I amplified my home's Wi-Fi with aluminum foil - <AUTHOR> https://www.jiffchat.com/m/2ZUaCkOed9+sHn4FHOS+PC2TGvE_vfjTVtKvyYvWbAE= <comment><USER3> It can work surprisingly well, I made a "dish" with an aluminum foil that was able to connect to a Romanian Wi-Fi hotspot from Bulgaria, according to Google Maps it should be something like 20KM distance. I should note that I had direct view of the town as I had significantly higher altitude.

The hotspot was some kind of public service provided by the Romanian town as it's name suggested. The ip WhoIs also confirmed that it was a Romanian one.

Every now and then the connection would have had slowed down and I would do some "Voodoo magic" on the aluminum foil to fix it(Not sure if it was me though, it seemed like if I move the dish slightly or fix a bump in the foil the connection would improve).

This was probably like 7-8 years ago and I was able to get something close to 6-7Mbps as far as I remember.

<comment><USER4> This seems great for sending but how does it work for receiving? Or did you somehow do this on both ends?

<comment><USER5> It's not needed to do it in both ends. Naturally, improving both antennas is better than doing in only one, but every improvement in sending is completely equivalent in receiving for a system that uses the same antennas for both directions of communication.

So, if a new antenna in client side improves signal reception by 3dB, it also improves transmitted power by 3dB. If you used the same antenna on the other side, the 3dB would be added again in both reception and transmission, for a total gain of 6dB each direction.

<comment><USER4> > It's not needed to do it in both ends. Naturally, improving both antennas is > better than doing in only one, but every improvement in sending is > completely equivalent in receiving for a system that uses the same antennas > for both directions of communication.

Does this actually make sense to you? Gain is a factor; it needs to be multiplied by something. Here's the obvious thought-experiment: consider an (ideal) parabolic mirror in (a vacuum). Put a lightbulb (infinitely tiny) at the focus. Light will come out parallel and will be just as strong no matter how far away the receiver is. i.e. the distance will be irrelevant when the sender is at the focus. Now try reversing their roles, with the lightbulb far away and the receiver at the focus. How strong is the received signal at the focus? You're claiming it won't matter how far away the sender is from the focus, which makes no sense.

<comment><USER6> > Light will come out parallel

No it won't, it's diffraction-limited. The best you can theoretically do is an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airy_disk](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airy_disk)

You cannot construct, with any arrangement of mirrors or lasers, a beam that does not diverge.

<comment><USER4> I was assuming geometric optics... because it was simple enough to get the point across. Which of course you knew, but took the liberty to 'correct' anyway. It's quite impressive how you can always count on HN pedants to deliberately go out of their way to technically-correct you while making sure to completely miss the actual point you're trying to make.

<comment><USER6> You're the one that started in by trying to wrongly "correct" the statement "every improvement in sending is completely equivalent in receiving for a system that uses the same antennas for both directions of communication" (which is actually correct).

The fact that you can't have perfectly collimated beams and must make do with antenna pattern "lobes" is actually important here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This kind of hack was really popular when wifi was first being adopted. These reflectors work best when they are spaced according to the wavelength. Here is a template I remember seeing years ago:

[http://www.freeantennas.com/projects/template2/](http://www.freeantennas.com/projects/template2/)

<comment><USER8> t looks neat, but it doesn't tell you how far away you should place it or how big to make it. Am I misssing something?

<comment><USER9> I'm going to guess that the image is supposed to be printed on a standard- sized piece of printer paper (before laminating). Going to guess "US Letter" 8.5x10" (215.9x279.4mm), but to be certain check the aspect ratio, if it's close to 1.414 then it's probably supposed to be A4 (210x297mm). And make sure that the square prints as a square :)

Then you follow the assembly instructions, which are indeed a bit minimal; The six "bumps" (called "tabs" in the instruction) sticking out the "Windsurfer" part are probably supposed to stick into the six cut-lines of the rounded rectangle piece you cut out from the bottom of the sheet.

This will make the "Windsurfer" part a particular curved shape. I suppose this is the "reflector", so you probably should glue the aluminium foil only to this part.

Then there's the two crosses on the "Windsurfer" part, which you also cut out with a sharp knife, and seem to me to be just the right kind of holes to pierce the whole thing on a wifi-antenna. Get the picture?

Some kind of photo of the finished end-result would have been nice indeed :)

Disclaimer: I know almost nothing about radio signals or antennas etc, the above is just my interpretation of the instructions on the site.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I don't think this is working the way he thinks it does.

What he's likely do is shielding the wifi receiver from co-channel interference, which is likely reducing the noise floor at the AP - which is giving him effectively more range, because now the AP can hear stations that are further away with greater ease.

I don't think this is giving expanded tx coverage lobes as his diagram indicates, its likely a function of lowering the noise floor that gives the extra coverage.

<comment><USER11> Yeah, something so imprecise isn't likely to work as he thinks. Proper shielding can do a lot more. If you made your house/apartment a Faraday cage and eliminated neighbors' AP's that would already solve most problems.

<comment><USER12> > If you made your house/apartment a Faraday cage

Might put a crimp on your cell phone reception ...

<comment><USER13> Is there a way to build your Faraday cage to block out wifi wavelengths but not cell phone ones? How far apart are they?

<comment><USER14> You could likely block anything over 2.3 GHz and get away with it: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_frequencies_in_the_US](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_frequencies_in_the_US)

<comment><USER10> unless you have Sprint ;-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> If you want to to do this "properly", see [http://ham- radio.com/k6sti/wifiyagi.htm](http://ham-radio.com/k6sti/wifiyagi.htm)

When messing with antennas, things like distance needs to be thoroughly calculated. Foil can help in many ways, but it can also make things worse—antenna calculations are tricky.

<comment><USER16> Done wrong this will increase reflected energy at the feed point and make the transceiver run hotter than it is supposed to, possibly leading to an early failure. Measuring SWR at 2.4/5 GHz requires some expensive instruments; note that the link you provided has only "calculated" SWR, not measured. Wifi doesn't involve much power, but these low cost Wifi transceivers are engineered with rather limited headroom for reflected energy and shipped with antennas that work within those limits, so if you do this you're a test pilot; there is no complaining if it lunches itself.

<comment><USER15> As long as you're not running a high-power transceiver (i.e. not consumer gear or consumer gear out of legal spec), I would not be worrying about SWR problems. Consumer Wi-Fi chipsets are designed to be fairly rugged. They normally operate nowhere near their limits.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> When we were kids we took massive mesh wire frames and wrapped them around the receivers of these kind [1] of dinky walkie talkies. It fully extended the range by a whole two blocks. We thought we'd invented sliced bread.

[1] [https://img.segundamano.mx/medium/32/3227658794.jpg](https://img.segundamano.mx/medium/32/3227658794.jpg)

<comment><USER18> Wow, I had the exact same set of walkie talkies as a kid! That image certainly brought back some memories! :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Do not tilt the antenna though. Maximum emission of an dipole is perpendicular to its axis.

<comment><USER20> On occasion, going against the grain (in case of interference from another transmitter) can help if you can polarize the signal somehow.

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

Of course you'd have to do the same thing at the receiver.

<comment><USER21> you can for point to point use multiple ap with anteneas using differently polarised antenas - to increase the bandwidth

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I was thinking of doing something similar a few days ago but came to the conclusion — perhaps wrongly — that the inevitable creases in a DIY aluminium foil sheet would render it ineffective as a dish, due to the scatter created.

Anyone more knowledgeable able to chime-in on the effect of creases here? I couldn't find any mention of it in the article...

<comment><USER23> speed of light / 5 GHz / 4 ~= 1.5 cm.

If you can keep the size of the largest crease/feature/defect in your foil smaller than this, you should be okay.

<comment><USER22> Wow, thanks for this — I did HS-physics but much of my knowledge has since left me... :)

Would love to dig into the science behind this a bit more — I don't really know where to start — i.e. why you're dividing by four.

So as not to waste your time, is there a named phenomenon that you can link me to to learn more about this?

Thanks again!

<comment><USER24> I would also like to know this. I don't know if there's a save function in h.news or not so leaving a comment

<comment><USER25> If you click through to the comment, you can "favorite" it and then it shows up in [https://news.ycombinator.com/favorites?id=dukes_haven&commen...](https://news.ycombinator.com/favorites?id=dukes_haven&comments=t) which you can also find on your profile page under "favorite comments".

<comment><USER26> Wow. I'm one of today's lucky 10,000. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I got this guy and this allows me to read / play games in my bathtub

[https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Original-Portable-Light- Weig...](https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Original-Portable-Light-Weight- Xiaomi-Mi-WiFi-300M-Amplifier-2-Expander-for-Mi-Router/32789948233.html)

<comment><USER28> How is this only $6? It looks great.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Is there a way to see the tangible output of the coverage?

How is the author drawing those diagrams? Can I map my room with the strength of wifi signals at different points?

I want to do these small hacks but also want to see the change validated in some way. Any pointers will be appreciated.

</comment><comment><USER30> Slight nit there's no amplification here just focusing to make the field more directional.

<comment><USER20> Gain is effectively the same as amplification, _any_ kind of gain achieved in a passive manner indicates some kind of directional compromise.

It also should work equally well when receiving and transmitting, whereas an amplifier would work for only one direction (so you'd need two, one to output more power, another to amplify the received signal).

<comment><USER21> But technically there are legal maximum emitted powers unless you are "a professional"

<comment><USER20> Fortunately the legal maximum is total radiated power and not 'power radiated in one particular direction'.

I did some pretty interesting stuff with 19 element Yagi's and very low power transmitters.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I am using my neighbors WiFi, which I can only catch in my balcony. He stays above me, but diagonally opposite, so the source is quite away. Any way I can amplify the WiFi strength? So I need the source to be around in order to amplify?

<comment><USER32> Lookup cantenna which was popular back in the day for catching WiFi from further away spots.

<comment><USER33> Saw a vid on youtube where a guy uses a metal kitchen strainer as a dish antenna for his laptop wifi out in the middle of farm field. The 'available networks' list shrinks and grows as he points it in various directions.

<comment><USER31> Would you kindly post link to that video?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> What´s the 'household shelter' for?

<comment><USER35> some countries mandate civil defense shelters in private dwellings, switzerland and singapore both come to mind.

<comment><USER36> Swiss law does not require shelters in all private dwellings, (you can pay a small amount at the time of construction for a place in a communal shelter) and I'm not sure that even that is required any more.

Large public buildings maybe still need shelters by law.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I have done that before except I went to HD and bought some aluminum flashing and made a corner reflector. Worked really, well and looked a bit ... tidier.

</comment><comment><USER38> Put 'em just behind the antenna like a dish aimed toward where you want to bend the signal to. It's not great, but it's cheap and easy.

<comment><AUTHOR> Have you tried something similar before? Does it work?

<comment><USER39> When I had my WiFi router in the basement I placed it in an aluminum oven dish, so that the reflection went towards the ground floor. It was a small but noticeable improvement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Aha I did something similar to this a while back. Had an ancient computer with a $2 WiFi dongle very far from the access point.

It could barely sustain a connection, never mind actually doing anything. So I cut up the neck of a bottle, covered with aluminium foil, and even added a little reciever at the focus point of the dish.

Signal bars went to a solid usable III.

</comment><comment><USER41> For optimal results, place the reflector at distance d = c / 2f behind the antenna (half wavelength). Where c is the speed of light and f is the frequency of your wifi. For example, for 5 Ghertz signal, that will be 30mm.

<comment><USER42> How exactly does this work? Especially in the case of a signal which isn't a perfect sine Wifi where (AFAIK) 5Ghz is merely the frequency of the carrier which is then modulated or so? Or maybe it's like 'close enough'?

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> Reminds me of this guy who used the same technique on the receiver: [https://youtu.be/VZKc3PBs67c](https://youtu.be/VZKc3PBs67c)

</comment><comment><USER44> For the antenna case (and I believe for the optics case too, but I'm not an optics guy) the beam disperses as 1/r^2 in both cases.

In transmit , the reflector provides focusing, which puts more power in less of the volume. In receive, the increased aperture allows the antenna to capture a greater area of the incoming wave giving more receive power. The effects are equal and usually just thought of as"gain" which is reciprocal for transmit and receive.

</comment><comment><USER45> better off just getting some patch antennas and using them.. though that's more expensive then foil, it does give you better control of the directions.

</comment><comment><USER46> See also: [http://mentalfloss.com/article/515193/researchers-develop- ch...](http://mentalfloss.com/article/515193/researchers-develop-cheap-way- improve-wi-fi-coverage-aluminum-foil) ("Researchers Develop a Cheap Way to Improve Wi-Fi Coverage With Aluminum Foil")

</comment><comment><USER47> This blog is missing a lot of details before we can consider this experiment successful. Most importantly, what is the usable throughput of a station in the "improved" coverage area? I would recommend using iperf before/after to see if there is any practical benefit.

</comment><comment><USER48> Did that a while ago, when the trees have leaves, I hardly receive WiFi in my shed. So I put a aluminum foil when I went to the back around the router.

It worked, but other directions are difficult. I also had success by changing the channel with less interference in my router settings.

</comment><comment><USER49> Just keep in mind you need some antenna diversity for the MIMO to work. Adding the foil increases the directivity, which you don't want for MIMO. Though it improves fringe reception, it may reduce the data rate for devices that already have sufficient SNR.

</comment><comment><USER50> The geek in me loves stuff like this. The old and jaded techie in me says just get something designed to solve the issue like:

[https://eero.com](https://eero.com) or the UniFi Mesh

:)

<comment><USER51> From eero's site: "From the window to the wall" — using pop culture references is risky when you don't understand them.

<comment><USER52> Skeet skeet skeet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> It's a little bit a shame, that this is not a standard solution for most IT related people, wouldn't you say?

</comment><comment><USER54> I just got back home for the holidays and made fun of my dad for doing this. Seems like it is working tho!

</comment><comment><USER55> theoretically, are there any regulatory issues on a piece of aluminum sold (and marketed) for this purpose?

if not, why aren't there cheap and effective such designs on alibaba - <USER2> have to DIY?

<comment><USER56> No regulatory issues. The aluminum acts to increase the antenna gain (i.e. concentrate the signal in a particular direction). The total power does not increase instead you take some from one place and add it to another.

There are tons of products for sale. You can get a replacement antenna that is a directional dish for example, instead of the typical omnidirectional dipole (stick).

<comment><USER57> > No regulatory issues. The aluminum acts to increase the antenna gain (i.e. > concentrate the signal in a particular direction).

AFAIK, many countries limit the EIRP, which increases with the antenna gain.

<comment><USER58> Correct. In the US, for example, for 2.4 GHz point-to-multipoint, EIRP is limited to 4 watts, and maximum power to the antenna is limited to 1 watt. So, if your router does 1 watt, you are limited to a maximum 6 dBi antenna gain. Lower the router power, and you can use higher gain antennas.

It's more complicated for 2.4 GHz point-to-point. At 1 watt transmitter power you are allowed a 6 dBi antenna. But for every 1 dBi you reduce transmitter power, you are allowed an additional 3 dBI of antenna gain to a maximum of 30 dBi antenna gain at 160 mW transmitter power.

5 GHz has even more complicated rules, I believe.

See: [https://www.air802.com/fcc-rules-and- regulations.html](https://www.air802.com/fcc-rules-and-regulations.html)

<comment><USER59> Or if you get your ham license you have a limit of 1500W PEP[1], just plug your callsign into the router ID and away you go. However that means you're also subject to no encryption or business related traffic.

[1] [http://www.qsl.net/kb9mwr/projects/wireless/allocations.html](http://www.qsl.net/kb9mwr/projects/wireless/allocations.html)

<comment><USER55> >However that means you're also subject to no encryption or business related traffic.

how does that work? isn't all wifi traffic encrypted by something between devices and AP?

(I skimmed your link and did a find for encry on it but saw nothing.)

<comment><USER57> No, encryption is an optional feature of the 802.11 standards. Every once in a while I see an unencrypted wifi AP nearby (it's the default on Android to show a notification whenever it sees an unencrypted wifi AP).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> I've heard it works for 802.11n. Does it work for 802.11ac?

</comment><comment><USER61> It has an effect, but much smaller than hoped in my experience

</comment><comment><USER62> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LY8Wi7XRXCA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LY8Wi7XRXCA)

</comment><comment><USER63> This is called Beamforming. Look it up.

</comment><comment><USER64> does this stuff work with walls?

I have a basement with thick walls.

<comment><USER65> It would mostly depend on what is in the walls

<comment><USER64> Bricks and concrete, I guess

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> A bit off topic, but what is this page doing, loading almost 500K in 2 XHR calls for approximately 9K of text... Egads, all the images are inlined data URIs!

I was staring at a blank page with a single image for over 10 seconds before the article text loaded. No loading indicator or anything.

<comment><USER67> There's no reason for this content to use JavaScript at all. I'm going to start holding this up as an example of why browsers shouldn't have JavaScript at all - many developers simply don't understand when not to use it. Educating them one at a time won't fix it.

<comment><USER68> > There's no reason for this content to use JavaScript at all.

How else would you add live comments without JS? This page is effectively a big chatroom. You can write at the bottom of the page and the website fetches the new messages async.

Don't tell me you would have a big http refresh every 5 seconds to load in the new chat messages, that's even worst than using JS.

<comment><USER67> >How else would you add live comments without JS? This page is effectively a big chatroom. You can write at the bottom of the page and the website fetches the new messages async.

Why on Earth does it need to be some kind of live chatroom? Just render them server-side and add live updates as a nice-to-have if JavaScript is enabled.

<comment><USER68> > Why on Earth does it need to be some kind of live chatroom?

Well, the website is called jiffchat.com and is a collection of chatrooms.

That being said, I turned off JavaScript and you are right. The page gets stuck on a lazyload placeholder. The initial content should be loaded and only the chat part be should added by JS.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


It's Just Fine to Make Mistakes - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/12/your-money/12shortcuts.html?src=recg&pagewanted=print

<comment><AUTHOR> _"... There are ways that those with superperfectionist traits can try to take things down a notch. They can try to break down tasks into more manageable bites, so it does not feel overwhelming. ..."_

Decomposition works because the tasks are do-able. The downside, any lack of resolution, timidity or weakness at any particular point at the transition from one chunk to another can trigger failure.</comment>


A town near me just added this for Facebook and Craigslist sales - <AUTHOR> http://imgur.com/GW05GMB <comment><USER2> Interesting idea...proud of my little hamlet of Bellingham!

</comment><comment><USER3> A lot of towns in my area have also let people know they can transact business in the lobby of the police station.

</comment><comment><USER4> I suspect many people will still go to Starbucks.</comment>


AlphaStar: An Evolutionary Computation Perspective - <AUTHOR> https://arxiv.org/abs/1902.01724 <comment><USER4> I am sceptical of Alphastar. It's not at all like alphazero, it's lots of complex parts glued together.

In the third group (second of the human and first post-review) of games, against a slightly modified version, the human won. I don't think it was a version modification, I think it was because the human had chance to review the computer's play and think of gaps. Maybe it's stronger than I think or can get stronger, but it looked like the first time a human got to sit down and think about it they could find significant holes in it's understanding. The games it won it mostly just crushed with superhuman micro, that's different in a one-off series than being consistently pro strength.

That's fair enough because it's a complex game but it just didn't seem as "polished/finished" as the chess/go demonstrations.

<comment><USER5> I was sceptical at first but after watching MaNa story video [0] - <USER2> anymore. Starcraft2 is a very complex game, but I've been able to crush best blizzard AI after a week playing - yes its that weak. Seeing AlphaStar strategy, from simple correct building placement to micro decision making is so much more inspiring. And it was achieved by deep reinforcement learning - never seen a more unstable and unpredictable algorithms in my machine learning career - even in fully observable environments. What DeepMind did - <USER3> THAT level of play, even if AlphaStar can see the whole map and micro 3 groups of units at once - is incredible.

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

<comment><USER6> You may want to try playing against some of the AIs developed by the Student Starcraft AI Tournament such as SAIDA, Locutus, CherryPi, krasi0, Iron Bot, and tscmoo.

If I could make a single recommendation to future AlphaStar opponents, it would be to prep against these AIs. AlphaStar has style overlap with the AIs mentioned above, and I'd like to see a match with human better prepared for that.

The SSCAIT has a weekly broadcast which demonstrates the strengths and weaknesses of AI players quite well.</comment></comment></comment>


Germany, with Skies Cleared by Coronavirus Lockdown, Produces Record Solar Power - <AUTHOR> https://time.com/5824644/germany-coronavirus-solar <comment><USER2> Wait, so the planes were the objects preventing solar power reaching record levels?

<comment><USER3> Ever-increasing numbers of solar power installations, clear weather, _and_ reduced pollution resulting from the lockdowns... I suspect the latter is the least significant, but "Hey, it's Sunny" isn't much of a headline.</comment></comment>


Think Again: Why do people hate TED so much? - <AUTHOR> http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/02/27/why_do_people_hate_ted_so_much?wpisrc=obnetwork

<comment><USER2> That's easy to answer -- TED is to ideas what sugar is to nutrition. One has a superficial resemblance to the other, a resemblance that lasts about 30 seconds.

<comment><AUTHOR> The article points out that it is more the style of the organization rather than the actual content which draws critics. I would say that's a fair assessment- I don't see any harm in spreading information, it's the audience's responsibility to take it with a grain of salt.</comment></comment>


Introducing Eats for Business - <AUTHOR> https://www.uber.com/newsroom/introducing-eats-business/ <comment><USER2> There is a lot of hate about this, but most comments actually sound like the OP didn't even read the article.

According to the article this is not going to be a catering service where 1 order brings food for the whole company, but an integration of Eats into Uber for Business.

> a way for organizations to use Uber Eats to manage food delivery for > employees, whether they're ordering to the office or traveling for work.

So it just basically something allowing people to order food _for themselves_ while having a part of the order automatically paid by the company.

So, no issues here of driver having to "carry up 5 catering trays plus utensils and sides for your office." like the top comment said.

This is barely just a new payment system basically.

[full disclosure: I used to work at Uber, but not on Eats]

</comment><comment><USER3> A thought experiment: Lets say they manage to offer restaurant quality food(in-spite delivery) for business lunches, at half the price of a restaurant.

And let's say we see similar trends in price/quality/convenience in pre-made food for the home.

How does that affect consumer behavior with regards to restaurants ?

And how can a regular guy profit from such trends ?

<comment><USER4> Regular guy already profits from such trends when he orders from Uber and similar services. I know that I profit every day when I use taxi at with higher quality and lower price than 10 years ago.

Or you can always set up a ghost kitchen - they're about to boom all around the world, I'd guess.

<comment><USER5> If you do set up a ghost kitchen, would suggest you do some research first. Lots of laws and insurance and marketing and logistics.

I was co-founder of a startup for a few years heavily involved in this space ( [https://www.thefoodcorridor.com](https://www.thefoodcorridor.com) ) and running a kitchen is not for the faint of heart. In fact, being anywhere in food is not (I also have a relative who runs a couple of food businesses).

Lots of cash flow, but skinny margins.

<comment><USER6> I used to think that. But then all these food-delivery services with around 100% markup showed up and seem to be thriving

<comment><USER7> Which food delivery services have 100% markup? Delivery or subscription fees that work out closer to 10% seem to be common for the ones I've seen; even with the aggressive begging for tips built into the apps, it wouldn't hit anywhere near 100%.

<comment><USER6> We have Chomp. My sister reports folks ordering coffee or chocolate from her shop, and paying as much for delivery as the product.

<comment><USER7> Sure, the flat delivery charges can be 100% on a minimal order, but I don't think that that is the majority of the business of a food delivery service.

<comment><USER6> Its almost the entirety of her Chomp orders

<comment><USER7> Perhaps, but on what basis would you suspect this one business (which you know about largely _because_ it seems surprising) is representative of food businesses accessible through Chomp generally (much less some segment consisting of _multiple_ delivery services)?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Uber betting on the notch removal next year I see.

</comment><comment><USER9> Would be very amusing if they started cooking up this program because SF proposed their cafeteria ban.

</comment><comment><USER10> Say you want to last minute cater for a small meeting or conference. Suddenly adding a 15 meal or 30 dish demand in to an existing fulfillment network is not going to result in 15 minute service, or even under 1 hour service. It's going to train wreck.

</comment><comment><USER11> hopefully has better selection than fooda.

</comment><comment><USER12> This speaks to one of the most profound things about Uber: once an infrastructure of transportation workers is set up, a single software development project can instantly transform the value of that network no matter how large it is. Many metropolitan areas, I'd imagine, would love to incentivize their resident corporations to spend more money on local food services (those "late night food allowances" are greater than what the finance firm's employees would spend themselves) but can neither justify the development costs nor provide upside as an incentive. Hardware meets wetware meets capitalism. It's both a thing of beauty and a little saddening at the same time.

</comment><comment><USER13> Uber still can't get consumer Eats right. My last order roamed the city for 30 minutes before arriving cold. The order before that was stolen by the driver. They picked it up and left San Francisco.

Good luck getting an Uber driver to carry up 5 catering trays plus utensils and sides for your office. Maybe there's a chance if Uber gives every driver a foldable cart that fits in the trunk without taking up luggage space for airport Uber rides.

<comment><USER14> That doesn't mean they can't get business eats right. Your experience is probably a win for them, it means they're getting a lot of drivers of varying quality. Also if you complained about it, that helps them to deactivate drivers that steal food and improve their process (they can probably keep ones that make the food cold, some don't mind (like me, at least for most types of foods and if I'm eating by myself) and some will just use a microwave). If they only had high quality drivers, they wouldn't be the growth company that they are. For businesses they can change it up, maybe even hire W2 employees. And they can even have a good experience in places that get press like SF and a mediocre experience for places outside of it. Only a handful of decision makers will judge their business service based on their consumer performance or performance in other markets. They also have name recognition - nobody got fired for buying Microsoft.

<comment><USER15> It's weird how positive you are about a business venture failing at the only thing that they are required to do -- bring you food in a timely fashion. "Your experience is probably a win for them" is a very strange way to prioritise what's important when running a business -- unhappy customers are a win somehow?

> If they only had high quality drivers, they [...]

... would actually be a good service?

> nobody got fired for buying Microsoft.

IBM, not Microsoft.

<comment><USER16> The thing that's important when running a business is making money. Having happy repeat customers is one way to do this, but there are many others. Having unhappy customers and crushing the competition is another. Having a steady stream of _new_ customers is another (see also, MLM schemes). Selling a product where customers cannot meaningfully evaluate quality is another (see also, Facebook video marketing).

If you don't like it, help the rest of us figure out a sustainable alternative to capitalism.

<comment><USER15> I'm sure that this is the reasoning they use to justify it, it doesn't mean that we should use the same reasoning to judge them as a company.

<comment><USER16> Sure. I guess my argument is, judge them all you want, nothing will change unless they have a concrete incentive to act differently.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Deepfakes Are Going to Wreak Havoc on Society. We Are Not Prepared - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/robtoews/2020/05/25/deepfakes-are-going-to-wreak-havoc-on-society-we-are-not-prepared <comment><USER2> Why didn't we face a similar apocalypse when Photoshop became ubiquitous?

It doesn't feel like "video evidence" is something people regularly use to determine truth. Political pages on Facebook and cable news seem to be what are primarily guiding people's political persuasions.

<comment><USER3> >Why didn't we face a similar apocalypse when Photoshop became ubiquitous?

Photoshop is still a manual process. You needed a skilled person to create the manipulation. Unlike a computer where you only need to feed it a picture and you get an output in minutes.

<comment><USER2> > _Photoshop is still a manual process. You needed a skilled person to create > the manipulation._

Does that matter? If I am looking to produce images that might have a devastating political impact to opponents the consequences aren't about how fast one can produce them, but how low the bar to entry is for one to produce a doctored image.

Photoshop, and tools like it, gave the public at large the capability to develop doctored images. Deepfakes seem to do the same thing that Photoshop did: lower the bar to entry for doctoring videos. You don't need tens of thousands of dollars and a large production team to create a fake video now.</comment></comment></comment>


Seven Languages in Seven Weeks: Io Language Day 1 - <AUTHOR> http://oscardelben.com/seven-languages-io-day-1

<comment><USER2> For a similar language with more syntactic sugar--[1,2,3] instead of list(1,2,3)--check out <http://ioke.org/></comment>


Remembering the Startups We Lost in 2019 - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/26/startups-lost-in-2019/ <comment><USER2> The big loss here IMO is Jibo. I think it could've been a lot more successful had it gotten to market faster and Amazon and Google hadn't eaten it's lunch. I think it provided a better experience for consumers.</comment>


Why You Hate Contemporary Architecture - <AUTHOR> https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/10/why-you-hate-contemporary-architecture <comment><USER2> Rianna Rennix & Nathan J. Robinson, thank you from the bottom of my politically-incorrect heart. This essay expresses exactly how I feel about post-war architecture. Absolutely brilliant.

I lived and worked in Silicon Valley for around 22 years. The climate is undeniably very pleasant, but the architecture is strictly industrial-park modern. Almost no imagination or beauty, only vast expanses of ugly office parks and tract housing.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is how i judge whether a building is ugly or not;

If you laid down a sleeping bag and slept outside it, would you feel like your sleeping under the stars, or are you a homeless bum?

Also CAD defiantly effects the design, if your drew a square box by hand you'd feel lazy, with CAD its sophistication.

</comment><comment><USER4> The writers struggle with whether beauty is objective or subjective. I think beauty is objective but hard to explain. Paul Graham approaches it here, [http://www.paulgraham.com/taste.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/taste.html)

</comment><comment><USER5> This is a great piece of polemic.</comment>


Lyft's Employees Could Buy Every Single Home for Sale in SF with Post IPO Cash - rising-sky https://www.redfin.com/blog/lyft-ipo-san-francisco-real-estate/ <comment><AUTHOR> They can only realize the cash 6 months after IPO. The question is how much will the stock be worth then?

<comment><USER2> Tree fitty.</comment></comment>


How to not be impressed by spurious correlations - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@inputcoffee/how-to-not-be-impressed-by-spurious-correlations-b7c6fe27a4ad#.dfvd7wq9f <comment><USER2> This is not new information though, right? I like that you point out the role of rising prices and population in so many of these.

<comment><USER3> Not new as a general concept but I hadn't thought of some of the details in this way.</comment></comment>


What's new in Ubuntu Desktop 20.04 LTS? - <AUTHOR> https://ubuntu.com/blog/whats-new-in-ubuntu-desktop-20-04-lts <comment><USER2> Here's a nice filesystem-level feature mentioned in the article to illustrate where Ubuntu are heading with ZFS:

"zsys is our own integration tool between ZFS and Ubuntu. When users install software or update their system, zsys will take an automatic snapshot, enabling users to roll back, should an update go bad. These snapshots are presented in the GRUB boot menu. This also lays the foundation for additional backup features in the future."

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Some interesting commentary on the work Canonical do with OEMs, and a statement of commitment to the Desktop - which goes against a common criticism of Ubuntu.</comment>


Ask HN: Can one convert from a developer to a designer? - <AUTHOR>

Have you or someone you know done this? I'd love to hear about it! I constantly hear stories of designer learning to program but rarely the other way around. I guess this brings up the age old question "Can art be taught?" <comment><USER2> "Can art be taught?" If not, then how do designers learn in the first place?

I'd say that, yes, those that possess one skill can also develop a second, unrelated skill. Some people might have a natural affinity for both, others will have to work harder. I don't think anyone that wants to become a designer is totally incapable.

</comment><comment><USER3> When I started out the two where the same, you had to do development to do design, the world has changed a good deal since then, I would say that the fields started their split after Photoshop was out, but up to PS 3 I remember designers writing their own plug-ins to do effects. I remember trading homemade plug-ins for Photoshop on BBS boards.

More to the point, I think you can learn the techniques and train the eye, but whether you can produce beauty with technique and an eye for design is subjective at best.

I personally am good enough to do commercial art for web apps but I won't be winning any fine art contests, I am fine with that because it is good enough for what I do. When I used to do simulation, I had a friend who was great at 3d art, when I would look at his work and compare it to our work (the rest of the teams) their was no comparison. He had a natural talent that none of us could achieve, to the rest we where good but he was better in a league of his own. He went on to work on the Polar Express and several other films, which in the 3D segment of design that is the major leagues.

The rest of the team (myself included) while good, would have never made it at that level. That being said, many enjoyed long careers in simulation and game development and where not affected by being the best 3D designer possible.

</comment><comment><USER4> Definitely possible.

2 Examples:

1\. Miche Capone - one of the founders of Photovoo and a mentor at 500 startups. I've worked with him before, fantastic designer. Got a CS degree, never officially trained in design.

2\. Jason Putorti - Check out his linkedin profile. He got a Bachelors in CS and Math.

I don't think it's easy, but like anything else, if you practice enough you will get better.

(Note: I don't know Jason but his profile is public so I figured it's ok to link to.)

</comment><comment><USER5> I've been in the process of converting for several years. I certainly wouldn't claim to have "arrived" yet, but I think the process has been very good for me.

It seems trite to say, but I believe that it's all about doing it. The most useful thing I've found (and I do this not just with design, but with programming) is to find something I like, and then re-create it. I'll see a shot on dribbble (<http://dribbble.com>) and decide to create something similar from scratch, by playing around in Photoshop until I get it right (or close). If I get stumped, my last line of defense is to look up a tutorial on the look I'm trying to achieve.

I would never publish anything I've created through this method, but the act of purposeful creation gives me tools and techniques to use down the road.

</comment><comment><USER6> Like you said in your post, I have done the opposite myself and I started out a designer creating pixel based isometric-style web designs and slowly converted in to a developer. I'd say it's more than possible for someone to become a designer after being a developer (my co-dev who is a designer is slowly learning PHP and knows HTML/CSS fluently).</comment>


Capturing a Full Day in a Single Photograph - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/02/picture-of-the-day-capturing-a-full-day-in-a-single-photograph/70675/

<comment><USER2> Some discussion about this 3 days ago on HN: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2160446>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> High resolution version [1].

\----

[1]: [http://www.greeksky.gr/files/photos/landscapes/20101230Souni...](http://www.greeksky.gr/files/photos/landscapes/20101230Sounio24Big.jpg)

</comment><comment><USER3> Annotated Photo: [http://www.greeksky.gr/files/photos/landscapes/20101230Souni...](http://www.greeksky.gr/files/photos/landscapes/20101230Sounio24.htm)

</comment><comment><USER4> Some discussion from the photographer, explaining how he shot the images and the equipment/software he used: [http://greeksky.gr/GreekSkyForum/index.php?PHPSESSID=39cd80a...](http://greeksky.gr/GreekSkyForum/index.php?PHPSESSID=39cd80a3cb56287debb9956b50bef3b5&topic=2.msg9#msg9)

</comment><comment><USER5> Camera sniper - 30 hours in fixed position...impressive.

<comment><USER6> Odds that he didn't use a tripod... slim.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wow. Today must be a day for great photography links.</comment>


Show HN: Belle – Configurable React Components with Great UX - nik-graf http://nikgraf.github.io/belle/#/guide/introducing-belle

<comment> nik-graf Hey, I'm one of the creators of Belle. Feel free to reach out in this thread in case you have any questions :)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Great resource, must have if I want to have a plateau of reusable components for a REACT application, good job!

</comment><comment><USER2> I really like the TextArea that auto-grows [http://nikgraf.github.io/belle/#/component/text- input](http://nikgraf.github.io/belle/#/component/text-input)

It grows/contracts just as expected in Android and iOS too. That's handy. Nice job!

<comment> nik-graf Thanks Sebastian :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Modal and tooltip/popover are the components that forced me to add react- bootstrap to my project (I didn't want to build those on my own.) Really looking forward to trying out Belle once those land.

<comment> nik-graf Thanks for your feedback technic. All of them are definitely on our list of components we want to do :)

Have you ever checked out: [https://github.com/rackt/react- modal](https://github.com/rackt/react-modal)

Seems to be pretty solid implementation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Great UX React components you should check out... .... from Creator No.2 :)

</comment><comment><USER4> CSS in JS, works great... You see belle components are so very stable and configurable, you change theme of whole app so easily.

</comment><comment><USER5> Congratulations Jyoti and Nik. I'm curious what the folks over here think about the choice to put styling in js.

<comment> nik-graf Hey Iwein, there are couple fundamental issue with the way we style HTML elements today. CSS is exposing every declaration into a global namespace. This makes it to eliminate dead code as it is hard to figure out where it is used. Many techniques like BEM were invented and declared as "the right way" to do styling.

I don't know if inline-styles defined in JS are the end-game, but working with it in combination with building components turned out to be working way better for us than using CSS.

If you want to know more about it I highly recommend this slidedeck: [https://speakerdeck.com/vjeux/react-css-in- js](https://speakerdeck.com/vjeux/react-css-in-js)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> looking really nice. Specifically the toggle is something I was looking for. This looks like clean use of markup and proper setup of CSS with good docu. Will definitly embed this in the future, and looking forward to see even more components. good stuff!

<comment> nik-graf Thank you very much. Glad you like it :)</comment></comment>


SimplePie is ceasing development - <AUTHOR> http://simplepie.org/blog/2009/09/26/simplepie-is-ceasing-development/

<comment><USER2> It's a shame that this is ceasing development as it was actually a reasonably useful class. I'm sure there will be someone out there willing to fork it though especially since it's in use on some pretty high profile sites. (e.g. Guy Kawasaki's, alltop.com)</comment>


AT&T Drops T-Mobile USA Deal - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204791104577108900032431264.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories <comment><USER2> I asked this on Twitter, but perhaps I'll get better responses here:

T-mobile is dying; it has _no_ plans for the future. They don't have the iPhone (and are unlikely to get it, due to working on a different set of 3G frequencies). They don't have any plans for LTE deployment, unlike AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint. Their parent company wants to get rid of them.

To me, this just seems like the government has done very little here for consumers, they will still likely end up with only 2-3 carriers. Why is it better for consumers if T-mobile just dies out rather than is bought to improve AT&T? (Also, many people think AT&T has a worse network than Verizon. Wouldn't this deal have, then, increased competition?)

<comment><USER3> I think a lot of people said the same thing when the banks started merging, too. And look where that got the US economy because of "too big too fail banks".

I would've preferred capitalism followed its natural course, and let one or two smaller banks die, than to get in a situation where a handful of _huge_ banks can wipe out the entire economy if they are allowed to fail.

The thing about capitalism is that it _needs_ to let parts of it fail, so it can thrive overall and in the long term.

Also, I don't think T-mobile will disappear. Worst case scenario it will be bought by an international carrier, but at a smaller price.

<comment><USER4> There is really no such thing as too big to fail. In the case of the "financial crisis", the few failing banks should have been allowed to fail. Some were and the sky did not fall. There were plenty of sound ones who were not involved in the nonsense. The same can be said for the automotive industry. The bailouts were nothing more than a transfer of wealth orchestrated by the government. From the middle class and the wealthy, to the incompetent clowns in the government and private industry who created the mess in the first place.

There is absolutely nothing worse for the people at large than the collusion between government and the private enterprise. It is very simply the definition of corruption. Read the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith for more love.

As for AT&T and T-Mobile, the government created the problem in the first place. By selling spectrum, they necessitate the existence of large massive companies in the space. They're the only ones who can afford the spectrum. If the government instead chose to keep the spectrum open, like say the way they do for WiFi, you would literally be able to start your own cellphone company in your garage ... and there would naturally be quite a bit more players in the space. They would still need to cooperate to make things work, but having more choices is the goal here.

If you look hard enough, behind every market problem and failure, you'll find a fat bureaucrat and fat "business man" working together to keep each other fat and the rest of us miserable.

<comment><USER5> > There is really no such thing as too big to fail.

Yes, actually there is. Too big to fail means that when an institution fails, its default will cause a cascade failure of other institutions relying on it -- and still other institutions relying on those -- including otherwise healthy ones whose only mistake was being integrated with the world economy.

This can ripple through the whole economy and work in tandem with the Paradox of Deleveraging to effectively cause a GDP death spiral. (See also: Great Depression.)

<comment><USER6> The more accurate term would be Too Big To LET Fail * , but the acronym starts getting unwieldy.

* [Or The #### Will Really Hit The Fan]

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Please, don't submit stories that exist behind pay or subscribe walls.

<comment><USER8> I would generally agree with this but, in this case, the headline tells it all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> What if Google bought T-Mobile (or Sprint)? They are certainly interested in the telecom space -- look at their investments in fiber-to-the-home and products like Google Voice. Together with their purchase of Motorola, they would be vertically-integrated too, which would allow them to do all sorts of borderline-creepy things with ads.

Of course this might spook the government, or turn Verizon or AT&T away from Android in retaliation, but its an interesting idea I think.

<comment><USER10> Google buying them would be even worse for competition than AT&T. It'd be a total closed loop: Google OS, Google handsets, Google network, Google services. John Rockefeller could only dream of that sort of integration.

<comment><USER11> Not if Google agreed to run it purely as a dumb pipe.

<comment><USER12> Ah, a dumb pipe carrier. Why hasn't one materialized already? I was saying that it was inevitable at least a decade ago.

<comment><USER13> > Ah, a dumb pipe carrier. Why hasn't one materialized already? I was saying > that it was inevitable at least a decade ago.

Plenty have materialised. Just not in the US. The three carriers in Aus are pretty much dumb pipes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> US phone plans are still crap compared to what's available in EU. We pay a lot for little service, and are locked out of using the latest phones on most networks unless we're willing to sign up for ludicrous plans that's really hard to get out of.

I've been happy with Virgin Mobile, I'm not willing to pay more than 35 a month, even though the service might be choppy at best.

<comment><USER15> The United States is 1.6 times the area of Europe, but more importantly, Europe has 3 times the population density! It just costs a lot more money over here to cover the same number of people with cell service.

<comment><USER16> The population density argument is bunk. Why does ATT provide utter crap for cell service in NYC and SF?

<comment><USER17> Probably because the places where you want to use your phone (inside buildings, in the subway) attenuate all radio signals.

<comment><USER18> Here in Lisbon we have antennas inside the subway tunnels since 2006.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I made a $500 bet with options that this deal wouldn't go through. I was right about the outcome but unfortunately I was wrong about the timing.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2351157>

</comment><comment><USER19> The US Government should buy T-Mobile and turn it into a nationwide information super freeway.</comment>


Show HN: I built custom bundles into DarwinMail to replace Google Inbox - <AUTHOR> https://www.darwinmail.app/index.php?source=HN_Custom_Bundles <comment><AUTHOR> Hello HN,

Today is a great day!

I have built custom bundles into DarwinMail in a bid to replace the void left behind by Google Inbox. As you may know already, Google Inbox shut down last March and I have personally been hurting since!

Thus, let me introduce to you, CUSTOM BUNDLES! [1]

Now you can bundle any email in your Inbox. From a specific sender, from a trip away, a work party and so on.

Check out the custom bundles now!

Have a wonderful day,

Joey - Creator of DarwinMail

[1] [https://www.darwinmail.app](https://www.darwinmail.app)

<comment><USER2> This looks great, is Bundles kindof like how the iPhone groups notifications? Can Darwin do this automatically?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you so much for your kind words :)

DarwinMail's bundles work just our iPhone's group notifications.

You can group emails via its label and use that to bundle them in your Inbox. This will be done automatically. The only step you must take is simply turn on the bundle via our 'Manage Labels' modal.

This allows you to fully customize bundles based on any criteria such as sender, title contains words, has attachments and so on :)

Please let me know if you have any other questions :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Why only gmail, why not imap ?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your question.

IMAP is certainly on the todo list :) [1]

For the moment, I am focusing on Gmail in order to develop the features users want and fix the bugs that inevitably arise. Then I will move onto IMAP.

I want to increase the likelihood of a smooth transition to other emails providers. I am both fixing bugs and implementing new features every day so we are getting closer and closer to IMAP every week :)

[1] [https://trello.com/c/vU2C4VLf/159-more- clients](https://trello.com/c/vU2C4VLf/159-more-clients)</comment></comment>


Startup Pricing Study at MIT Sloan - <AUTHOR> http://entrepreneurship.mit.edu/blog/mitmadsmitedu/startup-pricing-study-mit-sloan

<comment><AUTHOR> Looking for: \- Funded (angel or VC) \- Has been earning positive revenues for 1-3 years

For a pricing study that will be produce useful results for Startups.</comment>


IMAP4 Extension for Returning MYRIGHTS Information in Extended List - <AUTHOR> https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc8440 <comment><USER2> Speedier standards-based mail reading - nice. I see its by two people from fastmail.</comment>


Ask HN: How to auto-Parse Email for specific data - <AUTHOR>

Hi, I am working on something as a side project currently and planning out the feature set of the product. I wanted to know if there's a library or module in Python that works w.r.t. parsing emails forwarded to a particular email address.
Example use case: User forwards an email receipt recieved from any particular vendor (amazon or ebay or etsy etc.) to a specific email address. The details of the email body get parsed grabbing the essential information (vendor name, product name, date of purchase, etc.) and stores it to the users profile. The list of such details from various sources is then accessible from a central console if i may say so.
Is there a good way to approach this? Any pointers would be helpful.
Thanks. <comment><USER2> My recommendation for parsing the email receipts is to use regex if the format is consistent enough. If you need further help, please feel free to contact me as I have been doing similar email parsing work.

Shameless plug but you can use my service that will send HTTP POSTs to your app when an email is received:

<http://www.apinbox.com/>

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps lamson might be of use to you, if you're doing python already:

<http://zedshaw.com/projects/lamson/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks .. I just realized that Tripit does this w.r.t itineraries.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Help me crowdsource a definition of Americanness - <AUTHOR> http://america.joshuasnider.com <comment><USER2> This is really interesting because it forces me to think about what it means to be "American" based on what I know (or don't know) about two countries. Occasionally, I know enough about each country to make an informed decision, but often, all I have to go with are the locations as given by the webpage, and my own personal familiarity as to whether or not I've heard the name. Statistically, this should average out among the number of participants, but I wonder what strategies others use to answer the question?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I'm looking forward to seeing what the results look like, once I get enough people to submit.</comment></comment>


Epic Games showcases real-time ray tracing in Unreal - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/22/17150858/unreal-engine-star-wars-ray-tracing-epic-games-gdc-2018 <comment><USER2> I recall ray tracing a simple image of a shark over some sand on my old Amiga 500... one single frame took hours to render.

And now we have this! Very Impressive!</comment>


Simple XP tip: Turn off your beeps - <AUTHOR> http://blog.micropledge.com/2007/10/turn-off-your-beeps/

<comment><USER2> Simpler XP Tip: Turn off your PC. Throw it in the garbage. Buy a Mac.</comment>


Show HN: Order pizza with random toppings - <AUTHOR> https://roulette.pizza <comment><USER2> This reminds me of None Pizza with Left Beef, which just celebrated its tenth anniversary:

* original: [http://www.thesneeze.com/2007/the-great-pizza-orientation-te...](http://www.thesneeze.com/2007/the-great-pizza-orientation-test.php)

* anniversary stories: [https://gizmodo.com/reflections-on-the-10th-anniversary-of-n...](https://gizmodo.com/reflections-on-the-10th-anniversary-of-none-pizza-with-1819692097) and [https://www.buzzfeed.com/andyneuenschwander/hbd-none-pizza-w...](https://www.buzzfeed.com/andyneuenschwander/hbd-none-pizza-with-left-beef)

<comment><USER3> For those wary of clicking the Buzzfeed link, it is exactly as content-free as you would expect. (Although, surprisingly, they have done some pretty nifty journalism from time to time.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> 25 pizzas, with random ingredients, and delivery on New Years Eve to a major city:

"Time To Your Door: 44-74 minutes"

I doubt it. I can't afford to try it, but I doubt it. Will it take my $770 and deliver me 25 pizzas in less than 1 hour and 15 minutes on NYE? I would be absolutely shocked.

I recommend adding a disclaimer, or a time "estimate" phrase, or something. Do the estimates come from Dominos? Are they real? Shockingly wicked fast estimates if you ask me.

<comment><USER5> For far more reasons than I care to go into, the Dominos PULSE system[1] sucks at making delivery time estimates. The CSMs in store don't use it, but can't control what online orders see.

As a former manager, blowing through unrealistic delivery estimates for online orders were over half of the complaints I had to deal with.

[1] PULSE is the in-house Point of Sale system Dominos created. Except it's not just a POS, it does inventory management, labor management, shift scheduling, delivery routing, etc. Theoretically it has every variable it needs to estimate delivery times. But there's a disconnect between theory and practice, as most franchises don't learn enough about the ins and outs of the system to customize a lot of the defaults or even to use all of the modules.

<comment><USER6> While I agree with you that Dominos is terrible at estimating delivery times, it's because the pizzas always arrive in about half the time estimated. This has been my experience in Wichita, Las Vegas, and about half the time in the Seattle suburbs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Sent this to my friend in the next room, he yelled back his exact thoughts. He wants to say that "you're a monster and why is this a thing"

I for one welcome adding an element of chaos into food ordering

</comment><comment><USER8> It'd probably be valuable to add settings that consider allergies. Vegetarian and gluten free too. Looks interesting, though!

<comment><USER9> That's the roulette part. Not everyone wins!

<comment><USER10> Aye hardly seems good spirited when not taking either of those into account would result in unpalatable food a high percentage of time.

<comment><USER11> > would result in unpalatable food a high percentage of time

That's the point. Do you understand what 'roulette' means in this context? When you play roulette you more often than not lose all your money and have nothing to show for it. Like an inedible pizza.

If you made it so you always got something nice to eat... it wouldn't be roulette, would it?

<comment><USER12> You understand the difference between something that's not very nice and something which someone cannot possibly eat at all, right? As a vegetarian, I can imagine some pretty gross combinations of pizza that I still can eat, but I'm at a massive disadvantage if I get something I cannot eat at all.

<comment><USER13> Coming to terms with missing out is part of abstinence. If you're going to entitle yourself to the accommodation of others every step of the way, then maybe you aren't cut out for it.

<comment><USER12> I've managed ok for 20 years, thanks. I'm asking for one checkbox, just one, it's hardly asking others to bend over backwards.

<comment><USER14> Ahem, surely you don't honestly believe your request will be fulfilled with just "one checkbox, just one". It's not the matter of adding <input type="checkbox" id="justonecheckbox" value="vegetarian"> to the front-end...

<comment><USER10> Realistically, not honoring this request would just make those with allergies not participate. That's a loss of revenue. If OP doesn't want it, fine, but opportunities are being missed.

<comment><USER6> OP doesn't get any revenue from it. He's not Dominos Pizza.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I like this, but that's probably because I buy 5 pizzas or so fairly frequently and hate choosing the toppings.

That said, I'd prefer roulette on their medium pizzas that seem to be on sale perpetually. That with a modest upcharge and I might use it.

</comment><comment><USER16> > All orders are fulfilled through Dominos.

With Dominos pizza, I already _have_ the feeling my toppings are random. That is, sometimes I get a lot of topping, and most of the time but not always I get very little topping.

<comment><USER17> I think all the major chains have a policy in place where you get the exact same amount of toppings by weight no matter what you order. If you only order pepperoni you get a ton of pepperoni, but if you order supreme you get less of everything but it ends up being the same overall by weight.

<comment><USER18> This is highly recommended to me by excellent pizza makers. You don't want to overtop the pizza, it'll get soggy or greasy if you add too much

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Concept (but not implementation) reminds me a little of the old-school Pizza Party terminal app from the '90s: [https://youtu.be/J691aLfkWP0](https://youtu.be/J691aLfkWP0)

</comment><comment><USER20> $34.61 estimated for my random pizza. That's a hell of an expensive pizza.

<comment><USER21> I don't know where it gets ordered from, but a place in my town has pizzas that are about $30-$40 and they're worth it. For one, they're just amazing pizza, made by an amazing local entrepreneur, with a cool little pizza shop. For two, it's a meal out for 3 or 4 (they don't actually deliver), which isn't a bad price to eat out.

If it's Dominos, then I feel your pain.

<comment><USER22> I don't probably know WTF is a PIZZA (even a large one), that is worth it, at over $/€ 15-20... seems like we need a new big mac index! Is a $30+ pizza reality?

Edit: it's probably just the common salary & cost level difference here at the play, if in some places even a junior can make over 100k / year..

<comment><USER6> There's a place by me that makes a very good $32 pizza.

It's also 40 inches across, so I have to borrow the neighbor's truck to go pick it up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Feature request: randomize the delivery timing as well! I'd like a random pizza to show up at some point in 2018, ideally once I've forgotten this service exists.

Random address may or may not be going too far.

How about I enter how much money I'm willing to spend, and the website comes up with an order that fits the constraint? Completely random grubhub orders would be fun, too.

<comment><USER24> Add a browser plugin that detects when you are hungry based on how quickly you switch tab to something meaningless and just feedscrooll. Popup which asks, are you hungry, want me to order you a pizza on XX?

[Yes Please!, Schedule delivery for Later, Not Today ]

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> AI is truly taking over.

Over-engineering solution: Feedback the reviews from customers to a ML algorithm that have for inputs the actual pizza, time, and photos of food from the customer Instagram to truly make the best pizza each time.

</comment><comment><USER26> Clever scrolling taglines. Seems like your target audience would be a party crowd, and you might want to play that up a bit.

</comment><comment><USER27> This is awesome, I'm a little too chicken to put my money down though. It'd be fun just to see the random options or maybe other people's previous randomness.

<comment><USER28> Anchovy Pineapple Pizza on the way!

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Random between 0 and 4 toppings? 0 toppings is a pretty boring pizza...

<comment><USER30> Maybe 0 designates a quantum pizza, whose toppings change every time you take a slice.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> There's a funny novelty to this that you can't deny and the user experience does make it super fast to get a pizza. I'm not sure I see myself using it outside of an office joke but why not make a little profit from those who want to do this?

</comment><comment><USER32> As a owner of a dice I don't see a great need for this even if it was available at my location. The dice solution also has a lot more features such as covering allergies, absolutely-not-toppings or just adding drinks.

I guess if saving the surprise until you actually open the box is important you could either have a friend roll for you or give your local pizza place a dice (or url) and promise a tip if they roll for you. Who knows, maybe they would even like the idea of adding that to their menu.

If you want to complicate things a bit it should not be very difficult to just make a user script that makes a random order for you on your favorite pizza site.

<comment><USER33> Back before Netflix decided my address was fake and cancelled my account, and dvds were more relevant, I maintained a 500 length movie queue. When I got a dvd in the mail, it would be something I chose years in advance and I'd not look at the title on the envelope. The surprise from my past self was a great part of the experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> UI enhancement suggestion: "May the odds be ever in your flavor."

</comment><comment><USER35> Interesting idea. The website reminds me strongly of Grubhub from its coloring to the typing-taglines. Did this idea begin as a parody of GrubHub?

Not a criticism—-actually curious.

<comment><AUTHOR> I see what you mean, but no actually. I really just Googled "what color makes people hungry" and picked a red I liked!

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I priced a random 3 topping large pizza on Dominos website: $17.92 which includes delivery fee but no tip.

Roulette: $23.70 including tip.

</comment><comment><USER37> This is a nice novelty idea, but there is no way I'm entering in my info just to see what kinds of results pop up. Now, if you showed some random results, and THEN had an ordering process where we entered our info, you might get some actual use.

<comment><USER4> You can enter fake info. Seems like you don't get to know what kind of results pop up until the pizza is physically at your door

<comment><USER38> Now if you are allergic to certain thing? There should be an option to opt out.

<comment><USER6> There is. It's called not ordering. No one is forcing you to use Random Pizza.

<comment><USER38> Ha! This means no one should take any user feedback! Ha! But nope, the parent comment was not meant for you anyway.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Dominos is available in dozens of countries around the world, since 2017, about half their shops are outside the US, and they even offer fully robotized deliveries in parts of Germany and the Netherlands[1].

And yet, roulette.pizza is US-only. I mean, you had to specifically go and restrict the location, compared to what the site you're getting the pizzas from offers.

Why?

        ________________________

[1] [https://venturebeat.com/2017/03/31/soon-your-pizza-will- be-o...](https://venturebeat.com/2017/03/31/soon-your-pizza-will-be-ordered- made-and-delivered-through-robots/)

<comment><USER40> Dominos doesn't use the same web platform everywhere. Dominos Belgium for example shares a platform used by some other countries (FR, DE, NL, AU and more) which is completely different from the US one. And there are a few more codebases out there.

Same thing with Starbucks. Our Starbuckses are actually part of the Autogrill group and only share the products and branding with the "real" US Starbucks, none of the extra stuff/amenities carried over. (Starbucks in Belgium doesn't even have a website, let alone an app, for example.)

<comment><USER39> That sucks, honestly. So they managed to get consistent branding, but couldn't even offer a consistent API?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Care to share your 'stack'?

front-end/back-end/API's?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure! On the front end it's HTML, CSS, and jQuery - no hip JS frameworks nor complex build pipelines. Backend is node and express. The dominos API is [https://github.com/RIAEvangelist/node-dominos-pizza- api](https://github.com/RIAEvangelist/node-dominos-pizza-api), as mentioned below. Everything is hosted in AWS on Elastic Beanstalk on a few t2.micro instances.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Tried to order and got an error.

"Whoops - something didn't go right with the order, but you weren't charged."

Please email me. I want to try this. Email is in my bio.

</comment><comment><USER43> I got one with extra anchovies. Husband not happy.

<comment><USER6> Call them "free range Atlantic micro branzino" and see if that works!

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Nooooo! It could be pineapple!!! :)

</comment><comment><USER45> A whole thread on automated pizza with no Snow Crash jokes? I'm disappointed.

</comment><comment><USER46> It should include a 'no anchovies' option

<comment><AUTHOR> Anchovies are actually the only topping I don't include intentionally!

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> Needs the delivery guy shouting "Di Di Mau!" at you once he gives you the pen to sign your receipt.

</comment><comment><USER48> Given the state of the world, hopefully we technologists will consider using our prodigious collective talents in meaningful ways in 2018.</comment>


How to prepare your fresh Mac for software development - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@mtkocak/how-to-prepare-your-fresh-mac-for-software-development-b841c05db18#.gzc8lctm7 <comment><USER2> Step one is to install Xcode or the Xcode command line tools. These are necessary for brew to build from source.

Once brew and clang are working it's mostly a matter of installing packages as on a normal Unix system. Definitely want to install command-line git.

Of course what this guide is missing is how to set up the runtime for whatever environment/framework you're using. For Rails you'll want rvm/rbenv; for Node, nvm. You also may wish to test everything in a Linux VM that mirrors prod, in which case configuring your Mac to transfer or share the code jn your src directory with the VM is necessary.

Getting the actual dependencies of your code up and running is generally the most crucial -- and most difficult -- part of prepping any new dev box.

<comment><USER3> Using Docker, one could have various images made for whichever runtime environments you require. This way, no dependencies for running/compiling code need to be installed on a dev machine other than Docker and can be easily used from any machine with Docker, avoiding the hassle of setting up all of these dependencies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > Let's start with a list of essential things you need.

> ...

> Github — The essential version control system

git is the VCS. GitHub is a service ( website ) that provides git repositories.

<comment><USER5> I find it interesting that she installed GitHub Desktop but was using `git clone` later.

OP, If you are looking at this, learn that GitHub Desktop is supposed to provide a graphical UI for some basic git operations (such as git clone).

You can install and use git without installing GitHub Desktop.

<comment> J0-onas Isn't git preinstalled in macOS?

<comment><USER5> The one pre-installed is way outdated. Better off install the latest version using homebrew.

<comment><USER6> The one shipped by Apple on OS X 10.11.6 is 2.7.4, which was released in March this year. That's hardly "way outdated".

> Better off install the latest version using homebrew.

The Git project provides package to install binaries for OSX. Homebrew's name would be more accurate to the reality of the product if it's name was bathtub- whiskey.

<comment><USER5> They updated it, following this incident:

[http://rachelbythebay.com/w/2016/04/17/unprotected/](http://rachelbythebay.com/w/2016/04/17/unprotected/)

[http://rachelbythebay.com/w/2016/05/05/xcode/](http://rachelbythebay.com/w/2016/05/05/xcode/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Here's mine: [https://github.com/pathikrit/mac-setup- script/blob/master/se...](https://github.com/pathikrit/mac-setup- script/blob/master/setup.sh)

</comment><comment><USER8> I like homebrew-bundle [1]. It lets me list all of the apps I use in a text file and install them with a single command.

You can also run `brew bundle --cleanup` to purge your system of apps that you no longer need (as long as you installed them with homebrew/homebrew-bundle in the first place).

\- [1] [https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew- bundle](https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-bundle)

</comment><comment><USER9> I like laptop from thoughtbot. It is a good starting point.

[https://github.com/thoughtbot/laptop](https://github.com/thoughtbot/laptop)

</comment><comment><USER10> This one is better: [http://sourabhbajaj.com/mac- setup/](http://sourabhbajaj.com/mac-setup/)

<comment><USER11> Or if you like a fully scripted setup: [https://github.com/thoughtbot/laptop](https://github.com/thoughtbot/laptop)

<comment><AUTHOR> +1

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Setup for Homebrew, GitHub Desktop and an IDE? This seems excessively basic...

<comment> J0-onas Not to nitpick but TextMate and VS Code aren't even 'real' IDEs. They're text editors. The IDE aspect is added by installing plugins which a) mostly depend on the the needs of the user, and b) she didn't showed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> For <a very small subset of development>. When I get a new box I install among other things, OCaml and Forth...

This is a good rant tho' [https://medium.com/my-name-is-midori/software- development-is...](https://medium.com/my-name-is-midori/software-development- is-fucked-up-a002b3435be8#.bba2fro3h)

</comment><comment><USER14> For setting up a Mac, I can't recommend a .osx file highly enough. Dot files in general make setting up a new computer really easy, especially when combined with homebrew's cask. I've been able to setup a familiar dev environment on a new machine in less than 15 min because I've maintained dotfiles. It's a relatively small time investment upfront and the payoff can be massive, especially if anything ever goes wrong on your main machine.

<comment><USER15> I'm sorry I'm not totally sure I know what you are talking about. Care to link?

<comment><USER16> Scripting out your favorite settings, here's an example: [https://github.com/mathiasbynens/dotfiles/blob/master/.macos](https://github.com/mathiasbynens/dotfiles/blob/master/.macos)

I use something similar, along with dotbot ([https://github.com/anishathalye/dotbot](https://github.com/anishathalye/dotbot)) to wire up other application's settings files. There's lots of good examples around to steal and tweak.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This does seem a little basic but I forked and rewrote another setup guide specifically for front-end developers using a Mac.

[https://github.com/asuh/front-end-osx](https://github.com/asuh/front-end-osx)

</comment><comment><USER18> Apologies, but I can't help myself:

[http://widgetsandshit.com/teddziuba/2011/03/osx- unsuitable-w...](http://widgetsandshit.com/teddziuba/2011/03/osx-unsuitable- web-development.html)

But the problem ranted about above doesn't just apply to Macs. One of the most common things I see on our support system is the dev team who've built their app on Windows + XAMPP then wonder why stuff doesn't work the same when they deploy to their production CentOS box.

If you're writing any server side code you should be developing on a machine (or VM) that closely matches your production targets. Then there's no surprises.

<comment><AUTHOR> Man up and learn Emacs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Things like this make me die a little inside every time:

> Open a fresh terminal and enter this command: /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL > [https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/in...](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install\)")

<comment><AUTHOR> why?

<comment><USER16> You're executing a script directly off of a git repo. There's a lot of trust involved there. One sneaky pull-request away from an exploit.

That said, I do it all the time like everyone else. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's the official installation instruction of homebrew. [http://brew.sh/](http://brew.sh/)

But anyway I got your point.

<comment><USER6> That doesn't make it any less terrible, but honestly who expects more from homebrew, as a project it's hardly the pinnacle of engineering excellence.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Wuhan Outbreak Is Caused by the Bacteria Prevotella - <AUTHOR> https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339008515_The_2019_Wuhan_outbreak_is_caused_by_the_bacteria_Prevotella_which_is_aided_by_the_coronavirus_possibly_to_adhere_to_epithelial_cells_-_Prevotella_is_present_in_huge_amounts_in_patients_from_both_Chin <comment><AUTHOR> This is a preprint and needs confirmation. It may just be bad statistics, as prevotella from what I understand is not an uncommon gut bacteria.

This is however loosely supported by multiple reports[1] that patients still test positive for the virus up to a week after recovery and discharge.

1\. I'm having trouble finding it but it's a recent Reuters article reporting that up to a week after recovery patients tested positive.

<comment><USER2> I think the Reuters article you refer to is here: [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-health- reinfection-...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-health-reinfection- explainer/explainer-coronavirus-reappears-in-discharged-patients-raising- questions-in-containment-fight-idUSKCN20M124)</comment></comment>


Attack of the SPAC - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@andyravreby/attack-of-the-spac-baafd47f6ecc <comment><AUTHOR> How SPACs enabled an unknown electric vehicle company with no revenue to become more valuable than Ford overnight</comment>


What should I do with MOGBase.com? - <AUTHOR> http://michaelwales.com/blog/what-should-i-do-with-mogbasecom/

<comment><USER2> <http://mog.com/> might be interested in the domain?</comment>


Giant Concentric Circles in Granite Springs Valley, NV - <AUTHOR> https://www.blackrockdesert.org/wiki/index.php?title=Granite_Springs_Valley <comment><AUTHOR> Here's a google earth view showing the center of the circles mentioned here: [https://email@example.com,-119.000836,1390.6...](https://email@example.com,-119.000836,1390.69764979a,1868.98598613d,35y,263.87825996h,0t,0r)

Here's another google earth view that shows nuclear test craters by the Nevada National Security Site [https://firstname.lastname@example.com,-116.08582114,1329...](https://firstname.lastname@example.com,-116.08582114,1329.90636343a,16836.57456643d,35y,-123.44568868h,59.7376637t,-0r)

Disturbing and fascinating. I guess I'll have to visit the nearby National Atomic Testing Museum someday. [https://email@example.com,-115.1483791,628.17...](https://email@example.com,-115.1483791,628.17407431a,833.85996482d,35y,0h,45t,0r/data=ChEaDwoJL20vMDVyOXJ4GAIgASgC)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I found this by accident on google earth. It's pretty interesting and weird. I guess that people's best speculation is that it is a remnant from nuclear testing around the 60s.

Google earth URL [https://email@example.com,-119.000836,1390.1...](https://email@example.com,-119.000836,1390.18813777a,1040.89059732d,35y,263.87826055h,0t,0r)

This seems to be some other discussion about it: [https://aair.smugmug.com/Aviation-Archaeology-1/Giant- concen...](https://aair.smugmug.com/Aviation-Archaeology-1/Giant-concentric- circles/i-B6RhZHQ)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> See also: The Nuclear Canal: Project Plowshare and the Dream of Atomic Earthmoving [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21911587](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21911587)</comment>


Employee Equity - How Much? - <AUTHOR> http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2010/11/employee-equity-how-much.html

<comment><USER2> There's a bit of fuzzy math going on here. The equity formula is measured in terms of annual salary but stock actually vests over 4 years. So for the senior team member, they're actually getting 12.5% of their salary in stock every year.

If you assume the fabled 10X exit, the home run exit which makes the portfolio for investors, then that means the senior exec basically gets about double his salary as a reward for the exit (taking into account further dilution). For a "key function", a 10X exit represents a 20% bonus.

These numbers seem pretty underwhelming to me.

<comment><USER3> _These numbers seem pretty underwhelming to me._

To me, as well, which is why I insist on a fair salary and consider the equity portion as pro-forma icing on the cake.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The formula doesn't address a (common?) case: people joining an early stage startup sometimes (often?) accept lower pay than they could get somewhere else in exchange for equity.

Given that the formula for number of shares is based on annual salary, you're double-screwed in that case: not only you get paid less but you also get less shares because of that.

Or am I mistaken in my assumption that early stage startups pay less than stable, successful companies like Google, Yahoo or Cisco and attract people mainly with a promise of shares that some day might be worth a lot?

</comment><comment><USER5> It's a great point that the approach you take for the first few key hires is different from the longer-term approach. With my 1990s vc-funded startup Intrinsa, we took a similar approach: looking at percentages for the first handful of employees during our seed funding, and then in terms of estimated value of the equity once we closed a multi-million dollar funding round.

Thinking of it in terms of "brackets" as Fred does also makes it easy to explain to new and current employees, so creates a feeling of fairness across the different organizations as things scale.

</comment><comment><USER6> Is anyone else bothered by the idea that the VP of HR and the general counsel get so much equity?

<comment><USER5> Not at all. These are senior-level positions and you need to get good people there. If you value them less than other positions, you'll get second-class hires -- which will cause huge problems going forward.

<comment><USER6> They're not getting that kind of equity upside from not-startups.

Note that you are valuing them more than folks who are actually producing the first version of the product. Do you really think that the VP of HR is more essential than a lead engineer?

<comment><USER5> yes, once you get to a certain size (or for corporate counsel, start doing big or complex deals)

and the best corporate counsels and HR people get very good compensation from not-startups.

<comment><USER6> > yes, once you get to a certain size (or for corporate counsel, start doing > big or complex deals)

> and the best corporate counsels and HR people get very good compensation > from not-startups

We're talking about startups....

<comment><USER5> Fred's talking about startups that take venture funding, who frequently do grow to this level.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Venture capital is going to murder Medium - <AUTHOR> https://m.signalvnoise.com/venture-capital-is-going-to-murder-medium-656cbccf4829#.x8m2jftjl <comment><USER2> Discussed previously: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13328549](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13328549)

</comment><comment><USER3> Medium is a site I've wondered about a lot.

I'm a total outsider to that side of things, so maybe someone can explain it to me.

I see a lot of blogs and interesting articles that are on Medium. What I don't get is why they are there. It doesn't seem to be any different than any other blog site, except maybe it look a bit nicer. But that doesn't seem to be enough to explain how so many things I read are on Medium.

Is it discovery? Because I've never browsed medium. I just look on HN, and yet again there's some article hosted on Medium. Or I land on it through some other aggregation site.

I'm not sure how I'd be interested in better discovery, either. There's enough stuff on the web to read, so unless their discovery is amazing (ie fits my interests without me having to spend time searching/configuring) I don't see what the point is.

To me, the uninitiated, it just looks like yet another place to put articles. And that's why it is kinda surprising to read that hundreds of millions of dollars have been invested.

<comment><USER4> Discovery. If you cross post and get more traffic to your medium post than the version on an official company blog then it makes sense to keep doing it.

<comment><USER5> This. I posed identical posts on Tumblr and Medium for a few months, and the Medium traffic was always higher. The more people read it, the more traffic it got. If you put quality content on Medium, it's far more likely to be read.

<comment><USER6> Sorry for what might be a stupid question but I haven't used Medium and last used Tumblr a few years ago: how do you know how many readers you have? Do these platforms offer stats or is it based on Google Analytics or user comments?

It's not hard to believe Medium having more traffic than Tumblr, just wanted to understand how people measure this.

<comment><USER7> I'm not an insider or anything, but I just searched, 'medium blog stats' and came up with this:

[https://medium.com/@Medium/statistics-2971adaa615](https://medium.com/@Medium/statistics-2971adaa615)

[https://help.medium.com/hc/en- us/articles/215108608-Stats](https://help.medium.com/hc/en- us/articles/215108608-Stats)

[https://help.medium.com/hc/en- us/articles/215793317-Publicat...](https://help.medium.com/hc/en- us/articles/215793317-Publication-stats)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What bothers me about Medium is that they originally wanted funding to be able to create long-form, well-researched journalism.That is what they asked for on kickstarter, years back.

They got their support, reached their goal, delivered a few stories and then switched to being a blog-software company!?

That is not what I backed and paid for.

<comment><USER9> Are you sure it's Medium you're talking about, and not Matter[1]? I couldn't find anything about Medium on kickstarter.

[1] [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/readmatter/matter](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/readmatter/matter)

<comment><USER8> Hm, according to wikipedia: "In April 2013, Johnson and Giles announced that Matter had been acquired by Medium, a new publishing platform established by Twitter founder Ev Williams"

From the updates and emails back then I got the impression that medium was built FOR matter, and then becoming it's main product.

Apparently matter still exists too! :)</comment></comment></comment>


Writing a browser extension for three browsers - <AUTHOR> http://einaregilsson.com/writing-a-browser-extension-for-three-browsers/ <comment><USER2> In my previous work at a company that made it's money from a browser extension, I saw what hell it was to develop browser extensions for all major browsers.

I should note it looks like this issue is mostly fixed going forward. The chrome extension model won, and Firefox and Windows Edge are supposed to be supporting either directly or through electrolysis.

I.E. was not an extension, but a toolbar, written in C++ (being C++ the debugger was Windows visual studios so it was doable). Firefox was Xul based and almost impossible to debug at the time (much improved in recent months), and chrome just worked.

<comment><USER3> That's interesting. I've only made some toy extensions for both Chrome and Firefox, and I've got an impression that Firefox's extension model is somehow more "powerful", and Chrome's is a bit limited. But after reading the experiences shown in this thread, it seems that Firefox's model is actually harder to use in practice. Would this be related to the maxim that "less is better"?

<comment><AUTHOR> The old Firefox extension model, XUL/XPCOM is definitely a lot more powerful. You can basically access anything and do anything. On the other hand much of it is not documented and you're on your own in figuring out how it works. But they're trying to move people off that model, and onto the Add-on SDK or the chrome model, which is a lot easier to work with, and better documented.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> *two browsers

Opera 15+ is merely a fork of Chrome with some slight ui modifications. It does not merit being called a browser in its own right.

<comment><AUTHOR> Should maybe have been 2 and a half browsers. There are some slight differences, e.g. the way options pages are opened from the extension page, but basically Opera is just Chrome. What is the point of Opera, I don't really know why anyone would use it, but it was basically free to make the extension work for it, so I decided to include it.

<comment><USER4> > What is the point of Opera

Opera up to version 12 was a great standalone browser with UI and performance characteristics still surpassing all competitors even at this point in time. (As long as you exclude JS-heavy things.)

However at some point MBAs managed to take over, decided to continue making most of the company income with their mobile ad network.

Developing Opera 12 further was expensive, so they figured out a way to keep most of the users (for the ad revenue), while radically slashing the dev expenditure on the browser: Fork and rebrand chrome, while adding a few token features, pretend Opera 12 doesn't exist, and push people heavily to "upgrade".

</comment></comment></comment><comment> martin-adams I wrote my first extension for a proof of concept project for Chrome last month, and I literally had my first working example doing something interesting within 2 minutes.

I tried to do the same in FireFox, and gave up. I couldn't get my head around the documentation without taking a day out to get going.

<comment><AUTHOR> Firefox is also starting its third extension model now. At first it was XUL/XPCOM where extensions could basically hook into ANYTHING in the browser, then there was the Add-on SDK (formerly Jetpack), which is kind of nice, but a lot more limited, and now they're going with WebExtensions, because, well, Firefox basically does nothing but copy Chrome anymore ;)

But yes, that does make it complicated to figure out what's the best way to make stuff for Firefox.

<comment><USER5> >Firefox basically does nothing but copy Chrome anymore ;)

Thanks

If you can wait for the WebExtension API. If not use Jetpack. Don't write new extensions with XUL/XPCOM.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, that was unnecessarily snarky. But it does seem like Chrome is leading and Firefox is following on a lot of things. The look, multiprocess, extension model, all things that started in Chrome.

I was pleasantly surprised by Jetpack though, the jpm tool is very nice.

<comment><USER6> As a primarily Firefox user on Linux I do agree with you about Firefox mostly following Chromium these days. It seemed like for a long time Chromium was adding in features Firefox had with improved implementations, but now Firefox appears to be lagging. The Firefox extension model did allow for extensions like DownThemAll which I don't think can survive in this generation of extension models.

<comment><USER7> Yes; I have no problem with adding an API to make simple things easy, but TreeStyleTabs, VIMperator, Firebug, all of them need something more powerful than the Chrome model. I really hope they don't deprecate the old model and leave power users out in the cold.

And frankly, the old model is not so bad; if you're building any kind of extension that does more than connecting a button to an HTTP call, the couple of hours you'll need to get started are irrelevant in the long run.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have written browser extensions in Chrome very successfully. And failed horribly with Firefox.

Now when I see any working extension in Firefox I marvel at how much work that person must have put in to get it to work. Over time hopefully Firefox will get better. But the extensions have been bad for a while...

<comment><USER7> I've built a Firefox extension (now abandoned), which even used XPCOM, and while the documentation was spotty (this was back in 2010, it may have improved), it wasn't particularly difficult. The fact that you can easily unzip any extension and look at its source makes up for a lot of gaps in the docs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's not mentioned in the article (understandably), but writing an extension for desktop Safari is very similar to writing an extension for Chrome. One can even use the same codebase in most cases — the biggest differences are that Safari is a little more conservative in what it gives extensions access to and any Chrome-specific JS obviously won't work.

<comment><AUTHOR> But you need a Apple developer license to develop for Safari, and that costs 99$ per year :/</comment></comment>