Beyond Meat: Fake Meat So Good It Will Freak You Out - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2012/07/beyond_meat_fake_chicken_that_tastes_so_real_it_will_freak_you_out_.html <comment><USER4> I love how every time something like this comes out they ask someone who hasn't had meat in 10 years if it's just like meat. Yeah, because they would know.

My biggest problem, though, is if I'm having ingredients that aren't meat, I'd like to have them be good. I've never had fake meat that I would call appetizing.

I've had lots of vegetarian dishes that were delightful, but not one included fake meat.

I am not vegetarian.

<comment><USER5> I think an inescapable problem is that it's hard to get past the framing. A product might actually be a very good food that easily stands up on its own merits. But if it's being carefully processed in a way that attempts to mimic all the cosmetic characteristics of chicken, being labeled as "chikkin", and being served lightly breaded with honey mustard on the side, then it's perpetually doomed to just be an imperfect imitation of chicken.

<comment><USER6> I'm an omnivore, and if this stuff was equivalently expensive, and sufficiently chicken-like, I'd buy it instead. Real Chicken isn't exactly some holy grail of food, it just tastes good.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Maybe it's orthogonal, but this article doesn't discuss at all the nutritional advantages and disadvantages of eating meat. It may taste like meat, but the nutritional profile is nothing like meat.

<comment><USER8> Also, I'm curious what the actual impact of it is. One of the main arguments against meat is that it takes a great deal more energy and work to create 1 pound of plant food than 1 pound of meat. From what I've seen, beyond meat uses some sort of manufacturing process to create it. How much energy does it take to ship all those materials and run that factory?

<comment><USER9> It's about 6 times more energy intensive to order chemicals from new jersey and stir them in a vat than it is to ship live cattle to a slaughter house and butcher them.

Essentially all the cost of feeding and cleaning the cattle is very low, and storage of raw meat after slaughter is very cheap.

Alternatively storing the raw products for fake chicken are incredibly complicated. Furthermore, once the product is produced there is a ton of regulation about its care and handling. What's perhaps most troubling is the risk to workers while producing the product. They require fairly risky industrial tools, and not every manufacturer is really dillagent about providing good guards for people's hands.

<comment><USER10> The raw products for fake chicken are mostly soybeans or chick peas, hot water, and a mineral coagulating agent. The biggest energy input is for boiling the water and growing the crops.

Cows require 50 times more protein from grain as input than they provide after being slaughtered (you can google this, it's research from Cornell). You are 180 degrees wrong on that point, the cost of feeding them is _very high_. Unless you can genetically engineer them to have more efficient metabolisms, this is a fundamental problem for beef.

I can't tell if you're serious about the last paragraph. Citations would be great, because it's hard to believe that real meat is less regulated than plant-protein based fake meat or that the risk to workers that make it is less than to those working in an industrial slaughterhouse.

I'm not even a vegetarian...

<comment><USER11> > Cows require 50 times more protein from grain as input than they provide > after being slaughtered (you can google this, it's research from Cornell).

I suspect that you're referring to the research summarized at [http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/aug97/livestock.hrs.htm...](http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/aug97/livestock.hrs.html) .

I'm not sure that it supports the conclusions that you (and its author) make. For example: (quoting)

"> For every kilogram of high-quality animal protein produced, livestock are fed nearly 6 kg of plant protein."

6 << 50\. And, a lot of that "plant protein" isn't available to people.

"More than 302 million hectares of land are devoted to producing feed for the U.S. livestock population -- about 272 million hectares in pasture and about 30 million hectares for cultivated feed grains."

Much pasture land is pasture because it isn't all that suitable for other purposes. Unless you eat grass/hay....

"THIRSTY PRODUCTION SYSTEMS. U.S. agriculture accounts for 87 percent of all the fresh water consumed each year. Livestock directly use only 1.3 percent of that water. But when the water required for forage and grain production is included, livestock's water usage rises dramatically. Every kilogram of beef produced takes 100,000 liters of water. [wheat and potatoes take much less]"

It appears that he's counting rain as "use". While technically true, that water can't be used elsewhere. (Grain land is rarely irrigated and pasture almost never is.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I think I read about this stuff in an earlier article and I'm still wondering: How does it actually chemically respond to heat, water, oil, etc etc. I mean, I suppose its alright if it just works like chicken in a single context (grilled maybe?), but it's not really a meat replacement unless you can rely on it to behave the same as meat for the purpose of recipes.

Don't take that as criticism of the product, I'm just curious what it's properties are and if you'd need to revamp your recipes if you wanted to use this stuff.

<comment><USER13> I've tried this at home. I made chicken noodle soup with it and it worked really well. I sauteed it in olive oil in a pan first, then added it to the broth later.

It withstood both form of cooking fairly well. It browned in the pan and absorbed some liquid in the broth, but it didn't break down.

However, I don't know if this stuff would be grillable. It's not a big chunk like a real chicken breast. It comes out of the package in small chunks. So it'd work great for some recipes but not for things like chicken piccata.

However, I highly recommend Gardein for recipes like those. It comes in the form just like chicken breasts, and works great for recipes that require a large flat piece.

<comment><USER12> Interesting. I wonder if any molecular gastronomist chefs have figured out what its parameters are.

Anyone wanna try ice cream with frozen chick-a-like chunks?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Ingredients in Chicken (that isn't factory farmed): Chicken

Ingredients in this: Water, Soy Protein Isolate, Pea Protein Isolate, Amaranth, Natural Vegan Chicken Flavor (Maltodextrin, Yeast Extract, Natural Flavoring), Soy Fiber, Carrot Fiber, Expeller-Pressed Canola Oil, Dipotassium Phosphate, Titanium Dioxide, White Vinegar

So, it's not _terrible_ but it's just more fake pseudo-meat. What's so hard about buying a soy protein (firm tofu, tempeh, etc.), and just cooking it with spices and herbs like you would a regular piece of meat? Fake food sucks.

<comment><USER15> Have you been to any Buddhist country (Vietnam,Thailand India,etc) and tried any of the faux-chicken/beef/pork/fish dish? It isn't as real as Beyond Meat probably (since it is not made by scientists but thousands of years of practicing vegetarian) but is quite delicious.

<comment><USER16> We went to a Chinese restaurant the other day that is known for having vegetarian versions of almost every regular American Chinese restaurant dish. They used some kind of fibrous fake meat for the General Tsaos chicken that was very convincing. Maybe seaweed based?

<comment><USER17> My guess is seitan.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat_gluten_(food)>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been a vegetarian for 4 years and stopped about a year ago. This sounds great, but it still consists of soy protein, which is not good for men due to estrogen.

<http://www.menshealth.com/nutrition/soys-negative-effects>

Not too reliable of a source, I know, but there's a bunch of reputable books that I've read back in the day on this subject that said the same thing.

<comment><USER19> Soy (unfermented) is a terrible idea.

<http://www.jacn.org/content/19/2/242.full>

"Results: Poor cognitive test performance, enlargement of ventricles and low brain weight were each significantly and independently associated with higher midlife tofu consumption."

"We hypothesize that regular dietary exposure to soy isoflavones over many years during middle life may be associated with the appearance of accelerated brain aging in later life attributable to chronically sub-optimal neural plasticity."

<comment><USER20> This study seems to be counteracted by millions of Asian people that are living well into their 80s, 90s, and 100s, and eat a diet that has quite a bit of unfermented (and fermented) soy in it.

<comment><USER21> Surely that depends on how much of that population falls on the "low" or "high" side of soy intake as measured by the study. I don't know how much of the Asian population falls into the intake levels this study claims might be negatively affected - do you?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The problem with these alternatives is they are highly processed, the exact opposite of a healthy meal of vegetables, lentils, nuts...

That said, the modern industrial slaughter of animals is an ongoing atrocity on an unbelievable scale, worst than anything humans ever did to each other (and can only be deemed acceptable if you vouch for biblical notions of human supremacism). If this helps any, all the best to them.

<comment><USER23> There is nothing inherently wrong with processed food. Processed foods could only be considered "bad" if you're actually replacing healthy foods with them.

For example, a can of coke isn't actually bad for me per se, it's just nutritionally useless, and it's taking up 100something calories out of my calorie budget for the day that could be used by something with a higher amount of micronutrients in it.

I don't think any vegetarian or vegan is going to throw out all their veggies and start eating nothing but meat alternatives as soon as a viable replacement comes out.

<comment><USER22> The excessive amount of sugar in your coke kills your liver and pancreas, it's hardly harmless.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sugar-t.htm...](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sugar-t.html?pagewanted=all)

<comment><USER23> Gary Taubes, of course. This article says nothing about "killing" your organs. It simply mentions excess consumption raises your insulin resistance, which will be the case with overconsumption of ANY carbohydrates.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The plan to have it sold at the meat counter is cute in terms of confidence, but suicidal if they want to market to vegetarians. Once you stop associating raw meat with food, it starts looking, well, gross and violent, and the smell is off-putting. Most vegetarians I've known, myself included, try to avoid that section of the grocery store entirely.

So while I applaud them trying to compete with meat directly and potentially sniping some carnivorous business, I hope they will also keep a few boxes for me in the hippie section.

<comment><USER21> I'd think that the market for "I can't believe it's not dead chicken" for vegetarians would be a tiny trickle compared to if they can sell it as "good conscience, and healthier too" to the section of us meat eaters who _also_ find the meat counter off putting.

<comment><USER24> It's a bold move, to be sure. Nobody has ever had a fake meat product they were confident enough in to market to meat eaters, and as an ethical vegetarian, I certainly hope it works.

<comment><USER21> As a meat eater who happily eats pretty much whatever animal part I'm offered, I hope they succeed too, because I'd love to see a market for meat substitutes that are good enough that I get more delicious meat-like products to choose from that eventually taste better than the real thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> As a voracious meat eater, I am actually intrigued by the idea of a healthier chicken meat that takes the environment into consideration. If it tastes like chicken, even looks like chicken, is healthier than chicken, and has less of an impact on the environment/climate/conscience, why wouldn't you eat it? Now beef on the other hand...I still am on the fence there. What can I say, I like a nice medium rare, well-marbled, ribeye slightly charred on the outside. I don't think you can ever replace that.

<comment><USER26> My wife and I run a small farm and one of our products is organic, pasture raised chicken. All of our birds spend the majority of their lives out on fresh grass in the sunshine and our never exposed to any antibiotics, pesticides and herbicides.

The difference that a bit of exposure to green forage in an outdoor environment makes, both to the flavour and texture of the chicken, is AMAZING. Industrial broiler barn chicken pales in comparison.

I'd encourage anyone seeking to buy a more environmentally friendly chicken to try to make contact with a local organic farmer who's able to raise his birds outside and in a humane fashion.

<comment><USER27> How would you say your pure chicken would compare to a USDA Organic chicken I can buy at the store?

<comment><USER26> I live in Canada so I can't compare directly to a USDA Organic chicken. However, based on a chicken one could get from Whole Foods, for example, our bird has a much richer flavour and a firmer, less rubbery texture. This part is very subjective, of course, but in a side-by-side comparison you would definitely be able to taste and feel the difference.

We also raise our birds to be much heavier than a store bought bird - <USER2> average about six pounds after processing vs three-ish pounds in the store. I'd wager that your meat-to-carcase ratio is probably higher for one of our birds, giving a better value. (Actually, it's better value regardless - <USER3> sell our birds for $4/lb vs $5/lb for the broiler barn organic birds in the store.)

Environmentally, there's less concentration of pollutants. All of the chicken manure goes straight on the grass and is a primo source of nutrients for subsequent hay crops. For me it's a win - I don't have to apply fertilizer nor clean out chicken barns.

Coming from an animal welfare standpoint, just because you're buying "organic" chicken in the store, doesn't mean they've been raised in a humane fashion. I carry no guilt in eating our chickens. They're not overcrowded, debeaked or in a dusty, foul smelling environment. They live as well as I can provide up until the day they go for slaughter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> In Asia, there is a delicacy called dog meat. To maximize profit, cooks use pork instead (sometimes from sick or dead pigs) Then they fake it by adding fermented rice, ginger, shrimp paste to make it look feel and taste like real dog meat. For more info (in Vietnamese) <http://goo.gl/g07yF>

</comment><comment><USER28> Hong Kong has restaurants where they have items that are clones of chicken, shrimp,fish etc. but are not actual meat. I tried and it was great.

EDIT: Funny thing is that the menu has item names such as "vegetarian chicken" and I am not kidding.

<comment><USER29> In the UK, I've never found an imitation of fish or prawns, let alone a great one.

<comment><USER30> There are crabsticks, an old Uk favourite. They are pretty horrible though....

<comment><USER29> I believe crabsticks are made from reformed fish. Agreed on how horrible they are though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> This sounds very promising. As a vegan, it's pretty hard to find decent alternatives to meat, which I still crave once in a while - I went vegan for health reasons, not ideological ones.

This has been getting better with time, but unfortunately a lot of fake vegetarian and vegan meats tend to be unhealthy. In order to get some decent taste and texture, some odd ingredients are often used. Vegan does not equal healthy in all cases. This one sounds pretty good, hope they find their way to Canada and branch out to different meats, too!

<comment><USER32> I've tried a couple of beef and chicken alternatives that were splendid. The trick was to cook it to my liking. Crispy, wet, etc.

I imagine these kinds of foods are ok for transitioning into a vegan. However, I was vegan once, and I took it as an opportunity to discover all kinds of new vegetables and fruits. It was interesting learning to cook with no meat. I had discovered a whole new world of food.

Eating fake meat seems a bit nostalgic tbh.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> There is also Šmakoun, it's basically just pressed egg white. Here is the inventor describing it

 _The slice is made of pure egg white, that is albumin, which is a source of the most valuable proteins, necessary in metabolism of organs of living organisms. New modern technology of processing of the hen egg white has been developed in the Czech Republic and patented. This technology turns the white into a porous material further processed in pressurised steam chamber. That produces a compact belt of thin layer of material, composed of microscopic fibres. The belt is then rolled into the shape of cylinder, cut into smaller pieces. These are then pressed into the final form of 100-gram slices. Finished slices are vacuum packaged in plastic bags. As final treatment, each bag is re-sterilised in special equipment._

from <http://www.iufost.org/publications/newsline/Newsline55.html>

</comment><comment><USER34> This could be because we have such low expectations of what actually counts as meat. For example, Jamie Oliver on how chicken nuggets are made (in the US) <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2OK6xDd7Hs>

</comment><comment><USER35> Why would a person who is vegan want to eat fake meat? I find it odd a person who is a vegans who finds even vegetarianism too relaxed would even want to eat fake meat.

I wonder if the opposite could be done to create a fake carrot made entirely out of meat?

Beyond Meat's website has _"without the bad stuff (no saturated or trans fat, no cholesterol, no gluten, no antibiotics, no GMOs...and no meat)"_. How is gluten "bad stuff" unless you have celiac disease?

<comment><USER32> > Why would a person who is vegan want to eat fake meat?

I understand what you're saying, but the short answer is because fake meat is not meat. I don't think it's about not eating what tastes good but it's about not eating meat (or any animal by-products).

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I don't get it. You want all the benefits of eating meat without actually eating meat? I understand people have moral objections to the meat industry, but if you are doing it for health reasons you might as well just eat real meat. Research has shown quite conclusively that pre-historic humans survived on a diet rich in animal products, particularly animal fat.

<comment><USER37> The article spells it out pretty clearly:

"Brown's long-term goal is to offer a product that can satisfy the world's growing, and largely unsustainable, demand for meat, especially in ballooning markets like India and China."

"Meat is environmentally toxic and colossally inefficient, ethically dubious (even if you're OK with killing animals, raising and slaughtering animals in factory farms is hard to defend), and it's unhealthy (that's even true if you don't eat it—there's good evidence that the rampant use of antibiotics in livestock production has given rise to drug-resistant infections)."

The amount of resources required to raise an animal to the age at which it can be slaughtered for use as food is a very real problem as the natural resources of the world are strained by population growth.

<comment><USER36> Ok, so rather than feeding people the genuine article let's feed them some laboratory created faux-meat. That sounds like a great way to be healthy.

I don't disagree that we need to find more sustainable ways to feed ourselves, but we also need to be feeding ourselves quality food that matches our biological needs. Not whatever is most conveniently and cheaply produced.

<comment><USER38> There is not enough farm land to provide 7 billion people a western diet including 1500+ calories from beef every day. The only way to get close to that is to replace most farm land with solar panels supplement that with a lot of nuclear and wind energy and then factory farm plant matter using LED lighting in buildings and feed that to cows in another building.

Is it possible, sure but economics just a question of what your willing to sacrifice for what you want. And significant quantities of fake meat is probably a much better option for everyone involved.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> I'm not sure if I'm the only one that feels a little cheated with this article. It reads like PR for the product and Manjoo buries that Stone's Obvious Corp is an investor in BM in the the middle of the text even when he uses Stone's quotes at the beggining.

</comment><comment><USER16> I've had seitan "beef" tips at a good veggie restaurant that would convince almost anyone. Yes, heavily sauced, but the right color and a nice char on them. (And I'm just dating a vegetarian, so I have a good point of reference for real meat.)

</comment><comment><USER40> Why aim to make something indistinguishable from real meat? Instead of stopping when you hit "100% as good as meat" you can keep going, and make something 120% as good, and beyond.

</comment><comment><USER41> "I forgot I was eating something that didn't come from a living creature": Does fungus not live?

<comment><USER42> Are you trying to imply that consumption of animals and plants/fungi is the same? What's the point of that argument? I mean, come on, I'm vegetarian and I kill mosquitoes ...

<comment><USER41> I think it's the same, but then again I'm not a vegetarian. What I'm really trying to imply is that what people decide they're allowed to eat is based on (mostly arbitrary) social norms. Is there anything morally different between being vegetarian and keeping kosher?

Aside: Anyone who figures out how to make salmon produce pork will have a license to print money (kosher pork!).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Beyond Meat is people! It's _people_!

</comment><comment><USER44> Great more fake stuff, just what we need.</comment>


Babysitting Service that searches,matches,& emails parents their sitter matches - <AUTHOR> http://www.BabyMatcher.com Babymatcher.com allows parents and sitters to still get the best results, without searching for hours to find the right sitter or family, like on other more traditional babysitting websites.<p>BabyMatcher.com decided to start a babysitter matching service that would allow both sitters and parents to upload their information into our database.  From there, it becomes easy, our database personally matches parent's jobs with sitters skills based on the criteria they are looking for! Then, we simply deliver the top 5 individualized sitter matches to the parent's email account they provide us. After that, it is up to the parents who they choose to call for an interview! <comment><USER2> Your website is making me sad...why so much flash?</comment>


A Beer Drinker's View of the Venture Industry - <AUTHOR> http://venturefizz.com/blog/beer-drinkers-view-venture-industry

<comment><USER2> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1669210></comment>


The First Few Milliseconds of an HTTPS Connection - <AUTHOR> http://www.moserware.com/2009/06/first-few-milliseconds-of-https.html <comment><USER2> This makes a lot of sense right now, especially that the next major version of Chrome will mark HTTP websites as invalid

</comment><comment><USER3> Could do with a (2009)</comment>


Ask HN: How can I influence a change in this development process? - <AUTHOR> I'm a software engineer at a SaaS company whose product is a large (mostly just complicated) java webapp.  The company has seen a good amount of growth over one year and things are starting to explode on the software side of things.  Mainly, the fact that the code is fragile spaghetti that has zero unit tests (untestable by design) and there is a lack of software development process.
My issue is that I am feeling pressured from having to handhold QA after I fix a bug.  I spend more time doing this than actually writing code.
Here is a typical process to fix a bug in our application: 1. A bug is found 2. The reporter logs a ticket into JIRA often lacking how to reproduce the bug, and what the expected results are. 3. The SE gets assigned the ticket and needs to contact the reporter to find out how to reproduce and figure out what the expected result is. 4. After development, it is up to the SE to show the QA person how to test this new feature or confirm that the bug is fixed.
A few comments on QA: They are non-technical.  Documentation is poor, so the SE's need to show QA how to reproduce the bugs and what the expected result is. SE's tried making step-by-step videos on how to test the code change, but that has proven to be a waste of time, as SE's are still asked to be hands on with QA.  Sometimes there will be a bug deep in the architecture that can't be reproduced in the front-end.  QA is very lost at how to test these.  Also, we get a lot of cases, where QA thinks that a test failed, but it turns out that they just had lack of knowledge of the acceptance criteria and prior functionality.
Management doesn't want to enforce a process because it slows everything down.
Honestly, I'm pretty lost here because I can hardly articulate the intricacies of the entire situation.  Is this common? I'd really like to get some sage knowledge on what's going on here, cause all I see is a painful cycle. <comment><USER2> The key sentence is here: "Management doesn't want to enforce a process because it slows everything down."

Sounds like you answered your own question, resign move on then watch that ship burn, there is a limit to how much change a person could influence.

Sorry I know it is negative to think of it this way but its really hard to find a team that follows a process you enjoy. If you love testing and think that its the right way find a team that does that, don't waste time trying to convince people with a different mind set.

</comment><comment><USER3> > The reporter logs a ticket into JIRA often lacking how to reproduce the bug, > and what the expected results are

Could you funnel bug reports through a form that requires fields to be filled out before submission? If the report is still seriously lacking, use a canned reply asking for more information and close the report if this isn't given. Also, could you require the bug reporter to write step-by-step what QA must do to replicate?

</comment><comment><USER4> Management not wanting to enforce a process because of speed will change, it always does once they see clients leaving because of software quality and feature development slowing down.

The problem is between now and then in addition to hoping the pendulum doesn't swing too far the other direction.

Process doesn't have to slow everything down, my guess is you have one of two types of management or maybe both feeding off each other. A, you have young new founders/management that doesn't have experience with good process so they think all process just gets in the way. B, you have some experienced management that only came from or experienced heavy overbearing development processes.

The fact they have hired any type of QA means they do want improvement, but just are failing to see how to get it there. You will always find that QA requires some hand holding, but in the right situation it shouldn't be taking up the majority of your time.

Depending on what your current role is and what you desire to do and whether you like it there all affects what you can do and how to approach it. If you really love it there but are frustrated you can still try and help things get better. Process can be as simple as starting a daily standup on the QA issues and go over them. But to keep the fear down over the "process", don't make it formal yet, just get people together and say hey lets chat about X and Y and try and save us all some time. And just start doing it, don't ask for permission, don't say it is a process. You can influence how things work by influencing the people doing the work regardless of whom they work for etc. You can start small and do little things like this, and when you start seeing results and say you start getting to code 20% more of the time then celebrate that with an email to the group. By doing that you are telling them wow look at how much more productive I have become, oh yea, its from some changes in how we are working. See what I am getting at? Also, you could try another idea of getting 2-3 of the devs together and agreeing that you will each take one week of the month and handle training QA how to test the resolved defects for that week. It also provides a second pair of eyes on defects and cross trains people into other fixes. Or suggest your management hire a development intern for this type of work.

I am not blowing smoke, I have done this more then once. As a consultant, many times I have been asked to come in and fix things, but I am immediately seen as the outsider and people don't want their processes (or lack thereof) to change etc. So instead you have to be creative in getting the teams to buy into the changes without making it seem like you are creating any bad roadblocks etc. And celebrating little wins is usually really helpful. BTW -- doing it the grassroots way takes a lot longer then having someone in management sponsoring the change or demanding it, but honestly, I think the grassroots team way usually sticks better over time.

<comment><AUTHOR> this is some great insight, thanks!</comment></comment>


'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF - <AUTHOR> https://www.sfgate.com/food/article/Coerced-into-tipping-How-apps-are-changing-the-13164536.php <comment><USER2> I propose that we petition Congress to repeal this law:

"Tipping again changed in the 1960s, when Congress agreed that workers could receive a lower minimum wage if a portion of their salary came from tips. The minimum wage for tipped workers is $2.13, which has not changed in over 20 years, as long as those workers receive at least $7.25 in tips per hour. Saru Jayaraman, author of Behind the Kitchen Door, explains that a minimum wage of $2.13 means that their full wage will go toward taxes and forces tipped workers to live off their tips." [1]

[1] [https://www.tripsavvy.com/a-brief-history-of- tipping-1329249](https://www.tripsavvy.com/a-brief-history-of-tipping-1329249)

<comment><USER3> As a point of information: there is no reduced minimum wage for tipped workers in California.

Wait staff etc must still receive full minimum wage in addition to any tips they receive.

<comment><USER4> I don't think that changes the expectations on the waitstaff side, or the sense of obligation on the tippers' side.

The mountain that needs to be climbed here is about narrative/social norms, not real economics.

Unfortunately I think that bigger than shifting social norms will be shifting customer price expectations. If you kill tipping, expect wages to go up, even in CA, as staff expect (and perhaps legitimately require) a certain level of income, regardless of origin.

It's a little like subsidized gas. The US has been underpaying for gas for so long that I've got no idea what political martyr would try to put that cat in the bag. When a market distortion lasts so long it becomes part of the social fabric, it's real hard to just kill off.

I'd love to hear about times countries have been able to pull this off at scale.

<comment><USER5> Norway and Singapore tax the crap out of cars and are still doing fine.

<comment><USER6> While I fully support taxing the crap out of cars, Singapore and the USA are hardly comparable. It's the third most densely populated country on earth, and you can walk the circumference of the entire island in about a day. Not even factoring in the comprehensive public transit..

<comment><USER7> This can't be stressed enough. Large swaths of the US population would immediately become immobile. I think OP has never lived and worked in a rural area, say 30 miles outside of the nearest town, where survival depends on your ability to transport yourself.

<comment><USER8> Great point!

Except that the population density of the US is almost double that of Norway. (We definitely have our share of rural areas...)

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_depend...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density)

<comment><USER9> The density people live at is the interesting figure.

Of course it's quite high in the US, what with the population being concentrated on the coasts.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I am frustrated with articles like this that keep pushing a higher and higher "acceptable" tip percentage.

20% is not normal. 20% is very high for very good service.

15 years ago, 15% was normal. Now the minimum on these pos pos's is 18.

I tip 15% and no more unless service was well above normal.

And I have no qualms about hitting 0 for anything that isn't sit down service, including Uber and Lyft.

We have to fight this tip creep or we will live in a world where every service employee is paid with 100% tips by those that feel guilty enough to pay it while all the cheapskates freeload.

<comment><USER11> What's your Uber/Lyft rating these days? I imagine it's not good if you don't tip.

<comment><USER12> How would one know such a thing?

The absence of tipping was one of the big advantages uber and lyft offered over conventional cabs when they first came along, and I've stuck with it; I'm not going to tip.

If that eventually gets me blackballed so I have to go back to old-fashioned cabs, well... perhaps I'm not missing out on much.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Defaults matter.

If the 'default' tip on the app is 15% or 20%, then you need to make an affirmative choice to not tip. Yes, you can (usually) opt out, but the screen is telling you in no uncertain terms that _tipping is probably a social norm here—if you choose to opt out, you are making the extra effort to break the norm_.

Otherwise, why bother setting the default at all rather than force the user to enter an explicit amount every time, like on a restaurant bill?

Also, there's a whole subbranch of behavioral economics ('nudge' economics) that basically studies how to frame choices and set defaults to influence decision making [1]. Advertisers and politicians also take advantage of the power of framing and defaults.

So getting back to the ethics of the issue, it'd be interesting to see data on how much the default influences the actual tip paid, and how that incentivizes the actual business owner (e.g. set a higher tip rate, pay a lower wage?)

[1] [http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/richard.thaler/research/pdf/...](http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/richard.thaler/research/pdf/smartjpe.pdf)

<comment><USER14> I like when they set the defaults even higher than 20%. I went to a Sports Clips and the lowest default was $5 on an $18 haircut, with I think $10 being the highest. They spend probably 20 minutes on a basic haircut. I don't think that a 50%+ tip is reasonable.

<comment><USER15> I didn't tip my hairdresser for ~25 years. They are charging me for a haircut, and that's all they give me. What am I tipping for? It's always the same haircut as well, he/she never "goes out of their way" to cut my hair.

Then I learned that it's pretty much expected, so I tip "normally" now, but feel weird about it.

<comment><USER16> Same at a restaurant. They are charging me for food in a nice environment. What am I tipping for? I don't want a nice conversation with my waiter.

<comment><USER17> The expectation of tipping at a restaurant exists to allow you to punish the employee for bad service over the course of a meal by leaving a 0% tip.

It doesn't make any sense for a counter service restaurant or other such business that consists of a single interaction before paying, where if you receive bad service you already know that and can just say "actually never mind I'm going to a different place, cancel my order".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'm more annoyed about sit down restaurants that automatically add "living wage fees" or "aca coverage costs" to bills _before_ tip.

How is this acceptable? What other industry quotes prices that don't include wage costs, then bill for a higher amount.

It's particularly bad because pulling the percentage out of the tip lowers the percentage of the amount I pay that would go to the server (vs baking the price into the menu cost), so it's dishonest pricing and also convoluted tip theft.

<comment><USER19> I suspect the practices you describe are politically motivated advertising of prices (and related to price discrimination).

To add on a _living wage fee_ is to imply that a lower price available at other restaurants does not pay a living wage. This is a left of center virtue signal: "Eat here, where we make sure our staff earn a living wage."

To add on an _ACA coverage fee_ is to imply that, without mandatory healthcare, the restaurant could afford to give you a better price. This is a right of center nudge toward action: "You're in favor of mandatory healthcare, and here is what it's costing you."

Both fees are crass, tone-deaf choices but, unless the receipt literally says, "we take this out of the tip," it isn't theft. You're irritated (reasonably) _but are choosing to tip less, which seems like picking out the wrong party to punish for restaurant policy._

 __Tip well __, and then tell the owner that you won 't be eating there again because of the politically motivated fees.

<comment><USER20> > To add on a living wage fee is to imply that a lower price available at > other restaurants does not pay a living wage. This is a left of center > virtue signal: "Eat here, where we make sure our staff earn a living wage."

No, it isn't. It's a fee that started showing up in places like Seattle (and probably SF) after the minimum wage was raised, as a right-of-center jerk signal: "I would charge you less and screw my employees harder but the law won't allow me".

<comment><USER19> Well, then they're both right-of-center bird flips...

My point remains the same: anyone is right to get pissed of about these fees, _but tipping less punishes the server and not the owner who instituted the fees._ A better solution is to tip normally, ask to speak to the owner (or a manager), explain you will not be patronizing the business again (and why), and then leave.

<comment><USER10> Agreed, I don't care what their reasons are. It still amounts to a secret, extra charge that you did not know about until after the bill was received. If this happened to me, and it was not clearly posted on the menu that a fee would be added, I would absolutely refuse to pay it.

<comment><USER20> In Seattle at least, you'd be legally in the right to do so.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I hate the tipping system ("tipping") in the US. It's so forced and only benefits the business owner. You should not have to rely on uncertain tips to make up a minimum wage that is just stupid. Both parties keep the system alive, someone has to break the cycle.

<comment><USER22> It also benefits the tipped worker because they get to see more of that portion of their paycheck. Sales tax is never paid on tips and Income tax is rarely, if ever, paid either.

It's just a tax exemption that we've encoded into social behaviour.

<comment><USER23> It also harms the tipped worker.

How many times have you seen a young service worker prostitute their feelings towards some arsehole or bitch, because the worker really needed the income?

I live in a mostly tip-free country, and I am sure most front line workers here have a lot more agency to deal with nasty customers. Although the downside is that service staff have few ways to earn more except by changing jobs...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The article explicitly addresses SF So this article is about a state which enforces a minimum wage above the US norm for workers in tip-heavy industries. US minimum wage is like $2.15 and federally mandated tip+wage rate is $7.25 and the Californian state wage is $10. This is functionally equivalent to federal minimum plus 30%.

I realize the transition moment here is confronting, and with family who work and depend on this class of labour I am completely aware of the immediate pay consequence, but even with this,

I think Californians should grab an opportunity to walk off tip culture, and walk into 'fair pay for work' culture.

The minimum wage is not fair? Lets support all workers for a fair minimum wage. End tip culture.

<comment><USER25> For the people saying that this would have unintended consequences, that may well be the case. Somehow, the rest of the world seems to get by without the same tipping culture.

Moving towards a fair pay for work culture may require more than just 'not tipping', but we already have many examples where it is the case. Prices may go up, or tax laws need to change, but just because there are thin margins in the industry doesn't mean that the only way to survive is to force workers to live off their tips. In so many cases it seems like tipping culture merely serves to hide the true cost of a meal or service.

Similarly, the odd practice of not including any taxes in the sticker price on goods. This one in particular feels anti-consumer, and seems to persist because sellers worry that their prices, if listed including taxes, would seem higher than the competition. I'm surprised more retailers don't buck this trend more often; realising that taxes were included in Cafe du Monde's list price for their coffee and biegnets made the experience even more enjoyable than it otherwise would have been, and definitely contributed to a few of the midnight treks I made to get that particular treat.

<comment><USER26> Speaking about "unintended consequences", I would like to see a study if there's any correlation between heavy tipping culture and service quality. So far in my travels the US has been the place where waiters are the "nicest" while places with little tipping (but high menu pricing, ex. in Europe) I've had mixed service quality (but generally significantly worse than in the US).

<comment><USER27> I live in Germany, what the US tourists usually call "bad service" (because they were being rude or not happy enough) is simply expected here. Nobody where I live expects servers, cashiers or taxi drivers to talk to you beyond the necessary or fake a smile, in fact, my sister worked as a server and was told on no uncertain terms that faking a smile was an absolute no-go. (Though this is less common in the southern European states, especially tourists locations)

Tipping is generally only restaurants and taxis, where you simply round up to the next 5€ or 10€ and the waiter keeps the rest.

In my experience, I find US servers very unpleasantly/uncomfortably nice/happy while not really focusing on the service quality itself (food quality, accuracy of order or similar).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> These types of systems have pushed me toward carrying cash again. After feeling manipulated and/or guilty by the tip-requesting interface in situations where I would not normally tip or might throw spare change in a jar (vs the several dollars that's being solicited), I now pay in cash. It gives me the control over the transaction that I had previous to the interfaces' existence and I don't leave the situation with negative feelings.

<comment><USER29> Why feel guilty about it at all? Up here in Canada we have had pin validated transactions for a long time now, and the terminals have had tip prompts at least since we switched to chip and pin. It is just a reflex now when ordering at a counter to select "$ tip" and hit enter for zero tip. Annoying, but when every place seems to do it, it is easy to get over the feelings of manipulation and guilt.

<comment><USER28> 1) I don't like feeling manipulated, regardless of if I am able to get over it. It's still a negative experience.

2) I belong to an ethnic minority that stereotypically does not tip well (though I don't see this in practice with others of my ethnic group). I don't want any judgment of me or my ethnic group based on if the person handing me my donut figures out, either by looking or by watching my hand motions, whether I tipped.

3) I don't doubt your description of the interface. I experience a similar interface. If I have to be prompted for a tip, then have to decline, then feel manipulated and have to expend mental energy to "get over it" (as you say), have to think about how I'm representing my ethnic group, and contemplate my role in the socioeconomic inequality present between myself and the people in the service industry (as mentioned elsewhere in these comments), well then I'm going to reduce that to a 2 step process where I hand over cash and receive my purchase.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> It seems to me that tipping has evolved from an incentive and reward for good service to a form of voluntary workfare where those who have something to spare decide to share with those still struggling in the low end of the service economy.

<comment><USER31> yes! tipping is like a naturally occuring form of redistrbution of wealth in capitalist countries :) I personally view the evolution of tipping culture as positive on the whole. and also, I think people tend to tip a bit higher if they feel good about the service, so it still incentivizes good service. When I visit Europe, I am reminded how nice the service industry in America is.

<comment><USER32> Or you could just have a living minimum wage, lol.

<comment><USER31> yes, if the government could manage to pass a good law there :) but in the event that the government won't, tipping helps correct the situation.

<comment><USER33> Or it can be argued that tipping offers those who control the means to change the law (the elected lawmakers) the excuse they need not to.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I am confused as to why it's standard to tip some low-paid workers but not others:

* Fast-food workers do just as much work as coffee shop employees, why not tip them?

* Workers at clothing stores take the time to fold your clothes nicely and box/bag them for you - why not tip them?

* Grocery store checkout clerks in the city carefully bag up your goods so you can carry them with just two hands - why not tip them?

* The guy collecting trash from the streets to keep them clean is helping everyone, why not tip him?

It does seem at some point the tipping system will grow so large it'll collapse in on itself. Sadly though, places that have tried to move that direction, in NYC at least, seem to have struggled [0][1].

[0]: [https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/05/why- res...](https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/05/why-restaurants- walk-back-no-tipping-policies/482151/) [1]: [http://gothamist.com/2017/10/19/danny_meyer_no_tipping.php](http://gothamist.com/2017/10/19/danny_meyer_no_tipping.php)

<comment><USER35> FWIW, tipped workers typically work for an hourly wage lower than the minimum wage, and are expected to earn the rest from tips. Most of the jobs you're talking about are not in the tipping wage category, and management just has to monitor carefully. Fast food has tons of computers to do exactly that, and even department stores have secret shoppers and cameras to observe staff. Grocery stores have crazy levels of cameras to monitor staff; I'd say about 70 percent of the cameras are pointed at the cashier (the remainder at you as you wander the store to calculate dwell time and deter theft). Trash collection I don't even know the company behind it let alone ever seen the driver. I assume they have GPS and cameras now that communities have moved to those machine arm trucks.

Tipping is a sort of economic hack; you the customer are responsible for evaluating service, and punishing inept or even just lazy service. You're the final buyer of the service, so in a way it's fair; just atypically lassiez- faire method versus the usual social hierarchy of companies paying managers to supervise service workers.

I figure if tipping dies, it will be because there's a separate economic hack undermining it. When you live somewhere where restaurants start and fail every month, the cost of a bad tipper reputation is pretty low. And if you adopt an upfront tip model to combat this, you're people's losing good faith as the fee-for-service model no longer applies -- which this article directly discusses.

All of which puts us in the awkward position of trying to figure out whether the lunch spot we visit is paying its staff a tipped wage without any actual service -- no bussing, no setting, and just a beeper to let you know you should grab your food.

<comment><USER22> In the context of the article (CA and SF in particular), there is no tipped minimum wage. If your wage is minimum you make minimum, and that minimum is higher than most. If you make tips, they go on top.

<comment><USER35> Interesting, I thought OR was the only state like that. Of course, 'round here minimum wage is like 15 bucks, going by the ads on the In'n'out.

Edit: how do you account for this page which indicates a (slightly) lower tipped wage in CA? [https://www.minimum-wage.org/california/tipped-employee- mini...](https://www.minimum-wage.org/california/tipped-employee-minimum-wage)

<comment><USER22> Don't know where that site is getting their info from. Try this for latest facts: [https://www.dol.gov/whd/state/tipped.htm](https://www.dol.gov/whd/state/tipped.htm)

You can sanity check that website by looking up your OR (which the site claims has a tipped minimum wage).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I'm convinced that those systems have deliberately be made to push the customer to tip (more) and therefore increase the transaction fee for the payment operator (Square most of the time).

Most of the workdays, I go eat lunch at "order at the counter" places. The Square ipad is directly visible to everyone behind me in the line as they can all see that I put "No tip". More than once, I have seen people look back to check if other people in the line would see their choice, and subsequently change it to a "socially acceptable" tip of 15%.

<comment><USER37> I never tip at an order-at-the-counter restaurant. If I place my order at the counter, and get my own drink, find my own table, etc., I'm not sure what there is to tip for.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Shifting the burden of paying employees to the customer via guilt and coercion is what's wrong here. Customers should not be made to feel like an asshole for not appreciating seeing their quoted price go up 20%. Lobbying Congress? Start with not supporting dickheads who do this. Charge 20% more and pay your employees properly

<comment><USER4> A number of restaurants have tried this, and more broadly, JCP tried something of the same sort (charge the "real" price, do away with the manipulative abstractions).

You start hemorrhaging customers. People's baselines for how much food costs are old and calcified, and customers flat out can't be counted on to act rationally and in their economic self interest.

[https://abcnews.go.com/Business/jc-penney-admits-marking- pri...](https://abcnews.go.com/Business/jc-penney-admits-marking-prices-order- customers-discounted/story?id=19323843)

<comment><USER38> I'm aware of this research - it's a culture shift but it's not an immutable law of gravity. You need customers to start demanding this - it won't happen top down with restaurants.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Worth noting that California pays a "fair" minimum wage to tipped workers (as opposed to states that pay as little as $2.13/hr to tipped workers)

<comment><USER40> $2.13/hr was what I was paid as a waiter 20 years ago, and was terrible back then - it amazes me that this number is still the same.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Where I am there are a lot of restaurants with the Square tablets on a pivot, and what I've noticed is that with fast-food-type places the worker will turn their head away while you enter the tip amount. Or they'll preselect, "no tip"

I too am annoyed by the ubiquity of these tip prompts, but the manners haven't changed. (It's been on credit card slips forever.) People shouldn't feel obligated to tip just because, say, it's the owner serving cold brew from his food truck.

<comment><USER42> I mean, my fav is NYC cabs where the options start at 20% and go 25%, 30% or custom. Great way to avoid getting 10% tips if that was set as the floor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> It feels like a dark pattern for sure. I tip for service and service only. I regularly hit the no tip button on the new interfaces. I wish I didn't have to worry about tipping... I miss Uber when it abstracted that away. But alas it only works when they compensate drivers properly.

Tipping in general sucks. I feel like most of the time it's manipulating customers into squeezing a little extra on the top. Just raise your prices.

</comment><comment><USER44> Was in a restaurant recently, asked for the bill and when it came it already had a 10% tip included in it and a big spiel about how the company wanted to treat their staff right and that if you wanted to opt out, you could... What cheek. Never going back there again and I've spread the word to my friends of mine.

I'm UK based by and by. Keep that nonsense in the US.

</comment><comment><USER45> Amazon Whole Foods delivery is the worst offender in this area. You finish your order and on the confirmation screen they add a tiny little line item for a preselected 10% tip. Suddenly your "free" delivery is now $15.

</comment><comment><USER46> Lots of fast casual places now have a tip on their screens. I always choose 0.

I mean seriously the only interaction I'm having lasted 30 seconds, I'll never see this person again / they won't do anything more for me, no tip needed...

I hate tipping as it is (granted I do tip in non fast casual food situations). I'd rather just the cost be up front.

<comment><USER47> I used to feel the same, but then I started to appreciate just how fortunate I am to not have to work in retail. This isn't because I'm better. It's just because I was born into the right situation.

I always tip now and use the experience as a reminder not to take my fortune for granted. It's also a reminder that everything I have might be taken away at any time.

<comment><USER48> I don't think retail is a bad job. I would hate to be stuck at a computer all day writing code and dealing with non-technical managers and clients.

Someone who works a job where they receive consistent tips can make a lot of money, and if it's in cash it's tax free.

Plus the tips never go to the kitchen who do all the actual work.

<comment><USER49> > and if it's in cash it's tax free.

Obligatory nit: Being paid in cash is not exempt from regular income tax.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> I really don't like how this is moving from just food-service workers to pretty much everything.

The #1 reason I liked Uber/Lyft was you didn't have to tip. Then the margins didn't make sense and now they ask for it. I shouldn't have to subsidize those rides with tips because you're not paying the driver enough. Just charge me the price you need to charge me.

</comment><comment><USER51> In this scenario, especially in SF as a tech worker, you should feel guilty if you can afford to spare a dollar for someone on minimum wage for a tip but are reaching for the zero button. Having the iPad highlight your stingyness is not a problem with the technology.

<comment><USER52> Couldn't agree more. Don't like tipping an extra dollar for a coffee once in a while? Make it at home. If you can't spare $15 a week to tip service employees when you're sporting a six-figure salary, shame on you.

If you're a regular at a coffeeshop/fast casual place, another perk of tipping is that you quickly become known as a tipper and employees will come to like you. If you need a selfish reason to tip beyond having the employees like you, sometimes they'll even hook you up with free/discounted stuff.

It's easy to just eat out one fewer time a week and redistribute the would- have-been-spent-anyway money as tips to service employees, regardless of how much you think they actually 'did' for you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> I live in either NZ, the UK or China, depending on work. None of these have a tipping culture. It's the cultural and psychological aspects that are fascinating, particularly the comments that list proof that in the US, if outlets show real prices, i.e. those that the customer will actually pay, including tax and gratuities, people go elsewhere, to outlets that give a false sense of economy.

Personally, I've found that when in the US I felt the food to be cheap, but when I pay the bill, the actual cost to be largely equivalent to other western countries. But, I still harbour the irrational feeling that the US is cheaper, even though the receipts I submit don't reflect this "feeling".

Tipping (and non listed taxes) is the 99c cost point writ large. To me it seems, all other considerations (discomfort, worker's rights, fairness, etc.) are overwhelmed by the lower price ticket.

Thoughts?

</comment><comment><USER54> The worst is when I see this at a self-serve frozen yogurt shop.

That one really blows my mind. I literally filled the cup with froyo and all the fixins myself. My entire interaction with the employee is placing it on their scale and giving them money. Why would I tip that?

</comment><comment><USER2> I had thought of something profound today:

Within about five minutes, I had walked into a smoothie shop, ordered a drink, paid with a $1 tip, received my drink, and walked out.

Pretending for a moment that servers actually get their full tip (they don't), and assuming this person makes $10/hr, then by giving them a one dollar tip for five minutes of service, I effectively doubled their earnings for their five minutes. (Their wage is $1/6 minutes, less after taxes)

I received very little service, and nothing outside of what "their job" would entail. In fact, at one point the sever was impatient and made me feel rushed. Tipping is an abomination of a custom.

<comment><USER55> The tip is often split between all the workers on duty, with different splits depending upon position.

<comment><USER2> Hence the "let's pretend they get their full tip" statement.

It's also taxed, what's your point? Mine still stands.

<comment><USER10> It is only split between the workers not managers or owners. And since they don't really do anything for your tip anyway, seems fine to split it amongst the workers.

As for taxes... Only if it's reported. If you tipped in cash, you can be fairly certain that it will not get reported.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Related:

> A 2009 study by the [NYC] Taxi and Limousine Commission found that > gratuities rose after cabbies adopted a credit card system that prompted > riders to tip; their tips jumped from an average of about 10 percent when > all fares were paid in cash to about 22 percent on card transactions.

[http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2014/03/star...](http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2014/03/starbucks_square_and_e_payments_do_new_point_of_payment_systems_increase.html)

<comment><USER57> Considering the screen only has presets for 20%, 25%, and 30%, I'm not at all surprised.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> Don't always assume the full tip goes to the employees. At a place I used to work, the employer took 50% of the gratuity charge for all banquets. If you want the employee to get it, tip in cash.

<comment><USER59> Is there any state where that isn't just blatantly illegal wage theft?

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> There needs to be a ban and removal of the tipping requirement altogether. I know, easier said than done. I'm just saying, many European countries do not have tips embedded in their culture, and that's a good thing. If I go to a sit-down restaurant, I'm already being marked up for that - before tipping. If I have some food delivered, I'm paying for the delivery service, or I am being marked up on the item's price - before tipping. By doing that, we ensure that the salaries of employees are legally decent (rather than them counting on unpredictable extras to make ends meet). This forces the employer not to direct all of the margin into his own pocket while squeezing the employee's salary.

I personally have never tipped anyone unless I was excessively well catered for, or someone went out of their way to enhance the experience I was already paying for in the first place. That's what tipping must be, not forcing the customer to actually compensate for your employees being underpaid. I'm sorry for anyone who has a lower salary than normal because the boss expects that tips will bridge the gap. If needed, I'm much happier to pay a higher price (relatively). Indeed, I propose that most of the time, the prices are already including all costs and the margin, and that the owners direct the whole margin to them while squeezing the employees out of it and having them rely on tips to make a decent living. The solution to low salaries is not tipping and guilting people into paying extra cost for no reason whatsoever and for something that's already marked up to the appropriate level, it is better salaries framed by law or contract.

<comment><USER61> How do you ban a social expectation? Tipping is never _required_ , it is just socially expected.

<comment><USER60> Good point. To answer your question blatantly: by law. Not saying "you can't ever tip". But more to frame the employer/employee contract and prevent the employee relying on tips, and instead having a contractual/legal framework for his salary.

Let me be clear in saying however that I'm not a fan of shaping culture changes by legal requirements. So I'm second guessing myself a little too now, but I really think the culturally accepted tipping expectation is detrimental overall as per my original comment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> The employees who don't do anything yet think it's right to shame others into tipping them for nothing are the ones who should be ashamed. After accidentally tipping a few times for no reason, I have made it a priority to resist this bullshit. It's not my place as a customer to pay more for no reason just because most jobs in this country pay shit and I'm supposed to feel pity for the employees. Yeah the whole situation sucks and we should eliminate tipping altogether and have a livable minimum wage, but this is one way workers are not going to get sympathy. We can all fight for a proper minimum wage or they can nickel and dime the rest of us into not caring about their situation due to this kind of bullshit. I for one am going to specifically make sure not to tip wherever no service exists and whenever asked to before any service rendered, even if there will be a service rendered. I hope others have enough common sense and character to do the same.

</comment><comment><USER63> My personal rules are:

1) If I pay before I get service (fast food, coffee shop counter, etc), there's no tip. The point of tipping is for service, I'm not pre-tipping you for service you haven't given me yet.

2) The vast majority of the time I tip 15%. It's extremely rare I see service that's outstandingly poor or outstandingly good. Most are just average.

</comment><comment><USER64> It's very difficult to change tipping expectations. Uber unsuccessfully tried to maintain no tipping through its app. After driver complaints[1] and pressure from NYC[2] and others, Uber added tipping.

[1] [https://www.wired.com/2016/05/uber-wants-to-save-us-from- rac...](https://www.wired.com/2016/05/uber-wants-to-save-us-from-racism/)

[2] [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/17/nyregion/new-york-city- ub...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/17/nyregion/new-york-city-uber-tipping- app.html)

</comment><comment><USER65> I give credit to the few shops that default to "no tip" — presumably because so little service is involved in their transactions. Of course, it's fine to offer an option to add a tip, which is basically just the digital equivalent of a tip jar. But for the shops where service is minimal, it is appropriate to set the default to be no tip.

<comment><USER66> The real question is wether the workers are being paid the tipped or no tips minimum wage. The former being much less than the later in much of the US

<comment><USER65> I'm in CA so don't encounter this issue. Is it common in other states for workers in an establishment where you order at a counter and pick up your food from a counter to be paid a tipped minimum wage? I thought employers had to gross up employee pay if their hourly + tips didn't hit the non-tipped minimum wage?

<comment><USER49> > I thought employers had to gross up employee pay if their hourly + tips > didn't hit the non-tipped minimum wage?

Employers are required to do that.

However, as is most often the case at the low end of the job ladder, enforcing your employment rights against your employer is a very efficient way to find yourself unemployed and--in smaller communities where "people are gonna talk"\--blackballed from ever holding a job again.

<comment><USER65> I totally understand that. I'm just wondering if anyone is aware of employers paying a tipped minimum wage to the sorts of businesses described (where employees interact with employees in the same way as in fast food establishments, roughly).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> Unfortunately tipping is how these employers are legally permitted to pay their employees

Removing the tipping without increasing the pay is even more offensive and from my experience is a predominantly tech phenomenon (1)

(1) [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17612190](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17612190)

</comment><comment><USER56> To throw travelers a bone, regulations should require the screens to show the average tip.

In fact, it should be required to be the default.

<comment><USER68> That sounds awesome. One of the guys I knew in college was from Jamaica and literally never tipped anyone until senior year because he didn't know that you were supposed to.

Now all these other industries are trying to add tipping as a custom and and I have no idea who that actually goes to, what they make without it nor how much other people tip.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> I was just coerced.

I spent a decent amount of money to get my car detailed, and was presented with a Square app prompting for a tip. I did tip because it felt like not doing so was somehow improper. After thinking about it, I will not do this again.

</comment><comment> brian-armstrong The tip calculator on these is surprisingly broken in obvious ways. For example, if you order a cup of coffee and merchandise or a bag of beans, it calculates 15% on the entire order. Wtf!

<comment><USER69> You usually do tip on the full amount right?

<comment><USER34> The parent's point is that you don't normally tip on merchandise you buy. If you buy a beer for $10 and a tshirt for $30 from a bartender, a typical tip would be $2 not $8.

That said, it's sort of an arbitrary custom. It's not very much work to fill a glass of beer, find a t-shirt in some cabinet, or hand someone a cup of coffee.

<comment> brian-armstrong Not like it makes much of a difference, but in the cases where I've seen it, the merchandise is just on display on the floor. So there is not even an aspect of retrieving it from the cabinet, it is just being rung up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> Paul-ish I've started using cash where possible when I see these terminals. It's sometimes the easiest way to avoid the prompt altogether.

</comment><comment><USER70> When I was last in the US I noticed that restaurants generally seemed to charge similar amounts to my expensive city (Sydney) but that was before the tip. So is it a lot more profitable to run a restaurant in the US because you essentially offload the labour cost from the meal to the tip but can keep the meal a similar price?

Also if its something that is generally always expected to be 20% then why not charge extra and pay your staff normally rather than having this extra layer to potentially mislead diners?

<comment><USER71> We (Melbourne) noticed the opposite: the US seems really cheap, until you actually get the bill and add on sales tax and tip; then, turns out, it's about the same as here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Tipping should be banned completely. It's discriminatory, feeds into the black economy and is f __ __ __annoying.

Also, its linked to higher rates of corruption:

[https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty- research/publications/h...](https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty- research/publications/here-tip-prosocial-gratuities-are-linked-corruption)

</comment><comment><USER2> Is anyone else occasionally afraid to eat at restaurants if a) the tip is established before the food is made and b) you didn't tip well or at all?

I have a friend who tells me horror stories of foul behaviour performed with the food by the chef in these situations.

</comment><comment><USER51> Guess what, you still don't have to tip if you don't want to. Your "guilt" is your problem, not a problem with the iPad. Anything that increases the takehome pay of low paid service workers in SF seems fine. It is entirely opt in.

An article featuring complaints about some of the lowest paid people in SF getting paid a little more because of a new technology lacks some self awareness.

<comment><USER72> Look, if you want to pay them more, pay them more. I'm all for it. I just don't want each retail transaction to be turned into a labor negotiation!

Tipping at restaurants is bad enough: why do I have to decide how much the waiter should make? If you make me think about it, 20% gross honestly seems way too much: the back of the house contributes a much larger portion of the value of the meal, so it feels like I'm stiffing _them_! But tipping waiters is ingrained enough that I just always give that 20%.

Any other transaction where apps try to add tipping, though? That's going to be $0 every single time, guilt free. If anything, I feel like I'm doing my part to keep companies from ruining another social interaction.

<comment><USER51> Sure. Big picture, I agree entirely. I automatically tip 20% too as it's just the cost of the transaction and even if the waiter is bad it could well be because of their manager understaffing the restaurant or a number of reasons beyond their control.

Do away with the tipping and pay people properly for thier labor. En lieu of that happening (and I don't see it happening soon) I'll still tip at these kiosks. I don't have much sympathy for people who complain about them but I get your point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER73> How do you know who gets the tip? Panera used to refuse tips. Now I go in and I'm presented with tip amounts at the point of sale. Who get's that tip? The cashier? The person in back making my food? The person who comes by and busses my table? Or none of the above? Is Panera just pocketing what I'm willing to throw in extra? Maybe it is market research, they figure if I'm willing to tip 20% instead of 15%, then the should charge more for the sandwich?

</comment><comment><USER74> So many comments here are talking about "defaulting" to tips or to 20% -- but I've never seen that on a Square or Square-type device.

It always requires a signature and you have to explicitly press "18%", "20%", "25%" (or similar) or "No tip" button.

I would be shocked if I ever saw a tip amount pre-selected for me (unless on a bill for a large party at restaurant, which has been standard for a long time now).

<comment><USER75> But those four _are_ the defaults. And for someone just taking your order, the range from 18-25% doesn't match expectations. In those situations, $0.50, $1, or 10% all seem closer to what I'd tip. The point of the article is many people are now choosing 18%, since it's easier, and there's subtle pressure for them to do so.

<comment><USER76> On Square devices, I have observed that if the amount is less than a certain threshold, the tip amounts will be $1, $2, and $3. Past that threshold and it defaults to 15%, 20%, 25%. I live in a downtown area and regularly interact with these systems (2+ times per day on avg).</comment></comment></comment>


Rust at OneSignal - <AUTHOR> https://onesignal.com/blog/rust-at-onesignal/ <comment><USER2> First, I have to comment on that diagram:

That diagram is the most interesting representation of a diagram I have ever seen. Do you have a tool to generate these for you, or was it hand crafted for this post? If it's a tool, is it available anywhere? If this is a built out tool, I would use this tool all the time.

On the article itself:

This is the most interesting type of posts about choosing Rust. Very balanced and aware that Rust gives a lot of upsides, but compared to other alternatives there are measurable downsides as well.

I think the biggest trade-off that they identified (and I've also gotten the impression from writing Rust on my own time, not for work) is the relative immaturity of the ecosystem, in as far as libraries available, and amount of developers supporting some of these libraries. What makes me hopeful, is that as a stable language (post 1.0) Rust is still relatively young. And you can definitely see things improving, with the community growing, more libraries propping up, and also gathering around specific libraries.

<comment><USER3> > That diagram is the most interesting representation of a diagram I have ever > seen.

Thank you! We worked really hard on it.

> Do you have a tool to generate these for you, or was it hand crafted for > this post? If it's a tool, is it available anywhere?

It was hand-made for this blog post. The diagram itself was drawn in a vector graphics editor and exported as SVG. Then, using web inspector tools to find which visual box corresponded to some line of svg markup, classes/ids were added to the items we cared about. Next came writing prose for each component. Finally, a bit of JavaScript and a CSS animation makes it come alive.

> If this is a built out tool, I would use this tool all the time.

Me too!

<comment><USER4> > The diagram itself was drawn in a vector graphics editor and exported as > SVG.

Which vector graphics editor did you use?

<comment><USER5> Not sure what they used but on Windows I would recommend Inkscape (perhaps an obvious choice).

<comment><USER6> My obvious choice would be Visio or PowerPoint.

<comment><USER7> Powerpoint can't export to SVG though, can it?

<comment><USER6> Not the version that I own, but then there is Visio or the other vector formats that can be converted to SVG.

I seldom use SVG, because it is failed vector format. You still cannot guarantee an image will work properly across all browsers (desktop, mobile devices) or vector design tools.

PS or PDF have more chance of working across tools.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm always very happy to hear of companies using Rust.

I'm _especially_ happy to see that they're using clippy. It's not a core piece of their infra like hyper, but it's still being used, which is nice.

How has it helped? Does it just keep the code clean or has it found mistakes and stuff like that too?

Loved the diagram, btw.

<comment><USER3> > How has it helped? Does it just keep the code clean or has it found mistakes > and stuff like that too?

Clippy hasn't found any bugs in our code that I'm aware of, but it has been invaluable even so.

Clippy is really good at preventing bit-rot. When refactoring, it typically points out constructs that are no longer needed after other changes.

It's great for teaching how to write Rust effectively and succinctly. I've certainly learned a lot from it. One example lint in this area is using `for item in list` vs `for item in list.into_iter()`.

OnePush sets `#![cfg_attr(not(test), warn(result_unwrap_used))]` to make sure no `unwrap()`s are used in production code; all errors must be handled! `result_unwrap_used` has easily been the most valuable lint for us.

<comment><USER8> Nice to know, thanks!

Yeah, clippy isn't solely for finding bugs -- a lot of the lints are about better style and cleaning up code, which often become useful after refactorings.

<comment><USER9> I'd really like to use clippy, but for production use I don't want to use anything but the stable Rust channel, whereas clippy apparently needs nightly Rust. Maybe I'm being overly cautious (OneSignal seems to do fine with just version pinning), but there's a reason nightly is separate from stable.

It would be cool if I could configure cargo to only use nightly Rust when invoking clippy, and use stable for all dev/test/prod builds. Do you happen to know if that's possible?

<comment><USER8> Yeah, clippy is a bit of an outlier because it hooks into the compiler itself to extract information during compilation. These are APIs that will never be "stable", nor are they really part of the "stdlib"; it's just that they're around and accessible in a nightly compiler.

Given that clippy is a tool, not a dependency, folks aren't overly concerned about this -- it cannot infect dependency trees and only requires nightly for local development. Most people do `rustup run nightly cargo install clippy` followed by `cargo +nightly clippy` to run it locally without needing to change the default toolchain.

There are plans to distribute clippy as part of the rust "extended" distribution, so the stability issue will go away.

<comment><USER10> :) There is one way to have clippy work in the stable compiler: The integration of useful tools!

But that is clearly an awful idea. No one would like useful tools at the expense of "separation of concerns" and marginally increased compiler maintenance :P

<comment><USER8> Not sure what you're trying to say here (you seem to be using sarcasm but I'm not sure), though I will note that clippy is wedded to a lot of compiler internals, so being a part of the compiler build/CI is a good thing for clippy. Often APIs get removed or changed from the compiler internals and we have to work around or sometimes revert it. Usually it works out, but it would be nice if the concern of having to support clippy's use case was part of the decision of how an API is to be changed. In the opposite direction, rustc does lints already and clippy is an extension of that. So I'm not really sure if "separation of concerns" is an issue here -- they're really the same concerns. While a lot of the clippy contributors are not well versed with compiler internals, the clippy maintainers all basically have to be, and we often have to dig deep into compiler changes to make stuff work with nightlies.

<comment><USER6> I don't see any reason why a set of stable APIs couldn't be defined, after all other languages do have them for the same purpose as clippy, e.g. Go vet, .NET Roslyn....

<comment><USER8> A set of stable APIs could be defined, but it would probably remove some of the more powerful lints in clippy.

You have the same issue with clang -- libclang is stable, but a lot of the plugins use the unstable clang plugin API.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is an excellent blog post - thanks a lot for writing it up. Solid use cases defined, I particularly enjoyed how you dealt with the shortcomings of joining a relatively young language.

The 'belligerent refactoring' resonated with me - I have worked on untyped and statically typed codebases of varying sizes and when making huge changes there is no better tool for me personally than an expressive type system.

</comment><comment><USER12> Given the use case described for OneSignal and the enumerated benefits gained from Rust contrasted against the difficulties... I'm curious why Erlang/Elixir + Dialyzer wasn't considered or used?

We're starting to use Rust for static binary quasi-safety-critical applications, but communication/control-plane stuff like what's described at OneSignal we've found is much easier w/ Erlang.

<comment><USER3> We actually did consider them briefly. The problem in this case was having zero in-house knowledge about the technologies nor anybody particularly experienced with FP. We did not want to take on that much risk.

<comment><USER12> You started with experienced Rust people?

Where'd you find them? I'd _love_ to find a vein of them to mine over time. :-)

<comment><USER13> Post in HN's "Who's hiring". Rust being constantly on the front page seems to be a good indication that there are many people here who are interested in the language.

<comment><USER14> Indeed - I write things in Rust on my own time and enjoy doing it so much that I'd consider "come write Rust" to be a big, big positive differentiator between jobs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I think OneSignal will benefit immensely once Hyper lands async support in an upcoming release. I know this is an immature side of Rust but there is a lot of inertia behind async libraries right now.

<comment><USER3> We're definitely looking forward to the tokio-based version of Hyper async. In case it wasn't clear from the post, we are actually using the unreleased async version of Hyper (powered by mio/rotor) today.

<comment><USER16> You could switch to the tokio branch of hyper, my understanding is that it's pretty much stable, just waiting on the final tweaks before the impending release of tokio 0.1. We're so close...

<comment><USER3> I'm still a bit hesitant to pick up tokio and tokio-hyper so soon. We've got a lot of production miles on the current async client - on the order of billions of HTTP requests. Qualifying the new hyper code for production use will take some time. There's also still some discussion on the tokio issue tracker about problems with panicking; we'll probably wait until that category of issue is resolved before diving in.

<comment><USER16> That is super, super fair. :) I'm just incredibly excited for this release, almost as much as I am for Rust 1.15 generally. It's a good year so far...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Nice read. Apart from the excellent writing I also think the interactive diagram was really cool!

<comment><USER3> Thank you for the compliments! I'm especially glad you like the diagram.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> How does OneSignal make money? Since the pricing is free, i'm not sure how it will sustain itself after the vc chest dries.

<comment><USER19> Wet blanket! The rust will sustain them!

<comment><USER20> What does the expression 'Wet blanket!' mean?

<comment><USER21> It generally refers to something that ruins a happy/good situation -- like throwing a cold wet blanket on someone out on a summer day.

<comment><USER20> Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Every time I read "Rust tooling is weak" I'm sure in following lines I will not find words about IDEA plugin (powerful and with regular updates) and Cargo (with a lot of builtin features, such as testing). Rust tooling promotion is weak, not tooling itself.

<comment><USER6> Still has a bit of catch up to do, compared with what I enjoy daily in Java and .NET projects.

Right now my biggest pain, are the compilation times, specially seeing cargo compiling multiple times the same crates instead of reusing the already binary compiled libraries.

Unless there is some magic cargo incantation I am missing.

<comment><USER22> Cargo doesn't recompile all crates on each iteration, you are missing something definitely. It only recompiles changed code. Or if rustc/cargo version has been changed.

"a bit of catch up" is one thing, not mentioning most powerful IDE plugin is another.

<comment><USER6> This is not what I see, I imagine you are talking inside one single project, while I mean across all Rust applications I might have available.

1 - Get Project A

2 - Crate X gets compiled as one of the dependencies

3 - Get Project B

4 - Crate X gets compiled _again_ as one of the dependencies

I usually see this when compiling all the VSCode related projects during new Rust releases.

Could the reason be that Crate X on Project A and Project B isn't the same version?

Where are the binary rlib visible to all cargo projects stored? I could only find text versions zipped together.

I haven't checked this deeply yet, just seeing "Compiling crate X" multiple times isn't fun.

<comment><USER22> All projects are independent and binaries are stored in "target" folder. It's a good thing. Even libs nominally same versions can have different source code and dependencies (because of "replace" or vendoring).

<comment><USER6> No, it is not a good thing. It is a waste of my development time that I could use for productive work.

On other AOT compiled languages that I use at work, I can reuse binaries across projects, including the languages Rust intends to replace.

It is a hard sell, if using Rust means having to spend more time compiling than even with C++ (specially now that modules are finally coming, at least for us with VC++).

<comment><USER22> For me is a good thing, because, as I explained, version number is not a guarantee.

<comment><USER6> So, than cargo needs to be improved so that there is a set of dependency values (name, version, rustc version, etc) that can guarantee the uniqueness of a binary library.

To me it seems FOSS undervalues the value of binary libraries in the enterprise, or how they get used in many corporations or companies selling components.

Rust improved safety is a good thing™, but not at the expense of continuously seeing the same libraries being compiled over and over, vs reusing binary artifacts across projects.

<comment><USER22> Cargo needs to be improved, here I agree :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> >Languages like Go make it too easy to ignore errors.

What? I've almost exclusively heard the opposite: Go makes error handling _too_ in-your-face. People don't like writing "if err != nil" constantly.

>Finally, the developer leading the effort had experience and a strong preference for Rust. There are plenty of technologies that would have met our requirements, but deferring to a personal preference made a lot of sense. Having engineers excited about what they are working on is incredibly valuable.

I wish it were more acceptable to admit this instead of having to half-assedly argue that your favorite language just so happens to be a perfect fit for the problem. There's no shame in simply using the language you're most proficient in. Practically speaking, language choice is only a problem for large teams or for projects with language-specific requirements.

<comment><USER3> > What? I've almost exclusively heard the opposite: Go makes error handling > too in-your-face. People don't like writing "if err != nil" constantly.

Do you actually have to look at the value you err, or can you just pretend like it's not there? (genuinely asking, I thought it was the latter).

> I wish it were more acceptable to admit this instead of having to half- > assedly argue that your favorite language just so happens to be a perfect > fit for the problem.

This is one of the reasons we felt it important to mention. Rather than demand purely technical motivations, we choose to acknowledge the human aspects of software engineering as well.

<comment><USER24> > > > Languages like Go make it too easy to ignore errors.

> > What? I've almost exclusively heard the opposite: Go makes error handling > too in-your-face. People don't like writing "if err != nil" constantly.

> Do you actually have to look at the value you err, or can you just pretend > like it's not there? (genuinely asking, I thought it was the latter).

While Go may not have all the capabilities Rust has at forcing error inspection, it really isn't in the class of languages that "make it too easy to ignore errors". I agree that a lot of it is convention, but multi-value returns, usage of named variables and good practices in the base libs (flowing upwards) can't place it in the realm of easily ignoring errors.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> > To get the same effect in a dynamic language, one would need to load this > dictionary out of Redis and write a bunch of boilerplate to validate that > the returned fields are correct.

How is this not what serde does internally? I could certainly imagine a nice library for a dynamic language that has a roughly equivalent API.

<comment><USER3> It's essentially what serde is doing internally. As an author, you don't have to do any of the work, though. I struggle to imagine how a dynamic language could provide equivalent functionality without the call side becoming more complex.

<comment><USER25> See the sibling comment for an example. I really don't see the challenge here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> This is an amazing postmortem--thanks for posting it! I'm really happy to hear about your success with Rust!

</comment><comment><USER27> I'm always excite to hear about companies who are using rust in production. OneSignal team has done an excellent job to bring out the strengths and weaknesses. Would like to know more about the Unit Testing practices that OneSignal and others follow.

BTW - I have all the motivation now to plunge into the rust-world

</comment><comment><USER28> > This wasn't something we anticipated up front, but build times have become > onerous for us. A build from scratch now falls into the category of "go make > coffee and play some ping-pong." Recompiling a couple of changes isn't > exactly quick either.

Rust should really address the top problem with C++ which is slow build times.

<comment><USER29> Slow build times are a problem for C++, but there are bigger ones yet. Like the reliance on textual inclusion and the preprocessor instead of an actual module system. It has massive second and third order effects on tooling, code sharing, and community building.

Incidentally, a module system will help with build times, but that's only one of the benefits.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Since someone from the company seems to post here:

I'm curios: this looks like a perfect use case for Apache Kafka.

Did you evaluate it?

</comment><comment><USER31> why are you using a language specific connection pooler (r2d2).

why not something like pgbouncer?

this is similar to the java approach of building connection pooling into the application itself using jdbc.

<comment><USER3> We use PgBouncer as well. It's still useful to have a connection pooler within the application for ensuring connections are still good, reconnecting as needed, and making it easy to check out a connection.

<comment><USER31> that has not worked out well for me in the java world - one connection pooler connecting to another one. unless one of them has ultimate control on timeouts and eviction.

I'm actually very intrigued on if you are seeing actual benefits using r2d2 ... or would using only pgbouncer make it just as efficient.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Overall impression after reading this article: using Rust is painful and risky, and author is thinking often about Go.

There is huge advantage, not mentioned in article: when code has a lot of work with multithreaded tasks, race-conditions bugs will bite you sooner or later, and they will bite very very painful. They are hard to detect, very hard to reproduce and it takes long time to fix them. Rust is immune to race- conditions, and it's really awesome and enough reason to use it in apps like this.

<comment><USER32> > Rust is immune to race-conditions

Safe Rust guarantees no _data races_, but not race conditions in general.[1]

[1] [https://doc.rust-lang.org/nomicon/races.html](https://doc.rust- lang.org/nomicon/races.html)

<comment><USER22> thanks for correction.</comment></comment></comment>


So You Sold Your Company For Millions, What Next? - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/so_you_sold_your_company_for_millions.php <comment><USER2> Step 1) Profit

Step 2) ???

Wait.. what?

<comment><USER3> Step 2) Invest and repeat

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> execute and repeat.</comment>


Sell your JSON, Story or Markdown with MRTbrls. - <AUTHOR> http://mrtbrls.com/

<comment><USER2> This may be hard to hear, but you need to change the name. It's horrible.

Everything about the service (site, explainer video, etc) screams high-quality except for the name. I know there are reasons you're holding on to it, but it will eventually need to go if you're going to make the service successful, so the sooner you do it, the better. Good luck.</comment>


The Bug Count Also Rises - <AUTHOR> http://www.workpump.com/bugcount/bugcount.html <comment><USER2> One thing to note is that RAID here is probably referring to Microsoft's internal bug-tracking tool, not to an array of hard disks. That caused me some confusion the first time I read it.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't get it. Is there some cultural context I'm missing?

<comment><USER4> Its internal MSFT humor from the 90s. RAID is the bug database in use at the time.

Triage was a harrowing time at the end of a 3 year release cycle where you make agonizing decisions about which bugs you will NOT fix. Always sad when its your baby that's going to be shipping with a wart, however a bug fix usually introduces an average of 0.25 new bugs so you have to stop somewhere.

If you never worked on traditional shrink wrapped software you may not get a feel for the agony that was triage. I still my remember my first WF (won't fix) bug, which is still there to this day. The worst part about it was you usually already had a fix in hand.

These meetings could get tense at times. Yelling and angry exits weren't uncommon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Laughed out loud. Going to print it out.</comment>