chose the former.

</comment><comment><USER7> Very unclear from your question, do you mean make the switch from IC, or technical track? Or do you mean from first line management? I think the former because that latter isn't "switching" into management, it's more of a promotion.

I'll answer the former question because you're posting on HN, so that's probably your meaning.

Tip #1: it isn't by merit.

Tip #2. your people skills are the most important thing. the only important thing. even in a technical director+ role. work on that.

Tip #3. get a role, somewhere, that will hone your people skills. most importantly, interacting with people that are not like yourself. run for city council. do some kind of organizing in the neighborhood. i was going to say church but those would be people like you, if you are so affiliated. join the national guard for weekend duty. remember, you don't just want some improvement here, you want rapid improvement. that calls for really applying yourself. i mean you could even start small -- get a job as an apple genius or at best buy. but be sure to graduate from that quickly.

Tip #4. talk to the managers around you. every day.

ok, now you've done all that. switch jobs to a smaller company. commit to this for 3 years. do not stay longer. after that, you must job hop every 2-3 years to get fast promotions. you have to be careful that your job hopping are more responsibility each time, otherwise it's a bad look. be _absolutely focused_ on getting to your next job, on day 1 of your new job. that means solving as many impactful problems as you can, starting in week 1 of a new job.

i hate to say it, but make sure you collect linked-in "friends" at a prodigious rate.

</comment><comment><USER8> People who become managers, directors and eventually VPs usually have one thing in common. They know how to get people to become better people. It's not about being the best at the specific job that they did before getting promoted...it's about how they encourage others to do their best.

Another possibility is moving to a startup...in a medium term businesses (think 10-20 years) the upper echelon is filled with people that were part of the start up phase.

</comment><comment><USER9> It depends on the industry you're in but in most cases, it's also heavily dependent on building relationships across the organization and understanding the impact of decisions being made. Engineering is just a slice of the company and leaders that can link the technical to the business and align on company goals will inevitably be seen as more valuable partner.

</comment><comment><USER10> First of all, let me put this out there: you don't want to be a manager. It's not fun and games. It's not a powerfest. It's a slog. It means more meetings, it means dealing with people's personalities and personal problems, it means less code, it means less clarity, it means more politics. It means constantly trying to compromise between business goals, tech goals, and personal goals. It means becoming responsible not just for the technical product, but the people, and not just their professional lives, but their personal happiness and health. You can't manage burnt out people.

It's a horrible job. You don't want it, and I don't recommend it. I am 1000% serious here. You should ask yourself why you want to be a Director or VP. Is it money? Is it power? Is it respect? Often you can get those things as a regular engineer and not have to deal with politics and people crap. You don't want to be a manager. Seriously.

Still here? Ok, then. With that in mind...

The first thing is I strongly believe that you don't get anything you don't ask for. If your boss is anything like me and my peers and my boss and my boss's boss and anyone else I've ever worked for, they'll take your silence as contentedness. They'll assume that because you aren't the squeaky wheel, you're doing fine.

There isn't a magic lightbulb that's going to appear and they'll say "gee, PrimordialSoup would be a fantastic Director. I'll just take them out of their current role and give them lots of responsibility!" It's actually the other way around! They'll say "PrimodialSoup is a solid engineer, and I'd like to keep them there as long as they want to be."

In other words, you have to ask for it. And I don't mean like "Can I be a director now, pretty please?"

I mean go to your boss at your next 1:1, and you say "Hey, I've been thinking about my career. Let's say in 3 years I want your job. How do I get there?" And then work with your boss to identify opportunities for growth and experience over the next several months/years.

If your boss isn't interested in helping you grow professionally, then you need to find a new boss, IMO.

The second piece of advice I have is to take on all the responsibility you can handle. If a problem comes up, volunteer to fix it. If someone's struggling, volunteer to help. Mentor as much as you can. Be visible and be vocal. That doesn't mean be a jerk and shove your opinions down peoples' throats, but the more that people can see you as a subject matter expert in your area and the more they can see you acting decisively, the more people will start to think of you as a leader. And part of being visible is being _everywhere_ as much as you can.

Keep in mind that you generally aren't promoted _into_ a role. Usually you are _doing_ the job and the promotion is simply a recognition of the _job you're already doing_.

If you don't have direct reports now, it's a little trickier. But you and your boss should be able to identify opportunities for you to stand out as a leader, to gain respect from other peers, and then after you've been leading a project for a long enough period of time, they can make it official, and the people that were unofficially working for you are now officially your direct reports.

But taking on additional responsibility means _nothing_ if your ambitions aren't clear to your manager. They need the context to be able to say, "PrimordialSoup just took on an extra project. They're really going the distance to prove that they can handle additional responsibility." If they don't know you want a promotion, then they'll just chalk it up to you being a go-getter.

So back to point #1: you need to be explicit with your boss. "I'm interested in career growth. What can we do to get me to the next level?" is a great way to start the conversation. Be clear about your expectations and timelines. Don't be unrealistic. Your manager can't promote you overnight. But they can grease the wheels and get the ball rolling, and if they're any good themselves, they'll be able to guide you and mentor you to your next steps.

And again, if they can't or won't do that, then your best bet is to find another mentor, and that usually means finding another job.

Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER11> One amusing but insightful suggestion I read recently is: use the opportunity of your boss becoming sick and taking extended leave to gain experience operating at the next level up while acting in your boss' role.

(This popped up in a discussion relating to the influence that luck has on people's success.)

</comment><comment><USER12> Is it common for those positions to be promoted from within or hired from other companies?

</comment><comment><USER13> I'm happiest as an individual contributor so this is not from personal experience, just observation.

Start doing the job you want to be in. Solve the problems that the director or VP are solving. And find a mentor.

<comment><USER14> PlatoHQ is great for finding mentors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Directors lead groups of people, VPs lead groups of directors etc... You need to find ways to lead others hopefully in a high visibility project. At any rate, lead some project and deliver.

</comment><comment><USER16> Get an MBA become a product owner / have success that pushes the company to another level would help.

</comment><comment><USER17> "reasonable successful" isn't going to get you promoted to VP. I'm a VP, and know many in my role. Seek out and take OWNERSHIP of the hardest most important projects for your company, completely NAIL the delivery of said projects, and you'll get promoted.

Once there, you'll wish you were an engineer again...

</comment><comment><USER18> Companies do not willing hire managers, especially executive level. There is always a reason. For instance, they were hired from a competitor and had information, could bring over employees, etc. Other times it is personal relationships. Notice I say relationship not friendship. Many companies are doing unethical or illegal things and are not going to hire someone they think is a boy scout narc into their ranks. Many are doing criminal businesses on the side. You think I am joking or exaggerating, but this is sadly the reality. It's nice to pretend stuff doesn't go on but it does. The good thing is that you can start your own business, be the boss, and run an ethical ship.</comment>


Apple Urging Music Labels to Stop Licensing Free Songs on Spotify and YouTube - <AUTHOR> http://www.macrumors.com/2015/05/04/apple-urging-music-labels-ditch-free-spotify/ <comment><USER2> Original link: [http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/4/8540935/apple-labels- spotif...](http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/4/8540935/apple-labels-spotify- streaming)</comment>


Show HN: Birtchex - A New Bitcoin Exchange - <AUTHOR> https://birtchex.com/

<comment><USER2> Is this a landing page only or will I actually get an invite?

Which database setup are you using?

Where are you hosting?

What is it costing you to get approved by FinCEN?

Did you write the trading engine from scratch?

You are not listed on Bitcoincharts.com.

Good luck, I'll check out the platform when I get an invite. Andreas from justcoin.com.

<comment><AUTHOR> While just a landing page, it is fully functional. You will most certainly get an invite when we launch :)

We're using Amazon AWS along with a stack of nginx, Python, and Go.

The largest expense with regulation is lawyers and CPA's, which vary widely based on who you use. We aren't skimping on the important parts though.

The trading engine is built from scratch, however it is modeled after the LMAX architecture[1] and takes a lot of inspiration from the same systems the NYSE and NASDAQ use. We're not trying to re-invent the wheel, just bring some high quality racing slicks to Bitcoin.

We are not listed as we are currently not taking any outside trades at the moment. Once we open up the platform we plan on being listed on as many sites as possible.

Appreciate the interest, hope I answered everything to your satisfaction!

edit: forgot the link!

[1] <http://martinfowler.com/articles/lmax.html>

<comment><USER2> Certainly. I'm looking forward to the invite! Do you have any API docs at this time?

<comment><AUTHOR> Not right now, but I can tell you that we plan on offering both a REST and a websocket API.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> OP and co-founder here, happy to answer any questions you have.

<comment><USER3> Are you planning on adding PayPal integration?

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately PayPal is currently not on our roadmap, due to the prevalence of chargebacks and hacked accounts.

We will offer direct bank account transfers and Dwolla, however, both of which can be just as easy as PayPal.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: k-redux-router (on route = one code) - <AUTHOR> https://goo.gl/oWqARA <comment><AUTHOR> Extract of the README.md

> The lib was created to simplify our routes usages. This is done by matching > an uniq code to a route (we never identify a route to its href).

This lib allows us, via bindings, to use path params and query params, and context informations on top of that. context informations are the data you are putting in route definitions, like "is this route public?"

So this lib aims to simplify the maintenance of your routes:

We use uniq route code to identify routes, meaning that if you change related href your code is not impacted We describe routes as nested components We allow to put context informations into routes definition context informations are copied from parent to children and can be overwritten, meaning that you can put a isPublic: false flag on a parent (and only on a parent), and all your children will have this isPublic: false set.</comment>


Apple Files Anti-Theft Device Patent Based on Movement and Accelerometer Data - <AUTHOR> http://hothardware.com/News/Apple-Files-AntiTheft-Device-Patent-Based-on-Movement-and-Accelerometer-Data/ <comment><USER2> So if you run from the mugger it goes off? I guess that might be useful too.</comment>


ESA ExoMars launch - <AUTHOR> http://livestream.com/ESA/exomars <comment><USER2> In case you missed the launch: [https://twitter.com/esa/status/709312126356201474](https://twitter.com/esa/status/709312126356201474)

</comment><comment><USER3> It seems to me that they launched that with a much higher TWR than normal...the rocket seems like it accelerated much faster than I'm used to seeing. Is that just the Russian way?

<comment><USER4> The Proton-M's initial thrust-to-weight ratio is about 1.5, which is somewhat high. Falcon 9 is about 1.2, and Delta IV Heavy is about 1.25, for comparison. And of course since the Earth subtracts a constant 1, that means the Proton-M's initial vertical acceleration is 2-2.5 times higher than those examples.

I'm not sure why it's different. Higher TWR is more efficient (to a point), but it also means there's potentially additional capacity to be had by carrying more fuel. Maybe it has something to do with Proton's origins as a gigantic ICBM, although that was a long time ago.

On a tangent, reading the Wikipedia entry for Proton-M, there have been 117 total launches and 11 failures. That's a mildly terrifying failure rate!

It occurred to me that with the Russians launching out of central Asia, there must be some chunk of land to the east of there with a ton of rockets falling on it, since even with a successful launch the first stages are just dropped. I couldn't find much info on that, but there are some really cool pictures here:

[http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/culture/articles/eav04...](http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/culture/articles/eav041902.shtml)

And some history here, but no rocket pictures:

[http://www.russianspaceweb.com/baikonur_downrange.html](http://www.russianspaceweb.com/baikonur_downrange.html)

<comment><USER3> Thank you...I had googled exomars twr and came up empty.

<comment><USER4> I don't think the payload matters much. Certainly its own weight is insignificant compared to the rocket as a whole. I'm not sure if they might load less fuel if the payload doesn't need full performance, but if so I think that would be a relatively small effect as well.

I didn't find actual TWRs listed even just for the launchers, but you can find the liftoff mass and thrust pretty easily, and just divide.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


How LaunchDarkly Serves Over 4B Feature Flags Daily - <AUTHOR> http://stackshare.io/launchdarkly/how-launchdarkly-serves-over-4-billion-feature-flags-daily <comment><USER2> _MongoDB -- as our core application data store. It 's popular to make fun of Mongo these days, but we've found it to be a great database technology as long as you don't store too many things in it. Anything you can count on your fingers and toes should be fine._

I suspect this is a joke, but I'm still confused? If 4B things happen every day, how is that finger-toe countable? Does this mean that relatively slowly- changing things like "customer name" are stored in mongo while events etc. are stored elsewhere?

<comment><USER3> I was being cheeky :)

Events are stored in DynamoDB. We use mongo for "core" data like accounts, feature flags, etc, but none of the high throughput stuff touches MongoDB.

<comment><USER4> > Events are stored in DynamoDB. We use mongo for "core" data like accounts, > feature flags, etc, but none of the high throughput stuff touches MongoDB.

Curious, why the choice of MongoDB for anything? In my mind "core" data tends to be very structured and require true transactional updates, both of which are cornerstones of a relational database ( _cough Postgres_ ). Sure it's possible to use MongoDB, but what was the driver for it?

<comment><USER3> We had a lot of operational experience with Mongo from our previous jobs at Atlassian, and started out storing almost everything in Mongo. As we scaled out, we migrated all of our high volume data into other stores-- analytics into DynamoDB, searchable data into ElasticSearch, etc.

The last remaining piece is our core data, and there's no strong push to move it out of Mongo.

<comment><USER5> So, just to clarify, you use DynamoDB and ElasticSearch as primary datastores for those types of data and don't replicate data from Mongo into them?

<comment><USER3> That's mostly right. We don't use ES as a primary datastore, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Are there any good resources for managing feature flags like this? I am currently using Netflix Archaius and it's working great, but I find it's easy to forget what values are set or what flags exist. Over time, it's easy to make a mistake and deploy something broken. I'm currently working on instituting a kanban policy to replace feature flags with static configurations ~1-2 months after their initial deployment where possible. But I'm thinking there's a better way to avoid this trap.

</comment><comment><USER7> It's a pretty question architecture that outsources feature flags to a third party. You're creating a critical path hard dependency and for most apps this is going to be hit multiple times on every request and is something you're going to want to run locally.

<comment><USER3> We've thought quite a bit about how to make this work as a service. The key to our architecture is that evaluating a feature flag for a user does not involve a remote call. We make that work by embedding a rule evaluation engine in our SDKs. When you request a flag, the user is compared against these rules (in memory) and served the appropriate variation.

We then use a streaming API to serve rule changes, so when you make a change to your dashboard, the new rules are streamed to all your backend servers within a few hundred milliseconds.

If you need even more resiliency, you can deploy a small service in your own infrastructure ([https://github.com/launchdarkly/ld- relay](https://github.com/launchdarkly/ld-relay)) that allows you to persist these flag configurations in Redis.

<comment><USER8> Your rules engine sounds interesting - definitely worth a closer look.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> My logs show frequent timeouts when looking up setting through their API. Their SDK default timeout is 3s. Wouldn't want to wait longer. Maybe not serving all 4B

</comment><comment><USER10> Is averaging 4.6k requests per second really that much?

<comment><USER3> I think it depends on the workload. Serving 4.6k static pages per second, cached on a CDN, is not too difficult. However, handling an analytics workload of 4.6K RPS is a little harder.

<comment><USER11> Albeit doable with Lambda and Cassandra. ;)

<comment><USER3> I mentioned this briefly in the article, but we thought about doing something with Lambda + API Gateway. But doing the math, 5k RPS pushed through API Gateway is about $1500 daily _just_ to authenticate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> that's almost 512mb of 0/1 bits a day!

(not serious, I suspect they're wrapped in a 5kb HTTP request)</comment>


Mozilla accuses Finfisher of using Firefox as a cover for surveillance software - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22372027 <comment><USER2> _In 2011 the BBC found documents in the state security building in Egypt, looted during the uprising, which suggested that the Hampshire-based firm had offered to supply Finfisher to the Egyptian government to monitor activists._

How does someone do this — sell surveillance software to totalitarian states so they can "monitor" dissidents and activists — and then sleep at night, or face their children in the morning?

<comment><USER3> Easy, they tell themselves that the software is used to monitor potential terrorists and criminals.

<comment><USER4> I doubt if even that fig leaf is necessary. They just sell.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I believe there was also a question as to whether it complied with the terms attached to the LGPL-licensed GNU Multiple Precision Arithmetic Library.

\-- <https://citizenlab.org/2013/04/for-their-eyes-only-2/>

<comment><USER6> Is that actually going to matter to a company like the Gamma Group, though? They have enough governmental cover that they can pretty much do what they want, it seems like.

I'm genuinely asking - how do you even begin to prosecute a violation by a company like that?

<comment><USER7> In theory, the British government has not been above the law for 800 years. If the government will give this company a free pass on trademark and copyright violations, then I guess those 800 years have come to an end.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I like how that say that it is " legitimate surveillance software". In my opinion, there is no such thing, regardless of its legality.</comment>