Ask HN: What to do for logos? - <AUTHOR> I have a project that I'm launching in the next few weeks, but it is still logoless. Should I leave it logoless for a while (while bootstrapping), or suck it up and drop a $300 on a 99designs custom design or something? Is there a cheaper alternative? <comment><USER2> You don't care about a logo.

You need to care about your brand, and this should be an intrinsic part of what you're doing. It defined who you are, as a company.

If you're doing things right, you'll already know a huge amount about your brand, but most business and tech people are not used to expressing this.

Even if you have a crappy, hand-made logo, what matters is the brand, and being honest with it. If you're 2 guys working out of a garage, maybe a home- made logo does represent your brand better?

99designs and other sites are purely for eye candy. You won't get a well thought out logo that reflects your brand. It's purely visual design.

Source: I'm a Designer & Brand Consultantw

<comment><USER3> I'm more in favor of skipping the logo and brand entirely if you can. Startups have become so cheap & nimble these days that it is worth waiting out on establishing a brand. Worry about branding once you get user traction. Once you have user traction, you know who your customers are, what they want & what kind of brand identity will appeal to them. Starting to worry too early about branding is just money down the toilet if you ask me.

<comment><USER4> This is bad business advice. I'd down vote if I could.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> 99designs.

I feel bad about it because I would hate to see a programmer in the same boat. The truth is I just haven't found a versatile designer that's reasonably priced whose work I consistently like.

As long as 99designs consistently provides better results for less money i'll probably keep using it.

<comment><USER6> You might be interested in this review of 99designs from a designer's perspective. I tend to agree with his comments. However, there also seems to be a market and if all parties are aware of how choosing a service like 99designs (as described in the review) will impact their final product, then I would say "Go for it". FYI, strong language in this review. <http://www.graphicpush.com/99designs-bullshit-20>

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Learn a little bit about typography and then peruse fontsquirrel.com, pick an interesting font and let it do the work for you. Most enduring logos are not graphically complex.

Simple Logos: Bayer, 3M, Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo etc

I also second the recommendation to make friends with inkscape and gimp

<comment><USER4> The branding and logo development for each of these cost five to eight figures. Money well spent, because the average consumer recognize them instantly.

<comment><USER8> Do you have a source for this?

According to this blog, twitter's logo cost $10-15 and nike's cost $35:

<http://www.logoblog.org/wordpress/cost-of-famous-logos/>

<comment><USER4> I concede on the example of Twitter; that said, I had no idea _that_ was Twitter's logo. I thought their word mark was their logo, and perhaps this helps make my point regardless: did you know that Twitter's logo was a bird on a tree? That particular bird on a tree?

Anyhow, as I've said elsewhere in this thread my beef is with folks who think your logo is your brand, and that a brand is something you can do in Photoshop if you have some good fonts installed. It's not just wrong, it's damaging business advice.

I could also cop out and say that both Twitter and Nike have spent a lot more than $15 and $35 on their brand, regardless of the cost of their original logos.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The cheapest option would be to make something up yourself.

Inkscape (<http://www.inkscape.org/>) is a decent open source vector graphics editor that you should be able to use to whip up something halfway decent.

The issue you can have if you go with a really cheap logo is that it may be just a rip off of some other logo, and you may run into trademark issues.

<comment><USER4> If you think paying for a good logo is too expensive, just wait and see how much a free logo will cost you.

<comment><USER8> Care to elaborate? Whether or not you have a professionally designed logo would make an interesting A/B test. Have you done or are you aware of any research about this?

<comment><USER4> I think my use of the word logo in my comment contributed to the problem instead of a solution. Specifically, if you think of branding in terms of firing up Photoshop and trying out some cool fonts, then you are not seeing the big picture.

The specific reason that this thread has tweaked me so much is that it's just so typical for us developers to minimize the effort that goes into good design. It's like it's somehow incomprensible that a team of people with years of experience would spend weeks coming up with a brand strategy that works well across many mediums and tells a coherent story.

There's a really good article about the process of creating the FedEx logo on HN right now. He wasn't starting from scratch or doing a style guide and it still sounds like it took months.

<comment><USER9> But right now the guy is bootstrapping. He doesn't have money for brand design. He shouldn't even be worried about brand design. Having a decent looking logo so he looks professional to the 99.999999% of us who aren't brand designers is the key. Doing it at as low a cost as possible is important. This may tweak you and other brand designers out there, but the reality is he doesn't need anything more than eye candy right now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Do you have to have a logo? If you provide widgets and such, yes you do. Otherwise logos for websites are overrated. They are remnants of print publishing, where logo mattered to catch the eye of the consumer when he is picking magazines off the rack. Internet does not work like this.

Spend your money on a better domain name instead. This will help you being remembered without writing it down. And after that have a favicon that stands out. This will help you get noticed in a stack of browser tabs. But once the user is in your site logo has no purpose.

</comment><comment><USER11> I dropped a hundred bucks on a logo for my startup before there were all these crowdsource sites. It sucked (really, _really_ sucked) and was nothing like what I actually wanted.

I spent a day doodling and bouncing ideas off friends online, and with some luck, came up with the logo that I still use till today..... and I suck at drawing or design.

Like other commenters said, it's not about the crazy graphics.

(Just for reference, this is my logo: <http://neosmart.net/> )

<comment><USER4> It's true - you get what you pay for. How's business? Might be time to revisit your branding conversation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> If you're willing to put in a little work learning some design principles, that will help you out enormously when it comes to deciding which logo is best for your product. Whether you buy an inexpensive one off the web or create one yourself, you'll be able to make better design decisions.

For an introduction/overview to logo design and a set of resources, check out: [http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/12/02/logo-design- resourc...](http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/12/02/logo-design-resources/) Especially spend some time looking at logo redesign critiques since you'll get a better feel for why a particular logo might be better or worse. Also find some examples of bad logo design - that should give you a sense of what to stay away from.

To learn how to think about logo creation, skim a bunch of the "process" and "logo design roundup" posts: <http://imjustcreative.com/category/branding- identity/> If you decide to create your own, a typographic logo is probably a good place to start and there are several of the "process" samples that go into a lot of depth for that type. This is my single favorite place to learn about logo design.

And finally, for a solid overview of graphic design principles, there are a bunch of good tutorials collected here: [http://psd.tutsplus.com/articles/web/50-totally-free- lessons...](http://psd.tutsplus.com/articles/web/50-totally-free-lessons-in- graphic-design-theory/) Knowing a few of the design basics will help improve everything you create (not just your logo) much more than you may realize now.

</comment><comment><USER13> I used LogoTournament instead of 99designs -- similar approach. I'm generally happy with the result, BUT yeah, it was 300+ bucks, and I was not comfortable with the way that some other designers (including one who went through multiple revisions) kinda got screwed when I had to choose one.

BTW, though, I started out with a self-designed logo: [http://forum.emusictheory.com/templates/emusictheory/images/...](http://forum.emusictheory.com/templates/emusictheory/images/logo.gif)

Here is the new one: <http://www.emusictheory.com/images/layout/logo.jpg>

For you to choose what route to take -- well, can you say more about the kind of site you're building? If you're selling to (enterprise?) customers who'll really need to know that you'll be offering professional support, long-term presence, etc. then the craigslist approach won't work for you (and you need more spit & polish right from the start). If it's something like wrttn (reviewed earlier today on HN) then you'd be wasting your money; just go with clean & minimal for the site, and use a nice clear font for a lettered "logo".

</comment><comment><USER4> Lest you listen to the "design is overrated" crowd below:

<http://www.thesneeze.com/mt-archives/000273.php>

<comment><USER14> Out of curiosity, I checked the front page of that site. From the top blog post:

 _"I remember once when I was a teenager, I was walking through the woods and I came across an old pair of leather boots. The incredible thing is, when I looked inside of them I found 4 pieces of gold!

The not incredible thing is, I was a fat, lonely nerd playing Dungeons & Dragons.

Interestingly, playing Dungeons & Dragons is how I met my first girlfriend. (That's actually not true. Sometimes I just like typing sentences that no one has ever seen.)"_

Lol. Funny guy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Spending any money on a logo is simply not necessary in your position. Until you feel like you need to cultivate a brand, don't do anything. When you do, consider just picking a unique (but not too unique) font for the app's name. You can pay for the font if you must.

Designers get offended by this, but I've yet to see a case where logos are even slightly important to a bootstrapped business. You can always change it later.

</comment><comment><USER16> I'm an aspiring Designer/Developer. I've had some experience with logo design, and I'm always looking to expand my portfolio. You can check out some of my work at <http://donaldlivingston.com/portfolio> Feel free to contact me via <http://www.donaldlivingston.com/contact/>

</comment><comment><USER17> There are tons of designers who will do logo artwork for $150-200. I would suggest doing the typography yourself in Inkscape or Illustrator if you can, and then if you feel the need for a nice vector drawing to add to the text, pay someone later.

</comment><comment><USER18> I think you need to keep ironing out your solution first. A logo is not as important as a great product. Once you can afford (from your project's profit?) a designer, hire them to help you solidify your presence. Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER19> A method that worked for me but might not work for all. We had a friend in a graphic arts program at the local university. We asked him if he wanted to do our logo for a project.

</comment><comment><USER20> I have a friend / former co-worker whose sister is a graphics design student. She (the sister) created the last logo I needed, and I'll probably go back to her in the future.

</comment><comment><USER21> Do a quick logo yourself. You can use Inkscape or GIMP.

<comment><USER22> Never use GIMP for anything, except, of course, for demonstrating how not to do UI/UX.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> You can get a copy of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain and learn to draw. Proceed then to design the logo you have in mind.

<comment><USER24> Drawing from life and designing logos really aren't the same thing... Studying a bit about typography would be of much more use.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> twitter bought its logo for hella cheap, but go find an online graphical design community. Most of them are looking for any type of work to add to their portfolio and most will do it for free or on the cheap.

<comment><USER26> I really have to disagree here. I think this is absolutely the wrong attitude to have towards the design community. If someone came to this community and asked to build them an app for free they would get shut down.

Instead of putting up $300 on 99 design have a look around for a designer that makes logos that you like the look of and send them an email and ask what they can do for that amount. You might only get a few hours of their time, but you're probably going to get a much better result, and you'll be doing the whole design community a favour by not asking for free work.

EDIT: As a stop-gap, the inkscape option that pwim suggested sounds good.

<comment><USER27> "you'll be doing the whole design community a favour by not asking for free work."

This is a free market. Supply and demand. If people are willing to do quality work for free, let them. If someone is looking for quality work and they find it for free, they should take it. Doing a group of professionals "a favour" does not enter into the equation.

"If someone came to this community and asked to build them an app for free they would get shut down."

That's because no one made millions because of a logo. Apps are simply more valuable than logos, period. And they require more skill to create.

<comment><USER28> I agree with your first point in as much as people are free to work or not work as they please. That said, here's some perspective from the design side which may help you understand how designers may think about these kinds of things, even if you disagree or find it a touch extreme: <http://www.no- spec.com/faq/>

As for your second point, how much would you say the brand equity of Apple, Coca-Cola, or Nike is worth? They would simply be selling electronics, sugary water, and shoes if they didn't have design and marketing experts building and executing their brand (experts who I'm sure have been compensated quite handsomely). While I'll agree that it's easier to "throw together" a logo than a web app, good design does require reasonable skill, training, and experience.

ADDED: I guess I should be clear that I'm rebutting the assertion that design is necessarily less valuable than software development, not that startups require Fortune 500 branding.

<comment><USER29> In the early stages of a company, the logo contributes very little to the company's success. All it does is signal that the company is somewhat professional. It requires little uncommon expertise to achieve this goal.

The comparison to Apple, Coke and Nike isn't applicable. You're describing a different product than most startups are looking for.

Exhibit A: <http://techcrunch.com/2006/07/15/is-twttr-interesting/>

Exhibit B: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_logo>

<comment><USER27> Here's another example: the GoDaddy logo.

[http://www.dotweekly.com/the-story-behind-the-godaddy- name-a...](http://www.dotweekly.com/the-story-behind-the-godaddy-name-and- logo)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Ash does some simple and inexpensive logo design work - <http://inkash.com/Print>

<comment><USER31> that background... geocities?

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Do you have a concept in mind or are you looking for the concept generation + design rendering?

Ping me, email in my profile.

</comment><comment><USER33> 99designs.com</comment>


Why 'noncompete' means 'don't thrive' (2007) - <AUTHOR> http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2007/12/30/why_noncompete_means_dont_thrive_/

<comment><AUTHOR> Echoing an observation from this interview by the chairman emeritus of Greylock Partners (the Boston area's premier? VC firm, first limited parter VC firm, etc.): <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1547204>

The hook of that article is Greylock moving their headquarters to Silicon Valley a bit more than a year ago....</comment>


SkyMall's Demise Could Save American Airlines $350K a Year on Fuel - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2015/01/skymalls-demise-save-american-airlines-350k-year-fuel/

<comment><USER2> The article would be a lot more substantial if they researched what Skymall was paying AA to put those catalogs on their planes.

Wanna bet it was more than $350K?</comment>


Daylight Visualizer - <AUTHOR> http://www.velux.com/article/2016/daylight-visualizer <comment><USER2> Velux designs and manufactures fantastic windows. We had them in our German apartment and in few windows of our Swiss one. Folks in North America don't know what they are missing. Makes the highest quality windows available in the U.S. feel like they were bought at Wal-Mart.

<comment><USER3> Velux is at Lowe's and Home Depot in North America.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Reminds me of this blender/OpenFOAM based tool.

[https://www.ods-engineering.com/tools/ods-studio/](https://www.ods- engineering.com/tools/ods-studio/)

</comment><comment><USER5> Impressive splash page - but what makes this anything other than advertising? Is there something worth demonstrating on the technical side?

<comment><USER6> I think a bunch of HN readers are also interested in software product design. To me, this looks like a nice example of that. They appear to be taking a selection of fairly complicated functionality and packaging it so that non- technical people (architects?) can use it when discussing lighting options with people who they are helping design their houses.

<comment><USER7> I wouldn't describe architects as "non-technical."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > _promote the use of daylight_

I'd like to offer a contrary opinion about the obsession with daylight, floor to ceiling windows in new houses and condos, and glass skyscrapers. I'm fine with good artificial lighting. I don't mind some windows if it's a nice view or for fresh air (assuming the windows even open).

But in my opinion, good man-made lighting is better and preferable to daylight. We don't live according to the sun's schedule anymore, so you do need artificial lightning for most of the time anyway. Optimizing houses and buildings for daylight leads to weird shapes (like those diagonal ceilings in the article), higher cost (of course), zoning wars when one building might cast a shadow on another, weaker structures, and terrible climate control (glass buildings trap more heat in summer and are colder in winter).

<comment><USER9> What do you use to combat Vitamin D deficiency? [0]

"Known as the sunshine vitamin, vitamin D is produced by the body in response to skin being exposed to sunlight. "

"Vitamin D is essential for strong bones, because it helps the body use calcium from the diet. Traditionally, vitamin D deficiency has been associated with rickets, a disease in which the bone tissue doesn't properly mineralize, leading to soft bones and skeletal deformities. But increasingly, research is revealing the importance of vitamin D in protecting against a host of health problems."

[0] [http://www.webmd.com/diet/guide/vitamin-d- deficiency#1](http://www.webmd.com/diet/guide/vitamin-d-deficiency#1)

<comment><USER10> Would expect that daylight which has gone through glass is probably not going to help you produce vitamin D.

<comment><USER11> Why on earth not?

<comment><USER12> Because the ultraviolet-B component of sunlight is what allows your skin to create vitamin D, and glass blocks ultraviolet-B pretty effectively.

<comment><USER11> Wow, thanks for the information, I didn't know that! :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> "Daylight visualizer" is basically my job title.</comment>


Not every U.S. telephone number beginning with 555 is fake - <AUTHOR> http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/geekend/geek-trivia-strength-in-phone-numbers/ <comment><USER2> [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_%28telephone_number%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_%28telephone_number%29)

Much more interesting (from a hacker's perspective) were all the telco services provided using specific exchanges. For any given ILEC there was an exchange used for services provided to customers or employees, including everything from phone testing services and remote terminal access to business customer information and voicemail. By calling these numbers you could find some neat hidden services, and they were free from any phone. You can imagine how bored kids at school with a payphone could discover quite a bit in their spare time.

The DATU was my favorite. It was a secret lineman's number to test circuits, which also enabled you to listen in on live lines. Using these numbers without proper authorization meant jail time, but they had to catch you first :) Ringback was also a fun way to pass the time. Dial the number and hang up, and 30 seconds later the phone would start ringing, and i'd watch who would go answer it. Like I said, bored kids...

<comment><USER3> As a kid I remember these numbers we would call up and hear a bunch of other kids faintly having conversations in the background (and you could join in). Was many years ago perhaps someone else could fill in the details if they remember exactly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have the phone number 5555 5555 in a capital city - it's unlisted, never advertised, and still gets about 10 calls a day, mostly from babies and drunks. If you do get a number like this, and want to use it, I would suggest putting it behind an IVR and asking callers to press * to continue. We dump all the non compliant users to a voicemail, which is entertaining to listen to once in a while.

When we got the number first, it was not possible to call it from the major mobile networks as they had blacklisted it as a test number!

</comment><comment><USER5> Not only are they not fake, but you can have one today!

Callcentric is an "internet phone service", which has been around for at least 8+ years. They allow you to search for unused phone numbers [1] in various area codes [2]. I searched for unused 555 numbers in the following area codes (213, 310, 626, 818) all have some available! So, you could create an account, and for something like $3/month, forward this 555 number to your existing number [3].

[1] [http://www.callcentric.com/did_lookup.php?type=check_by_us_n...](http://www.callcentric.com/did_lookup.php?type=check_by_us_number&prod_id=7&npa=213&nxx=555&sub_did.x=37&sub_did.y=8)

[2] [http://www.bennetyee.org/ucsd- pages/area.html](http://www.bennetyee.org/ucsd-pages/area.html)

[3] [http://www.callcentric.com/dids/phone_number_sale](http://www.callcentric.com/dids/phone_number_sale)

</comment><comment><USER6> Similar: not every 192.x.x.x IP address is in a private (RFC1918) network.

<comment><USER7> This is interesting. Do you know who controls these public addresses? I know in the past I've seen filtered connections to 192.x.x.x thinking that it would get only internal connections then. The owners of these public addresses could wreak havoc in some places.

<comment><USER6> There's a university with a 192.16x.x.x allocation who has written about the confusion it's caused.

Nothing that special about it from a CIDR point of view -- but is rather confusing to us humans when written as a dotted quad.

Github's GITHUB-NET4-1 is on 126.96.36.199/22, which is what reminded me of this.

<comment><USER8> Heck, the University of Waterloo has 184.108.40.206/16, and I see people get confused all the time between 192.168. (private) and 129. (publicly routed).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This isn't new at all. For as far back as I can remember you could dial 555-1212 from any area code and get directory assistance for that area code. There's even a toll free 800 number (1-800-555-1212) which prompts you for the city you'd like.

Haven't used it in a long time ( _seriously who would when you can search the internet on your smartphone?_ ) but I think it's the same service as 411 minus the $X/min fee (the 800 number version is free, I think the non-800 versions might bill you).

<comment><USER10> The area-555-1212 one actually is the most expensive at $3.50 according to Wikipedia [1]. There is toll-free directory assistance (it doesn't say what number) from AT&T, where the 800-number owner pays for any lookups.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555-1212](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555-1212)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> UK numbers for drama...

[http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/telecoms/numbering/guidance...](http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/telecoms/numbering/guidance- tele-no/numbers-for-drama)

<comment><USER12> We use those as placeholder text on our registration forms.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> What's next? EXAMPLE.COM becomes an actual site?

<comment><USER14> In that same line of thinking, who gets the email @test.com?

<comment><USER15> The people at test.com! They sounds a bit cranky.

      http://contactx.test.com/contactX/contact-spam.cfm

<comment><USER16> (Very OT) Wow, test.com actually have a patent for "Internet test-making"

[http://www.google.com/patents/US6513042](http://www.google.com/patents/US6513042)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Slight correction needed to the article: Mexico left the NANP in the late 90s and has adopted its own country code and dialing plan. It hasn't changed much since but you do need to use 011 and whatever code it is now to dial there.

</comment><comment><USER18> Imagine your domain becomes your telephone number one day! Or your IP. Well, you can already do that I supposed with VoIP

<comment><USER19> Can't wait!

"Hey Jim, give me a call at 2607 f0d0 1002 0051 0000 0000 0000 0004 when you get a minute" :)

<comment> vezzy-fnord Now all we need is a catchy jingle for Moss to sing along to.</comment></comment></comment>


Skeuomorphism.it - Flat design in Seconds - <AUTHOR> http://skeuomorphism.it/

<comment><USER2> Cute, but perpetuates the "false alternative" between "flat" and "skeuomorphic". The alternative to "flat" is a style filled with gradients, layers, textures, etc. (i.e., using lots of Layer Styles in Photoshop). Skeuomorphism is a subset of the latter style.

See <http://sachagreif.com/what-skeuomorphism-is-and-isnt/>

</comment><comment><USER3> I couldn't get it to work (and want it to!). It says "Command Set is not available". That's if I open a png image and click "Work the magic". Thanks</comment>


Steve Blank: Your Computer May Already Be Hacked – NSA Inside? - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveblank/2013/07/15/your-computer-may-already-be-hacked-nsa-inside

<comment><USER2> I've been interested in this topic for a while, and I've found most people's responses to the question falls into 3 broad categories:

1) This is just tin-foil-hat paranoia. You're crazy. (This is by far the most popular choice.)

2) I'm unimportant. "They" wouldn't care about anything I do, so what does it matter?

3) Universal surveillance is a fact of life now. Deal with it, or move somewhere remote like Kamchatka and raise your children to believe civilization was destroyed by zombies.

<comment><USER3> (1) should be conclusively disproven by now. (3)'s probably closer to the truth. I for one would be flat out shocked if some US chips didn't have security overrides built-in</comment></comment>


'Show, Don't Tell' Almost Ruined Me as a Writer - <AUTHOR> https://lithub.com/the-three-words-that-almost-ruined-me-as-a-writer-show-dont-tell/ <comment><USER2> My understanding of 'show, don't tell' is that instead of just telling the reader;

he was nervous

you show it through the prose like this;

He hesitated. Wringing his hands together, shifting from foot to foot. "I... I don't think you're right. Maybe not about that."

You shouldn't be keeping the stuff you're not telling secret. It's not about not letting the reader know things, it's about not being fucking boring about it.

<comment><USER3> I agree with that you should show when you can.

But at the same time a lot of the time people in real life _don 't show_ nearly all of what is going on with them.

In that case "tell" either gets contrived - you end up with convoluted attempts at externalizing thoughts in way that bears no relation to how the character would act in real life, or you ignore the story. The former often leads to lots of monologues or contrived props to make the character show you things in ways that makes no sense. In the right setting that can work, but often it is just jarring to e.g. have a character talk out loud to themselves or otherwise act out things they'd be more likely to just have thought about.

This seems to be why she is bringing up abuse, for example. An abuse victim writing about their experience can certainly "show" the abuse, but how do they show how it made them feel and what it made them think about, when they've often worked hard to keep a mask and not show the world how they were affected?

It's good advice to show, not tell, on the basis that most people who haven't written much tell way too much and show too little. The problem is that it is then sometimes overdone. It doesn't _always_ makes sense to show instead of telling. Either because showing becomes contrived, or for example because showing commands attention, and sometimes you want to tell to avoid drawing attention away from the main thrust of a scene or a work to some detail necessary to understand what is going on, but not important enough to show.

<comment><USER4> Show doesn't necessarily mean _show_ right? The subject might not wring their hands and shuffle from foot to foot. Instead they might feel their pulse start to race, or feeling sweaty palmed or whatever. It's about describing a thing and allowing the reader to understand why without always explicitly telling them everything.

<comment><USER5> As an actor, we'd call that kind of thing "indicating", which is more telling than showing. Rather than actually feeling something, you put on the indicators of that feeling: "There is water leaking out of my eyes, therefore you know I'm sad". Which misses the whole rest of the performance. It's better than saying "I am sad", but not by much.

What you really have to do, in both writing and acting, is more subtle and difficult. It has to become an organic part of the narrative/performance Any example you give is always going to sound like indicating, since it is extracted from that overall flow. If you've crossed out "he was nervous" and wrote instead "his pulse raced", you haven't improved it by much, if anything. But if you're fully visualizing the scene, from whatever POV you've been using so far, you can seek out the next detail and write that as the next sentence.

The essence of "show don't tell" is to be active rather than passive. Talking about feelings, or even indicating feelings, is less active than saying how they act on those feelings. The more specific their actions, the more the reader will internalize the feelings as they live it with the character, even -- or perhaps especially -- when being told from a viewpoint that wouldn't give them access to internals like pulse rate. Movies are exciting without getting any of that information directly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Many great writers tell and don't show, if that is what the situation calls for. Read a couple of pages of Tolstoy and you will notice.

What is the reason this mantra became so engrained, most notably in creative writing courses? I think the reason is that it is very hard if not impossible to teach people how to write beautifully, but it is relatively easy to teach them how to write acceptably. The main trick is to teach them to avoid common pitfalls and mistakes. Among this is the basic stuff like: don't switch perspective or time midsentence, be wary of adverbs and adjectives, etc. It also includes the tricky stuff that can easily go sideways. A fledgling writer had better stay away from sex scenes, to mention an obvious one.

"Show, don't tell" fits this category as well. The idea is that "telling" done badly is a sure way to bore the reader out of her skull. And it often is. It invites lazy characterization. "Amy was nervous," does not sound very exciting.

The problem however is that "showing" can get quite boring as well. There is, for instance, this whole hackish vocabulary of observations that signal emotional states, which has become a drop-in replacement for telling. Instead of nervous, Amy is now fidgetting, her heart is pounding and her palms are sweating. These are the worst examples of course. Better writers go out of their way to avoid cliches like this, but they are still beholden to the idea that Amy shall not be described as nervous. That can become problematic if working around it ruins the pacing of a text or diverts the attention from what the writer is getting at. Tolstoy often feels so wonderfully to the point because he dispenses with the obvious stuff by just telling it.

Showing and telling are tools. Like in many other endeavours, you should use the best tool for the job.

<comment><USER7> Chekhov (possibly apocryphal): "Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass."

You can tell things. You just have to tell the _right_ thing.

<comment><USER8> I'd assume the "broken glass" is actually relevant to the story, so this way "show, don't tell" is actually the way to _compress_ information.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I agree with other commenters that the author's interpretation of "Show, Don't Tell" seems off, and/or contrived. In any case, maybe the piece is meant to be meta, like Alanis Morrisette's "Ironic", because it seems the author went out of their way to not show any actual examples of how "Show, don't tell" resulted in inferior writing.

</comment><comment> yoz-y I've only skimmed the article. However I can't help myself but thing about the recently posted article: [https://barryhawkins.com/blog/posts/the-myth-of- commoditized...](https://barryhawkins.com/blog/posts/the-myth-of-commoditized- excellence/)

Blog posts complaining about a "concept reduced to a few words" that did not help them would make more sense if the author first explained how they approached "the thing", what they expected to get out of it and what were they ready to sacrifice.

</comment><comment> alan-crowe I think of "Show, don't tell." as a mnemonic name, comparable to the mnemonic names for instructions in assembler language.

Obviously LDA loads the accumulator, but does it also clear the carry bit? You cannot divine from the name. You have to be familiar the details of the instruction from the manual.

Similarly, can you ever "tell"? You go to the "Show, don't tell." chapter in the "learn to write novels" book, and re-read the section "Sometimes you have to tell.".

You cannot work it out from the three word phrase. It is not just that it is too short. The internal structure is merely mnemonic. "show" doesn't mean "show". "tell" doesn't mean "tell". They are just reminders of the more subtle concepts explained in the chapter.

</comment><comment><USER10> > "For some of our students, "Don't tell" repeats the abuse they will have > endured along with its highest commandment: secrecy."

This is way too extreme. Surely people who have experienced abuse shouldn't be treated like they are too frayed to understand the difference between a literary tactic and oppression of their suffering? Surely it's not healthy to cast trauma victims and survivors in this kind of way? They can think for themselves like everyone else.

</comment><comment><USER11> It's all about me, Me, ME!

Better article about "Show, Don't Tell" on TV Tropes.[1]

[1] [https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ShowDontTell](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ShowDontTell)

</comment><comment><USER12> This is written so incoherently that no one should be taking writing advice from this person, whatever that advice is.

<comment><USER13> Agree. Indeed it reads like a parody of (self-obsessed & pretentious) bad writing.

<comment><USER14> Agreed.

I think the problem is likely that neither this teacher nor any students really understand what "show, don't tell" means, and tend to overuse it when they think they do.

That's just a guess, though. This article is a pretentious mess.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is what happens when pretentious literati feverishly search for something novel to expound on. There is no magic spell with which to entrance your readers. Pick a method, practice, and develop your own style. If you're really, really lucky, your style will coincide with the shopping lists of our various editors, and publishers, and you might make a living. Write on!

</comment><comment><USER16> Well yeah "show don't tell" is terrible memoir advice, but memoir isn't fiction, and memoirs about abuse, your own thoughts, or crying a lot are terminally boring (but important). "Show don't tell" is how to write entertaining fiction, which is not to say that you can't write dry non-fiction about weighty subjects. That said, this:

> When I was taking a sculpture class in college, I sewed a

> kind of wall hanging about secrets I had to keep. I wrote

> things on pieces of paper and tucked them into bumps and

> layers in the fabric. I sewed pockets shut.

is showing.

This is not to discourage those authors whose favorite subject is themselves and their feelings. As an avid reader of fiction, however, if you really must write about your inner feelings, I would suggest making it magical realism or using plot devices where your inner thoughts influence real events, and not subjecting the reader to two hundred pages of your thoughts. Make it a therapy session or a deposition if you must. Or gimmicks. _Trainspotting_ is boring life stuff and the dude going on about how life sucks without heroin, but it's written in a Scottish accent, so it's interesting. (And to be clear it also has plenty of showing. A lot of the scenes of the family life of his friends, etc are pretty indicative of their social environment without going "we were all poor and disenfranchised".)

<comment><USER17> >> Or gimmicks. _Trainspotting_ is boring life stuff and the dude going on about how life sucks without heroin, but it's written in a Scottish accent, so it's interesting.

If all you got from Trainspotting is that it's 'boring life stuff' save for being written in multiple patios, you probably shouldn't be giving advice to fledgling authors.

<comment><USER16> The author of the original article is lamenting that "show don't tell" is making people reluctant to write about the personal traumas of their life, and instead have to write "action-packed" scenes. There are like three action- packed scenes in Trainspotting and they're all well within the lived experience of the average first worlder. It's "boring life stuff" in the sense of being about on the other extreme from a Michael Bay movie. Sometimes people don't talk in precise terms about art they consume.

I was using it as an example of a novel about life that has nothing action-y happening and where many scenes don't directly advance the plot, but remains both a page turner and not particularly preachy.

<comment><USER17> Seems like you're reading the word action in a narrow blockbuster hollywood sense, which isn't the context that it's used within the article.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been enjoying Stefan Zweig lately. I suppose Zweig figured he could show, not tell by writing scene where the first person narrator meets someone in the lobby of an expensive hotel, who then relates the bulk of the story. In short, Zweig shows someone telling a story ;)

Zweig's style to me is almost like a friend retelling a movie or long novel, but to a very high level of detail and with excellent recall for relevant descriptions and quotes, when needed. Sometimes he sets this up through brief shell of a traveling narrator meeting the subject of the story (who then provides the main narration), sometimes he dispenses with this and just relates the story.

This technique is used here and there - now that I think of it, "interview with a vampire" works this way. This sort of writing can be very effective. At times, I have to wonder if it isn't a way to break through writer's block or free yourself from the difficulty of writing fiction - you, as a writer, place yourself in the position of a stranger meeting an interesting person, and then you imagine the story being narrated to you. You could keep the shell, or discard it and just keep the inner story as first person narrative.

</comment><comment><USER19> "Write what you know" \-- while not exactly _bad_ advice -- is also better when not taken too rigidly. "Write what you believe" is better, I think.

<comment> dawg- This is true for most rules of thumb. "Show, don't tell" is great advice for beginning creative writers since most people struggle with that aspect of writing. But as you gain experience you learn how to break the rules gracefully.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I always considered as something that applies to filmmakers more than writers. Sure you could through natural storytelling demonstrate that a hobbit hole is comfortable place to live Or you could use your greatest strength as a writer and just tell me

"Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort."

<comment><USER3> I think this demonstrates the opposite of what you want. Saying "a hobbit hole is comfortable" would be telling. It's not explaining or showing what makes it comfortable, or why it is comfortable - it's one abstraction up and just declares it comfortable. For what we know at that point in the story, a hobbit likes worms and oozy smells and finds that comfortable.

But instead he evokes those images, and gets you to imagine something different; something probably closer to our idea of comfort, because the reader now has seen that hobbits ideas of what isn't comfortable is at least somewhat aligned with ours even though the live in a hole.

I'd consider this a fantastic example of how to show without having to be boring and prescriptive about just describing what you might see, but how you can also show through creating emotional response and through exclusion.

That said, good writers will know when to break the rule and tell. Tolkien certainly does tell a lot even if I don't agree that is an example of him telling. A lot more than many, if anything. But of course he gets away with that because he was a fantastic writer. The advice to show is beginner advice more than anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I think "Show, Don't Tell" is excellent advice and not just in writing: it's even more valuable for filmmakers. You should be able to watch a movie with no sound and follow the plot.

Of course there aren't actual rules and the best writers break the not-actual- rules all the time. But a lot of really bad writing does seem to involve telling rather than showing. And isn't the goal of writing classes the elimination of really bad writing?

I'm very skeptical of the idea that someone can be taught to be a (good) novelist. I don't think that someone can lend you their model; I think you have to develop your own. Cormac McCarthy explained his use of punctuation with "There's no reason to blot the page up with weird little marks. I mean, if you write properly you shouldn't have to punctuate." I find that quote hysterically funny. I don't have a strong opinion about whether he's right. Rather, I think the whole point is that he has a strong sense of what good writing is and it's _his_.

<comment><USER22> > You should be able to watch a movie with no sound and follow the plot

Why?

<comment><USER23> Because visual storytelling is the whole point of the medium.

Yes, there should be a symphony of sound and visual working together. But the whole point of the medium of Motion Pictures is to tell stories through... motion pictures.

<comment><USER22> That is just begging the question. _Why_ can't sound and dialog be an integrated and necessary part of the storytelling? What about musicals? Disneys Fantasia? The voice overs in Goodfellas? The dialogue in Pulp Fiction?

Who even decides what the "point" of a media is beside the people creating stuff in the media?

<comment><USER23> What do motion pictures offer that no other medium offers? The answer is moving images.

What I'm saying is that a medium should play to the strengths of the unique thing that it offers over other mediums.

What do video games uniquely offer? Interactivity. Therfore, the video game medium should focus on offering interactivity that would be impossible to get in any other medium.

<comment><USER24> > What do video games uniquely offer? Interactivity. Therfore, the video game > medium should focus on offering interactivity that would be impossible to > get in any other medium.

To the Moon[1] and Dear Esther[2] won awards and high praise from critics and players alike, _despite lacklustre interactivity_.

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

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

<comment><USER23> I adored Dear Esther. The interactivity was amazing.

It enhanced the story and immersed me.

Thanks for the great example.

<comment><USER24> > I adored Dear Esther. The interactivity was amazing.

Anecdotal report of what you thought doesn't advance the conversation. I can just say it was a boring game for me (it was) and we're back to square one.

I feel that if you call Dear Esther's interactivity "amazing", you either haven't played enough games to be able to expound judgement, or have a definition of "interactivity" different from most players. Some quotes from the Wikipedia page, based on multiple published sources:

> The gameplay in Dear Esther is minimal, with the only task being (…)

> Despite questioning whether it truly constitutes a video game (…)

> (…) critics were divided by the suitability of the video game medium for > conveying the story of Dear Esther.

> (…) stating that the game "would be better as a short film" (…)

> The limited interactivity between the player and the narrative (…)

The _consensus_ is that it's a good work of art, with a good story, visuals, and sound design, but that there isn't much to _interact_ with.

<comment><USER23> >Anecdotal report of what you thought doesn't advance the conversation.

I don't know what this means. If it is an insult, I am too stupid to understand it.

>I feel that if you call Dear Esther's interactivity "amazing", you either haven't played enough games to be able to expound judgement, or have a definition of "interactivity" different from most players.

You could not experience the game without interacting with it. It's in first person. You move the story along as you discover new story elements. You experience emotions and perspectives first-hand.

>The consensus is that it's a good work of art, with a good story, visuals, and sound design, but that there isn't much to interact with.

Dear Esther would not work in any other medium. It would be extremely boring without the interactivity.

So if we're circling back to the original comment that spawned this discussion: Interactivity is what makes the medium of video games unique. Dear Esther focuses on interactivity by making the entire story unravel as you choose to explore it yourself... interactively.

Your point would stand if Dear Esther put you on rails and you barely pushed any buttons (like a Hideo Kojima cutscene). But that's not how the game is designed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> > In the real world, watching our action would be akin to constant > dissociation. Instead, we feel things, we say things to ourselves, and > eventually we come upon subject matter and then to the scenes.

I think that's why writing "I felt scared" is usually fine. But 'show, don't tell' is more about avoiding things like "she felt scared".

<comment><USER26> I'm always reminded of Futurama.

"You can't just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!"

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> > In fiction, internal narration—the telling

 _Internal_ narration, done well, is showing—demonstration of the character and their relationship to and the effects they experience from the context and events—not telling. External narration is telling.

</comment><comment><USER28> Recently bought "Self-editing for fiction writers" as it was recommended as a good book about not only editing but also writing itself.

The first chapter is named "Show and tell".

Here the authors also state the "show, don't tell" rule. They also show the difference between the two and give the advice to alternate both styles and in which context which style would be appropriate.

So yea "Show, don't tell" isn't a law you must strictly follow, but a rule, a guideline. As all rules it can be broken. At some point you should ask yourself "But when?" And this is how the rule invites to do further research on the "Show and Tell" styles.

</comment><comment><USER29> It's in IKEA assembly instructions that this maxim shows itself in its most harmful form.

<comment><USER30> Not sure why this meme exists that IKEA furniture is difficult to assemble. I'm no genius when it comes to handiwork for sure, but I never had issues with IKEA stuff.

<comment><USER31> I recently assembled my first piece of non-IKEA furniture.

I think the misconception might stem from the fact that

* IKEA instructions for even very simple things like shelves are often up to 20 pages long. A lot of steps are very simple, but there are lots of them.

* IKEA furniture parts often have many markings on them to make them unique. This is necessary for reuse across products, but also identifiability for above-mentioned instructions.

The shelf I recently assembled had none of these "problems". In fact, it only had 2 types of structural metal bars that were identical except for length, and boards to go on top of those bars.

The instructions were 2 pages of text. Full paragraphs worth of text. It included sentences like "Connect the vertical corner pieces such that the second-to-last lower peg of the top piece connects to the topmost peg of the lower piece".

That one sentence takes around 10 seconds to parse, 30 seconds to visualize and then 1-2 minutes to lay out with the physical pieces in front of you.

I would estimate around 80% of that time is waste, compared to just printing those instructions using one IKEA-style diagram.

<comment><USER30> Also, text may skip some things that the visualization will have to show explicitly.

If I'm unsure which screw they really mean here, which orientation I should have that piece in etc., I can just look really closely at the drawing and identify exactly what they mean. See the different layers of depth and how they cover each other to see the exact order of things. See the the exact drill holes or other marks to disambiguate things.

Maybe it's just that some people think more in words others more in images and prefer instructions of the corresponding type.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> It's not those three words that almost ruined you. That much is clear.

</comment><comment><USER33> The telling behaviour is falling out of our culture. The dispassionate army Sargent basically relaying information without care or cause for it's impact is telling. The kid made to get through class by doing an oral presentation and focuses on rapidly getting through the content that needs to be said without caring about it's delivery is telling. Telling is the most basic form of communicating. Most of the information we used to "tell" each other is done over computers now, there's no need to boringly recite football scores or updates on the weather. The communication we do in real life is more focused now.

I don't know in what places a formal and functionary 'telling' mode still is common. Asking a person who 'tells' to show more encourages them to see the words as if they describe a visual. Show the reader the details in a way that the mind's eye could reconstruct it. It's not the end all or be all of writing, for sure. If you're going to use 'show, don't tell' to silence yourself, then yeah that's not going to work.

</comment><comment><USER34> 1/2 of the way in and the premise in the title still hasn't been explained. Not going to stick around for the next 1/2.

<comment><USER35> Agreed. I didn't finish the article. I was hoping the author would tell me what "show, don't tell" means, why it is said, and maybe even an example. I have a guess of what it means, but as this is the first time I have encountered the phrase I'd like a concrete definition or description.

I am always trying to improve my writing and most of the books I have read on the topic of writing well have a common theme: write clearly and simply. For someone who appears to think of themselves as a writer, I did not find this writing very clear and had to re-read many sentences. I also didn't know what "mimesis" meant, and although it sounds fancy I don't think it added anything. I guess I am not the intended audience of this article.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> _The way I was taught to write, with a hostile reader glaring at me, implied that nobody would care what I had to say anyway._

This is far more disturbing than the main premise. I can also relate.

</comment><comment><USER37> I was given this advice but could never follow it, I would take the reader by the shoulders and shout into their face.</comment>


Facebook User Valuation by Year, 2003-2012 (Infographic) - <AUTHOR> http://plugg.io/infographics/facebook-valuation-by-year-2003-2012

<comment><USER2> I wonder if Zuckerberg should have stopped taking investment in 2008? Seems like he would have retained more control and still achieved a high valuation by 2012.

</comment><comment><USER3> the last few rounds of fundraising were odd--fb was already cash flow positive and they didn't do much with the cash aside from buy random small companies

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> $333 value per user in 2007 seems astounding to me.

</comment><comment><USER4> Why is Putin's picture on there?

<comment><AUTHOR> I think that it represents investments from undisclosed Russian billionaires in 2011</comment></comment>


Ask HN: is our 10% conversion rate typical for launchrock? - <AUTHOR>

I put up a landing page for gush today http://getgush.com/<p>We got a statistically significant and constant 10% conversion rate from clicks to signups. Most of the traffic came from tweets. That seems really good, better than I expected, is that typical? Anyone else want to share their conversion rates with launchrock? <comment><USER2> Hey, I'm one of the LaunchRock founders.

I'll let you know a dirty little secret. We're not currently filtering bots from our own stats, so it's even higher than that. Since the current app is mostly what we built over a few weeks after our Startup Weekend, it's missing a few details like that.

We're adding filtering in the next version of the app which we'll be opening to the public.

<comment><AUTHOR> Looking forward to the next version :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> never used launchrock, but 10% conversion for anything is good.</comment>


Politics on YC - <AUTHOR> I have been a lurker albeit, but love YC news. Part of the policy states limited political chatter. In the last month, I have seen an abundant amount rise to #1, example is today. Can we please address this. I like to think this is my safe place :)  Orthogonal to popular belief, science and technology can be a stress reliever from modern day politics. <comment><USER2> You're probably seeing fluctuation within the normal range. HN's policy and moderation have been the same for a long time. The submissions and comments that get posted are certainly influenced by macro trends in society at large—we can't be immune from them—but all that has been happening for a long time as well. See [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869) if you want more reassurance.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! Great data in that link</comment></comment>


Desligado - <AUTHOR> http://dmfrancisco.github.com/Desligado/ <comment><USER2> Looks awesome, gmail and other applications would benefit immensely from this instead of just trying to reconnect!</comment>


The takeaway from six years of economic troubles? Keynes was right - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.reuters.com/anatole-kaletsky/2014/10/31/the-takeaway-from-six-years-of-economic-troubles-keynes-was-right/ <comment><USER2> Real wages for almost all Americans have not risen over the past few decades except for the rich. Quantitative easing should have been distributed to the populace not banks. Point is the economy has not improved for most Americans and Keynesian throry is wrong

</comment><comment><USER3> "Countries that took emergency measures to reduce public borrowing have mostly suffered weaker growth, as in the case of Britain from 2010 to 2012"

Someone is going to have to point out for me where this supposed 'austerity' happened in the UK, because I'm f*cked if I can see it.

Charts are here: [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25944653](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25944653)

Definition of a Keynesian: someone who thinks a 6% of GDP budget deficit is 'austerity'.

</comment><comment><USER4> Zero interest rate policies definitely make it more difficult for central banks to use interest rates as a tool to stimulate aggregate demand.

Sure, the massive bond-buying program of the Fed did actively push interest rates close to zero. But, in the process, it decreased long-term interest rates too, in particular, treasuries and T-bills. This decrease allowed the government to borrow more money during auctions.

Isn't this a case for QE enhancing the government's ability to borrow? Or is my crude understanding of monetary policy all wrong?

<comment><USER5> I'm pretty sure everyone's understanding of monetary policy is "crude".

What you say appears to be right, but it's also rare if not unheard of. As I understand it, _normally_ , as the US (and I and my family) experienced in the '70s, these policies would be viewed by borrowers in such a way they'd demand more interest for lending their money to the government, through combinations of perhaps rising inflation and perceived regime risk (which rising inflation is an example of, by eventually liquidating debts for less real value).

"This Time It's Different!", which they always say (and is the title of a recommended book on the subject, an 800 or so year study of this game). The theory I hold to as of now is that the world-wide nature of the Great Recession and other factors like the artificiality of the Euro have made the US dollar, and US government debt, the "least worst" place to put your money. Well, in any quantity at least, e.g. I remember tiny Switzerland (GDP ~1/32nd of the US) getting very concerned about "hot money" inflows into their franc and maybe taking some actions WRT to them.

The PRC is also something of a wild card: they watched the debacle of Indonesia, where a short term liquidity crisis was treated by the IMO as a typical 3rd World unsustainable government debt crisis, resulting in needless hardship and the ousting of its long term strongman. The CCP decided to make sure that didn't happen to them and have as a result acquired vast foreign wealth/debt holdings, including plenty of US government debt.

<comment><USER4> You've got some sound logic there, particularly on why the US is a popular place for investment. That is definitely a factor as to why T-bond yields have stayed low over the last few years. But, is inflation really that big a factor in determining bond yields during auctions?

With regards the '70s, you emphasized "normally" in your reply. Why was that? Weren't the '70s a time of unusually high inflation and unemployment in the US?

And thank you for the book recommendation! It looks really nifty!

<comment><USER5> It's my understanding that _perception_ of future inflation is _very_ important in determining bond yields. At the extreme, you want to get paid back in real terms, not "NuDollars" (hmmm, Heinlein assumed inflation of at least 3 orders of magnitude in the time _Citizen of the Galaxy_ was set). Or why we talk about "real" interest rates, subtracting inflation. Of course, let's not get into how the government is scoring inflation nowadays, or how everyone admits that the cost of education and medicine don't track official inflation at all....

As I understand it, the '70s were "normal" in that that sort of response is what you really should expect from such policies. Check out the book, which I bought but have only glanced at.

The smashing of the Phillips Curve, the official, written into law as I recall, relationship between inflation and unemployment, wasn't considered normal at the time, e.g. the word "stagflation" was coined to describe it. But skimming the Wikipedia article on it suggests that it was never true, or at least not for more than the short term.

And the "'70s" economic agony was rather long term. E.g. you won't read it in Wikipedia, but LBJ closed the gold window to all but central banks in 1968, i.e. moving it much more to the political arena by cutting out "speculators" like George Soros. That was a near catastrophe of the "black swan" type ... at least to them, who thought we could afford both "guns and butter".

With a slow end in the early '80s, delayed in part by the phasing-in of Reagan's tax rate cuts required by the Democratic House, conveniently providing an "It's Morning in America" 1984 campaign theme as "Reaganomics" vanished from the vocabulary ^_^.

<comment><USER4> Your inflationary expectations point makes sense. Considering the US economy is in a period of low to zero inflation at this point, it is fair for bond yields to be low for 3-year terms and so. I completely forgot about NuDollars, hehe.

The bit I know about the '70s is also the US going off the gold standard, with Nixon putting the then Fed Governor, Burns, under immense pressure to keep interest rates low in the face of high inflation. Not to mention going off the gold standard altogether.

Much of my reading on economic growth has been rather lopsided on the side of monetary economics. I'm looking to pick up more on the influence of government policy such as tax cuts, etc.

<comment><USER5> Just a few mostly "I Was There" notes, you're headed in the right directions:

"Energy" was a prime issue in the '70s: the '68-71 ending of the gold window (BTW, prior to that it was illegal for US citizens to own gold) plus the Yom- Kipper War resulted mess up crude oil prices and supplies, and Nixon oversaw a fundamental change in regulatory policy that made everything in this and many other areas a lot more expensive (I highly recommend this book ttp://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0307453693/ which is where I learned about LBJ's closing of the gold window, and which actually doesn't feature much of Reagan until I presume the end, I'm still in the Nixon period).

And rather critically Nixon's wage and price controls were never lifted for oil and gas, and by the Carter Administration bureaucrats were determining where every gallon of refined oil went. My father actually set up a tank farm of 55 gallon drums, but that turned out to be needless because among other things the bureaucrats made damned sure farming regions were not lacking.

The "Energy Crisis" ended practically overnight when Reagan deregulated oil (gas might have come later). This was mightily helped by the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Saudis at least signed on to the campaign to bankrupt the Soviet Union by keeping oil prices down.

By the end of the "'70s" inflation was as I recall flirting with 15% per year, and Volker's necessary high interest rate solution brought the prime rate above 20%, and the government had to borrow at ~20% when Reagan came into office, which explains some of what was going on then.

On the other hand, Reagan, the Senate Republicans, and Tip O'Neal, sort of a transitional figure between the older more responsible liberals and the current type, pretty much never seriously cut budgets, instead all the screaming was about decreases from an automatically increasing baseline. Some of those were of course cuts after inflation, but not by much, as usual, "domestic spending" was the price the Democrats/Left demanded for the Right (which at least here used to include a lot of Democrats) to be able to fight the Cold War.

Which of course Reagan won, not that very many people at all believed he would, or could fix our economy. The mood really was grim back then (there was also all that Malthusian "Limits to Grow" (apparently rified by the energy situation), Soylent Green, we're killing the environment and bringing on a new Ice Age, nonsense back then), the first iteration of today's "preppers" were the survivalists back then, I was one (starting from 2nd grade in 1968 when my mother became a Civil Defense Block Mother, back before it was decided "Crisis Relocation" was cheaper on paper and CD -> FEMA).

The government influence of tax rate cuts was _profound_. I went to college far away from my family in 1979, and at a distance watched my parents substantially shift their economic activity. One extreme of the "'70s" was their taking out a $50K note to computerize a bunch of doctor's offices, and only being able to keep it current, not paying it down, while interest rates were so high.

And _everything_ was done with taxation as a primary issue. As/after the Reagan tax rate cuts were phased in, that became a much smaller issue, and their ventures became much more economically productive.

That today we have one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world is significant.

Anyway, have fun, and after this thread winds down feel free to email me (it's in my Hacker News contact info) if you have any more questions, desire for book recommendations, etc.

<comment><USER4> Wow. The '70s were a tumultuous time indeed! I guess Volcker's policies had to really fight for the headlines with that much going on at the time.

I do have many more questions with the issues you brought up, yes :) It was a fun discussion. Thank you! I'll contact you by email.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > In a sense, it is odd that the power of fiscal policy has come as a surprise > – or that it continues to be categorically denied by the German government > and the U.S. Tea Party.

Nobody is denying that government spending can induce growth in an economy. What the Germans are saying is that it doesn't generate enough growth to cover the additional spending in the long run.

And that because of their already high debt and ongoing overspending, many countries - the US included - are going against a wall.

</comment><comment><USER7> Perhaps Mr. Kaletsky's conclusions regarding Keynesian principles might be more compelling if his portrayal of the facts of global economic policies were (a) more consistent, and (b) more accurate: [http://mises.ca/posts/articles/capitalism-4-0/](http://mises.ca/posts/articles/capitalism-4-0/)

<comment><USER5> That article does a great job of demolishing Kaletsky's declamations on the Great Depression and Recession. But this quote of him also caught my eye:

 _But governments and central banks usually panic during the liquidation phase, pushing interest rates below their natural rate again and boosting the money supply This artificial stimulus, especially if sustained for a long period, inevitably sets off another credit boom and the cycle begins anew._

Which is what sort of happened in Japan ... except for that "another credit boom" part.

As far as I know you don't have to be an Austrian to know about, let alone believe in the "pushing on a string" thesis; if you're not familiar with it, read the mises.ca article about what businessmen are really responding to.

Another thing to prop up the thesis is the "inverted yield curve" recession predictor, specifically short term interest rates suddenly rising above long term. The theory is that's because businesses are frantically borrowing in the short term to keep themselves afloat while they work their excess inventories down. If they survive that experience, no low or negative interest rates will interest them, so to speak, in resuming the intensity of the game that almost killed them.</comment></comment>


Peter Todd (Bitcoin core dev) set up a SHA-1 "Pinata" and it's been claimed - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/rauchg/status/834770508633694208 <comment><USER2> Apparently this was the winning script: [https://blockchain.info/tx/8d31992805518fd62daa3bdd2a5c4fd2c...](https://blockchain.info/tx/8d31992805518fd62daa3bdd2a5c4fd2cd3054c9b3dca1d78055e9528cff6adc?show_adv=true)

If you 'unhexlify' both hex strings on that page, you can see that the first 320 bytes of each PDF from shattered.io were used as input.

       In [1]: import binascii, hashlib

       In [2]: input1 = binascii.unhexlify('255044462d312e330a25e2e3cfd30a0a0a312030206f626a0a3c3c2f57696474682032203020522f4865696768742033203020522f547970652034
       ...: 203020522f537562747970652035203020522f46696c7465722036203020522f436f6c6f7253706163652037203020522f4c656e6774682038203020522f42697473506572436f6d706
       ...: f6e656e7420383e3e0a73747265616d0affd8fffe00245348412d3120697320646561642121212121852fec092339759c39b1a1c63c4c97e1fffe017f46dc93a6b67e013b029aaa1db2
       ...: 560b45ca67d688c7f84b8c4c791fe02b3df614f86db1690901c56b45c1530afedfb76038e972722fe7ad728f0e4904e046c230570fe9d41398abe12ef5bc942be33542a4802d98b5d70
       ...: f2a332ec37fac3514e74ddc0f2cc1a874cd0c78305a21566461309789606bd0bf3f98cda8044629a1')

       In [3]: input2 = binascii.unhexlify('255044462d312e330a25e2e3cfd30a0a0a312030206f626a0a3c3c2f57696474682032203020522f4865696768742033203020522f547970652034
       ...: 203020522f537562747970652035203020522f46696c7465722036203020522f436f6c6f7253706163652037203020522f4c656e6774682038203020522f42697473506572436f6d706
       ...: f6e656e7420383e3e0a73747265616d0affd8fffe00245348412d3120697320646561642121212121852fec092339759c39b1a1c63c4c97e1fffe017346dc9166b67e118f029ab621b2
       ...: 560ff9ca67cca8c7f85ba84c79030c2b3de218f86db3a90901d5df45c14f26fedfb3dc38e96ac22fe7bd728f0e45bce046d23c570feb141398bb552ef5a0a82be331fea48037b8b5d71
       ...: f0e332edf93ac3500eb4ddc0decc1a864790c782c76215660dd309791d06bd0af3f98cda4bc4629b1')

       In [4]: input1[:8], input2[:8]
       Out[4]: ('%PDF-1.3', '%PDF-1.3')

       In [5]: hashlib.sha1(input1).hexdigest() == hashlib.sha1(input2).hexdigest()
       Out[5]: True

</comment><comment><USER3> So it was claimed by reusing the collision data from shattered.io: [https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=293382.msg17950195#m...](https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=293382.msg17950195#msg17950195) Pretty cool.

<comment><USER4> I'm really interested in the comment about someone else running a bot that tries a double-spend based on the answer in the original transaction. It sounds like it didn't work, but it could have. Is there a way to set up these sorts of automated challenges in a way that isn't vulnerable to that?

<comment><USER5> It's possible in Ethereum. You set a two-step process, in the first step you claim the solution - providing a hash of it, and your address. In the second step (in the next block), you provide the solution, and a smart contract can only send money to the address you provided in the first step.

<comment><USER6> It's possible in Bitcoin too and not just for the kind of trivial program you could plausible execute in a public blockchain. [https://bitcoincore.org/en/2016/02/26/zero-knowledge- conting...](https://bitcoincore.org/en/2016/02/26/zero-knowledge-contingent- payments-announcement/)

(And to not put too fine a point on it: the existing track record of ethereum smart contracts suggests that if such a bounty had been created there it would have simply been stolen due to contract/vm flaws by now.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This thread seriously need a ELI5... or ELI don't have a degree in Mathematics.

<comment><USER8> When you send Bitcoins you are not really sending them to any recipient but you place them in the block chain and attach a challenge. Everyone who can solve a challenge can spend the coins associated with this challenge.

Usually the challenge is to prove that you have the private key to a public key included in the challenge so that the public key can function as an address for you and only you can spend the coins because only you have the private key.

But in this case Peter Todd placed 2.48 BTC in the block chain with the challenge to provide two different but otherwise arbitrary pieces of data yielding the same SHA-1 hashes. Someone now used the collision generated by Google to spend those coins.

<comment><USER9> Can everyone place a custom challenge in the Bitcoin blockchain?

<comment><USER8> Yes, challenge and response are just small programs. Every transaction is essentially just two small programs, one that solves the current challenge proving that you are allowed to spent the coins and a new challenge to be solved by the next one who wants to spent the coins.

<comment><USER10> So the way to "collect" those coins is to post the solution to the hash collision and, as a followup challenge, something encrypted with your public key so only you can decrypt it later on. Correct?

<comment><USER8> Yes. And in this case you have to be quick and maybe need some luck. Because everyone could try to get those coins you have to be the one that gets his transaction included in the block chain first.

If Google had not publish the collision but you found it yourself, miners could still just steal the collision from your transaction, throw your transaction away and spend the coins themselves.

Actually everybody could just watch all new transactions, steal your collision once they see it and try to front-run you. So this kind of challenge is not really a good idea in general, at least not in this simple form.

With normal transaction this is not an issue because there you only reveal a signature proving that you know the private key, you do not reveal the private key itself and therefore others can not sign their own transaction and try to front-run you.

 _[...] and, as a followup challenge, something encrypted with your public key so only you can decrypt it later on._

That is not entirely correct, as mentioned above this works by signing and not encrypting. Everybody and especially miners have to be able to verify your transaction but they could not do that if you simply encrypted something. Well, they could if you published the private key but then you get into said front-running issue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> BitBet: A SHA1 collision will be found before the end of 2017

[https://bitbet.us/bet/1351/a-sha1-collision-will-be-found- be...](https://bitbet.us/bet/1351/a-sha1-collision-will-be-found-before-the/)

<comment><USER11> One of the "no" bets was for ~7.4 BTC (~$8500 USD). Interesting that somebody was willing to lay down that much.

<comment><USER12> There was also an 8 BTC (~$9250 USD) bet placed on "Yes" two days before the collision announcement.

<comment><USER6> even knowing about these things in advance, the risk that the site loses your funds is so great that it's not very attractive to bet on these things.

<comment><USER13> The site publishes the bitcoin txids + addresses so it is trivial to verify whether they are paying out the winnings.

<comment><USER14> I think the issue is that like any other outfit that holds bitcoin they may just "lose" them and vanish.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I have no idea what's going on. Is this bad for bitcoin?

<comment><USER16> No. Bitcoin uses "scripts" to validate transactions. It is a small turing- incomplete language with specialized operators that let you perform comparisons and such. This script was set up such that you could spend the coins if you could make a hash collision in SHA1.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Magic – Easiest way to add passwordless authentication to your app - <AUTHOR> https://magic.link/ <comment><USER2> Hey David from the Magic team here. Magic is a Javascript SDK that lets you add passwordless authentication to your app with a few lines of code. I'm here to help answer any questions!

<comment><USER3> Hi David! As an iOS dev I can't wait to try this out on mobile. Although until then I have a noob question: I've noticed some services that offer similar email button sign ins, but the emails were delayed: sometimes by a few minutes, other times by a few hours. If you can comment on it, what are some ways that Magic works to optimize that delay between button and email trigger? Thanks!

<comment><USER2> hey peterkos, great question! We ensure reliable delivery times through a variety of strategies:

1\. We strive to maintain a good email domain reputation which is a huge factor for email deliverability and speed

2\. We pick our email service provider carefully. Current we use Postmark which carters towards transactional emails and has the fastest delivery time to all inboxes.

3\. We have redundancy mechanisms in place that allows us to switch between email providers (SendGrid and MailGun) on demand.

Hope that answers your question!

<comment><USER3> Thanks, it does!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ergoemacs-mode: ergonomic keybindings in Emacs to reduce RSI - <AUTHOR> http://ergoemacs.github.io/ <comment><USER2> There are other options for a more efficient Emacs.

[https://github.com/chrisdone/god-mode](https://github.com/chrisdone/god-mode)

[http://ergoemacs.org/misc/ergoemacs_vi_mode.html](http://ergoemacs.org/misc/ergoemacs_vi_mode.html)

My understanding is that Emacs keyboard chords are not healthy.

[https://ergoemacs.github.io/banish-key- chords.html](https://ergoemacs.github.io/banish-key-chords.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> >Use the commonly bound keys familiar to most people today. Ctrl+C for copy

Disgusting

<comment><USER4> hi, you might give it a try. Many who used emacs for 10 to 20 years wrote to say they absolutely love it and switched. You can see them in the testimonials section.

Matthew Fidler introduced a theme system, so you can change any key you don't like, or disable the Windows style shortcuts. He's also quick to answer questions or fix bugs. Almost always within a day.

PS Matthew Fidler has been working on the project in the past 4 years. It's also part of GNU Elpa. :D

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> thanks for the post!

by the way, there's earlier hackernews discussion at [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=695893](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=695893)</comment>


The Parable of the Pebbles - <AUTHOR> https://meaningness.com/eggplant/pebbles <comment><USER2> The quibble over definition, when you can replace rationality with utility and ditch the whole page of text.

Generally, we do things, because they work (produce results perceived as beneficial) and do repeatedly and reproducibly so, system or no system.

Now, this is not exactly strictly rational as it depends on self-referential definition of success or benefit, which is always heuristic and limited.

Ultimately, this reduces to biological and conditioned instincts. These can change too.

Cognitivism can be rescued by noting that some things change slower and less chaotically than others, these are easier to study - and that all physical systems still have a quantifiable determinism.

Sorry about breaking nebulosity by retreating to chaos. "Because" in backwards direction is hemmed in by it. The truth is measured as information. And ten the may be true non-determinism possible but due to chaos not leading to true unpredictability.</comment>


There's a ~50% chance you were involved in a Facebook study, here's the results. - <AUTHOR> http://slate.me/wrNUrC

<comment><AUTHOR> Note: It involved 250 million users, so that's approx 50% of the entire FB user base. Assuming HN has a 100% Facebook user population (not unreasonable), that's where the 50% comes from.

<comment><USER2> > Assuming HN has a 100% Facebook user population (not unreasonable)

It would be probable 2 years ago or so. Now I highly doubt it's anywhere close to 100%.</comment></comment>


Terry Gross Interview: Woody Allen On Life, Films And 'Whatever Works' [radio] - <AUTHOR> https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105400872

<comment><AUTHOR> As unrelated as it may seem, I couldn't help myself from sharing this interview with you since it shattered so many preconceptions I held of who Woody Allen really _was_. . .the interview was so revealing and awe-inspiring that one could certainly make the case that he approaches his stories much like a hacker approaches his problems, by doing _whatever works_ first and foremost.</comment>


Show HN: Last Time – do you remember your last time? (iOS app) - <AUTHOR> http://lasttimeapp.com/?utm_source=hn&utm_medium=show&utm_campaign=hacker_news

<comment><USER2> Great concept and very well designed.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks :)</comment></comment>


Taming OpenAPI using Racket to create a DSL - <AUTHOR> https://developer.squareup.com/blog/making-openapi-swagger-bearable-with-your-own-dsl/ <comment><USER2> I don't see that quote in the article at all, and it doesn't appear that the author claims any kind of trickery or sneakiness to trick his team into using Racket. It seems like the team built the tool together.

<comment><USER3> Yes, I don't see any mention of trickery in the article. For the record, capital-R Racketeers do not condone trickery.

<comment><USER4> That's a surprise! It sounds like the first in its line. As Wikipedia says:

> Scheme was originally called "Schemer", in the tradition of other Lisp- > derived languages such as Planner or Conniver.

If there's any programming language family which condones trickery, I would think this would be it.

<comment><USER3> Whatever the goals of all the Scheming, it doesn't seem to have involved monetary wealth. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The idea of using a DSL to get around constraints in an upstream language you don't control is indeed a nice one, and one I've used before to a good degree.

I'm sure I'm going to get downvoted for this, but the use of Racket is a smell here. Why not use whatever language you were using before to turn the input DSL into the output OpenAPI spec? Sooner or later, another engineer is going to have to maintain that. You already have another language you're using for other things, and you're introducing an entirely new language and ecosystem to do one small thing. Is this something that couldn't be done in your existing stack?

</comment><comment><USER6> > Problem: while OpenAPI is great for describing APIs, generating client SDK > code and defining your API contracts, it's definitely not a great experience > to write OpenAPI documents from scratch.

Personally, my main problem with OpenAPI is that it is commonly used for documenting contracts, but very rarely for actually driving the implementation. In practice, I have seen a few implementations like OpenAPI Generator [0] but a) with dynamic languages like Python code generation is an anti-pattern, and b) even disregarding the former, the generated result is (in my experience) very incomplete and still needs a lot of manual coding.

I would like to see more frameworks that utilise OpenAPI for routing and request/response validation.

[0] [https://openapi-generator.tech/](https://openapi-generator.tech/)

<comment><USER7> Sorry, I've heard this statement a few times, code generation in dynamic languages is an anti pattern. Do you happen to have any more reading on this?

Sure the generated code is usually not readable which is against the zen of python. But writing code to generate code, especially if it's contract driven, is the correct approach no matter the language.

So really what I'm looking for is more substance of why generating code is an anti pattern in python but not in C.

<comment><USER8> My personal feeling is that it just doesn't fit into the workflow. With C you always have a compilation step and thus a build process, so a code generation step fits quite naturally into your makefile (or other build script).

With Python there's normally no build step – you just run the program. Adding code generation means adding another step, which you might forget to run, leading to confusion. If you make the build step mandatory you lose some of the upside of dynamic languages.

<comment><USER7> I've always solved this with unit/functional tests. The test runner effectively acts as a compiler, for the purposes of checking the contact. in this process.

This is something that's baked into a gate check on merge to the source repo. Or rather it should be.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Why didnt they use the language they already coded the API in then ?

<comment><USER10> This is where I'm really struggling with this story. Now, they have two places documentation can reside: in the code for the API itself, and now in a separate file encoded with a custom LISP-like language?

I feel like the author is forgetting how software gets developed in the real world... or just human nature in general.

Documentation created with this approach will instantly go stale, and will likely get out of sync with the true API very quickly.

How is this a good solution at all? How is "tricking" people into this unsustainable situation a good thing?

<comment><USER11> I'm guessing the real plan is to trick the co-workers into rewriting the entire application in Racket.

<comment><USER5> It really irks me how some treat the practicalities and existing choices of real world software development as an annoying impediment to getting to use a language they're interested in. Whether you're interested in a language and whether you should use it in production can be two separate things. If you've got a compelling reason to use a given language in production, you probably don't have to trick your co-workers into doing anything, you just have a conversation with them! And if you "trick" them into using it for something small, aren't you going to sabotage your long term relationship and trust with them for minimal gain?

<comment><USER12> > _If you 've got a compelling reason to use a given language in production, > you probably don't have to trick your co-workers into doing anything, you > just have a conversation with them!_

Nothing in the article suggests that conversation didn't happen. The only mention of "tricked" is the headline the submitter gave it on HN.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Little good nice story of how to introduce a new tool for work without getting into a crusade. I guess however the manager/architect didn't care much of the additional dependency added to the project thought.

</comment><comment><USER14> I've recently built a thing at work to generate an OpenAPI spec from Clojure specs and some annotations, which worked out surprisingly well. We already have a collection of endpoints through compojure, and we just spec the handler functions and add some annotations for docstrings, and that's basically it. As an added bonus we have the test suite validate all api calls against the spec, so in theory the OpenAPI spec should always be accurate.

For the curious, we took and hacked [https://github.com/metosin/spec- tools](https://github.com/metosin/spec-tools) to output OpenAPI 3, and added a very thin shim to hook that up to our routes.

</comment><comment><USER15> It isn't clear whether they already use Racket.

If Racket was added for this purpose then here are a couple boring[0] solutions that could have lower operational costs.

Generate OpenAPI specifications from your service code.

Use a YAML preprocessor/template engine such as [1]. I have used a similar technique to generate SQL queries.

[0] [https://mcfunley.com/choose-boring- technology](https://mcfunley.com/choose-boring-technology)

[1] [https://github.com/con2/emrichen](https://github.com/con2/emrichen)

</comment><comment><USER16> Seems like it could be convenient to use typescript in some way. Not to code the DSL, but as the DSL itself.

It's language specific, but if a variation with minor attributing extensions existed that seamlessly round-tripped to yaml, the verbosity would just completely collapse.

Readability and creating from scratch could be an order of magnitude more efficient for anyone familiar with JS (reading a handful of interface definitions vs. human parsing back and forth between the docs and YAML).

</comment><comment><USER17> Generally, this technique can work for adding any kind of pet tech to your work stack:

\- identify an isolated, low-risk need.

\- develop a solution in your tech (usually on your own time).

\- introduce to your boss/company as already developed.

The biggest risk for the business is needing to replace the component. In these cases usually an isolated, irregular solution is acceptable

<comment><USER5> Why the phrase "pet tech"? This is a good way to "ask for forgiveness, not permission" which I approve of. But is the goal of adding "pet tech" necessarily a good one? If technology is actually going to move your firm forward long term and is a good long term decision, it's not pet technology. It's a good decision, and it's something that hopefully your team and firm is behind.

<comment><USER18> If it's a good decision then you shouldn't have to ask for forgiveness rather than permission. It's also, if it's not just a pet technology, a strategic decision that impacts everyone on your team and it's pure ego to think you should make that decision alone.

<comment><USER5> I agree with both points. I do think there are orgs where, due to shall we say "personality constraints" you can have majority consensus that a decision is good and should be made but it can still get roadblocked. Of course, such situations are an indicator of a dysfunctional org; in a functional one, you have these kinds of open discussions and like you said, you don't need to ask for forgiveness rather than permission, and you can make these strategic decisions together as a team.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Please don't try to nest quotes of the same kind like this. It reads as 3 parts, quoted - unquoted - quoted, and makes no sense like that.

Yes this is a very pedantic thing to complain about and I do understand what is meant. But it does bother me. Yes, I do realize it's using slanted quotes and not just " \- still doesn't read right for me.

</comment><comment><USER18> edit: Got confused by the title not actually matching the article title and having click-bait information added to it that didn't appear in the original.

<comment><USER12> Which part of the article(!) suggests to you they didn't have that discussion?

<comment><USER18> The word tricked.

<comment><USER12> Where in the article does it appear? From what I see, the only claim in that direction is the random(?) headline the submitter added here. And even then, it doesn't have to be interpreted that way - it could also apply to "they'd normally not consider a language like this, but for this specific case it seemed to make sense".

<comment><USER18> Good point, didn't realize they changed the original title since that's almost almost frowned upon on HN.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Now you are the single point of failure for this service, and worse, you forced your team to learn something they may have had zero interest in looking into.

Never do this in prod without a heads up and approval from most of your team.

I worked with a guy who after completing his tickets instead of looking for more tickets or helping his team, spent his time rewriting the entire clientside application in typescript. He was let go the following month.

<comment><USER12> Am I missing something? The only thing pointing in that direction I see is the submission title here on HN, which is in no way reflected in the article?

<comment><USER20> No mention in the article but the title is clearly implying that.

<comment><USER12> Which is the title on HN, not the title of the article.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


WebGL GPU Particles - <AUTHOR> http://soulwire.co.uk/experiments/webgl-gpu-particles/

<comment><USER2> I've been playing with webGL particles and I'm surprised that texture upload is chosen over normal attribute arrays. I'll have to try it out and see if its faster.

I've found it best to not update anything if you can help it, so use procedurally generated particle effects.

For example, to follow the mouse, I'd be passing in a smoothed curve the mouse has recently travelled down as uniforms. This doesn't work the same way, and won't give as exact results, but does look nice.

One of my blog posts, related: [http://williamedwardscoder.tumblr.com/post/43800948133/effic...](http://williamedwardscoder.tumblr.com/post/43800948133/efficient- procedural-flame-particle-effects)

More recently I've been doing effects using Perlin Noise at an extra dimension - time - and that works great for stuff like plasma effects that don't have to react with the environment. [http://williamedwardscoder.tumblr.com/post/57181055984/perli...](http://williamedwardscoder.tumblr.com/post/57181055984/perlin- noise)

<comment><USER3> Texture upload is a great choice because it means your particle update routine can be a pixel shader that you run the current 'state' texture through to produce a new 'state' texture. Then you're literally running the whole thing on-GPU. Not aware of ways to do that at present with DX9-class hardware or with the WebGL feature set. Modern desktop GL and DirectX let you write to and read from basically anything, as I understand it.

<comment><USER4> > Texture upload is a great choice because it means your particle update > routine can be a pixel shader that you run the current 'state' texture > through to produce a new 'state' texture.

Yep. This is how GPGPU programs were done some 10 years ago when there was no API to deal with GPU buffers in a more flexible way.

These days we've got Transform Feedback (aka. Stream Out in D3D) and Compute Shaders that are more flexible. And Cuda and OpenCL, of course.

One thing you should be aware of when doing this kind of texture-to-texture GPGPU is that the internal GPU pipeline in GLES2 (and thus, WebGL) may be less than full 32 bit floating point. Also the texture formats being used are not full floats. So watch out for numerical precision issues!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I actually cant manage to get this page to work for me. Could it possibly be something to do with the fact im running Linux? Does chrome for linux support WebGL yet?

<comment><USER4> >Could it possibly be something to do with the fact im running Linux?

No.

>Does chrome for linux support WebGL yet?

Yes.

I can run this on Linux with Firefox and Chromium.

Check that you have OpenGL properly set up (e.g. correct gpu drivers).

In addition use the WebGL extension check to see that your OpenGL version (ie. GPU and drivers) can access textures from the vertex shader. It's a feature that was added a few years ago, there may still be hardware/software versions that doesn't allow this.</comment></comment>