To hire neurodiverse workers, one firm got rid of job interviews - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20191018-where-75-of-workers-are-on-the-autistic-spectrum <comment><USER2> As an Aspie/ADD, I have never passed any formal interview, even for an intern position (sic!). (You can compare and contrast it with my GitHub/Resume/blog to make a judgment.)

Fortunately, many times (even for mid-size companies or research institutes) the hiring was less formal. For small startups, where it is informal, I didn't feel at a disadvantage. For big, I don't believe I can pass through the first filter.

It seems that there are so many hidden assumptions people take on: what should be on Resume, how should one present oneself, where it is fine (or de facto expected) to exaggerate one's accomplishments or hide one's weaknesses. And that an irrational feeling of being weird is often an instant no-hire. Moreover, many symptoms od ADD are taken for laziness, sloppiness, or lack of motivation. Many symptoms of Aspie are taken for rudeness, ill intentions or trying to dominate (breaking a social rule => (s)he thinks (s)he is above it).

(I've heard it so many times about people interviewing others, as "(s)he is smart, passed all test, but weird, I don't like to work with her/him". At this point, it is systemic discrimination. I the same places, remarks about one's ethnicity or gender wouldn't pass (rightfully!). Sadly, other areas of discrimination like age or class are given a pass.)

At the same time, I know a lot of people good at "big talks", and making a good impression, who got hired almost everywhere. Also, they make it easy to persuade the right people to give them recommendation letters, even if their collaboration was minimal.

<comment> core-questions > I've heard it so many times about people interviewing others, as "(s)he is > smart, passed all test, but weird, I don't like to work with her/him". At > this point, it is systemic discrimination.

No, that's a misnomer. Systematic discrimination implies the system itself codifies this behaviour - but instead, what is codified is _team fit_, which is often based heavily on intuition. Humans are capable of being good judges of interpersonal compatibility, and the best interviewers employ an appropriate amount of intuition in the process because only a limited interaction is possible and every bit of information available deserves to have some chance of being factored into the assessment.

Let's face it: for neurotypical people, a lot of autists are very hard to get along with. Their behaviour is not always predictable in the way that we need behaviour to be in a workplace; and when more pronounced, their specific needs are not something that we want to have to address in our coworkers.

It's good that small companies are often able to accomodate folks like yourself, but expecting big companies that more often than not are looking for cookiecutter, commodity employees that will fit the HR process lifecycle. If you need more input and aren't demonstrably going to produce more output than the average worker, from their perspective you're not the best choice to hire, period.

Of course, I'm sure you'll find plenty of people who vehemently disagree with me, claim that it is in fact systemic discrimination to want something like "team cohesion", and will make you a protected class soon enough.

<comment><USER3> > Let's face it: for neurotypical people, a lot of autists are very hard to > get along with. Their behaviour is not always predictable in the way that we > need behaviour to be in a workplace; and when more pronounced, their > specific needs are not something that we want to have to address in our > coworkers.

Or try it like this and see how it feels:

"Let's face it: for white people, a lot of black people are very hard to get along with ..."

<comment> core-questions Hey, if you want to make it a racial thing, that's your problem. I find people "go to the well" for this sort of argument when they can't actually argue with the real premise.

<comment><USER3> You mistake my intent.

I'm not trying to "go to the wall" because I want to win an argument with you.

What I'm trying to do is use an example of another kind of discriminatory behaviour which is socially unacceptable to demonstrate to you that many people will find your words to be obnoxious and judge you harshly for them.

But hey, if you don't care about that kind of thing then it's not your problem I guess.

<comment><USER4> GP pointed out a real, existing problem, and trying to deny it by pattern- matching into a racial problem isn't helping either of them.

> _that many people will find your words to be obnoxious and judge you harshly > for them._

That probably speaks more about those people than about GP.

Having worked and being friends with people who most definitely fall into the spectrum (didn't get confirmed diagnosis, though), it does present very unique challenges in terms of teamwork and workplace organization, challenges that gender or ethnic differences don't bring in. It takes special company architecture and open-minded people to make it work; your typical 9 to 5, crank out code and kill tickets off Jira software company won't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > Terms like these – or interview questions such as 'where you see yourself in > five years' – can be too general for people with autism, as many with the > condition can find vague questions particularly hard to decipher.

Pretty sure it's not just autistic folks who have to have prepped & memorized some bullshit in advance to have any kind of "acceptable" answer to those sorts of questions. Not to take away from the broader point of the article nor what this company's doing.

"Tell me about a time you've dealt with a douchebag at work" is one that always gets me. I just have to make something up for it. 15 years of working and I'm... pretty sure I haven't. I mean, not really. Not a good answer though, so here's some fiction I invented & memorized for you. Hope you like it.

<comment><USER6> Never in my entire career have I been asked the 'where do you see yourself in 5 years' question. It doesn't even make sense in the tech world. In five years? There's a good chance your company/business unit won't exist and I'll be 1-2 jobs on from this one mate. Don't worry about it.

It sounds like a hollywood movie cliche you'd hear at an interview scene. I'd laugh if I got that question in an actual interview.

I'm sure it made sense 30-50 years ago when people spent decades with the same employer, but anyone asking that question today is just indicating how out of touch they are with the real world.

<comment><USER5> I think I had that exact one once early on. I did actually get an "if you could go back in time a couple years, what advice would you give yourself?" a little while ago, which 1) threw me, because I wasn't expecting much of that formula crap from this place, and 2) I hadn't prepped for, so I just punted, being able to think of very little other than things unrelated to work but also lame, cliché, or "don't interview at that place, you'll have to answer a dumb question and then you'll feel like an asshole when you can't". I tried to deflect with a joke but it didn't work. Oh well.

I've consistently gotten the "tell me about a time you fucked up" and "tell me about a time you worked with a douchebag" ones. And simple "tell me about a time you disagreed with someone at work"-type ones. Not every interview, but often. And unless you've actually had an experience that happens to make for a good answer to those, you've basically got to make something up. Even if you _have_ fucked up tons of things and worked with a bunch of douchebags—the questions are weird because if everyone answers totally honestly some people will have way better answers, especially if they're also good story-tellers, because they've been lucky ("lucky") enough to have had an experience fitted perfectly to a good answer for those questions.

Even for the simple "time you disagreed" one, I don't exactly file away details about little disagreements in my head, so I can't form a satisfying tale from those—almost all of which were pretty boring anyway—sorry, so here's some made up bullshit again. Which will be better than most people's best _honest_ story anyway. What the fuck was the point of these, again?

[EDIT] I actually think being a smidge _less_ psychologically stable and well- adjusted might make it easier to answer some of these! Hahaha. Shouldn't have read the Stoics so much in high school, I guess.

[EDIT, responding to edit]

> I'm sure it made sense 30-50 years ago when people spent decades with the > same employer, but anyone asking that question today is just indicating how > out of touch they are with the real world.

Yeah the honest answer, based even on my _relatively stable_ employment history, would be "somewhere other than your company, with a 15-20% pay bump (by the time I leave—30% over what you're about to offer me now), probably attained leveraging something I learned here". Just following the trend line here, don't blame me :-)

<comment><USER7> I'm curious, what do you think is a "good" answer?

Because, from the interviewer standpoint, here's what such questions are about. Prepare to have your mind blown, maybe.

1\. Hiring is by far the most stressful, unpredictable, career-destroying part of a manager's job. And that's as an employee, if that's your business (founder, entrepreneur) you're scared shitless that a mistake may plain and simple ruin your business, and you along with it (not just financially, the stakes are much higher when it's your company).

So the 'soft' questions are attempts to weed out 'problems'. Get this through your head: when interviewing, experienced managers are not "selecting the best" but rather "avoiding the worst". And these questions... they're crapshots in the dark — "how the hell am I supposed to know if this person is OK/normal or a piece of work?" It's even more blurry from the interviewer's side. So they just try to get a 'feel' for it, intuitively.

Your answer? It does not really matter (specifics, context, etc). The _real_ question is: _are you 'normal'?_ Are you honest / reliable / well-adjusted / not too weird / not too aggressive / not too whatever makes life difficult for everyone (starting with you). It's really just that. (anyone who claims drawing psych profiles from interviews is basically BS'ing or a trained clinical psychologist, and don't fall for HR stuff, they're so full of their 'methods' because they know it's just super-human to judge people accurately).

2\. What are the risks of a bad hire? Well, whatever they are, you are responsible if you signed that person in. You, the manager, will face the consequences — it's your team, your doing, your mistake. HR, if it exists, is usually just there to fit some bean counter + legal requirements. They won't feel the heat. You will, daily.

People lose their job over bad hires. They fail their mission. It's a stupidly high-stake decision given what little means are at their disposal — which is why some companies begin to think about it and adopt really different processes where they onboard you progressively and judge in very real terms, real work, real collaboration, if you're a fit or not.

3\. The ugly truth of hiring is that we hire the people we like. Period. Full stop.

We hire the people we like. It's proven by countless psych studies. Whether you're aware of that or not does not make a difference — you can only select for what you think is right, and what is right is: 1. candidate can do the job and 2. _I_ (thus others) can work with candidate on a daily basis. This kind of sentiment is not about skill, history, it's about being able to share a cup of coffee without feeling awkward, being able to disagree about a technical point and still come out together as a team on the other side once a decision's been made by whoever's in charge — might be none of you in the interview room, c-execs and whatnot.

So as a candidate, the worst answers you can give are _anything that doesn 't help to ease your interviewer's fears_. Anything that doesn't tell them in so many words: "don't worry, rest assured I keep my cool, I'm reasonably balanced, I don't hit people or yell, I won't ruin your company/division/team." That's really all we can try to ask before the fact. So whatever the question —hard, soft— ask yourself: what are they afraid of? And your answer should simply solve for that. It's that simple. Convince me I'm not making a mistake by taking you in. Convince me I'm not a fool for trusting you.

If you pass in that regard, and your skills match the job, then you'll get hired — unless someone had a better human contact with the interviewer(s), in which case skills don't matter much, it's all about feeling comfortable with each other.

Remember this, a famous saying in management / entrepreneur circles: "You can always train someone (to meet whatever skill is required), but you can't change them (personality likely won't change)." Hence why "we hire a _person_ , not a profile."

Most managers would rather hire someone really nice and train them for 3 months before they're operational, rather than make a bet on a weirdo — whatever their expertise. The obnoxious genius is just about the worst choice you can make, whereas a great personality will always be an asset provided we can elevate their skill, and/or pay them less until they acquire the desired skillset.

4\. About 'honesty'. Honesty isn't sarcasm: nobody expects you to marry the company, not even the interviewer thinks that for themselves (and founders / entrepreneurs are not clueless about job hoping these days). The '5 years' question isn't about that. It's precisely screening for the "great personality but training required" cases: if we hire you, will you be willing to evolve, to learn, to get better and meet our needs, our standards of quality?

Thus anything that says: "I see myself getting better" is a good answer. Anything that says: "I don't care / I just do this to eat and pay the bills / I have no interest whatsoever in improving myself or my work" will get you rejected (unless that's what they're looking for, to exploit you until you burn out, in which case you should see yourself to the door for your own sake).

Just my 2cts, from a management / consulting standpoint.

Remember: those people on the other side of the table have much, much more at stake than you or any candidate; you may get hired or not (so you either win a job or lose nothing) while they risk losing their own job / mission and the upside if they succeed is only to continue said mission with no perturbation. It's a much more daunting proposition for them, and yet they _have_ to go through it and ultimately make a choice. If they take too long, budget might slip through their hands. It's a jungle for managers out there.

____

Bonus: Now let me tell you what's even worse to go through than a bad hire as a manager: firing someone. Some people literally fall in depression over this. Quit their job, even. It's a drag. It's really hard. You can't imagine how horrible it feels unless you've been there. Hence why you'd rather do it as little as humanly possible, and that means not screwing up the hiring process, which itself is very much imperfect...

I hope this gives you confidence that, however you want to see it, you very much have the easy part as a candidate. There are very few bad answers if you're honest _enough_ about _who you are_ (again, specifics, contexts, made- up stories, who cares as long as it tells the truth about you), which is the whole point. Know this: "courage" etymologically means "telling your truth with all your heart". It's about vulnerability. Courageous people, who know to show some vulnerability, are those we can trust because we can 'feel' them, for real, we know who they are. The "mistakes" question is partly just that: tell us you're human. Tell us you make mistakes. Tell us you learn from those. Tell us you didn't know better, not always, but you know more today than you did yesterday. Then, we can relate. We can trust you with _our_ mistakes. We can grow together. We can count on you to support us.

And I know, I know it's not like that in every company, far from it. But it should. And there are plenty of very 'normal' people like that. They may not have the words to spell it like I do here — I just read a lot so I have these words now, from much smarter / more experienced people. Now, so do you.

If you go into interviews thinking "I'll reassure them, I'll show them they can trust me, because I'm worth it, because I'm reliable, because people can count on me, because fuck I'm _likeable!_ " then I assure you: you're 50% in already. Compared to all the others who will try to hide who they are, in fear that they might not get liked, well guess what: _don 't know, don't care, won't take a chance. Next._

All the world needs is you at your best, you becoming better, growing, sharing, caring, empowering. These are the true rock stars. And make no mistake: nobody's born this way. All those who became that pretty much engineered it. It's the truth in "fake it 'till you make it", it's not actually _fake_ but rather "play the part as best you can", i.e. elevate yourself to this ideal vision of you you have in mind. Before you know it, it's not a vision anymore, it's become real, the real you. Great managers and entrepreneurs know that, they only wish you knew it too, so we can start working together tomorrow. Today. Yesterday. Where have you been all this time without us? ; )

<comment><USER5> > So the 'soft' questions are attempts to weed out 'problems'. Get this > through your head: when interviewing, experienced managers are not > "selecting the best" but rather "avoiding the worst". And these questions... > they're crapshots in the dark — "how the hell am I supposed to know if this > person is OK/normal or a piece of work?" It's even more blurry from the > interviewer's side. So they just try to get a 'feel' for it, intuitively.

Oh, I get it, I've been on the other side of the table, plenty, and in more than just a "pull in some dev to get their take" role. But you've gotta have _some_ answer to those when you're interviewing and I need some prep + a little fiction to avoid the possible red flag that comes up from simply blanking on them. My goal is to get past them such that no-one thinks about the answers again, not to wow anyone, which I know isn't what anyone's fishing for with those.

<comment><USER7> Aha... so you know. Hopefully my long piece will be useful to someone else, then.

"Red flag", that's the expression I was looking for indeed.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, sorry, didn't mean to dismiss your post with such a short response. It does give good insight into the Hiring Mind, for those who may not have been there.

<comment><USER7> It's fine, don't apologize. I didn't take it as a dismissal, and I was the one to offer _entirely unsollicited advice_. No worries, and I do appreciate your replies!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> dawg- This brings up the same core issue as all official diversity initiatives: as soon as you talk about it, you destroy it.

When you make diversity a focus and celebrate yourself for being diverse, then the spirit of diversity is ruined. It's like something out of a zen koan. A truly diverse organization would not need to put out press releases and build its brand on being diverse, nor would they need to start official initiatives to select "diverse" employees (the very concept of an individual being "diverse" betraying the absurdity of the whole enterprise).

You are left with a shell of the real thing - it's a commitment to aesthetic diversity (even of the neuro- variety), without the spirit that diversity is meant to represent. In a situation of aesthetic diversity, people are valuable because they are "diverse", rather than from simply being people. Their adjective ends up coming first (autistic, black, queer, etc.) and, at least at the level of the organization, their humanity gets left behind.

<comment><USER8> This is 1000% true. Before getting into tech, I did odd jobs for years. I worked in the restaurant industry, retail clothing, hospitals, landscaping, etc. I worked in teams where I was the only man, teams where we were all men, and teams with a somewhat even split.

Diversity was never anything more than a short HR training session, and that was it. There was no advocacy, no talk of being "allies". And everything just worked.

Even though I prefer working on diverse teams (diverse along any and every dimension), I really dislike virtually all current activism that's supposed to be about diversity. It just feels...gross.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> A young recruiter asked me how I interview people. I asked him what his favorite video game was. Super smash brothers, he said. I asked if he could ask enough questions to gauge how much of an expert someone was. He said, "of course!" Asking a lot of general questions about a number of things and encouraging them to go into detail often shows if they've been there, done that, and shared in the same blood sweat and tears. Especially when people get excited, it's great to see how they thought about things and how they'd approach the same problems knowing what they know now.

Hiring bad people in engineering can cripple your services. Adding code that's hard to understand, has poor time complexity, or is over-engineered can add more technical debt that any one feature is solving for, and reworking that code can cost way more time than it originally took to write once it's part of some production service.

<comment><USER10> > Hiring bad people in engineering can cripple your services. Adding code > that's hard to understand, has poor time complexity, or is over-engineered > can add more technical debt that any one feature is solving for, and > reworking that code can cost way more time than it originally took to write > once it's part of some production service.

So use code reviews prior to merging, and prevent that code from becoming part of that production service. If they're then unwilling to incorporate that feedback into their code, it might be time to review their contract.

Edit: Assuming people are capable of reviewing each other's code.

<comment><USER11> The last place I worked, the junior engineers reviewed the interns code. There weren't enough senior engineers to review the junior engineers code, so we ended up reviewing each other's code.

I was pretty green at the time, so we just ended up with a terrible codebase after being there for a few years.

It was already bad to begin with, but that's because it seemed like what that company does is churn through junior engineers and interns at the nearby university to get their shoddy projects done.

TLDR: If you hire too many bad or junior engineers, you're going to lose control of your project since you might not have time to review all their code.

<comment><USER12> Strong support from technology alleviates the problem.

If your linter already complains about bad indentation, your senior devs can concentrate their limited time on more substantive issues.

Of course, that scaling by technology has limits.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> > Instead of using CVs and interviews, potential employees undergo a basic > competency assessment in which they are evaluated against 25 desirable > attributes for software testers, such as the ability to learn new systems or > take on feedback. Following these initial tests, potential staff undergo a > week of working from home fully paid.

They still have an interview. It just isn't like a traditional interview. You need to pass a test and then prove your ability for a week. It's really a week-long interview.

<comment><USER14> It's not an interview if they're paying you, it's a conditional hire for a week. Calling it an interview is like calling actually starting a job after a barrage of three interviews the _fourth_ interview. At some point you're torturing the meaning of the word to pointlessness.

<comment><USER15> If the tasks you're doing that week are purely for assessment purposes and the environment is completely different from the actual work place (as it takes place remotely), I'd say it's closer to a paid interview, which isn't new, than a classic trial period. It isn't that much longer than the process of some big companies, if you add all the interviews together.

I certainly understand people who think otherwise though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It's a fine line companies walk. They want to build a cohesive company identity with aligned values and goals, but they also want diversity, which makes all of that harder. So you have these "culture fit" interviews which are really just conformity checks. "Are you going to get on people's nerves?" is really what they want to see, and the right answer varies by environment. They're asking, "Are you one of us?" No surprise people on the spectrum struggle reading that and end up being either too honest or just too awkward.

"Be yourself" is terrible advice if you want to work at a startup and you're at all out of step with their culture and worldview. As one such person I have learned to mask whatever needs masking.

<comment><USER17> Cohesive company identity with aligned values and goals is not endangered by people with Asperger or whatever on position of coder or admin. The way more bigger threat to that goal is selection of people for management and leadership level. Who gets rewarded and why.

You can talk about cohesiveness and shared values till your face is blue, but if people lie, manipulate, intentionally misinform, are antagonistic in order to throw competition down, it wont happen no matter how autists were refused.

Like, we come back to social skills of developers topic every other month. But actual cohesiveness culture depends way more on middle management which tend to attract and select people who cause way more drama and ineffectivity then people with asperger.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Any hiring process will by definition favour certain kinds of candidates at the expense of others. Having a week long paid trial is a great way for the company to be less conservative about who they try out, but will also mean they'll miss out on candidates who are already employed and unwilling to take time off or quit their job to participate in it. In the end though, if they can tap into an undervalued candidate pool though, they should come put ahead.

<comment><USER19> In this case, the week long paid trial is work from home, and I did not notice anything that said that the work had to be done during normal businesses hours. It should be possible for most people to fit that in around their current employment.

<comment><USER20> > I did not notice anything that said that the work had to be done during > normal businesses hours

It doesn't seem an unreasonable assumption.

Having them work outside of business hours (isolated, no real time communication) on an standalone project (because self-onboard on a large and complicated project isn't reasonable) wouldn't really be a representative test of if they can work in a team and on a real project. At that point you are really just paying to solve a larger coding test.

> It should be possible for most people to fit that in around their current > employment.

I highly doubt that most people would be able to fit ~40 hours of work on top of their normal work schedule. I'm single and have no particular obbligations, and I would still struggle. No way a parent of a young child or someone who has a dependant parent/relative would be able to fix that much amount of work in their schedule.

And even if someone manages to do 2 full time jobs for a week, would their output really be representative of their skills? I certainly wouldn't want to be judged on the quality/quantity of my output when working late nights after 8 hours in the office.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> i have ASD and ADD, it certainly isnt easy, while i have ability my social skills are pretty terrible and the sad truth is that is what an interview is about, regardless of what the job is the one thing basically everyone has to have is the ability to work in sales because thats basically what you have to do at an interview, sell yourself (in full knowledge that there are others applying for the same position with more experience and no issues)

which is generally not easy when you know that youre already a poor prospect due to various conditions, and then getting asked vague questions like "tell me about a time when you were valuable to your team"

i find talking about myself awkward at the best of times, getting asked to pull random events where i think i might have pleased someone etc and turn them into some mini story on the fly is never going to end well for me

thats another issue, everything is about being a "team player" etc and putting it bluntly im not and doubt i ever will be, i dont do things the way others do which means im unlikely to be a "good fit" amongst a bunch of classically trained people who stick to rigorous methods

in the places i have worked ive usually ended up as one of the "go-to" people, i make a point of being good at what i do but getting someone to actually take a chance on you is not easy

<comment><USER22> I hate this as well — especially if it seems to be only about selling. I worked to lead various film crews and I can tell, that there is no correlation between how well somebody is able to sell themselves under pressure and the wuality of their work. If there was any relationship it is negative in proportion: the worst people I ever worked with were incredibly good at selling themselves to a degree you cold describe them as conmen (and it was always men). Coincidentally it was never their fault when they clearly didn't manage to do their part.

That beeing said I still think it is good to give others a chance to get to know you. It happened multiple times to me that I found out only during a project just _how_ humble some people have been — not mentioning things that would have instantly give them a pass.

Additional caveat: communications _is_ a crucial skill to have in nearly any job and it is also a common point of failure in projects with more than one person ans any HR person worth their salary should be able to sieve out people who would hurt a project by beeing unable to communicate their ideas clearly.

I think if the process doesn't you, it wouldn't be a bad idea to tell them before coming to the interview: "I have condition XYZ and so it can happen that UVW. To allow you a truthful judgement of my work please consider looking at $PLACES"

That way a well meaning HR person has at least the chance of looking at you through with your unique context in the back of their mind.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> > Five years in, 75% of Ultranauts' staff are on the autistic spectrum – and > one reason for this is its innovative approach to hiring.

Given that autism has a significant male to female ratio (quick Googling suggested 4:1 for Male:Female for autism), this seems to indicate that their percentage of women developers is low.

<comment><USER24> 4:1 is the US average for software engineers.[1]

[1] [https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11.htm](https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11.htm)

<comment><USER12> That's less skewed than I had expected!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Am in this demo, and my interview experiences have been bewildering.

Whenever someone has actually tried to assess my skills and get me do something, so almost never, it is always fine. In an interview, I have almost no idea what is happening and it is never fine.

Yes, this isn't going to suit everyone but the point is that suits some people who were totally shut out before.

<comment><USER5> It may be infeasible for a number of reasons, but this post makes me wonder whether it'd be worth asking candidates _how they 'd like to be interviewed_, then doing that.

<comment><USER26> I'm pretty sure most of the people who have problems with where do you see yourself in 5 years, what's your biggest weakness, tell me about a time when things didn't go as planned etc. will have just as big a problem with how you'd like to be interviewed - I know for me the answer for how would you like to be interviewed is honestly I would not like to be interviewed in any way whatsoever.

<comment><USER12> You can ask that question in writing and with no expectation for an immediate response. Much less terrifying that way.

And you'd ask it like: "Here's a bunch of different options for assessing your skills, which one do you think would showcase your strengths best and fits into your schedule etc? Please take your time to think it over, a reply by next week is fine."

<comment><USER26> ok that makes more sense than how I was envisioning it in my head.

<comment><USER12> It's still difficult to get this stuff right.

As a related example: a candidate for an onsite interview at Google gets a chaperone for lunch. The lunch companion has no input into the hiring decision. (And the Google hiring process is formalised enough that they really have no input.)

Of course, candidates usually don't 100% believe that and treat lunch as a secret test of character and stay on their toes, just to be safe. That can be very stressful for some people.

(I behaved like that when I was a candidate.)

Similar for the topic at hand: you can't just declare to the candidate that you are going to treat the different forms of assessment you offer as equivalent. You actually have to think of mechanisms to convince them. Lest someone pick a more stressful one than they want for fear of discrimination.

(And there are benefits to the candidates for the interview. For example it's strictly time bounded, so you are not going to obsess and pull an all nighter, because you are afraid that the competition is pulling all nighters.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I've seen some articles[0] and firms[1] in the last years of not only valuing diversity in profiles of people but actually valuing aspies higher than neurotypical types.

I think aspergers can definitely be a super power, but I thought it strange to actually say it is a net advantage since how can it be expected across the board?

0\. [https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20160106-model- employee...](https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20160106-model-employee-are- autistic-individuals-the-best-workers-around)

1\. [https://auticon.com](https://auticon.com)

<comment><USER12> If your work environment is explicitly set up to cater to people with Aspergers, it might make them more useful to you than neurotypicals.

And that's while neurotypicals might still be better all around employees in your average company.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> At one of my early startups I shared a sizable private office with two other engineers, one other full-timer who was the lead and a contractor we were pretty sure had aspergers based on a variety of odd but relatively easy to ignore behaviors.

Everything was fine and his work was acceptable until he apparently became convinced we were talking about him behind his back and conspiring in some way against him. He started leaving an external webcam w/microphone attached to his desktop and monitoring the shared office when he wasn't around, his contract required him to provide his own computer so he didn't seem to see a barrier to attaching a camera and microphone despite his role having no need for such things - this was years before video conferencing for meetings was commonplace.

Because we were a proper scrappy startup we would work crazy hours often, but his being an hourly contractor didn't enable him to pull all-nighters with us salaried folks. So the circumstances somewhat encouraged this paranoia, but his mind went crazy with it.

His contract wasn't renewed because of this crap, it was a really annoying situation. I hated that we essentially fired someone because of dumb social issues despite their technical contributions being good.

</comment><comment><USER29> Pet peeve: there is no such thing as a "neurodiverse person". Individual people cannot be more diverse or less diverse than others. Diversity is a property of a group.

<comment><USER30> Actually it is a thing - it the now accepted term for a wide range/spectrum of conditions Dyslexia Dyspraxia, ADD Aspersers.

<comment><USER31> So perhaps a better terrm would be 'neuroatypical person'?

<comment><USER30> True but its harder to say :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> They are only hiring testers which is a big resource waste but lots of autists can create kickass software without needing to waste resources on analysis paralysis.

<comment><USER33> Some of them. Most of them, like most ordinary people, do not have the capability or the discipline for coding. Testing seems to be within the capability of more of them.

<comment><USER32> But we are talking about spectrum folks who love computers here. Sounds like management still does not trust them with core functions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Wasn't this tried like a year ago at one of FAANG companies and an AI was put in charge for automation process and it hired only male, mostly white, and got a huge backlash? I can't quite recall the details nor the specific company but I do recall the backlash from feminists, so somebody help with a link please.

<comment> e-_pusher You are probably thinking of this:

[https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/10/17958784/ai- recruiting-t...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/10/17958784/ai-recruiting- tool-bias-amazon-report)

<comment><USER34> Yup, that's it, thank you

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> This is pretty brilliant. I hadn't accounted for this, despite doing a lot of thinking in this area, but this sort of issue, where the business focuses upon forming itself around the mentality of the employee rather than the other way around, makes total sense. As we move away from repetitive physical labor to mental work (I prefer that to the term 'knowledge work' because very often the work has very little to do with actual knowledge which can be explicitly codified but instead relies upon workers mental faculties), it's obvious that we will need to change a lot of the structures and practices of business. Many of the things that businesses have focused on are derived from things that were very important in factory work. The ability to reduce your work to a checklist of verifiable, quantifiable, and (very importantly) transferrable tasks, the ability to 'sell' (not always actual sales, but extroversion, self- promotion, etc), and things like that are all very possible and beneficial when a business consists of a factory floor, a front office, a sales force, and a back room with accountants and the like. When the factory floor disappears and instead the business is tackling intellectual challenges that require different strategies for every one, problems that are poorly defined, etc... the difference is so substantial that any adequate changes will have to be similarly substantial.

It's a big change. It impacts far more than the company office. It affects what society views as valuable. It changes what society sees as success. It basically shoots off in an orthogonal direction from everything society has been structured around for the entire 20th century. I am reminded of things like the recent book 'Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking' and the documentary 'The Century of the Self.' It really is a sea change and social changes of that magnitude are messy, slow, and usually come with a good amount of strife. Substantial changes like these being tried by this company are stressful and induce anxiety most especially in anyone who has invested in or succeeded in the older model, so the psychological hurdles are high. But, substantial changes are necessary and since this is a novel situation, our best chance of finding the successful solutions are trying and evaluating substantial changes.

</comment><comment><USER36> I wonder why they just didn't get rid of normal job interview questions and let a natural conversation unfold. Surely they want to at least meet the person and get a feel for their character.

<comment><USER37> The problem is that you can't have a natural conversation with someone where there's high stakes. Job interviews are incredibly asymmetrical conversations, where one party has very low stakes (often they're choosing between several candidates who all have met earlier qualification hurdles, and only one candidate is needed to fill the position) and someone has very high stakes. There is no way to make the high stakes candidate behave as though the conversation has low stakes, and so that will always shift the conversation.

Also, people can often let biases influence them:

[http://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/09/why-job-interviews- don...](http://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/09/why-job-interviews-dont-work- according-to-a-psychologist)

<comment><USER12> As a candidate, one of the social hacks you can do is make the interviewer think the conversation is low stakes for you.

Either by bluffing well, or by genuinely making the conversation low stakes.

Some strategies of for the latter:

* start interviewing while you are still happy at your old job

* interview in batches, so you can afford to bomb some, and ideally get multiple offers you can play against each other

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> In its survey of 2,000 autistic adults, just 16% were in in full-time work, despite 77% of people who were unemployed saying they wanted to work.

crazy stats. I wonder if its true when extended.

</comment><comment><USER39> I do wonder if, as we keep progressing down the hiring to fill a company with a maximum number of equally-weighted populations by various identity characteristics, if it will some day become trendy and hip to choose your employees based on who would be most productive without regard for the effect on the identity dimension distribution.

</comment><comment><USER40> Would love to hear about their compensation and benefit packages and how they compare to industry- and NY-averages.

(Is the competitive edge of neurodiversity being properly carried through to living wages, benefits for people who aren't full time, promotion processes that support differences etc)

<comment><USER41> Reminds me of this article [1] about Goodwill stores hiring people with disabilities like blindness and paying them way less than minimum wage (22 cents, 38 cents and 41 cents an hour). I found the article very though- provoking. Yes, they are hiring many people who probably would not find work elsewhere. Yes, they are also paying them pennies.

[1] [https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2013/07/30/does- good...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2013/07/30/does-goodwill- industries-exploit-disabled-workers/#6de39dac6a56)

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Any software engineer that wants to build a _real career_ with _real progression_ will already know that changing jobs should be done by connections, not cold-applying for jobs.

Sure you need to get your foot in the door, but if you don't utilize the connections you've made throughout your working history, you either A) weren't useful enough to build higher standing connections, or B) were probably too focused on being a good employee on a technical level.

Pro-tip: Companies love hiring people they already know through some mutual relation. I would argue that a cold-interview process is directly the result of a lack of trusted upper-management network contacts.

It's very common to skip these bullshit interviews through this path. When you ask yourself "how did this manager get there?" this is probably your answer - they knew how to play the game better than you did.

<comment><USER43> > Any software engineer that wants to build a _real career_ with _real > progression_ will already know that changing jobs should be done by > connections, not cold-applying for jobs.

If you can get referred, sure, do that. Why should that be a requirement to build a "real career" with "real progression" though? (And what does that even mean?)

Earlier this year I interviewed with several companies. I was referred to some of them. For some others I didn't know anyone so I cold-messaged recruiters on LinkedIn. It worked just fine and I received similar offers in both cases.

You're probably doing more harm than good by scaring people away from cold- applying.

<comment><USER42> >If you can get referred, sure, do that. Why should that be a requirement to build a "real career" with "real progression" though? (And what does that even mean?)

It means moving away from being a shit-kicker coder to a more senior position at a fast pace. And eventually on to upper management.

If you ever want to reach upper-management, you basically have two choices: A) You work from the ground up _at the same company, forever_, or B) You work at various companies, developing a network and getting recommended into higher positions from your networks.

<comment><USER43> But you can have a "real career" without ending in management. In the Bay Area you can make absurd amounts of money as individual contributor. Not C-level of absurd, but high enough to be fine with earning less but enjoying your work more—money is only a means to an end, after all.

Also, the only way I'd be interested in going into upper management would be as technical co-founder, which requires neither grinding levels nor job- hopping.

Overall I think you're being a bit too reductive about what a "real career" means.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> This is an interesting idea. An interview is a two-way process though, so I wonder how you could ensure that an interviewee could test & probe the company to be sure it's a place that they would like to work in?

</comment><comment><USER45> We need more genetic diversity in STEM. When will we be introducing DNA testing and doing mutation testing on all candidates to ensure perfectly equal distribution of all genetic combinations among employees?

<comment><USER46> Eliminating a source of bias that might prevent optimal workers from being hired is efficient, the initiatives listed in your sarcastic strawman are not.

<comment><USER47> >optimal workers

Do you actually talk / think in those terms?

At the end of the day, all I care about is: are you smart, can you think critically, will you get along with others. Same goes for everyone who's hired me. And a lot of it is just chance/luck.

<comment><USER48> That's not a very good way to build a team, though. Teams need complementary people, and one part of that is having different ideas (e.g. physics vs CompSci thinkers), and having some people willing to grind out the details while others run on ahead with good ideas not fully fleshed out.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Family turned a former Freemason temple in Indiana into a home - <AUTHOR> https://www.businessinsider.com/family-freemason-temple-indiana-into-home <comment><USER2> A decade or so ago, my band mate and a few other folk musicians purchased an old temple in Cumberland, RI. After initial estimates of 75k for renovations, they are 200k in and they've done countless hours of free labor.

The result? Talisk, Alasdair Fraser, and Hanneke Cassel are all playing there this spring...three of my musical idols!

Let's restore and repair our great spaces, the value and community is incredible! Blackstone River Theater is a great example of the cultural value of this investment.

<comment><USER3> That's pretty cool! Do you have a link to any sort of pictures, etc?

<comment><USER4> Yes! Can anyone comment on how tough it'd be for the BRT to have an e-reservation system for tickets? Right now, you have to call, leave a message, then they have to call back and confirm...it's not ideal.

BRT, Masonic Temple venue: [http://www.riverfolk.org/venue- info/](http://www.riverfolk.org/venue-info/)

Alasdair Fraser: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08zd3hI87bc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08zd3hI87bc)

Talisk: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9481kEyAPM0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9481kEyAPM0)

Hanneke Cassel: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFD1nURfyMU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFD1nURfyMU)

<comment><USER5> Even tiny parties use eTickets over here. I looked one providor up. It uses Eventix.io

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The misinformation about Masonry in the article is very unfortunate. The Freemasons are not a "secret organization" — they are organization of secrets. Big difference. Also, this building isn't a temple, they're referred to as lodges. I can go on...

The Masons are one of the largest fundraising organizations in the world, who started and fund the Shriners Hospitals, as an example.

Would have preferred to see a more positive and realistic perspective on the Freemasonry.

<comment><USER7> What does the difference between "secret organization" vs "organization of secrets" mean?

<comment><USER8> They're publicly well known, and as far as I'm aware they don't have any rules against telling people you're a member. Many of their temples/lodges/whatever you want to call them are identified somewhere on the facade (Freemasons' Hall in Edinburgh for example is available for hire as an event space).

However, what they do and talk about within the lodge is secret.

<comment><USER9> > They're publicly well known, and as far as I'm aware they don't have any > rules against telling people you're a member.

2B1ask1 is a Freemason slogan: To become a Freemason, ask one about joining.

[http://freemasoninformation.com/2b1ask1/](http://freemasoninformation.com/2b1ask1/)

In fact, from the page:

> If you are seeking Membership YOU MUST ASK a Mason or a Masonic Lodge for an > application.

Can't very well ask one if the fact they're Masons is supposed to be a secret.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Must get very cold in the winters-- I can't imagine what it would cost to heat most of that space. I'm also impressed at how permissive the local zoning rules are. I guess in parts of the country that are struggling economically and seeing population declines, they can't be too difficult. The property taxes are probably super low as well given then very low purchase price.

<comment><USER11> "It's not bad at all!! We have 6 separate central a/c units and 8 separate central heating units. We can pick & choose what parts of the building to heat/cool and to varying temperatures. Our highest gas bill this past winter was $330 and that included almost an entire month of subzero temperatures. The building is incredibly well insulated."

[https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/e4r2ap/m...](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/e4r2ap/my_house_is_a_20000_sq_ft_1926_former_freemason/f9f8baa/)

<comment><USER12> That's incredible. My gas bill in the winter for a 100yo house is more than that. Very jealous.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Original reddit post

[https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/e4r2ap/m...](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/e4r2ap/my_house_is_a_20000_sq_ft_1926_former_freemason/)

</comment><comment><USER14> Cool article!

I had a wealthy relative who carried her bag with her so she wouldn't have to travel from one side of her house to the other just to get something, and if I lived at this former temple I'd do the same.

"Other times, the children use the [movie] room to play hide and seek, and sometimes they invite the 15 to 20 other kids in the neighborhood over to have a Nerf-gun fight."

If I were a kid I'd have a blast here.

</comment><comment><USER15> Not a temple, but maybe just as interesting. This guy bought a dismantled nuclear missile silo and documented the process of recovering it and converting it to a house: [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd50A5qLv8FemVufSvDgkCQ/vid...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd50A5qLv8FemVufSvDgkCQ/videos)

The channel has been quiet for a year or two but becoming active again this year it seems.

<comment><USER16> In the 90s, a large percentage of LSD manufacture in the US took place in an old nuclear missile silo in Kansas.

<comment><USER17> Where can one read more about this?

<comment><USER16> [https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/wamego-lsd-missile- silo](https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/wamego-lsd-missile-silo)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Tangentially related, anyone in the PNW who doesn't already know about McMenamins should check out their hotels. They mostly buy old historic buildings and remodel them as hotels/restaurants/pubs/etc. while maintaining interesting aspects of the building histories.

E.g. we have stayed at the Kennedy School in Portland where our room was a converted class room.

[https://www.mcmenamins.com/stay](https://www.mcmenamins.com/stay)

<comment><USER19> I discovered them a couple of years ago when I went to see a movie (The Greatest Showman) at McMenamins in Centralia, WA. Wow. I twas like going back in time. Oddly, one of my favorite things was the bathroom. Original porcelain from the 1920's or so, and the urinals didn't flush. Instead, wastewater from the sink drained into the urinals and flushed them. Very efficient!

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I feel like professionals should have completed this job. The picture of the bathroom is really disheartening. All the pipes are industrial looking and the "taps" are ball valves. The sink is a bucket and the tub is a cattle/agricultural wash basin.

I suspect the local historical preservation society has limits on the exterior of old buildings but can't do anything about the interior work.

<comment><USER21> The bathroom is pretty bad, but the other renovated rooms are decent. The kitchen looks great, the kids room is acceptable, and the library is very classy, although I think the desk may be facing the wrong way...

<comment><USER22> The kids room looked like an amazing setup, desk + foosball + a kick ass built-in lofted bed? My inner child was thinking of all that space for the activities

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I wonder how they heat the place; Indiana ain't the Bay Area.

I used to know a guy who rented part of the Alameda former masonic lodge. The architecture was amazing. The guy who bought it got a real steal (I think during the 2000 downturn).

<comment><USER24> They probably heat it selectively and still pay a lot in utilities. One of the photos of stairs looks like it has a fairly small HVAC so there are likely multiple systems for the whole building.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> One of the tricky things with a project like this is that banks are very leery of underwriting a mortgage on something that isn't a residence (I ran into this when I briefly flirted with buying an old fire station). Usually the best you can do is a construction loan at a fairly high interest rate.

But if you have California equity and are buying at Rust Belt prices (as in this case) you can just pay cash.

</comment><comment><USER26> Those antique pool tables that came with the place could be restored and sold for several thousand dollars. What a steal.

<comment><USER27> But why?

<comment><USER28> I think the point may just be that the price was pretty aggressive, not that it should necessarily be done.

I was also wondering if the pipe organ works, or is close to working. I don't even have an estimate of what that might be worth but it wouldn't surprise me that it alone would be more than what they paid for the place. Again, I'm not saying I would want them to do that, just that that may be pretty valuable on its own.

But on the flip side, I can see why they had a hard time finding a buyer. Even were it ready to live in on day one, it would be a project home nevertheless, just to find something to do with the space. You can get similar problems when selling a church; if there isn't another organization of a similar size and similar needs ready to move in, who is really going to buy it, especially for larger churches?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> In Ontario, one of the more popular things to do is convert one room schoolhouses into homes. The same is done with churches, so it makes sense that former fraternity assets are as well.

These organizations used to form the fabric of a civil society that persisted underneath the volatility of governments and economic concerns. The liberal aspect of the group created neutral ground for people with different religious convictions to form a civil community outside their churches and temples.

When you look at the historical impact of that organization, the best summary I've heard is it has served as a check on hegemony, as the villains of history seem to be the ones most concerned about them.

</comment><comment><USER30> This is the family blog, about the renovation : [https://freemasontomansion.wordpress.com/](https://freemasontomansion.wordpress.com/)

</comment><comment><USER31> I nearly did the same thing in my town. Bit more expensive, but there was a roughly 18k-sqft old fraternity house in town. My wife and I considered purchasing it at $400k, we put an offer in at $350k, but it was declined.

Another group bought ($390k) it and completed a remodel (estimated $180k) and it's now worth ~$1.25m and it's beautiful. Kind of regret not purchasing it, but it just wasn't in the cards at that price.

<comment><USER32> I won at auction and helped renovate a 90-year-old former sorority house. We started with an estimate of $300k and ended up at over a million dollars.

Every time I hear "we should estimate software like we estimate construction", I tell this story.

<comment> 867-5309 reminded me of the quote "software are like cathedrals: first we build them, then we pray"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Heating and cooling costs must be a pain point, I wonder if there is an easy way to zone the AC to just a room.

<comment><USER34> You can get wall units in some select areas and that should take care of things. If they previously had a house in San Diego they probably aren't hurting financially. I'm jealous of all the space, it almost seems like too much without putting in a gymnasium and skate park.

<comment><USER35> > If they previously had a house in San Diego they probably aren't hurting > financially.

That's not necessarily true, it really depends on when they bought their home. Housing prices in California have nearly quadrupled in the last two decades. Families that could afford a house in the 2000s are priced out of the market today. If you entered at the right time you could be paying more in property taxes than mortgage, or living paycheck to paycheck with a three figure salary.

The article says they bought it outright and used the equity from the sale of their CA home to fund the initial remodeling costs, and they've put an additional $40k into it. The reddit post says they sold their home in San Diego for $700k, which at that price is a sub 2000 sq ft ranch.

Just looking at the photos in the article, there don't appear to be hundreds of thousands of dollars in renovations. In fact most of the living spaces shown appear to have been done on a budget. So if we assume the kitchen was the additional $40k in renovation costs, we can assume they didn't get all that much out of their house in San Diego. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say $150k.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> There's some commentary here and with the focus on this article being an old empty temple. Are there a lot of these abandoned temples around? Are these fraternities in decline or something? What was the height of their popularity?

<comment><USER37> Historically the peaks of Freemasonry in America were around the time of the revolutionary war, civil war, and two world wars. Being a fraternity first and foremost - soldiers abroad found brotherhood and companionship together in freemasonry - their numbers soared around this time as new initiates joined. Since the 70's or so the fraternity has seen a steady decline of membership not to dissimilar to the decline of religious institutions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> I had a similar opportunity when I last moved, but the giant historic downtown structure was over a million dollars, and had some visible deterioration that made me think I'd spend another million in repairs.

It also occupied almost the entire plot of land, which for that downtown area, was unusual.

On the other hand, if I bought it, I'd have beachfront property in about 50-100 years once the ice caps melt!

</comment><comment><USER39> > They bought it in full for $89,000, so they do not have a mortgage and are > debt-free after using the money they got from selling their San Diego home. > The equity they earned from that sale funded most of the up-front remodel > costs at the temple.

I suppose that says something about California real estate prices.

</comment><comment><USER40> Toronto has a building [1] of a very similar size and internal layout that is used as a concert venue and offices for some IT company with conspicuously generic name. The list of people that performed there looks like Rock-n-Roll Hall of fame and it was one of the most entertaining places to visit during Doors Open Toronto. During the visit I realized that graffiti-style artwork inside was done by someone I know.

[1] [https://www.888yonge.com/](https://www.888yonge.com/)

</comment><comment><USER41> The buyer says that the house seems "haunted" and that there are "paranormal activities". Haunted houses typically have lower values on the housing market, as demonstrated by horror movies like The Shining, etc. All jokes aside, it would've been better to convert it for commercial use, such as an office, rather than for it to be a residential unit, since all that empty space seems to be wasted.

<comment><USER42> Or an event hall, or a quirky hotel of sorts

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> That's awesome. Maybe they open a restaurant or something on the lower floors and recoup some money.

<comment><USER44> sounds like a good way to lose more money :D

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Even in rural Indiana isn't $89k for a 20k sq.ft. home really cheap?

<comment><USER46> I grew up in that part of the world and I can safely say nobody there has $89K laying around to make a purchase of this type (renovations aside, imagine heating the place). The absence of qualified buyers drive prices around there. People who have never been to the rural areas of the midwest simply have no perspective on the economics of that region. Its not impossible that the equity from their San Diego home sale made them the richest people in the county (I don't recall the town being mentioned in the article).

<comment><USER47> > richest people in the county

Any farmer who has land passed down through generations is a multi- millionaire.

A good friend of mine in high school lived on about 600 acres. His family made almost $10 million selling half of it to Walmart.

<comment><USER48> Surely the location of that land matters? Not every farm is worth so much, right?

<comment><USER47> Oh, without a doubt you are right. "Good" farmland is quite valuable however.

[https://www.chicagofed.org/publications/agletter/2015-2019/n...](https://www.chicagofed.org/publications/agletter/2015-2019/november-2019)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> How is this building $89k and not $8.9M?

<comment><USER50> rural rust belt

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> > California Masonic membership is open to men age 18 or older who meet the > qualifications and standards of character and intention, and who believe in > a Supreme Being

no one's perfect and I don't believe</comment>


IOS Programming in Recipe Form - <AUTHOR> http://www.nscookbook.com We have done a lot since this site first showed up on the Hacker News, let us know how we're doing! <comment><USER2> Looks like it contains decent, if not slightly outdated, tutorials for beginners.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi fnayr,

I appreciate the feedback. How would you recommend we improve?</comment></comment>


Taking more math in school will raise your income - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2009/08/how_to_get_smart.cfm

<comment><USER2> Alternatively smart people and/or hard working people make more money, they also tend to take "hard" courses such as advanced math while in highschool.

No causation required.

<comment><USER3> Individual effort is controlled for in the study discussed: "each extra required maths course raised the annual income of black males by 15%". Of course, this study still doesn't make a strong case for causation -- the number of required math courses in a school is likely correlated with school quality, which is likely correlated with other socioeconomic factors.

<comment><USER4> Huh? How do you infer that individual effort was controlled for by quoting "each extra required maths course raised the annual income of black males by 15%"?

<comment><USER3> "each extra -required- maths course" -- as in required by the school. This is also made clear in the linked paper: <http://www.columbia.edu/~jg2394/papers/jobmarket.pdf>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Yes, I asked about this a while ago, with an interesting discussion ensuing.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=633540>

As the submitted article here notes,

"Of course, finding qualified teachers to teach advanced maths courses will not be easy."

Not easy by far. Here is a detailed article about just how difficult it is to find elementary school teachers who know even very basic math

<http://www.ams.org/notices/200502/fea-kenschaft.pdf>

and how especially lacking such teachers are in school districts with mostly poor students from ethnic minorities. One finding from that article illustrates the grave nature of the problem:

"in my first visit in 1986 to a K-6 elementary school, I discovered that not a single teacher knew how to find the area of a rectangle."

<comment><USER6> Teach for America and Teach First (the British equivalent) are actually doing a great job at addressing this problem. They are able to recruit teachers from top universities to work in some of the worst schools, precisely by focussing on the difficulties and challenges of the job.

From a different economist article: [http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?stor...](http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14133684) "Nearly a tenth of Oxford's class of 2009 will be Teaching First this autumn."

I've heard the statistics are similar with a huge percentage of Harvard's graduating class going into Teach for America.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately, unions strongly oppose Teach for America: "Teach for America -- the privately funded program that sends college grads into America's poorest school districts for two years -- received 35,000 applications this year, up 42% from 2008. ... Union and bureaucratic opposition is so strong that Teach for America is allotted a mere 3,800 teaching slots nationwide" <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124061253951954349.html>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Greenspun had a good post related to this: [http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2009/08/11/comfortable- wi...](http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2009/08/11/comfortable-with-our- stupid-children/)

I once lost out on a job because of my Calculus grade in college.

</comment><comment><USER8> I would imagine this to be true. I have done a quite a bit of math as a requirement for getting my CS degree, but I have never been very good at all.

This finds me balking from math heavy software development jobs because I feel like my math skills will hold me back(or at least slow me down). This is sad, because many of the most lucrative software development jobs I see are generally pretty math heavy. I would venture to guess this is the same in other fields as well.

<comment><USER9> This is why I skipped CS, and got a degree in Mathematics. It's not that it's impossible to pick up some solid math skills on your own, but if you're already programming for a hobby, learning a lot of what gets covered in CS is pretty simple, compared to picking up higher-level mathematics.

Abstract algebra and analysis (Calculus the way it should be) changed my perspective a hell of a lot more than any of the CS courses I took, and the time in formal math makes the process of turning academic papers into working code a lot easier.

<comment><USER10> I largely agree. I went for a Math rather than a CS degree myself. With that said, you will be required to learn a lot of math in a decent CS course and an interested student can pick up on the rest themselves relatively easily.

<comment><USER8> Ahh if only I was a good student. That being said, trying to bone up on my skills as I am looking at some jobs doing geomatics stuff.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> If you sit in the front row of the classroom, you'll also get straight A's.

<comment><USER12> Actually a study in Colorado showed that sitting in front does improve performance:

[http://www.psycho.uni- duesseldorf.de/abteilungen/ddp/Dokumen...](http://www.psycho.uni- duesseldorf.de/abteilungen/ddp/Dokumente/Sonstiges/SurprisingImpactOfSeatLocation.pdf)

<comment><USER13> This makes sense with how I feel when I go to classes.

Whenever I sit in the back, I always struggle much more to pay attention, even when the lecturer is good.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It doesn't look like this generalizes. It's true for young black males at low levels of math education based on this study, but there's nothing to suggest anything more than that. I have a math degree and I wish everybody would take more math, but I don't think there's much causality between taking math and earning more at higher levels of math education. There certainly may be correlation though.

<comment><USER15> I don't think it's about math degree levels of math education. it's about the fact that all the highest earning majors with the exception of maybe law require at least the calculus series.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Really? I have a bachelor in applied mathematics, I like math and algorithm, but when i was interviewed with a software engineer position, i had been asked all kinds of c++ programming questions, and these "do you have experience on this and that". I had to spend extra time on these things, i just felt why i didn't directly get into computer science program and spending more time on these detailed engineering things at school

</comment><comment><USER17> What a revelation! I can't wait to tell it to my lawyer friend who hasn't taken a math class since his sophomore year of highschool and makes $145k/yr three years removed from an English degree.

Won't his face be red!

</comment><comment><USER18> good old 6th-grader-quality research.

correlation mistaken for causation...so frustratingly pervasive in our society.

</comment><comment><USER19> I just graduated from University, and I intuitively believed that taking more math would make me a smarter person. So although my major was Psych, I took courses in Analysis, Algebra, Discrete, and Number Theory. Of course, potential employers have neither seem to have given a fuck nor realized just how difficult Analysis was, but whatever-

I even implemented the thinking style I picked up in Analysis, such as the notion of a compact space [as it relates to social cohesion], while writing a paper on Aristotle's Politics in my sophomore year. I didn't use any math words at all, and instead drew a diagram to illustrate what I meant, and really enhanced my argument.

Anyway, bottom line: I took a shitload of math to make myself smarter and to enhance my nerd cred; nobody seems to care; maybe someone here will give a care; since I'm ultimately probably going to be self-employed anyway, perhaps my improved mental acumen will pay off financially, but as of yet it's unclear.

<comment><USER5> What did you expect to do after graduation with your major in psychology? What are some of the most interesting things you learned in your psychology courses? (I ask, because I am writing a working paper in psychology--about IQ testing--just now.)

<comment><USER19> Favorite topics: working memory; attention; instrumental conditioning; emotional regulation.

<comment><USER5> I'm very interested in working memory and attention, and know very little of the literature on those subjects. I'll look for your comments on posts about those issues.

<comment><USER19> I'm going to try to draft up a blog post about working memory and the relationship between working memory and attention - if you send me an email [zackster/@gma\il.com] I will link you to it.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Kaggle discriminates prizes based on where you are born - <AUTHOR> https://www.kaggle.com/c/passenger-screening-algorithm-challenge/discussion/35118 <comment><USER2> Your headline here is wrong. It's not based on where you are born. It's based on whether you're a US citizen.

tl;dr The United States Department of Homeland Security sponsored a Kaggle competition, and the prizes cannot be given to non-US citizens. This is due to US laws preventing security organizations from paying foreign contractors.

Nothing particularly new or surprising here, and it makes sense that a government security organization wouldn't employ foreign citizens.

<comment><USER3> Yes for sure is not surprising but this kind of competition should not be hosted in Kaggle. The value of Kaggle is to share and find a better solution of the world (with prize) by gathering people from anywhere in the world.

Not only the nationality issue, but this competition also prevents competitors from opening publicity, including future research and writing blog posts about it. Seriously why they are willing to host this thing in a public community?

This competition significantly degrades the true value of Kaggle and DHS should host the competition themselves not using this kind of platform.</comment></comment>


Ask YC:What kind of music do you listen to? - <AUTHOR>

I will like to know the type of music other hackers in here listen to, to get into sync with their hacking? I listen to enya and some meditation music to really get in sync when i hack. so i will like to know, what music do you listen to? <comment><USER2> Pattern:

1) YC user is on drugs, has just completed what he considers to be a hacking feat, or is otherwise mentally stoked, and feels the irrepressible need to share what music he likes.

2) YC user realises that he can tell the world what he likes by posting a news item about it under the pretense of asking what other people like, oblivious to the fact that no one really cares. Note that if said user really cared what others liked, he perhaps would not include his own taste in the post. But he doesn't - this is expressive, one-way-only.

3) Some other YC users feel the same need and so congregate on that thread and reply with their own musical taste. Note that there is no actual discussion (how could there be?), just a bunch of people shouting their tastes into a tube with no one at the other end.

4) YC is less valuable for it.

5) Rinse, repeat every few weeks.

<http://searchyc.com/music> :

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=132026> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=61831> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=144666> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=139901> etc, ad nauseam.

Am I the only one who thinks this?

<comment><USER3> "YC is less valuable for it."

I don't think so.

If YC became less valuable every time someone disagreed or posted something questionable, there'd be nothing left. We'll be fine. Lighten up.

<comment><USER2> I'm not saying we won't be fine :-)

However, a thread like this is not a discussion. Of the bunch of replies other than my one (and its associated meta-discussion), every single one is a "me too"-like statement that "this is what I listen to". And how could it be another way? We are all different people with different tastes and there is no singular "hacker music" that's best suited to programming.

So, an Ask-YC like this:

\- doesn't bring anything new to the table in the OP (particularly since it's been done many times before)

\- brings nothing in the comments

\- is theoretically incapable of doing either anyway

Therefore, it's a complete waste of space. There could be an insightful article on the front page in its stead, but instead, all there is is this vacuous nothing. YC is worse for it, not better - YC thrives despite the presence of this kind of thread, not because of it.

<comment><USER4> I dont know if the thought ever entered your block head that the writer of this post wanted to know the type of music other hackers listen to and not to declare a particular type of music as being "hacker music". Although you stated that the question has been posted before, you also made a presumption that everybody joined hacker news at the same time and every body keeps tabs on what is being posted and makes sure that he doesnt do a repeat of a post. that isnt so, new people join hacker news everyday and ask questions, so it is inevitable that the same questions may be repeated, giving the fact that YC news doesnt have search natively. downmod me for all i care but i have stated my points clearly. thanks.

<comment><USER2> Hackers are people, spread around the world and all social classes. They listen to all types of music.

I would be shocked to find any kind of music that some hacker somewhere doesn't listen to.

Therefore, the question is as meaningless as asking what colour hackers' hair is. Or what they eat.

Also, the idea of HN turning into an endless repetition of the same questions that new people ask all the time because they don't know that they've been asked before proves my point quite thoroughly: it's not a good future for HN.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I don't listen to music while i program. I listen mostly to hardcore and punk and that's is not good for your concentration. I have 2 tracks with boring D'n'B stuff witch i listen to while i read, but not while i write. While im just browsing and wasting time on the net i listen to HC and Punk and sometimes some metal stuff. If anybody wants more specific details about my taste he/she can check me out on <http://www.last.fm/user/pavelludia>

</comment><comment><USER6> 20 minutes of free jazz or grindcore before hacking and time passes a lot slower.

Expanding on this: I don't listen to music while programming. If it can be treated as background music, then it's too boring to hold my attention when I need to get distracted for a moment. I try to listen to some challenging music before programming to get focused, and it seems to be working.

</comment><comment><USER7> Online music is what I listen to mostly these days as my browser is always on. I love listening to some of these tracks in particular

<http://muziboo.com/song/list/nitindubey23?order=2>

Anyone into Indian music here? :)

Disclaimer: Link from my startup.

</comment><comment><USER8> I stream KEXP out of Seattle most of the time- big fan of the variety- esp new music, indie bands, some hip hop, and a smattering of everything else... I had messed around with a trial of Pandora, spent some time going through radio feeds from all over the world, and KEXP was consistently my favorite.

<comment><USER9> I thought about trying Pandora. What was your opinion of it?

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> No music during programming. The only exception is to build a accoustic protection against typical noise-office. In this case, I hear electronical music or lounge music (most important: no voice!).

</comment><comment><USER11> Boards of Canada, Brian Eno, and other ambient stuff. Stereolab is also good. There's also this 13 minute ambient song by American Analog Set that is awesome for work: Late One Sunday.

</comment><comment><USER12> <http://www.last.fm/user/xenoterracide/> easiest way to find out what I'm listening to.

</comment><comment><USER13> bassdrive.com or protonradio.com

</comment><comment><USER14> trance, dance, and techno. Basically anything that sounds techy

</comment><comment><USER15> somafm.com and 90's rock music.

</comment><comment><USER16> groove based music only

</comment><comment><USER4> I kind of like the music of evanescence, it gets me into the mood almost immediately.</comment>


Is the Internet a Matriarchy?  - <AUTHOR> http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/chicks-rule/

<comment><USER2> This might be my male bias showing, but most of the sites in the "patriarchy" section are way cooler than the ones in the "matriarchy" section.</comment>


Legally blind programming help - <AUTHOR>

Hey! So I've been learning how to code and being legally blind is probably one of the hardest things I have to deal with. Vision is 20/200 and I also have a disease that causes extreme light sensitivity. I usually have dimmed displays and zoomed in as well.<p>Can anyone give me some suggestions on how I can find a way to not zoom in all the time. A lot of platforms don't support increasing text sizes therefore I end up two inches from the screen - straining my vision as usual. Can someone help me out? Don't want this to get in the way of my abilities any longer. Thanks again! <comment><USER2> I'm visually impaired, not legally blind although not far off it. I'm also pretty photo-sensitive. Some things that have helped me in no particular order:

\- Get a large (27" in my case) monitor so I can have the text large without having to constantly zoom in. High resolution + higher DPI is easier on the eyes than getting big text by lowering the resolution.

\- Learn a terminal based text editor (Vim or EMacs) and get good at using the terminal. Many GUI based applications, particularly IDEs have limited options or don't work well with larger text sizes. Working within a terminal makes developing less "visual" while maximising the amount of information on screen. Now I spend 80% plus of my day in a terminal and my eyes are significantly less tired at the end of the day.

\- Use a tiling window manager. On OSX I use Slate ([https://github.com/jigish/slate](https://github.com/jigish/slate)), or on Nix you could use something like XMonad. The screen-snapping stuff in recent versions of Windows is helpful too. The idea here is to rely on the mouse as little as possible.

\- use a dark color scheme. I like Solarized-dark but there are several other good options.

\- pick an easy to read font. I use Menlo and have the size up around 32pt.

\- use a terminal prompt that makes it very clear where the prompt is when scrolling back through history. I use this one [https://gist.github.com/agnoster/3712874](https://gist.github.com/agnoster/3712874)

\- get an adjustable monitor arm so you can bring the screen closer to you without craning your neck. I've had the same one for 15+ years but am planning on buying one of the Ergotron ones in the next few weeks

\- use f.lux to take the bright blue tint out of screen colors [https://justgetflux.com/](https://justgetflux.com/)

\- work in a room lit by lamps positioned so that they don't add any glare.

\- if you often find yourself working at the same screen as other people, set up a second monitor in mirror-mode or investigate using TMux if you're both in terminal editors so that you can have your terminal configured so it's comfortable for you, and so can your partner.

I'm happy to provide more info on any of this.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for all of this. I wasn't expecting someone to give me a detailed response like this. Really appreciate it. Can you shoot me an email at firstname.lastname@example.com so I have your contact info in case I have a question. Keep in touch! Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Start using screen reader such as NVDA/Jaws on Windows, VoiceOver on Mac or Vinux (a ubuntu fork with Orca screen reader). I have a little vision left but I do dev with only TTS. It's not that hard (considering I've been doing it for over 9 years) but GUI tools (IDEs and texteditors) are your biggest pane points.

Visual studio is quite accessible and I use it a lot.

That said, I've been programming for nix as well though Sublime/etc are completely inaccessible (at least on Windows).

Managing *nix servers with SSH is by far the most accessible and rewarding experience I've had. VIM is my personal choice for editing. text-based terminals are ridiculously powerful and accessible and they level the playing field IMO.

</comment><comment><USER4> Screen readers or Braille displays are options - window-eyes is free on windows now (with purchase of an office bundle) and VoiceOver is free on OS X. After the learning curve you may find it faster than navigating visually if it's painful or slow to look at the screen. If you're in California you may want to look into the Department of Rehabilitation (or find the comparable department in your state/country) which provides free equipment and training for visually impaired users entering the job market or school.

</comment><comment><USER5> Another tip, I have read into efforts of some of the large technology companies. In my opinion, Google is making the greatest strides in terms of comprehensive accessibility for visually impaired and blind users / developers:

[http://www.google.com/accessibility/products/](http://www.google.com/accessibility/products/)

</comment><comment><USER5> I've done research on this before. Though I'm not blind or visually impaired, my research would tell me that a good place to start would be emacspeak

[http://emacspeak.sourceforge.net/](http://emacspeak.sourceforge.net/)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I have a lot of research to do thanks to you guys. Honestly, can't thank you all enough for the suggestions! You are all awesome.</comment>