Nobody's going to steal your idea - <AUTHOR> http://www.johndcook.com/blog/2012/11/02/nobody-will-steal-your-idea/ <comment><USER2> This is pure nonsense. Please, please, please stop talking about ideas. What people steal --and the only thing with huge value-- are MARKET OPPORTUNITIES. Ideas are easy to generate. Everyone has loads of them. When an idea is combined with the work necessary to identify if a market opportunity exists it can become invaluable.

Ideas are not stolen because an idea, all by itself, does not identify whether or not anyone wants the thing or the service. If I told you that I had an idea to make a dish-washing sponge in the shape of a smiley face you, more than likely, would walk away laughing. So would I if someone came to me with that idea. How would you react if I actually manufactured them, sold a bunch and showed you that people want them? Right. You'd pay attention. You wouldn't laugh. And you certainly wouldn't walk away. Well, I saw exactly that happen at the Shark Tank show recently. I think the guy got a $300K investment.

$300K for the idea for a friggin smiley-face sponge? Nope. $300K for the market opportunity he uncovered.

If you present someone with an idea and that idea is so good that it identifies the market opportunity without further work, well, it might get stolen. With most other ideas they'll listen and nod and possibly even think you are a moron and completely forget what you told them.

If, on the other hand, you show them an idea coupled with your work confirming that a good scalable market exists, hold on! The market opportunity will either be stolen or you'll have someone all over you wanting to become an investor or participate in some manner in the opportunity you identified.

<comment><USER3> "Ideas" and "market opportunities" sort of go hand in hand, don't you think? The market opportunity is assumed when someone talks about an idea for a business.

<comment><USER2> > "Ideas" and "market opportunities" sort of go hand in hand

Only when the idea precedes the exploration of the opportunity space.

Have an idea -> Build a prototype -> Show it around -> Close some sales.

Here the idea is related to the market opportunity. It triggered a search for the opportunity when someone was interested or puzzled enough to do the work. Few will invest in an idea unless there's some kind of "sugar on top" that reveals really good potential for a market opportunity. Many will invest in a reasonably tested market opportunity.

When are an idea and a market opportunity not connected? When the idea does not precede the market opportunity.

I'll give you a couple of concrete examples from my own life.

A friend of mine came over one day many years ago and said that his contact at one of the local film studios told him that they were looking for a carpenter that would make them 100 sets of this specially designed piece of furniture for an expansion project. My friend knew that I, when not coding or designing products, liked to, among other things, do woodworking projects. I also had a pretty niche setup in my garage at the time.

So, here's an opportunity presented to me which had not originated with an idea.

What did we do? We spent that weekend making an unsolicited sample of the piece the studio needed. He delivered it on Monday to his contact along with pricing. By Wednesday we got the deal. By Saturday I had a pile of furniture- grade plywood in front of my house that was eight feet tall. We setup an assembly line and spent a week (with some help) cranking out the pieces. My neighbors were puzzled and probably somewhat concerned. A couple of them came over to help for a few bucks. Delivered on time and walked away with $60K profit. Sweet.

Any able carpenter would have taken that opportunity and run with it. We just ran faster and put a solution in front of the customer as painlessly and well- executed as possible.

Another time I had someone call me to tell me that there was a company in need of a box built to translate a communications protocol in real time. RS422 in and out. Status display. Power button. The conversations went something like this:

        Me:  "How many?"
        Him: "Probably 25 per month"

        Me:  "How much are they willing to pay?"
        Him: "They've been trying for months but it's a bunch of
              Optics PhD's and this isn't their thing.
              They are desperate for a solution".

        Me:  "Why?"
        Him: "They have sold a bunch of these units at about $500K
              a piece and this has been one of the only reasons
              they can't deliver."

        Me:  "I can meet with them tomorrow AM"

End result: I sold them a protocol converter box for $3,000 a pop for the first 25 units, $2,000 each for the next 75 and $1,000 each thereafter in lots of 100 units.

I built it in a weekend: 1 RU enclosure. Off the shelf 8051 board. Small custom board with RS422 drivers and receivers. LCD display. Power supply. Connectors. I don't think the total cost exceeded $150. It would have been a sweet ride except that about six months later they got acquired by a large multinational and, effectively, shut down.

Again, a market opportunity that did not come from an idea.

Now, what if I said? "Let's build an RS422 protocol converter box and sell it for $3,000". And I did this in complete isolation of having identified a market need? Well, it'd be a flop. Sometimes fining opportunities is like finding a needle in a haystack. Someone almost has to sit on it for you to become aware it even exists.

<comment><USER4> I'm a "optics" (actually photonics-crypto) PHD candidate that also can build a RS422 protocol converter. You had luck I wasn't in their team :)

<comment><USER2> I actually tried to convince them that this stuff was very simple and that they could do it. No interest whatsoever. I think what was going on behind the scenes is that they were in talks to be acquired (or planning to be in talks) and they really wanted their product to work. They probably also had a number of challenges of their own to deal with. In that context, it may have made sense to pay whatever was necessary to get going.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> An obvious counterexample is sittercity/care.com

"On July 20, 2006, Sheila Marcelo and Nick Beim flew from Boston to Chicago to visit a company called Sittercity. The business, which charged parents to access an online database of sitters and nannies, had been launched in Boston five years earlier.

"We took the meeting to talk about an investment,'' says Genevieve Thiers, the Boston College alumnae who founded Sittercity. She'd met Beim, a partner at Waltham-based Matrix Partners, that year at a trade show. "Nick talked about how Matrix worked with companies and founders,'' Thiers recalls.

Marcelo was serving as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Matrix, hoping to join or help start a business that Matrix would back. "I wanted to do family, health, or education - those areas were my passion,'' Marcelo says.

Three months after the trip, Marcelo started a website, Care.com, to compete directly with Sittercity. Matrix Partners and several prominent investors poured capital into her new company - totaling more than $16 million so far. It wasn't until late last year that Sittercity raised its first round of venture capital."

[http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2009/11/2...](http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2009/11/22/websites_rivalry_provides_lessons_in_sharing_or_not_sharing_strategic_secrets/)

A lot more backstory: [http://www.boston.com/business/technology/innoeco/2009/11/th...](http://www.boston.com/business/technology/innoeco/2009/11/the_backstory_on_carecom_sitte.html)

<comment><USER6> Is that a counterexample? Suppose they hadn't taken the meeting. What would have prevented Marcelo from starting Care.com?

As far as I can tell, nothing. Sittercity had been operating for 5 years in public view. Obvious idea, proven market, easy to find Sittercity users to interview.

(However, bringing an EIR to an investment meeting strikes me as incredibly dubious.)

<comment><USER7> Completely agree here, this is not a counter example of 'stealing' an idea but one of 'executing' on an idea.

And not surprisingly this is what folks worry about, that someone with more resources than them will hear about their idea and be able to execute on it before they get off the ground. That would be true, if the person who had the resources didn't have anything else to do, but as a rule that is very rare, people with the ability to execute and resources do.

The care.com example is an example of an entirely different situation. That situation is that a business concept is proven out but doesn't have the capital to scale and the owners aren't doing the scaling. There are a number of folks who look for this type of business and build it in a different market. There was even a story linked here about a German company that did this. Much less risk since the idea is already 'proven'.

But if nobody is doing your idea, many people will think it won't work because if it did then someone else would already be doing it, so they won't 'steal' it because obviously its not a viable idea :-)

<comment><USER8> Ok But I think you are missing the point. They reached out to a firm "Matrix Partners" to help them execute by financial means and that firms individuals chose to spin off an exact duplicate of their startup?! Sham! ~That firm should be frowned upon and ridiculed and avoided by all entrepreneurs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The attitude that nobody's going to steal your idea might hold true for a certain audience, but having worked in environments where not only will people steal your idea, but often relationships are formed for that very purpose, I would take that advice with a few grains of salt.

As with everything, context is key -- if you're talking about building a new widget for platform_x, and you're in a conversation with your grandparents, you're probably in the clear (for a specific definition of grandparents).

If you're having that same conversation with the world's most prolific exporter of widgets for platform x, it might be better to listen than to talk.

In contracting environments, specifically in Federal government, the IT ecosystem is an adversarial one, all the work is bid upon, subsequently awarded to a Prime contractor who may or may not sub out some of the work to sub-contractors. It's not impossible for some of the subcontractors to have their wagons hitched to multiple ponies, on the assumption that they'll work with whomever wins.

Idea sharing and NDAs are critical in this sort of environment as the novelty / uniqueness / effectiveness of your particular solution to the problem being bid upon is your key differentiator. Otherwise, you likely end up in a price race, where either the largest contractor or the most ill-adept at bidding will win.

</comment><comment><USER10> I actually did have someone steal my idea. I was interviewing for a technical co-founder and talked to a guy who seemed really interested. However, after a couple of conversations I got a weird vibe from him and went with someone else. (Oh, and I had $1M in funding at this point, & I was looking for a full partner, not someone to "just build my idea.")

A few months later I find that he has started a similar company, with a similar name, and is out raising money. He even said that he came up with the idea when he was 'inspired' by his young daughter. (Dragging your kids into your lie is always scummy.)

(This was for a very unusual startup idea, btw, not a game or social app, etc. I am also a recognized expert in this field, 15+ years of experience, national newspaper/magazine profiles, blah blah blah.)

He ended up getting money in Singapore and launching a pretty sucky site that got zero traction. It's been a couple years now and I haven't seen anything else from him (but I've been too busy with my company to really look).

At the time, I was LIVID but after I cooled off I realized that 1) it was pretty great external validation and 2) someone who would "steal" my idea (and make up a story about it!) would never be able to execute, and I was proven right about both things.

My company is now nearly five years old and we're working on our third product extension off the original idea. :-)

<comment><USER11> So you agree with the OP that there is no danger in sharing your ideas before you have traction, etc.?

Also, I have seen plenty of posts talking about these types of situations and the person, just like you did, never explains their business or provides a link to it. I would be curious to see what the actual idea was to better understand your situation.

<comment><USER10> I think the danger is situational. If you're the kind of person who will give up when you see someone swiping your idea, there is danger. If it makes you work harder ... then it might be an asset. :-)

You have to have faith that it's not just your idea that's valuable, but your idea + you and your experience and what you bring to it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't agree. Mainly because I don't agree with the premise that ideas are worthless - something that is echoed around all the time. Ideas being worthless is the lazy and easy way to explain to someone why they should get feedback on their idea.

The reality is ideas do have value. We've got a great idea for a new product, and we're not telling anyone about it. That's because our idea has value and we don't want anyone else to make it before we do. Come back to us in a year or two and I'll happily explain our reasoning behind this.

If an idea is worthless it means it literally has zero value. Value doesn't have to be a positive value, it can be negative as well. Given 2 ideas, which of these would you rather develop:

\- A mobile phone for elephants

\- A service which sends you an SMS when your website goes offline

If both ideas have zero value, it doesn't matter which one you pick when you set out. The reality is if you are going to set out and make mobile phones for elephants you are going to burn through your cash a lot quicker, and have a much lower chance of ever making money and succeeding (if you measure success through sustainability and profitability).

These two ideas are not equally worthless, therefore one has more value than another. Two things with differing value cannot both be worthless unless they both have negative expected value. Not all ideas have negative expected value and you easily build a case arguing that the SMS service idea has positive expected value. "All ideas are worthless" is not true as all ideas have varying levels of negative/positive expected value.

Sharing your idea is usually the right thing to do, but it does come with some potential downsides. Just because it's usually the right thing to do doesn't mean it's always the right thing to do.

Someone might steal/copy your idea. It's probably a lower chance than most people estimate especially in the very early stages of startups.

<comment><USER6> I am not buying your idea valuation logic. "Worthless" means lacking significant positive value.

If business ideas had significant value, you'd see people buying them. They don't, though. They might by a proven opportunity, or they might buy knowledge. But ideas on their own? As unsaleable as used chewing gum.

I really don't believe people should worry about business ideas being stolen. If your idea is so simple that J. Random Hustler can steal it from a description, a) the idea's probably too simple to matter, and b) many other people will have thought of it.

To successfully execute on a startup idea, you need solid knowledge of the domain, and the ability to keep having great ideas. There is a ton of iteration before product/market fit, and I think copycats just don't have the depth to successfully iterate there.

<comment><USER13> It is true that for people to buy ideas they must have value. But the transaction must also be feasible. The trouble with ideas is that I can't easily prove to you the idea is valuable without having already given it to you, thus destroying your incentive to complete your end of the transaction.

It may be that there isn't a market in ideas because they have no value. But it may also be that there isn't a market in ideas because it's too difficult to facilitate the transaction.

<comment><USER6> I suspect that's not particularly difficult to solve. Escrow is one solution. Profit sharing is another. Independent valuators would be a third. I imagine any energetic business lawyer could come up with a number of other approaches.

The problem is that nobody wants to buy raw ideas. Any decent entrepreneur has ideas coming out the wazoo. People who aren't decent entrepreneurs could probably _use_ ideas, but they'll very rarely recognize that they _need_ them.

There is a great market for _proven_ ideas. That's why a major route for startup exit is acquisition. Once you've achieved product-market fit, plenty of people can see the value of your idea.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> There's lots of reasons for NDAs besides stealing ideas. I doubt Apple is afraid I'd steal the next design for their new phone (although they may worry Samsung might), but they still probably don't want me blogging about it. There's marketing impact.

Also companies often don't like to commit to product before it's committed. I learned an important lesson at one of my first startups that customers will try to hold you to your "proposed" roadmap. Even though we say, "We're just trying to be transparent. This WILL change. We don't know of this we can do." -- people will tend to find things they like and essentially view what you showed them as a promise to deliver. You suddenly have customers who claim you not only didn't deliver a feature, but that you broke a promise. Until I know I can ship, I really prefer not to talk about it publicly -- even with tons of caveats.

</comment><comment><USER15> Not always true. We were working on a smartphone game with an original concept and kept blogging about it. Including telling about the idea and showing early gameplay video. It might have been a coincidence, but a virtually identical game appeared before we were finished and became quite successful on Android. So next time I'll be a little bit more careful.

</comment><comment><USER16> So many times I've had an idea and not long later someone has come out with that exact product - not because they stole it from me but because they come up with it themselves. The ability to execute on that idea is much more important.

<comment><USER17> >So many times I've had an idea and not long later someone has come out with that exact product - not because they stole it from me but because they come up with it themselves.

Right.

I believe that as we collectively walk toward the horizon of what's possible, new things become visible to lots of us at roughly the same time.

>The ability to execute on that idea is much more important.

Sort of.

Thing is, patents seem to reward not the ability to execute, so much as the ability to execute first on what is rapidly being revealed as obvious due to the advancing horizon.

Executing fastest seems to be equated to the result being non-obvious and ignores the reality that parallel development towards the same end is likely.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> First of all, one cannot 'steal' your idea. You still have it...

Actually I have taken an idea from the company I was working at. They kicked me out and I started my own company developing a very similar software, but I believe it is more successful, not because of technical superiority or so, but more due to customer empathy. Most people love to work with me, because I deliver quality and on time, in contrast to my former company. So I have a slightly bad feeling, but a) hey, they kicked me out and b) I treat customers much better than they did.

</comment><comment><USER19> Ideas are indeed cheap and not particularly scarce.

Yet, when you're implementing that idea or talking to a business about buying your implementation of an idea, it is no longer a run of the mill idea. If your or your client's competitor gets wind of what you're doing, they may try to use that knowledge in their role as competitive antagonist. After all, business is war.

Further, ideas can eventually become methods honed by experience. I worked for a company that discovered attempts to sell their system had the unintended consequence of providing valuable consultation to the prospective client. The prospective client could then use hard-won information on how to roll an in- house implementation. They would do this even if the costs were higher, to avoid relying on an external service. In the end, the company ended up charging for consultation, for some reason, bit their tongue when national news credited the client for the innovation.

<comment><USER20> > After all, business is war.

Not true, not even metaphorically as with team sports. War is about literal destruction whereas business is a competition in production and creativity.

<comment><USER19> War is about much more than literal destruction, even aside from the easy example of a cold war. War has long been a concern of the appropriation of wealth and power and the destructiveness varies. Sometimes a city was sacked with all its men killed and women taken as property. Sometimes a city would be left largely intact but held under a different banner. Sometimes cities or countries are blockaded and sieged in order to starve them into submission. Then there are sneakier and more covert operations intended to destabilize from within.

Creativity, ingenuity and perseverance can provide success in either war and business, but it's never a guarantee. Consider Edwin Howard Armstrong, who experienced the destruction of his life after he invented FM radio.

Those who wage wars are not necessarily those who actually fight in them. Though it would be distasteful and wrong to equate the plight of an embattled soldier with that of a corporate employee, their metaphorical role as chess pieces to occasionally sacrifice is not without convention.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> There is definitely a great divide on whether to keep an idea secret or not. Locations and the social circles you are apart of matter quite a bit; I live in SF and work in PA and I'm surrounded by very capable people. I have had ideas stolen that I was in mid process of building, particularly by an EIR's (entrepreneur in residence) who had better resources than I and were able to execute much faster. And it turned out to be a success in the app store.<br/> For those who say its ridiculous to keep things secret--I think they aren't surrounded by very capable people who are willing to do anything to be successful. Apple, (a pretty successful company), is highly known for keeping their ideas secret. You know why? Because they have burned in the past, just like I have and others around me. Product test as secretly as you can, build a capable product, not an MVP, and hit the market hard!

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure Apple's a great example. They keep their ideas secret for marketing reasons: they get immense amounts of free advertising by being dramatic about new product launches. And because they burnish their brand by maximizing their number of public hit products. (They also keep some details of incremental improvements secret because it's a highly competitive market, but that's different than stealing ideas for new products.)

In fact, I'm having trouble thinking of a "big new idea" product they did recently. They were years late to the MP3 player and smartphone markets, for example.

Since the idea's out, would you mind saying more about the idea that was stolen?

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I deal with this every day when I meet founders. They tell me that they're keeping their idea under-wraps because they don't want anyone to steal it or pass it on to someone who could.

Not once has any of these people succeeded with this approach. On the other hand, Joel at Bufferapp who I've been watching since the early days was very public. Got out there to find out if people wanted the product pre-MVP and when there was an MVP he let people use it. Today they're based in SF, have strong revenue, a team, venture funding and hundreds of thousands of users.

The people with "stealth companies" that succeed are serial founders with money behind them. Most of the time they don't keep it under-wraps, they just don't share it online. If you ask them what they're doing they'll tell you and they're constantly getting out there talking to partners, investors, etc. Many of these companies fail such as Color.

Unless you're starting a new national airline that could be stopped if a competitor found out what you are doing and went to congress or partners to block you from entering the market.

I recommend talking to competitors if you're put in a situation with one. This is something I've done and they've been very helpful, on one occasion one helped me out without intending to by talking about why one feature probably wouldn't work without a tweak because they found out it doesn't work without X.

In the end it's about execution. Get as much as you can out of the door as you can and learn as much about the market as you can.

I actually wrote an article about this a new months ago: <http://brack.in/post/32461803751/stealth-is-bullshit>

<comment><USER23> "one helped me out without intending to by talking about why one feature probably wouldn't work without a tweak because they found out it doesn't work without X."

Didn't you just disprove your whole point there. Your competitor revealed his/her ideas about how to solve a problem (that you hadn't even foreseen yet going by your description) and in the process hurt him/herself in the marketplace. Your advice of meeting and talking openly with your competitors didn't really work out for that person.

<comment><USER22> No because they also received value from me explaining what we're building and he was very interested by it. They are a much bigger market-leading competitor so it's not a case that people will deal with every day.

I can understand why someone wouldn't want to talk to a competitor but not when dealing with normal founders, users, etc. As you pointed out it can be risky but overall being open usually leads to a net positive.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I feel like one point that is missing in this conversation is that sometimes when you don't talk to people about your ideas you miss out on a lot!

I frequent a lot of technical mixers in the region and I talk to a lot of people about their ideas (and sometimes about my ideas). Not to mention validation (how many people get excited about your idea), but there are a lot of helpful criticism or leads to be found by telling people your idea.

There were a ton of folks that, after having heard what they were doing, I was able to point them to similar entries in the field ("your idea sounds really similar to this existing site, but they're different because of X") or to tools that could help them ("hey, have you heard of twilio/stripe/etc, because that could help you bootstrapped quickly", or "hey, you should talk to X, he's actually working on related topic and could give you some insight").

If you're some huge company (Apple, Facebook, Google) you already have a huge pool of internal brains to pick. If you're one lone entrepreneur on a mission, I'd say you benefit a lot more from telling good people about your idea than it is to stay mum about it.

</comment><comment><USER25> If the person you're talking to is really capable of executing your idea (chances of that are small to begin with), he/she is probably also smart enough that they have their own ideas they're more interested in than yours.

<comment><USER26> That depends. I know that HN is more focused on ideas that boil down to making a website, the concept isn't true in the general case. For example, if you're doing ASIC/FPGA optimization, coming up with an idea is hard, and implementing one is (relatively) easy.

<comment><USER25> I used to be an IC designer - ICs are an exception. There are some exceptions of course - medical drugs are another that come to mind.

Most business ideas are pretty simple though, even outside the internet world. Eg. Sam Walton -> just wanted to build a better retail store, turned into Walmart. Howard Schulz -> better coffee shop -> Starbucks. Warren Buffett -> stockpicking -> BRK. And so on. Execution on these was the hard part.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I really wish we could stop having this semantics debate over the word "worthless." When one side says "ideas are worthless," they're saying that they have no quantifiable monetary value until executed. When the other side responds with "ideas aren't worthless," they're arguing against the notion that ideas are of no use at all.

We've been arguing over two definitions of the same word for years, and both sides have been correct all along.

</comment><comment><USER28> I had an idea stolen. It was pure philosophy... a means to help a woman understand how her man is motivated. Not a male / female thing, but that was a very marketable aspect, and (thus) the way I communicated the idea. It was butchered, but still sold $4m in books. The butchery got worse over two sequels. I seriously doubt that I will ever be able to communicate said idea (much less sell it) unless I can completely reconstruct its presentation.

Not saying that I disagree with the idea vs execution rhetoric here in the comments, I do agree... execution is more important. Execution in plant growing is more important than the seeds themselves... unless you lack the seeds.

Some here have said that at the right moment any arbitrary number of people will discover idea X. I would agree if the subtlety of the idea is not arbitrary, however the best ideas are unexpectedly early, and therefore subtle.

Do not mistake any of this as an argument for patents, or even fairness in a general sense. I know business is war. One's only recourse is carefulness, caution, the sacred texts called it wisdom.

</comment><comment><USER29> The author has little to no idea how many trade secret cases are brought each year in the U.S., and the conviction rate stemming from thos cases. The staggering number is simply too overwhelming to simply write such an igonrant article.

The fact is that ideas are stolen at a rate more common than anyone's guess. Most companies have a NDA/non-compete agreement for a reason. While the know- hows might not be readily apparent, reverse engineering is not far from outcry. While a good idea requires flawless execution to make a successful business, the majority of the population fails to understand that the idea, or the conception, is all that is needed to take that freedom of operation from you...just ask any patent attorney.

</comment><comment><USER30> Ideas don't succeed by themselves. Different people will build differently and therefor succeed accordingly. Hire talented people so that you can reduce the risk of failure by solving your problem better than anyone else. If you can execute better than anyone then you shouldn't be worried about people chasing your idea.

You only realize how much commitment is required when you get around working on a project. People don't really have the time to build your dream. even If someone steals your idea, they will only get to the first version of your product, you have the vision for the later versions and updates (you'll always be ahead of the game).

</comment><comment><USER31> Note that there is a difference between trade secret and a cool idea you have. If you have an idea that has been implemented, it's a really smart plan to keep it secret: if the idea's found out, your competition will also likely know how valuable it is. They'll know it's worth implementing. But unimplemented ideas are only as useful as their implementation. And getting people to go along with your ideas? Well, that's where ramming it down their throats comes in. And if your idea is obvious, well, it's not really a trade secret either.

And a trade secret's valuable because it has at least some protection legally.

</comment><comment><USER32> Immitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

A local startup raised over $300k after stealing my work and trying to pass it off as their own but they had no idea how to execute on it after they raised. They're now grasping at how to find product-market fit and they've pivoted thrice because they can't pull-off what they ripped-off. We've found companies in Europe that came up with the same idea because the verticals we work in are more evolved there. Seeing others conjuring similar ideas validates that we're on the right track in a new market ripe with opportunity.

</comment><comment><USER33> Since we don't manufacture much in the US anymore it's becoming unpatriotic to not worship intellectual "property." It's almost all we've got. But still, some very successful people have chimed in to the contrary:

Napolean Hill (Think and Grow Rich): Ideas without action are impotent

Thomas Edison: Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration (he became a litigious bastard anyway)

If you're in business to make money, almost without exception it's going to be all about making and keeping people happy. That takes ongoing work, it only starts with an idea.

</comment><comment><USER34> If you have visible success, you have a target on your back. If you don't, your risk of getting ripped off is small, and as the author puts it, you have to force your ideas down people's throats.

Look at what happens when something like Twitter or Ebay takes off. The idea isn't difficult to clone at all, and quickly you see competitors of all sorts show up -- often very experienced and well capitalized.

Those two companies got protection not from patents and other paperwork, but from network effects and the first mover advantage.

</comment><comment><USER35> It's quite conceivable that someone will steal your idea, if it's a good one. The question is the degree to which they can impact your ultimate execution of the idea--and that depends on a range of factors, from market dynamics to your own ingenuity.

Whenever I hear a common refrain in an industry that something doesn't happen, I know immediately that it absolutely does happen, but that acknowledging it doesn't fit with the existing culture for some reason.

</comment><comment><USER36> I think this notion varies depending on whether one is discussing B2C or B2B.

I would love for some smart folks to "steal" my idea, and build a real marketplace for spot-freight, but nobody with talent seems interested. I believe this has to do with a lack of knowledge about the specific industry. As a result, I've been building a solution myself, slowly but surely.

</comment><comment><USER37> If you're just at the "idea stage", then no one is going to steal your idea.

If you've progressed further and have some traction, some lessons learned in customer acquisition channels, etc., _then_ you should be cautious about what you share because your information has real value.

</comment><comment><USER38> You may want to avoid sharing your ideas with anyone who has a keen understanding of the patent system.

If you get out-executed, its your fault for not executing. If someone steals your execution because they patented your idea, then it might have been better to keep your mouth shut.

</comment><comment><USER39> Mohnish Pabrai explains this concept of "cloning" really well: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBXRNH9VfhA&feature=youtu...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBXRNH9VfhA&feature=youtu.be)

</comment><comment><USER40> I would think there is value in the NDA for the legal side of VC/Funding. Isn't protecting one's Intellectual Property seen as prudent, and one of the checkboxes to check in evaluating a business plan?

</comment><comment><USER41> On related note, I let fear of plagiarism be an excuse not to publish content to blogs. I've since found free tools (i.e. Copyscape) that help protect content creators.

</comment><comment><USER42> Sharing your ideas with the right people helps make them better. The more feedback I get on an idea, the better I am able to nurture it and execute it in a useful way.

</comment><comment><USER43> I disagree what the article is talking about. I believe the ideas matter! but most of them just don't work, we need to try them out and get the right one.

</comment><comment><USER44> ideas that are easy to reproduce and implement can be easily stolen. for example, you buy a Groupon clone for a few hundred bucks, in some countries these clones are more dominant than Groupon itself.

</comment><comment><USER45> sure - but signing a generic NDA on a cheap piece of copy paper doesn't cost much...so w/e, if it makes someone feel better then don't worry about it.

<comment><USER46> I'd respectfully disagree -- it depends who you are. Many entrepreneurs, rightly or wrongly, will treat that NDA as their own provisional patent/trademark/copyright. What if you sign that NDA and start working on a related project? (Or an unrelated project that becomes related, or a project that independently comes up with similar ideas/tech?).

The problem with signing an NDA is that by definition you're not sure what you're about to see. If you sign one and then the entrepreneur says "so my idea is to send a rocket to Mars" and you later take a job a SpaceX, get ready to be pursued (again, rightly or wrongly.)

In general, it's not good advice to take a "whatever" attitude with legal documents. The fewer you're bound to, the better.

<comment><USER45> good point. I guess where I would have a legal objection to that line of thought is that an NDA != patent/trademark/copyright - and if it does then it is not strictly an NDA. Certainly maintaining independence of legal bindings is a nice freedom, but knowing what you sign (or choose not to sign) is probably the smart thing to do for any legal document.

"The problem with signing an NDA is that by definition you're not sure what you're about to see." - I am not sure I agree with this (sorry for being picky). To me an NDA means you won't share some material with another party. Whether you already know what that material is or not doesn't really have much to do with what an NDA is. That being said, odds are you won't know beforehand...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> ... but somebody can out-execute you on your own idea.

</comment><comment><USER48> I guess someone has never seen the social network.

</comment><comment><USER49> The problem is that there are companies and people with way more resources than you out there.

They could take your idea and execute it faster and maybe even better than you.

Look at Zynga: They continue to rip-off smaller developers because they have a much bigger pool of resources.

<comment><USER50> There are ideas that big companies will never execute - because throwing 5000-20000$ per month might be simply not worth that.

Recommended reading: The Bootstrapper's Bibles

<comment><USER49> What if my idea is big? Should I just hope they won't take it from me?

<comment><USER50> I see several option:

1) double check your idea. I have not come to any unique idea of my own that is not implemented yet or not in implementation stage. In some cases implementations are really poor but still they exist.

2) You have some know-how what makes implementation of your idea successful. They can steal your idea but they will fail to implement it successfully (some comments in this discussion give example of this).

Let's say your idea is really big and you implement it first. So what? If it is really good to be copied they will copy it faster than you will get your first paying customers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> Except for Zuck, he'll steal the shit outta your Hipster Coffee Shop Wifi app.

<comment><USER52> Ha ha ... Too good as an example. I also agree that it better be safe than sorry.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How many hours do you work? - <AUTHOR> I keep finding my self working 50-60 hours a week. Is this normal? <comment><USER3> I work from home, and typically I'm "In the office," about 32-40 hours a week.

I find that I can sustain a max of about 4 hours of focused work (programming) a day before I'm just mentally worked over. If there isn't more project management/coordination work to do, then I'll just call it a day.

There have been short seasons where I've averaged quite a bit more, but I don't know that I was ever actually more productive. For me it feels like I hit a point at which there is no more work to be wrung out of me, no matter how long I sit in a chair.

At the same time, I find that work is often on my mind during the rest of my life, and here and there an idea pops up while I'm engaged in another activity.

I used to do contract programming and found that was the hardest part - <USER2> brain was at work a lot of the time outside of "work hours," but how was I ever going to Bill the client for that?

<comment><USER4> "For me it feels like I hit a point at which there is no more work to be wrung out of me, no matter how long I sit in a chair."

This sentence made me laugh a little bit to hard. I know where you are coming from.

Don't forget to do a small weird dance every hour or so. To move those muscles and the keep blood flowing to all corners of body.

<comment><USER3> Standing desk keeps me alive, for sure.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I have RescueTime installed and so this is what it says for last week:

61h 54m logged 87 is productivity pulse

29% software dev 29% communication & scheduling 16% design

I'm a CEO of a data startup. I'm still coding a lot & do all the product design. Comms has increased thanks to more sales meetings etc.

What's missing from this is ~1hr of emailing in the morning & again in the evening on my iPad Pro every day (no tracking on the iPad).

Have been doing this for months and it's rough as hell. Hoping this is the last month as we'll be hiring people to start filling in the roles I don't have time to do any more.

I'm also very aware that none of this sustainable.

</comment><comment><USER6> Used to work (IT, game/web development) 40h max a week. And could barely handle it. As I grow older (33) the tolerance is going down. My body asks for more exercise and less sitting (or standing doesn't matter) hours. So 40h a week is too much now. I'm at 25-30h tops. So I try to make the most with that time. Of course I must say that I have a condition, since I was a kid, that makes me feel terrible if I sit for too long (more than normal). Circulation or something. My pressure goes way down I guess when I'm concentrated (going to the movies was hell). So I learned to be effective and do a lot in less time. I now only work at home. Thank god. My goal is to work 3, 4 hours a day tops.

<comment><USER7> Can you elaborate on how you learned to be that effective? I'd much rather work less, but I find I can't get work done in 40 hours, and my coworkers doing the same work can. I often need to put in some extra hours here and there.

<comment><USER8> I'm also working part-time, although I had a lot of full-time jobs with varying intensity. I noticed for me most time gets eaten by tasks that I'm either stuck on or that progress really slowly for various reasons. E.g. something I do all the time is too slow like the editor, the build/test cycles or finding the reason for an exception because there are no logs. Usually I always make myself time to also optimize these things and also communicate that in meetings. And when planning of tasks happens, I try to get involved, understand what kind of work that would mean and discuss that. (Estimation is undervalued I think) And of course get a deep as possible understanding of the core technologies, that makes work also more fluent in the long-term. This way you also have increased idle times between tickets/pull request and it's possible to put more time into such general optimizations.

At least that's my strategy. It's definitely not a career-booster but the results are good.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> About 15 hours a week. I sometimes ramp it up if I've got a new project that I'm excited about but over the long term it always drifts back down again.

When I look back to my employee and contracting days although I was on site for eight hours a day I wasn't really doing any more than three or four hours worth of work.

<comment><USER10> What do you do that you can work 15 hours per week?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I actually wrote about that yesterday: [https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2020/07/11/1830](https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2020/07/11/1830)

I'm doing roughly four hours of 30m calls a day (which completely destroys any real productivity I have), plus around two hours of actual "focus time". The overhead and fragmentation implied pushes this to a 10-12h daily range, which is becoming a serious issue as I can't find the time to plan or do quality work right now.

<comment><USER7> I feel the same way! I don't know how to get work done when there are so many meetings and random events, and yet my employer expects us to get it all done within 40 hours (and will be concerned if you can't).

<comment><USER10> Exactly!

I try to work my minimum 40 hours. After doing more for years and not getting rewarded/promoted, I don't see a point of doing more. Everybody else works more than me, so I'll never be promoted again but at least I won't be wasting my life. It is very stressful though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> As an independent contractor, I worked 5 billable hours a day and an hour or 2 on top of that.

I worked alone with almost no distractions. Just me and 3 dogs in the country.

<comment><USER10> Sounds like you're living the dream. I want land in the country but my wife won't move.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Before COVID, I was in the office about 35 hours a week and had about 10 productive WFH hours in the evenings.

Since perma-WFH, I "work" for maybe 65 hours and get at most 15 hours of actual work done.

</comment><comment><USER14> Probably 20-30 hours per week? I'm paid for full-time. Company is very happy with me. I wish I could give them more, but that's pretty much my maximum.

</comment><comment><USER15> 24 hours a week over 3 days. I went part time the other year since working 37.5 official hours (actually more) was full of arguing, battles and stress at work. I realised having a life was more important than work.

Work is part of your life, not your life. I work to live, not live to work. No gravestone ever tells you how much money a guy made. It only mentions being a loving father, husband or son.

<comment><USER16> Are you still able to pay all your bills? What do you do? I'd love to do something like this but the opportunities seem to be few and far between

<comment><USER15> Yes, I ensure that my outgoings are low. I have a mortgage to pay (it isn't a luxurious area, so the house prices aren't astronomical) but before moving to 3 days I ensured that I cleared debts on cars/credit cards (eg. do you really need a brand new car?), so it isn't an overnight change. I have a strict budget (just a spreadsheet) where I allocate a portion of money to "going out", an allocated amount to fuel and then other bills and rates, car maintenance and insurance (saving up over the year so you can pay at a lump sum when required, saving up in advance, as it is cheaper to pay a lump than pay monthly for car insurance) and any left over goes to a holiday fund or savings. The secret is to religiously stick to the budget! And over-allocate for each section; when you spend less on a section you will be pleasantly surprised and have spare cash, eg. assume 400 for food when you know it is only 300 (just an example). Alternatively, put a smaller figure for your monthly income than you actually earn and you will always have spare cash at the end of the month, eg. if you earn 1000 put 900 and try to live off that. You'll always be 100 better off at the end of the month then.

I do not have many services that I rent, eg. I only have Netflix. I don't have a contract phone - I went SIM-only and bought an Honor Play phone outright since the cost of that was far less than a contract phone per year. I have a large music collection that I bought when I was younger (spent all my money on that really), so you might consider a music subscription service good value but I don't need it myself. I occasionally rent a film, or make use of an Amazon Prime offer to watch stuff on there for a week (and then cancel to avoid an on-going debit) or Google Play movie offers. It is cheaper than going to the cinema and you don't have to listen to someone else eating popcorn with their mouth open.

Sure, I have less to go out and spend on luxuries (a couple of CDs a month perhaps, a book) but I get to spend more time with my wife. Who cares what you eat if you are together (do I really need a gourmet meal to enjoy my wife's company?). You end up enjoying nature more instead of "things".

I see some of my contemporaries being unaware of what they spend per month (literally no clue), and have leased cars, many foreign holidays (pre- lockdown), and rent many services eg. music subscriptions, Grammarly ?!, VPS they don't need, Sky, TV licence, the list goes on and on. And then they are confused why they work so much, and always "run out of money" by the end of the month. It's blindingly obvious - they spend too much on things they don't need, and don't have time to use because they are busy working to pay for them...

Many of these subscription services rely on you not noticing that small fee going out of your account, yet they all add up. If you add them up and work out how much they are per year, you would likely be shocked and consider it poor value. You would probably rather spend the value of the subscriptions on something else - perhaps a holiday or a trip.

If you can aim to live on half or two-thirds of your income, you can save a lot and then you have a bit less worry about incoming crisis bills (eg. broken fridge). We are careful where we shop for food. If you can make a meal plan for the week you will spend less on food since you only buy what you need for those meals. You will throw out less. I am eating a lot more rice these days as potatoes seem to upset my stomach, and the good thing is that rice can be bought in giant bags very cheaply. It is also filling and goes a long way!

For a job, I write software. I try to occasionally supplement it with contract work but I am more of a programmer than a salesman so my success in this area is quite limited!

I was not able to do this when I was younger since I did not earn as much, and foolishly spent all my money than I earned. Getting into debt taught me to keep an eye on what I spend and be strict about spending, so that was a beneficial lesson from that perspective. I wish you success - just look after the pennies, and the pounds will surely look after themselves.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I don't know about it being _normal_ but it's not out of line. I tend to work 10 hours/day 5 days a week and have been doing so for the past 35 years. There have been times when I've worked 60-70 hours/week and I can tell you that's less productive than working 50 hours/week because fatigue makes things worse - those extra hours are actually working against you. As a result I've learned you can't work more then 10 hours/day and you need _at least_ one day off per week. That means the max you can work is 60 hours/week, and that's not sustainable. You can do that a few weeks but you can't sustain that. 50 hours/week is both sustainable and doesn't work against you. As with anything, YMMV. 50 hours/week is what _I_ have found I can sustain. Your sustainability rate may be more or less. You need to find what works best for you.

<comment><USER18> Early in my career, I routinely worked 50 hrs/wk. Not on purpose; I just preferred to get to the office early to avoid the morning rush hour, and I often stayed around late to get a drink with co-workers after work. I was always productive, and it wasn't until years later that I realized that 50 hrs/wk adds up to an extra 3 months/yr.

Same job, about six years into it, a major project came up that I had staked my reputation on. For almost six months, I was working 80-100 hrs/wk. It _destroyed_ me. My metabolism shut down, my thyroid was damaged. My body temperature dropped from 98.6F to 97F, and overnight while I slept it dropped to 96F and I had trouble waking up in the mornings. I found out later that if it had dropped any lower than that, my body would not have been able to warm itself back up. It took about a decade for my temperature to return to normal, but I still need thyroid medication. And my ability to work long hours has never returned; it's a good thing productivity continues to increase with experience. I work a lot smarter now.

EDIT: the project was a success, at least. My boss was awarded employee of the year, but I was awarded second employee of the year, which was the only time they did that. I also got a little engraved glass plaque, the kind that comes from a corporate gifts catalog. Maybe a $50 gift card too. _So worth destroying my metabolism for over a decade._

<comment><USER10> Figures your boss would win it...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> So much of "normal" depends what _your_ objective is.

If you are very career driven, work at a startup, or would like to generate additional opportunities for your own advancement - 60hrs a week might be normal.

In my own experience, you stop measuring work by hours at that point, and convert to measurement by results (which, if you are ambitious, leads to more hours actually worked).

If you want to work fewer hours because you don't want to prioritize your work or career (to spend time with friends or family, other passions, etc), that's fine. There are probably folks with that mindset who would view 30 hours as normal.

Personally, I am at my office working 12hrs a day 5 days a week. Then about 10 hours on Sunday.

But that's because my objective at this phase of my life is to build a winning business and maximize the value of our equity.

Your objective is probably different from mine, but hopefully not different from those you are working with.

</comment><comment><USER20> I spend about 4-6 hours a day (M-F) in meetings or doing focused work, and probably another hour or so per day doing less taxing things like organizing my notes & responding to emails.

I've definitely had busier times throughout my career where I've worked 50-60 hours a week, and I know others who work those hours pretty regularly, so OP's schedule is "normal" for some situations or types of people -- but definitely taxing enough to cause burnout and not a schedule I'd recommend maintaining long term if there's any way to reduce those hours.

I agree with the other responses in this thread suggesting that you can really only get ~4 hours of focused work done in a day.

OP, if you can cut some of your low-impact hours where you're working but not really getting much done, that's probably a good place to start.

</comment><comment><USER21> My work week is generally 30 hours or so, which provides me more than enough to provide for both myself and another, as well as excess for savings.

If you're working that long, I feel the other parts of your life may be suffering. Do you have a fixed time contract or are you contracting?

<comment><AUTHOR> Fix employment and yeah it's a strain on my marriage. The business is going through a transition and needs some help. I'm doing what I can. It's just been a few months now and I've seen it at previous jobs. I don't mind a little extra here and there but I'm not sure if I should push back on work or on my wife's expectations of me being home more

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I think it's normal to work 50-60 hours a week if you don't actively track your time. When I was going to the office, I actually worked a lot less. I averaged around 35-40 hours. Now that we all are remote, I find myself working 45-50 hours a week. It's too easy to accidentally go over since I do not have to worry about leaving the office at a particular time due to commuting. However, in general, I feel much more relaxed then before and I do not mind the extra work. I do not let it get out of control since, every hour I work extra, my salary per hour decreases. I like to keep it as high as I can since it makes me feel that my time is worth it.

<comment><USER10> "every hour I work extra, my salary per hour decreases"

It amazes me that more people don't realize this. I work for a financial company and most people don't realize this. My company also expects people to be happy with a 7% raise when being promoted, but they expect a 15% increase in hours.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I personally think it's not "normal" in this century to work so many hours a week especially for someone who reads/posts on HN. If you're referring to whether it's "common", that depends on which industry, country, company you're in and the kind of work you're doing. For some professions (like lawyers in certain countries or doctors almost everywhere), 80-100 hour weeks are common.

If you're in tech and you're not automating your tasks as much as possible, then you need to dig deeper on doing that. Even if you're not in tech but you use computing technology for work, you should look at ways to avoid repetitive manual work.

</comment><comment><USER24> Currently I'm working as a contractor, with a pretty low cap on the number of hours I'm allowed to bill. My current schedule looks like this:

Monday: 9am-4pm

Tuesday: 9am-2pm

Wednesday I take off.

Thursday and Friday I do childcare.

There is a little bit of flexibility, but on average I'm working 12 hours a week. I'm going back to working "full time" soon, which will involve 9AM-4:30PM Monday-Friday. On the one hand having more work will be good, but on the other hand losing the extra time spent with our child will be hard.

</comment><comment><USER25> 50ish hours give or take 10. I'd say a good 10-15 of those hours are researching and studying material on how to improve current projects and my own development. It's greatly beneficial for the company I work for and myself in my opinion.

A good example is gRPC. We all can use it no problem, but using it correctly and efficiently is outside the scope of some teams so I like to spend the time to understand it deeper and spread that knowledge within our groups.

</comment><comment><USER26> I'm a full time software engineer and it depends for me. Some weeks I'll work 30-35 and others I'll work 45-50, depending upon what projects are in flight and at what stage we are at in the project. I don't mind the weeks where I'm working a little longer as my job is well-paid and flexible where I'm able to "leave" (I work from home) early for the day fairly often when I feel I'm at a good stopping point.

</comment><comment><USER27> I aim for four chunks of pomodoros per day, split in two sets by a long two hour lunch (plus gym some days). So that's about 8.66 hours of focused work time per day.

But in reality I miss about 1-2 pomodoros every day due to unforeseen events, procrastination, latenesss and so on.

I work mostly 5 days per week, but sometimes I'll work on Saturday too if I'm feeling good that day and nothing else better to do.

I'm a freelancer and building my own product.

</comment><comment><USER28> Maybe 2 hours a day, max. There just isn't that much work to go around where I am, honestly.

</comment><comment><USER29> 40 hours most weeks but when a project deadline is nearing then it might be 45 hours. You don't generally get any utility from working longer and actually are more productive with a lesser schedule. Burn out is very real.

</comment><comment><USER30> I'm a student having summer holiday. Right now I'm programming 10-12 hours every day trying to launch a MVP before I start Uni in September. I basically only take time off if I have to visit family or friends.

</comment><comment><USER31> As a consultant with large clients (Cloud Platform Engineering) - 40 hours.

Previously I worked as an Ops / Platform Team Lead for a NFP that was around 130 people - 40 to 70 hours as I was very emotionally invested.

</comment><comment><USER32> Only as many hours as are necessary to get the work done. I'm done trying to use my own graft as a means of getting ahead, which is why I'm a manager.

</comment><comment><USER33> SrSDE / Scala. Not normal. I used to do 37-38 hours as contractor. Little bit more as a fulltime, but there is some overlap with my hobbies.

</comment><comment><USER34> 10 to 14 hours a day

HOWEVER

A) Around 4 hours of this is on 'must do and not very productive work'

B) So in effect there is just 6 to 10 hours of work a day on vital stuff

<comment><USER10> Are you hourly or salary?

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Plan for 35 hours a week, but expect to work 80 hours a week periodically. Averages out around 45 hours.

</comment><comment><USER36> 6-8 hours a day, rarely productive more than that and actually only hands on 4-5 hours max

</comment><comment><USER37> It depends. Do what works for you. How productive do you feel? There is no right answer.

</comment><comment><USER38> About 2-3 hours per day.

</comment><comment><USER39> Not normal. 32 hours/week.

</comment><comment><USER40> that's fairly close to what i typically do :-/

probably around 48-55

</comment><comment><USER10> 40 per week

</comment><comment><USER41> Not normal.

</comment><comment><USER42> 20, though I am recently unemployed. :)

</comment><comment><USER43> 40 maybe.

</comment><comment><USER44> 40

</comment><comment><USER45> How many hours does it take?</comment>


Clean Links – Converts obfuscated or nested links to genuine clean links - <AUTHOR> https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/clean-links/ <comment><USER2> This seems to work pretty well on Google search results. If you haven't noticed, Google search has this anti-feature bordering on the dark pattern where hovering a link shows the correct destination URL but right-clicking it (eg. to copy the destination URL) instantly replaces it with an nested Google redirect (I assume they're doing this for the tracking, statistics, etc.)

<comment><USER3> The google redirect does tracking and referer hiding. You'll want to be sure that your browser does referer hiding if you go direct to the link.

<comment><USER4> Can someone explain why my browser provides referer info at all? Why isn't this a permission I need to give away? What common features that the _user_ needs on the web rely on it?

<comment> chestnut-tree If you are using Firefox, you can disable referrer info without using a plugin. Here's how:

In the URL bar, type the following and press enter:

      about:config

Now search for the following entry on the page:

      network.http.sendRefererHeader

The default value is 2. Change this to 0. This disables the referrer header.

Note that some sites won't allow you to sign in or register if the referrer header is disabled (e.g. Pinterest), so you may have to temporarily enable the referrer header in those instances.

A final point is that this Firefox setting obviously has no effect if referral info is already appended to the URL (as is the case with Google search results).

<comment><USER5> Alternatively, you can instead set

        network.http.referer.spoofSource

The default value is false. Change it to true. This causes Firefox to instead submit the website being requested as the referrer; leaking no information, but breaking fewer sites.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > About the Developer:

      Name 	     Diego Casorran
      Homepage   http://goo.gl/eyC52

The irony is strong with this one...

</comment><comment><USER7> This addon currently does not work with e10s / multi-process, just fyi for anyone trying it on a beta/alpha/nightly build of Firefox.

</comment><comment><USER8> That's awesome! This is needed for Chrome as well.

<comment><USER9> I just found & installed the "Copy Real Url" [1] Chrome Extension which adds a context menu item to copy the 'clean' url on Google and other sites. It works well and the code is simple and short.

[1] [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copy-real- url/opel...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copy-real- url/opelelcojgjgddbfhlolihhdmjodmjdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> We do some of that in Ad Limiter, for some ad links. We want to know the real destination site so we can rate it for legitimacy. Ad Limiter puts the real destination URL back into the DOM, so if the user does click on the ad, ad tracking is bypassed. This is just a side effect of rating. But if users like it, we could do more of this.

I'd considered making HEAD requests for all ad links to try to track through all the redirectors and ad services to the final site. That would probably result in lots of fake clicks for advertisers, though. There's also the question of what ad networks do with a HEAD request. Time to look at this again and run some tests.

</comment><comment><USER11> Why isn't this working on mobile Firefox? The install button is greyed out for me.

<comment><USER6> Replace "firefox" in the URL with "android", then it works.

Alternatively, just go the usual route of Menu->Tools->Add-ons->"Browse all Firefox Add-ons"->Search for "Clean Links"...

<comment><USER12> Thank you. Paying it forward by putting the link here.

[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/clean- links/?...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/clean- links/?src=search)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Very useful. Sad that this needs to be fixed using a plug-in or extension.

<comment><USER14> Be thankful that we still have plugins legal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> For Safari, I use the following extensions, which provide similar (but not identical) functionality:

[http://canisbos.com/directlinks](http://canisbos.com/directlinks)

[https://github.com/grahams/safari-utm- stripper](https://github.com/grahams/safari-utm-stripper)

</comment><comment><USER16> How does this differ from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en- US/firefox/addon/google-search...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en- US/firefox/addon/google-search-link-fix) ?

<comment><USER17> it works on sites other than google?

<comment><USER16> > it works on sites other than google?

Despite the name, so does the one that I linked. (I only see a mention of Yandex in the description, but I could have sworn it works on any page using the same tricks.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> How does this work? Does this just look for things that look similar to URLs in the parameters?

Especially: How does the unshortener work?

<comment><USER16> See hackernews2000's ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12064870](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12064870)) very nice comment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> There is another extension called redirector that does the same thing. Anyone knows of the differences?

<comment><USER20> Redirector ([https://github.com/einaregilsson/Redirector/](https://github.com/einaregilsson/Redirector/)) lets you create your own rules for all kinds of purposes and have complete control over them (including by testing them against different URLs).

The subject of this thread seems to come preloaded with some a bunch of URLs and strings and doesn't let you create separate manipulation rules. It's literally just a "cleaner".

Compare OP's link: [https://i.imgur.com/CZPkRYD.png](https://i.imgur.com/CZPkRYD.png)

To Redirector's power and reflexibility: [https://i.imgur.com/lYb9DtQ.png](https://i.imgur.com/lYb9DtQ.png)

As you can see, what Clean Links does can be done with a single Redirector rule, while having the power to create as many others as you want.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> How would this affect affiliate tracking on a site like Kayak or priceline? Wouldn't it scrub over the affiliate id? Seems like that could be a major headache for sites that use URLs to track referrals/sales.

<comment><USER22> Nature of the web, really. As a website, you control the content you send out to the user, but that's where it ends. If the client rewrites the content as per the user's needs or wants, that's out of the site owner's control (unless you want an arms race, of course, in which case it's pretty much lost by default for site owners vs all users on the planet)

<comment><USER23> the only way I can see around this would be to give every affiliate a unique hostname on the target domain. then the site owner would identify the affiliate using the hostname of the incoming request. next step in the arms race would then be for an addon to understand per-domain rules for rewriting hostnames. lather, rinse, repeat.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Anything similar for Chrome?</comment>


Simple Startup Cashflow Projections - <AUTHOR> https://docs.sendwithses.com/random-stuff/startup-cashflow-projections-spreadsheet <comment><USER2> FYI, this spreadsheet does not use words like income, profit, loss, expenditure, etc. in the same way that businesses and accountants use the terms. Be very careful if you're communicating these numbers to other parties - they may not interpret the words in the same way you intend them.

Example: Cash flow is not the same as profits/losses. If you buy a $1M CNC machine for $1M in cash, your profit is $0 but your cashflow is -$1M.

Example two: Expenditures are different from expenses. The date you agree to buy (and are legally contracted to buy) a $1M CNC machine may be different than the date that those funds leave your bank account. (And those dates may be different than the dates over which the $1M CNC machine depreciates and eventually breaks down.)

Issues like these two can cause a business to run out of cash, even when then business is making a legitimate profit. This is why an income statement detailing your profits & losses is not enough - you also need a cashflow statement.

<comment><USER3> > FYI, this spreadsheet does not use words like income, profit, loss, > expenditure, etc. in the same way that businesses and accountants use the > terms.

That's a very polite and roundabout way to say the spreadsheet is wrong...

<comment><USER4> The spreadsheet is not wrong. It's just named incorrectly. It should be called "Income Statement Generator" because that's exactly what it is.

<comment><USER5> It's not though. For example, the hardware/software purchases in month 1 are an expenditure, but would likely be a depreciation expense over a period of time.

<comment><USER4> Can you give an example? In Australia, you'd need to buy hardware or software for more than $30,000 per unit to be forced to depreciate it over multiple periods. Anything cheaper than $30,000 can be expensed right away. So I'm looking at it through Australian optics and having "Hardware/software" under expenses would be fine for almost every small business here.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, I guess you're right. It's just confusing to see them call the spreadsheet "Cashflow projections" and then use the words 'expenses' and 'profit/loss'. But then again, they also use 'expenditures', so who knows what they're going for. In their example spreadsheet (and to your point) I guess all the expenditures could correspond 1:1 with expenses, so in this case cashflow == profit maybe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There is a free (but polished) online app to do in-depth forecasting - [https://startuprunway.io](https://startuprunway.io) It's part of a suite of other related apps for financial planning of your next startup [https://ltse.com/tools](https://ltse.com/tools)

</comment><comment><USER7> Every founding team / management team should be doing this or something like this. Even early on. Pre-CFO. Angel stage, seed stage. Whatever.

When the "easy" money stops - which at some point it will - and raising "the next round" gets hard, cash flow is going to matter.

The concept that burn rate ticks down toward or "months until death" march to the next fundraise will not be an effective plan in that environment.

</comment><comment><USER8> Agreed!

I swear by this type of cash-flow-pro-forma. It becomes a model for the business that you can share with anyone involved in the business (or would like to be involved).

In some ways it becomes my simulation engine for the business. There are ways to alter the basic sheet for different purposes, but here are my basic add-ons or differences from the sendwithses.com version.

My sheet has:

* Metrics section at the top. This CAN be dollars or units, but it can also be non-accounting metrics that are key indicators of health or risk a project faces. Like foot traffic, downloads, hours of sleep...

* Assumptions at the BOTTOM of each month - that way you have room tell the story of the changes between months. If you plan to have radio / podcast interview in July on a particularly appropriate show with an audience that should LOVE your widget, then plan for it and note that in the assumptions for that month.

* Another column between months that expresses either formulaic or raw changes for that month. Meaning, 100 more widgets or 10% more widgets. If the change is exceptional, an explanation is written up in the assumption section at the bottom of the month - see above.

* A column for Month Actual. At a glance you know what is happening. You can go nuts and add a percentage difference or just a percentage difference and skip the Actual column.

* And a column for difference between Month Actual and Month Projected.

At first you'll want to hide the change (or delta) column and historical months, but depending which hat you are wearing when you use the sheet, you'll want to show and hide different things.

Everyone in the company / project should have their own, but there should be only one master sheet.

So glad atanpur shared this...in the thousands of clients I've had, this sheet had more impact than anything else. Whether they were kids or MBA smarty pants. Build one of these and you get to play out any scenario you like. You can share this with almost anyone - taking them on the tour for the first time is really fun.

<comment><USER9> Would love to see your version... do you mind sharing?

<comment><USER8> Good idea - I'll do a Show and Share within a week. I'm currently working two clients (one turnaround and one startup) through building this sheet, so I'll pay attention to the empty sheet and see how to make it more template-like.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> A bit tangential, but please for all that is good in this world, stop depending on static AWS IAM User keys in an integration product. [https://docs.sendwithses.com/how/how-to-generate-aws-keys- fo...](https://docs.sendwithses.com/how/how-to-generate-aws-keys-for-sending- emails-programmatically-via-simple-email-service-ses-).

You should absolutely be using cross-account roles which, with role assumption, vends ephemeral credentials when you need them. [https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/tutorial_cr...](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/tutorial_cross- account-with-roles.html)

A compromise of your vault (and hopefully not remote code execution) means the attacker at least can't blast a billion emails out at someone elses expense.

</comment><comment><USER11> Cashflow is an unavoidable and often difficult lesson to learn. Not a bad idea at all to have a simple version like this going from basically the beginning.

</comment><comment><USER12> Revenue can be recognized in the future and thus affect cash flow calc.

<comment><USER13> That won't really affect cash flow.. If you have to recognize 1/12th of an annual subscription every month for GAAP accounting, you still have 100% of the cash up front. Your monthly income statement will only show 1/12th of the revenue, but the balance sheet will have an accrued revenue liability equal to the remaining period while cash is just.. cash.</comment></comment>


Periods in Microsoft Azure usernames considered harmful - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Microsoft/vsts-tasks/issues/2405 <comment><AUTHOR> The person who closed the issue is a Microsoft employee, if it isn't clear.</comment>


SpaceX faults helium system for explosion - <AUTHOR> http://gizmodo.com/spacex-figured-out-why-its-expensive-rocket-exploded-1787007827?utm_campaign=socialflow_gizmodo_facebook&utm_source=gizmodo_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow <comment><AUTHOR> Source SpaceX update at [http://www.spacex.com/news/2016/09/01/anomaly- updates](http://www.spacex.com/news/2016/09/01/anomaly-updates)</comment>


Lazydocker: a terminal GUI for Docker - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/jesseduffield/lazydocker/blob/master/README.md <comment><USER2> This looks good.

I believe there is a lot of room for TUI tools like this. Modern terminals and TUI libraries are advanced enough to support splits, colors, clicks etc.

Why run a 600mb electron app when a small TUI app will do just fine. Even if it's a 30mb jar file that needs the jvm to run.

I also believe that constraints boost creativity and the fixed amount of rows/colums in a terminal and limited set of colors is great for that.

It's not because some of these TUIs run full screen that they need to completely drop the unix philosophy. Apps like Mutt, Tig etc frequently delegate to $EDITOR, diff, w3m and others.

Some of my favourite TUI apps:

* Tmux : windows/panes multiplexer

* Tig : git log/status/blame/stage

* Mutt : email

* Fzf : fuzzy finder

* Irssi : IRC

<comment><USER3> Another favourite of mine is mpsyt – a terminal interface for youtube-dl. I stream music for hours without ever getting ads or even having to have Youtube open in the browser.

<comment><USER4> That was pure gold. Thank you, sir.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There is also Dry - [https://moncho.github.io/dry/](https://moncho.github.io/dry/)

The best part about dry is using it through docker itself.

<comment><USER6> Oh thanks for sharing! I found this one more "mature"

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you like this you might like Glances. I use it on my home cluster to monitor Docker quickly. You can pull it up in a browser for extra laziness.

[https://nicolargo.github.io/glances/](https://nicolargo.github.io/glances/)

</comment><comment><USER8> I wish gocui had a simpler us-ascii based theme so I wouldn't have to fix utf-8 when connecting to remote in screen.

</comment><comment><USER9> When did terminals get clickables?

<comment><USER10> It's been a while, I've been using Vim that way for ~5 years now. It's just less well-known, but it works very well!

<comment><USER11> tmux tab number can be clicked too.

<comment><USER10> Yeah, I actually switched from MacVim + Terminal to iTerm + tmux + terminal VIM once I realized mouse support existed.

Bonus is that I can work remotely through SSH with that exact same setup!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> You may want to add high up the documentation that it works with both regular docker and docker-compose.

Without watching the whole video... I would have come away with the impression that it only works with compose.

</comment><comment><USER13> any trick to make it look good on a terminal with a light background? not very readable for me.

<comment><AUTHOR> I've just released a new version which works better with light backgrounds, so feel free to give that a shot and let me know your thoughts :)

<comment><USER13> Thanks! Looks much better :-)

One oddity, not sure if I have just not read the docs enough - but if I start it within the directory of a docker-compose project, it comes up completely blank. But running outside that directory shows all my containers / services (including running images inside the docker-compose project).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is fantastic. Thank you! Really well designed and intuitive. It will save me a lot of hassle monitoring containers on servers.

</comment><comment><USER15> Wonder if this will work in the new windows terminal... would be a good test app if it doesn't.

</comment><comment><USER16> Nice! Now let it use tmux-style navigation commands instead of a friggen mouse and I'd be happy.

</comment><comment><USER17> > Memorising docker commands is hard.

I wouldn't agree. Literally: run, build, delete, ps, rm.

<comment><USER18> docker logs --tail 1000 -F container-name is kind of a pain

</comment></comment><comment> yjftsjthsd-h That is a beautiful logo/icon. Also nice tool; will have to try it out.

</comment><comment><USER4> This is awesome. I want more.

</comment><comment><USER19> was there no such thing as kitematic?

<comment><USER20> This being terminal based means it can be used easily over ssh.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Looks really nice. For operational-types things, I do wonder if curses UI's are better than web UI's.

<comment><USER22> They're more practical: ssh into the server. start the tool. [do your stuff]... close the tool. close ssh session.

With a web UI: ssh into the server. find out you want to check your containers statuses. ssh again while binding some local port to a remote port. start the web UI service. open a browser window. enter the URL. [do your stuff]... close the browser window. go back to the terminal. close the web service. close ssh session.

<comment><USER23> The WebUI port forwards can be made a _bit_ more tolerable by using LocalForward in your ~/.ssh/config [1] assuming you're okay with the forwards being set up every time you log in. I agree that it's still clunky though; in- terminal tooling is generally preferable.

[1]: [https://linux.die.net/man/5/ssh_config](https://linux.die.net/man/5/ssh_config)

<comment><USER22> I tried that in a different context... The problem if you're managing many servers is that you'll have to setup a different local port for each server. When I needed it, I had to go check the .ssh/config each time to figure out which port was bound for this server. Did not save any time.

<comment><USER24> FWIW `DynamicForward` turns on a SOCKS5 proxy, so a dedicated Firefox profile[0] that has its proxy set to the dynamic forward port will be able to browse as if running on the remote machine. I believe remote DNS resolution, works, too. It still could clash ports if you have the same DynamicForward port for multiple ssh configs, but it can drastically reduce the number of port-collisions

0 = you are of course welcome to try running Chrome with `--proxy-server` et al, but I find Firefox a ton easier to use in that situation</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: PortManager – Manage ports from your macOS menu bar - <AUTHOR> http://portmanager.app/ <comment><USER2> Looks good.

Suggestion: Allow users to test the application before paying by only displaying 1 or 2 open ports and below that show something like "XXX more open ports [Unlock]".

You could encourage users to pay by adding a quick feature to display:

\- XXX standard open ports (ie: 21, 22, 80, 443)

\- XXX unknown open ports

\- XXX ports opened + closed past X minutes (monitoring)

The third line (open/closed) would be great for software that keeps opening/closing ports for unknown reasons, which could cause intermediate issues.

</comment><comment><USER3> Is there something similar on Linux? I'm tired of using netstat -anp | grep $PORT and then searching for that process. This is a nice utility.

<comment><USER4> I haven't tried this app, but lsof is usually very helpful at finding things like this on Linux.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Looks neat, and appears to work well.

I found the gumroad payment process a bit confusing. In particular, I wanted to first try before buying (among other reasons, apps like this have a tendency to fight the OS for permissions, so I wanted to be sure it works). I ended up ordering twice, once for $0 and the second time for >$0. Wish there had been an easier way.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for downloading the app and for the feedback, I'll think about how to improve the user experience for purchasing / trying before you buy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'd imagine this was made mostly with developers in mind, but this looks like an incredibly useful tool for Gaming. Mapping ports to set up dedicated servers with friends can be a huge hassle! This would have been great when I used to run Minecraft servers.

</comment><comment><USER8> Such a nice utility. And the experience written on the webpage is exactly me.

</comment><comment><USER9> Would killing work with docker containers as well?

<comment><USER6> Hey there. I'm relatively new to Docker but I can test this out and let you know. If not, I'll see if there's a way to make it work in a future update. Cheers</comment></comment>


California wants Silicon Valley to pay you a data dividend - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnet.com/news/california-wants-silicon-valley-to-pay-you-a-data-dividend/ <comment><USER2> Moronic politicians way out of their depth. I would love to see Silicon Valley shut its shop in California and move to Nevada/Texas etc.

These moochers and sucked enough blood from Tech companies and deserve to be left with the cart dragging hobos with perfect income equality.

<comment><USER3> You sound even-handed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Speaking as someone who would love to see Silicon Valley dissolve and its firms relocate throughout the US, I wholeheartedly support this.</comment>


A Challenge To Break Python Security - <AUTHOR> http://tav.espians.com/a-challenge-to-break-python-security.html <comment><USER2> I'd be really interested to know if any of you guys manage to find further exploits. Thanks!!</comment>


Making AI Better by Making It Slower - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@bellmar/making-ai-better-by-making-it-slower-34e09ba9fcb9 <comment><USER2> I finished "Blink" recently and one of the little revelations in that book is about the police and why nobody has partners anymore. Some friends and I used to joke that it was because the city was trying to save labor costs (an extra car being a lot cheaper than extra cops, we reasoned).

Turns out that a cop on their own is more conservative. They have to think about whether to engage - they have no backup, so any situation they get themselves into, they can't entertain any fantasy that their partner will dig them out of it.

It slows them down, makes them assess the situation, reason about it instead of reacting. It improves citizen and officer safety.

Using computers to audit human decisions instead of circumventing them just sounds like a more realistic option. Send the questionable xrays for a second opinion (or have the same tech look at them a second time on a 'good day' instead of 4:30 on Friday). File code review comments instead of blocking a merge. File PRs to upgrade dependencies that appear to pass the test automation.

The human still consciously chooses in these situations.

In the old days we had some UX luminaries who talked about the importance of having systems (especially where Customer Relationships are involved) whose business logic can be overridden by a human operator. Waive the fee. Exempt from taxes, what have you. It's in many ways the same kind of problem, just magnified.

<comment><USER3> > Turns out that a cop on their own is more conservative.

They are? It's plausible to me that a cop on their own is more scared and more likely to take drastic action if they feel threatened.

<comment><USER2> I thought so too, but the statistics seem to disagree. Wait for backup.

It seems like having a partner was intended to keep cops out of trouble (safe and honest) and that doesn't seem to be working out that great either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I find blog posts like this interesting, in that they seem to justify a certain set of ethics (in this case why it's okay to make machines that ultimately result in people dying) by basically ignoring it and replacing it with a completely different problem (type 1 versus type 2 thinking, both of which can be used ethically or unethically). It really seems like a form of self delusion to me.</comment>


Lossmaking Chinese miner splashes $300m on Jagex - <AUTHOR> http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/83f1d1ea-ea8d-11e5-888e-2eadd5fbc4a4.html#axzz431O41kvx <comment><USER2> Please link a version of the story that is not behind a paywall.

<comment><USER3> Click 'web' link below title.

It's not that hard to use Hacker News</comment></comment>


Does hacking dilute creativity? - <AUTHOR>

Hey guys,
Up until now I've been on the business side of things, but have now decided to learn to hack so that I can build my own ideas as soon as they come. However, even though I really enjoy programming, I feel that it somehow constricts my flow of ideas. Instead of pondering about whats possible, I now feel less creative as I feel the need to 'stay within the lines' of programming.
Has anybody else felt that hacking dilutes their creativity? If so, does this go away as your hacking skills progress? <comment><USER2> What kind of stuff are you building?

I do have that problem to some extent myself. Sometimes building something really shows you new insight into a problem or system, but other times it ends up being 90% drudge work of the "accidental complexity" variety.

One approach to mitigate it is to try to find a lightweight prototyping process you can use, where you still actually write functioning code, but hopefully in a way that's less constraining. This is particularly useful if your "real" code is tied up in frameworks and Enterprisey architecture, which tend to be hard-to-steer ships.

Many parts of the Lisp and Python communities consider ease of open-ended, exploratory programming one of their main goals, so you might find something useful there. Prototyping the core ideas in some simpler way can also help; e.g. a lot of game designers will test out mechanics ideas by building little 2d demos where triangles interact with squares, even if the real game isn't going to look like a 2d abstract game.

</comment><comment><USER3> Disagree!

I'm on the business side of things as well and I started learning PHP last year while freelancing and then switched over to Rails when I started my work with a Rails dev shop.

I have found that the process is that I dream up an idea, figure out how to code it, and repeat either step as necessary. Sometimes you have to tweak, sometimes you have to redo, but I have never really felt the constraints of my ability to code as a limitation to my creativity.

It becomes easier as you get better. :)

EDIT: I have also found that it helps for me to create a lean canvas for my projects - the money aspect is somewhat important, and it helps me figure out the MVP of a product so that I don't slave away for weeks on a non-profitable idea.

<http://www.leancanvas.com>

</comment><comment><USER4> No, programming empowers you to make your ideas actually work. It also forces you to break the great big idea into chewable little pieces, and that's the process that turns imagination into creation.

But yeah, you might feel constrained for a while until you master the tools. Once you do master them though, will anyone be able to tell you that your idea can't be implemented?

</comment><comment><USER5> Constraints (like the limitations of a programming language, system resources, etc) are what make it possible for me to be creative.

EDIT: i think that's also why you often hear the phrase "pushing the boundaries" in relation to creativity. Society is a constraint of a sort.</comment>


Automatic Colorization - <AUTHOR> http://tinyclouds.org/colorize/ <comment><USER2> Previously, as this is from 2016: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10864801](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10864801)

There's also a bot on Reddit that colorizes: [http://www.whatimade.today/our- frst-reddit-bot-coloring-b-2/](http://www.whatimade.today/our-frst-reddit-bot- coloring-b-2/)

</comment><comment><USER3> You can colorise your own photos by using this web form on Algorithmia: [http://demos.algorithmia.com/colorize- photos/](http://demos.algorithmia.com/colorize-photos/)

In my experience most colorisation looks very smudgy, does not "colour in between the lines", and generally seems to make things look sepia with low contrast - however I'd like to see this problem investigated more to see how good it can get - perhaps we could end up doing similar things for astral objects?

</comment><comment><USER4> I was just thinking yesterday while reading [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13678255](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13678255) (Street life in london) that I would like to see it colorized.</comment>


Dustin Curtis' Single Mistake with Svbtle - <AUTHOR> http://therain.posterous.com/dustin-curtis-single-mistake-with-svbtle

<comment><USER2>
        'Dustin Curtis is a genius.'
        That was my first thought when I saw Svbtle—this changed after few minutes.

What. The. Hell!?

I absolutely fail to see how Svbtle deserves more attention than the dozens of other blogging platforms built every week (building a blog is probably the most common programming exercice after "Hello world!"). As far as I can tell, his big innovation is to use the word "idea" instead of "draft" so that it doesn't force him into "thinking about ideas as posts, like every other blogging system does". What else is there to it? The interface gets out of the way? <http://www.quietwrite.com/> does a pretty good job at this already.

<comment><USER3> What's up with the hate? Dustin's design is excellent. It's on the bleeding edge of easy. We need easy.

Personally I could see a wicked iPad app for his design… you open it in Safari. Very few products would work as well on an iPad from an administration point of view.

I agree with the author of this post. I think Dustin Curtis may have prematurely launched, but I disagree in thinking that's a problem unless his end goal was to build a tumblr.

If his goal was to build a better interface and launch it. He succeeded.</comment></comment>


What I Saw Before the Darkness [video] - <AUTHOR> https://vimeo.com/340318187 <comment><AUTHOR> From the page/producer:

" A neural network imagines a person. Then, one by one, neurons in the network are being switched off... Project page: [https://aitold.me/portfolio/i-will- not-forget/](https://aitold.me/portfolio/i-will-not-forget/) The audio track Dark Love For Love was created here: [http://computoser.com/track/100](http://computoser.com/track/100) "</comment>


Sacred Language Cows Part 2: we can rebuild it. We have the technology. - <AUTHOR> http://joshondesign.com/2012/03/14/sacred-cows-2

<comment><AUTHOR> This is a followup to my previous essay. In this essay I hope to prove to you that the benefits of storing code in something other than plain ascii text could outweigh the costs; or at least close enough that it is worth exploring.</comment>


Bloggers Want Out Of Playboy Poll, But That Bed Was Made - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/16/bloggers-want-out-of-playboy-poll-but-that-bed-was-made/

<comment><USER2> I thought I remember the outcome of the "should we ban links to TechCrunch" poll was that only the good ones will end up on the front page. It seems like just about every single TC article is still getting submitted. I think it's safe to say this is not one of the better TC posts.

</comment><comment><USER3> Flagged - this is NOT hacker news.

No offense to ajbatac who's submitted some good stuff.</comment>