Ask HN: Should I Take CTO/Co-Founder Role? - <AUTHOR> Hi all.
I'm a little at a loss here. My CEO just offered me to fill our vacant CTO role and become a co founder to the company. I feel up for the challenge and capable of the responsibility, but I'm a little fearful of taking a salary cut (from ~100k to < 50k). I am our only earner between my wife and I, and we are finally reaching "financial equilibrium" (we racked up a ton of debt just after college and are nearly in control of it) and I really wanted a few months of normalcy or at least general liquidity to establish some savings and pay off some debts before plunging into something like this.
The opportunity for reward of we're successful is immense and really enticing but don't know if I can stomach the risk. Short of budget adjustments (which we're planning now) what options do we have with our shitty credit to help float the next few months? I'm not per se looking for a yes/no, I just want opinions of those more experienced than I so that I can make a more informed decision. <comment><USER2> Maybe I just don't understand startup culture, but, no. Absolutely not. Cutting your salary in half to take a promotion? Where's the money going to come from to do CTO things, like hiring engineers, if the company can't pay its CTO a reasonable wage? I would not advise you to do that, _especially_ when it's not even something your financial situation can support.

<comment><USER3> Completely agree here. I would not take a 50% cut to take, what amounts to in title at least, a promotion. Granted the founder role may come with different class of shares or bonuses which may be something to consider. But at the same time, those shares are probably worth minimum now and will be that way for an extended period of time or at least until fully vested. Either way, you are giving up immediate, guaranteed income to take a bet on the value of the company down the road. If you are not financially and mentally prepared to take that gamble I would not recommend doing it.

I am not sure I understand why a CTO role would be a 50% pay cut from your current role? It sounds like they are trying to pull a fast one on you hoping you like the title over the salary.

<comment><AUTHOR> There's definitely a component of saving burn rate for the company and making me more literally dependent on the success of the company. I understand the perspective there and the needs that the company has right now, but I'm leaning on the no side -- if I can't provide for myself and my wife a stable means of living, there's no way I can continue doing the high-quality work that has earned me this offer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> While I don't know the details of this offer, I would strongly advise you to give it a pass. Such a paycut will rarely compensate you fairly even if your start-up ends up being a moderate success (~200 M exit). Unless this company already has a terrific traction and you get a significant chunk of the options, there is no point in a 50% pay cut.

There are also several gotchas around start-up options. You should read this: [http://blog.samaltman.com/employee- equity](http://blog.samaltman.com/employee-equity)

</comment><comment><USER5> If you have to ask random people on the Internet, no.

</comment><comment><USER6> To take the CTO role and be the co founder the overall components that make up your package will change, it's hard to provide advice without knowing the rest of the package comments that you gain - but a big part of the structure will be to ensure you have skin I the game to make it a success.

<comment><AUTHOR> I mean, right now I have about 1% equity and I'd jump to near 10%, so in the event of wild success of the company (let's say a 100M exit) I'd be way ahead, but in the meanwhile I don't think it's responsible to sacrifice the financial stability we're just arriving at. I'm in no position to open deep lines of credit and have no savings, so it's not like those are options.

The way I see it, it's really a timing issue more than anything. If I were a homeowner, I could consider an equity line on my home to cover a couple months of expenses (plus I wouldn't be paying rent...), or if I had a longer credit history I could open a big card with the understanding that I would either have a good exit with the company or leave for a well-paying, more stable job at a larger company at some point and be able to repay the debt either way.

It's just the wrong time in my life to take this risk, unfortunately. It's not even the long-term effects of the risk, either, it's the change to the near- term status quo that I don't think I'll be able to handle.

<comment><USER7> I'm being blunt here but you should really re-think how financially literate you are if you think taking out debt for a unicorn exit is worth it.

It is not the wrong time in your life to take this risk. This is the wrong risk.

Jeeze, I mean you are saying you're willing to cripple yourself financially, and you are already in debt, I mean... I don't know I'm at a loss for words...

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm not suggesting that I'm strongly considering the option; I'm merely suggesting that the option exists. I don't like the sound of it either!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: CraigsList alternative idea? - <AUTHOR>

Hi everyone. I was thinking about the idea of a CraigsList alternative?
I know it's all about execution, but is this market a bit overpopulated(in terms of solutions)?
After all, the only thing wrong with CraigsList is the design?(sorry, I might be wrong, CraigsList doesn't support my country-Bosnia and Herzegovina)
I'd really like to hear your opinion on this, I'm interested in creating something out of it! :) <comment><USER2> There are 3 just in this current YC cycle: Listia, Renthop, and another that isn't launched yet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the info. I really like this RentHop.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Devsupport.ai – Automate API integrations - <AUTHOR> Hi All, API integration often cycles in repetitive use cases, API specs, Libraries/SDKs, developer context & tech support.
We are building a desktop app that lets SaaS API sellers design their API integration flow and lets their customer integrate APIs in seconds.
SaaS API companies (including our existing customers) resort to:
1. For API documentation - readme.io, Postman and Swagger (few use PDFs too.)
2. For Chat/Support/FAQ - Freshdesk/Zendesk/Calendly/Skype/Teamviewer
3. For Developer Context - IDEs for Android/iOS/JavaScript
On top of these tools, they hire developer success manager and support staff.
We combine all these facets and offer them through Devsupport AI.
Also, we offer manual support as a back up when automation fails to work.
We have launched a public beta and are seeing a good traction from few payment gateways in South East Asia and wanted to get some constructive feedback from the community.
Please take a look at https://devsupport.ai and let us know your comments/feedback. <comment><USER2> Isn't this space insanely crowded?

<comment><AUTHOR> For our learning, can you point out few products?</comment></comment>


Are Kilian Jornet's Speed Records Too Good to Be True? - <AUTHOR> https://www.outsideonline.com/2324076/ultrarunner-kilian-jornet-everest-controversy <comment><USER2> No. (At least to anyone who's followed his career.) That dude is a total class act.

As a side note, the article mentions a Seb Montaz-Rosset film that features Kilian called "Downside Up." It's... maybe one of the craziest things I've ever seen. Ski mountaineering is amazing! [https://vimeo.com/ondemand/downsideup](https://vimeo.com/ondemand/downsideup)

<comment><USER3> Betteridge's Law of headlines.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The dude is a freakin' machine. There's a short film (13 mins) called 'Kilian' at [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eVBrMcflDE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eVBrMcflDE) which made it into the Banff Film Festival last year. Worth a watch if you want get a better feel for how he travels and his thought process. Food for twenty hours in the mountains? Oh, I'll probably take 4 Snickers or something...

<comment><USER5> Nice, thanks.

What are those cute little axes that he's running? And what's going on with them at 10m50 - is that a foldout pinky rest?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eVBrMcflDE&t=650](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eVBrMcflDE&t=650)

<comment><USER6> Looks like a pair of Petzl gully axes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is Outside magazine stirring the pot for no good reason. Kilian has proven dozens of times in highly competitive and controlled races that he is a notch above competitors from his generation. Also, the FKT-s he sets are not out of this world, and many of them have been broken since (Kilimanjaro and Aconcagua iirc). Anyone who has used a watch GPS enough times will know that once in a while they will just misbehave and report incorrect coordinates.

<comment><USER8> I think the article largely paints a favorable picture of Kilian.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I really don't get why he doesn't just carry a reliable GPS tracker with him. Seems so much easier than arguing with people online.

<comment><USER6> He's probably using a GPS watch which is very convenient but error prone. They'll frequently get misreads (where they briefly think you are miles away from where you actually are) and accumulate small amounts of error over time (the granularity isn't great, so sometimes it will continue to increment distance even if you are standing still).

Really reliable GPS trackers are big and heavy, and for someone attempting speed records just not worth the weight. And even with reliable GPS tracker there will still be doubters who will claim the data was faked.

<comment><USER10> How does error-prone GPS work on a technical level? Based on a description of GPS I would think it's kind of an "all or nothing" thing (no signal, or exact calculated position)

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

I just don't get how you can get "low-fi GPS". What happens exactly? Either you receive the signal or you don't, and any bounces off the ground or something will just add a couple of meters.

<comment><USER11> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Error_analysis_for_the_Global_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Error_analysis_for_the_Global_Positioning_System)

The largest source of error is ionospheric delay which changes throughout the day. This can be corrected with additional ground measurements (DGPS, WAAS) or a second receiver on a different frequency. GPS watches do WAAS but nothing else.

(As an aside, I have been unable to get my hands on any modern multi-frequency GPS receivers. If someone has a link to one that I can buy with a credit card, I would love it! But that rules out the industrial ones that are "call for a quote" because if you have to ask, you can't afford it ;)

Other sources of error are inconveniently positioned satellites ("dilution of precision"), multipath reception, and the intrinsic quantized nature of the code being transmitted by the satellite. (This last one can be mitigated by tracking the phase of the carrier signal independently from the navigation code, however. Not sure if GPS watches do this or not, but I suspect they do. A comment below implies they don't have the power budget for the extra CPU cycles, though, which might be true.)

An ideal model of GPS makes it seem like there are four unknowns, but in reality there are many more unknowns. You don't know exactly where the satellites are (ephemeris errors). You don't know if the clock on the GPS satellite is right. You don't know the speed of light through the atmosphere on the exact path between you and the satellite. You don't know the exact time at the receiver's location (internal oscillator error, etc.). You don't know that the signal from the satellite took a straight line route. You don't necessarily have an optimal view of the sky to be able to hedge against the other errors (HDOP/VDOP/TDOP). As a result, you don't get a pinpoint location in the real world.

(One last thing, it turns out there is a reason why GPS receivers give you separate speed and position outputs. Speed can be determined independently from position by monitoring the doppler shifts on the received signals. Many receivers do this, which is why your speed can be correct but your position wrong.)

<comment><USER12> > As an aside, I have been unable to get my hands on any modern multi- > frequency GPS receivers. If someone has a link to one that I can buy with a > credit card, I would love it!

Try SwiftNav or Tersus. I have not used either of them so I can't comment on the quality, but $1-2k for an RTK setup is pretty great. They are both more 'startup' than traditional suppliers.

uBlox F9 looks good but isn't quite available yet. They have a solid line of single frequency receivers so I'm looking forward to seeing pricing.

I have briefly tested some Unicorecomm from China, and they work well, but they miss your online store requirement, and the documentation is nonexistent.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Going up to those altitudes without supplemental oxygen sounds absolutely insane to me. Studies via MRI have shown brain damage even in climbers climbing Mont Blanc (4,808.7 m (15,777 ft)).

[https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/brain-cells- into-...](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/brain-cells-into-thin- air/)

</comment><comment><USER14> I don't understand the desire to race as fast as possible through the natural splendor of the mountains. I feel like these speed-climbing folks are really missing out on the experience.

<comment><USER15> For some of these people, the fact that there's natural splendour there isn't the point and isn't relevant. It's like game-grinding. Pick a new achievement - running through mountain trail X - and then grind it. Tick it off, do the next one. Whatever they're seeking is inside their heads and the setting is just a convenience. It could just as easily be a featureless 50 mile tunnel. The setting is relevant only as far as it's a recognised thing to grind and tick off.

<comment><USER16> This is not at all how professional trail/ultra runners approach their lives. You can follow a lot of them on social media (including Kilian Jornet) see how they actually spend their days.

<comment><USER15> And it's not how everyone who plays games plays. But some do. I suspect there are many you don't see on the social media. It would be a strange field of human endeavor if it somehow managed to not have any people like this. I doubt they'd be the professionals. They wouldn't be the social media self- publicitors.

<comment><USER16> The professional ultra running scene isn't like what you think of when you think professional sports. There are certainly runners on the track and in road races that take the mindset you are describing, but ultra/trail running is very different from other pro sports.

<comment><USER2> That's been my experience too... I've known many triathletes who will do an extra lap around the parking lot to meet their coach's exact plans, but that seems a lot less common among trail runners.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Thursday's Junk-Bond Rally May Have Been a Fed-Fueled Mirage - <AUTHOR> https://www.barrons.com/articles/thursdays-junk-bond-rally-may-have-been-a-fed-fueled-mirage-51586535580 <comment><AUTHOR> Here's the Fed's term sheet: [https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/file...](https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/files/monetary20200409a5.pdf?mod=article_inline)</comment>


Why we have chins - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150413183745.htm

<comment><USER2> Aside from the chin...look at the picture of the modern human skull compared to the Neandethal-era skull. Notice Neandethal-era skull has a perfect bite and the modern human skull has an overbite. The overbite is the direct result of humans developing/using eating utensils (this fact may have actually been from a recent HN front page post).

<comment><USER3> Can't get over how Lamarckian this sounds. How long have we been eating with utensils? Long enough for such a radical change? And is an overbite really such a disadvantage that it would select you right out of the gene pool?

<comment><USER4> Human physical genetic changes have accelerated in the last 50,000 years. Probably accompanying new pressures brought by living in social groups. But since the fork was only invented 400 years ago, maybe utensils is a reach.

<comment><USER5> Surely "utensils" includes more than just modern style metal forks? I don't think it's a stretch to say that the use of tools of any kind in the eating process could remove specific evolutionary pressures that would otherwise inhibit some individuals from reproducing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> First thing that came to my mind is that chins might be better as attachment for facial muscles giving more expressive or efficient face expressions or talking.

<comment><USER7> My first thought was that a chin may take a punch better...

<comment><USER8> Quite the opposite. A punch on the chin will knock you out easily.

<comment><USER7> Not to argue, but is being knocked out bad? It seems like a common occurrence to a fight is go to unconscious. Some people have strong chins. Would they do better in a no rules fight historically, if they didn't go down?

<comment><USER9> Getting knocked out in an athletic competition is one thing. Getting knocked out when a neighboring tribe is attempting to kill all your men and old folks, enslave everyone else, and steal everything of value, would probably have been something else.

<comment><USER7> If you're unconscious, you're not a threat any more.

Live to fight another day.

<comment><USER9> Inter-tribal resource wars might be fought by primitives, but they're not fought by _idiots_. Nor are they fought by chivalrous knights. The throats of unconscious warriors will be cut. Even if a throat was missed in all the chaos, what is the evolutionary advantage to a male of living on after all fertile females have been abducted?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> _" Our study suggests that chin prominence is unrelated to function," Holton says, "and probably has more to do with spatial dynamics during development."_

Just as a sidenote on this theme, it's interesting how according to studies chin prominence correlates with perceptions of leadership ability, confidence and sexual attractiveness in men. Apparently chin implants are as popular as breast augmentations these days:

[http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/03/us-chinimplants- id...](http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/03/us-chinimplants- idUSBRE8420XF20120503)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Here's a link to the original article ("The ontogeny of the chin: an analysis of allometric and biomechanical scaling"):

[http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12307/full](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12307/full)

</comment><comment><USER11> Would like to point out that we're not the only species with chins.

Elephants have chins, too. [1]

(This is my favorite fact at parties. I'm a blast.)

1\. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chin](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chin)

<comment><USER12> Do elephants have a chin since they use their trunk as an eating utensil?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> My instinct is to see chins as shields to the Adam's apple. I have no explanation for why primates have less prominent chins, though.

</comment><comment><USER14> How about chicks dig guys with a manly chin.

Don't know how you can call yourself an evolutionary biologist if you so easily overlook sexual selection.

<comment><USER15> Because you need to ask why they dig a manly chin.

Long hair makes sense because it is a crude history of our health. Symmetry also makes sense, as it is a sign of healthy, strong genes. Being rich enough to afford to waste stuff also makes sense (and explain a ton of weird human and animal behavior)

But if a chin serves no purpose what so ever, why would it become a sex symbol? They're not big enough to work like antlers (look how much energy I can accrue to grow these big ass antlers!) so why would they start to grow in the first place?

<comment><USER14> It is unclear whether sexual selection impedes or facilitates natural selection [1]. Sexual selection can happen just because. A female who prefers chins will give birth to sons with chins and daughters who like chins. It's a positive feedback loop that doesn't need cooperation from natural selection to give it fitness.

At one time in the past there may have been a reason that the men with chins were more successful than other humans. The correlation may have been coincidental though. Maybe the men with no-chins happened to be living in a part of the world that suffered a famine. Or if there was a direct relationship, the sexual preference remained after the natural advantage was no longer relevant.

The study does a good eliminating mechanical advantage as a reason for having a jaw. (And that's all it says.) But the speculation about why the jaw exists (inserted by the news writer and has nothing to do with this study) seems less certain to me. Why did chins not simply get smaller with the rest of the skull? Something encouraged chin growth in humans. But to say what you'd have to study skulls from the past to see exactly how the chin changed over time.

[1] [http://www.cell.com/current- biology/abstract/S0960-9822%2811...](http://www.cell.com/current- biology/abstract/S0960-9822%2811%2901397-2)</comment></comment></comment>


How to get the Facebook password of almost anyone in less than 10s - <AUTHOR> http://www.stephanerangaya.com/post/6785393180/how-to-get-the-facebook-password-of-almost-anyone-in In my opinion, this is a security issue. This method works for Google Chrome and Firefox (with Firebug) but probably with Safari and Internet Explorer 9 too (I haven't tried). Note that it's not only for Facebook, you can get any Gmail, Twitter, etc.. password as long as you have... <comment><USER2> I wrote a script to do this for gmail and yahoo a long long time back

[http://code.activestate.com/recipes/576542-password- grabber-...](http://code.activestate.com/recipes/576542-password-grabber- javascript/)</comment>


Cloudera Files for IPO - <AUTHOR> https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1535379/000162828017003221/projectthunders-1.htm <comment><USER2> Dupe of [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14006407](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14006407)</comment>


CloudGrid.js by Pinterest - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/pinterest/cloudgrid

<comment><USER2> I wish there was a link to a live example. The repository comes with an example but I'd have to check out the repository to see it. Unless there's a trick to loading html files in a repo on Github to be rendered in the browser (I know, security nightmare).

<comment><USER3> Pinterest front page is the example.

<comment><USER2> Pintrest front page is just vertical columns. This is more of a horizontally and vertically justified view. Much harder to achieve than columns.

In fact, from easiest to hardest...

* Vertical columns * Horizontal rows * Vertical and Horizontal grid</comment></comment></comment>


Shortest Quicksort Ever? - <AUTHOR> http://taliesinb.net/quicksort-in-61-characters

<comment><USER2> I found this J example on StackOverflow. 43 characters, excluding name, assignment operator, and optional whitespace.

        quicksort =: (($:@(<#[) , (=#[) , $:@(>#[)) ({~ ?@#)) ^: (1<#)

[http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2603739/what-is-the- most-...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2603739/what-is-the-most-concise- programming-language)

<comment><USER3> O.O .....Oh wow...I truly have NO idea how to read this >.<

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Usually, when I see an opaque post like this, I'll not worry too much because I figure it's really only relevant to the (very, very, very small) minority of the people who understand it. But it's only 61 characters, and I'm certain that I should be able to walk my understanding of quicksort (refreshed with <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quicksort>) - but I'm stumped.

And so, I beging to lose another two hours of my life as I attempt to understand what this interesting syntax mechanism for representing algorithms consists of...

</comment><comment><USER5> This is a good opportunity to show off the (fake) Haskell quicksort:

qsort :: (Ord a Bool) => [a] -> [a]

qsort [] = []

qsort (x:xs) = qsort (filter (<= x) xs) ++ [x] ++ qsort (filter (> x) xs)

Not 61 characters, but it has the added benefit of being comprehensible!

<comment><USER3> Saw your code, couldn't believe how awesome it was, and made an effort to make it shorter just for kicks. (Warning though, I'm pretty new to Haskell.) Did a bit of "cheating" here and there, since the purpose is for it to be as concise as possible, and got it to 50 characters. I'm sure someone can get it lower :P

       f=filter
       q[]=[]
       q(h:t)= q(f(<=h)t)++[h]++q(f(>h)t

<comment><USER6> I got it down to 47 characters and improved the performance by moving the less common case to the bottom. (Not that is matters since this implementation sacrifices performance for elegance, but playing code golf with Haskell destroys the elegance anyway...)

      f=filter
      q(h:t)=q(f(<=h)t)++h:q(f(>h)t)
      q _=[]

<comment><USER3> totally stole your idea and found a way to do it in 46 characters :P

       f=filter
       q(h:t)= q(f(<=h)t)++h:q(f(>h)t)
       q a=a</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Pinterest acquires Jelly - <AUTHOR> https://blog.jelly.co/big-news-pinterest-acquires-jelly-1ef68d36480d#.j3z4t5cf3 <comment><USER2> Stumbling upon Jelly gave me the same excitement as when I first discovered Ask Jeeves. And like Ask, the product fell short of expectations - it couldn't answer my basic questions.

Seems like an acquihire.</comment>


Scientists at MIT Are Designing Chairs That Assemble Themselves - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2015/02/mad-scientists-mit-designing-chairs-assemble/

<comment><USER2> Can't visit this website, shit ton of javascript that make it so laggy. (with chrome)</comment>


The Price Is Right: What Advertising Does to TV - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/10/12/the-price-is-right-emily-nussbaum <comment><USER2> What I got out of this article: Advertising has become so deeply entrenched into the medium(not just commercials) that it has become almost required to invoke a sense of commonality between the characters and the viewer. You are what you eat, in a sense. If its The Mindy Project and Tinder, or Mr. Robot and Starbucks it likely doesnt matter anymore as long as the logo finds its way into your eye sockets. In an effort to ease the process, the act of bashing the product in satire has become increasingly common. To put in other words, Colbert lied to you openly to get you thinking about a product.

</comment><comment><USER3> "At this point, the model seems to morph every six months."

I stopped reading here. The model is ads and subscription revenue. Ads have been around forever. Subscription revenue has been around for at least twenty years. For instance HBO is decades old and they have even been producing original shows for over fifteen years. You also have some other revenue sources, like iTunes downloads. No huge change there. Cable operators have been selling pay-per-view for decades.

How is that "morphing every six months"?

<comment><USER4> What you got to what a set up for why that view ("seems") was wrong.

You wrote "Ads have been around forever"

A few paragraph later, which you didn't get to, the author says:

> This is both a new crisis and an old one. When television began, it was a > live medium. Replicating radio, it was not merely supported by admen; it was > run by them. In TV's early years, there were no showrunners: the person with > ultimate authority was the product representative, the guy from Lysol or > Lucky Strike. Beneath that man (always a man) was a network exec. ...

> Advertisements shaped everything about early television programs, including > their length and structure, with clear acts to provide logical inlets for > ads to appear."

ending up with:

> This sponsor-down model held until the late fifties, around the time that > the quiz-show scandals traumatized viewers: producers, in their quest to > please ad reps, had cheated. Both economic pressures and the public mood > contributed to increased creative control by networks, as the old one- > sponsor model dissolved.

You write: "Subscription revenue has been around for at least twenty years."

The author's starting point is from before pay cable. ("Then came pay cable, the VCR, the DVD, the DVR, and the Internet".) As [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cable_television_in_the_United...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cable_television_in_the_United_States) point out, that was nominally the late 1940s, but 'Original programming over cable came in 1972 with deregulation of the industry.'

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> And this is why I only watch content with access to fast froward button. No TV for me.

<comment><USER6> And yet, many movies and TV shows (including premium TV that features no commercials) feature some level of placements from advertisers, be it subtle or obvious. And everything falls victim; even The Martian has a plug for Under Armour.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: To all the java developers out there, favorite java tech stack? - <AUTHOR> I'm starting a new job as a full-stack developer (currently back end), I have a month before I start the new job (we can choose what stacks to work with) and want to create some personal projects. With so many options out there, I was just wondering what is your favorite java stack to use and why? Thanks <comment><USER2> This is going to sound like a troll but I'm a long-time Java developer that hasn't written Java code in over a year because I've switched to Kotlin.

Practically speaking, I'd start with whatever stack your new employer already uses. Having a solid understanding of the existing components will give you a baseline understanding of what was chosen and why.

One framework that's caught my eye recently is Micronaut which is basically a simplified version of Spring with added benefits like using little to no reflection.

</comment><comment><USER3> You can do a web search on this: "Popular Java web stacks 2019"</comment>


Open Source Alternative to One Time Password ( OTP - ** But without SMS )  - <AUTHOR> http://motp.in

<comment><USER2> Hi, I just tried using the 'demo' from the site. However, since I have a Singapore phone number (+65 code), I was only able to enter in my number as "0065</comment><comment>---" \- but no missed call. Could you please let me know how to go about testing it out with this number? Thanks.</comment>


Lila Tretikov Has Resigned from Wikimedia Foundation - <AUTHOR> https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082470.html <comment><USER2> Honestly, this all sounds pretty typical of non-profit organizations. I've been working with various different ones since I was 7. Sometimes as a volunteer, sometimes as an employee, sometimes as an executive, and sometimes as a board member.

I have never seen a functional non-profit. For whatever reason, non-profits seem to attract all kinds of people who are motivated by things I can only describe as "weird." And it's not just at the management levels. Volunteers and employees tend to have an irrational sense of entitlement, as though the mission of the group and the fact that they are in some way devoted to it earns them a right to a voice in the leadership.

But there are also issues with the personalities that the management roles attract, particularly with boards. There are two types of board members: those who are doing the work because they think they should, so they want to get in, make decisions, and get out. Then there are the ones who are passionately invested in "the cause", and the passionate ones are complete wild cards. You never know what you are going to get. Narcissists, martyrs, and drama queens, most often. But sometimes other.

I haven't been following this situation at all, but if I had to make a guess, the truth is somewhere in the middle. Lila was probably doing her honest and straightforward best to deal with a situation that was _way_ over her head and made some mistakes.

The board and other employees are probably a mixed bag of honest, good-heated people trying to make a difference, some complete nutbags, and a lot of people in between.

In many ways, non-profits are like academia. Important and necessary organizations, but extremely disfunctional in the same ways. They tend to be sanctuaries for people who do not really function all that well in public society or companies. The pay stakes are generally lower, so people fight militantly over issues of status and control that seem trivial to the rest of the outside world.

<comment><USER3> You're painting with a broad brush and your characterisation is greatly at odds with many of the functional non-profit organisations I know here in Australia:

* the St Vincent de Paul Society

* the National Heart Foundation

* Cancer Council of Australia

* Opera Australia

* Unicef

* National Disability Services

I could go on. My point is, non-profit organisations encompass a huge spectrum of activity. Many operate like any other company and pay wages for the majority of employees. I would argue that 'the mission' actually makes a non- profit more likely to succeed, as everybody knows what they're working towards and what team they're on.

Wikipedia is a different beast entirely.

<comment><USER4> You worked internally in of all these and more?

Sorry if I'm a little doubtful but that's quite a resume.

<comment><USER5> How do you define functional such that the only way to identify it is to work there?

<comment><USER4> The Australian "National Heart Foundation" for instance has killed a lot of people, fucked up shit.

But people love them cause they are functional. Lot's of PR.

The op topic (On topic to the parent link) was they are very broken internally. So much so they fail the the cause of good.

They do, and they don't, on topic is how good they are, is 500 million the red cross spent on 6 houses true, and right. What's the real story. Are NPO that bad really?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Some background here:

[http://mollywhite.net/wikimedia-timeline/](http://mollywhite.net/wikimedia- timeline/)

The above conflates a lot of highly unrelated events, but it's a cool visualization.

But the reality is that she lost the support of senior staff, and wasn't able to regain it. It's impossible to recover from something like that, so it's a good sign she stepped down.

<comment><USER7> So there is a crisis at the WM foundation? could you explain for those who are not in the loop? is it about their search engine project?

<comment><USER8> I've written a few comments, they might be helpful. One I just posted here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11177401](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11177401)

But the original story on HN has some comments from me:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11101164](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11101164)

My take at the time:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11101262](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11101262)

For an excellent backgrounder, then Liam awyatt's b;oh sets things put the clearest:

[http://wittylama.com/2016/01/08/strategy-and- controversy/](http://wittylama.com/2016/01/08/strategy-and-controversy/)

And:

[http://wittylama.com/2016/01/30/strategy-controversy- part-2/](http://wittylama.com/2016/01/30/strategy-controversy-part-2/)

<comment><USER7> Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I worked for Lila when we were both at SugarCRM, and I never got the sense of what is being claimed at WMF was her modus operandi (I found dealing with her a fairly transparent affair, which is why I thought she landed at WMF). It's really quite dumbfounding.

<comment><USER10> I know little about current WMF circumstances, but my guess is that fairly transparent for a corporation would be seen as fairly secretive at WMF.

I think part of the problem here is that she had never edited Wikipedia before joining, which means it would have been very hard for her to understand the vast cultural differences.

Wikipedia comes out of the open-source and open-culture world, which has a very strong transparency bias, and which has had to fight hard to maintain that openness. And my experience is that Wikipedia even stronger than that, in that the editor communities organize many thousands of people all in public. Making that work requires very strong habits of transparency.

It's very different than current American business culture, where executives get a substantial level of deference and assumed control of information.

<comment><USER8> This. You have captured the problem in a nutshell.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Huh. I absolutely hated the new "Media Viewer" and the WYSIWYG editor, but I didn't know there is this big drama behind it. (Plus all the Knowledge Engine thing, which I didn't hear about. But neither did more senior editors, it seems.)

Truth to be said, I _do_ really like Wikipedia's mobile layout and mobile website in general. I still think they should do something with the discussion system, as I think having wiki-style discussions that nobody ever opens is not really good for anything, but I don't know what to do instead. :)

<comment><USER12> I really like the Visual Editor, as a novice editor - it makes things such as adding citations and links wonderfully easy.

<comment><USER11> Interesting. Maybe it's just me being used to wiki syntax for such a long time that it just irritates me to use WYSIWYG.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What has happened here is one of the worst situations in the WMF's history. I feel the most for James Heilman, who was removed from the Board only after asking serious questions about Lila's 'Knowledge Engine".

Lila's stint has had a terrible impact on the staff and community alike.

Here are some emails to the Wikimedia mailing list. The one that started the beginning of the end is when she was very specifically asked for the Knight Foundation grant application, which it now appears was the catalyst for the Board removing James because he asked questions that threatened her:

[https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081678.html)

When it was finally released - which only occurred when someone from outside the Board took the initiative to speak to the Knight Foundation who said the grant was never confidential even though the WMF said it was - there was a mass exodus of staff, with the most notable from Siko Bourtese, whose email to the mailing list [1] read, in part:

 _I've had the amazing privilege of serving this movement in a staff capacity for the past 4 ½ years, but I've now decided to move on from my role at the Wikimedia Foundation._

 _Transparency, integrity, community and free knowledge remain deeply important to me, and I believe I will be better placed to represent those values in a volunteer capacity at this time._

Ido Ivri sent the following email to the same ML [2], in which he states his serious concerns around transparency, the removal of James and the steady flow of people resigning.

Brion Vibber, an exceptional and well respected member of staff sent a direct email asking what was being done stop people leaving. [3]

Then Lila sent out a now infamous "Why we've changed" email, and made things much, much worse. [4] it was summed up well by Brion [5]:

 _Lila, a few notes._

 _First, many staff members feel that the accomplishments you claim under "we" are not attributable to you._

 _Complaints about lack of strategy and confusing management have come from all levels of the staff; the implication that people who failed to be promoted might be behind discontent seems not to hold water._

 _As to shutting down pet projects to improve focus, it 's unclear what projects you refer to._

 _Fundamentally we agree that we must improve tech. But the tech side of the organization, based on my conversations with other employees including managers, does not seem to have benefited from your tenure -- ops laregely manages itself, while the other sections get occasionally surprised by a reorg. We 've still not fully recovered from the 2015 reorg and Damon's appearance and disappearance._

 _If your contention is that tech supports you as a silent majority, I have strong doubts that this is the case._

James Heilman explained the problems around the Knowledhe Engine, which was pretty damning [6].

The final departure, and IMO the most damning email, was from data scientist Oliver Keyes, who resigned [7] with the following email:

 _Dear all,_

 _I am leaving the Wikimedia Foundation to take up a job as a Senior Data Scientist at an information security company. My last day will be on 18 March._

 _After 12 months of continual stress, losses and workplace fear, I no longer wish to work for the Wikimedia Foundation._

 _While I appreciate that the Board of Trustees may take steps to rectify the situation, I have no confidence in their ability to effectively do so given their failure to solve for the problem until it became a publicity issue as well as a staff complaint._

 _I wish the movement and community the best of luck in building a fairer, more transparent and more representative governing structure._

 _All the best,_

 _Oliver Keyes_

 _Of these last 5 years, Wikimedia Foundation_

It is the minutes of the Discovery Team meeting [8] that really showed me the level of Lila's dissembling, she kept trying deflect awkward questions to others and kept asking why staff didn't feel "empowered'. I'm glad she has gone. She has caused untold damage to the WMF, it is literally going to kts years to resolve the fall out of all of this and regain trust with EMF staff and community by the BoT. Many of the Board should just resign. Those who were open and engaged the community, such as Dariusz, should definitely stay!

1\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html)

2\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081966.html)

3\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081997.html)

4\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082145.html)

5\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082150.html)

6\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082287.html)

7\. [https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-Febru...](https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082313.html)

8\. [https://m.mediawiki.org/wiki/Discovery/2016-02-16_Discussing...](https://m.mediawiki.org/wiki/Discovery/2016-02-16_Discussing_Knowledge_Engine_with_Lila)

<comment><USER13> Note that it's Brion Vibber, not Brian Vibber.

Apart from that, excellent summary of events.

<comment><USER14> >Note that it's Brion Vibber, not Brian Vibber.

According to my browser's spell-checker, Mr. Vibber is misspelling his name.

Who are you going to trust, some guy who apparently can't spell his own name right, or a multibillion dollar corporation that spends tons of money on developing state-of-the-art software tools like spell-checkers?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> If some more people leave, presumably the foundation can go back to hosting Wikipedia and funding the _occasional_ project to improve it, after extensive user input.

You know, instead of this playing startup thing.

<comment><USER8> There was never a problem with developing new technology. It was the outrageous dissembling and secrecy around the Knowledge Engine that has caused this problem.

You cannot go into an organization with such an extreme ethos around transparency and openness as the WMF and get away with secretly coming up with a plan to compete against Google. That's what was done, and I don't care who on the Board say it wasn't ever a plan to compete against Google with a search engine made by the WMF: that was the plan cooked up by Damon, and I'm certain Lila kept going with it, even when Damon left.

<comment><USER16> What about Flow? Media Viewer? Visual Editor? The "extensive user input" came after the code was already written and the community didn't like the result.

<comment><USER17> VE was a Sue Gardner thing. Hate or love it, it had nothing to do with Lila.

<comment><USER16> And Media Viewer was in development before Lila came around, even if she did preside over its release. I'm not really interested in blaming individuals. The point is that the Wikimedia Foundation as an organization has a history of pushing projects the community doesn't want. A different kind of executive director might move the foundation back towards more of a support role for the community. Of course, that's not going to happen unless the makeup of the board of directors changes drastically.

<comment><USER8> I think that's not entirely accurate. The VE was wanted, and clearly is needed. There have been valid concerns around Wikimarkup that lead to a less than great UX experience for many editors, and it is a barrier to entry.

It was discussed for a long time when I was active in the community. People who were active in the community championed it.

The execution seems to have been less than successful. The way that some things were introduced were also less than stirling. Rolling do,etching like the VE on a shoestring budget is also quite difficult, on such a massive project.

Sue didn't always get things right, and during her tenure mistakes were made. She was, IMO, amazing though. When she left, she had bedded down an amazing amount of important processes, including governance and other important organizational matters. Her technical skills weren't perhaps as good as her other skills (but actually, they weren't that bad really). There were issues that needed addressing by the next ED, but there always will be matters that need addressing! Nobody leaves an organization in 100% perfect running order.

Lila has not only left the WMF with issues, she has destroyed a good deal of trust, and left the WMF's governance, openness and transparency in tatters.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Wow that timeline was FANTASTIC and amazing.

I just cant believe how tumultuous this was.

I really found the Jobs/Apple/Google salary debacle part fascinating.

</comment><comment><USER19> Why?

</comment><comment><USER20> imho: The longer the same people stay with an organization, the more personality issues come to the surface. As you end up with a self appointed dictator and his/her sidekick, assorted followers, the opposing team and the rest regulated to the sidelines. Meanwhile it's sad watching a sinking ship.

"Narcissistic personality disorder"

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

ps: I don't like you so I am going to vote you down regardless as to the quality of your postings ;)</comment>


Ask HN: Good resources for offline documentation to code without internet? - <AUTHOR> I was on a road trip recently, and decided to try learning Vulkan while I was in the passenger seat, as I had downloaded a PDF of a Vulkan tutorial before I left. I wrote most of a Makefile for my project, but found myself struggling to remember specific automatic variables. I tried `man make`, but that only described the usage of the program itself, not writing Makefiles. Additionally, I found that I had no reference for SDL2, and resorted to reading header files to glean specific API details.
I've found myself in this situation before, trying to learn new things on long flights as well.
Even if there were man pages for some of these things, HTML documentation might be preferable. It would be nice to have a program or library that could download language and project specific documentation in an easily searchable and browsable library. Does anything like this currently exist? <comment><USER2> Check out Dash, which is a offline documentation browser for the Mac. There's also an OSS clone that can read the same docsets.</comment>


How do DNS-based proxy services work (e.g. to watch the BBC olympic feed)? - <AUTHOR>

I have a British wife who was being driven crazy by the US Olympic coverage.  Following the suggestions on
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4306600
I used the free trial of www.unotelly.com.  It worked like a charm.  I pointed my DNS to one of their servers, and I could see the BBC live Olympics streams.  I get that they make my computer appear to be in the UK, but how do they do that? It seems like a big improvement over the older VPN services.  What's going on under the hood?  Any security concerns from a service like this? <comment><USER2> Simple guess: Their DNS server always returns the same IP address, which is a simple transparent proxy.

An encrypted VPN would protects you from data sniffing done by your ISP. Obviously the VPN provider will be in a position to sniff your data. With the transparent proxy, your data is not encrypted and can be sniffed by both your ISP and your "VPN" provider.

</comment><comment><USER3> Why not just use a VPN? especially on a LowEndBox and it will allow you to maintain it and be able to keep the security as much or as little. Then your wife will be able to also watch all her favourite tv shows on BBC and others.

<comment><AUTHOR> The biggest advantage is easier configuration. You can set the DNS on the router, and then all computers on your network (including Xboxes, iPads etc.) and work with it. It also seems like it would be a bit faster not having to do a VPN. In short, changing DNS settings is usually a lot easier than setting up a VPN connection.</comment></comment>


This Page Is Anonymous (2013) - <AUTHOR> http://voidnull.sdf.org/ <comment><USER3> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5638988](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5638988)

243 comments from 6 years ago

<comment><USER4> I notice a user was offering to contribute one bitcoin to the reward there, upping its value in present-day terms by $9000. At the time, it would have been worth around $135.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> > ssh -o ProxyCommand="nc -X 4 -x localhost:9050 %h %p" sdf.org

This will send a DNS A record request for sdf.org and on some platforms, a request for SSHFP records, too. Unless the system is configured to route all DNS traffic over Tor, it may be possible to correlate those requests' originating IP with the published update timestamps.

<comment><USER6> > Unless the system is configured to route all DNS traffic over Tor

Edge cases like this is why I always use things like Tails when I want to do something over Tor. There are just too many gotchas, and many of them are barely even avoidable in the first place (like correlating timestamps).

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've known about sdf.org for a long time because they advertise in 2600. It's the kind of service that makes me so happy it exists to the point that it kind of makes me sad that I personally have no use for it :).

<comment><USER8> Yeah, this gives me temendous nostalgia. SDF was my first introduction to Unix, must have been 12 or 13 years old at the time. I'm almost giddy when I find these sorts of early internet systems / services are still online.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Analyze voidnull's use of pronouns and do a sim search over other users' accounts on HN and the Web.

"Our most forgettable words, such as pronouns and prepositions, can be the most revealing: their patterns are as distinctive as fingerprints." [1] - <USER2> James W. Pennebaker

[1] [https://www.secretlifeofpronouns.com](https://www.secretlifeofpronouns.com)

<comment><USER6> I haven't read the book, but does it talk about whether it's possible to "fake" the way you write? I'd also be interested in whether it explored the way people write in web communities, I have a strong feeling people change their tone and phrasing based on the audience (especially when upvoted and downvotes are involved).

<comment><USER10> i would go through a loop of translating the documenting using online translators between X languages. It will create syntax errors but will provide maybe some "hashing"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Since this also mentions the HN account

[https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=voidnull](https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=voidnull)

could any HN moderator comment on the status of that account?

<comment><USER12> It's fine and was always fine. Probably it got affected by a software filter at some point when it was new, but a moderator marked it legit so that wouldn't happen again.

<comment><USER11> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Evidently 'adnam [1] (adnam@sdf) [2] is Adam Hayward [3].

The bike in the pic is a Dahon [4] folding bike.

Adam's freeshell site [5] contains a password-protected link to his CV (request sent).

Here's an archive of his Bristol University Information Technology Society (BITS) homepage from 2002 [6].

Adnam is "a nickname given to me by some mates in Cambridge" [7].

And here's the analog site stat logs for requests from Tue-08-Feb-2000 15:16 to Mon-08-Apr-2002 13:09 (789.91 days). [8]

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5639997](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5639997)

[2] [https://sdf.org/tour/sdfers/gen.cgi?adnam@sdf](https://sdf.org/tour/sdfers/gen.cgi?adnam@sdf)

[3] [https://www.flickr.com/photos/adnam/16677188/](https://www.flickr.com/photos/adnam/16677188/)

[4] [https://dahon.com/bike/](https://dahon.com/bike/)

[5] [http://adam.freeshell.org/](http://adam.freeshell.org/)

[6] [https://web.archive.org/web/20020201220147/http://bits.bris....](https://web.archive.org/web/20020201220147/http://bits.bris.ac.uk/adnam/)

[7] [https://web.archive.org/web/20020211221929/http://www.bits.b...](https://web.archive.org/web/20020211221929/http://www.bits.bris.ac.uk/adnam/about/)

[8] [https://web.archive.org/web/20031112001318/http://www.bits.b...](https://web.archive.org/web/20031112001318/http://www.bits.bris.ac.uk/adnam/stuff/?page=log)

</comment><comment><USER13> Correct me if I'm wrong, but any VPS that accepts cryptocoins is basically the same thing. Is this special in some way?

<comment><USER14> The anonymity of sdf.org accounts and VPS/servers are all limited by association through access and payment. Tor is arguably the most anonymous access method for any of them. Excluding login chaining via Tor through botnets and compromised servers, anyway.

If done carefully, using well-mixed Bitcoin is arguably as anonymous as sending cash through the mail. There are ways to screw both up, but also ways to do both with arbitrary overkill.

Anyway, this is cool. I mean, six years is an OK run. But on the other hand, all remote VPS and servers that I setup are just about as anonymous. And yes, it's lots easier now than it was in 2013.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is great - no success since 2013.

<comment><USER16> Do we know that? I, at any rate, have no way of knowing that.

<comment><USER17> we do know, as far as proving a negative goes anyhow; i'm a sdf member & volunteer ... the voidnull page has never been put away for too long & if anyone was able to deobfuscate the user's identity beyond the website page proper it would be a whole exciting todo for our community.

if it becomes 2023, and if by then nobody's doxed voidnull i think a special edition "everyone wins especially voidnull sdf forever" mug &or hoodie would be in order!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Seems long enough that a future AI could connect writing style to other people writing about privacy during this time using an offline copy of the internet.

<comment><USER19> Maybe not :-)

[https://github.com/psal/anonymouth](https://github.com/psal/anonymouth)

<comment><USER18> Seems unlikely they would use this and not mention it. Besides, it reads naturally.

I've read spun spam emails, you can easily tell something's off.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is super interesting, brings back memories. We take for granted how easy anonymity is in age when anyone can spoof their MAC address at a public wifi point and be fairly anonymous.

Question: Is there a technical reason the author does not suggest simply using torsocks? (eg: torsocks ssh sdf.org). I thought maybe it didn't exist in 2013 but the github has some files that date back that far.

<comment><USER14> It's generally safer to use torsocks, because it routes DNS queries via Tor. As oil25 notes, using the ProxyCommand option doesn't. However, it's possible that torsocks in 2013 didn't reliably block DNS leaks.

In any case, Whonix was available in 2013, and using it would have -- and does -- prevent DNS leaks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I don't understand the part about 1 dollar donations. Surely that can't be enough money to do much of anything given how rare I imagine it is for people to create an account.

(Though I'm personally tempted to.)

<comment><USER21> The $1 donation is just there to prevent people from mass-creating new accounts. It can be waived if someone vouches for you.

The non-ARPA and above users are somewhat limited in what they can do[0].

I've been a card-carrying metaSDF user since 2006 and it's a wonderful $HOME away from home.

[0] [https://sdf.org/?faq?MEMBERS?01](https://sdf.org/?faq?MEMBERS?01)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> [http://voidnull.sdf.org](http://voidnull.sdf.org) is probably still a thing. No one has asked us for that $100 smj promised. Happy 32nd year, SDF.

<comment><USER17> nydel@sdf pledges an additional usd100.

signed. j r nydel t.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Is it not allowed to have an anonymous HN account?

<comment><USER12> Of course it is. We don't ask for names. We don't even have a way for users to give us their name, unless they choose to publish it via their username or the About field of their profile.

<comment><USER23> Thanks!

I thought maybe "HN is a community—users should have an identity that others can relate to." meant our nyms should point to a real person, and that the account mentioned in the article was terminated for being registered via Tor.

I try to find the middle ground with this account.

You can probably find out who I am, but I hope people will respect it's important to have nyms where we can have informal convos. (Also luckily most snoopers are lazy so simply not tying my legal name to this is sufficient considering I'm not expressing anything particularly controversial...)

Kind of like how half of Gotham seems to know who Batman is, but they pretend not to ;)

<comment><USER13> I have several completely anonymous accounts on HN all registered and used through Tor. It has never been a problem.

<comment><USER14> Did you need to request that accounts created via Tor be un-shadow-banned?

<comment><USER13> No, I'm not aware of ever being shadowbanned and I think I would realize if I were since I often browse logged out.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> So, as far as we can tell, voidnull's identity has still not been unmasked.

<comment><USER17> voidnull's anonymous page has been my mood ring for about six years.

on good days i visit and appreciate the accomplishment + appreciate that our good ol' SDF is a public access multi-user system on which such a feat is possible!

on bad days i start thinking about writing evil sudos and shit, just grasping at straws.. that f'king page done been mockin' me since 2013 :P

on today, i love seeing the spirits of HN & SDF intersect!

so many incredibly insightful, funny, creative approaches abound in this comment section. warms my heart!

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Will they block an account for spam? Government requests? High usage rates? Etc

<comment><USER21> They explain their policies here[0]. Notable is:

>Any illegal activities which includes, but certainly isn't limited to spamming, portflooding, portscanning, unauthorised connections to remote hosts and any sort of scam can really not be tolerated here. Why? Because there are many here on this system that can suffer from this sort of abuse. If you want to use SDF, you really have to care about this system and the people here. If you don't want to care, then you really shouldn't use this resource.

[0] [https://sdf.org/?faq?BASICS?04](https://sdf.org/?faq?BASICS?04)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> > I did not lick the envelope

So what if he did? Even if we had his DNA, we wouldn't know whose DNA it is. It would be as useful as finding a key on the ground without knowing which house it unlocks.

<comment><USER26> Seems safe to assume we could identify nearly anyone these days using DNA thanks to the services that collect such information for genealogical or medical purposes.

<comment><USER25> Yep the only way to identify someone with DNA from an unknown source is to already have a copy of their DNA on record, that you know is theirs. Or maybe a close relative's DNA on record.

It would depend on the country whether or not their DNA is likely on record. Most Americans do not have their DNA on record. However it's interesting that Kenya recently required collection of DNA from all citizens.

But yep those who have signed up for 23 and Me with their real name (or maybe a close relative) can be identified from an anonymous DNA sample. Or previously incarcerated, since then the government would have their DNA on record.

Or if they were already a suspect, then their DNA could then be taken and matched against the anonymous sample.

So maybe by disclosing that he didn't lick the envelope, he's inadvertently telling us that his DNA is on record somewhere?

<comment><USER27> In the US, enough people have submitted DNA to 23andMe, Ancestry, GED match, etc., that a random DNA sample can be identified by so-called "genetic genealogy" methods.

Basically because your generic relatives have submitted their DNA to these services, a small pool of potential candidates for your DNA can be identified, and traditional investigation methods can identify you in that pool.

As the density of people who have submitted DNA to these services increases in the total population, identifying random samples will be easier. (It is already getting easier.)

These techniques were publicized with the Golden State Killer case but have been used in several other law enforcement investigations.

My contact with this field is mostly through friends in the industry, but The Daily podcast's series on it seemed like a good introduction:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/06/podcasts/the-daily/dna- ge...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/06/podcasts/the-daily/dna-genealogy- crime.html)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Left-brain/right-brain -- the dancer illusion debunked - <AUTHOR>

In regards to the purported test for right/left-brain dominance (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=78295)...
I suspected this article was bunk, so I went straight to the source -- a scientist friend whose research focus is binocular rivalry.  Here's her (entertaining) reply:
...as for your question, you have definitely asked the right person. The idea about the left and right hemispheres comes from my old phd supervisor. The guy is awesome but completely insane. I can guarantee it has absolutely nothing to do with hemispheres, but it is a very cool illusion anyway.  The idea is published, though, so if you wanted it for some crazy trivia question you could use it, but nobody in science believes the idea...
If you did want to use the fact.. the more interesting fact is the experiments that he used to work it out. It is called caloric stimulation and involves injecting freezing cold water into someone's ear, with the aim of activating the other hemisphere (I was a subject and it hurts like hell and then your eyes start spinning around and you feel seasick).  So my boss Jack worked out that if you squirt freezing water into someone's ear they tend to see it go one way rather than the other.  He also published (citing personal observations) that the only thing that stops rivalry is laughter, sneezing and orgasm..  he says that during these three events you end up seeing a combination of the two images... the guy is crazy!

<comment><USER2> The freakonomics guys did a pretty unscientific study, the result of which was the test had some limited predictive power - but opposite to the original hypothesis.

[http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/23/right- versu...](http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/23/right-versus-left- brain-what-does-the-spinning-dancer-teach-us)

</comment><comment><USER3> Some more info and a link to the original from Michael's Optical Illusions & Visual Phenomena [<http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/sze_silhouette/index.html>]. Check out the 'eyes' on the enhansed version. Freaky.

Also, Michael provides a little info on what goes on in the brain when the figure reverses [[http://www.uniklinik- freiburg.de/augenklinik/live/homede/edg...](http://www.uniklinik- freiburg.de/augenklinik/live/homede/edg/misc/ambi_en.html)]

</comment><comment><USER4> As I said the previous time it was posted (the url you posted was to the dupe), it is just badly rendered. A badly rendered image is not going to have any special predictive power about mid-level brain functions, especially since the information that's extracted (clockwise vs. counterclockwise) makes no sense in this context.

Spinning is neither clockwise nor counterclockwise unless you are looking along its axis of rotation. In that image, we're looking perpendicular to the axis of rotation.

</comment><comment><USER5> Uhh is it just me, or does the ballerina switch her direction of spin every now and then... it starts off clock-wise, then after a while it changes direction, and then back again...

<comment><USER6> I've been working on being able to switch the direction at will.

<comment><USER7> Just focus on her extended foot.

<comment><USER6> I did. Then I moved onto her head. From there, to the picture as a whole. I'm now working on reducing the latency between willing for the shift, and actually having the shift happen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> oh. well yeah. like someone commented, its like an advanced necker cube <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necker_cube>

As far as the brain thing goes...whatever...

It was pretty accurate for me though. I saw it clockwise. Right brain? lol

</comment><comment><USER9> I don't clearly see how it de-bunked the bunk. Infact I think it still supports the fact.Coldwater disables one hemisphere at which time they see it one way implies illusion could have something to do with the active hemisphere?

</comment><comment><USER10> When I start to look at it, I get a random direction every time. I suspect this means the test isn't very good.

</comment><comment><USER11> Is the paper online?</comment>


Physicists Create a Working Transistor From a Single Atom - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/20/science/physicists-create-a-working-transistor-from-a-single-atom.html

<comment><USER2> Here are some more detailed sources.

[http://www.nature.com/nnano//journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nnano...](http://www.nature.com/nnano//journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nnano.2012.23.pdf)

[http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nnano...](http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nnano.2012.21.html#/acknowledgments)

</comment><comment><USER3> to save people poking around (because the linked article is quite appalling vague) - what you might call the "active part" of the gate is a single atom. that is surrounded by input, output, and gate connections and insulation that are all multiple-atoms in size. so the single, central phosphorous atom controls the flow from source to drain, depending on the gate voltage.

<comment><USER4> So it sounds like the challenge at this point is getting sufficiently small wires.

<comment> da-bacon Making it work at room temperature is probably a greater long term issue. As the temperature goes up the system has a higher probability of accessing states that will make it not function properly (i.e. your logic gates become probabilistic.)

<comment><USER5> A massive redundant array of probabilistic logic networks sounds pretty familiar to me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> That's great and all that but you can't scale up production at that scale (imagine even building an opamp with it) and it doesn't mention anywhere how long the gate actually lasted. Thermal effects at that scale would probably destroy it pretty quickly.

<comment><USER7> I think this is more about proof of concept than a presentation of its readiness for production at a large scale or at any scale. Give it 5 more years and maybe we'll be closer to seeing it more frequently in the technologies we use.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Does this say something fundamental about transistors or something fundamental about atoms?

<comment><USER9> "Does this say something fundamental about transistors or something fundamental about atoms?"

Neither. It just says that someone has gotten better at using a hammer to guide an egg, into a frying pan, without breaking it. And they performed that trick while wearing thick gloves.

"The central achievement of the latest work is to use the STM–hydrogen-resist lithography approach to position a single phosphorus atom between source and drain contacts and two (more distant) gate electrodes."

Also, I take strong issue with the term "single-atom transistor". I would expect to hear that from a crank working out of his secret basement lab. You cannot build an electronic device out of a single atom, and obviously, they used many.

Lastly: "Single-atom transistors represent the ultimate limit in solid-state device miniaturization." That's patently false. Thousands of atoms were used here, so there is likely room for improvement.

[http://nature.com/nnano//journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nnano.201...](http://nature.com/nnano//journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nnano.2012.23.pdf) (Transistors arrive at the atomic limit)(A single-atom transistor has been made by positioning a phosphorus atom between metallic electrodes, also made of phosphorus, on a silicon surface)(2012-FEB-19)

<comment><USER10> It's an issue of definitions. Of course you cannot build an electronic device using only a single atom, because you need leads, interconnects, power supplies, measurement equipment etc. So when you talk about a single atom transistor, what's meant is that the critical, behaviour determining region of the device is a single atom. If you took that single atom away, you would not have a transistor any more.

In much the same way we talk about 32nm transistors in computer chips for example - it's understood that this number refers to the gate length, not your whole processor.

<comment><USER9> "It's an issue of definitions. If you took that single atom away, you would not have a transistor any more."

No, you would still have a transistor, albeit a non-functioning one, just like you would still have a car if you removed the engine. I appreciate your effort to explain, but your explanation is worded for people similar to those who work in your lab. Definitions should be correct, especially when they are put forth by the NY Times, a news source for the general public. People have already had their expectations raised over "jetpacks for everyone any day now" stories, so it's rather irresponsible to define something new with a name which is obviously false, and which tends to overrepresent, by far, the achievement that the name defines. I actually work with nanotech, but the average reader of the NY Times has little-to-no knowledge of "leads", "interconnects", "power supplies", "measurement equipment", "critical, behaviour-determining regions", "gate length", or even: "transistor".</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Ansible Weekly - <AUTHOR> http://devopsu.com/newsletters/ansible-weekly-newsletter.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Ansible has been taking off in the DevOps world and this newsletter curates the latest news from the community.

Just launched the first issue today, which you can see here:

[http://devopsu.com/newsletters/ansible- weekly/1.html](http://devopsu.com/newsletters/ansible-weekly/1.html)

If you're not familiar with Ansible, check out my earlier blog post on it: "Shell Scripts vs Ansible: Fight!"

[http://devopsu.com/blog/ansible-vs-shell- scripts/](http://devopsu.com/blog/ansible-vs-shell-scripts/)</comment>


U.S. Stepping Up Enforcement on Delinquent Student Loans - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-12/u-s-stepping-up-enforcement-on-delinquent-student-loans <comment><USER2> Disclosure: I work as a blue-collar engine mechanic. Ive never been to college.

That having been said, im familiar with debt after the 2008 housing collapse. I lost my truck and my trailer home, partly because of a shady home loan and partly because well, my employer went out of business. That having been said it was relatively easy to discharge these debts. the bank wasnt too upset about the home and offered to help me restructure payments, which I agreed to until I found someone else to buy it from me. The truck I sold back to the dealership...which incidentally also went bankrupt, but they were easy to work with.

I know people in this town with student loans that show up at the local watering hole every week and count their beers in dollars and their tips in change. One of them got her license revoked because she wasnt able to make student loan payments, and had to move back in with her folks. Because she has outstanding student loan debt, she cant qualify for section 8 housing or food stamps. Even her family gets harassing calls about the money she cant pay back fast enough.

She is a biologist, but all of her money goes straight to the loans. it has for 9 years now.

Why is it I can ditch close to 90 grand in loans lickety-split but students cant? how is education any different?

<comment><USER3> The logic runs like this:

A _secured_ loan should be easy and cheap to get, because if it goes bad, the lender can reposes the collateral. This is like your house and the truck; you ran up some debt, it didn't work out, you lost them both, but you also lost the debt.

An _unsecured_ loan should be harder to get and pretty expensive, because it's riskier. If I run up $20k on my credit card paying for a fancy vacation, then can't pay, they can't take that vacation back from me. If I declare bankruptcy, I get a "free" vacation (I mean, not exactly, bankruptcy is complicated and expensive, but...) That's why credit cards run a 16% interest rate.

Student loans are for an education, which you can't repossess, but we also don't want to carefully vet applicants or charge them 16% interest rates. To try and square the circle, we've decided that student loans will be super easy to get and have very low rates, but then to try and avoid abuse we've decided they can't be discharged in bankruptcy. And then to try and avoid people being stuck with massive loans they can never repay, there's a bunch of complex income-based repayment plans and schemes where you can get balances forgiven in some cases.

> Why is it I can ditch close to 90 grand in loans lickety-split but students > cant? how is education any different?

Education debt is different due to the combination of being inherently riskier than, say, a mortgage to buy a house, while still being something we want widely and cheaply available.

That being said, your biologist friend may have some better options if she looks into it.

<comment><USER4> > we also don't want to carefully vet applicants

Sounds like you don't want to vet them at all, when carefully vetting would be a good answer.

<comment><USER3> > Sounds like you don't want to vet them at all

I'm struggling to understand how you could read my comment and feel like you have _any_ idea what I think should be the case. I am making a _positive_ claim about US politics, not a normative claim about how it should be.

> when carefully vetting would be a good answer.

No doubt you have a citation for this? An example country that has implemented this with excellent outcomes?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm convinced you can't fix the education problem in the US until you can fix the demand side as well. Where I live in Maryland, you can do two years at the local community college (which is excellent) for $8,000 in tuition and fees (total), before finishing up at a four year-college. Very few people take advantage of the opportunity.

Why are people clamoring for free college when they're not using the cheaper options that are already available? Say we had free tuition at public colleges. Would we be able to get rid of federal student loans in that case? Or would people just turn their nose up at public colleges, and demand the government pay tuition for private schools? There is something psychologically messed up on the demand side.

<comment><USER6> _> Where I live in Maryland, you can do two years at the local community college (which is excellent) for $8,000 in tuition and fees, before finishing up at a four year-college._

This is true for the majority of students, but not generally true for the top ~1-10% of students who often need all 4 years to compete for slots at top law schools, med schools, phd programs, and employers. And getting into the top 4-5 of any of those things (except maybe phd programs, outside of a few fields like CS) will pay itself back in spades.

I'd be curious to see a study that figures out who _thinks_ they are in that 1%-10% vs. who actually is. I.e., are people just being idiots, or are they over-estimating the trajectory of their early career?

Also, even for the other 90%, the same is true for lots of stuff. Including housing and vehicles. People aren't rational.

<comment><USER7> That explains why a small elite who likely don't need assistance with loans don't avail themselves of community college, but doesn't say much about the general case.

<comment><USER6> To reiterate, the question I'm asking is: how many people think they're the small elite but are actually the general case?

I.e., how many people are acting irrationally vs. how many people are misjudging their own place in the world?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> For people struggling with paying their student loans, their federal loans offer the option of being able to go on an income based repayment plan[0]. I haven't done it personally.

The biggest problem with the US higher education system is that the universities have very little skin in the game. The government more or less prints money and 'loans' it out to students and props up the universities. If the government wasn't propping up the universities there wouldn't be a 1.3 trillion dollar student loan bubble[1] and the degrees that aren't worth the paper they're printed on would disappear.

[0]:[https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/repay- loans/understand/plans/in...](https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/repay- loans/understand/plans/income-driven) [1]:[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-17/u-s- stude...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-17/u-s-student-loan- debt-sets-record-doubling-since-recession)

<comment><USER9> Exactly this. Prices started doubling when everyone starting getting loans. At the same time we need more craftsmen and tradespeople. The lesson is that if you give out free money, people will fight to be the first to get it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> > Hypothetically, a member of the Class of 2019 with $50,000 in loans would > owe about $550 per month over the next decade -- or $20 daily. (Assuming 6% > annual interest and a 10-year term.)

This article misrepresents the nature of student debt in the United States. The average student graduates with 60% of the debt in Bloomberg's hypothetical scenario ($29,800) [0] with a fixed rate of 5.05% [1]. This leads to a monthly payment of ~$320 with a 10y term, 58% of Bloomberg's calculation. Student loan debt is absolutely a major problem, but it's important to rely on facts, not hypothetical scenarios.

[0] [https://studentloanhero.com/student-loan-debt- statistics/](https://studentloanhero.com/student-loan-debt-statistics/)

[1] [https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/types/loans/interest- rates](https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/types/loans/interest-rates)

</comment><comment><USER11> I don't envy people on the receiving end of this.

That said, it sounds like it's part of the trend to begin to put pressure on the universities by making student loans less attractive. If there are consequences for racking up large student loans that you can't pay people may think twice about taking them on.

For years Universities have been increasing tuition on well beyond the rate of inflation, often for degrees that have no real market value, with the money going mostly to administrators not the ones actually creating and teaching the material. Unless you start to put pressure on the funding source etc. there is no way to begin to reign this in.

<comment> crooked-v Pressure on student loan repayments isn't going to change anything if the loans still have the same availability in the first place.

<comment><USER11> If the executive order signed in March does what it says it will I would not be surprised if that changes as well...IE: shifting some of the liability for non-payment back on the university and requiring them to state what the default rate is for graduate. IE: IF you take on this loan, how likely will you be able to pay it back later on.

[https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/trump-pursuing-ways- to-h...](https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/trump-pursuing-ways-to-hold- colleges-accountable-for-student-loan-debt-free-speech)

<comment><USER6> The executive order doesn't actually do anything about debt.

It just requests reports from various agencies, which will then be used to help shape policy in 2020 when the Higher Education Act is reauthorized. Similar reports have been requested by previous administrations, to little effect.

The EO was largely about free speech at research universities, which is extremely narrow and ignores the really problematic institutions both in terms of free speech and in terms of student loan debt.

The free speech rules apply to places like UC Berkeley and UIUC (who are already obligated to follow 1A, and who the courts are adequately dealing with when the don't) but not places like Wheaton College and Cedarville University (both of whom will fire tenured faculty for not being Christian or Republican enough, and expel students for being unapologetically homosexual).

Because the oversight is targeted at research institutions, it also completely ignores for-profit institutions where 50% of students fall into default as well as non-research private institutions which are often far more expensive than their public counter-parts.

Both are by design -- requiring free speech and financial accountability from _any_ recipient of federal student loan money would put lots of conservative christian colleges in very hot water...

<comment><USER12> And wouldn't make an ounce of difference in the student debt problem, given the small numbers of students at private Christian schools.

It's also worth pointing out that other private schools, such as Vanderbilt, would also be in a lot of hot water for similar reasons.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> You can wring a dry towel and all you want but never get a drop of water.

These people are by and large broke. It's likely to cost more in enforcement than they'll get back.

At least the IRS will continue to lack funding so the rich don't have to pay .

<comment><USER11> There are things in the works to shift some of the liability for defaulted student loans back on to the Universities along with some forgiveness programs attached to these. People who can afford to pay them back should, but the universities need to be held accountable for spiraling out of control costs for programs that students often can't pay back because of lack of market demand for skills and over-priced degrees.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Student loans need a TILA box: you're taking $100,000 loan for a $30k/year job. It'll take you 20 years to repay, do you wish to sign?

<comment><USER15> All the check boxes in the world still can't obtain consent from a child. And make no mistake - someone about to graduate high school, herded by their parents and other authorities their entire life, is a child.

It's time to admit the failure of this particular financial engineering scheme, and close it down. Rather than complaining about the money that has already been lost, be diligent in preventing whatever government-handout the industry scammers are cooking up next.

<comment><USER16> That's why an actual example with numbers is important, like the other replier.

Also should add the typical earnings for person with the desired degree, with history.

There's probably a case to be made that students were conned into unrealistic loans.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> crooked-v I wonder how long until there's a "millenials are killing the student loan deferment industry" article.

<comment><USER17> Maybe if they didn't eat so much avocado toast, they'd be able to pay back their student loans! /s

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'm homeless with $9k owed to Betsy DeVos' Navient, not the Federal Govt, went through bankruptcy and can't get a job with a degree that isn't usable for reasons other than itself. Seems like another case of the vampires squeezing the blood of poor to pay for the tax cuts and welfare for the rich. Isn't it the usual case the weakest members of society are routinely scapegoated when there's a nationalist, bifurcating upheaval?

</comment><comment><USER19> Instead of collecting debts, they should figure out how to make education free.

<comment><USER12> Is this meant to be sarcastic? I suppose it would be possible if you enslaved those with PHDs and unpaid debt, forcing them to teach at universities administrated by those enslaved for their debt, built by those enslaved for their debt.

Pharaoh had a lot of things for "free," as did the plantation owners in the US, but the cost of free is pretty much the opposite of free for those who end up doing the paying. And the cost to society is something I'm pretty sure most wouldn't advocate today.

<comment><USER19> I'm serious. Society can figure out how to make education free, and not put students in crazy debt for years. If you don't advocate it, you basically advocate debt profiteering.

<comment><USER20> Lots of people advocate for abusing others because they benefit from it and never see any consequences.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > _Collection costs such as processing fees and costs associated with > potential civil litigation can also be added._

What's to stop this from being abused, as the threshold for "potential civil litigation" is probably a low and subjective bar, which the poor couldn't afford to challenge/fight, if they were delinquent anyway...? Also, delinquent is simply late on payments and not defaulted, yeah? One is far more egregious than the other, is it not?

</comment><comment><USER22> This article leaves important questions unanswered:

It says the amount of money collected on delinquent student loans increased, but is that due to a policy change or due to tax cuts and improving economic conditions?

The chart shows an increase in collections every year since 2014, with the largest increases in collections between 2014 and 2016, so it seems likely it's just an improving economy.

But if there was a policy change, what changed?

</comment><comment><USER23> There doesn't seem to be much of a counterbalance to the drastic increases in tuition and fees, which have outpaced inflation for some 40 years or more.

</comment><comment><USER24> > including the cost of placing a loan with a private collection agency

I was under the impression that private collection agencies work on commission from the amount they recover. Is that not the case?

</comment><comment><USER25> I feel badly for the people that got sold college as an aspiration that they weren't qualified for, and dropped out after a couple of semesters.

I don't feel badly for the 30-somethings I know who racked up expensive private school loans, bumbled around through "finding themselves", failed startups, went back to school for more debt, traveled the world, and now are finding the bill for that irresponsibility coming due.</comment>


Ask HN: Interview Question - <AUTHOR>

On Monday I have an interview at a firm that does websites. In the email, he sent me two sites and asked me if I was capable of building similar ones. The sites he showed me are pretty bad. But that's beside the point. Would it be a good idea to take one of the sites, redo it my way, and show that to him on the interview? <comment><USER2> Showing your own demo is a excellent idea. Before you do though, suggest probing for background details on their current websites, e.g. "just curious, how did you decide upon the current format/template?" Take a consultative approach, "what works/doesn't work with what you have now?"

</comment><comment><USER3> Yea +1 for this would impress me if I were interviewing you. (So long as your site was decent.) Also agree with other commenters about being diplomatic and focus on positive aspects.

</comment><comment><USER4> Absolutely, especially because you said you have the time. My best hires over the years have gone above what was requested of them during the interview process.

If you focus on being enthusiastic about the position rather than negative about their site, you should be fine.

</comment><comment><USER5> I've been interviewing for a while now, if a candidate did that it would definitely make a good impression on me. Cheers!

</comment><comment><USER6> Yes... If you have the time... Show them what you can do. I love to see candidates that show up showing me what they can do for us vs. Just having a nice chat...

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah I've got the time, to do it. Thanks. Just didn't know if it would be a good idea.

<comment><USER7> Thats actually a good idea - just dont be cocky about it and check their portfolio section - try to follow their style if you can. This should help as well.

<comment><USER6> Yes... Do be diplomatic about it.... Don't say... I redesigned ur site because it sucked.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well yeah, that would definitely not go well. I plan on introducing it as "This is what I can do."</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


How To Successfully Interrupt A Conversation - <AUTHOR> http://www.fiddyp.co.uk/how-to-successfully-interrupt-a-conversation/ <comment><USER2> Also works at stores and libraries to cut in front of people who've been waiting patiently in line on the premises.</comment>


21-Year-Old Raises Largest Seed Round In Silicon Valley History — $25 Million - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/lucas-duplan-raises-25-million-seed-round-for-clinkle-2013-6

<comment><USER2> [https://www.clinkle.com/signup](https://www.clinkle.com/signup) stripe connected.

/legal may say something about what they are working on to.

<comment><USER2> [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/clinkle/id458523629?mt=8](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/clinkle/id458523629?mt=8)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Isn't this what Dwolla's currently doing?

<comment><USER4> Sometimes it's cheaper for investors to pump money into a new company than try to buy into one that has already gained traction. For $25mil they might take 80% of the company. If they gave Dwolla 25million, they might get 10%. If investors believe the technology will be in demand in the near future, gambling $25 million for a slice of that pie is a no brainer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> tl;dr - One screenshot, loads of investors, no synopsis of the app at all really. "Wait and see".

I'm quite excited to see it.

<comment><USER6> There are some scant tech details in this article: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5953926](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5953926)</comment></comment>


POTUS cannot block critics on Twitter, federal appeals court rules - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/legal-issues/president-trump-cannot-block-his-critics-on-twitter-federal-appeals-court-rules/2019/07/09/d07a5558-8230-11e9-95a9-e2c830afe24f_story.html <comment><AUTHOR> Here is the court opinion as a PDF: [https://games- cdn.washingtonpost.com/notes/prod/default/docu...](https://games- cdn.washingtonpost.com/notes/prod/default/documents/50cd2708-7de6-465a-864a-6436b3897c53/note/9f67d853-2343-428b-aa11-56f61320f3a7.pdf#page=1) . I would replace the original URL with this link instead now that I think about it.</comment>


Is Everyone a Photojournalist?  - <AUTHOR> http://workshirtinc.com/chicago-sun-photographers.html

<comment><USER2> No! But Everyone pretend to be one ! Photojournalism is a real job and require experience and talent.</comment>


Prototyping Bootstrap Layouts in Fireworks - <AUTHOR> http://bootstrapfireworks.com/

<comment><USER2> I was sold by the name alone- and at quick glance I really enjoy this product. Thank you!</comment>