Qualcomm and Apple agree to drop all litigation - <AUTHOR> https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2019/04/qualcomm-and-apple-agree-to-drop-all-litigation/ <comment><USER2> Notes:

\- Apple pays Qualcomm a one time payment, no word on the size

\- Qualcomm is up almost 18% while apple is flat which tells you who this affected more

\- ends all ongoing litigation

\- 6 year license and global patent license agreement that can be extended

 __NOTE __global license here is important as there was talk of just a US based agreement before

\- new chipset supply agreement so don't look for Apple designed chipsets just yet

\- Qualcomm might be finally done with litigation. China fined it $975M and Korea hit it with an $865M fine. Though to be fair, both countries are hardly neutral in this and its very reasonable to see these fines as a form of tariffs to help their own domestic companies

\- wasn't a court ordered agreement which means both sides came together to make this and it wasn't forced on them by the courts.

\- Qualcomm reported incremental EPS of $2 on its website, that's a fair bit so this is probably a win for Qualcomm in the short term, note this doesn't mean its bad for apple.

\- bring on the 5G iPhones now, perhaps this makes Samsung the biggest loser out of this as apple is now ready for the nextgen cell service and Qualcomm is no longer negotiation from a position of weakness

\- QCOM's licensing model lives on, good for them, makes them a big takeout target now, could see $100 QCOM in that case, its at $70 now and was $57 at the start of the day.

<comment><USER3> I'm guessing the one time payment might be of large enough size that analysts could figure it out based on quarterly statements, but I'm curious what the patent royalty agreement looks like.

For Apple, I'm sure they'll still a) work on designing their own modems and b) source modems from Intel.

<comment><USER4> > b) source modems from Intel.

This settlement does not say good things about Intel's progress on 5G.

<comment><USER3> Yep. I'd guess that they continue to source LTE modems from them, however.

<comment><USER5> All of their LTE modems, or just some of them like previous years?

<comment><USER3> My bet would be they diversify their sourcing, if they can. In the FTC case Apple stated that they wanted to buy 4G modems from Qualcomm, but Qualcomm refused unless they were exclusive.

But who knows what the terms of the deal are.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I sure hope Apple puts Qualcomm modems back into iPhone. The Intel ones are inferior in nearly every way.

I live in a poor reception area. With an iPhone + Intel modem, iOS reports 0 signal. With an iPhone + Qualcomm modem, I do get enough of a signal to make calls and receive SMS.

Unfortunately, WiFi calling on iOS has also gone downhill in recent years (ATT & VZW). It seems as though I have to have a bar or 2 of a signal for WiFi calling to work. If I have no cell signal, WiFi calling connects/disconnects every few minutes, even if I'm in the middle of a call.

<comment><USER7> Not saying I disagree with you but, anecdata: n=1

<comment><USER8> Yeah could be the antenna or something else that is making the difference.

<comment><USER9> I have no idea if it _is_ the antenna, but if so it certainly wouldn't be the first time for Apple.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Self-interest mandated this resolution. Both companies were risking more than they stood to gain by winning their various suits.

Who nominally 'won' will depend on whether Apple is paying what it considers reasonable royalties going forward and whether the patent agreements allow it to utilize Qualcomm's IP in their own chipsets.

If Qualcomm has given up on tying patents to chips then it has effectively lost. If they can maintain that position with everyone but Apple, they'll probably be OK with the outcome.

Apple was forced to the table by its partner (Intel) being unable to supply 5G in a timely manner, so it may very well had to give up more than it otherwise would have.

<comment><USER11> >If Qualcomm has given up on tying patents to chips then it has effectively lost. If they can maintain that position with everyone but Apple, they'll probably be OK with the outcome.

Apple now has a direct license with Qualcomm. The arrangement before that was only the contract manufacturers had a license with them. It seems very likely that the patents and chips got unbundled (at least for Apple).

The FTC case still seems like the main risk to their business model.

<comment><USER12> Since Apple was the major leverage for this case, I'd speculate that Apple could apply that same leverage to get the US FTC to settle.

<comment><USER11> I don't see why it's in Apple's interest to get the FTC to settle.

<comment><USER13> Because this might have been one of the terms of the deal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> 4G/LTE cellular baseband and RF is very hard to get right. Optimizing its power consumption for different scenarios is very very very hard to get right. The 4G graveyard is littered with companies that have tried and failed. TI. Agere. Infineon. Renseas (Nokia). Broadcom. Intel. All these have over time shut down their cellular baseband divisions. They've all released chipsets that work. But none have got the performance-power equation right. Phones built with their modems have all been battery drains that can't get you through the day if 4G is turned on. Qualcomm is the only supplier to consistently get this right.

<comment><USER15> Infineon not exactly... Intel's 5G chips were being developed by the former Infineon Wireless Solutions unit, which was bought by Intel.

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> It sounds like Apple had deliberately embarked upon a legal Denial Of Service attack. Qualcom produced documents [0] showing that apple actually had a plan to weaken Qualcom over a 5 years period, a plan that included forcing them into extensive litigation on multiple fronts.

I imagine the revelation of such a document played a significant part in driving Qualcom to settle. That, and their own suit which basically said, "Qualcom's licensing, that we agreed to, isn't _fair_ " (yes, I know that drastically over simplifies the issue, but it is the crux of a portion of the dispute)

[0] [https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/04/16/apple-q...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/04/16/apple- qualcomm-face-off-epic-courtroom-drama/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cc36c11d97c3)

<comment><USER17> I think the more charitable interpretation would be "We have realized that Qualcomm's licensing, that we agreed to, isn't _legal_." From what I understand Apple's argument has essentially been that they don't _need_ to license the technology from Qualcomm due to having an implicit license via extinguishment at the level of their suppliers. Put that way it becomes "Qualcomm has lied and tried to trick us into paying for something we already had rights to." There's still an outstanding court case to settle this and from what I understand the pretrial judgement is not favorable to Qualcomm.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> On the surface, this looks more positive to QCOM. However, I feel a good long term play for APPL would be to negotiate a cap on royalties for all LTE shipments through litigation like this, then fade in their own silicon in some developing markets whilst keeping their eye on 5G deployments using modems from the best vendor(s).

My 2 cents.

<comment><USER19> FWIW, Apple's stock symbol is AAPL.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I will definitely be refreshing my iPhone in 2020 to get back on a Qualcomm modem. In my area the difference was very apparent when I replaced a damaged same generation phone and the radio changed to Intel.

</comment><comment><USER21> Note that this is good not only for Apple, but the agreement also stops Qualcomm litigation against Apple's contract manufacturers (Foxconn, Pegatron, Wistron, and Compal). This helps Apple immensely by steadying their supply chain.

</comment><comment><USER22> Wow. I suppose Qualcomm will be the 5G modem supplier then? Stunning turn of events. I thought the relationship was broken beyond repair. Great for consumers though. I've been frustrated with the Intel modem on my phone.

<comment><USER23> Especially considering Apple's hiring of baseband chip engineers...

<comment><USER24> They might still develop their own baseband eventually, intermittently using Qualcomm to get to 5G.

<comment><USER25> Apple has a lot of other devices besides phones that use cellular networks.

I wonder if you just care about data and not voice, how much of this quagmire you can avoid? Ipads, watches, maybe Airs with data only chips, that'd be a lot of chips.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Charlie from semiaccurate has been following the story for a while:

(2017) [https://semiaccurate.com/2017/11/06/qualcomm-opens-apple- leg...](https://semiaccurate.com/2017/11/06/qualcomm-opens-apple-legal- filing/)

(2019) [https://semiaccurate.com/2019/04/16/qualcomm-just-beat- apple...](https://semiaccurate.com/2019/04/16/qualcomm-just-beat-apple-into- sumbission/)

That's also the reason why Intel is quitting 5G modems

</comment><comment><USER27> What a shame. Qualcomm's business practices are ludicrously bad. But it seems Apple has no alternatives. In 7 years I predict they are making their own modems.

</comment><comment><USER28> I'm surprised that this news didn't impact Intel at all, good or bad, since they were also a big part of this whole issue.

Does anyone have insight into why that is?

</comment><comment><USER29> My god, it's 2019. I can't believe QCOM and APPL were still ligitating this. How many years of lawsuits and counter-lawsuits has it been? I bet their lawyers are some of the happiest people of this decade.

</comment><comment><USER30> QCOM ended the day up 23.21% whilst AAPL was essentially flat for the day, high of USD $201.35 closing at $199.25 so normal trading variance.

It appears that QCOM got the better end of this deal.

Does anyone know of the $2 EPS [1] is due to the one-time payment or an annual EPS from the ongoing patent royalties?

[1] [https://investor.qualcomm.com/static- files/3cb803e8-fc20-4ec...](https://investor.qualcomm.com/static- files/3cb803e8-fc20-4ec6-87e2-7af6f6936e2c)

<comment><USER31> The market is stupid. They have valuated Apple under Amazon, now Apple is over Amazon and Microsoft.

How stupid is that?

<comment><USER30> Why is it stupid? Apple made 8x more profit than Amazon and 2.4x more profit than Microsoft.

It deserves to be worth more and still has the lowest P/E ratio of all major tech companies (5.7x lower than AMZN).

If you think something is undervalued, buy it.

<comment><USER31> It's stupid because the market valuated AAPL at about $150 three months ago, and now is about $150.

That stupid.

BTW, I say the market is stupid because I bought AAPL shares January 28th (a monday), and I've bet the market ever since, I've beat SP500, DOW, I've won AMZN, MSFT, GOOG, everything. I even won Warren Buffet.

And I'm selling now, because the market is also predictable.

I have no words for it, they do as they are told by the news. I do the contrary, this is a warning sign for me, I might miss 10%-20%, but it doesn't matter, 30% is good enough and not worth the risk.

<comment><USER32> So you beat the market for a total of... Two and a half months?

Your arrogance is pretty typical of people investing for the first time. It's like buying a scratch off and saying, "Only an idiot doesn't know where to scratch!"

It's your prerogative if you want to believe that the market is stupid/predictable, or that you can invest better than people with billions of dollars in resources, but just ask yourself this: Why are you succeeding where others aren't?

<comment><USER31> > So you beat the market for a total of... Two and a half months?

I've been beating the market for quite some time.

Looks like the market doesn't go your favor. It went mine, so I'm right.

The market is stupid, the proof is that a company's value doesn't change in a question of months, but stock does.

> It's your prerogative if you want to believe that the market is > stupid/predictable, or that you can invest better than people with billions > of dollars in resources, but just ask yourself this: Why are you succeeding > where others aren't?

Because very few of us are smart, and not me, because I'm small, but the big ones are controlling many dumb ones that believe the rhetoric they read anywhere online and for free. Specially the bots.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Interestingly there hasn't been a huge shaekup in share price for companies like Qorvo whose parts are only found in the Intel model, not in the Qualcomm builds.

</comment><comment><USER34> So will 5G make it to September's iPhone?

5 months isn't normally anywhere near enough to integrate a new baseband chip and still get to market...

<comment><USER35> Given Intel's recent demo of 6 ghz wifi, September's phone will probably have 4g cell but wifi 6 radios.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I always wonder how much do the lawyers make whenever litigations like this are on-going. Easily a few millions ?

<comment><USER37> I suspect the lawyers are on payroll

<comment><USER38> Some are for sure, but this kind of stuff often requires specialization which may not be in house. Also often you want a second opinion from outside legal counsel.

<comment><USER39> I'm sure both Apple and Qualcomm have large legal teams experienced in this kind of litigation.

<comment><USER40> I'm sure those teams often ask for outside help. I know the corporate lawyers I've talked to (mandatory legal training...) have told me about sitting in a trial watching as the outside lawyers he hired for the case did the actual arguments in court.

<comment><USER41> Both sides employ outside counsel. They're large multinational law firms that charge a high hourly rate (high 3-figures to 4-figures depending on the seniority of the attorneys).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Sorry if this is a naive question: Any chance we'll ever know how much Apple paid Qualcomm? How open are the books of each company? _Can_ a public company settle a suit without revealing the terms?

<comment><USER43> EPS increase of $2 [https://investor.qualcomm.com/static- files/3cb803e8-fc20-4ec...](https://investor.qualcomm.com/static- files/3cb803e8-fc20-4ec6-87e2-7af6f6936e2c)

<comment><USER42> Thanks! That's useful. Although I assume it aggregates the settlement payment and some other payments associated with the new agreement. (Although, I guess you could call the whole package the settlement?)

I guess I'm just looking for the amount of money Apple agreed to pay—beyond the value of services/chips they will receive—in order to settle this lawsuit. If the accounting can be done that way.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Does this mean the next iPhone iteration will use Qualcomm's modem?

<comment><USER45> 2020 maybe. 2019 models are surely already fixed on the hardware side

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> How is the market pricing this if the quantum has not been disclosed?

</comment><comment><USER47> How much insider trading happened today.</comment>


The Reg A+ Bombshell: $50M Equity Crowdfunding - <AUTHOR> http://www.seedinvest.com/blog/regulation-a-equity-crowdfunding-rules/

<comment><AUTHOR> This looks like this could be a big deal. Kickstarter would be a lot more fair and more compelling if the backers were also investors, and could get a piece of the upside when helping to support development for a risky product. And it makes a lot of sense that consumers should be investors, since they often know the space better than a VC.

My immediate concern is that these rules look somewhat complicated. What will it mean to have to file a modified version of an S-1? How much will compliance cost when trying to go this route? Maybe there will be an enterprising YC company that help with Reg A+ compliance automation...?

</comment><comment><USER2> Reg A may even be better than Title III because it's about allowing the public to invest _alongside_ sophisticated investors into large deals.</comment>


India's tech industry panics over U.S. plans to change high-skilled visas - <AUTHOR> http://money.cnn.com/2017/01/31/technology/india-h1b-visa-trump-tech-companies/index.html <comment><USER3> As an Indian who spent a lot of years on H1-B visa, I welcome this move. Though while talking about this subject, one should bear in mind that "Indians on H1-B" are not a homogeneous group.

There are those, employed by the likes of AmaGooFaceSoft / Unicorns or graduating from mid-top tier universities, who will benefit by the proposed changes and who were indeed the "target audience" in mind when H1-B was linked to "getting high skilled immigrants in the US".

Then there are those who are transferred here in bulk by TCS/Wipro/Infosys/TechMahindra, who are paid the minimum H1-B wage possible, who jump from client to client across different states every now and then (true first hand accounts of my close friends) - these people are still mostly happy (cannot generalize though) to have the opportunity to work in the US for a few years and save, considering Indian salaries back home. While the individuals in this category might be getting a better deal, overall they become a pawn in "gaming of H1-B system" by Indian outsourcing companies.

Auctioning H1-B visas based on salary is a step in generally right direction. It may hurt low-paying industries relying on H1-B, but we can assess the impact on them and implement targeted fixes later if needed.

<comment><USER4> I've never understood why it is okay for outsourcing companies to "own" HIB visa people. A colleague told me long ago that it was like indentured servitude unless/until you could escape to a regular company that was willing to sponsor.

<comment><USER5> Imagine living under the fear that your visa can be canceled the next business day and you have to leave US soon before you have enough time to make alternative plans. Especially when you are a newcomer in the USA, a overwhelmingly unknown land. If this happens, then you have I believe 30 days to find another company who is willing to sponsor you and then you have to go back to India to reapply for another H1-B visa with new employer. Also, your outsourcing company keep a close eye on you in terms of if you are job hunting, in some s=cases there is some sort of collateral kept backhome as well. Also, if you are an average skilled employee then you don't have much leverage to jump ships.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's about time.

Say what you will about Trump's other policies, but it's high time someone took an ax to the H-1B program. The level of abuse I've witnessed from it over the years is heinous; foreign workers essentially working as indentured servants, with the only beneficiaries being corporations using their cheap labor and the foreign consultancy firms that farm them out.

I'll be interested to see what changes get made to the program to move it back towards its intended purpose.

<comment><USER7> this culture of abusing your workers spills out into the US workforce as well. i've known people (us citizens) who have had to send lawyer letters to get their invoices paid by these consultancy firms, who aren't used to getting pushback from their servants. sometimes in the tens of thousands of dollars for high end work.

of course the bad behavior stops immediately when they get a nice little letter with an american law firm's name at the top of it.

they're scumbags.

<comment><USER8> Yeah ... these measures don't really address the underlying issue of scumbag executives. They're just going to find another way to pay for cheap labor, e.g., shifting revenue to countries with cheap labor. This move may actually expedite a major shift of software engineering to other countries. In turn, it could help improve other countries' infrastructure creating a positive feedback loop for outsourcing.

Unintended consequences caused by government regulation.

<comment><USER9> Actual offshoring is a lot more difficult to manage than H1B candidates who sit in your office.

For the former, the big names are well versed in churning out billable hours regardless of actual work performed. The 11-12 hour time difference can sometimes be a boon, but more often than not leads to both your remote and local employees being unhappy. Local employees because they're asked to stay late or come in early, and remote employees because access to transit is more difficult if only US business hours are an option.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Heh. Depends on which part of India you're referring to. The younger me would have found it more difficult to get foreign assignments that form the foundation for a lot of the house buying and marriage making here, but I think the slightly more experienced folks like present me welcome the change - <USER2> is the low end of the salary range I'd expect if I was going to jump countries with a family, and now I don't have to compete in a lottery with tens of thousands of fresh graduates wanting onsite assignments.

The bodyshops like TCS, CTS and Infy will suffer, though. Their exorbitant margins on shipping obedient and freshfaced barely-post-teenagers off to projects where they're mostly expected to punch the clock and do bits and pieces of what the Architect says / tech support are over. They'll survive, though - the Leads, Pricipals and Architects will just have to travel up and down a bit more. I expect they'll lay off a lot of people, though. And the long tail of salaries here will likely go down. But if there is an increase in off-site outsourcing, it'll balance things out. They'll just staff more people at the home base and freeze salary hikes citing this.

Dowries will also likely go down. There's going to be a sudden dearth of grooms with the cachet of foreign work experience and a cache of saved dollars. It's also possible that if this sticks a lot of the shady engineering colleges that have sprung up here like weeds will see reduced demand. Entry fees at medical colleges will probably spike.

<comment><USER11> These Indian body shops are the bane of my existence but I know a bunch of H1B holders that were FTEs and I would be horrified to lose them. I don't know what they get paid, but I know it's below the rate for non-Visa holders. If you're an architect in NYC (which a bunch of them are) they probably top the $130K margin, but a bunch definitely won't.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> ex-H1B Indian here, now permanent resident of Canada. Left US for good, because I was being exploited by tech firms taking advantage of my H1B status.

This is a welcome change in my opinion. H1B workers were exploited by the Indian body shops as well as American employers. Raising the minimum wages will prune the bad apples and make H1B a visa system for the truly skilled candidates.

Quirks:

1\. Find & shutdown fake employers running fake payrolls to match the increased wages. A search for *consulting.com will bring up many 'one-room' body shops in the US.

2\. Stop the lottery process and award visa to truly skilled candidates who can provide proofs for their skills.

3\. H1B LCA process should be changed and made similar to the PERM process, so that it will be a true test of the market.

4\. Giving preference to Master degree holders is not a good idea, having a Masters degree from an American University is not an indicator for "highly skilled". Most of the students from India obtain these Masters degree just for the purpose of getting an OPT visa to improve their chances of getting selected in the lottery for H1B.

Many of these 'master' degree holders show fake experiences & do 'proxy' interviews to get into companies. These fake experiences are backed up by experience letters from bogus companies setup for this purpose from India. Many of them also provide 'bonus' services like proxy candidate interview services on Skype.

5\. Stop 'future GC'. Many body shops in US do this by taking a huge deposit from the candidates for their 'future GC services'.

<comment><USER13> What is "future GC"? I googled it with success. Thanks.

<comment><USER13> I meant without success...

<comment> guard-of-terra I imagine that's Green Card.

<comment><USER13> Thanks you. Obvious now... (slapping forehead)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I actually think this will result in accelerating India's growth in the tech sector. There might be slight downturn in the shorter term for the services sector but this will be compensated by the product companies.

Once the above happens, I actually think it will have a net negative effect for the US tech sector. Yes you can still find the best engineers to come to the US, however once salaries start rising in the developing countries, people will not want to flock to the US.

A clear example is the aviation sector. Pilots from the developed countries flock to fly for the airlines in the Middle east and Asia. Look at Emirates, Etihad, Air Asia etc. Many of them are expat pilots.

<comment><USER15> This is because of the seniority system put in place by the unions. They pilots fly over seas as there are not a lot of jobs at major airlines flying the big planes domestically.

<comment><USER14> Yes there are not a lot of jobs because the airline sector doesn't have much growth in the US. Compare that with the the economies of developing countries, they are growing rapidly. Another example from India is Indigo (which is a major domestic airline) recently ordered close to 200 A320 airplanes which a massive bet on growth.

I would think the same thing will happen to the tech sector in the longer term where the demand and growth will go to Asia.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Trying to play a devil's advocate, I might be downvoted here right away. Disclosure: I am not going to be affected by this, but I do work in tech industry.

1\. With the decline of low-wage tech workers, where do you think the mundane/non-value added work they do will go? Not everything will/can be outsourced, and you don't want to your USD 130K employee to do that. There is a real scarcity of tech skilled workers in the US. This may be filled gradually in the future, but in the short-term, there will be some consequences.

2\. This will affect small companies, non-SF/NYC/Seattle area start-ups, and companies, non-tech companies. Not everyone can pay this salary. These businesses are not going out of their way to pay for H1Bs.

I may be wrong, and that's why I have a genuine question. Is there a credible research about the loss of jobs due to H1B and it is not just an availability heuristic? I agree that outsourcing causes loss of local jobs, but that is not what this is trying to solve.

<comment><USER17> "There is a real scarcity of tech skilled workers in the US."

That is a blatant falsehood it only exists due to "culture fit" where you can only hire a skilled tech worker if they're also a 20-something white male Stanford grad living in SV or maybe NYC.

Try just considering hiring a person of color or a woman. There's a hell of a lot of them, they're not much worse at their jobs than the young white boys, but on the coasts they are not allowed in the industry at this time.

No matter how far left wing tech people socially signal, that kind of person will never ever hire a woman or PoC. Yet here in the TrumpenReich rural heartland far from the coasts I've worked with a cool (South AFAIK) Korean dude and a Jamaican and I know some awesome female IT professionals.

If you want to hear about how great women and PoC are, you have to move to the coasts, but if you want to actually get a job with women and PoC you need to go right wing heartland, which sounds weird but is so true.

I live in one of the most segregated metro areas in the country far from the coasts, yet my neighborhood has a higher percentage of blacks than Google employees has a percentage of blacks. Huh. Klan-land is more diverse than coastal tech, you wouldn't guess that from how far left they talk.

I know I sound harsh but PoC and women are wasting their time trying to get jobs on the coasts; tech industry is far too racist and sexist to hire them. They can get jobs away from the coasts and in my experience they do really well.

My experience with decades of corporate speak indicates that corporations always talk the opposite of what they do. In the heartland we don't have "womens coding classes" and PoC outreach because we don't need them, instead of providing lip service we actually hire them instead.

<comment><USER18> > Try just considering hiring a person of color or a woman. There's a hell of > a lot of them, they're not much worse at their jobs than the young white > boys

Why do you believe women and minorities are worse workers than whites?

<comment><USER17> That was sarcasm. If read with an emphasis on the 'much' not the 'worse', even if you give the coastal tech employers the benefit of the doubt WRT the direction of the greater or less than symbol, the absolute value of the difference in performance observed has been unmeasurably small over the last couple decades.

The coasties seem to claim its just a cost of doing business that companies will fall apart if a woman is hired or a black is hired, but my personal experience far from the coasts is they do just fine.

I just find the whole situation comparing coastal culture and midwest development culture frustrating.

Endless coastal complaining about how there's a shortage of skilled employees, because they only hire 22 yr old white boys. The heartland away from the coasts is not experiencing that crippling lack of talent, because we don't have crippling levels of racism and sexism.

Endless self congratulatory crowing from the coasts about having outreach programs to get women and PoC into coding, not that it matters, because coastal tech companies only hire white men. Meanwhile they denigrate the heartland away from the coasts for not being liberal enough and not having enough "programs" to get women and PoC into coding, yet we have the only employers who actually hire women and PoC so we don't need the programs to being with!

There should be a bot on HN where any time someone complains about lack of skilled employees it replies with "STFU and hire some PoC and women instead of white frat boys"

<comment><USER19> So this is intriguing, I've never heard of the heartland as a great place for diversity. Do you have any evidence for this situation you describe?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> "Preference given to H1-Bs that pay the most".

Sounds like a win for workers all around.

<comment><USER21> What happens when the employers run a fake payroll to pay more money on paper but low in reality ?

<comment><USER22> This seems irrelevant to me. What's stopping them from doing that today?

<comment><USER10> The Justice Department, I suppose? [http://www.ndtv.com/indians-abroad/two- indian-americans-arre...](http://www.ndtv.com/indians-abroad/two-indian- americans-arrested-in-us-for-h1b-visa-fraud-1466742)

<comment><USER12> Just a drop in the ocean.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> This is actually a good step. Eliminate cost arbitrage as motive for hiring foreign workers. Hire to fill genuine gaps in the labor pool. I don't see any downside and I'm an Indian in the US.

<comment><USER24> I have 2 years exp in medium sized product company (which has global market) in India. I have developed iOS apps, react app, web app in django (basically full stack). have experience in python, java, javascript and swift.

I applied for few good colleges (UCSD, UT Austin, Carnige Mellon, GATech, Arizona state) to specialize in Machine Learning in US.

Should I change my plans (I have to spend anywhere from 40-90 lakh RS to get MS in these colleges), is 130,000 $ too high for guy with my profile to work in a good product based or research oriented companies in US after graduating?

<comment><USER12> ex-H1B here, You have good skills, once you graduate, you will have to depend on your luck to get into the H1B system currently.

Why don't you get MS from good universities in Canada and enter the express entry immigration system which values your skills unlike H1B system which depends on luck ?

<comment><USER25> Yeah Canada seems like a safer place for foreigners right now. US visas and even green cards are no longer worth as much because Trump has demonstrated he is willing to invalidate them at his whim.

Trump just now barred from entry (effectively deported) all visa holders (including H1-Bs) from 7 Muslim countries who happened to be outside the US for vacation when his Executive Order hit. He also tried to do the same to green card holders (but the courts stood up to him so he backpedaled).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I'm not sure I understand the outrage from India. If you look at their standards to receive a visa to work there:

The applicant should be a highly skilled and/or qualified professional being engaged or appointed by a company or organization or industry or undertaking in India on contract or an employment basis at a senior level, skilled position such as technical expert, senior executive, or in a managerial position, etc.

There should not be a qualified Indian available to do the job that the visa holder would be performing.

The employee's salary must be in excess of U.S. $25,000 per year (seems small until you put it in perspective: $3,168 is the average household income in India.)

Meaning it is almost 8x avg household income for a salary requirement in India. If you equate that to the us average household income of $51,939, the H1B should be at $402,000 here

</comment><comment><USER27> nobody is freaking out. Infosys and TCS are NOT India's representative companies anymore. They are the Flipkarts and the Olacabs and Paytms now. Or even Freshdesk, Zoho and Helpshift.

I think most people welcome the move - we have lost many good potential employees who were headhunted by outsourcing companies by showing them the American dream and then chained to the yoke in some dreadful job.

The services business is not going to be affected that much - most of the work was happening onshore in India anyway. This is a delta of a billion dollars at worst. In the long run, this is going to be much better for both economies.

<comment><USER28> Infosys has market cap 34b, Flipkart valuation is tumbling and now at 5b.

While not as cool as startups, Infosys and TCS are still much bigger and more stable companies.

<comment><USER27> by that measure all other startups suck and only microsoft or yahoo/alibaba is worth anything.

I'm talking about aspirational reach - a H1B+TCS is not aspirational anymore.

<comment><USER29> Sorry. That companies you mentioned are cool and hip not because they are great but because VC's are currently pumping money into them through a firehose.

Let the tide die. These companies aren't even a shred of dust compared to operational, financial and execution discipline of outsourcing firms.

My guess is round about the next US recession most of that start up people will do anything for a job in outsourcing firms just to keep them fed and pay their bills.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> 130k is indeed too high. To fight the most egregious abusers 100k would have been enough. Not everybody works in Silicon Valley IT, and even there the indian bodyshops offered only <50K for the H1-B abusers.

Many other industries rely on foreign talent, and many cannot pay 130k, but 100k would be fine IMHO.

<comment><USER31> 130K in Kansas City >> 130K in SF. Hope they take geography into consideration.

<comment><USER32> Why? This is great for programmers in areas like KC.

<comment><USER33> Are there _any_ programmers earning 130K in KC? Depending on where you are in the country, the new H1-B pay floor may be above the local pay ceiling for non-managerial positions.

<comment><USER32> I'm sure there are a few but isn't that the point? If all the H1B's are in CA/NY/WA maybe KC (and cities like it) will become more attractive to programmers as they raise their wages.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Considering that foreign counties are providing free tuition to qualifying students and then sending them here to get better paying jobs, I can only be supportive. Although, in the long run I'd prefer to see tuition be free at public schools here as well.

We seem to have gotten things all around ass backwards these days. We get high-end candidates from Asia and low-end candidates from Mexico, so Americans are being squeezed on both ends.

<comment><USER25> No such thing as "free tuition", it's just paid through taxes instead of through student fees.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> CNN now uses words like "freak out" for their headlines? Amazing.

</comment><comment><USER36> here's the actual draft of the executive order: [https://cdn0.vox- cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/7872567/P...](https://cdn0.vox- cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/7872567/Protecting_American_Jobs_and_Workers_by_Strengthening_the_Integrity_of_Foreign_Worker_Visa_Programs.0.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER37> 130K is far too high in my opinion. Maybe that would be reasonable in Silicon Valley but nowhere else. This policy should account for the cost of living of where the businesses are located. A large amount of businesses will not be able to afford employees at that proposed salary - even the if the potential employees are highly skilled.

<comment><USER38> I used to work in mid-west tech and 130k was something a development manager would get which was was 4 levels above an entry level engineer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Zero-sum for Indian IT firms [https://qz.com/899306/will-the-h-1b-be-worth-it- for-indian-i...](https://qz.com/899306/will-the-h-1b-be-worth-it-for-indian- it-firms-if-the-us-overhauls-its-work-visa-programs/)

</comment><comment><USER39> Indian IT firms are making money by selling software engineers, not software to US;

</comment><comment><USER40> I think it will affect US more in negative way. I may be wrong but it's my perspective. The companies will do more outsourcing and the companies like TCS, Infy will not bring people in US. We are living in communication age and their is nothing can be done remotely. So why I need to pay double when I can do same work with 1/4 of salary.Many captive companies already sending less people to US.

In other words US will get less talent and less benefit of talented engineers from India, China. More and more work go outside the more loss of US.

</comment><comment><USER21> On the long term this will help Indians even more and various US businesses might be willing to outsource even more operations out of USA to India.

<comment><USER41> People have been saying this ever since late 90's. Is there any specific evidence that tighter visa rules result in more outsourcing?

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Is "freaks out" really appropriate for a news piece title? Did a seventeen year old girl write this? Yikes.

<comment><USER43> I don't mind critiques of language formality or effectiveness, etc, but no need to police or denigrate young women. Keep misogyny out of it.

<comment><USER44> Are you not the one dragging mysogyny into the conversation? There's nothing wrong with a 17 year old speaking in this fashion and GP didn't say there was. They only said journalists shouldn't.

They also implied it's more commonly found among females. Again, only a comment on what they perceive; there's nothing illegal or unexpected with a 17 year old saying "like, omg, freaks out".</comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft uses malware tactics to foist Windows 10 on more PCs - <AUTHOR> http://www.smh.com.au/technology/gadgets-on-the-go/microsoft-uses-malware-tactics-to-foist-windows-10-on-more-pcs-20160524-gp355z.html <comment><USER2> My in-law's laptop "upgraded to Win 10 all by itself" last week (that's how they described it), and I can only suppose that one of them closed the nagging pop up, unknowingly triggering the update.

After rebooting, neither the keyboard nor the trackpad would work. I had a spare USB keyboard (no mouse), and I managed to delete the faulty drivers, which were replaced on reboot by valid ones (the bad drivers were reported as 'up to date', so updating wouldn't do it).

Disabling all the spyware features with only a keyboard during the post- install setup wasn't fun. Thankfully, the device manager is still his old Win95 self, and I could easily navigate through it even though I haven't owned a Windows machine since XP.

I learned after the fact that refusing the User Agreement would revert to the previous version of the OS. I wish I had known that before finalizing the impromptu upgrade.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm just waiting for the day when Microsoft moves on to subscription based service. Basically I'm assuming that they want their win10 user base high enough and then one day they say "we changed our licensing policy to subscription based" and then everyone has no choice but to pay $20 or whatever every month or be locked out from their machines. There's probably some small print in the win10 EULA that conveniently allows them to move onto this model under the ruse of "rolling releases"

<comment><USER4> I expect they won't do that until Win10 is an established rolling release OS. I also expect they will wait until after Windows 7 is no longer supported (2020) and Win10 has over 50% share. Also, I bet it will be rolled into Office365 subscription. People who have Office365 get recommended and security updates for Win10 for FREE! Such a good deal! You get office, and 1TB online storage for just $10/month!

If they can convert 50% of Win10 users (.625/1.25 billion) to subscription that's $6.25 billion / month or $75 billion / year. Their yearly revenue for 2015 was $93.6 billion. With a billion people (their stated goal for Win10) on a subscription model for $12/mo that is +50% yearly revenue -- enormous growth for such a large company. I do not doubt that is the end goal.

EDIT: "current count" of 1.25 billion windows machines was an estimate by business insider from 2011.

<comment><USER5> I understand the reason the upgrade is free is to rather move to an ad supported service.

<comment><USER6> For now, yes. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a "Windows Premium Edition" that's subscription based to remove the ads in the next few years. They can test the water with that, then start adding exclusive features to the paid version over time.

<comment><USER5> I agree. But I would expect Windows Pro to be that edition. The "pro" doesn't stand for much right now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I just restored one of my neighbour's computers to life after it 'suddenly stopped working, it only shows a black screen with a mouse pointer'. The last thing the thing - which runs Windows 7 - had done was try to install KB3035583, the 'get Windows 10 now or die trying' version. It died.

After restoring Windows' messed-up intestines the machine booted up again. I'd removed all traces of KB3035583 in the hope that this neighbour - a farmer's wife in her 60s - would not be bothered again, nor tricked into 'upgrading'. Being the wise person I am I decided to keep the machine in quarantine for another day, just to make sure Microsoft would not come up with yet another way to foist this miscarriage of an operating system onto hapless users' machines. And, lo and behold, the next day I was greeted by yet another 'update', also summarily hidden and scrubbed, but still... I do these people a favour in helping them with technical stuff, but I don't want to become a full-time guardian. If this keeps up I'll just put some form of Linux on the thing and be done with it, all she uses it for is some light web browsing and mail-related stuff anyway.

To paraphrase a well-known quote, the harder Microsoft pushes, the more users will slip through their fingers and move to better pasture. That they don't realise this is something of a mystery to me.

<comment><USER8> > If this keeps up I'll just put some form of Linux on the thing and be done > with it, all she uses it for is some light web browsing and mail-related > stuff anyway.

Why wait?

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm seeing this story in several places, so I'm going to go with the smoke==fire assessment, but can anyone confirm? I hate to pull the [citation needed] card, but this sounds beneath even the Microsoft of the 90s. And if it's true? OMG, today's "open source, and Linux, and ponies!" Microsoft is demonstrating worse behavior than the "convicted abusive monopolist" Microsoft, IMO.

<comment><USER10> [https://support.microsoft.com/en- us/kb/3095675](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3095675)

This notification means your Windows 10 upgrade will occur at the time indicated, unless you select either Upgrade now or "Click here to change upgrade schedule or cancel scheduled upgrade". If you click on OK or on the red "X", you're all set for the upgrade and there is nothing further to do.

<comment><USER9> Wow, from their very own docs, huh? I was never a huge fan of some of Microsoft's patterns even when I worked there, but this is a new low in my eyes.

<comment><USER11> Asking users to actually read something and not just blindly dismiss it is a new low?

<comment><USER10> From the linked article:

If you're determined to avoid Windows 10 you've simply closed that pop-up by clicking the little X in the top right corner, _by now it 's probably second nature._ This week Microsoft took advantage of this by changing the pop-up so that clicking the X to close it implies your consent to upgrade, tricking even more people into installing Windows 10 against their wishes.

<comment><USER11> I doubt it's the same pop-up. This one specifically states: 'Based on your update settings you're scheduled to upgrade on ...'. Just closing the pop-up wouldn't change this fact. Can't really empathise with people complaining about this.

<comment><USER10> It isn't the same popup, because Microsoft has continually changed it over the past year. They have done everything they can to ignore and circumvent user preferences during this whole process.

It started with OK and cancel, then changed to Upgrade Now and Upgrade Later, with the close button being the only way to decline. Now it is being pushed as an automatic upgrade with a deliberately small and unobtrusive cancel link instead of a prominent button. Also, if you are away from your PC, it will happen automatically.

Look at their own UI guidelines: [https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/dn7...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/dn742499\(v=vs.85\).aspx)

Dialog boxes always have a Close button.

Don't disable the Close button. Having a Close button helps users stay in control by allowing them to close windows they don't want.

The Close button on the title bar should have the same effect as the Cancel or Close button within the dialog box. Never give it the same effect as OK.

Also, read this: [http://blog.ultimateoutsider.com/2015/11/the-gwx-control- pan...](http://blog.ultimateoutsider.com/2015/11/the-gwx-control-panel-faq- frequently.html)

It does seem that, on more than a few occasions, Microsoft has gone out of its way to bypass workarounds people have found that disable the GWX app, from resetting registry settings to re-releasing KBs that were explicitly declined and hidden by users.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The guys at MSFT just don't give a fuck... I wonder what are their plans with W10 and the next versions. It seems it is mandatory for them that everybody moves to W10, the question is why ? what is MSFT strategy for the next 5/10 years when it comes to Windows ? A closed system like the Xbox ?

<comment><USER13> To get Microsoft-owned media content in front of more eyeballs. This is what Google (indirectly) did with Android, and what Yahoo wish it could do to shore up its declining share of consumers of its content.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I thought I was the only one! My gaming PC hooked up to our living room TV has nagged about the upgrade for months, and I dutifully closed the popup window each time I saw it. About two weeks ago, I turned on the TV to find a new login screen and noticed that my remote keyboard and mouse daemon had stopped. All in all, Win10 has been just fine, but I had no idea how it managed to install itself without my direct approval.

</comment><comment><USER15> Can anything damage large companies' reputation irreversibly these days? Whether is Microsoft forcing "upgrades" on PCs or Apple forcing iOS updates with their constant popups (which BTW you can avoid by using a proxy file) or their planned OSX obsolescence. And Google being a web company is free to muck up the UI, tie unrelated products together or discontinue services without any recourse since they're not client applications. Most large software companies' practices seem abusive to me. "We take security seriously" \- after they've just been hacked or "We take privacy very seriously" \- after they've just handed over user data for some ad cash, etc.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> The side effects: "I live in the Central African bush. We pay for slow satellite internet (per MB d/l). Just ONE of our computers has secretly d/l'ed 6GB for Windows 10. We track & coordinate anti-poaching rangers in the field with these PC's + GPS. F* You Microsoft!" [https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4mcdon/i_live_i...](https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4mcdon/i_live_in_the_central_african_bush_we_pay_for/)

</comment><comment><USER16> Left to their own devices, people would never upgrade. This is a security risk for MS. (Win 8 support ends January 2018). Chrome was championed for auto updating, and now all browsers do the same. Web apps can auto update whenever they want. Mobile apps auto update. Why shouldn't operating systems?

<comment><USER17> There's a difference between security and stability updates and major version changes.

I have no compelling reason to upgrade my Windows 7 machine to Windows 10; 7 performs all the tasks I need it to. I do not trust the privacy changes in Windows 10, which is more reason for me not to upgrade.

I've disabled the Windows 10 upgrade path, but otherwise keep it up-to-date on all patches.

What do I do when Windows 7 support ends? I'll cross that bridge when I get to it... but that bridge won't be to Windows 10.

<comment><USER18> I agree with your statements about Windows 10. In my case, I don't use my Windows laptop for day to day anymore. It also told me that Windows 10 is not optional and it will happen next week and there is nothing I can do about it. It sits connected to my TV via HDMI cable only to stream DRM related content such ad HBO Go, Netflix, etc.

At least once a week, it takes about 30 minutes to apply updates. Where my computer would restart several times.

<comment><USER19> Fortunately that use case is quite well covered by alternative solutions, like Roku, Chromecast, Fire, or a homebrew HTPC running something like Kodi or Plex. The Raspberry Pi is a popular host device for that.

<comment><USER20> "DRM related content such ad HBO Go, Netflix, etc." None of those will be supported on a device for as long as they will be supported on a PC. Not that I'm a PC fan, but the general purpose operating system idea really shines here.

<comment><USER19> I disagree. Only a homebrew HTPC is at risk of losing those things. Any of the commercial streaming boxes/sticks from a reasonably reputable company should have support for DRM-protected content for the indefinite future. After several years a specific version of the hardware may stop receiving updates, but that's not a big deal when the original device cost $35 (assuming that you can pick up a similarly-priced replacement in the future).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Use Linux. Problem solved.

Of course, if you have special needs (games, proprietary Windows-only software, etc.), you might have to run Windows. My advice would be to simply use an Enterprise version of Windows 7, which doesn't "upgrade" you automatically, and work on moving away from any Microsoft platforms as quickly as possible.

<comment><USER22> >problem solved

And perhaps many new problems introduced (as you point out), so... no, not really.

<comment><USER23> Recently had a project with a C++-on-Linux deliverable. I developed on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, the most recent LTS at the time. Someone else tested on 16.04 LTS, which came out between me finishing development and him testing. Code compiled and failed to link until we built libcurlpp from source.

In short, Ubuntu's been shipping a broken libcurlpp for something like a year. Further research tells me that's not the only package affected, and GCC 5 has generally made life entertaining.

I'm also running 16.04 on a Raspberry Pi, and oh boy is that fun! An even less tested architecture!

* Chromium segfaults on startup, and appears to have been doing so for about a year. Ubuntu continues to package completely broken updates occasionally.

* Most audio from Firefox goes through what I've been calling the noisy Satan filter.

* Initially, all programs segfaulted in ld.so when running in GDB. Currently, it spits out a couple errors and continues.

* nm-applet reliably segfaults a few minutes after starting.

* For some unknown reason, wlan0 has 7 global IPv6 addresses and counting.

But at least it doesn't update without asking. I suppose there's that!

Edit: Not that I think what Microsoft is doing is OK. Just think "just use Linux" often causes more problems than it solves, especially for people who just want Word and Facebook to work.

<comment><USER24> Still not as bad as development on Windows though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This is essentially an entire feature of the updater. Imagine the meetings and project management involved.

<comment><USER24> There are MS employees right here on HN, I wish some of them would chime in with their thoughts on this whole debacle. I imagine most of the employees were kept in the dark about this too, as the nature of MS/proprietary software is secretive and sometimes considered abusive to the employee. Likely they've signed non-disclosure agreements and could lose their jobs for giving an honest assessment of what they think about their employer.

<comment><USER25> Yeah, I know that worker bees are always the last to know the big picture, but someone somewhere had to make the "X" violate Demeter. Now, there's an argument to be made that the close button is only for the notification that something is going to happen, but come on. Obviously they didn't focus group this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Windows 10 slows down my whole PC and won't let me downgrade. I was forced to move to Linux or deal with constant lag from all forms of input.

Can't believe I wasted my time putting up with the lag to fix my wifi so I could install updates.

</comment><comment><USER26> A simple guide for life: (1) Gather information (e.g. read the screen) (2) Think about it (3) Act accordingly

<comment><USER20> We live in an age of information overload.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> For probably the first time I understand why forum/reddit mods turn to those "megathreads"

Do we need a new story about this every day. ugh.

<comment><USER28> Yes, until Microsoft finally ends this madness?</comment></comment>


Cisco backs down, drops cloud from default router settings - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.cisco.com/home/update-answering-our-customers-questions-about-cisco-connect-cloud-2/

<comment><USER2> _Cisco will not arbitrarily disconnect customers from the Cisco Connect Cloud service based on how they are using the Internet.

Cisco Connect Cloud and Cisco Linksys routers do not monitor or store information about how our customers are using the Internet and we do not arbitrarily disconnect customers from the Internet. The Cisco Connect Cloud service has never monitored customers' Internet usage, nor was it designed to do so, and we will clarify this in an update to the terms of service.

Cisco Linksys routers are not used to collect information about Internet usage.

Cisco's Linksys routers do not track or store any personal information regarding customers' use of the Internet._

Ignoring all other aspects of this for the moment, I think startups can all learn something from this. Make sure you check what your lawyer is saying on your behalf. Putting " _You agree not to use or permit the use of the Service: ...(ii) for obscene, pornographic, or offensive purposes;_ " in your TOU may help protect you from some obscure theoretical legal point of view, but from your customer's perspective it makes you seem malicious.

Ironically(?), the first thing you have to agree not to do is " _invade another's privacy_ "

<comment><USER3> Do we know that's really what happened? I can very much see it going either way a) Lawyer put in too much defensive language or b) Cisco really wanted to push you into a new service.

Admittedly, it's a very different product and service, but can we blame them when they see companies like Facebook forcing their email service on users in such an obtrusive way? If I were a semi-out-of-touch manager I might think "The cloud is the way to go, we get more control, there are legitimate upsides to consumers, and anyone who bitches ultimately shuts up after a day of tweeting."

Seems like there's lots of precedent for them to think about trying.

<comment><USER4> There are two separate issues here. It's clear that Cisco deliberately created the Cloud Connect service (I won't speculate on their motivations; in theory such a service could benefit customers) and deliberately auto-updated customers to it (which they promised all along). The TOS is a separate problem and appears to be a combination of legal ass-covering and deliberate misinterpretation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _"We believe lack of clarity in our own terms of service has contributed to many of our customers' concerns, and we apologize for the confusion and inconvenience this has caused. We take responsibility for that lack of clarity, and we are taking steps to make this right."_

Hey Cisco, what about having people locked out of their own routers? ( [http://www.neowin.net/news/cisco-locks-users-out-of-their- ro...](http://www.neowin.net/news/cisco-locks-users-out-of-their-routers- requires-invasive-cloud-service) ) I don't see it mentioned in your non- apology.

</comment><comment><USER6> This is an essential move on Cisco's part but the damage has been done. We should expect more of these. A friend bought a Samsung TV which wanted to download updated firmware from the Internet when she turned it on the first time. (it has a bunch of, IMO worthless, streaming features built in) With all the pieces there at what point does the TV accidentally 'brick' itself? Or you have a RandomBrand unit where RandomBrand goes out of business and the TV tries to download and can't so becomes worthless.

Eventually "no software changes needed" or something to that effect will be a 'feature' that sells gear. Or of course open software.

<comment><USER7> We recently purchased a TV for a short conference we were having. We didn't have much time to pick it out, so we picked out a reasonably well-reviewed name-brand television (my apologies, I can't remember the brand off-hand).

Like your experience, the device required an immediate network update.

Once the update was complete, I was astounded to see the television automatically download promotional advertisements and display them prominently on the main menu of the television, amidst the standard options.

If we hadn't _required_ the television for the conference, I would have returned it to the store then and there. I anticipate that we'll see more of this in the future, and I don't look forward to it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Cisco from the start should of made this an opt-in and not an opt-out (which in this case took customer pressure to even get opt-out). Whether they meant to do this on purpose or just misinformed management, they should of known from the start this was going to be a PR nightmare forcing updates which then require you to sign up for their cloud and their new TOS.

<comment><USER4> The part no one mentions is that Cisco advertised these routers as cloudy all along, so the firmware update just delivered the already-promised features. People who bought these routers probably didn't quite realize what a cloud router means, though.

[http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless- news/31723-...](http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless- news/31723-cisco-announces-smart-wi-fi-router-line)

<comment><USER5> Did they advertise it as "locked until you agree to whatever agreement we want to force upon you"?

<comment><USER4> Everything has had EULAs for years.

<comment><USER9> People don't buy products after reading disclaimers or EULAs. But they carry some expectations as what to get from it and what not. If they later find a too wide difference between their expectations and how that EULA had been acted upon, they know what brand NOT to buy next. And friends warn friends, if only to save them from reading 10 EULAs daily.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Inside the Cosmonaut Survival Kit (2013) - <AUTHOR> http://theappendix.net/blog/2013/11/the-cosmonauts-survival-kit

<comment><USER2> Good article, not too much anti-russian speech.

Also see the space laser handgun: [http://englishrussia.com/2013/10/05/laser- gun-for-a-soviet-c...](http://englishrussia.com/2013/10/05/laser-gun-for-a- soviet-cosmonaut)

</comment><comment><USER3> For comparison, US medical and survival kits from Mercury to Apollo [1].

[1] [http://airandspace.si.edu/exhibitions/apollo-to-the- moon/onl...](http://airandspace.si.edu/exhibitions/apollo-to-the- moon/online/astronaut-life/medical-survival.cfm)

</comment><comment><USER4> > _here are the three coolest-looking cosmonauts I found while researching > this post_ ...

> Tereshkova

Yes, the first woman in space. Had a major panic attack during the flight, screamed her lungs out, vomited all over the capsule and prompted Korolev to instigate the "no women in space while I'm alive" rule, which was in fact observed.

> Musa Manarov

Incidentally I worked with a guy who was training as Manarov's double for one of his flights. But then something didn't work out, he left the program and ended up writing (accounting) software for living.

<comment><USER5> _Yes, … observed._

This is a shitty comment and makes HN and the internet at large a worse place. I don't have time to engage in an extended debate about this, but I wanted to note, publicly, that this is inappropriate.

(If you had contact info in your profile, I'd have sent this directly. Feel free to contact me by email, but I can't promise I'll be able to respond.)

<comment><USER6> Seconded.

Perhaps the parent poster didn't intend to offend, and just wanted to pass along some personal information? It's hard to tell. To be clear, this type of gender-based ban is rediculous.

A brief search on this shows there's a much more balanced information out there. Here are some interesting snips from a CS Monitor article on Tereshkova.

[http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2013/0614/First-woman-in- sp...](http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2013/0614/First-woman-in-space- Miserable-cosmonaut-or-triumphant-space-flyer)

She actually solved the first big problem in her flight: On the first day, the ship's autopilot mistakenly steered her away from Earth, leaving her facing the prospect of being lost in space.

After her trip, the Soviet space program canceled any future trips for women, and indeed, Tereshkova remained the only woman to go to space for almost two decades. In 1982, the Soviets launched a second woman, Svetlana Savitskaya, and the next year, America sent up Sally Ride. Since then, 48 other American women have gone to space, but only one other Russian: Yelena V. Kondakova, in 1994.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/science/space/sally- ride-t...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/science/space/sally-ride- trailblazing-astronaut-dies-at-61.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0)

<comment><USER4> > _She actually solved the first big problem in her flight: On the first day, > the ship 's autopilot mistakenly steered her away from Earth, leaving her > facing the prospect of being lost in space._

The Cristian Science Monitor is an excellent source of information on the Soviet space program, but the autopilot malfunction was exactly what triggered Tereshkova's meltdown. It took considerable effort for the Control Center to make her calm down and follow the instructions to reset the autopilot. She was by and large unfit for the mission and she ended up in space only because Soviet Union needed to launch a _woman_ into orbit.

<comment><USER7> Do you have any sources for this other than, literally, "dad's dad's friend who heard a rumor?"

<comment><USER4> From what I understand my grandafather's friend was a part of the launch crew, so it's not exactly "dad's dad's friend + rumor", but here you go anyways, courtesy of Wikipedia -

[http://www.webcitation.org/6Ho9TOB7t](http://www.webcitation.org/6Ho9TOB7t)

You want this part -

      В космос Терешкова слетала. Это потрясающая, мужественная
      женщина, но ведь она не выполнила ни единого своего задания!
      Ее тошнило в космосе, она теряла сознание, мне Королев
      рассказывал. Тогда же при мне он сказал: «Пока я жив, ни
      одна женщина в космос больше не полетит». И двадцать лет
      наши женщины не были в космосе.

I trust you can handle the translation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good time in Vegas with all this stuff.

<comment><USER9> I think the full quote is in order. [1] It's hilarious:

       Major T. J. "King" Kong: Survival kit contents
       check. In them you'll find: one forty-five caliber
       automatic; two boxes of ammunition; four days'
       concentrated emergency rations; one drug issue
       containing antibiotics, morphine, vitamin pills,
       pep pills, sleeping pills, tranquilizer pills;
       one miniature combination Russian phrase book
       and Bible; one hundred dollars in rubles;
       one hundred dollars in gold; nine packs of
       chewing gum; one issue of prophylactics;
       three lipsticks; three pair of nylon stockings.
       Shoot, a fella' could have a pretty good
       weekend in Vegas with all that stuff.

BTW since the movie was released shortly after the JFK assassination, "Dallas" was dubbed to "Vegas" in post-production.[2]

[1] [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057012/trivia?tab=qt&ref_=tt_tr...](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057012/trivia?tab=qt&ref_=tt_trv_qu) [2] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Strangelove#Kennedy_assassi...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Strangelove#Kennedy_assassination)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Not long ago I saw, on a live feed, one of the Russian cosmonauts use a large dagger, during an EVA to install the new cameras facing earth.

I guess it's not all that different from using a diving knife, but it was weird to see that double-edged weapon used in space.

<comment><USER11> Would you provide more details to trace-back this footage?

<comment><USER10> It was on 2013-12-27, or at least that was the date in Western Europe. The knife had what looked like a leather sheath. I remember seeing it through the wall of his perspex toolbox after he tidied it up.

Good luck :)

<comment><USER11> Found it. Third part 2:21:40.

[http://www.space- multimedia.nl.eu.org/index.php?option=com_c...](http://www.space- multimedia.nl.eu.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=8647:expedition-38-russian- spacewalk-37-december-27-&catid=1:latest)

<comment><USER10> Bravo. I'm surprised you found that in all those hours of video!

I wonder if it's custom made or a regular diving knife. Those Orlan space suit gloves are quite bulky.

<comment><USER11> Download and fast forward, 10 minutes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm skeptical Makarov's main purpose was scaring off bears. More likely a quick way for the cosmonaut to terminate it's own life?

</comment><comment><USER13> _> NASA spent nearly 20 years developing a form of space ice cream that astronauts found palatable._

When will the internet get over the space pen meme?</comment>


Apple wins backing of EU court over 13B euros in unpaid taxes - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/15/apple-wins-backing-of-eu-court-over-13-billion-euros-in-unpaid-taxes.html <comment><USER2> Corporate taxes are idiotic. Companies relentlessly dodge them and then individuals can argue against proper capital gains taxes under the BS of double taxation. Just get rid of corporate taxes worldwide. These court battles are such a waste of time and energy.</comment>


Clock Ticking On Pageflakes? - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2008/04/13/pageflakes-out-of-cash/

<comment><USER2> I have never used pageflakes, but if they don't already have a social component like being able to see your friends start pages then they should try adding that, investors might like the idea.</comment>


M&A Issues: The Stay Package  - <AUTHOR> http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/02/ma-issues-the-stay-package.html

<comment><USER2> I say "Yay!" for number 3, the carve-out for employees when their shares have been diluted to worthlessness. That actually earned me a bit of cash during the dot-com flame-out era.

Also as a counter-example to another point, I was at a company where the stay package was 4 years. It has expired, and all 5 founders have stayed past the 4 years. I think a large part of this is due to the quality of the acquirer.</comment>


Got a 4? You just got fired from Microsoft - <AUTHOR> http://ceklog.kindel.com/2012/08/27/got-a-4-you-were-just-fired-from-microsoft/ <comment><USER2> Microsoft, I think, will be looked back upon as a great example of stack ranking's failure or success. At GE, it is looked upon as a success. But GE's workforce is (mostly) not in the world of knowledge-workers. They're not expected to come up with great products that sell to the masses, for the most part.

I often wonder if Microsoft's inability to get great products to market in a timely fashion is due to stack ranking. They clearly have great people who work there, who can make great products. Even the Zune was a great product. They arrive on the market about 3 years too late, and then require iteration on top of it. Is this because people there optimize their careers for "their number", rather than what's truly best for the company? Only time will tell.

<comment><USER3> I think it would be very lazy to reduce Microsoft's ultimate success or failure in this decade to a single policy. There are lots of factors that can make large companies fail to move well with the times.

Likewise, I wouldn't give it much credit if MS (or Google, or whoever) does well. With a few notable counterexamples, most very large companies end up adopting processes to manage the size of the company, but how large is the impact of the particular process chosen? Is it really controlling success or failure?

Bad management/vision can happen in any system.

<comment><USER4> What would Ballmer rate in CEO stack ranking with the rest of corporate America?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nothing too new in the post, perhaps a little bit more jaded than how it is often explained.

The part I found most interesting was your opinion on the different roles at Microsoft (quoted below). As someone with some experience in the PM role, I found it especially interesting. I find the opinion you have described spectacularly oversimplified, specifically in that the goal is just to write software (something only developers are needed), instead of writing the /right/ software, and at the right time. It is interesting to examine the different roles and how they interact, i.e. how devs often think of PMs as meetings and overheads, whilst PMs sometimes think of devs simply as resources. Tests, of course, are often left out in their own world, just hacking on whatever, and fixing the builds :-)

\</comment><comment>--- Did you notice I said "software developer" above? This advice is really targeted at people who are good at and love actually writing software. It somewhat applies to program managers, product managers, and so forth, but hey, we work in the SOFTWARE industry. The only clear-cut jobs are for those who actually write the shit. Everyone else just helps.

<comment><AUTHOR> Author here.

I was a PM for a great part of my 21 years at Microsoft. I'm quite sure I am "spectacularly" oversimplifying things. That was intentional.

Here's the problem, related to this specific post, which is about mediocre reviews:

A SDE's job can be measured far more objectively than most other roles in a software company. PM's, specifically, have an additional challenge in that what they do is extremely hard to measure.

But don't get me wrong, I was not trying to diminish the importance of the other roles in creating great products.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> The friends I have who have gotten offers from Microsoft were all informed that Microsoft, as a matter of policy, pays 60% of the top market salary. Has that policy changed?

<comment><USER7> Every company I've ever worked at - has claimed they pay Radford 50 [1] . (50% of the average).

Unless every company pays their employees pretty much exactly the same, somebody out there has to be in the Radford 75, 90, and presumably 100. You'd think that they would brag about that so the best employees would apply there.

It should be clear why companies won't admit to being in the radford 40, 20, 10, and presumably 0. :-)

[1] <http://www.radford.com>

<comment><USER8> I'm really confused by "50% of the average." Wouldn't the average be 100% of the average? I read "50% of the average" as paying someone half of what they are worth.

<comment><USER9> yeah i agree it is a confusing (and redundant thing to say), but i'm fairly positive (from context) that what he meant was '50th percentile of salaries for that position' or 'the average salary for that position'.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The system is really ugly in the sense there's a percentage of people that get each score and MUST be met each cycle.

20% people of each group will get a 4/5 regardless of their work done. Then the other 50% of the people that bust their butt off are told: Sorry! We can only tell 10 percent of the people they rock.

<comment><USER11> Yeah, you can be a really, really good dev in a really, really good group, and get screwed. But if you move to another, weaker group you'll start getting great reviews again.

It's nuts. It's probably what's going to force me out. I want to work with very good people, but to get good reviews I'd have to work with knuckledraggers.

<comment><AUTHOR> Author here.

This is the point where I have my biggest beef with the Microsoft system. I was fortunate to have worked in and managed several groups that were CLEARLY exceptional. One team I built was built from the ground up and EVERYONE I hired (about 30 people) had previously had 3.5 or better reviews.

In the end, I did those people a dis-service by hiring them. Some of them got 3.0s the following year. If I had been 'smarter', I would have 'padded' the team with a few poor-performers to ensure that I could meet the curve.

However, earlier in my career, someone I worked with, and whom I thought I respected, confided in me that he did this; he padded this team with "3.0s" intentionally. This felt completely and morally bankrupt to me. So I vowed to never do it myself.

The way this is supposed to be dealt with is that the stack ranking is supposed to balanced up to groups of ~250 people. The VPs or GMs of these larger groups are supposed to 'break ties' and deal with outliers by using their larger population. At a certain scale (and I believe this) it is realistic to believe that there can be a 20%, 20%, 40%, 13%, 7% bucketing. However, this system requires managers to be ready & willing to fight all the way up the chain. And, to a certain extent ALL managers at MS think their groups are better than others (due to the competitive nature induced by the stack ranking we're talking about also applying with even more dire consequences).

There is a related issue that the Microsoft system causes that is directly related to this: Even though groups must put 7% of their people in the "5" bucket, and are expected to "manage those people out" they are not rewarded for doing it, at all. In fact, it is _in those managers best interests_ to keep those "5s" around.

Sad. And Frustrating.

<comment><USER12> So what happens if you simply refuse to play along, and give your superior an intelligent argument as to why you're doing so?

From the stories I've heard from friends at MS, there does really seem to be a sense of office-politics-gone-insane there.

At some point, it seems there has to be a backlash.

<comment><AUTHOR> At some point, as a manager, you put your own career/reputation on the line.

It is important to remember we are discussing outliers here. 4s & 5s represent 20% of the company. My blog post does not impact that other 80% really at all, and within the 20%, 7% likely really deserve to be let go anyway (IMO).

It's a big company. With any sufficiently large population there will be problems. I'm not a MS apologist, but at the same time MS produces some pretty damn good things regardless.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Dear Microsoft

You may have received a payment from me, likely for something X-Box related my kids have requested. On my payment, you will notice a number, from one to five. The breakdown for the numbers are as follows:

5: Wow, I really love your products! Each one is a groundbreaking example of "the road ahead." The design and execution are an example to the rest of us of what success looks like. Sadly MCSFT, you just didn't make the cut this year, but don't worry, only a few of your competitors ever get this number, i.e. Google and Apple.

4: Rock star! I couldn't make it through the day without one of your products. To be honest, you didn't really perform as a "4" this year, but work hard! I'm sure you can do it!

3: Thank you! My 2008 copy of Word still works great, and on the rare occasion I boot into Windows 7 I think, "Hey, this OS isn't so bad. I've used worse."

2: By "worse," I mean Vista. Yeah, it works, but honestly, I'm still a little put out by the whole experience. If you really put your heart and mind into it, I'm sure Win 8 will be the run-away success I know you've been working hard to achieve. But, don't screw this up, okay? People are watching.

1: Don't let the door hit you on the way out. Failure to actually deliver innovation, years of being a bully, and products known for their bugginess is no way to run a company. I might care more, but I don't. I'm too busy watching netflix on my iPhone.

I hope this helps. PS - I'm sorry, but thats not what I meant by "you're number one."

<comment><USER14> Snarky, not even close to relevant to the article and adds nothing to the conversation. I sure am glad this is the top post.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Wow hard to figure out if the post is sarcastic or mad or just a matter fact this is how it is. It seems like a sad place. :(

<comment><USER3> Doesn't sound bad to me. Seems like a good place to be if you're performing well.

<comment><USER16> The problem is the system imposes a bottom 10% even if everyone performs equally well.

<comment><USER17> _The problem is the system imposes a bottom 10% even if everyone performs equally well._

The problem isn't ranking people, it's how they determine the score. Are the bottom 10% really the bottom or the people who were the worst at selling themselves to their managers? Do you really thinking that everyone performs equally well?

I look at the MSs and Googles of the world as the big leagues in software development. They only want to hire the best and only want to keep the best around. Not everyone can make it in the big leagues, it's just that simple.

This sort of thing happens in pro sports every single day. NFL teams are finishing their cuts right now.

<comment><USER18> _The problem isn't ranking people, it's how they determine the score._

That's not the problem either. The real problem is stack ranking is a morale killer. You get rid of the bottom ten percent and then the top ten percent says "Damn, every day I come to work I feel like there's this black cloud hanging over the cube farm. This place sucks, and I can get a job anywhere I want!" Then they do.

So you're left with the middle - people who do their job reasonably well and aren't dumb enough to take risks that might get them downgraded. Projects that are in trouble can't be turned around because the best (remaining) people stay away. And the people who couldn't get away find other jobs. I saw this happen on a project at a financial company I worked for. They needed eight or ten developers and went through at least twenty in the space of a year.

Does Microsoft have well-motivated top talent? It certainly doesn't show in the product lineup.

<comment><USER17> _The real problem is stack ranking is a morale killer._

Depends. I've been on teams where the weak links are the morale killer. Busting my ass while watching people do little and continue with a job or worse yet get the team accolades made me leave my last job.

 _Does Microsoft have well-motivated top talent? It certainly doesn't show in the product lineup._

This is a completely separate issue. I would argue that MSs problems have nothing to do with engineering talent. Their problems stem from the management side with Balmer being problem number one. Doesn't Google also do some form of employee ranking? They seem to also have plenty of talent. Google though has side stepped needing great management by being data focused to a fault. This has made them better than MS in some ways, but worse in others.

 _So you're left with the middle - people who do their job reasonably well and aren't dumb enough to take risks that might get them downgraded. Projects that are in trouble can't be turned around because the best (remaining) people stay away. And the people who couldn't get away find other jobs. I saw this happen on a project at a financial company I worked for. They needed eight or ten developers and went through at least twenty in the space of a year._

You're right that it's not always the best solution. First, a company needs to be at the top of their field so they are attracting top talent. If Joe Bobs software attempted stack ranking they are going to fail because they are not the big leagues. No one goes to work there expecting it to be that way. People who work at the Googles and MSs of the world expect that environment and are rewarded well when they thrive.

At the end of the day, coming in at the bottom of one of the premier software companies isn't necessarily a bad thing. I regret not trying to get a job at one when I was younger just to see if I could hack it. At the time though my priorities were different.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Somewhat off topic: what happened to Mini Microsoft? It seems like he/she was intercepted and lobotomized by Microsoft PR. The open threads with wonderful discussion (one of the best venues for talking across silos) habitually wither from neglect from Mini. What's the next best place?

</comment><comment><USER20> 9:00 PM? Is this what hard work is considered nowadays? Going home that late everyday? Geez, I'd rather be called lazy.

<comment><USER21> I've stayed at office for days.

Some people I know never went back home for a week.

At the year end appraisal. We were told we deserved nothing extra as we were told that we were just doing our jobs.

That's how badly management can rip you off.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Stack ranking is nor for everyone. Its a bit like making a awesome but a very difficult dish. Its a kind of a dish which will taste horrible if don't get the ingredients right to the very pinch.

For stack ranking to work you will need awesome leaders at the top rung in the company. You will need to fight out politics, processes and eliminate bureaucracy. You will also need a fair measuring of performance. Without all of this you see managers awarding their yes-men(their pets and bootlickers basically) top ranks and the good guys will leaving the organization. Unfortunately its very easy to get into this mode, especially if you are a large company will several layers of management- this kind of things can run for years until irreversible damage is caused. The net result after years will be false or irrelevant numbers floating in the company, while the best talent has already left.

Even Jack Welch, mentions that stack ranking works best if everybody in the organization is stack ranked all the way up to the CEO. So that if some one cheats in the middle he will get ranked low under his manager and so on an so forth. This is very different to what happens in most big corporates. Managers are generally left immune to this process. The net result is they begin to form gangs of yes-men around them. Whoever refuses to be a part of it, slips out of favor of the manager and gets a bad ranking. Net result in mass is a disaster. Which is not apparent until very late.

So if you are company with a culture of politics, processes, nepotism, bureaucracy and biases. Stack ranking will not help, but rather destroy you.

I saw all this at a Mega Corp here in India. Needlessly to say that company today is struggling fallen far below from its original glory days.

</comment><comment><USER22> How does this affect the "contract employees"? I'm guessing they don't get the bonuses, but do they get rated?

Microsoft still has a high rate of contractors (and I count some friends and relatives among this number), although less since they got in trouble from the federal government for not paying most types of benefits to contractors. [1]

1: [http://archive.washtech.org/news/courts/display.php?ID_Conte...](http://archive.washtech.org/news/courts/display.php?ID_Content=381)

<comment><AUTHOR> Author here.

In my experience what this post discusses is completely irrelevant to contract employees.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Level 64?

<comment><USER24> That's the second level for a "Senior" developer. The senior level band starts at 63. Below that are 59 (college graduate) to 62, which are the bands of Software Engineer and Software Engineer II. Above it are Principle (65-67) and Partner levels.

<comment><USER8> I was expecting the levels to be factors of 2. :(

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I wonder what the stack ranking in MSR (the pure research arm of Microsoft) looks like.

</comment><comment><USER26> Ranking is designed to protect and benefit the people assigning the numbers. The numbers are meaningless and should be called political ranking. Its ok to work at one of these places short term if you need the cash, but have a plan to move on soon.

</comment><comment><USER27> Stack-ranking is this idea that emerges when a bunch of bored, overpaid and underemployed people of marginal intellect (that's being generous) watch a terrorist attack on TV and decide, "It be funna' do that to, hurr hurr, a comph-uh-ny!". The caretaker who wipes the shit off their mirrors every morning reminds them that they have executive positions and can actually act out their childish fantasies, so they do.

<comment><USER21> I don't know why you are being down voted, because there is some truth in what you say.

The point is so called senior managers and executives you see today in the vast majority of the companies are totally undeserving of what they get. They didn't make it to the top on merit. Most of them had it easy, they made it big during gold rush in the IT boom. They were just there in the right place at the right time.

Most of them if were to compete with even a average developer of our time, will not last much longer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I always found it amusing that Enron did stack ranking while at the same time cooking it's books. They were just doing it to be assholes.</comment>


Chinese invest $5bn to build Intel x86 clone (Godson) - <AUTHOR> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/25/ict_godson_3b_chip/

<comment><USER2> "Wouldn't it be funny if Silicon Graphics started building systems with these Godson-3 chips? They could dust off Irix and take it out for a spin on some new iron and allow it to run x64-based Linux applications in emulation mode"

Love the idea, specially they build some nice desktop systems. But IRIX would need some serious work in order to be competitive again. Linux on MIPS would be a much more practical choice.

</comment><comment><USER3> Maybe it's time for the State Department to revisit technology export restrictions to China?

<comment><USER4> Are the proceedings of ISCA really a "technology"?

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Calling this a clone is a understatement to say the least. At 16-core, 2 GHz, and 512 gigaflops these are some pretty serious numbers. China is getting scary.

</comment><comment><USER6> Calling this an x86 chip is misleading:

"...the Godson-3 chips have instructions added to help the QEMU hypervisor (the one that's at the heart of Red Hat's KVM hypervisor) to translate instructions from x86 to MIPS format. According to early benchmarks, the emulation penalty is about 30 per cent."

</comment><comment><USER7> I recall reading an article saying that the latest intel chips had 4-5 billion transistors, this article doesn`t have any transistor counts higher than 600 million.

Something must be missing.

<comment><USER4> What's missing is single-thread performance.

(Also, I think Intel is in the 2-3B transistor range.)</comment></comment>