Ask HN: What should I use to write native desktop apps for Ubuntu? - <AUTHOR> I am computer science student. And I want to write a native desktop app for Ubuntu which will be displayed in the system tray. I tried building a sample app using ElectronJS but it compiles to very big file size for a hello world system tray app.
I have looked into GTK and Qt but I am confused which one I should use. I want to know which one will be easier to pick up and get going. <comment><USER2> The safest, simplest option would be C, CLion and GTK. Qt is pretty heavy in it's own ways (though not as much as electron).

I might try out relm + rust, to see what the state of the art is: [http://relm.ml/relm-intro](http://relm.ml/relm-intro)

I've used [https://www.mono-project.com/docs/gui/gtksharp/](https://www.mono- project.com/docs/gui/gtksharp/) in the past, and it was easy. Looks like there is a notification area example: [http://www.mono- project.com/docs/gui/gtksharp/widgets/notifi...](http://www.mono- project.com/docs/gui/gtksharp/widgets/notification-icon/)

Looks like it's possible in go: [https://github.com/mattn/go- gtk](https://github.com/mattn/go-gtk)

And python: [https://python- gtk-3-tutorial.readthedocs.io/en/latest/](https://python- gtk-3-tutorial.readthedocs.io/en/latest/)

It doesn't look very supported, but even node has GTK bindings: [https://github.com/WebReflection/node- gtk](https://github.com/WebReflection/node-gtk)

Honestly, thanks for bringing this up. Looking at these is interesting an nostalgic. It seems like everyone nowadays just does webapps, and its interesting to see "the state of the desktop in 2018".

</comment><comment><USER3> People are down on Electron. But to me, it looks more like the future than GTK or QT for many things. In the end, Electron's tradeoff of resource use for ease of development is likely to win because computer capability will always trend above the line needed to run current web browser technology and Ubuntu ships with a browser. OK, Electron is not native. Neither is Java and every argument against Electron was made against Java twenty years ago and performance of Java apps on ordinary computers was often much much worse than Electron on its worst day.[1]

The story of computer programming is the story of programmers avoiding the need to write native code. Assemblers, compilers, Cobol, C, C++, Java, Go all exist because hardware is the worst abstraction most of the time. Particularly because it is sticky. Twenty-five years after first programming on TRS-80's and Apple II's, I freaked out about allocating a 10,000 element integer array on a machine with 4GB of RAM and dual quad-core Xeons.

That's not to say that writing code at a low level might not be a good learning exercise. But it's not a reason to claim moral/ethical superiority. Engineering is about making meaningful tradeoffs based on project criteria. Resource allocation ought to be evaluated based on the importance of the problem the software solves...and consuming "too much" resources is often a reflection of the problem's importance. and problem importance can be a useful way of evaluating software quality.

Don't fight the last war.

Good luck.

[1]: And there was Java in the browser!

<comment><USER4> Alternatively, all modern desktop OSes come with decent browser engines built in. You may use [https://github.com/zserge/webview](https://github.com/zserge/webview) for a common simple API on top of the native webviews and it allows you to build small executables (<10MB) that don't consume too much memory.

<comment><USER3> Thanks, it looks like an interesting project. Not sure it is a general alternative to Electron programming in Javascript. Looks like a more direct alternative to GTK, QT, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm writing a systray application in golang currently. Binaries turn around 3mb. There's an external library for cross platform tray support somewhere on github, I can't remember exactly what it's called though

Edit: it was the first result on Google; [https://github.com/getlantern/systray](https://github.com/getlantern/systray)

<comment><USER6> Wish Go had a more complete UI lib. Libui sounds promising though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Take a look at Lazarus. It runs natively and outputs native binaries from x86 PCs to ARM *PI like boards.

[https://www.lazarus-ide.org/](https://www.lazarus-ide.org/) [http://wiki.freepascal.org/Lazarus_Application_Gallery](http://wiki.freepascal.org/Lazarus_Application_Gallery)

</comment><comment><USER8> As far as i know ubuntu uses Gnome which means you should use GTK to let your app look nativ. I dont know how it will look if you use Qt.

<comment><USER9> QGtkStyle and the Gnome platform theme mean this isn't really an issue.

<comment><USER10> In practice, though, I can nearly always tell when a new app I install uses Qt. It always seems a little off, and some little details end up not feeling right. If you use GNOME or Xfce and are starting a GUI project, it's better to just stick with GTK.

<comment><USER9> Unfortunately, GTK applications in a Qt desktop are a complete disaster. This means if you use Qt, it looks and works well on some desktops and OK on others, while GTK is good on the latter and bad on the former.

<comment><USER11> I have to disagree. I use plasma as my desktop environnement and I occasionally use some gtk3 apps like evince. The KDE team did a good job porting the breeze theme to gtk, evince is beautiful here. So is gedit and meld is okay too. The gtk header bar also looks good and I actually like it. Chrome also looks good here.

KDE also provide a nice configuration tool for gtk apps.

Worst case, I feel gtk apps look and feel as they do in gnome, which is okay. The gnome crowd paid attention to the look and feel of their software and this is noticeable.

I still do prefer KDE apps most of the time, I always feel they behave the right way. What should be zoomable with the mouse wheel is for instance.

Qt apps also look good on gnome, especially when using the breeze theme. Gnome with this theme is beautiful.

However, many KDE apps are broken or ugly if QT_QPA_PLATFORMTHEME is not set to "kde" (and then you get whatever theme is configured in plasma, not the theme of your current desktop environment). At least outside of gnome.

Bare Qt apps don't have this problem: VLC looks good everywhere.

However, configuring the look and feel of Qt 5 apps is a pain outside of KDE.

Gtk3 apps are also more likely to behave better on a touchscreen (scrolling, for instance). Plasma do behave very well on a touchscreen. KDE apps, not so particularly well. Gtk 2 is a disaster, popup menus are unusable. This makes xfce unusable on touchscreens on which I tested it.

Some details, some behaviors are different between the toolkits. Overflowing toolbars unhide differently for instance (this is visible with LibreOffice vs LyX. I find Qt a bit annoying with this).

With Qt you get the opportunity to have a good opening file dialog. The gtk one is nice looking but quite annoying. It autocompletes in a surprising way (in KDE at least), and reauires typing Ctrl+L to type a path but the recently used files gets in the way (although is occasionally very helpful).

I also have observed that Qt apps play well with the DPI / font scaling setting of the xsdl x server on Android. Gtk apps require to set GDK_DPI_SCALE manually.

For programming, I would not hesitate between Qt and gtk. The Qt API is clean and straightforward and powerful. Gtk looks worse to me. And for the documentation, Qt is top notch. I might have missed something on the side of gtk. I would use gtk only if I have to use C.

Qt apps will also probably look better outside of Linux/BSD than gtk apps.

Gtk will probably look more native than anything on the Ubuntu desktop, since everything in Ubuntu is written in gtk. I would still consider Qt though. With care given to integration, good result should be reachable.

<comment><USER9> It's only good if you stick to Breeze. If you use anything else (QtCurve, Virtuality) there's no GTK3 port.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> They will both probably be about the same, tbh. People seem to like Qt a bit more, but high-quality bindings really only exist for c++ or python. GTK, on the other hand, has bindings for most langauges. You could also use tcl with tk, java (or clojure or kotlin or scala or...) with javafx or swing, d with dlangui...

Ultimately, what's important is to start making something. Any language, any toolkit, doesn't _really_ matter all that much. If you don't like it, try another language, another toolkit.

</comment><comment><USER13> If I had to do it, I would use a language that I am comfortable with and the most used GUI library/framework in that language. I know Java well, so I'd either chose Java/Swing or Java/GTK[1].

[1] Java binding is officially supported: [https://www.gtk.org/language- bindings.php](https://www.gtk.org/language-bindings.php)

</comment><comment><USER9> What languages do you know? With Qt, Python is an option but you're better off using C++. Bindings to other languages exist, of varying quality.

</comment><comment><USER14> Gnome has won the war, it's the default for the major distro's so Gtk.

If it's a quick thing then maybe just make it a shell extension.

</comment><comment><USER15> I'm working on an app now and I using QT. I have used QT off and on over the years from 3.x days even. I still use QT because I feel if I wanted my app to run on other platforms like macOS or Windows I might have an easier time at least with the GUI piece.

You can use GTK on other platforms too, I just never have.

</comment><comment><USER16> I tried writing a GUI app in wxpython and it was pretty straightforward, however you need to figure out how to split up work task from the main rendering process if you go that way!

</comment><comment><USER17> libui showed up recently on HN, I also recommend wxWidgets.

</comment><comment><USER18> How about javafx?

<comment><USER13> Not sure why you were down-voted. It's a valid option IMO.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Why not simply use Java or C#? _No one_ writes desktop software in JS

<comment><USER9> Far too many people write desktop software in JS. I wish they wouldn't, but they do.

<comment><USER20> It's not so much the greatness of JS that attracts people, but having access to the DOM and browser based rendering. HTML/CSS is the very best possible declarative syntax for building interfaces ever devised really. The alternatives are way less flexible and cross platform.

<comment><USER9> HTML and CSS are actually a pretty terrible syntax for building interfaces, which is unsurprising given HTML is a document format, and CSS is designed to style documents. If they were really the best possible syntax, you wouldn't have so many popular frameworks.

Rather, HTML/CSS/JS is what you're stuck with if you're treating the web as your platform, which is tempting when your code is really just a front-end for a remotely hosted system anyway.

Electron is the result of people trained in web development turning their hands to desktop development, but not wanting to learn something completely new.

<comment><USER16> Your argument would be much stronger if you actually provided the better alternative, instead you don't bring anything new to the conversation.

<comment><USER9> Qt Quick. Really, anything that has layouts (Windows Forms, for instance).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Spark Core Shower Room Door Sensor - <AUTHOR> https://unop.uk/dev/spark-core-shower-room-door-sensor/ <comment><USER2> So the engineer in me always twitches a bit at how much computer power is being applied here for a simple task, and the humorist in me is glad that it isn't wired up to a web cam :-)

My favorite door sensor was a small corner reflector taped to the top and a laser pen pointer down the hall with a photo transistor next to it. Didn't really tell you if anyone was inside but it did tell you if the door was open or closed.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is great! Been considering jumping into Spark to update my Bathroom sensor: [http://briiiiian.com/bathroom-f-graf/](http://briiiiian.com/bathroom- f-graf/)</comment>


Senate defeats amendment to shield browsing histories in FISA searches by 1 vote - <AUTHOR> https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/13/senate-browsing-histories-fisa-254970 <comment><USER2> They're literally trying to sneak this in while Americans are distracted by COVID-19.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Added context to original title. It was:

Senate defeats amendment to shield browsing histories in FISA searches</comment>


Mark Zuckerberg Live at TC Disrupt - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/video/

<comment><USER2> Here's a recording for anyone who missed it <http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/25340828>

</comment><comment><USER3> well, that was an awesome interview</comment>


IOS 7 vs. Windows Phone 8 - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM8NSSzxNGM&q5881188=1

<comment><USER2> Who's copying who now?

<comment><USER3> You could argue that iPad also copied the original MS Tablet, but the difference is the Apple version wasn't completely awful. If iOS7 is a non- offensive version of Win 8, I'll like it very much.</comment></comment>


Donald Trump risks China rift with call to Taiwan's leader - <AUTHOR> https://www.ft.com/content/fd19907e-b8d4-11e6-961e-a1acd97f622d <comment><AUTHOR> This is a very big deal. China is hypersensitive to any official contact, military sales, bilateral deals between Taipei and Washington. To give you an example: In 1996 when Taiwan's former president went to the U.S. to receive an honorary diploma from his alma mater, China responded by launching missiles into the Taiwan Strait.

I fear Beijing will do something similar to save face/show strength. It also sets the stage for China not being able to trust the United States to behave within established foreign relations norms.

Watch this space.

<comment><USER2> My parents lived in China for a couple years so I'm no expert but I did, through accidental trial and error, figure out what not to do sometimes. To me this move looks to be deliberately designed to annoy them.

<comment><USER3> > To me this move looks to be deliberately designed to annoy them.

...or to send a message that things will be done differently from now on.</comment></comment></comment>


Want to learn programming? Here are top books for learning any language you want - <AUTHOR> http://amazedprogrammer.blogspot.com/2017/08/i-want-to-learn-programming-which-books.html?m=1 <comment><USER2> Hoo-Boy, the _amazedprogrammer_ conflates programming languages with programming. It's a common error, but a significant one. Programming is separate and distinct from the programming languages used.

Moreover, this post provides a bibliography of books for learning programming languages for novice programmers, but provides no help in choosing which language a novice should choose.</comment>


Firefox 10th Anniversary Demos - <AUTHOR> https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/demos/

<comment><USER2> Mozilla's answer to: [http://www.chromeexperiments.com/](http://www.chromeexperiments.com/)

<comment><USER3> I'm not sure. I have visited this website infrequently for years now, so I think it is actually older than Chrome itself, although new demos of course keep popping.

<comment><USER4> Raphael is correct. We started the Demo Studio in response to Chrome Experiments.

Back then, Chrome Experiment authors were building experiments that only worked in Chrome. This led some to believe that Chrome was an especially powerful browser, when in reality many of the experiments could have worked in any modern browser if they had been written correctly.

We launched the Demo Studio to address that problem. We called for demos that showcased the power of the Web, not just the power of Firefox. We wanted to show the world that the modern Web, not Chrome, was the platform that made amazing things possible. Three years later I'm happy to say we accomplished our goal. The Demo Studio has more demos than Chrome Experiments and we don't hear people referring to the Chrome platform in particular as being revolutionary.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Running these on the Nightly froze my Yosemite Mac and I had to reboot. Apple detected the graphics card issue upon reboot.</comment>


JavaScript motion blur demo - <AUTHOR> http://dhotson.github.io/blur/

<comment><USER2> There's something about the blur effect that is really compelling -- it's almost like there are little pieces of _real_ paper flying around.

Code is here: [https://github.com/dhotson/dhotson.github.com/blob/master/bl...](https://github.com/dhotson/dhotson.github.com/blob/master/blur/index.html)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I've been testing out some motion blur effects in the browser.

Something that's kind of cool is that it's simulating a camera's shutter opening and closing. ie the shutter doesn't open instantaneously—it takes some time to fully open.

Pixar uses a similar technique in their RenderMan renderer: <http://renderman.pixar.com/products/whats_renderman/3.html>

</comment><comment><USER3> My new screensaver.</comment>


Study: Self-driving cars have higher accident rate - <AUTHOR> http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2015/10/31/study-self-driving-cars-accidents/74946614/ <comment><USER2> > it is making the comparison from a tiny pool of autonomous test cars, about > 50 of them in California, versus 269 million conventional cars as of 2013

That is the flaw: the control group should be some regular cars in California traveling the same areas at the same hours, not the US average.

I suspect that comparing any group of 50 cars in California (autonomous or not) against a US average that takes into account many cars travelling along empty areas will result in the former having a lot more fender bender rates.</comment>


New Zealand banning assault and semi-automatic rifles - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-newzealand-shootout-ardern-guncontrol-idUSKCN1R205Z <comment><USER2> (New Zealander here) I was surprised that these weren't already banned. How many bullets do you really need to hunt? Some clarification on NZ's new gun laws: [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/21/explainer- how-...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/21/explainer-how-are-new- zealands-gun-laws-changing)

The rest of the world sees that the US constantly ties itself in knots over the gun issue, and the horrific loss of lives. Hopefully NZ's swift response shows that things CAN change.

<comment><USER3> > How many bullets do you really need to hunt?

In the US, this is the question used to neuter the second amendment. It isn't there to protect us from deer. The 2nd is meant to be used against people. The right that exists is the ability to protect your rights, life, and property, through force if necessary.

<comment><USER4> Look at it this way: if you're going to lead an illegal insurrection to overthrow what you think is a tyranical government, why do you care what the gun laws are?

<comment><USER5> A necessary precondition for a tyrannical government is a power imbalance between the people and the government. Allowing citizens to own arms that are in the same league as what the government uses prevents this.

<comment><USER6> So, civilians owning tanks? Predator drones? Attack helicopters? Cruise missiles? Fighter jets? Biological or chemical weapons?

We don't live in a world where the people and the government can reasonably expect to have symmetrical physical warfare capabilities. This argument is irrelevant today.

The only area where the exists any form of symmetry would be cyber weapons, not physical.

Defending against other _individuals_ is still a viable argument, and is the only reason I think we need to be careful about how far we go with regards to gun control, but that has some tight limits and I think we can find more effective solutions than guns if we put some effort into it and take it seriously.

<comment><USER5> > So, civilians owning tanks? Predator drones? Attack helicopters? Cruise > missiles? Fighter jets? Biological or chemical weapons?

We don't need any of that stuff to keep the balance. Iraq, Afganistan, and Vietnam are proof of this. Insurgencies are extremely effective against our military. The only real requirement for them to exist is a sufficient quantity of small arms, and maybe some improvised explosives. The argument is still very much relevant. What's happening in Venezuela right now would not be possible without having first disarmed the populace.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I believe that writing legislation for assault rifles is trickier than for semi-autos, because the latter is a more properly defined type.

That is, we talk about assault rifles as if they were easily defined but they can be functionally the same as sport rifles but with different grips, and the larger default magazines.

<comment><USER8> Assault rifle is a defined term, it comes from the German Sturmgewehr, and it has been used since WWII to mean a select fire military issue weapon.

As a side note, they've been heavily restricted in the US for civilian ownership since 1986, and manufacture for civilian ownership has been banned since 1986. As a result, the supply is very limited and the cost for a civilian legal M16, for instance, hovers around 20 thousand dollars. I believe one has been used in the commission of a crime in that time period since 1986, and the transfer and sale and even movement of them is also heavily restricted and subject to a BATF background check and a local sheriff approval.

Of course you're misusing the word to mean anything that looks scary or looks like it might be a civilian legal non select fire rifle, but we're scientists, we ought to do better. The 1994 "assault weapon ban" didn't ban any assault weapons. It also catapulted the Republicans to power and destroyed the Democrat party for nearly 20 years as this is America and we don't like people pretending parts of our Constitution don't exist.

<comment><USER7> >Assault rifle is a defined term

It is not precise enough, that is my point. You can take an assault rifle and manufacture a sport version that removes military convenience features but is still as deadly. Not so with the auto or semi-auto designation.

They are right to focus on magazine size in legislation. Also ammo type.

<comment><USER9> "Assault rifle" is a rather precise term that means it is capable of firing more than one round with a single pull of the trigger, has detachable magazines, and is chambered for an intermediate cartridge. If anything, it is more precise than "full auto" which encompasses other types of firearms as well.

The ambiguity comes in from the more recently coined term "assault weapon" that is rather similar to "assault rifle" but means something different. Some would say this similarity was intended to confuse the matter and provide the connotation of military "machine guns" when using the term to the general populace. And to further cloud the issue, there is no universal definition for "assault weapon" when used to refer to certain firearms. Generally it is used to define cosmetic features rather than any real functional differences.

<comment><USER7> I know the US Army has a precise definition for an assault rifle, but I'm not so sure there is a good legal definition, and that's what I'm talking about. This holds true for New Zealand. If anything the US Army definition is probably too precise and would cast a net probably not broad enough.

Also the "selective fire" of assault rifles means you can select either semi- auto or full auto, which I think should be preferred terms in legislation. That is, you ban weapons that are automatic or semi-automatic (or both.) And again, the particulars of the magazine.

<comment><USER8> Automatic weapons (and select fire weapons) have been heavily restricted in the US since 1986. It's not a US Army definition, it's been an internationally defined term whose use in this way dates to WWII. It's not a new thing.

Banning magazines is ridiculous. Banning cosmetic features as the "AWB" in 1994 did is even more ridiculous -- it's intellectually dishonest.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I guess I can see both sides of the argument. I own multiple semi automatic rifles and enjoy them very much. At the same time no one "needs" to own one of these. I think anyone attempting to buy any type of firearm should have to: 1) Attend a safety training course; 2) Present some type of proof that they have met with a trained counselor, psychologist, whatever, that says they are not a danger to themselves or society (tricky! I know, very, very tricky); 3) Limited to how many they can purchase in a given time frame; 4) Waiting period of 2 weeks or some definitive cooling off period.

That's all going to be very, very controversial. Personally, I don't want it, any of it, but as a responsible owner of high capacity, semi automatic rifles, I'm willing to at least meet the other side halfway. I love going out to the range and blasting away at old cars and crap, but I don't think an outright ban is the answer. We have to find a middle ground.

<comment><USER11> These are controversial because firearms are deeply ingrained in American culture, and it is easy to see how such reasonable-seeming measures could be abused or counterproductive. For instance, if I'm suffering from mental health issues I might decide not to see anyone about it for fear they'd take my guns away. Anything that could be used to allow the government to keep track of who owns what can be --and has been-- abused to harass people or preemptively confiscate weapons.

These don't seem like problems to people who don't have firearms as part of their culture, but they're important to those who do. I honestly don't know what a good solution would look like. I believe in the purpose of the second amendment, and I like knowing that I have the right and ability to defend myself, but it has become clear that society is not fit enough to handle the current state of things. I don't really know what a good solution looks like.

<comment><USER10> You have a point there, firearms and the idea of "you can take my gun when you pry it from my cold dead hands" is deeply ingrained in the American psyche. I also think about those instances where we've had frightening scenarios of confiscation, such as Katrina. There's also the distrust of citizens in the government to both protect them, and protect their civil liberties, and freedom.

Recently I heard a quote that might add some to this discussion: The police are there to protect the government and society, not you. So if we put that together and apply it to this issue, without a gun of your own, you're left dependent upon the police who may not protect you, per se, but they will protect civil order and the government. Who decides what that civil order is?

I don't know the answer either but I accept the responsibility as a gun owner to come to the table, and find a solution.

<comment><USER12> Let's not pretend all Americans, much less all American gun owners, subscribe to the "cold dead hands" mentality, are arming themselves against the government, or even oppose gun control. Despite what many people would say, it is even possible for Democrats, liberals and "leftists" to own guns for their own self-defense and to believe in the 2nd Amendment.

Yes, that ideology describes a lot of (if not the majority) of outspoken gun owners, but "outspoken gun owner" tends to be a self-selected filter for pro- NRA identity politics.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Isn't that exactly what the shooter wanted?

They're playing right into his hands. They skipped the step where you negotiate with the terrorists and went straight to accepting his demands. I guess that doesn't matter when you need to be seen doing something.

Edit: I mean that the shooter wanted NZ gun control as a means to the end he seeks. Not that it is the end he seeks.

<comment><USER14> you think the shooter's intentions were to advocate for stricter gun laws?

<comment><USER15> 1\. Outlaw guns in New Zealand

2\. Outlaw guns in the US

3\. Race War 2020

4\. ????

5\. Profit

Pretty much the TLDR of this guy's manifesto.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Also posted earlier today: 'New Zealand PM announces ban on all assault rifles after Christchurch massacre' [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19449256](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19449256)

<comment><USER10> That post is dead and was flagged apparently.

<comment><USER16> Oh, strange - I wonder why? (mods feel free to message me so I can improve future posts if required), I don't generally have a bad rep on HN and it was an uneditoritialised title etc... anyway - what matters is that people are aware of the news, not who posts a link to it.

—

Context as to why I posted earlier today: I was born, grew up and lived in Christchurch until 2012 when I moved to Melbourne.

I was there and working in the main hospitals (sysadmin / ops engineer running the primary patient management and some lab systems) and in that role during both of the two major earthquakes that levelled the city.

The emotional, mental and social stress of those two major 'natural' disasters were so incredibly deviststing and this this shooting has surely got to pile on for people still living there.

<comment><USER17> FYI a lot of HN users flag non-tech/politics submissions wholesale. Either because they don't feel they fit the HN topic, or because these topics often devolve to flamewars.

<comment><USER16> Yeah fair enough too - it isn't tech related, while political I feel it's more social but certainly not technical.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I already feel safer, knowing that gun-law-abiding terrorists will now have to reload after a mere seven shots. Furthermore, I am confident that the lack of "military style" will actively hurt both their already fragile egos _and_ their aiming skills.

</comment><comment><USER18> China has how many Muslim Uighurs interned? Millions?

Do you support the right to arms for Uighurs?

'At first I did not speak out because I did not believe they were coming for me.'

<comment><USER12> When you mention Neimoller's poem, 1984 or Brave New World in an internet comment not related to literary criticism, you automatically lose.

<comment><USER8> Who made up that silly rule?

<comment><USER12> Analogies to the Nazis (which Neimoller's poem is, implying a slippery slope to mass graves or something equally terrible) and dystopian fiction have become so tedious and banal at this point that I group them together with Godwin's Law as examples of arguments with negative intellectual value.

If a commenter is resorting to these, it's evidence they have little of value to add to the conversation beyond concern trolling.

> Who made up that silly rule?

I guess I did. But I can't be the only one sick of seeing these low effort memes pop up around here.

<comment><USER8> Godwin's law doesn't say what you think it does.

It's not a "low effort meme", it's appropriate sometimes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Thank God for the Second Amendment.

<comment><USER20> Its only modern purpose is to enable mass shootings and support gun owners pride.

<comment><USER11> It isn't about pride, it's about self-determination, a concept deeply rooted in American culture. Part of being responsible for one's self is being responsible for one's own defense. Lord knows the police are not fast enough, or brave enough for that matter, to protect us anyway. Americans look at the kind of thing that happened in France, where people waited to be executed in a theater, and they say to themselves "I'll go down fighting, thanks". Whether that's a realistic thing to prepare for or not, that is the mindset. We have a significant aversion to being helpless and relying on the state.

<comment><USER21> Citizens of other countries, who don't have such a weird constitutional attachment to gun ownership, don't have the concept of self-determination?

<comment><USER22> I would argue that this is exactly the case. The governments of other countries are generally based on the concept that they decide what their citizens may do. The US federal government is based on the concept that they decide what citizens may _not_ do, and the Bill of Rights is designed to set limits on even that "negative" power.

The Second Amendment does not apply to citizens. None of the BoR do; they are restrictions on governmental power.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


RAF Intelligence Analyst Decoder Test - <AUTHOR> http://www.raf.mod.uk/careers/iadecodercomp/ <comment><USER2> Kind of neat. Heres an image of the solution, for anyone who doesn't want to try it themselves. <http://i43.tinypic.com/mjmi47.jpg> the name of the .wav gives it away, and I visualized it using one of foobar2000's default visualizations. A more advanced tool would probably give you a better resulting image. Reminds me of aphex twin putting things in his tracks (<http://www.bastwood.com/aphex.php>)

<comment><USER3> for the pythonistas

 __* UNTESTED SPOILERS __ __

import wave

import struct

import pylab

f = wave.open('Spectrogram.wav')

t = f.readframes(f.getnframes())

v = array([unpack('h',t[i:i+2]) for i in xrange(0,len(t),2)],dtype='float').flatten()

pylab.specgram(v, Fs=44100, NFFT=2048, noverlap=1024)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Did you see also corresponding "Intelligence Analyst" position description?

<http://www.raf.mod.uk/careers/jobs/intelligenceanalyst.cfm>

If I understand well, pay is just 16,675 GBP per year? That sounds crazy low. Even other related positions are not that much better.

Are there some tricks to sweeten it for UK army people - like you don't pay taxes/food/rent, extra per-diem allowances, long vacations, good pension?

That's for example how jobs in international organizations can be very attractive despite not particularly high salaries.

<comment><USER5> That's just the starting salary at the base rank; you wouldn't be there for very long! It goes up incrementally every year and jumps when you get promoted. Promotion is good and can go up to over £40k if you make it up the ladder. See link: [http://www.rafcom.co.uk/pay_allowances/pay/2008/raf_air_08.c...](http://www.rafcom.co.uk/pay_allowances/pay/2008/raf_air_08.cfm) All the perks that the Army get are the same for all 3 services: Job security, free uniform, Forces discounts, expenses, cheap food & accommodation with all utilities included in the rent (free while on operations!), free medical & dental, excellent facilities including: (catering, social clubs, activity clubs, gym), excellent pension, great holidays, world travel, lots of opportunity for sport or expeditions etc. But everyone, including the Army, pays tax! It's a pretty good life that has a load to offer in addition to a good pay package.</comment></comment>


What's so special with minimalweather.com? - <AUTHOR> http://www.minimalweather.com/about <comment><USER2> So the icon shows what the weather was the previous time you ran it?

Maybe I'm misunderstanding it but it seems like an anti-feature to me.

<comment><USER3> There's an app that'll show you the temperature in realtime on the icon without the need to open the app. It's called eWeather HD and uses the notifications feature of iOS in a pretty clever way. The app itself is a little obtuse, but having the temperature right there has made it worthwhile to me.

[http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/eweather-hd-weather- forecast/...](http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/eweather-hd-weather- forecast/id401533966?mt=8)

<comment><USER4> I've just realized how impossible it would be for me to live without widgets on the home screen. I've been taking them for granted it seems.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think the value here isn't really displaying weather. I believe the author effectively demonstrates an interesting technique that non-native apps can utilize to make them feel more native.

As far as awesome and simple non-native weather apps go, check out: <http://pattern.dk/sun/>

</comment><comment><USER6> Really beautiful.

Suggestion: Add city name. I know you don't want to clutter the interface, thus the name _minimalist_ weather, but it makes me nervous to look at a screen and _hope_ it has determined my location accurately. It makes me skeptical about the results too, as I didn't get any notifications on OS X Lion saying "minimalistweather.com wants to use your location". Also it displayed a gorgeous "25 degrees", while OS X's weather widget says "29 degrees"...

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for you feedback. I'll add that feature along with other ones. Show and correct city and change from C to F.

<comment><USER6> Thanks. But make ˚C -> ˚F an option! Many of us don't have the faintest idea what 100˚F is (I must multiply it with 5, divide it by 9 and subtract 32 or 23 from it... too much work)!

(as a side note: for the benefit of others, ˚ is typed with option-k. I had to try a million different combination until I found it).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Weather Live has been doing this for quite some time; I wouldn't call this "so special".

It's not an enviable feature. Right now I am in San Jose and I can see what the temperature was in Boston last time I launched the app.

<comment><USER8> They took a simple feature and hacked it to its limits, I'd say that's pretty cool.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Cute hack, remindining me of "Defender of the Favicon": <http://www.p01.org/releases/DEFENDER_of_the_favicon/>

Which is a JS version of Defender that displays wherever your browser displays the sites favorite icon.

</comment><comment><USER10> Very nice as a hack. I am not sure about the usability of it, and a lot of the comments already capture that. If you really wanted to hack this, how about the following: 1\. You package it as an app (not that hard to do, from where you'll be starting) 2\. You let people set parameters for how often they want to be notified, for which city and in which scale 3\. You use the push notification feature to push them the notifications as per their settings.

But all that's just trying to create the better weather app/notifier. And there's tons of ways to do that.

What you've done is really cool with the icon becoming the widget, and for that, it is a great idea. Makes me think what else you could be using this hack for - not just weather. Imagine sponsorship space - share icon space with main advertiser for a content app. Or display your high score in a game. Or show the last badge you earned in a gamified app....the possibilities are endless. Very cool hack!

</comment><comment> at-fates-hands the live tiles on my windows 7 phone does this actually for several apps (shows up to date info), including my weather app.

</comment><comment><USER11> Is there a weather app that shows me the weather right now relative to the weather at the same time _yesterday_?

I don't know about you guys but I always evaluate weather in relative terms("it's cooler than yesterday morning") and yet most apps just throw the temperature at you...which could be wildly deceiving depending on wind etc.

<comment><USER12> It's not an app (or at least, it isn't a standalone feature of an app), but if you search on wolfram alpha, it usually provides a handy graph for the past. I'm always wondering the same thing as well.

eg <http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=weather+san+francisco>

and hit "more" when the "Weather history & forecast" section shows up. I don't know how permanent this URL is, but here's the result I get from that:

[http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/pod.jsp?id=MSP32441a2b0ia1...](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/pod.jsp?id=MSP32441a2b0ia1c88ff8d5000047d3gfiiag46gh6c&s=8&button=1)

I would love to see a better interface on that data as a standalone app.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Pretty clever to generate the image for the app icon.

I did a similar thing where I converted a screenshot of a bus schedule to a data URI and saved it to my homescreen. I did it so I could check the bus schedule in places without service.

</comment><comment><USER14> If you're using Chrome, the Currently extension is a must:

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ojhmphdkpgbibohbnp...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ojhmphdkpgbibohbnpbfiefkgieacjmh?hl=en)

When you open a new tab, it'll show you current time and weather forecast:

[http://f.cl.ly/items/1X373t2P143f0j1I3a3R/Screen%20Shot%2020...](http://f.cl.ly/items/1X373t2P143f0j1I3a3R/Screen%20Shot%202012-07-25%20at%201.14.51%20PM.png)

Nice typography, choose from 3 color schemes and whatnot.

<comment><USER15> I prefer More Interestingness* - I have a clock on my machine already, and I rarely need to know the weather every time I load a new tab.

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ngddmdmkjnnefgggjn...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ngddmdmkjnnefgggjnnnepijkcighifa)

<comment><USER16> That link goes to Currently still. Here's More Interestingness: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ngddmdmkjnnefgggjn...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ngddmdmkjnnefgggjnnnepijkcighifa)

<comment><USER15> Oops - thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I don't get it. My Android has a widget on my homepage that shows me the current weather for my location, updated live. Is that all this is doing?

<comment><USER18> If you look at the screenshot of the home screen, you'll notice that this is not an Android device and thus has no Android widgets. So, no, that's not "all this is doing".

<comment><USER19> "But my Android can do it, why can't the iPhone, another reason why Apple sucks!" :rollseyes

<comment><USER17> Well, I did mean it as an actual question. I didn't know Apple didn't have widgets (or something similar)

<comment><USER18> If iOS had widgets, don't you think that people wouldn't resort to the half- working hack described in the linked article?

<comment><USER17> Hence my confusion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Very cool that you got this to work in iOS, but you know what else is special? Android widgets.

</comment><comment><USER21> I never understood the point of a service that tells you the weather where you are.

<comment><USER22> So you know what to expect when you walk outside.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Having to open the app to update the weather rather defeats its utility.

</comment><comment><USER24> For some reason I'm really bothered by the fact that it's locked to Fahrenheit if you're in the US. At least give me a query parameter or something.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's fair. I didn't figured out a way to keep a clean UI and switch unit. Will add a query param and think something for the interface. Thank you for the feedback.

<comment><USER25> On the other side of that, I'm in the U.S. but I use a VPN in Sweden so I can only see it in Celsius.

It might be cool if you could click the text, "20 ºC," to switch between the two.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Nine times out of ten I want to know the weather X hours from now, not the current weather or the weather Y hours in the past.

<comment><USER27> There is an excellent widget on Android that shows the weather for the next 24 hours which does exactly this. [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.veierland....](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.veierland.aix)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Can I specify a zip code? I went to it on my desktop and my phone, and both show different, wrong temperatures.

</comment><comment><USER28> Seems like a decent use for iPad since we still (!?) don't have the built-in iOS app.

</comment><comment><USER29> This will be great on my blackberry, all the other free weather apps out there suck.

</comment><comment><USER30> Ugh... minimal doesn't have to mean useless. In my mind you could display four times as many stats about the weather and still be a far cry from the clutter- fuck that is weather.com. As it is this is useless for anybody who wants to know anything beyond "is it hot or cold right now."

<comment><USER31> Still this is enough for some people (like me) who just want to see the current temperature. There are plenty of sites/apps that do what you said so no need to tag this one as 'useless'.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> minimalweather 2.0: I like to call it "window" :)

<comment><USER33> Hm? My window provides an experience rather close to reality, except the 'getting soaked by summer rain' part. I wouldn't call that 'minimal'. Maybe your window is broken. Does it run iOS, Android or WP7?

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> i badly want weather radar that doesn't suck

<comment><USER35> I think <http://fullscreenweather.com> is pretty good.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> It's great!

</comment><comment><USER37> Nothing.

</comment><comment><USER38> The really, really, really poor man's widget. What's the point if it's showing me stale data? If it's been so long that I can't remember the temperature, I'm going to have to launch the app anyway.

<comment><USER6> I think it's more of a neat hack, not a replacement for anything.</comment></comment>


A few points to keep in mind when reading any upcoming story about Elon Musk - <AUTHOR> http://observationalepidemiology.blogspot.com/2017/07/a-few-points-to-keep-in-mind-when.html?m=1 <comment><USER2> I believe hype is actually Musk's primary product: by constantly coming up with these announcements he plays his part in maintaining the narrative of the US being the leader in tech innovation, over and above the narrative of the US being a formerly cutting-edge economy that is in the process of falling behind. (Which one is actually true is debatable, but managing perceptions is an important part of keeping the economy running.) Someone who _merely_ organized solid electric car manufacturing or workable private space launches would probably not be as successful in attracting investment.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I've been an unabashed fan of Elon Musk ever since I read the long series of essays on him at Wait But Why blog. So I am probably not objective in evaluating him. This blog post, while not deep in research, did make me pause and think if my love for all-things-Musk has gone too far. Curious to hear what the HN community thinks.

</comment><comment><USER3> A friend of a friend of mine knows Elon extremely well. What I heard is that he is on the spectrum, and/but genuinely a genius.

<comment><USER4> I have spent the greater part of my career working with individuals with disabilities and I always suspected that he may be on the spectrum. If it is true then he is a terrific role model for people to see that not all individuals with autisim are alike.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you Powerofmene and Boothroid. I would not have guessed this about Elon. (I didn't even know the phrase "on the spectrum").</comment></comment></comment>


Python Makes Me Nervous - <AUTHOR> http://teddziuba.com/2008/12/python-makes-me-nervous.html

<comment><USER2> Not a very well researched article, mostly a rant.

First the article complains about not being able to figure out how to use a method from its signature. This ignores Python's style, which is to actually document things (and documenting is easy using docstrings). It isn't the language's fault if someone writes a function and doesn't tell you how to use it. Yes, a function accepting "kwargs" with no docstring is unnecessarily difficult. But anyone respecting Python's style would have a docstring that describes all possible keywords. I fail to see how a documented Python function could be hard to use.

And it's clear from the article that the author doesn't know how to find documentation. There's an example for open() which cites the 2-line help documentation and complains about everything it doesn't say. There are in fact several paragraphs on open() in the actual documentation (e.g. "<http://www.python.org/doc/2.5.2/lib/built-in-funcs.html>"), including information on exceptions raised, something the author thought was missing. Again, an ignorant programmer is not a fault of the language.

</comment><comment><USER3> Summary: Author doesn't like these things about python:

\- Duck Typing

\- No constructor overloading

\- Exceptions in Python aren't explicit ("checked")

Eh. You can't approach Python with a Java mindset and expect to be happy, just as you can't approach Java with a Python mindset likewise.

</comment><comment><USER4> Sounds like you aren't complaining about Python, you're complaining about coworkers who don't document their functions. Sure, Java forces you to at least declare the type of each argument, but that's a pretty lame reason to insist on static typing.</comment>


Average Is Over - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/25/opinion/friedman-average-is-over.html <comment><USER2> Ridiculous.

The solution to average people becoming less relevant in the economy (which I don't dispute, btw) can of course never be to make everyone above average as that is by definition impossible.

It's a feel good message for average folk that papers over the truth, which is that average folk that used to make a decent living doing average work will become poor. All of them, eventually. How poor exactly? Well, you could do worse than to look at Chinese factory workers for an indication of where things will end.

Of course it's more complicated than that: if the average man has become as poor as a Chinese factory worker, he will no longer be able to afford expensive gadgets and value added services, so it'll be in the interest of at least some sectors of the economy (think Apple and Google) to keep the impoverishment of the middle class down to a minimum. On the other hand there are other sectors of the economy (think McDonalds and Walmart) that will do just fine even if everyone is poor, so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

But, like I said, this article is ridiculous. Giving everyone a PhD won't solve a thing.

<comment><USER3> The solution is none. There is no "solution" because it, in itself, is not a problem. The problem is that everybody feels entitled to a top 10% salary and many would _kill_ for "their fair share" when nowadays even the lower 10% have their basic needs covered and some left for leisure.

The problem is that a society where everybody have similar incomes is somehow fairer, when there is no logical chain leading there and to top it off it causes ruination. Did cause it already just after industrial revolution, when this disparity in productivity first became natural, and does more and more now.

Having everyone highly educated would solve many things. Not salary disparity though, as it isn't a problem in the first place. The problem is having a significant chunk of the population hungry or homeless. This can perfectly be eradicated "even" with a higher disparity.

<comment><USER4> _nowadays even the lower 10% have their basic needs covered and some left for leisure_

Only really because of what's left of the welfare system, mainly Medicaid, Section 8 housing, food stamps, and the EITC; which I agree does help on the low end, but is increasingly being time-limited and rationed (e.g. Section 8 is hard to get into). The 10th-percentile household income in the U.S. is around $12,000. If that's all you had to live on, even in cheapish parts of the US it'd be quite a stretch to pay rent+food+transportation+healthcare out of that, especially for more than one person.

 _The problem is that a society where everybody have similar incomes is somehow fairer, when there is no logical chain leading there and to top it off it causes ruination._

Well, I've lived in both the U.S. and Denmark, which have very different levels of income inequality, and I wouldn't say Denmark has suffered ruination. There are pros and cons, of course. The logical chain isn't _that_ complex if a society actually wants to implement it; it doesn't require some kind of communist revolution, just high and highly progressive taxes (including on capital gains), a national healthcare system, and a strong safety net.

<comment><USER5> _The 10th-percentile household income in the U.S. is around $12,000. If that's all you had to live on..._

It's not all you have to live on. People in these income ranges tend to have _consumption_ of $18-22k.

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/special.requests/ce/standard/2009/income.txt

The missing piece of the puzzle is that a lot of people in these income ranges receive many benefits which do not qualify as income.

<comment><USER4> That's what the first part of my reply is, isn't it? EITC, Section 8 housing, food stamps, Medicaid, etc., are where the extra money comes from. Which I agree is a good thing, and what makes it at all possible to claim that the 10th-percentile income is one that's possible to live on. But I don't think those programs are very secure (they've been significantly cut, many are hard to get into now if you weren't already in, and I think more cuts are likely), so the prospects aren't great.

<comment><USER6> Umm all of those programs budgets grow year over year every year.. Some of them spiking in recent years.

Cuts from future growth rates are not cuts, they just slowed growth of a program..

You might be able to paint a picture of cuts per capita, but that is due to immigration driven population growth, not cuts to the program.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "Apple had redesigned the iPhone's screen at the last minute, forcing an assembly-line overhaul. New screens began arriving at the [Chinese] plant near midnight. A foreman immediately roused 8,000 workers inside the company's dormitories, according to the executive. Each employee was given a biscuit and a cup of tea, guided to a workstation and within half an hour started a 12-hour shift fitting glass screens into beveled frames. Within 96 hours, the plant was producing over 10,000 iPhones a day. 'The speed and flexibility is breathtaking,' the executive said. 'There's no American plant that can match that.' "

Ah yes, at midnight I'll just go walk over to my "dormitories" on my "plantation" and wake my "employees" and tell them to get to work harvesting cotton. In exchange for their 12 hour work day (and a comfy dormitory in which to live) I'll give them tea and a biscuit!

I don't understand why the "Average" American won't come work for me given these perks.

<comment><USER8> I'd like to see the author in the shoes of those workers :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This is fascinating. I think the big (and scary) meta-trend is this:

The population is increasing and the requirement for people is decreasing.

This gap is made wider by increased birth-rates and better automation. More people are being born into a world where fewer are required. That is quite a scary thought. Computers and machines automate and replace people everywhere.

I have some anecdotal evidence of this:

At my last business we used to follow-up twice via email with all of the people who had not responded to a quote that we had sent them. We had 50-100 enquiries a day so the follow-ups soon mounted up. I tried every CRM and mail- list manager out there. I could not find one that would trigger an email from my Gmail account if a contact had not responded. I was spending 3-4 hours a day doing the follow-ups. So were my staff. It got to the point where I wanted to hire someone to do it. Eventually I learnt more about the software and read up on ruby on rails. I hired a small software house to help with the backend, built the front-end myself and a month later, a machine replaced the humans and prevented a new hire. That is just one job at a tiny 5-person company. At scale, computer-based automation creates huge efficiencies. The flip-side of that are huge deficiencies in employment.

Here come the machines.

<comment><USER10> I think it's also a matter of what kind of world we want.

For example: Do you choose to use software instead of employing a person because you prefer the software, or would you prefer to hire a person but choose software because it is cheaper (which helps the company survive) and kind-of can do the same job?

If it's the first, there's a good reason to be scared. If it's the second, then market forces might eventually balance out and make hiring people an attractive choice again.

Ideally, tools such as computers will go back to being tools, "human helpers" and not "human replacements".

I do not like to think about an automated, antisocial world in which less and less humans are needed because machines have taken over. Isn't that self- defeating anyway? When did we start putting our tools above ourselves?

<comment><USER11> > Do you choose to use software instead of employing a person because you > prefer the software

I think in the long run the software will do a much better job than a person. It's inevitable in my opinion. We are not even a century into computing and look what we already have achieved.

> I do not like to think about an automated, antisocial world

That is because you define your world as the action of going to work in order to receive food and shelter. This does not necessarily have to be your world. I say we should leave this world to machines while everybody can go on to do what he is really passionate about.

Of course we need a different distribution mechanism of goods created by the machines. But that's a different question.

<comment><USER12> Some people are in fact doing jobs they're passionate about.

What you should really worry about is a world in which a person can't do anything except consume entertainment and goods, because everything else is handled better by machines....

<comment><USER13> And what exactly is wrong with that? You've gotten 'consume entertainment and goods' confused with 'do absolutely anything they want'. Maybe that's making movies, or writing, or painting, or travelling, or maybe spending their time getting to know interesting people. And even if this person really prefers sitting at home watching TV (even though they haven't spent their energy at some demeaning, labour-intensive job), well, who are you to say that's a problem? Let people decide for themselves what they want to do. Increasing their free time and decreasing scarcity can only give people more options.

<comment><USER12> No, I don't have it confused.

Some people really like producing something someone else can use. Especially if people then actually use it. There are quite a lot of people like that, actually. And such people would be absolutely screwed in the world you describe.

What's the point of making movies no one will watch? Is it worth writing if no one will read it? Painting if no one wants to see them? For some people, yes. For many, no.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It was only a few centuries ago that we paid this exclusive, elite upper class in society called scribes to write and transcribe things for us, because we weren't literate enough to do it ourselves. The parallels are pretty surprising today: we're paying an exclusive, elite class called programmers to write in the languages understood by computers. Software is eating the world, jobs are being displaced, and the demand for technical talent is as high as its ever been.

<comment><USER15> Is programming that elite though? wages seemed to have hardly changed in the U.K. in the last 10 years (accounting for inflation). Also programming pays a similar amount to other jobs requiring a degree and is certainly a lot less than jobs like accountancy, finance, law and medical doctors.

For example, average programmer salary in 2004 was about £31k and in £38k <http://www.itjobswatch.co.uk/jobs/uk/programmer.do> and if you calculate £31k in today's money you get £38,440 [[http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-1633409/His...](http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-1633409/Historic- inflation-calculator-value-money-changed-1900.html)]

<comment><USER16> I don't know about the UK but in the US accounting, law, and medicine require appropriate licensing keeping supply low and wages high(er). But I dont think programming will ever reach the prestige of law/medicine since in the former you are engineering machines whereas in the latter you are engineering the human body and society, which will always be way sexier.

<comment><USER15> I'm just talking about supply and demand which should have kicked in if there is a shortage. Perhaps shouldn't have mentioned Doctors thing, which a different issue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The author's sudden and poorly supported conclusion doesn't really fit. Because people with bachelor's degrees have the least unemployment, it is imperative we pass a GI Bill to ensure everyone gets a bachelor's degree?!

He's getting the causality wrong. It's not because they have bachelor's degrees that they're getting jobs. They're getting jobs because they're (minimally) bright and (minimally) ambitious.

Printing 100 million bachelor's diplomas "solves" the unemployment problem in much the same way that printing 100 trillion dollars solves our financial problems: not at all.

<comment><USER18> Although your argument is perfectly valid, one should not underestimate the value of the Bachelor's degree as just a piece of paper. I'm not trying to be facetious but a lot of employers filter, and sometimes hire, applicants based on their education level. In these cases, some employers assume these people have the skills. The important point here is that skills can be acquired in post-secondary education or on your own. However if done on your own, you face a hurdle of not having the college degree.

<comment><USER6> if 95% of the population have a BS/BA, then it no longer serves as a filter... Business will find a new filter.

Also if 95% have a BS/BA, then you no longer have negotiating power for your higher wages...

Giving everyone 4 more years of education will certainly benefit society, but it doesn't solve the inequality problem.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I've been thinking about this a lot lately.

I think he's right about many things there: manufacturing jobs are leaving and not coming back. Automation is becoming more and more advanced, particularly if you factor advances in robotics and ml since 2006 or so.

Things move faster and average just doesn't seem to cut it when you can manufacture excellence. Hell, lawyers and doctors will be next, how about faux ai that can write simple web apps or come up with good designs? Give generative models a few more years to advance, we'll see how far fetched that is. Some people will get very rich from all that. But that wealth will go to those who control what amounts to the means of production and they'll be able to defend those means with patents. I guess workers could strike back in the day, good luck with that now, the little guy has even less negotiating power.

All this to say, I think these trends and the shift they bring are going to be the most fundamental shift in economic organization since the industrial revolution. Not sure what the answer is, but I'm concerned that those in power dont even recognize the issues (they're not "nerds", as they say.) Time will tell, but I'm not all that optimistic about the average joes out there.

PS I wish the answer was everyone will start their own business, but honestly I just don't think that will be practical.

<comment><USER20> >how about faux ai that can write simple web apps or come up with good designs?

A major class of workers that software has a tendency of replacing is programmers themselves. Bespoke solutions are replaced by what used to be called shrink-wrapped applications. In the web area, look at how services such as Squarespace replace bespoke sites by providing easy to use site design tools.

<comment><USER21> I am that guy, the average programmer. I used to wire up mobile apps to back end services. I have had no interest in my services for over a year. I think I have been replaced by iCloud, urban airship, parse, etc...

<comment> UK-Al05 Depends what you mean by average. If you've been programming in objective-c; that most likely means you understand memory management; small-talk style oo etc. Corporate Java programmers have forgot this stuff, yet they will always be in demand.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I think he meant "ordinary" not "average". Average has a specific meaning and as many have pointed out, you can't make everyone above average.

What we've got to figure out is how to keep the large mass of ordinaries from being made into Eloi by a combination of welfare states, machine productivity, and wealth disparity.

Or, failing that, find a way to prevent the Morlocks from eating the Eloi when it suits them.

<comment><USER23> _you can't make everyone above average_

Yes, you can, because there's an infinity of dimensions and each person only has to be above average on one of them.

I'm really surprised how many people here aren't getting this.

<comment><USER24> Infinity of dimensions, sure. But we're only talking about one of them: __number of dollars of economic value you can create __.

Whether you're an above-average Scrabble player is irrelevant to a discussion about work and wages. Unless there's something of economic value that you can do better and more cheaply than a robot, there is no reason for anyone to pay you.

<comment><USER25> I think a better way to describe it would be to say that in order to make sure you earn an average salary, you have to be above average at something, and more so than in the previous century.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Folks are harping on the meaning of "average," but it's clear to me that in the article, "average" here is a euphemism for "unskilled."

When you've been working as an semi-skilled laborer in a textile mill for 20 years, and suddenly your job is made redundant in favor of automation- your mill training becomes worthless. You don't need to become "above average," you just need to learn a different semi-skilled trade. Like pushing around excel spreadsheets.

</comment><comment><USER27> This article reminds me of Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Player_Piano>

It's a pretty good read. It has an interesting take on a future where machines do the majority of the work. With the way things are headed, I'd say a society like the one described in Player Piano might not be to far off. I'm still undecided whether that's a good thing or not.

</comment><comment><USER28> One question I've had for...a while now.

If

      a) corporate profits are up

      b) hiring isn't happening, or is seeing a skills mismatch

then where exactly are all these profits going? If they're going to capital goods for the company, that just moves the question on down the line. If they're going to shareholders, then what are those shareholders buying? And if it's just sitting in the bank, where is the bank lending it out?

<comment><USER5> Many of the profits were earned overseas, and are being left there. If they bring the profits home to the US, they will be taxed. Essentially, the US is levying a tax on (certain) foreign investment, specifically investment by Google Ireland in Google USA.

Additionally, most of the private sector is deleveraging and building up cash reserves to use in lieu of debt financing.

<comment><USER29> Do you have numbers or references on the deleveraging point? I know that Google, Apple and Microsoft are sitting on vast cash reserves...but is this what is happening in the economy in general? If this is the case, then this is as far as I can tell good news. Debt serves a purpose, but if it causes systemic problems like we've seen in recent years then it should be kept low.

<comment><USER30> I recommend this paper for some numbers on the US, UK and Spain, and the different sectors.

[http://www.mckinsey.com/Insights/MGI/Research/Financial_Mark...](http://www.mckinsey.com/Insights/MGI/Research/Financial_Markets/Debt_and_deleveraging_The_global_credit_bubble_Update)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> " Each employee was given a biscuit and a cup of tea, guided to a workstation and within half an hour started a 12-hour shift fitting glass screens into beveled frames. " - This is true in the actual times, since China (no matter how they want you to forget it) is living under very harsh communist regime, but that will change when chinese workers start demanding better working conditions, more time for family, better salaries, etc..as far as I know, it's China who's living in a bubble.

</comment><comment><USER32> The flip side is that all this automation makes stuff cheaper, and a better lifestyle is available for less money.

<comment><USER33> I think that _should_ be the flip side but aside from 2009-2010 (the bulk of the recession), inflation has remained constant over the last ten years. Inflation adjusted wages have continued to decline to record numbers. The jobs that are returning in the current recovery have been primarily low paying ones (clearly IT is exempt from this).

What has been going up is corporate profits. Apple's latest figures are mind boggling. A billion dollars in profit a WEEK. Someone up higher in the comments wrote that we are at peak-capitalism and headed towards Marxism/Socialism. While I doubt that's going to happen (Wall St too strong, progressive politicians too weak) I think America _needs_ to go that way.

As Elizabeth Warren said 'There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own'. I feel that corporations (they are people right) and "The 1%" need to pay as much or more of their income in taxes to repay society for their success. This money should be used to address the problems in this article. The US needs to make higher education and retraining free/affordable, make health care free, and provide better social safety nets. With these things in place, Americans will be able to start getting competitive again.

<comment><USER34> _I think that should be the flip side but aside from 2009-2010 (the bulk of the recession), inflation has remained constant over the last ten years._

While this may be true, technology has definitely become cheaper and more accessible. Eg. in my country, which is a Western economy, few people could afford computers in the 80ies, except maybe for the very low end (C64, MSX). Now many families have multiple laptops, smartphones, and maybe even a tablet.

Also, fixed Internet connections used to be expensive, pay per minute. Nowadays, for 20 Euros per month you get an internet connection without data limits and plenty of bandwidth.

Technology did become more accessible for the average family. And the impact is real: snail mail is almost killed, records stores have mostly disappeared, and next up are book stores. The price of e-mail is near-zero, iTunes music purchases are often cheaper than new physical albums (especially if you have to pay S&H fees), and Kindle ebooks are often cheaper than paper equivalents.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> So we're currently building an economy that the "average person" doesn't have the skills to participate in.

OK.

So who are we building this economy for, and why?

<comment> UK-Al05 Consumers. The economy serves the consumers.

<comment><USER30> But as Henry Ford realized, if the consumer has too low an income he or she cannot afford to conume, so your fctory will be unprifitable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Better titled

 _Average is looking less attractive than it did 10 years ago_

There will always be a place for average. However, I don't think it's going to be as attractive of a place to be as it has been. It's going to be much more costly to try and coast through life.

<comment><USER36> It's also worth noting that it's never been as affordable or easy to escape "average" as it has been today - interestingly enough, thanks to technology.

<comment><USER10> What is this "average"? Obviously, it is a statistical measure. But what does it mean in terms of people?

In those terms, "the average" is just a narrative of what the average person would be like. Which seems to be breaking down.

Sure - you can make a list of specific things that every person needs or desires, as there is a lot of commonality between people. Aside from that commonality, we do different things, which are specific to persons or groups. You cannot really speak of a mathematical average there, as those are qualitative differences not quantitative differences (and the groups also overlap...).

How do you "escape the average"? How is it to be "average"? How will you and other people escaping, affect that average? Will the average catch up with you?

I think the term is losing meaning, more than anything else, due to the specialization inherent in our technological society, and due to non- geographical clustering of people made possible by faster means of communication.

<comment><USER36> Er by "escape" I meant "opt-out."

A while ago, if you were average, there were too many barriers to not being average to let you to escape the middle and it was easy to just "be."

Now, with the internet, the barrier to escape has been lowered to a laptop + an internet connection.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I can't believe those Presto touchscreens at restaurants are $100 per month. I love gadgets and technology, but much prefer dealing with a server and think most people do. My kids like the games and nag incessantly to play the "pay" ones, but I hardly think this is the end of waitresses and waiters. (I hope)

<comment><USER38> Agreed, I think replacing waitresses with touchscreens removes an important part of the whole dining out experience.

A touchscreen waiter seems very cold and utilitarian. It reminds me of the cheap LCD displays that have replaced gas station attendants. Almost all of the gas stations that I've used recently have them, and they all have very poorly worded prompts that show no regard for the time that I spend interacting with it.

I can't help but feel that we're headed the same route with eating food:

WELCOME. PLEASE SWIPE CARD.

SELECT FOOD.

THANK YOU. DISPENSING FOOD. PRESS ENTER DESERT?

COME AGAIN. SPC. 2 MEAL LOBSTER FRIDAY.

That's not the experience I'm looking for when I want to go out on a friday night. I want a real person to show up at the table and all of the imperfections that comes bundled along with it.

Is that just because it's what I'm used to? Will our kids grow up in a world without waiters and not even care?

<comment><USER39> If people really wanted gas station attendants, they would go to gas stations that had them instead of LCD displays, and you would see more of them. In reality, you can hardly find a gas station that has an attendant outside of states that don't let you pump your own gas, because the demand isn't there.

<comment><USER40> Same goes with the the self-checkout lanes at grocery stories.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> When a liberal talks about how somebody "should have access to" something, hang on to your wallet. Because you will pay for it.

<comment><USER42> Do people seriously consider this guy a liberal? He spent most of the 2000s talking about how awesome globalization is and how the free market was gonna fix everything.

<comment><USER39> "Liberal" is a relative term. If you like Noam Chomsky, Friedman probably looks pretty conservative, but if you like Ludwig von Mises, yeah, he's a liberal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Great article. This illustrates a fundamental mistake that many believe which is that just because they have a college degree they deserve a certain job, income or lifestyle.

<comment><USER44> Yeah I completely agree with this. There is an attitude just like this in England at the moment. There aren't enough graduates using their initiative and being creative in either finding jobs or making work for themselves to fight the declining level of jobs. The assumption is, leave school, go to University, get a job. Unfortunately for them that route is failing now.

<comment><USER45> In the past, when less people were attending university, this would be true as in getting a degree you were putting yourself into a fairly exclusive group. Now though, when so many are getting degrees, you need to go above and beyond them to put yourself in a group as exclusive as the degree would give you a generation ago.

<comment><USER44> Yeah i think you're spot on, it's that ability to shine out from the crowd that is required. Although i guess the exclusivity of being a graduate could easily return with recent hike up in fees within the last couple of years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> did you mean to link to the comment field in particular, or the entire article?

in any case, it reminded me of

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_guarantee>

<comment><USER4> I tend to agree with that solution, though I think there are more and less sustainable vs. conflict-inducing ways of structuring it. The simplest way is just to pay out cash collected from taxes, but that's always subject to conflict around "my tax money going to support lazy bums" type stuff, and easy to cut (or fiddle with in various ways to meet other budgetary goals).

More sustainable basic incomes tend to be structured as royalties imo, like Alaska's oil fund. One possibility would be to look at what might happen in a future where agriculture is mainly mechanized, so in effect food is being grown by robots. Initially what that'll mean is whoever got in place first will profit from them; whoever had the land and the capital to invest in the robots will then own the results of their production, even in a hypothetical future where they run 100% on autopilot henceforth. So it's a sort of strong- dependence-on-initial-conditions type situation, where who gets the results of the robots' labor depends basically on who was on top in the last pre-robot generation (granted, it may not be a purely black-and-white pre-robot/robot transition). I think in that case we'd have to eventually (somehow) transition towards a bunch of arable land + robots being held in trust for the population as a whole, splitting up the proceeds, or at least a portion of them, like the Alaska oil fund.

Lots of details and questions around exactly how the numbers work out, but at a high level I like a solution of not intruding much into the "normal" part of the economy, like humans doing things for other humans, but operating some basic minerals/land/agriculture in some sort of trust arrangement, with proceeds distributed to everyone, as their share of the proceeds of the earth+robots (as opposed to the proceeds of other humans' labor).

<comment><USER47> Georgism is interesting: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism>

My issue with that is that it would drive us to extract the maximum value from the land, which could worsen the environment even more. I would like to hear more about what people think about this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> More bachelor's degrees won't increase the number of exceptional people, it will just mean more average people with bachelor's degrees. A side effect of this will be that the number of jobs for average people with bachelor's degrees will increase. Some of the most stable and best paying jobs are in education, law enforcement, state and local government, school and health care administration and so forth. Basically anything that is full or partially funded by tax dollars.

In many places there is already an attitude of why would you be so dumb to subject yourself to the logan's run of working in private enterprise when you can get an easy job with a pension by simply working directly or indirectly for the state.

</comment><comment><USER49> What's usually missed is the value of being a skilled tradesman.

Who fixes your robot?

Who builds your house?

Not everyone is cut out for college, actually, most people aren't.

<comment><USER50> > who fixes your robot?

Who fixes humans? Robots will do this eventually.

> Who builds your house?

Robots here too.

Just because they can't do it today doesn't mean you shouldn't plan on them being able to do it.

<comment><USER51> The question is, will a robot that is autonomous enough and sophisticated enough to build a house be cheaper to operate than a human worker? As complexity of machines increases, the number of ways they can break down increases exponentially. Humans bodies are self-repairing for the most part except in cases of severe traumatic injury and disease.

<comment><USER39> The complexity of a robot is mostly in the software. Input (cameras and microphones) and output (robotic arms, etc) have been around for decades, but robots have not been able to interpret a picture of the world effectively. That's a software problem.

The thing about software is that you write it once and then it's free to copy. The first general-purpose robot workers will probably run expensive proprietary software, but 10 years later there will be usable open source versions. The physical robot itself will become cheaper, if anything, due to economies of scale.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> I always wondered, is it actually possible for us to ever assume that we can achieve better unemployment rates or is there a practical minimum which we can never get below again.

If you think about it, in a world without technology, the money we spend has to go to someone in the economy. However, since we know have artificial workforce in play, we effectively pay less, which means that we in consequence pay out less than we receive. So eitheir we all get paid less (yay communism), or some people just naturally have to be unemployed (yay income inequality).

</comment><comment><USER53> There is no "solution" per se.

As I see it it's like this.

Most people are paid with how much labor they provide. $X amount of hours worked equals $Y amount of money. Call these people Group A. Some are paid using a different scale in line with the value of their creations. E.g. inventing a better battery, opening a well positioned McDonalds, etc. Call these people Group B.

Technology is reducing the amount of hours of labor from Group A the world actually can use. Similarly most of Group A won't be able to create something that actually adds value to the economy and transition into Group B.

So what are we going to do with all these people from Group A that are not adding "value" to the economy? The only reasonable solution is to subsidize these people in a way we deem socially acceptable.

Social Darwinism isn't acceptable, so the trick is finding a way to do this without causing side effects and hopefully that adds benefit to society. Note these people won't generate benefit to the economy in any meaningful way.

</comment><comment><USER54> One point of the article that rankled me was his concept of a G.I. Bill so that everyone had access to higher education. That seems very misguided in my opinion. Instead of focusing on "higher education" should we not attempt to remake our primary education system such that we provide people with more relevant knowledge and skills?

</comment><comment><USER55> > Therefore, everyone needs to find their extra

This is Tom Friedman's socioeconomic policy in a nutshell: America as Lake Wobegon.

Heaven help us.

</comment><comment><USER56> Tom Friedman's Lake Woebegone bias is showing. Again.

</comment><comment><USER57> A more optimistic counterpoint:

[http://drezner.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/01/22/prediction...](http://drezner.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/01/22/predictions_about_the_death_of_american_hegemony_may_have_been_greatly_exaggerated)

<comment><USER58> I think the numbers from Harvard B-school grads isn't really that shocking or terrifying. Of course the US is losing ground to the BRIC countries. They were bound to make progress eventually. Also, the 21% that felt America is "falling behind" probably didn't mean to suggest that the country is finished. They're reacting to events of the past year, such as the demotion of our credit rating, which, as that particular snippet states, reflect a negative trend worthy of greater public attention. Nice article overall though, especially the point about the country successfully deleveraging.

</comment></comment><comment><USER59> Siri has changed the discussion about voice recognition and semantic search. Hard to imagine what will happen to all the call-centers in India if the use of this technology becomes more widespread. How many years are we away from this?

<comment><USER6> Speech recognition has been displacing Indian call centers for 10+ years. Tellme Networks and Nuance have been leading this space... Siri has done nothing in the call center sector.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> The majority of comments seem to praise the programming/IT community or question the state of our government/economic system but I have a different question.

What future skill set should people be retooling to have? What can our economy use more of?

<comment><USER61> Taking care of children/elders/family/friends/neighbors.

With everything else automated, people will still be in need for social interaction with real humans.

Currently the issue is that there's no simple economic value to put on these tasks. Given their importance, I'd claim the bug lies in the economic model, not in social interactions.

This all assumes that automation is put to its full potential: What will society look like when harvesting energy, food generation and processing, transportation and home building ("basic needs") were fully automated and available for more-or-less free? (home building is the odd one out in this list, as the others are for nearly instant consumtion, while most people live under the same roof for a while)

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> Same exact article written by Business Insider:

[http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-01-19/strategy/3064...](http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-01-19/strategy/30642154_1_recession- millennials-change)

</comment><comment><USER63> Better education isn't going to solve the problem of technological unemployment.

We actually need a completely different structure.

<http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-nation.htm>

</comment><comment><USER64> His arguments, and many here, are moot because of the political ramifications of disenfranching such a huge number of voters. The average worker, by definition, commands by far the biggest voting block.

When their minds are concentrated on this one problem, irrespective of their normal voting choice, they will vote for whoever offers them a way out.

It will end in tears as almost all wall-papering does, but not for a decade or two.

FWIW, I think this is the beginning of the China-induced global economic realignment. But we won't begin to see the real ramifications for a couple of decades because of the above.

</comment><comment><USER65> Go listen to Davidson's interview with a factory worker over the increasing amount of automation and required technical knowledge that will eventually shove her out of a job if she doesn't acquire the skills to keep up:

[http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012/01/13/145039131/the- tran...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012/01/13/145039131/the- transformation-of-american-factory-jobs-in-one-company)

It's sobering. It makes me eternally grateful I have skills, well at least _some_ skills, that won't be replaced by a robot and CNC mill overnight.

</comment><comment><USER66> I think that we're taking the concept of "average" too literally. Picture two lines: average worker competency and need/requirement for the company to be competitive. The author states that historically those two lines have been so close as to be equivalent in management's eyes. Now the second line has moved up.

So according to this definition, the average line is no longer acceptable. As a result we need to move it up to realign with the need line.

Under this definition the author is not as problematic as before.

<comment><USER6> I like how you explained it much clearer than the professional author did...

I think NY Times needs to realign their columnists talent level...

</comment></comment><comment><USER67> Interesting. In addition to post-high school education access, it's important that we also re-think our education system by creating environments that inculcates learning around our individual passion/talent. Above average performers are known to love their craft, and in a hyper-competitive economy that requires one to learn, unlearn and relearn, passion would matter a whole lot.

</comment><comment><USER68> On the contrary, I feel average is the new _skill_. There are many a time where you need just average skilled workers. High skilled workers may find such tasks mundane while for average skilled workers the same mundane tasks may be challenging. IMHO, I would love to have a good mix of high skilled and average skilled workers.

</comment><comment><USER69> As a corollary, nobody average is busy.

</comment><comment><USER70> Post high school education is overrated. In fact the American school system won't really prepare you to face the reality.

Yes it seems like the need for these "average" jobs are decreasing but in the end it will all balance itself out and there will be new areas that would need to be filled.

<comment><USER71> What's overrated is the "pick a degree, any degree, you get to call yourself 'educated' in four years!" mantra. The difference between the US and (what I hear of (so probably stereotypical)) Germany is that in the US you're told from a very young age to go to college to "get an education". In Germany you're told to go to college to "become a competent engineer".

I really disagree with you that it will balance out, that everything will be alright, and that the 40-hour work week will keep on going. I'll defer to the other comments on this page for reasons why.

<comment><USER70> I believe new opportunities will open up. Change will come. There are plenty of needs that will surface somewhere and it's up to the "average" to adapt to fill those needs.

Those that don't adapt or resist the change will be the ones that suffer the most. This is a pattern with many things in life.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER72> This seems strangely familiar: [http://www.businessinsider.com/if-youre-an- average-worker-in...](http://www.businessinsider.com/if-youre-an-average- worker-in-this-forever-recession-youre-going-straight-to-the- bottom-2012-1#ixzz1k0tZFvyn)

</comment><comment><USER73> Maybe added economic value is the wrong way for society to decide the quality of someone's life?

</comment><comment><USER74> In the future, people will need more than a degree. They will need a few. That's what our children will have to deal with. There's nothing ridiculous about this. More and more and people are getting access to education.

</comment><comment><USER25> I have been thinking about solutions to this, to get a feeling for how things will work out in the future by itself. Technology allows us to replace manual labour with machines, but it also can create jobs for other things we have been struggling to automate since it's naturally resistant to being industrialised. These are human things, which tends to be the service economy.

To work on real examples: There are tasks around the house that I don't enjoy doing or don't do reliably. Things like laundry, taking the rubbish out, cleaning, paying the bills, going shopping for food or new underwear. I wouldn't mind laundry people coming into my house once a week to pick the laundry up, doing it somewhere else, and bringing it back. I also wouldn't mind if someone would fold and pack my laundry for me nicely. Also, if my underwear or socks get old, drop me an e-mail allowing me to replace it with a provider of my choice. A cleaner is also very handy. It would be nice if someone would note when my handwash soap or toilet paper is running low, and order it for me. It would be nice if the delivery and placing of those things in the correct place was done for me.

Now all of these things I mention can already be done right now by employing serving staff, but this has a few issues. The main is cost, second to that is trust and personal space, and third to that it's perceived as a demeaning job.

Technology allows us to solve a lot of these things. From making sure that the right people can enter the property at the right time, e.g. when you are out, and that they do only what they are supposed to do (e.g. track their time, and movement around the house). It can also give anyone easy instructions on what to do when they enter the house (e.g. a mobile device with a checklist to check on things that need replacement, and even to guide them around the house to where these things are, and knowing what stuff has been delivered and needs unpacking) Other things can be -done better off site with modern industrial methods, e.g. your laundry. Also when replacement shopping has been ordered, it can be brought into your home along with the laundry, instead of you having to wait for a delivery. I can see this stuff potentially becoming a lot cheaper while creating a lot of low skilled jobs, perhaps jobs people can do while studying other things. In the long run a lot of these things will probably also be automated, making these jobs go away again. That in itself is a good thing, since all of us want these jobs to go away. Then humans will just be left to making choices about what they want to consume, or be creative if they want to be creative. We won't be happy but that's a different issue.

</comment><comment><USER75> He mentions most of the points in article in this video - <http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/Friedman>

</comment><comment><USER76> Or more accurately, the average has changed.

</comment><comment><USER77> I believe that the solutions will be found in a change in our value system. Things that we really appreciate, things that are uniquely human, will be valued more. See thisismadebyhand.com Obviously solving big problems and being "not average" will be important, but I believe that many people will be able to find niches doing things that add value to life in ways that a machine can't.

</comment><comment><USER78> I find Thomas Friedman, as a columnist, to be decidedly below average. Why does he still have a job?

</comment><comment><USER79> I suppose the original author is worried about U.S. average falling with respect to world average.

<comment><USER80> That's only the globalization. The other thing affecting the (now global) average is automation, which is faster than before.

</comment></comment><comment><USER81> I feel like I was just rick rolled.

 _Please prefix the pundit's name to these links._

As for this particular pundit, he lost me at "invade Iraq". After claiming the earth is flat, you'd think people would have learned to ignore this asshat.

</comment><comment><USER82> This is pretty obvious stuff.

</comment><comment><USER73> tl;dr

america in decline. getting a job hard? try school.

</comment><comment><USER83> Welcome to Peak Capitalism. This is the peak of our current socio-economic system, and I'm fairly certain that everyone in the White House is now well- aware and convinced of what's likely going to happen over the course of the next 10 years. I hope they're preparing for it right now.

I believe the coming collapse of the capitalistic-democractic system is imminent, and America needs to very seriously start planning for a conversion to Socialism/Marxism because the current system is not going to work for very long.

<comment><USER20> Because that worked out so well for Russia and China. Command economies have never efficiently allocated resources, and they never will. Economies are just too complicated for a single central authority to control successfully. They can never have enough accurate information, and can't be flexible enough to rapidly changing circumstances.

Just look at the hopeless response to the financial crisis from European leaders. You really want to put politicians in charge of all business activity as well?

<comment><USER39> If the alternative does turn out to be unemployment on a massive scale due to automation, the Soviet Union doesn't look so bad in comparison. It's probably not optimal, but at least we know that it works (badly, no doubt, but life went on under the Soviets). I seriously doubt Friedman's idea of sending everyone to college would work at all.

<comment><USER6> The Soviet Union killed 100m of its own citizens. Now what doesn't look so bad?

<comment><USER39> That's a grossly exaggerated figure, and if you skip the Lenin/Stalin era and go straight to Khruschev it's not nearly as bad. And if, by hypothesis, the "average" person become redundant and unemployable, they would simply starve to death in lieu of government intervention, which would lead to a death toll that would make the Dekulakization look like a traffic ticket.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER84> Yet he still has a job at NYTimes.</comment>


Netflix: Almost THRICE as big as it was last year - <AUTHOR> https://news.alphastreet.com/netflix-almost-thrice-as-big-as-it-was-last-year/ <comment><USER2> So, what does this mean for a viewer?</comment>


Top Prospect Connects with LinkedIn to Turn Your Talented Friends into Cash - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/15/top-prospect-connects-with-linkedin-to-turn-your-talented-friends-into-cash/ <comment><USER2> People have tried this before, but not as a tech solution and not built on Facebook and LinkedIn.

</comment><comment><USER3> I interviewed with the team in early January. Smart group. Hope they do well.

</comment><comment><USER4> I smell a David to LinkedIn's Goliath.</comment>