Ask HN: I lost my ability to focus for hours on coding. How to regain? - <AUTHOR> I lost my ability to focus. I check social media and youtube frequently while doing work. If I do not do that I feel some void and feeling of losing out(I do not know how to express this).<p>How to regain my focus and avoid this trap? <comment><USER3> There's a lot of factors that might go into this. If you're hungry, sleepy, undersocialized, unkempt, unfit, depressed, in a loud, messy, and distracting office, with unclear and unexciting goals, large monolithic tasks without clear breakdowns on how to move forward, constrained by slow tools, management, or blocked on dependencies... well, it'd be no wonder you wouldn't want to work!

Eat well. Sleep well. Exercise. Dress for success. Socialize, integrate with the team, find the goals that will motivate you - be that helping out your work buddies, or building that sweet new piece of technology.

You want to have energy, health, mood, and motivation. When any of these suffer, your work suffers too.

Don't be afraid to use whatever tools you have at your disposal to cut out distractions and inhibit bad habits, but don't tyrannize yourself either. Working 8 hours straight isn't necessarily your most productive option. Consider scheduling breaks - but use your tools to limit your distractions outside of said breaks. Find a balance that will let you keep your mood up while also getting good work done.

<comment><USER4> > Eat well. Sleep well. Exercise. Dress for success.

One of these is not like the others. I can understand emphasis on dressing up in contexts that involve _selling_ \-- a product, an idea or even yourself. But what does it have to do with focus?

<comment><USER3> It doesn't necessairly need to be "dressing up" per se.

But if you're showing up to work poorly shaven, wearing stained sweatpants - you're going to be at least a little more self concious, a little less self confident. Nobody's going to lift your mood with "hey, looking sharp!". It's going to reflect in your body language, and the body language in your peers, even if it's largely on a subconcious level.

It's potentially the difference between being ready to walk to lunch, or a meeting, or an interview at a moment's notice - ready to actually tackle the work and the day - vs being ready to go to bed at a moment's notice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is a common problem. The book _Deep Work_ goes into it in detail, and has some research-based techniques to fix it. Basically it boils down to removing distractions, and determination, gradually building up your brain's ability to focus again.

[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00X47ZVXM](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00X47ZVXM)

<comment><USER6> If I try eliminating distractions, I just end up daydreaming. I spend most days at work just reading the same shit over and over with nothing sticking. I manage to get work done in rare bursts after exhausting my brain with distractions.

Fwiw, I'm in my mid 40s and have less than a year of treating my sleep apnea. I'm pretty sure I've had ADHD my whole life but blamed other things until recently. I'm trying to resist getting medicated, but I think I might it to get me focused enough to work on CBT and meditation.

<comment><USER7> Don't medicate but challenge yourself. Learn a new editor while doing your job. Try using Windows instead of using a Mac. Try typing only left handed. There are varioud challenges to overcome boring assignments. Also try a standing desk so if you skive then you must stand up for fifth teen mins.

<comment><USER8> the worst advice ever.

If you have medical issues - take care of medical issues in the best way possible.

Challenging yourself = denying yourself treatment.

Challenging yourself is not a treatment for something like sleep apnea.

<comment><USER9> Yes but the evidence for ADHD is dubious. We have a long way to go when it comes to understanding the human mind. Anyone, not just people with ADD, can increase their performance with narcotic stimulants. Just don't be disingenuous about it.

<comment><USER10> Just because ADHD is poorly understood and often diagnosed incorrectly does not make it any less debilitating to those who have it and certainly does not imply that they are not in need of medication. Yes the medication can be abused by those who don't need it to get an edge. This is what makes it a controlled substance. Opiates can be abused too and have the same effect on everybody. The difference is that people in server pain need opiates to function at a baseline normal level. People with ADHD need medication to function at a baseline normal level. The fact that some people abuse them to go beyond that is completely irrelevant

<comment><USER11> > People with ADHD need medication to function at a baseline normal level.

This statement is so out of line I had to chime in. I was diagnosed with ADHD as a child. I was medicated for a few years, before I stopped taking the pills without telling my parents (they were being pressured by the private school I was in to medicate, I was kicked out shortly after they found out I had stopped.)

Those years are a complete empty window in my memory, and left me with physical ticks that _decades_ later I still have to suppress, alongside no actual tools for dealing with the symptoms.

Medication is not a silver bullet. Not all ADHD cases need to be medicated. Find what works for you, whatever the hell that is, and don't listen to dogma. For me that was coping mechanisms combined with a realization that much of the "attention deficit" was because I _didn't want to pay attention to the shit I was supposed to_ and _that's completely reasonable._ To insinuate that I haven't tractably found success ("baseline normal") with a non-medicative approach in my life is frankly insulting.

<comment><USER8> 1) have you ever had psychometric testing done? 2) what are you non-medication coping techniques?

Genuinely interested in hearing your story.

<comment><USER11> 1\. I might have when I was initially going through a ream of behaviorists, but I'd be lying if I said I recalled, this was around/after 3rd grade.

2\. In large part, reminders. Notes, lists, alarms (calendar/phone alarms for _everything_, watering plants to finishing work shit), behaviorally trained prompts, anything to disrupt the "mental feedback loops" where I can find myself "unconciously" falling into something like tearing at my fingernails, reading HN, playing video games, or really any of the infinite things I'll come up with to not do what I should be doing.

e.g. even right now writing this, I'm being pinged to go back to reading PRs: after years of having automated browser alerts going "hey you shouldn't spend time in this video game/on hn, it's been 20 minutes and you have nothing to show." my brain has picked that up and is able to do it on its own. I found that hard blocking didn't work since I'd just find ways around it, but if I can remind myself this is something I _want_ in any way from pragmatism (mortgage) or emotional (getting wife nice things) whereas the games/Hn are actually _unwanted_ (despite what the dopamine might say) it's easier to force myself to focus on something I don't want, even in bursts. (getting myself to internalize and BELIEVE those facts took years and I still fight with sometimes when willpower is low.)

This was a bit of a ramble, and I'd be remiss to mention that the motivation to use the prompts would be missing without the philosophical context I assign to the things I do. (Disclaimer: I recognize not all people can use this technique, I simply use the fact that I have strong long-term motivations against my bad short-term focus) I mentioned it in passing (mortgage, wife, etc) but really finding things I _WANT_ and using my brain's likelihood to fixate on those, especially in periods of distraction, I can tie those things back to what I SHOULD be doing and create a virtuous cycle. Contrivedly: Distracted looking out a window at garden. Fuck, I can't afford this garden if I don't go back to coding. (Dang, this HN post is getting long. Better get back to work so I don't work late today and can spend time with the wife when she gets home :) )

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The real trap is feeling like you need to be focused eight hours a day when it's not strictly needed.

There's an occasional crunch where I have to heads down get something done, but in that case there is actual motivation to be heads down and get things done.

I find a due date way more motivating than a mere thought of "I should be working...".

Overall, if I'm not already focused in, it's because it's something not as important as other things in my life.

</comment><comment><USER13>
      echo "127.0.0.1 facebook.com twitter.com ycombinator.com youtube.com" >> /etc/hosts

<comment><USER3> Windows Edition (admin command prompt):

echo 127.0.0.1 facebook.com twitter.com ycombinator.com youtube.com>>"%WINDIR%\System32\drivers\etc\hosts"

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Momentum!

At least for me, productivity requires momentum and being at a standstill feels like quite a hurdle. So at least at first, work on something you're really excited about. Something that won't feel like work. It could be a small project you couldn't otherwise really justify spending time on, but do it anyway. Visualize the end result, get yourself excited, and finish it.

Once you've gained some speed you should be able to tackle other tasks and projects. Social media will start to seem less compelling than it does now.

<comment><USER15> The browser extension named Momentum is also useful for this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I had that issue two months ago. I digged into my calendar and found out that's when I stopped going to the swimming pool, doing enough physical exercise.

It's old knowledge but : "A Healthy mind needs a healthy body" stays true.

<comment><USER6> I tried exercise, and now that's all I want to do. Ugh...

<comment><USER17> I know that feeling; it's addictive, because it feels so good. Make sure to take rest days, otherwise you might injure yourself from not giving the muscles and tendons enough time to repair.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> When this happened to me I got a ton of advice (similar to what's been written by other posters) and it was all great.

But to make any of it to stick I had to stop thinking of my productivity as some intellectual problem and myself as the master of my attention.

You're not in control of most things. You're trying to steer an elephant. Accept it, it's easier and it's true.

Then — with a slightly more realistic view of yourself set up processes and guardrails to keep your brain in line. Stimulus control sounds like a good first step. Check out StayFocused for Chrome and then delete all other browsers.

Add or remove one thing a week until you're where you want to be. Good luck.

<comment><USER19> I came across this discussion and this video recommendation one after the other :) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hu4Yvq-g7_Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hu4Yvq-g7_Y)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I've had this happen before. For a six-month period I was able to finish my day's work and then head home and spend another 3-4 hours focusing on my own stuff. After having a three-week vacation, I lost this ability. I couldn't focus anymore. I was back to being a regular person.

Things I did to get my focus back:

One is that I introduced sugar/caffeine back into my diet. Drinking a sugary, caffeinated beverage improves my ability to concentrate significantly. While this might not be right for you, you might find that some of your other dietary choices are affecting the supply of glucose to your brain.

Another is routine. If you had the ability before, you can get it back again. One thing that helped me return to my groove was listening to the same music I used to listen to while concentrating. Having an album in the background on repeat can work wonders. Maybe there are some other important concentration triggers that you need to tap into.

Lastly, maybe your work just isn't that interesting. Rediscover what things you actually want to be working on. Get excited about something again.

</comment><comment><USER15> Use tools such as SelfControl.app, ColdTurkey.app, and Freedom to block websites.

Some people will claim that is a crutch. Thats a great analogy because crutches help you get things done while you heal.

<comment><USER21> Focus is another one I really like on the Mac - it replaces websites with a different quotation each time:

[https://heyfocus.com/](https://heyfocus.com/)

On Windows, I add websites to the hosts file as others have suggested: HN and Google News are the main ones, I gave up FB long ago.

Doing this still doesn't get you back on track coding / focusing, but it helps. The idea is to break your habit of visiting distracting sites - <USER2> these apps help - but also build a habit of work. The more you make it a habit, the easier it becomes over time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I have a similar problem which is ruining my life. Not only I cannot focus on my work, I cannot focus on anything. I'm throwing my degree and my life down the toilet.

There's no light at the end of the tunnel right now. It's the worst feeling I've ever experienced. I know what I should do but I can't.

<comment><USER23> what if you try to focus on something that you really want to do and not on something you have to do?. i.e. Plan to visit a new country and work from there a couple of weeks. Something that I did when I felt like that is check all the meetups around town and meet really interesting people that ended up being good friends and help me to see things with a different point of view

<comment><USER15> FYI, planning a trip to a new country is a pretty Executive Function intensive task. As an immigrant and frequent traveler, I would say this could be a bit Hard Mode.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> It sounds trivial, but I find a pen and notepad to be helpful.

I write down a list of tasks I want to accomplish that day, and then tick them off as I go. Once I get to the end of the list, I'm done for the day and can have a beer (or go to the gym, depending on the day) :).

Then the next day it's rinse/repeat.

</comment><comment><USER25> Recognize that your FOMO (fear of missing out) is greatly amplified by social media and that using it only makes the situation far (far) worse, leading to more distraction, leading to more social media use, which feeds right back into the vicious cycle.

Learn to live without social media -> watch your life improve.

It's as simple as that.

Delete your accounts, including Twitter. Find other ways to stay connected to timely information. Treat it as a good challenge that you _can_ succeed at, as something that will make you stronger and healthier in the end.

</comment><comment><USER26> Changing the color scheme in your editor can make your work seem novel again.

Electronic music also helps me, but this is counterproductive for some.

<comment><USER27> Yep, good underground techno mixes at 125 or higher bpm can give you the drive and concentration you need for extended periods of time.

My coworkers usually get a slight shock when they learn what kind of music I have in my headphones during work, being a 50 year old guy :)

<comment><USER28> Do you have a public playlist?

<comment><USER29> Digitally Imported is pretty great. I've subscribed for years alongside Spotify and prefer it for set and forget playback of a genre of electronic music. Spotify is for specific playback and discovery.

There may be a free trial, and I think there is a free tier with ads if you can tolerate them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> For me, this means that a) I am not interested in my work, b) I am tired, or c) I am burnt out. All of these can be greatly helped by getting some good sleep, and a + c can be helped by having some fun - especially social or physical activity somewhere new (weekend trip, drinks with friends, etc).

You can try and force yourself to focus with tools and mental tricks, but that always seems to make me feel worse. Better to get at the root cause, which is almost always stress or physical exhaustion.

</comment><comment><USER31> I had a similar issue recently and during one of my many afternoons dicking around on the internet to avoid work I actually found a solution that worked surprisingly well: FocusMate.com

It's kind of like chat roulette (before it got weird) for study buddies. I'll admit the premise is a bit odd butt don't knock it until you've tried it. Essentially, you're paired with a random partner for a 50 minute mostly-silent video chat. You spend the first minute or two saying a quick hello and each definitively stating what you're going to accomplish in the hour and then you get to work (separately - they're very clear it's not for collaboration). When time is up you both report back on whether you did what you set out to do. And while you get to work the corner of your screen has a little live stream of your partner diligently working.

Not only does it help keep me "accountable" and working pretty efficiently for the full 50 minutes but it's also made me so much better/more realistic about estimating what can be accomplished in that time.

</comment><comment><USER32> I had to completely clear my mind of the past, and of what others may think of my project/code. It's a brand new day, you're breathing, you can truly work on whatever you want.

When I'm hot on a new video game, I can't wait to fill the most immediate next hours on doing it. What was that for you at some point? I enjoyed QBasic in gradeschool and revisiting after years in the field was really fun.

Whatever that code is, I suggest pursuing it even if it's not

a) something everybody on here says we need to be doing

b) related to your dayjob

c) related to that "big project" that you need to do perfectly

I wish you the best.

P.S. strike perfectionism out of your mind

P.P.S: Practically look into using the Pomodoro Method

P.P.P.S: Either start or stop doing drugs. Or see a board-certified medical professional if you think that would be dope. It is.

edit: formatting as always

</comment><comment><USER33> Could something else trigger your distractions and then spiral you into out of topic behaviours?

In my case, that's a chatty coworker. Every time he yanks me out of my flow, I get the urge to check social networks and have a really hard time going back to deep work.

</comment><comment><USER34> The problem is you mixed work with other things and since other things are less boring and less challenging your brain escapes to them semi- automatically.

Quick and dirty hack is change your surroundings. Go to another room, sit at different desk, on different chair, on a different clean computer (with different os?). Don't open any of your usual distractions there. Block them in hosts file (don't even check if you blocked them successfully).

You'll regain bit of your focus. At least till you leatn to slack off there too.

</comment><comment><USER35> This happened to me.

The void feeling is Depression. Youtube distracts from it, but reliance on distractors is only a symptom.

There are many kinds of depression, distinguished first and foremost by what treatment works on each.

That is the reason that "gold standard" double-blind trials fail to find that anti-depressants work. Imagine if you couldn't distinguish a broken arm from a broken leg, a broken humerus from a broken ankle. Trials of a cast on the left lower leg help only a few people, on the right only a few; left upper arm, right forearm, yada yada. "Casts are ineffective!"

Take the wrong meds, nothing happens. Take the right one, miracle!

There is no shame in medicating a problem: "If you can't make enough of your own serotonin, store-bought is fine."

It is entirely possible that losing 50 pounds, or exercising devotedly, or dropping carbohydrates and alcohol from your diet would also fix it. Medicate first, and then see if those help. There is no end of benefits to these other measures, but you need to get your brain working right first, or you set yourself up to fail.

In my case I was fixed up only two days after getting a sufficient dose of the right thing. A smaller dose had no effect, and other meds had no effect. Some kinds take weeks to build up before anything happens. I had five serious side effects (dry mouth, jaw clenching, ears ringing, dizzy spells, one more I don't recall) that passed after a few months.

You can get past this, with help. Get help!

</comment><comment><USER36> Use the Pomodoro technique and limit your social media checks (if any) to the scheduled breaks that the technique provides for you. In general, it's also highly desirable to enter a _flow_ state as quickly as possible (this is what "focus" really is, after all) and there are ways to make this more likely, such as starting your session with easier, lower-stress tasks and moving on to harder stuff incrementally.

</comment><comment><USER37> For me, I find this is more about fear/dread. I don't procrastinate on social media when I'm doing something well.

You'll have to find a way past that fear. You can:

1\. Be braver - admit you're afraid and do it anyway.

2\. Find the root cause of fear. Maybe you've dealt with too many death marches. Maybe you don't feel like you can meet your expectations. Just admitting it can make it go away.

3\. Plan it out in a way that nobody can screw it up, not even you.

</comment><comment><USER38> I'll probably catch some flak for this, but if this is just a short term hurdle during a single project get your hands on some adderall. If it continues for more than a couple weeks even when you're working on something you are passionate about put the pills away and take some time off away from the keyboard to try to decide if this is an issue of focus and distraction or just burn out.

</comment><comment><USER39> I would guess that your lack of concentration is due to boredom, maybe because you're working on stuff you don't care about. If circumstances requires you to work on uninteresting things, putting the distractors out of easy reach can help you grind away in the short term. In my own experience, I needed to change industries to work on things I found more interesting.

</comment><comment><USER40> Talk to your supervisors about how you aren't excited about your tasks at work. If there's nothing they can do about it, quit. Find something that excites you.

A family friend of mine used to play violin in a traveling rock band. He slept in the van and loved every minute of it. Later, when he had a family, he settled down and became a contracted fundraiser for non-profits. One day he came across a particular non-profit that he loved, identified with, and felt excited by. He took a 50% pay cut and settled into a permanent position with that company because "it felt like being back in the van again"

If you're the kind of intrinsically-motivated person who can trick their head into being excited about 12 hours of being immersed in a problem, then you'd be an incredible asset to any company that gets you excited.

If you have an idea of what company, industry, or problem that might be (good news: people usually do), pursue it like hell.

</comment><comment><USER41> Stop all use of these sites for a month.

See if other "distractions" take their place.

If no, then you're just addicted to social media and hopefully that month will cure you.

If yes, you're probably burnt out and need to move to your next exciting new job, or move house, or go on a road trip for a few weeks or whatever it is people to deal with burn out.

</comment><comment><USER42> > I check social media and youtube frequently while doing work.

Well, _don 't do it_ then.

> If I do not do that I feel some void and feeling of losing out

This is a _minor discomfort_. You need _learn to cope_. You must be young and healthy now, but the reality is that down the line, you are likely to develop some sort of permanent injury/impairment that you will have to cope with for the rest of your life. Start small, learn to cope with that little bit of discomfort.

Not to belittle, it's actually a major and widespread problem. Avoidance of minor discomforts is literally what keeps people smoking until it kills them. It's what holds people back from achieving the best life they can have because they avoid all the little risks that add up to big opportunities.

You have a will, you're not slave to your whims. Take control of your life and earn some self-respect.

</comment><comment><USER7> I have a hard and fast rule to never use a work computer for anything except work. Also, enforce rationing your use of FB to after 7pm for 15 mins max. You'll find the hours spent wasted can be summarized in a 15 min block. The key for me is hard and unbreakable delimiters.

</comment><comment><USER43> Regarding the "some void and feeling of losing out(I do not know how to express this)" \- "The Willpower Instinct" is a book that covers that exact feelings and how to address it. Unfortunately I am too lazy to find the exact location in the book for you.

</comment><comment><USER17> Something like this requires dedicated and deliberate behavior modification to fix.

You've essentially developed a habit. Like others have said, this might be caused by various factors, so look at what's lacking in your life and try to fix that, but afterwards you may need to create a plan in writing to correct the behaviors of the habit that has formed, because otherwise, even if you fix the root cause, the habit might still remain.

As for how? That's a good question that I don't yet have the answer to. I'm working on the first part myself. After I fix my root cause, I think I will fix the habit via a combination of lists and daily resets (i.e. no old tabs on the computer the next day).

</comment><comment><USER44> Social Media Trap -- I installed the Leechblock extension for Firefox which helped me a bit. Also going to special places like silent libraries is helpful for me to concentrate. As final escape, think about going offline. Documentation can be downloaded.

</comment><comment><USER45> Do it, but something different.

If you are a writer, and you're stuck writing a book, you write something else for a while. If you're a painter, you might try using a new medium.

You're a programmer, so try tackling a completely different small problem. Maybe take the opportunity to try a totally new (to you) language — don't be afraid to use something _radically_ different. Ever code in assembly? Why not!

Some people work better when they're "in the spotlight." Twitch streamers are often known for entertainment, but actually many coders show up there, too. You could try starting a stream, and see if you are more focused when people might be watching.

</comment><comment><USER46> This may sound stupid or trite, but have you considered moving into a management position?

Social media and Youtube may be stealing your attention because you simply enjoy them more. If coding was more enjoyable, you'd be doing more coding at the expense of those distractions.

But maybe you just don't enjoy coding your current project. A lot of projects are not intellectually or morally stimulating, and it's hard to stay excited about them, particularly if your work culture is the least bit toxic.

Being a manager means dealing with people, and a lot of experienced coders actually get more out of that than out of JIRA-code-Git-repeat.

<comment><USER47> It might be surprising, but dealing with people still requires focus :) Also, instead of code, you write docs - so many docs. Which, again, needs focus.

<comment><USER48> I think the comment was more about the fact that social media is more enjoyable and therefore drawing OPs attention. If they moved into management, perhaps that would be more enjoyable and therefore remove the social media draw. They could have used any occupation not just management. Maybe OP just doesn't enjoy coding anymore.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> I wrote a blog about this a long time ago here: [http://debugreality.blogspot.com/2010/03/hidden-dangers- of-w...](http://debugreality.blogspot.com/2010/03/hidden-dangers-of-working- in-it.html)

It basically boils down to understanding the negative effects of your work and taking responsibility for your mental well being by countering them which is where work life balance come from.

Previous HN discussion here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1203696](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1203696)

</comment><comment><USER50> I found that I do that when I feel I haven't been around enough people. Perhaps upping the priority of talking with people, anyone can help you feel better. Does this seem to resonate with you? It could be any reason

<comment><USER51> I discovered this about myself too. If I'm spending enough time with actual people I don't care about my phone or social media.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> Watch more porn, or get laid more.

I was having focus issues, because coding is fascinating but not inherently sexy to me. After working on a problem for a while, the enjoyment of the problem would become overshadowed by my sex drive, and I would start to find anything else more interesting. Ended up being my body's way of reminding me that I should make some babies before I died, so I was subconsciously distracting myself away from anything fascinating that wasn't the opposite sex.

<comment><USER53> Realize that promiscuity is a disease vector.

<comment><USER54> The OP was crude and perhaps hinging on taboo, but there are well established schools of psychology on the topic, namely Freud's psychoanalytic theories come to mind.

<comment><USER52> I'm actually really curious why you think I was being crude/taboo here. Maybe just a cultural difference? I spent most of my adult formative years in the military, and there's been some cultural friction ever since I ended my service. An explanation of your opinion would be quite welcome!

<comment><USER54> What? I was defending your comment, seeing the downvotes!

Crude, well... to be honest, because of the slang words, eg. 'getting laid' and your argument could have been framed better to be more intellectually stimulating. Taboo, well.. because I don't see anyone else talk about this, yet it's such an important topic of human psychology / sociology.

<comment><USER52> I understood that you were defending it! The downvotes were a bit confusing to me also, as I felt pretty well founded in my original comment. As I said, I'm more just interested in your reasoning that I was being crude and taboo, because I have a background that seems less common among HN posters. It would help me better understand the downvotes!

I definitely could've swapped out "getting laid" with something more elegant sounding, such as "engaging in intercourse" or "stimulating a release of oxytocin", but I assumed that "getting laid" is both socially acceptable and has a well understood definition. Apparently HN disagrees!

I don't consider sex as a subject to be taboo, especially from a health standpoint. People get degrees from major universities that are entirely sex- related. So I guess I'm just a little confused by all responses, especially the one from hi41. Thanks for explaining your reasoning, it's good to hear the process behind these differences in opinion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> I wrote some things that help me focus here:

[https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/focusing](https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/focusing)

Mostly it's about practicing mindfulness throughout the day, setting goals, GTD approach of task management and using tools like Focus for automated Focus sessions throughout the day with breaks in which I am allowed to read news and relax.

<comment><USER56> Just logged in to say that the tips on your wiki are pretty good and overall all the info in there seems pretty valuable, bookmarked. Thank you for this!

Also, might give me some inspiration to make my own wiki ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> It's a vicious cycle.. the more you distract yourself, the more your brain wants quick hits, so you feel the craving for more distractions. There are many ways to help outlined by other comments here, getting exercise probably one of the most effective. However any solution will involve you making a conscious effort to pull out of the cycle and change your habits.

</comment><comment><USER58> When you are coding, or when you are working? I'm asking because perhaps you just don't enjoy your job. Can you still code for some hours when you're working on side-projects or learning new things?

I have no useful tips to add beyond what's already been mentioned here. The only thing I can suggest is to clarify if your _job_ might be the real problem.

<comment><USER41> Most programmers don't spend any amount of time on side projects. Maybe the all, like me, weakly aspire to, though.

<comment><USER58> It's still a valid question to ask though.

And many people do program outside of work. Not necessarily big projects, but things like AoC, ProjectEuler, or just learning a new language/framework.

But yeah - I believe more programmers don't rather than do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> if you are asking it here, I assume you did some online research too and I believe that you already know all the solutions. For most of the people the problem is not sticking with these solutions and not being patient enough to get the result.

I'm married, above 30 with a lot of things going on in my life. And often my co-workers make joke about me going into ZEN mode when working.

Don't look for a magic tricks. It is as simple as you hear from everyone. You just need to be patient and stick with them long enough for your brain to get use to it.

I'm careful about eating and sleeping. Having enough fun. I put my phone away while working and resting. I use Pomodoro technique to make sure I have enough short breaks and I have a goal. And I know very basic of meditation breathing technique (learned literally in 30mins). I only drink one cup of coffee on the morning and one cup of tea on the afternoon.

<comment><USER60> I agree. Remove the phone will pay dividends. I started leaving my phone in my car after work and already I'm seeing benefits with my afternoon/evening. I'm able to get more done as well as have a full night's sleep.

There's something about the phone that just keeps me distracted. So, I just don't bother with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> Heavy metal helps for me. Try Iron Maiden, Metallica, Dream Theater, Moonspell, Therion, etc. all this works for me. And stop visiting those websites of course ;-). Make accessing them harder, you could add the problematic domains to /etc/hosts to resolve to 127.0.0.1 or something like that.

<comment><USER24> I'm the opposite, I need silence to focus, I find music distracting!

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> If you are not against some help from technology, then there are software/apps that block internet access for social media web-sites etc e.g. freedom.to

You could also try browser extensions, e.g. for Firefox: Mind the Time -- shows stats of internet usage; LeechBlock NG -- blocks sites.

</comment><comment><USER15> Recognize what unmet needs your habits are grasping towards.

If you spend too much time on facebook, it could be because that is the lowest-effort way to keep up with friends you value. Message 4 of them and schedule a time for a phone call. Better yet, schedule a _recurring_ phone call.

</comment><comment><USER63> No you didn't. This is an emotional problem masquerading as a cognitive one.

This happens to me at my three-hour university lectures. Some days I am emotionally tortured and cannot focus at all. Some days I am emotionally healthy and can focus through nearly the whole thing.

</comment><comment><USER64> Find a good therapist. It may even be free, depending on your health insurance. My therapist has helped me discover the root causes of mental habits that are holding me back. Now I'm making progress on them. The sessions are worth my time and money.

</comment><comment><USER65> You might be genetically susceptible to distractions. Some people are just better at focusing than others. It's perhaps not where your power is.

The best solution is to simply delete all your social media accounts that you don't use professionally (strategically).

</comment><comment><USER66> Is the lost focus for the work you do as part of the job you described [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18400859](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18400859) ?

</comment><comment><USER67> In my experience, only regular meditation sessions and physical activity (i.e. working out) will help.

Also look into your diet, too many carbs / sugars could make you sleepy and are not good for your concentration skills

</comment><comment><USER68> Self-fulfilling prophecy, probably a reason you want to be in this trap

</comment><comment><USER69> Uninstall Instagram and Facebook from your phone. Block them and other time- wasting sites on your computer. Start training yourself to not be distracted. This is what has worked best for me.

<comment><USER25> Same here.

The quicker you distance yourself from social media the healthier you will be. There's literally everything to gain by leaving it behind.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> Look to your health. Eat right. Exercise. Clean your workspace. Etc.

</comment><comment><USER71> I think you answered your own question. Ditch the social media. It only hurts for a bit, and then you start to feel better and wonder why you were so obsessed to begin with.

</comment><comment><USER72> It happened to me on a job that I hated. Doing something you like might fix it.

Try a side project or some library or module that you've always wanted to write.

</comment><comment><USER73> depression, anxiety, and adhd (inattentive), had me troubling to stay focused. I lost 90 lbs (515 down to 425) since September, started seeing a therapist, and start adhd meds... the crossfit/keto/fitness + adhd meds have had the biggest effect on mood, depression, and focus. I'm taking 50 mg if Vyvanse and it totally keeps me balanced and focused.

</comment><comment><USER74> Adderall. Truly.

<comment><USER17> Adderall is good for focus once you break the habit of social media / youtube, otherwise it just makes you really good at focusing on social media / youtube. I know this from experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> I lost my ability to focus for ~6 months.

I started working on something that I cared about.

Slowly, over 3-4 months, I regained it.

</comment><comment><USER76> Maybe the DMAE supplement could help your brain to regain focus.

</comment><comment><USER77> it sounds like addiction to me. Some people are more sensitive to all kinds of addictions than other.

</comment><comment><USER78> Work is work

</comment><comment><USER79> Caveat: I can only speak for myself and don't know if these are extrapolatable to others. I can't say I'm an über-focus person, probably mediocre, but I use tools to help be better. I know co-workers who would be in a deep focus while the house is burning around them, and I'm not at that level.

TL;DR: Reduce cognitive load.

Rule 1. Make your environment conductive to focus.

If you are in an open office, you have a shit sandwich to start with. So isolate yourself from the cognitive "filth and rabble". Long time ago I worked with a guy who built a cardboard wall and then wired a camo net over his cubicle, but maybe one doesn't have to go to such extremes.

Headphones: Use headphones and music to drown out co-workers talking and other noise. I don't play my absolute all-time favorite tracks on repeat, I play something I merely like: noisy stuff like some desert sludge metal or stoner rock -- I sort of tune out the music and the music drowns out all the noise. You'll need to experiment what music works best for you. I use Spotify and try to improve my playlists with new interesting music.

Tune your programming environment to have a look-and-feel that fades to the background. Nicer and duller colors. Learn all the shortcuts to be effective, and learn a powerful editor which gives you macros and regular expressions and whatnot. The less mouse you need the less mini context switch which is better.

Turn off audio notices, turn off all blinking "hey you have mail".

Rule 2. Coffee/tea in moderation.

Too much of too strong coffee within too short time makes my focus become scattered. My mind starts to get racy. The best thing is to dose coffee such that one doesn't go over the limit. A tea in the morning a few hours after waking up works quite well.

Rule 3. Notes and checklists.

It helps to be a compulsive note-taker. Before I start anything, I make sure to have a vague idea of what to do, then I make a checklist. I write down notes and think of next things to do while waiting for something. I do "self- retrospectives": when I'm done with a few hours work, I go through it and make notes and checklists of next things.

The checklist lives all the time, new things get added and old points get marked as red cross (not done, bad idea, didn't work, etc.) or green tick (done, clear, good idea, etc.). I use a program called Zim but you can do it with any editor.

Rule 4. Train your memory.

I've noticed it becomes easier to suppress problems from tiny context switches that way. One is less likely to forget the context prior to the interruption, and the notes help a lot with this, too.

Rule 5. Rest to recover.

When you're not at work, you're not at work and you should not be thinking about work either. Exercise, read, do something else you like.</comment>


GDC 2018 – WebGL and glTF - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnsqdYSMq38 <comment><USER2> There are still tons of WebGL apps that make the mistake of loading OBJ, DAE (Collada) files or some similar editor-oriented 3D model format. This is like loading embedding Photoshop PSDs throughout your web page because you don't feel like exporting to PNG. I believe this is a major contributor to the "WebGL is slow to load" impression many users have.

glTF is the PNG of WebGL. It's compact, quick and easy to use. Distributing content in a some other format not optimized for distribution is a disservice to your users, your servers and the technology as a whole.</comment>


Bonsai: Bulletproof contracts, simple e-signing, escrow for freelancers - <AUTHOR> https://www.hellobonsai.com/ <comment><USER2> This is my first time posting on Hacker News.

Can I just say that you should be very careful about describing your contracts as "Bulletproof".

There is honestly no such thing as a bulletproof contract.

Secondly, telling people that "top attorneys" drafted the contracts is meaningless. That strikes me as just pure throw away marketing speak.

There are many things to consider when drafting this type of agreement and I'm just not sure that your description of the service should give freelancers great comfort.

Just my two cents. I do love the idea and know first hand the importance of having a contract in place.

<comment><USER3> Apparently they didn't run the marketing of the contracts by the attorneys.

I don't know much about law, but a lawyer told me that law isn't black and white. It's gray. So, bulletproof probably goes against that.

<comment><USER4> Bullet resistance then. Must leverage ballistics-speak when describing legal processes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "1.5 Invoices. The Developer will invoice the Client for work done weekly. The Client agrees to pay the amount owed within 21 days of receiving the invoice. Payment after that date will incur a late fee of 5% ."

Fee being yearly or monthly? When setting up the variables it was displayed as monthly - but this is not conveyed anywhere in the contract which will default to the Clients best interest (yearly).

<comment><USER6> Is it a fee or an ongoing interest penalty? If a fee, then wouldn't it be 5% one time?

<comment><USER7> A one-time fee incentives them to not pay late, but once they are already late, there is no more incentive since they have already incurred the 5% fee.

<comment><USER8> Indeed, still exploring carrot and stick options here to get clients to pay on time.

One nice idea we've come across is a trivial discount for early / on time payment (~1-3%). We've heard anecdotally that it helps!

<comment><USER9> I hope that's coming out of your share.

<comment><USER7> You just quote high enough that the "discounted" rate is the real rate and the not "discounted" rate is the penalty rate. Then you're just rephrasing things (discount vs. penalty) to put a better spin on it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This looks quite interesting. A couple of things i would like to see are:

\- sample without the need to provide an email e.g. show at least one and offer more samples when email is provided

\- what's the pricing / cut you take from the money transferred through your service?

<comment><USER8> One of the makers of Bonsai here. Thanks for checking us out!

\- Agree re email. Reason we did that is we realized most people don't have the need to create a contract immediately, and unless they bookmark us, they may not remember "that cool website that does my contracts for me..." Providing the sample contract + other relevant educational material in the meantime to stay top of mind was the best short term way to do that.

\- Regarding transaction fee, right now we're really only looking at escrow, which depending on the transaction size and deal we're able to get from the third party escrow provider, it should be somewhere around 2-5%.

<comment><USER11> Re: email I did the opposite. I was ready to view it now, but waiting for an email turned me off. So I tweeted it instead and hope I remember to go back to my tweet. And, there's a part of me that says, in a nice way, "you haven't earned my email yet."

Still, I love the idea and actually want to find a reason to use it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I've always liked the Elance / Freelancer escrow systems, in principal, and I use them when buying services. But those sites have way too much of a low-end feel for me to ask my own clients to pay me via those, for 5 or 6-figure jobs.

If this can be a high-end equivalent of those low-end escrow services, that will be nice.

</comment><comment><USER13> Skimming over the title and the URL, I was hoping to find a Bonsai care/maintenance contractor network.

How do you reach your target audience with a company name and URL like yours? Could you provide a sample contract without the need to enter a valid E-Mail address?

<comment><USER14> I always suffer the same confusion when I try to shop at amazon.com

<comment><USER15> In fact, I have yet to find an actual Amazon[1] on amazon.com, although I have found books about them [2].

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

[2] [http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search- alias%3Dap...](http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search- alias%3Daps&field-keywords=amazons)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Is anyone worried about the claim of being "bulletproof". This is like waiving at red flag at a lawyer.

</comment><comment><USER17> If only this existed for the United Kindgom. Looks like a great, accessible service.

<comment><USER18> Would love a service like this for the UK!

<comment><USER19> Yeah, but they'd need to cover what the IPSE/PCG contract template covers already; for those few occasions where a client will accept it ...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Looks interesting. I live in Canada and have contractors worldwide. I suspect this is a typical case.

I don't really care about contracts but escrow would be useful. I mean, I don't care about a formal legally binding contract that covers canada- Indonesia, phillipines, UK, etc. that would be complicated. But having a secure way to pay outside of elance/up work would be nice.

Also, when I click "let us know" it opens the mail app on my iPhone. I haven't set that up. You would have better luck if the email was also displayed.

</comment><comment><USER21> [http://bit.ly/panwlegaldocs](http://bit.ly/panwlegaldocs)

I recently open sourced my legal docs on Google Docs, so people could share docs, ask questions, and help each other. Legal docs are expensive and the language is very obscure. Let's utilize our legal experience and help each other out. Here's my post: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10100848](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10100848)

</comment><comment><USER22> The sample contract is well drafted and the plain English style is refreshing. The only bit of residual legalese is the bit before the signature blocks: "THE PARTIES HERETO AGREE TO THE FOREGOING AS EVIDENCED BY THEIR SIGNATURES BELOW."

It's as if the drafters, after taking great pains to make the contract clear and straightforward, decided "well we better put _some_ magic words in there or people won't think this is a binding contract!"

<comment><USER23> Really? I'm confused by the sample contract. Section 1.3 seems to be in direct conflict with itself and also in conflict with Section 1.5.

      1.3 Payment. The Client will pay the Designer a flat fee of $10,000 once the work is finished. Of this, the Client will pay the Designer $2,500 before work begins.

      1.5 Invoices. The Designer will invoice the Client for work done monthly. The Client agrees to pay the amount owed within 15 days of receiving the invoice. Payment after that date will incur a late fee of 2% per month on the outstanding amount.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Please, please support other countries such as the United Kingdom. This would be ideal for me!

</comment><comment><USER25> What's the transaction cost for payments?

I'm a client who's just looking for a cheaper/nicer way to send payments to my freelancers.

</comment><comment><USER26> Similar contracting type service => [http://ourdeal.com](http://ourdeal.com)

</comment><comment><USER27> i just registered; great job with the user-experience. i think the team made it really easy to use.</comment>


Announcing OSS-Fuzz: Continuous fuzzing for open source software - <AUTHOR> https://opensource.googleblog.com/2016/12/announcing-oss-fuzz-continuous-fuzzing.html <comment><USER2> Finally some serious community fuzzing effort! I always thought of fuzzing- project.org as of a joke, based on how little information there was. Hopefully this one will be better...</comment>


Energy Scavenging from a 2C temperature gradient (Jan 2019) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ravi_Kishore16/publication/330568372_Energy_scavenging_from_ultra-low_temperature_gradients/links/5ce10b8892851c4eabacf153/Energy-scavenging-from-ultra-low-temperature-gradients.pdf <comment><USER2> A ring of gadolinium is used as a rotor in an electric generator, motion is caused by using heat to create a magnetization gradient in different zones of the ring: "Cyclic heating and cooling causes magnetic domains to orient and disorient, resulting in time-varying magnetization and an unbalanced magnetic torque on the rotor."</comment>


Show HN: A simple solution to implement INotifyPropertyChanged in WPF - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/iamnottimi/Harloxy <comment><USER2> Cool to see WPF still getting some love :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Haha yeah, it's fun to develop with but the implementation of the interfaces is annoying ;)</comment></comment>


Generative Art Finds Its Prodigy - <AUTHOR> https://www.artnome.com/news/2018/8/8/generative-art-finds-its-prodigy <comment><USER2> I like Manolo Naon's art, and I am quite fond of creative coding, but something that strikes me when seeing this article comparing his works to Kandinsky, Ernst et. al is that his works are always harmonious, a single idea in action, whereas all these classic artists have conflicts and discord in their works.

They deliberately avoided doing things that were simply decorative or pleasant. (Probably they were avoiding accusations of just making couch and wallpaper patterns)

There is more to experience then just one decorative process at work.

You can _feel_ the artist's presence and discord in the images. Look at the Max Ernst works and ask yourself why he left it imperfect, fading away like dreams or unconscious processes.

Look at the Kandinskys. There is far more information (different design processes juxtaposed), and even after looking at it for a while you still have to wonder how it is balanced and yet there's barely any repetition.

Manolo is always explicit and readable. There is a lack of mystery. Once you've examined the image then you like it, but nothing stirs in the depths.

But he's young, I like the direction, and he will definitely keep developing.

<comment><USER3> I've experienced what you're talking about as maybe the fundamental challenge in making computer-based art. Computers love to follow rules. Come up with some interesting rules, and they will spit out interesting pictures/music. It's much much harder to figure out how to tell the computer "okay, but break the rule just a little bit, at the appropriate time". Codifying breaking the rules _as its own rule_ is...well, so far it's mostly eluded me.

<comment><USER4> Maybe there's an opportunity to combine computers and hand-made choices.

Art using a mixture of several generative tools and manual tweaks by the artist on the final result could achieve that goal of "breaking the rules just a little bit", especially if the generative tools are parametrical and easy to customize, maybe with direct manipulation on the generated canvas.

<comment><USER5> If you're interested in this. Combining generated art with manual tweaks. Look into [http://gif.com.ai](http://gif.com.ai)

You're in for a pleasant surprise.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It seems that recently there's been interest in procedurally-generated imagery among artists, but almost all completely unaware that the demoscene has been doing the same (and much advanced its techniques) for many years:

[http://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarching...](http://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarchingdf.htm)

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

<comment><USER7> Demoscene demos are nice, but to me they feel more like expressions of technical prowess rather than aesthetic art. I don't think I've ever seen a demo where the result transcends the algorithm, and I don't think that's the goal of the demoscene in any case. They want to showcase how much technical brilliance they can fit in a couple of KB's.

That's different from this example, where the goal is more like how much expression (emotion/aesthetics) can I put into a single image. And I must say I agree with the author that his work is astounding in this regard. Each one of them feels like a proper artwork, not just someone that's fiddling with a couple algorithms.

<comment><USER8> You're right that many demos simply exist to showcase technical brilliance, but many in the demoscene are starting to trend further towards expressing artistic ability. Some examples off the top of my head:

\- Number One/Another One by CNCD/FLT: [http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=77399](http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=77399)

\- When Silence Dims the Stars Above by Conspiracy: [http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=75713](http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=75713)

\- Aurora by Excess: [http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=75791](http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=75791)

\- Along for the Ride by Ümlaüt Design: [http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=78053](http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=78053)

<comment><USER9> Smash smashing it again with the first one...

BTW - your realtime synth engine ([https://github.com/monadgroup/axiom](https://github.com/monadgroup/axiom)) looks great. Any ETA for a Mac build of the VST?

<comment><USER8> I have a super-beta build working, if you'd like to try it out/help bugfix shoot me an email at "copodt at the google email" and I'll send it to you :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> If you want to understand art since Cezanne, and especially after 1945, you need to understand the modernist idea of the meta-narrative. It works like this -- prior to the loosening up of gesture in painting, the narrative was whatever was depicted. Maybe it was Washington Crossing the Delaware, or Napoleon Crossing the Alps. Pictures told stories directly. Beginning with impressionist painting, and following through to non-objective modernist paint, pictures told a second story -- a meta-narrative. This is the narrative of the events that created the painting. It answers the question -- what is the story of this artwork's creation? This leaves the viewer to deal with things like struggle, imperfection, and arbitrary residue (there are cigarette butts within some Jackson Pollocks). Did you ever visit MoMa and see Barnett Newman's Vir Heroicus Sublimimis?

[https://www.moma.org/collection/works/79250?artist_id=4285&l...](https://www.moma.org/collection/works/79250?artist_id=4285&locale=en&page=1&sov_referrer=artist)

It could be a generative work of art -- but wait -- the vertical stripes where the masking tape was peeled away leave small amount of paint bleeding into the stripes. Why? It tells you something about how it was made. Cold geometric forms made with a human touch. Visit the Joseph Albers, Piet Mondrian and Ad Reinhardt paintings and there's arbitrariness and human touch in them all.

So, I would ask you -- what is the meta-narrative of this generative art? What is the story behind it? Does it inspire you? Do you feel like you are looking at art? Or a modern art-themed screensaver?

<comment><USER11> I'm not an art history major, but why does a work of art require a backstory? Or a meta-story? Why is a screensaver not "real" art? It seems so limiting. That's a beautiful painting and the painter is very talented, but there is no existential dread evident in the brush strokes, no social commentary on the intersection between class warfare and feminism, so it's not "real art". Who makes these rules?

It's like when you hear a young pianist play Liszt perfectly or a Rachmaninov piece better than Rachmaninov did, and the critics say, "Well there was no emotion there, no struggle—she has a long way to go." Bullshit! It was great! Why can't art just be appreciated itself, without all this "story" baggage?

<comment><USER12> > Why can't art just be appreciated itself, without all this "story" baggage?

Because that eliminates the in-group, experts, elite, etc. Hence all the "rules" and terms like "outsider art", etc

<comment><USER13> You can similarly ask, 'how could art exist without "in-group, experts, elite, etc."'? Why in the world would anyone create all these bizarre objects?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Another interesting artist in this genre:

[https://twitter.com/inconvergent](https://twitter.com/inconvergent)

[https://img.inconvergent.net/](https://img.inconvergent.net/)

<comment><USER15> Shameless plug: Inspired by "inconvergent" I have built a plotter and started working on my own generative art realised with pen and paper: [https://www.instagram.com/framedbyher/](https://www.instagram.com/framedbyher/)

<comment><USER16> Where did you get the plotter?

<comment><USER15> I have built it myself. I was inspired by a couple of tutorials I found on the internet. Most of the components are off the shelf, stepper motors, smooth rods, belt, arduino, etc. The components that hold everything together are either 3d-printed or laser cut. The software that is running on the arduino that translates gcode -> stepper motor impulses is slightly modified grbl [0]

I have a (poor) timelapse video of the assembly process - [1]

[0] [https://github.com/grbl/grbl](https://github.com/grbl/grbl)

[1] [https://framedbyher.com/the-story/](https://framedbyher.com/the-story/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> For anyone interested in the history of generative art and its parent discipline "(new) media art", some historical resources:

\- [http://generative.net/read/home](http://generative.net/read/home)

\- [http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/mediaartnet/](http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/mediaartnet/)

\- [http://userwww.sfsu.edu/swilson/book/infoartsbook.html](http://userwww.sfsu.edu/swilson/book/infoartsbook.html)

\- [http://archive.aec.at/](http://archive.aec.at/), and [https://s3.amazonaws.com/arena- attachments/139740/8aec5cb9da...](https://s3.amazonaws.com/arena- attachments/139740/8aec5cb9da76a6194bfc5184a427c5b3.pdf?1376461955)

\- [http://dada.compart-bremen.de/](http://dada.compart-bremen.de/)

\- [http://turbulence.org/](http://turbulence.org/)

\- [http://neural.it/](http://neural.it/) (magazine)

\- [http://rhizome.org/art/artbase/](http://rhizome.org/art/artbase/)

\- [http://www.nettime.org/](http://www.nettime.org/) (classic net.art mailing list)

\- [http://we-make-money-not-art.com/](http://we-make-money-not-art.com/) (previous-generation blog)

\- [http://www.creativeapplications.net/](http://www.creativeapplications.net/) (current generation blog)

Referring to Naon as a "prodigy" is a deeply out-of-context claim.

<comment><USER17> [http://archive.aec.at/prix/](http://archive.aec.at/prix/) all the way back to 1987. Naon is a tiny blip in an ocean of creativity and ideas.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I think Naon is very distinctive for his embracement of the importance of human touch & influence in generative art. His choice of color, his adjustment of the shape and form in the work (either intentional or accidental) all produce works that have a human element to them even as they are generated by a Processing script. Automation is a tool and a big element of the work, but the vision of the artist and his creation plays a big part in what the end result looks like.

I've often wondered - and maybe this is an actively explored area of art - what it would look like to attempt to remove _all_ human impact from the process of generative art. A human will write the code, so maybe that's impossible, but how far divorced from the influence of the coder can the resulting work be? Do we just end up at random noise, or is it still possible to make something pleasing without a conscious guiding hand? Distribution- mimicking methods like GANs are very "hands-off" like this in principle, but of course are influenced by the training data. Interested to see how generative art continues to play out in the future.

</comment><comment><USER19> Joshua Davis [0] has been doing generative art (mostly Flash/actionscript) since late 90's. Took a class of his once and it was amazing (as is his art).

If OP subject is prodigy, Davis is the grandfather.

[https://joshuadavis.com](https://joshuadavis.com)

<comment><USER20> Came here to say this

<comment><USER13> In the same tradition: [http://mariuswatz.com/](http://mariuswatz.com/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Generative art is a fascinating space - it's in its infancy for sure - I've been getting into it this past year and wrote my first algorithm about a year ago:

[https://anemy.github.io/concentric/](https://anemy.github.io/concentric/)

Like all art, it comes down to who witnesses it, and how it makes them feel. However - there's a definite gap between seeing something in real life versus digitally which I'd like to see Naon bridge. There's a large community of plotters which are doing a good job of bringing generative art into the real world. Definitely worth checking out the twitter hashtag:

[https://twitter.com/hashtag/plottertwitter?src=hash](https://twitter.com/hashtag/plottertwitter?src=hash)

Naon cranks out amazing compositions at an astounding rate, it makes me real happy to see him get some good exposure like this.

One of the cofounders of Etsy, Jared Tarbell, is also a great artist and worth checking out: [http://www.complexification.net/gallery/](http://www.complexification.net/gallery/)

If you'd like to see more generative works, the subreddit is a good starting place: [https://www.reddit.com/r/generative/](https://www.reddit.com/r/generative/)

<comment><USER22> Concentric looks really great! It actually has decent variation

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Apparently, he published all of his code (I didn't see any mention of where). Regarding the color -- he mentions being careful with the palette, but I wonder how he gets it to turn out correctly (assuming it's RNG). It seems like you would have to keep generating new instances until you find one that looks pleasing.

One algorithm that comes to mind:

      1. Choose a color palette and initial resolution.
      2. Implement generative features at current resolution.
      3. Generate the output and until it "looks right".
      4. Increase feature resolution.
      5. Go to step 2.

In other words, one could keep generating prints until the locations and extents of the sampled colors "looks right", then keep the random seed and continue implementing finer details until they "look right", etc.

This will be the second time I drop this on HN this week, but check out Primitive Pictures[0] if you are interested in this kind of stuff. Also, I highly recommend Schiffman's YouTube channel[1] which goes into depth on how to get started with processing (and p5.js, the browser/canvas version). Note that the artist in the article learned how to do this by reading Schiffman's book, which is covered in a series of tutorials in the linked YouTube channel.

[0] [https://github.com/fogleman/primitive](https://github.com/fogleman/primitive)

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvjgXvBlbQiydffZU7m1_aw](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvjgXvBlbQiydffZU7m1_aw)

<comment><USER24> I don't think this algorithm is very common. In particular, the colour palette can usually be chosen _last_ , and a lot of generative art (at least all that shown in the article) will not need multiple resolution passes. I think a more common discovery/refinement process is to go from more random to less random, or random in particular kinds of ways. For example, you can specify the values or distributions (or at least ranges of values) for particular parameters based on things you think will look good or which should end up similar in ways you like to things you've found already.

Generative art is a search in an extremely high dimensional space. The more you go into it aiming for something in particular, the more nailed down it is and the closer to traditional art (and the harder to pull off well IMHO, think how much difference slightly changing the position of one of the elements in these images would make, versus slightly changing the position of someone's eye). If you go looking for "new and interesting" or "looks good" without really aiming for anything in particular, it can be a lot easier to find good things.

I've seen a couple of really interesting talks recently about the surprising successfulness of objective-less search by Ken Stanley:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQPL9GooyI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQPL9GooyI) (40 min.)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZBViI8ZaU0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZBViI8ZaU0) (90 min.)

He started off looking at human-directed machine-evolved generative art, and ended up with a far more general discovery.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I don't think we're being radical enough. I think this kind of art is fantastic, but it copies human-designed art. Let's do things that aren't possible with paint or crayons - let's do multi-dimensional time-shifting video art.

I guess we need to do stuff that looks like 'normal' art first, to get people used to it.

<comment><USER26> In my town we call that stuff "video games."

<comment><USER13> I think of most generative art as video games larping as "fine art."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I've been making art from randomly generated numbers for years. It's a realization of Pollock's objective where the viewer's subconscious is the only artist free from bias of any other person, a conduit of the mind.

[https://imgur.com/a/2qRHjxl](https://imgur.com/a/2qRHjxl)

</comment><comment><USER28> I believe the purpose of Art is to reveal the soul of the Artist. This is why simply copying (or trying to emulate) the work of another artist is not considered art. However, learning to follow the rules set by others is a helpful stepping stone to striking out on your own and breaking those rules.

</comment><comment> d--b One has to remember that "generative art" only characterizes techniques for generating pictures. Art itself is about what the picture makes people feel, or what they have to say. Just making pictures for the only purpose of being "beautiful" is fine, just not very artful...

<comment><USER29> > Just making pictures for the only purpose of being "beautiful" is fine, just > not very artful...

Beauty is the goal of art.

If his works don't resonate as well as a Nikolay Dubovskoy or a Cy Twombly, or any other human artist, it's in beauty that he fails.

I find that generally this confusion around "beauty" comes from using a popular but non-standard definition of beauty.

Beauty has meant, since the ancient Greeks and up through the romantics to today, "a higher emotional response", whether joyful, sorrowful or disgust.

Beauty is often confused for perfection among laymen. This is not a popular definition of beauty with aesthetic theoreticians, and only reached popularity under the regimes of the early 20th century fascists.

Beauty is a revelatory emotion, any revelatory emotion.

In aesthetics, the opposite of beauty isn't ugliness, but literalism and cold intellectualization.

That which isn't beauty in art is mere journalism, politics, or advertising -- these are lesser concerns than beauty.

Confusing that which isn't beauty in art for the core of art is like thinking that fashion and hairstyles is the core of music, when quite the opposite is true. Fashion diminishes music, not strengthens it.

Similarly -- that which is not about beauty in art diminishes it, not strengthens it.

<comment><USER13> I'm curious how your theory of art deals with minimalism and conceptual art. I suspect you'd have to admit that mid-century we collectively expanded the definition of beauty to include modern ideas – structure, process – and expressions of irony.

<comment><USER29> As for irony, ask any art historian with experience in middle ages or late antiquity art. She'll tell you that it has always been a popular device in the arts.

The problem with "irony", where this common myth about its novelty comes from, is that Irony is invisible to generations separated by time and place.

To see irony in a work of antiquity requires a significant amount of education in the circumstances of that work. Irony never lies of the surface of a work. If enough time passes, our appreciation of that irony will often be lost.

How much irony is hidden there in the vase paintings of ancient Greece which we will never recognize, having not the context to see it? Irony, a Greek term, coined by Aristotle, passed on by the Romans, and more recently popularized in the 1500's by the French -- yet could we recognize Irony in any of their works without help?

If the average art critic finds no instances of irony in the art of the past they could be excused for that, their job isn't art history. Those are separate professions.

Where art critics do deserve blame however is when they've been shown countless examples of irony in the works of antiquity, and they act as if those instances are all unique anomalies. If they continue to bandy about the story of irony's novelty to defend the valuations of the works of their contemporaries, that's not fair play.

That's Art Criticism made Marketing, and it's an ugly but extremely common thing.

<comment><USER13> Many thanks for the explanation – you've illuminated a path to a deeper understanding of art history and aesthetics, which I hope one day to possess!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Discovered him on Twitter last year and was immediately blown away to see how his compositions resembled futurist and constructivist works to an uncanny extant. (Malevich, Kandinsky et al.) There is something about his choice of color palette that makes him really stand apart.

</comment><comment><USER31> These are some beautiful images. I am relieved to see this article is about a person and not an algorithm. I wish I knew what quality it is about these that are more appealing. I think it is the abstract nature of it. Some look like flowers, some like 80s pop art, some reminiscent of Dali. The images remind me of specific human shared experiences without having to reproduce an dog eyeball in the middle. Human Generative (algorithms + design) vs AI Generative (algorithms only). Maybe I am biased for team human and if someone told me these images were created by a neural network I would be more critical. Although I don't think these could be created by a NN. Certainly not picking different themes for each set.

</comment><comment><USER32> Interesting that he wants to keep it all digital and prefers it not made tangible.

Seems like it would be much harder to make any sort of living from your work by limiting the format to just digital.

Really cool nonetheless.

</comment><comment><USER33> I really do love generative art, but this article was so hyperbolic I couldn't make it through. I think this is generating designs, nice patterns for throw pillows, but not art. The only generative artist I know who deserves the article's level of idolatry is Tarn Adams, because Dwarf Fortress actually creates stories and scenarios that provoke thought.

</comment><comment><USER34> This gives me an idea. What it game textures for 3D models were entirely made up of shaders/generative algorithms. The entire game could be rendered with an equation and never have to load assets.

<comment><USER35> That's how a lot of the demoscene stuff works I'm sure!

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY5Vrc5G0lk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY5Vrc5G0lk)

> The secret behind all this is procedural content generation. in a nutshell, > instead of storing a movie as-is we're storing a certain number of > mathematical formulas for image and audio manipulation as well as the > "recipe" how to apply those small bits of code in a way that what you see > comes out.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Interesting stuff. All works of art tend to build on what came before, this does so in a much more direct way. At what point is something a derivative work rather than original?

<comment><USER37> Actually if you check out more of his work it looks quite different from what was chosen for this article. I think the article wants to portray a logical progression from modern art to generative art, or just to show that an algorithm is capable of generating images that are similar to those of highly creative human artists.

[https://www.behance.net/manoloide](https://www.behance.net/manoloide)

[https://www.google.com/search?q=Manolo+Gamboa+Naon&num=100&h...](https://www.google.com/search?q=Manolo+Gamboa+Naon&num=100&hl=en&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi3ucCyjrDdAhWV- mEKHR7mBQIQ_AUICigB&biw=1366&bih=618#imgrc=_)

He also is a young guy with plenty of time ahead to develop his own style. As someone who also experiments with generative art and music I am absolutely impressed by what he's done so far.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> You can't say generative art without saying demoscene.

<comment><USER13> Both generative art and the demoscene were preceded by decades of work with their own histories.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Very interesting pieces he has produced. I wonder how much is generated via rules vs simply coded. Cool find.

</comment><comment><USER40> I thought this was going to be a profile of Scott Draves of Electric Sheep fame.

</comment><comment> yoz-y I know art is whatever people describe as art but I can't really get behind this specific kind of creation. To me this creates as much emotion as a gravatar and reminds me of my dabbling in fractal art. Just hit random until something nice comes out.

<comment><USER41> It's cheating because it was done on a computer!

It's a fairly common attitude that creating with a computer is somehow inferior, from Tron missing out on a special effects Oscar because computer graphics was 'cheating', to pretty much every designer being told at some point 'it can't be that hard, it's all done on a computer right?'

Expected better from HN though.

<comment><USER42> Well at risk of waking a tiger, I think his view was one of intentionality. Whereas he did not say it was because it was made with a computer, that sort of feels like putting words in his post.

I think cool generative art is the space stuff like no man's sky, and spore. I know it's maybe considered low brow but it was interesting to me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> This site is blocked by the coffeeshop wifi as inappropriate content. I'm at Tim Hortons in Ottawa.

<comment><USER36> +1 416 977 8000

<comment><USER44> The butter donut reminds me of Alaska.</comment></comment></comment>


The Myth of the Interchangeable Programmer: Can't We Just Offshore Him? - <AUTHOR> http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/entdev/article.php/3757311/The+Myth+of+the+Interchangeable+Programmer:+Can't+We+Just+Offshore+Him?.htm <comment><USER2> Isn't this just the Mythical Man Month?

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month></comment>


WebGL in Internet Explorer - <AUTHOR> http://blog.virtualglobebook.com/2011/10/webgl-in-internet-explorer.html

<comment><USER4> _a work-in-progress that implements WebGL with Canvas_

That's a neat hack but it is absolutely not going to work in any practical sense. There is already a many orders of magnitude performance gap, and depth buffering will at least add yet another order of magnitude.

Also, canvas only supports affine texture mapping, as opposed to perspective- correct 3D mapping. This looks completely ridiculous for many common cases:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Perspective_correct_textur...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Perspective_correct_texture_mapping.jpg)

 _And_ , canvas can't cleanly stitch textured polygons together, so there will be visible seams everywhere.

I don't mean to be a killjoy, but I think one would find this endeavor very discouraging in the end.

</comment><comment><USER5> "I'm still confident that Microsoft will add WebGL support to IE" - hmm! Really?

<comment><USER6> I think Microsoft will.

Yes, Microsoft has opposed it so far. But WebGL is gaining traction and will soon be enabled in all web browsers but IE. Interesting websites using it are starting to appear, and that will only accelerate.

So Microsoft will lose out by being the only browser not supporting a useful technology. People will prefer other browsers. Where Microsoft has nothing to lose by implementing WebGL.

<comment><USER7> Won't it be WebDirectX then? DirectX is a direct competitor to OpenGL.

<comment><USER6> But WebDirectX would benefit Microsoft in no way. It would be a proprietary extension to the web. It would not let IE run WebGL websites.

Microsoft has recently seen the light when it comes to web standards - <USER2> latest versions of IE are very standards-compliant.

I agree that Microsoft hates OpenGL, and promotes DirectX in any way it can. But Microsoft also used to hate JavaScript and HTML, and tried to get people to develop in .NET on the web (Silverlight). But it has shifted to actually supporting the standards-based web. WebGL is part of that web.

<comment><USER5> I think if it comes to it, Microsoft will invent WebDirectX under the guise it's for Windows 8 metro apps, and simply left it on in IE10. 3D on the web is a niche so it doesn't make their browser uncompetitive. Besides, they can also claim "you can do the same thing in WebDirectX anyway, just use that" - <USER3> they don't have to be seen supporting OpenGL (who cares if anyone writes wrappers? they don't have to pretend WebGL is a good idea).

For the record, it's an utterly backward and damaging thing to do to the web, but they'll do it anyway.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


In Memory of Jim Weirich [video] - <AUTHOR> http://confreaks.com/videos/3072-imjw2014-goodbye-jim

<comment><USER2> [https://github.com/jimweirich/wyriki/commit/d28fac7f18aeacb0...](https://github.com/jimweirich/wyriki/commit/d28fac7f18aeacb00d8ad3460a0a5a901617c2d4)

</comment><comment><USER3> I attended one of Jim's many presentations, came to know that he created Rake. RIP.

</comment><comment><USER4> and GEMA hits .. Can not watch this in Germany because of SME-music content.

<comment><USER5> There's a link to the original video:

[https://ia700606.us.archive.org/33/items/GoodbyeJim/Goodbye%...](https://ia700606.us.archive.org/33/items/GoodbyeJim/Goodbye%20Jim.mp4)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Touching.</comment>


Facebook, Google to be forced to share ad revenue with Australian media - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/apr/19/facebook-and-google-to-be-forced-to-share-advertising-revenue-with-australian-media-companies <comment><USER2> What if Google and Facebook just said "No, thank you."? I think Google and Facebook have more power in this relationship, which might say something about the tech giants. The only possible thing the Aussies could do is block the websites, and that sounds like political suicide to me. I'm guessing the companies will decide to play ball, but if other countries start to follow suit, it might be interesting to see what happens if they start pushing back.

<comment><USER3> > The only possible thing the Aussies could do is block the websites, and that > sounds like political suicide to me.

The first thing they could do is fine them. Google and FB might say "ha! but we don't have bank accounts in Australia!" and the government will simply collect from companies in Australia that have outstanding bills from Google for e.g. Adwords or Google Cloud.

Google can still run their websites to be reachable from Australia, but they wouldn't be able to do business in Australia. And what's the point of running an ad tech empire if you can't make money off of it?

<comment><USER4> Could Australian ISPs be instructed to just blacklist Google's and Facebook's Ad servers nationally?

<comment><USER5> There are currently several sites banned in Australia, and the blacklisting took the form of ISPs hijacking the DNS lookup. Which means it is totally ineffective. Our government is not well known for mandating the right tool for the right job, when it comes to tech.

<comment><USER6> Sure but custom DNS is not something everyone can or will do, and businesses certainly won't allow it.

<comment><USER5> Sure, but there are a few caveats to that:

\+ Firefox doesn't use the system DNS by default anymore (Defaults to the DoH provider, usually Cloudflare)

\+ Chrome doesn't use the system DNS by default anymore (Defaults to Google's)

\+ Businesses often set the default DNS to use Google's, not their ISPs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _The code was to require the companies to negotiate in good faith on how to pay news media for use of their content, advise news media in advance of algorithm changes that would affect content rankings, favour original source news content in search page results, and share data with media companies._

This seems...confused. At that point why wouldn't Facebook, Google, et al just ban the media company links from their platforms and avoid the hassle?

<comment><USER8> Because news media represents one of their largest channels of legitimate traffic and engagement. It's why Google put so many resources into AMP, Facebook on their curated news feeds, etc.

Removing news links would probably eventually kill social media platforms in the long run, or at least accept a new path with much less growth.

<comment><USER9> Spain tried this and Google just dropped all the Spanish news sites from Google News in Spain.

"We regret that due to the Spanish law, Spanish publishers aren't featured in Google News and Google News is closed in Spain."

<comment><USER10> I suspect there's a decent chance the same thing will happen in France, if the appeals process doesn't reach some kind of more reasonable solution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Because of the SEO, most of the news sites are already clickbaits with junk information in them, it seems like this will grow a new industry: Link-tax- optimization.

<comment><USER12> Prime example: I opened up cnn.com which some people consider to be a news web site. The main headline is "Experts say grocery stores may need to keep customers out" ([https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/19/business/grocery-stores- coron...](https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/19/business/grocery-stores-coronavirus- pickup-delivery/index.html)). The real story is that grocery store workers are dying but a title based on that isn't clickbaity enough. It has to make you think the article actually affects you so you click it. I probably wouldn't have clicked the link if it was about grocery store workers getting covid-19.

And of course their "experts" are just random people who said some things. And they mention that even if they do keep customers out they while still have pickup and possibly delivery. So who cares about that part of the story then? Apparently it's not going to affect me.

The media has done nothing to prevent panic buying and everything to encourage it with these click bait headlines. There is no reason stores should be running out of anything but PPE and other things where demand naturally shot up because covid-19 like PPE and disinfectant. Demand for toilet paper only went up because of the media (and government). The other thing the media has been doing is shaming people but I'm not going to go there.

<comment><USER13> Stores run out of toilet paper because we're no longer popping at work: [https://marker.medium.com/what-everyones-getting-wrong- about...](https://marker.medium.com/what-everyones-getting-wrong-about-the- toilet-paper-shortage-c812e1358fe0)

The lockdowns have precipitated a huge shift in how we eat and what/where we purchase things. The supply chain is responding, but pivoting is expensive and groceries are a low margin business... the shortages could have been a lot worse. Going forward we may see shortages in imported foods/produce due to pandemic impacts in other countries and/or regulatory/logistics problems getting that food to market.

I'm not saying that the media has been responsible, just don't discount the bigger picture of changes in consumer behaviour.

<comment><USER14> Stores were running out of toilet paper because people antecipated they would run out of toilet paper. Just a self-fulfilling prophecy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Even though the specifics are not clear, we will (and should) be having more and more of these kinds of discussions going forward to avoid the monopoly created by the distribution reach of tech giants. It is in the interest of the tech companies themselves to come up with something reasonable, because the governments won't be able to, and whatever they come up with will likely be too complicated, mired in politics and too specific to each country. It is better if the tech companies can nip this in the bud even before it becomes too politicized.

Google, Facebook and Amazon owe their power to being great at content distribution. And I believe that if they take care to compensate content creators fairly, these sorts of upheavals will be greatly reduced. I think YouTube does a fair job of this. Not perfect, but a better balance, and I believe even that is enough.

<comment><USER16> How you dragged Amazon in the mix at the end is perplexing to me.

<comment><USER17> Amazon's ad network is growing incredibly quickly, and op may be referring to the content against which these ads are placed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I don't understand. If they wanted to tax it for the government / social programs it would sort of make sense. But why distribute it to old media companies?

Is there any merit to this at all?

<comment><USER19> The old media companies business model collapsed (newspapers). So they are essentially turning the old media companies into public companies, but instead of using tax dollars they are arbitrarily punishing Google and Facebook because they have a lot of money.

<comment><USER20> It is far worse than that. If they did a 'bailout and buy up' of failing companies. Instead it is still for private profit and receiving an arbitrary punishment to try to enrich private parties. Which is so damn very corrupt by definition.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> It is worth noting that "The Australian Media" in this case refers almost entirely to Rupert Murdoch.

<comment><USER22> That's the heart of the matter here, or at least where my interest lies. Protection of the independence of "The Australian Media" has been chipped away at for a long time, with the media ownership laws being watered down more and more, allowing for greater concentration of ownership.

What makes me suspicious is that protectionist action such as this is only coming now, at a time where the already-concentrated landscape is threatened, and because it's already concentrated there are a lot of powerful people with their fingers in the pie - much more-so than when it was less concentrated (almost by definition).

Therefore, my take on this is that it's protectionist for News Corp / Rupert Murdoch more-so than any reasons of the "social good". Very much a case a of "when elephants fight, it's the grass that gets trampled".

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Sounds bad. The government could tax Google and Facebook and decide to subsidize the media. Subsidizing the media would look weird probably but it would be more honest. Or am I wrong?

<comment><USER24> neither solution is attacking the root of the issue: the monopolization of the ad market which has made news reporting/blogging unsustainable. If the aussies want to have a body of independent sustainable journalism, government subsidies are dangerous.

This ruling makes more sense, it's like attaching a VAT on google's pipeline.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> This seems like a bad idea in that it doesn't address the actual issue: most people just read headlines now. The question that leads from that is asking whether that is a result of the design of Facebook.

Google is a different problem and it looks like they recognized the problem more with them and wanted to deal with the algorithms but I still think that people have accepted too readily the problem is that people just scan headlines and not that Facebook and Google to a lesser extent have an incentive for people not to click links too frequently.

<comment><USER24> clickbaity headlines are a result of websites desperately trying to get attention through clicks. If they don't need the clicks to remain profitable, the problem will go away

<comment><USER25> I mean it in more the sense that Facebook only serves your content to a very small amount of people who like your page to test it before they send it to more and more people, and that if I was trying to resolve the issues the companies were having with Facebook I would address that issue first.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> the primary issue is the ad market capture by G+FB. Instead of forcing them to pay up, force them to provide evidence that their advertising works, and that the market capture is not just capture-by-marketing or regulatory-capture of the entire advertising pie.

Also, break up their monopolizing tactics, like not sharing search queries with target sites (removal of referral) and monopolizing the browser search bars. Maybe G should share the search term instead of revenue.

</comment><comment><USER26> This is one of those things that seems to me, on a very superficial level, to be "fair" \-- online advertising companies have DECIMATED traditional media -- but I can't help but feel there are some really strange second- or third- order effects coming down the line.

This is just such an unnatural? forced? solution, and in my very limited experience, that leads to weird incentives later down the line.

It sort of feels like Google and Facebook are being incentivized to NOT display the content of traditional media institutions. That... doesn't seem like the intent.

</comment><comment><USER27> The article doesn't really make it clear exactly which ads Australia is trying to get a piece of. If Google is taking article content from publishers and combining it with ads before sending it to the user, I get why they'd want that money. If however, they're trying to get ads from Google search results, how does that make any sense at all? That's like every business in town trying to get ad revenue from the Yellow Pages.

</comment><comment><USER28> France and Spain have both led in this already, the ideal scenario is other governments taking the opportunity to jump on board. Google is more powerful than any given government, and can simply withhold service. ...Unless enough countries band together and demand this and leave Google no choice but to comply.

</comment><comment><USER29> This is indeed a landmark decision and I hope it will snowball into what it should really become: Google sharing revenue with all sites that it takes content from (hello Wikipedia and every blogger out there) not just media sites. Otherwise this measure is strongly biased in an unproductive way.

<comment><USER30> > Wikipedia

Most Wikipedia content is licensed under a Creative Commons license, so, _by intent_ , Google's free to use it as long as there's attribution. I'm not sure what would happen if a law forced Wikimedia to take money for something it's intentionally giving away.

<comment><USER29> The fact that they give it away, should not prevent/stop the receiving party to pay a fair share for it, if they extract value from it (and in Google's case monetize it). Also I am giving away my comment here, but I am sure happy if someone upvotes it (although that is not implicit in the transaction).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Same news from the Associated Press: [https://apnews.com/8ca7559d39b89d097a158043ca8f44bc](https://apnews.com/8ca7559d39b89d097a158043ca8f44bc) .

</comment><comment><USER32> I believe this move should be followed by governments worldwide, you are accessing worlwide data by providing services to citizens of different countries. You are also generating $ by ad services generated by this data(i.e. access to news portals), and it goes to profit only one country. Are the ads from only local companies?(I don't think so). How fair is that? In a world where trade deals are done to benefit both nations in case of commodities, why not do the same for bits and bytes of information?</comment>


The Consequences of Your Code - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZM9YdO_QKk <comment><USER2> I'm no longer convinced there's any meaningful difference between incompetence and malice.

By now every programmer on the internet knows their systems can have widespread consequences, and that users won't hit the happy path on the first try, and that systems will live far longer than planned, and so on.

The only place where this has a meaningful distinction is amateurism. You can only claim you didn't know any better if you weren't expected to. A professional carpenter doesn't get to say "Oops, I didn't think someone would lean on _that_ wall." Sorry your building collapsed, but at least I didn't do it maliciously? Professionals don't take mulligans.

<comment><USER2> Corollary 1: This also applies if you build a system which is 'technically correct' but so complex nobody could be expected to understand it.

Corollary 2: This also applies if you build a system which lacks proper documentation. It's functionally equivalent to a system which is so complex nobody can understand it.</comment></comment>


Amie Street Closes Series A Financing Led By Amazon.com - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/08/05/amiestreetcom-closes-series-a-financing-led-by-amazoncom/

<comment><USER2> Congratulations. Another missed opportunity for the major record labels. Glad they are trying to hang in there by partnering with companies that will only allow music downloads for Windows Media Player, and have a board full of suits.

<http://corp.spiralfrog.com/board.aspx>

not that i have a problem with any of the fine gentleman or woman on the spiral frog executive team.

</comment><comment><USER3> Brown represent!</comment>