Market Rate is for Lobsters - <AUTHOR> https://ernie.io/2015/12/05/market-rate-is-for-lobsters/ <comment><USER2> It's funny that the term "Market Rate" is used but, the actual market is never really mentioned.

Ann is paid $170,000 in the Bay Area because that what all the other developers of her caliber are willing to exchange their time and expertise for.

A company would pay Ann $50,000 if it could. They only hire people who they think they will eventually make more from their labor than they will pay the person.

If you are Google, you will make roughly $1M per employee currently. For Software Developers that number is even higher, for Sr. Software Developers that number is even higher. The fact that how you get paid and how much value you generate don't have much of an effect on each other is basic capitalism.

What's smart is to be Ann, get a $170k salary and move to Costa Rica and keep the $170k because at the end of the day, she wouldn't have been hired if she didn't make more than $170k of value for the company.

<comment><USER3> >Ann is paid $170,000 in the Bay Area because that what all the other developers of her caliber are willing to exchange their time and expertise for.

Well...sort of. Ann is paid $170K because Bay-area companies have bid up the cost of Bay-area developers to $170K.

Ann doesn't really have a say in this, and it has nothing to do with how much value she adds to the company (although obviously a company wouldn't fork over 170K if she didn't add at least that much value to the company).

Now if Ann moves to Costa Rica, she is now a Costa Rica-based remote developer. And I suspect that Costa Rica-based remote developers have not been bid up to the same level as Bay-area based developers. So her employer would certainly be justified in seeking a downward salary adjustment.

<comment><USER4> An interesting experiment would be a job board that stripped out names and locations, and only listed skills and accomplishments of technical hires. The goal would be an auction system to determine what "market rate" truly is for each role, with externalities filtered out.

This would mean hiring companies would need to accommodate remote workers; are they willing to for the cost benefit? My experience says no (except for <100 companies that are remote first).

<comment><USER3> I would think that if there were a worldwide market for developers, salaries would come down.

The Bay area seems to have a positive-feedback loop going on. Highly-paid programmers have bid up the cost of housing to astonishing heights.

So when companies want to attract more developers, they have to offer even higher salaries, which lead to housing costs being bid up even more.

<comment><USER5> > The Bay area seems to have a positive-feedback loop going on. Highly-paid > programmers have bid up the cost of housing to astonishing heights.

This... is not the primary driver of the insane housing costs in the area. A survey from a year or two back found that tech workers make up ~8% of SF's population.

For a variety of reasons, [0] it's nearly impossible to build new housing in San Francisco. I get the impression that the situation is similar in much of the Bay Area.

In San Francisco, for the past decade or so for every new unit of housing created, roughly five people have entered the city. [1]

Add supply to take care of the backlog _and_ meet expected medium-term demand, and you'll see prices stabilize (and maybe return to less-insane levels).

[0] The _least_ of which is Rent Stabilization. :)

[1] You _could_ make the argument that "If noone was able to pay the insane prices, the prices wouldn't be insane." This is true, but -frankly- there are _lots_ of _very_ highly-paid people out there. As far as "highly-paid" people go, tech workers really aren't all that highly-paid. :) (I know of decent-to- good engineering sales [2] folks working at bigcos that make between 2 and 10x what I understand mid-level Google engineers to make.)

[2] That is, salesmen that _also_ have a technical background, can handle crunchy sales and configuration questions, and can even do _real_ , deep troubleshooting of the product they're selling.

<comment><USER4> > That is, salesmen that also have a technical background, can handle crunchy > sales and configuration questions, and can even do real, deep > troubleshooting of the product they're selling.

I'm in the wrong business.

<comment><USER5> > I'm in the wrong business.

 _nod nod_

If you've both the people _and_ technical skills required to do engineering sales, you're probably seriously limiting your earnings by remaining a programmer.

<comment><USER4> If one was so inclined, where would one start looking for these sorts of roles?

<comment><USER5> The folks I know of that do this work for large companies that do a _lot_ B2B or enterprise stuff. They effectively lucked into the positions. Most started as programmers but -at some point- got noticed by their managers as having really good people skills, -whether through a stint in regular sales, non- front-line tech support, or just interactions with coworkers in the office- but one went from pure sales to engineering sales because of his side projects and general technical aptitude.

Sadly, I forget what these positions are _actually_ called. Best of luck in your hunt! I hope you find and fill such a position and are both happy and richly rewarded in it. :D

<comment><USER6> Presales, Technical Sales, Sales Engineers

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> A lot of these issues only arise if you're assuming you need to create some sort of master pay system that is "fair." We all know in practice that decisions like pay can be based on the environment at the the time of hiring, or other random variables.

For example, an engineer may get hired at a time when there is a high supply and relatively low demand, and is only able to negotiate a salary of $100k. 5 years later, because of the relative shortage of engineers, a junior engineer is hired at $130k, while the the more senior engineer is now only making $120k.

Of course, trying to come up with a master system to adjust for something like that will be impossible, as this article points out (using a hypothetical move from a higher cost location to a lower cost location). The company will not adjust the senior engineers salary until he puts up a fight and comes in with competing offers.

What this suggests is perhaps that the most effective and fair system is no system at all, one that remains dependent individual actors (or businesses) trying to get the best deal that they can for themselves. This is, in practice, what is happening now, but we wouldn't have any expectation of every company trying to create some sort of formula to determine what is "fair."

This means sometimes that you will be hurt by environmental factors (say you quit or get fired in a down market in your field), but other times you may cash in (maybe the senior guy at your company quits and you have the opportunity to leverage that into a much higher salary for doing his job).

Trying to make some master system that is "fair" and will work in all circumstances just seems silly. The market is perhaps a good arbiter of value on a broad scale over long time periods, but in more localized environments and shorter time spans, it is far more random. Thus, the best personal system in my mind is one in which we can take advantage of the randomness when possible, and learn to handle the inevitable downsides as well.

<comment><USER8> It's this kind of thinking why I have left several jobs and immediately got a 20% more money at my next job - the company I was with didn't keep up with market rates. It's ridiculous, because my knowledge of their software makes me worth MORE than someone with the exact same skills and background who is new to the team. It is this short sighted "try to save 20k a year" that causes so much turnover at companies. If you have a good engineer, give them raises constantly, or they'll just leave for a new job that pays them more. The 20k you might save is WAY less than what you'll pay to get a new dev who doesn't have nearly the same institutional knowledge as the one you lost.

<comment><USER7> I think it's great you were able to get 20% pay bumps just by moving. Are you saying this is a bad thing? Did any of those companies end up being a better experience than the companies you had just left?

<comment><USER8> I'm saying it's bad for the company. They lose my institutional knowledge and have to pay the costs of getting a replacement, simply to try to save a relatively tiny amount of cash by not paying me more and hoping I don't notice.

<comment><USER7> It's true they lose institutional knowledge, but it's possible they get someone better to replace you (you in the general sense). I think these shake ups are generally good for an industry as a whole, even though it may (or may not) be good for any individual company.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Discriminating based on location for 100% remote work is opening up a big can of worms. Since in this case physical location isn't material to the work, paying less based on location could be inadvertently discriminatory. For instance, do localities with low pay just happen to correspond to where certain ethnic minorities live?

Other parts of the Buffer payment formula simply illegal. The practice of paying people more for each dependent [0] violates many localities' (e.g. Cook County, IL [1]) anti-discrimination ordinances.

0\. [https://open.buffer.com/transparent- salaries/](https://open.buffer.com/transparent-salaries/) 1\. [http://www.jmls.edu/clinics/fairhousing/pdf/cook-county- huma...](http://www.jmls.edu/clinics/fairhousing/pdf/cook-county-human-rights- ordinance.pdf)

<comment><USER10> He does health coverage which is worth more to employees with dependents , provided by most employers, avoid the anti-discrimination laws?

<comment><USER9> Benefits like healthcare coverage are usually explicitly exempted. For example, see the relevant law in the State of Alaska: [http://www.touchngo.com/lglcntr/akstats/statutes/title18/cha...](http://www.touchngo.com/lglcntr/akstats/statutes/title18/chapter80/section220.htm), specifically section (c).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I work remotely from outside Boston, a friend at work is remote from Argentina (I find the parallel to the article interesting). I make more than he does by a significant amount (very roughly similar to the salaries in the article).

I actually don't know what would happen if I moved to Argentina. I presume my salary would get dropped. Maybe not.. depends on if I can convince someone else to give me an offer at my previous salary for remote work... but then what of my Argentinian friend?

I think all developers _should_ get offered the same amount independent of location. As remote work takes off (and I think it will...), this will become the norm. Why? Because of how market works. If Google will pay me 170k to work from my house, then smaller companies need to start competing with that.

Ironically, the big companies are still way behind on this. I work at Canonical... our devs are all fully remote. I have people from nearly every continent working on my project. There's very very little friction to remote teams, except sometimes you need to talk to someone who's asleep. But that honestly is not usually that bad. You keep close teams in similar time zones and everything just works out. We use hangouts and irc and email... hell, the disincentive to have useless meetings probably saves us more time than we spend working around the relatively small problems remote work introduces.

(also, I'm kinda glad to get away from whiteboarding crap... a whiteboard is not a good tool for pretty much anything in development... a shared text window is almost always superior)

<comment><USER11> I agree that your gross pay is higher, but I'm curious if your net take-home pay after "expenses" is still higher? I use scare-quotes because while it's easy to compare things like tax and rent, it's harder to compare food and entertainment (where cheaper costs may entice someone to eat out more regularly). It's hard to make a strictly apples-to-apples comparison, but I think it's a worth looking at whether you would take home more or less by working in Argentina. (The general "you", not suggesting that you have to consider moving to Argentina. :P)

I think the article puts things a little unfairly by saying only "Option 1: Ann's pay is reduced". Yes that is what's happening, but if Ann knows what her compensation will look like in Buenos Tiempos, she should be able to figure out roughly if she will take home more money by moving there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Commenter on the story has an excellent point: "An even more absurd, but equally "market rate" scenario would be to pay Ann more because she wants to and has chosen to drive a luxury car, but to pay Sofia less because she chooses to take public transportation." \- Philip Hallstrom

<comment><USER13> That scenario would only be "market rate" if the market put a higher price ( _market price_ ) on luxury-car-driving engineers.

In that case it would likely not seem absurd because presumably there would be some extra inherent value in luxury car drivers (e.g., uber drivers).

<comment><USER14> > That scenario would only be "market rate" if the market put a higher price > (market price) on luxury-car-driving engineers.

That's the point actually. Driving a luxury car is equally as irrelevant as location. There really isn't a good reason for a company to reward employees for how those employees spend money outside of work.

<comment><USER15> But the location isn't irrelevant and that's the entire point that this article blindly misses. The company may not care that their developer is living in Silicon Valley, but there are a lot of companies that do care and will pay high salaries for him/her. Either the company competes and offers a high salary as well, or it just doesn't get to hire developers from Silicon Valley. It's basic supply and demand.

If you're buying a car and it comes with a high power engine that you don't care about, you still have to pay the premium for the engine. You can't pay less because you tell the seller that you won't utilize the extra power. The car has a higher market price because there are people that will pay extra for the high power engine.

<comment><USER16> > Either the company competes and offers a high salary as well, or it just > doesn't get to hire developers from Silicon Valley. It's basic supply and > demand.

This statement is still correct and less loaded if you remove the words "get to".

I have no idea why a fully-remote company would want their developers to live in Silicon Valley so much that they would pay a premium for it. Why even bother being fully-remote then?

<comment><USER15> The company doesn't want the developer to live in Silicon Valley. The developer already does and that means any company that hires him/her will have to pay that premium because his/her market value is higher.

<comment><USER17> The problem with this is that it sends unpleasant signals to the other developers.

If the SV developer's value to the company is the same but they get paid more, then you're saying to all the other developers who work there, "You produce enough value that we could pay you this much, but we don't want to. We prefer to pay you less, simply because we can."

This is, of course, their right, but that sort of thing tends to make people unhappy, and unhappy employees tend to be unproductive, and then gone.

<comment><USER16> I'm asking something simpler than that: why would the company pay a Silicon Valley salary _at all_?

Several people here are taking it as a given that a technology company _has_ to hire some quota of people from the Valley.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Hiring strategies like this are often used as a legal pretext for paying women less than men. Economists call this the 'marriage monopsony.'

The idea is that because men on average earn more money, or at least did until recently, women generally move when their husbands get a new job. This means that men are able to compete for the best wages in a global market, but women are only able to compete for the best wages in their local market. Which, depending on their industry, often means only a handful of options, and thus severely limited bargaining power.

See also:

[http://econpapers.repec.org/paper/izaizadps/dp7343.htm](http://econpapers.repec.org/paper/izaizadps/dp7343.htm)

<comment><USER19> _until recently, women generally move when their husbands get a new job_

In academia we usually refer to this as the "two-body problem". It sometimes results in a spouse earning less because they can't negotiate as effectively; on the other hand, it also often results in a spouse being hired who wouldn't otherwise have been. Statements like "I'd love to work here, but my husband will need to find a job too... can you hire him as a lecturer?" are far from uncommon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Cost-of-living adjustments are pretty de rigeur for global operations which hire out of a particular social class and want consistent ability to staff locations important to them regardless of variances in local cost of living. Consider, for example, megabanks.

Many software companies hire remotely and are rediscovering this. We don't _need_ , as a function of the business, to have someone in e.g. central Tokyo and central Kansas, but it turns out that we often end up having that, or the strong possibility of that given the ex ante distribution of individual candidates.

Almost every distributed shop I worked with has a formal or informal discretionary bump in "the formula" to accommodate high-cost-of-living candidates. It is generally closer to $10 ~ $20k rather than "double."

American companies used to (and some foreign companies still) adjust salaries based on family size, too, which was also primarily a way to maintain access to desirable candidates for non-managerial work who had gotten an early start on family formation. (This was subsequently illegalized in the US, AFAIK, but "city in which you live" is not in general a protected class in US labor law.)

<comment><USER21> If you look at the linked Buffer formula, they are explicitly paying 3k/year per dependent, which I thought was not legal in the US

<comment><USER3> Why wouldn't it be legal?

It is somewhat weird though. I think it would make more sense to pay employees with dependents less.

<comment><USER22> Paying more to people with more dependents effectively discriminates against several classes which are protected in the US:

\- Those who for medical reasons cannot have children.

\- Those who for (lack of) religious reasons do not have lots of children (families with 6+ children have a different distribution of religious beliefs than the overall population).

\- Homosexuals.

On the other hand, paying less to people with dependents (why?) effectively discriminates against:

\- Heterosexuals.

\- People who for religious reasons have lots of children.

\- Disabled dependents (not a protected class in the US, but maybe it should be!).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Wait, is it actually lawful to advertise salaries that vary with the size of employee families?

That seems like a really, really bad idea.

<comment><USER5> > ...is it actually lawful to advertise salaries that vary with the size of > employee families?

I'm no expert on labor law, but why wouldn't it be?

<comment><USER10> Housing law clearly bans that sort of thing for tenants. I can imagine labor law being similar.

<comment><USER5> Housing law bans _increasing_ rent based on number of children. I'm fairly certain that -at least in SF- it doesn't prohibit the _reduction_ of rent for each child present in one's family.

Why would labor law ban the _increase_ of one's salary based on size of one's family?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I was about to write a long economic essay on why this can't always work out, but I think the main thing here is that he is talking about a distributed team. in which case, (I presume that) the location has very little advantage unlike a company that is let's say based in Sillycon Valley with sales efforts there as well elsewhere in the States, or development work that relies heavily on collaboration (as opposed to top down direction).

In which case, realistically Ann should get paid the same amount as Sofia. No problem hiring all Sofias if Ann's situation in Sillycon Valley does not confer any benefit to the company at all.

<comment><USER25> Agree, it's a contrived example.

The reason Ann can ask for $170k a year is because there are _other_ companies in Silicon Valley that are _not_ distributed companies, and that are competing for her, because they can't hire Sofia's.

If this company hires her anyway, despite not getting any benefit from her location, the company is making a stupid decision. They shouldn't hire her, they should hire two Sofia's elsewhere instead.

Salaries are both compensation for work performed, but also the cost of accessing certain labour markets. If you want to hire a bus driver in Manhattan, that person is going to cost you a lot more than hiring a busdriver in Hicksville. Not because there is a difference in skill, but because you need to pay a premium to get access to people who can work in Manhattan. Silicon Valley works exactly the same way, you need to pay a premium to access its labour force. And if you don't need access to it, don't pay the premium!!

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> The remote work market will trend towards location-independence.

Differential pricing cannot last in a fungible market. The companies that offer $100k and get $300k value from each employee will eventually out-compete those that offer $100-200k and get $300k value.

It's the same mechanism behind free markets defeating other forms of discrimination (I use this in the general, non-legal sense). If most companies pay women less because that's the market, eventually the non-discriminating outliers will do better and the market adjusts to the more efficient reality.

The timing may be unknown, but the movement towards a non-discriminating equilibrium in fungible markets is not.

</comment><comment><USER27> I actually think that Option 1, where Ann has her salary lowered after moving out of the valley is the most reasonable way to handle remote compensation. In other words, as an employee you get compensated by the quality of life that you can afford (how many goats you can buy regardless of what city you live in) instead of by some metric of how many dollars you are worth to the company.

The way I look at is that employment is a mutually beneficial agreement. Both parties should have the option to end the agreement when some part of the situation changes. When Ann moves and for some reason thinks that it's unfair that she won't be making an SF salary in Ohio, she can leave the company. Same goes for the employer when an employee moves from Ohio to SF. Saying "you're working remotely and we will pay you Ohio market rate but if you move to SF, we cannot afford that, so you will either have to accept Ohio market rate in SF or leave to find another company that will pay you SF market rate" sounds like the only fair option to me.

<comment><USER26> If you buy your goats from the local market, they are more expensive in the valley. But if you buy them from Amazon, they are the same across the US.

Where are you buying your goats?

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Changing pay based on location seems to be creating a strong incentive for fraudulent behavior. I'll tell the company I'm living in San Francisco whilst living Buenos Aires. If they ever ask, I'll say that I'm traveling for a month. Cost of living adjustments makes a lot more sense when the employee must be physically present.

</comment><comment><USER29> >What happens next? More importantly, what should happen?

>So, we punish Ann for moving by reducing her salary?

I don't see a problem with reducing Ann's pay. If rent is only $300 instead of $3000 the pay should reflect that.

If that sounds like a problem, imagine that the company pays rent or for hotel stay for visiting employees. If hotels cost $400 a night in SV and $40 a night in Argentina, should the company pay $400 a night in Argentina in order to 'equalize the pay'?

<comment><USER30> > I don't see a problem with reducing Ann's pay.

It does seem odd that an employer can use a person's lifestyle as a basis for adjusting their pay. Almost a violation of privacy.

<comment><USER31> It does look bad in the "reducing salary" aspect, but if you're asking someone to come to SF I sure hope there's a major premium so you can afford your half- an-appartment

<comment><USER30> If you're asking them to move to SF, yes. But if they choose to move to SF...should they get a raise?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Option 1 seems the best of those constrained choices.

Until global and remote work is the norm and as productive as on-site work, there is a local market. And the local market is one of the factors you're competing within/against (employee/employer perspective).

Setting one market wage worldwide as an employer ensures that you'll not get much (any?) talent from the high-cost locations.

<comment><USER33> _Setting one market wage worldwide as an employer ensures that you 'll not get much (any?) talent from the high-cost locations_

I don't see why; it just means you have to set the global wage equal to the ceiling, not the average of all local market wages.

<comment><USER34> As an employer, you're then leaving a ton of money on the table by paying people substantially more than their alternative offers.

<comment><USER8> That's only true so long as everyone else is only paying local market rate. Once a company starts offering people in Argentina SF-level pay... that company now will get every single qualified developer in that location that they want. So now other companies have to start offering similar wages, or they only get second tier devs. It's called competition.

<comment><USER34> Sure, but as a company there's not really any incentive to do so.

I could accomplish a similar effect by merely offering 50% more than the prevailing Argentinian developer wage while still realizing substantial savings over SF rates.

<comment><USER8> ...until someone else offers 55%, then you offer 60%... until it reaches equilibrium at approximately 100% (and I understand real life is a lot more complicated than one single salary number)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I think it depends to a large extent on whether you're paying for results or time.

The remote contracting market, especially for fixed rate contracts, is not driven by locations. It's driven by who in the globe can do a particular job at a particular price, and there's a wide variety in how much that translates to in "goats" for different developers.

Traditional remote jobs are still driven mostly by paying for a fixed amount of time working on the job per week. As such, they're not hiring for a "job to be done"—they're hiring you as an individual. To do that, they just need to pay more than the next best option, which is frequently determined by the local labor market.

Given that, option 1 makes a lot of sense, with the catch that you have to have a clear policy so it's known ahead of time. Also realize that Ann might try to get a better replacement offer and then you'll have to match to the "new" market for that location.

</comment><comment><USER35> Employers are customers that pay for semi fungible services. And like all people and organizations they will try to get the best price they can get. They want a certain amount and level of service and will try to pay the minimum to get it. Just like a person will try to get the cheapest plumber who is skilled enough for their needs.

</comment><comment><USER15> The author is failing to understand basic supply and demand. Just because the company doesn't care that the developer is in Silicon Valley doesn't mean there aren't a ton of companies that do care and will pay a large salary for it. Either you compete with those companies and offer a high salary, or you will just exclude yourself from higher silicon valley developers.

Just because you don't value location doesn't make the location premium any less real. The simple fact is that there is a lot more demand for developers in the bay than there is in South America.

A company could certainly overpay the devs outside of SV so the numbers look the same, but it's fiscally irresponsible.

</comment><comment><USER36> One of the replies to a Buffer employee's comment caught my attention:

> Perhaps you are (inadvertently) either using location as a lever to underpay > employees, or using it as an excuse to overpay people you like but perhaps > do not justify the cost for the business?

I think this hits the mark. Companies that push heavily for remote work generally aren't doing it because they genuinely care for the benefits it brings employees. They're pushing for it because it saves them money over operating with an entirely local team (when local means a high market-rate area like SF), precisely because they can discriminate based on location when negotiating salaries.

</comment><comment><USER37> I'm curious what this guy's view of free markets is (for/against). A competitive global market should end up with the situation he complains about (developers in low-income countries being paid less). Buyers (companies) will try to buy as cheaply as they can, and sellers (employees) as expensive as they can. Developers in "Buenos Tiempos" can't charge SF prices, because all the other developers would be happy to work for 10% less than SF prices, resulting in a downward spiral.

In a non-free market, such as a command economy, prices could be set by someone(s). But he doesn't like the idea of an arbitrary entity (the company, in his case) setting the number of "goats" (living standard) you get paid. He wants developers to get to negotiate that. But they already are, and globally developers and companies have settled on the prices we have.

I suspect that some analysis would show that developers want a certain standard of living globally, and beyond that, they are pretty happy. I'd love to be paid the living standard of a millionaire, but I'm also okay to be paid what other developers are getting paid. Until all of us decide refuse anything less than living like millionaires, we'll get paid a middle class salary.

</comment><comment><USER38> The military solves this by having "Basic Allowance for Housing" and COLA multipliers be VERY specific to "duty station". Those absolutely do change if you move, and are separate from "salary", so it's not perceived as the same thing as reducing salary on move.

</comment><comment><USER39> I think the formula makes more sense if you look at MRR from the perspective of workers in each market.

Salary may naturally vary by location, but wealth accumulation (in dollars, not goats) should be the same for equivalent contributors across the distributed organization.

<comment><USER40> I think that was the point the author was making. It's not the employers decision on your location adjusted wealth sccumulation opportunity, or how he puts it _how many goats you get_.

He's basically advocating for global market value. The side effect here is that individuals are free to maximize their wealth by choosing to live where they can best maximize their wealth. This allows the individual to chose what is valuable to them - dollars/goats or the intangibles of a location, e.g. sunshine, culture, freedom, family, etc.

This makes some sense for the individual where you have global scarcity. This enhances the competition for the individual's skill where geography in many cases presents a real barrier. For example in non-distributed workplaces you are essentially up against a sort of implicit collusion to minimize rates, the local market demand for your skill.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> There's an important thing that is not covered here. Currency fluctuations.

Assuming you pay people in their own currency (which is useful to make sure they don't pay unnecessary fees, and also that they get a consistent pay each month). How do you keep salaries consistent globally?

Do you adjust them each month to compensate fluctuations? Sucks for those that just got a pay cut.

I don't know the answer, I think the way Buffer does it is the best of the options I've come across so far. I'd like a better solution.

</comment><comment><USER42> Slightly unrelated, but I find the scaling factor based off experience interesting. Speaking as a junior, I am convinced that in 2 years or so when I would probably be classed as intermediate I will be worth far more than 10% more than I am now. Beyond that, I work at the moment with people who would be in the advanced/master range who are I think are definitely worth more than 20/30% more than me.

</comment><comment><USER43> Come to think of it, supposing a company is OK with remote workers, why would they hire somebody in an expensive location?</comment>


The Single Productivity Tool for Everything and Everyone - <AUTHOR> http://postfrenzy.com

<comment><USER2> Quite an improvement from the previous release. I remember checking this out last year.</comment>


Why Private Messages Suck - <AUTHOR> http://paulstamatiou.com/2007/09/16/why-private-messages-suck/

<comment><USER2> I'd say the reason private messages are used (and the reason everyone wants to reinvent the wheel for their social networking site) is that it is more convenient to send a message to someone directly from the site you are using when you see their name or profile than to switch over to your mail client and fire up an email. Also keep in mind that a lot of the target audience of sites like Facebook are on university run email servers which generally have a less than pretty user interface.

I would like to see more systems however allow you to view the message in the email and allow you to respond by hitting reply.

<comment><USER3> As a university student who regular communicates using facebook messages instead of email, I can say that in the current culture email is seen as overly former. I use it when I'm communicating about classwork, but for anything social, email is almost inappropriate.

I realize it's kind of ridiculous, but it's how it is and everyone I know checks their facebook account just as much if not more than their their email inbox anyways. As you said, it doesn't help that Pitt has a terrible web-based email UI.

<comment><USER4> It seems to me that the best thing (for the user) would be to allow forwarding of Facebook messages to an arbitrary email account. I really don't get the 'email is dead' thing though. Recently, somebody trying to contact me asked a mutual friend for my Myspace page (I don't have one) instead of my email, phone or IM information.

It wouldn't bother me much if these systems were open. I wouldn't mind having a social-networking ID if I could interact with other services instead of having to log in to each one. I have one mail client and one Jabber client. I could use them to connect to a thousand accounts each, and users of tens of thousands of other providers can interact with those accounts. Oops... this just turned in to a rambling rant.

<comment><USER5> Exactly. The social networks' messaging systems are convenient front ends, but there's no reason that they can't all share data.

<comment><USER3> I'm sure open access to facebook messaging will come eventually. There's no rush because facebook is the market leader and most people don't realize there is something wrong with having to log into facebook to reply to messages.

<comment><USER4> The problem is other people having to have a facebook (or myspace, etc...) account to _receive_ messages from you. Half the people I want to talk to have facebook, almost half have myspace, a few have both, a few have some other social networking service and a few have none. They all have email, and most of them don't consider it outdated.

I realize I don't have much in common with the average high-school/college student, but I suspect many of them get annoyed with this multi-network situation too. Inter-network personal messaging is a solved problem - RFC 821 came out in _1982_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> _which you check 144 times per day assuming you use Gmail_

Which is probably not a good assumption to make. Tons of people are using gmail, or hotmail or some other email with a web interface, but it's not everyone. So long as facebook messages can be checked from any computer, versus email which is usually checked from home, people will still use both.</comment>


Silicon Valley Isn't Run by Straight White American-Born Men - <AUTHOR> http://readwrite.com/2015/08/14/silicon-valley-ceo-diversity <comment><USER2> Just looking at the CEO roles doesn't exactly give an overall picture of diversity in SV or tech in general. However, many of the arguments I see on the other side - namely that all of the groups mentioned here are in fact underrepresented - neglect one fact: the overall percentages pretty closely mirror the demographics of degree holders in the fields necessary to perform many of the tech jobs in SV.

Women, for example, hold a disproportionately low share of STEM undergraduate degrees, particularly in engineering. Therefore it is only common sense that they wouldn't be getting jobs that require these degrees at the same rate that men do. It's not because of evil white males not wanting to hire women (or any of the other groups that have claimed discrimination in SV) - it's because fewer of them _choose the profession_. The degree issue is also the reason that the CEO role _is_ diverse - because it doesn't necessarily take an engineering degree to be the CEO of a tech company. Diverse qualifications will yield a diverse pool of talent.

<comment><USER3> The fact that there's underrepresentation of various groups in SV is but a symptom of a much bigger problem, which is that for whatever reason, these fields and the programs they map to are unappealing to many people. I think the most productive route to take would be to figure out exactly what has gone wrong in our education system and society that makes STEM fields attractive to only a very limited set of individuals and fix it. If this root problem is neglected, making hiring more diverse for diversity's sake will end up being a bandaid on a broken limb.

I am not saying to put a stop to diversity hiring — it's necessary in the interim, because society and the education system can't change overnight — but it does _not_ solve the actual problem and the longer the problem is left unaddressed, the harder it becomes to fix. We need to be putting serious resources into improvements in education and pushing cultural changes to how STEM careers are seen by the general public, and it needs to happen soon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The subtitle was cringe-worthy:

> Women, gays, and immigrants form a new majority at the top.

What? Looking at the union of all women, all people of color, and all LGBT people, and saying that this group forms a "majority" (non straight-white-U.S. born-males) shows what is wrong with how some view diversity.

Its nice that _some_ women, _some_ LGBT people, and _some_ people of color make it to the top. The talk about diversity has never been that they don't.

The list shows 4 underrepresented groups in the top 10, as if that is a success, forgetting that:

1\. There are two women only. 2\. There are no U.S. born persons of color in that list.

The only valid statement is that non-U.S. born people seem to exist in healthy amounts. But those like me who are born outside the US shouldn't be helping Silicon Valley check "non-white" boxes off, pretending like race and socio- economic problems in the US that keep persons of color from attaining positions of authority don't exist.

<comment><USER5> Economic problems prevent Whites from getting to the top too, not just Asians or Blacks. So how is that an unfair advantage that Whites have over minorities?

<comment><USER4> I'm not sure I follow. Yes, absolutely, Whites are subject to economic problems too-- not just persons of color.

Are you questioning whether a racial divide exists at all in America, where non-whites are subject to unique limitations that Whites are not subject to? Or is your objection different?

<comment><USER6> A lot of people on HN and other places on the internet believe that everything is the result of class problems. And class problems are completely independent of race.

<comment><USER4> Right. I was just asking for confirmation so that I don't argue past the grandparent poster.

I also feel like a lot of people take that stance because they feel that those on the opposing side are claiming that it is __only __because of race. More often than not, we are merely saying that race and class are interconnected; they are neither completely orthogonal, nor exactly the same.

There are definitely cycles of racism, patriarchy, and homophobia that perpetuate class struggles that are difficult to break out of. There are also other class struggles that affect us all.

<comment><USER6> Go read his post history. Unless you enjoy arguing on the Internet then I wouldn't bother.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Well, if my people of color want to get to the top, they're gonna have to develop the neccessary skills require to be at the top (leadership skills, negotiation skills, management skills, acquire the required experience to run a company, and they need to lower their empathy level, down to the point where they can utterly crush their competitors with no remorse, like all those pyschopathic CEO, for example, the CEO of Tobacco, who feels no guilt in killing millions of people each year).

Most of my asians peoples prefer to be the smart math/computer programmer guys who do not want to do the boring day to day chores of running a company, and they prefer to just do amazing things with a computer instead.

Nothing wrong with that.

<comment><USER7> What if I told you... that there is an entire continent out there where almost every company is run by an Asian person?

Please do not perpetuate these ridiculous stereotypes.

<comment><USER5> What if I told you that in those Asian companies that is run by an Asian at the top, that the other 99% of Asian is not at the top?

Not every Asian can get to the top. Just like not every White men can get to the top. The top is the top for one reason, the reason being that only the top percentage of people can get to the top.

Anyway, you're basically saying that in a country of White majority, the men most likely to get to the top of other men, is a White men, while in an country of Asian majority, the men most likely to get to the top of other men is an Asian men.

And not only that, not every men want to get to the top. Some men are perfectly happy with where they are. You can't just force those men who do not want to get to the top get to the top to take on responsbilities that they don't want to take on in the first place.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Not trying to start any fires, but are non-heterosexuals really underrepresented in Silicon Valley? The culture I've seen seems to fully embrace people of various sexual orientations.

According to Gallup [1], only 3.8% of American adults identify as LGBT, so the fact that even one CEO in the top 10 (in fact #1) is in the club is actually somewhat remarkable.

[1] [http://www.gallup.com/poll/183383/americans-greatly- overesti...](http://www.gallup.com/poll/183383/americans-greatly-overestimate- percent-gay-lesbian.aspx)

</comment><comment><USER9> I didn't know that Tim Cook came from such humble backgrounds. That's pretty impressive.

</comment><comment><USER6> 1 out of 1 US presidents is black.

We did it!

Oh wait 96 out of 100 members of the US senate is white. But we do have 31 women senators.

<comment><USER10> Ironically, white straight men from SV are under-represented in the Senate - as is everybody else from California or the other big states.

<comment><USER6> I cannot tell if you are being sarcastic.

HNers should understand basic statistics. Saying 0 out of 2 is an underrepresentation is inaccurate.

<comment><USER11> He's saying all Californians are underrepresented in the Senate because we have the largest population and still only 2 Senators.

<comment><USER6> Thanks! My brain did not make the switch to politics politics. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> With small exceptions it very much is. And beyond the CEOs you have to take into account stats on VCs and Executive Boards...

[Added]:

And I'd take it one step further to see if there's real diversity or just the appereance of: how many of the women/blacks/asians etc are there with the exact same criteria as the others and not because somebody (always a white male) thought "hey, we have too many white men, let's put a woman/minority on this position, it will look good".

While that might still increase diversity, I see it as hypocrisy for 2 reasons:

1) If the straight white man put aside was better for the job.

2) Token diversity just hides the prejudices under the carpet.

3) Token diversity doesn't help with the underlying reasons behind the inequality (e.g. being poor with less schooling opportunities prevent many blacks to be able to get MBAs and CS education, and instead of helping change that for all, they make a mockery of diversity with random exceptions).

4) Isn't it still white males making those decisions about which token people to include?

<comment><USER13> So which of the aforementioned ceos do you believe is the token? Tim cook? Satya nadella?

<comment><USER12> Obviously I DON'T believe CEOs are appointed as token minorities.

First of all because the "non white straight male" CEOs are few and far between anyway, so it wouldn't give much advantage for your company to tout one when nobody expects you to (not to mention it could hurt in some bigoted demographics).

But second, and most importantly, because those doing the appointing care very much for the actual performance of the CEO (which affects their bottom line) to just put a token person in its place. Whereas for lower positions, even managerial ones, they can appoint the token person here and there much more easily.

I also don't believe a listing of 10 companies, especially without also enumerating also their whole boards, VCs, etc, is enough to make a point.

Besides Asians/Indians are taken as non-threatening and a "safe choice" even by bigots in these days (there's a reverse stereotype associating them with IT). I'd like to see some blacks, latinos, etc into that list (which IIRC make for a huge percentage of the Californian population, but are totally missing even from the "top 10" list).</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Semantic programmatic search for computable data - <AUTHOR> http://www.kemvi.com

<comment><USER2> >>> kemvi.entity("japan") Traceback (most recent call last): File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module> File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist- packages/kemvi/__init__.py", line 232, in entity ret.append(Entity( __item)) TypeError: __init__() got an unexpected keyword argument 'popularity'

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, it's fixed -- that shouldn't have slipped through testing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Can you elaborate a bit further on the data you have? Is it a flexible architecture where you plugin data from multiple sources? How do you solve ETL for that? Or is it a fixed data set? If so, what is it?

<comment><AUTHOR> Currently, it's great for socioeconomic data on countries, as well as for high-res socioeconomic data for the US (county resolution). There's data from the World Bank, Dept of Health, Dept of Labor, Dept of Justice, and several other public sources, with all entities reconciled.

We're building a pipeline to make it so that ETL involves as little human time as possible, but it's in its early stages now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is awesome. Are you planning on adding more diverse data sets beyond government and economic? Something like professional sports stats, college sports stats, etc?

<comment><AUTHOR> If there were canonical sports stats data sources to include, it wouldn't be difficult. Email us at firstname.lastname@example.com if there's something specific you have in mind.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nice... feels a bit like the Gremlin shell. What's the tech behind this website?

<comment><AUTHOR> The idea is that you'd use this via the python shell (and soon, from your R code or Javascript code), and not through the website. Looks like we need to make that clearer. The website stack is Postgres+Django+Python.

<comment><USER5> How interconnected is your data? Did you consider a graph db?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's highly interconnected. For example, you can make hops like USCounty-- USState--Senator--Vote on economic stimulus bill.

The data backend is indeed NoSQL, but we didn't choose a graph db because there are no really good graph solutions that are easily parallelized.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> How do you get list of properties that a given entity supports?

<comment><AUTHOR> You can't get a complete list the way it's currently set up. But SomeEntity.property(), without an argument, will give you a sample of them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Are you guys hiring? This looks like a lot of fun to work on.

<comment><AUTHOR> Not yet, but drop us a line at email@example.com.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Any chance of a Ruby API?

<comment><AUTHOR> Coming soon, along with R and Javascript!</comment></comment>


Hack Google Adwords to help you pick a name for your product - <AUTHOR> http://www.ewakened.com/2011/08/using-adwords-to-find-the-right-name/

<comment><USER2> I've read about this method for name generation many times before and there always seems to be a lack of data to show the method's level of quality or relevance. Would love to hear a statistician's take on this.

<comment><USER3> Fully agree, but the author is not using AdWords to generate names, but to have a number of names (4 in this case) compete with each other (running the exact same ad, just changine the name). The reported outcome in that case was 80% of the clicks went to "Autovate", although we don't know that all variations got equally exposed.

[edit] The four names in question were Motiveatr, Autovate, Autovator, My Auto Motive.

[edit] (Removed rant on the name Motiveatr)

<comment><AUTHOR> haha agreed. My Auto Motive I thought would do well though ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This concept can even be taken further - rather than testing just a name, use AdWords to test your entire product _before_ even building it.

For example, if you are thinking of opening an online business selling widgets, you can build a test website and advertise it using AdWords. Provide a fake checkout process, but rather than processing credit cards, just inform your users that your product is not yet available (at a point in the workflow where it's clear they intend to pay already). Then, with a quick calculation on the data, you have a rough idea of how profitable your business will be upon launch.

Obviously, it's not a perfect model, but still a very nice way to gather market data for cheap before you invest the time and money to build anything.

</comment><comment><USER5> With $20 budget and 4 versions this seems like a random spike in data. If you are going to use this method I suggest to use Google AdWords Campaign Experiments (built-in tool). It will tell you if your results are statistically significant. There is also Excel spreadsheet to download and play with numbers to see if results are significant.

Second caution. This approach only tests what's the best name for your ad. It doesn't tell you what is the best name for your product.

</comment><comment><USER6> Interesting method but the author seems a little surprised that doing market research actually works. His sample size compared to the population seems just a liiiiittle bit too small to yield meaningful results from though and there's no real indicator of its reliability.

What would _really_ be interesting is a long running series of these with larger sample sizes. Might cost a bit but you could probably come up with a reasonable hypothesis test and some solid results.

Fair play to him if it's not just a fluke.

</comment><comment><USER7> Smart way to add some interesting, relevant data to your initial product development, period.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm starting to become tired of such liberal use of the words 'hack' and 'hacker'. _Maybe_ 'marketing hack' would have been ok, but honestly there isn't even any programming involved here.

On an entirely separate note, nice product name. And that does seem like an interesting method for picking one.

<comment><AUTHOR> I debated the name and really tried not to, but I think it does fall under the definition of a hack... I could be wrong. Sorry if I mislead. Was not the intention.

<comment><USER9> I think "a clever use of something for a purpose it wasn't originally made for" can be rightfully called a hack. Doesn't seem misleading at all to me.</comment></comment></comment>


node.js vs. kotlin as a server side development - <AUTHOR> Hello.<p>I have developed services with nodejs and I wonder a performance comparison between nodejs and kotlin as a server side development. <comment><USER2> Want to first say that I've been using and working professionally with node since v0.10. I love it and don't want to give the impression that I am a hater at all.

That said, at my place of employment I am currently in the middle of migrating OFF a node server (your typical express stack) to a Kotlin/Spring based one. I think I have the perspective you want in other words.

My recommendation is use Kotlin. Its fast, interops with the entire Java ecosystem and all its libraries, has a fantastic and sane type system (think TypeScript on steroids) and fantastic tooling. Its also pretty easy to pick up. I had never worked with it before and I was up and running on day one with it.

</comment><comment><USER3> This article hits most of what I'd have to say on and around a question like this. It does discuss Java, not Kotlin, but Kotlin is JVM so it really doesn't change the answer meaningfully.

[https://rclayton.silvrback.com/speaking-intelligently- about-...](https://rclayton.silvrback.com/speaking-intelligently-about-java- vs-node-performance)

</comment><comment><USER4> If you're thinking about web development in Kotlin, check out [https://kweb.io/](https://kweb.io/).

It takes full advantage of powerful Kotlin features like coroutines to make the barrier between browser and server almost invisible.

</comment><comment><USER5> I would go with Kotlin 90% of the time. It's faster, has better syntax, strong type checks, great ecosystem and community (Jetbrains, Spring, Google support it). It has some wicked cool Reactive support and scales pretty well. So I would go with Kotlin.

Unless, you want to build a prototype and do not know the language. NodeJS may help you get started quickly.

</comment><comment><USER6> this page might help [https://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/](https://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/)

But is raw cpu time really what matters most for you or solving a problem in away that can be scaled and maintained in away that you understand maybe more important?

</comment><comment><USER7> Kotlin is easier to work with for large projects. You're less inclined to write messy code than JS.

</comment><comment><USER8> If you make use of the NPM ecosystem you are inviting security holes into your product. Stay away.

</comment><comment><USER9> In general, Kotlin is 5-10x faster than JS and uses 1/2 the memory.

The speed difference depends on what you're doing, but I would guess it's rare to find situations where Kotlin is less than twice as fast</comment>


Look like your boss - <AUTHOR> http://www.inter-sections.net/2008/01/16/look-like-your-boss/

<comment><USER2> God forbid I ever come to the point in life where I actually do this.

<comment><AUTHOR> What, you mean the point where you get promoted? ;-)

<comment><USER2> Yes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I've also heard that the viewpoint that successful consultants don't "look like" permies. Doing otherwise might increase the perception that their work is something which could instead be done by a permanent employee.

No axe to grind, worked both sides of that fence. Not sure if I think there is much truth to it. I do know some odd-looking consultants though :-)

</comment><comment><USER4> "Sometimes their shoes are even cheap and beat-up, even though it's a mortal sin in England". It is?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hell yeah. Over here (in England), people will make a pretty quick negative judgment about you if your shoes look wrong, in the typical office environment. A lot of people (none of them managers) walk around wearing shoes that look like they've been wearing them since A-levels (pre-university school). You can't get away with that in this country.

<comment><USER5> I felt vaguely ridiculous as an American traveling in London for this exact reason. I have decent shoes that I wear all over the place: they are made of leather, they are (I guess?) relatively stylish. But in England I felt like I was a homeless person wandering around with cardboard boxes on my feet. It's always interesting transitioning from a country where no one cares what you look like to nearly any place in Europe, where Appearance Matters(tm)!

On the whole I like the European model a little less since I always feel a little outclassed, even just going to a market or something. But Europeans traveling in America are probably in a constant state of disgust at the disheveled state of most of us...

<comment><USER6> "...I was a homeless person wandering around with cardboard boxes on my feet."

Gets my +10 vote of the day for hilarious mental image!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is interesting...</comment>


LVI – Hijacking Transient Execution with Load Value Injection - <AUTHOR> https://lviattack.eu/ <comment><USER2> Discussed last week: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22537216](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22537216)

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah, I missed that one; meanwhile, it has been submitted five times with this URL without anyone posting a redirect note (and without getting traction).

<comment><USER2> It's a fairly technical paper, but there is a nice movie trailer for it: [https://youtu.be/baKHSXeIIaI](https://youtu.be/baKHSXeIIaI)</comment></comment></comment>


Why Apple can't meet its luxury brand expectations for the iPhone - <AUTHOR> http://www.networkworld.com/article/2854014/opensource-subnet/why-apple-cant-meet-its-luxury-brand-expectations-for-the-iphone.html

<comment><AUTHOR> To maintain its course, Apple will have to become the world's biggest luxury brand and outperform top luxury companies like Mercedes and BMW.

</comment><comment><USER2> Is it reasonable to compare Apple to Mercedes + BMW? There are other luxury car brands.</comment>


c4x86 - JIT compiler for x86 in 86 lines - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/EarlGray/c4 <comment><USER2> This is amazingly elegant and concise. I've heard a lot of people, including the compiler academics, claim that even the simplest non-optimising compiler for x86 would be extremely complex; this is a great counterexample to that, alongside (O)TCC. It looks like it's using mainly two registers only for code generation, eax and ecx, and the stack.

Jack Crenshaw's "Let's build a compiler" tutorial series uses the same code generation method but with eax/edx ([http://www.pp4s.co.uk/main/tu-trans-comp- jc-intro.html](http://www.pp4s.co.uk/main/tu-trans-comp-jc-intro.html) ); not sure if he was the first one to come up with it, however. Incidentally, I think his tutorial series is one of the best ones I've read for understanding how compilers work, even better than all the "traditional" literature like the Dragon Book.

The other article that'll probably be very helpful for those understanding how the rest of this compiler works is [http://www.engr.mun.ca/~theo/Misc/exp_parsing.htm#climbing](http://www.engr.mun.ca/~theo/Misc/exp_parsing.htm#climbing) which describes the "precedence climbing" way of parsing expressions.

Compilers are often thought of as "magic" that only very few people can understand, but I don't think that has to be true in general. While "production-quality" compilers like gcc are certainly very complex, the _essence_ of a compiler is really quite simple. However, this wouldn't be the impression one gets by reading a lot of the compiler books out there --- the heavy emphasis on theory in the majority of them has a somewhat obfuscating effect. They also tend to focus a lot more on compiler-compilers (Lex, Yacc) and more general parsing techniques like LR, while spending very little on the simple methods of syntax-directed translation and recursive descent. AFAIK precedence-climbing is not even described in the Dragon Book.

<comment><USER3> I've never seen precedence climbing in _any_ compiler textbook, unless you count the lcc book. (I learned of it instead from an unconventional algorithms class by Dave Gillespie, who wrote Gnu Calc.) You can see how it gets squeezed out of the curriculum since you can write a conventional parser just fine without it, but it's a loss -- when you see it how can you not go "Oh yes, that's sweet, that's just right"?

Crenshaw's series turned me off when the first parser he showed would incorrectly accept incorrect inputs, and it could've been done rightly just as easily -- or so it looked to me. I did not test it or read further, and since it's so often recommended I seem to've missed something.

P.S. precedence climbing in Python: [https://github.com/darius/sketchbook/blob/master/parsing/pre...](https://github.com/darius/sketchbook/blob/master/parsing/precedence_climbing.py) . Pratt's top-down operator precedence parsing is essentially an object- oriented way to express the same algorithm: [https://github.com/darius/sketchbook/blob/master/parsing/pra...](https://github.com/darius/sketchbook/blob/master/parsing/pratt.py)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Previous discussion on C4: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8558822](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8558822)

Looks like this is a fork of that.

<comment><USER5> That discussion makes me a little sad for HN. Although 'userbinator has a fantastic comment in there.

<comment><USER6> link to userbinator's comment [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8560974](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8560974)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What prevents c4x86.c from compiling with c4.c? Is it the <sys/mman.h> header? (Note the "not self-hosted" comment in the README.)

<comment><AUTHOR> It's `mmap` call and syntax of function pointer at the end of the file (needed to call the compiled code).

P.S. Otherwise, it is ready to run itself, work in progress.

<comment><USER2> Allowing it to call arbitrary functions using dlopen()/dlsym() would be the idea I have for fixing the first problem - it'd also increase its power substantially since it can then make use of any other library's functions instead of the currently hardcoded list. Supporting function pointers would be a bit harder and involve changing the parser/code generator.

<comment><USER8> How would you tell it which shared library to dlopen?

Was looking into changing the order of arguments to go the right way 'round. Also changing address refs to be PC-relative, to avoid the relocation phase. Seems pretty straightforward.

<comment><AUTHOR> I thought about `dlopen`, but did not know how to fetch it libc platform- independently (`dlopen(argv[0])` is fine on OS X, but not on Linux).

Now I see that the first argument can be NULL, that approach is feasible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This greatly helped my understanding of how compilers work.

How different would the implementation be for x64? Would it primarily be a matter of translating opcodes and calling conventions? For example, pop ecx is 59 [1], and on x64 it looks like it would be pop rcx, which is also 59 [2][3].

[1] - [http://sparksandflames.com/file/x86InstructionChart.html](http://sparksandflames.com/file/x86InstructionChart.html)

[2] - [https://defuse.ca/online-x86-assembler.htm#disassembly](https://defuse.ca/online-x86-assembler.htm#disassembly)

[3] - [http://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/hardware/ff5...](http://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/hardware/ff561499%28v=vs.85%29.aspx)

<comment><USER2> For x64 under both *nix and Windows sizeof(int) remains at 4 while the sizes of pointers increase to 8 bytes (64 bits), so anything in the compiler that depends on those sizes would also have to change. As for the opcodes, with x86/x64 it's a little weird since 64-bit mode actually defaults to 32-bit data sizes and uses mostly the same opcodes as 32-bit mode, with a prefix byte needed to override this to 64 bits. Addresses default to 64 bits, however. The 32-bit environment is "nice" in that pointers and integers are the same size; not true for most 64-bit in general ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/64-bit_computing#64-bit_data_mo...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/64-bit_computing#64-bit_data_models) )

But still, trying to fit the x64 version in 64 lines is probably going to be the harder problem. ;-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This also works on win32 under mingw32. I forked and added support for it: [https://github.com/joebo/c4/blob/master/c4x86.c](https://github.com/joebo/c4/blob/master/c4x86.c)

</comment><comment><USER10> By 86 lines, do they mean 542 lines?

<comment><AUTHOR> I meant the code generator size: it starts at line 448 and ends at 535, so its size is about 86 lines. The rest of the code is taken from original c4 and is not changed.

<comment><USER11> ..and SNAP! Great work, dmytrish. This is a godsend to people trying to fight their way through traditional compiler texts. Thanks for a truly impressive contribution to the language dev world.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you. rswier's c4 was a great inspiration for me. I am glad If my humble two cents are helpful for somebody.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> If you enjoy this sort of thing you might enjoy my Brainfuck micro-JIT: [http://blog.reverberate.org/2012/12/hello-jit-world-joy- of-s...](http://blog.reverberate.org/2012/12/hello-jit-world-joy-of-simple- jits.html)

</comment><comment><USER6> Here is another example of a microjit, this time in Python [https://gist.github.com/leegao/1073233](https://gist.github.com/leegao/1073233)

</comment><comment><USER13> Is the upshot of this sort-of like 'tcc -run'?

<comment><AUTHOR> At a quick glance, yes, `tcc -run` seems to output machine code into memory for running it, so yes.

<comment><USER13> Cool. Is that all that's required to use it instead of this?

      #!/usr/bin/tcc -run

Or does doing that require weird stdin-related Magic?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> That is some beautiful code.</comment>


Powerset labs to offer natural language based search - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2007/tc20070917_676790.htm

<comment><USER2> the keyword is "to" offer. I so sick of hearing about this thing already. I just want to try it.

Thanks for the link to the article</comment>


Single founder work flow/organization? - <AUTHOR>

Super dumb question of the day, but I am looking for anecdotes about how people organized their work to launch independently. Yes, I have done a search of HN (and found a discussion of Trello, which might help me) but I am really not finding what I need.
I was a good student in my youth and I was a homemaker and homeschooling mom for a long time. Then I had an entry level job at a Fortune 500 company for five years. None of that really gives me a workflow model for developing my websites. I have several websites I want to develop. I have recently gotten some feedback and other support and implemented some of the suggestions, but I am currently waiting on other people for some things (not a criticism of them) and feeling directionless. Surely there are things I can be working on productively until they get back to me.
My sites grew out of audience interest. Initially they began as emails on a parenting list. After repeating myself two dozen times, I would take one of the better emails and edit it for publication to my website, or sometimes if something got a really big reaction out of people I would edit it and post it. But that wasn't a business model. It wasn't even intended to be. I have to find a means to organize my thoughts, develop my sites, work on not just posting but also promoting and monetizing my work. And I am at a loss as to how to work all that out.
Thanks <comment><USER2> If you're a visual person, you could look into something like corkboard.me (an online board for your post-it notes) or one of the many kanban board offerings -- just google kanban, and a bunch of services should pop up. My own webapp, <http://mindcast.com> could probably be used, as well, although it's more oriented towards visually mapping bookmarks.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'm in a kind of similar position - sole founder, lots of ideas and not a good enough way (at the moment) of keeping track of them.

From looking around, OmniFocus and Basecamp (but Basecamp Light if it existed) would do the job, though bootstrapping I can justify the money for what may or may not work for me.

Interested to see what others recommend, if there's anything else to look at, or do I just write a lean requirements/project management app (which I could eat dog-food with and track the app I'm building in the app I'm building :-)

<comment><USER4> Don't write your own project management app unless that's what your idea is. IMO.

I really like OmniFocus but it's pretty expensive, and you have to purchase separate licenses for the iPhone, iPad, and OS X versions.

TaskPaper is popular. I tried it and found it too limiting after getting used to OmniFocus.

I really like OmniFocus actually. That's my recommendation for task management software. It's very fast to CTRL+ALT+Space and enter new tasks(whenever you have an idea come to you, just enter it and it will go in your inbox and you can organize it later) and it's easy to keep everything organized. I put almost everything I do in there -- I even have a weekly recurring project to clean my apartment up.

Now, OmniFocus has a breaking point -- it's really for personal productivity, it's not a bug tracker, and it's not for collaboration. If you start growing your business and have other people working with you, you'll need something else... but for solo projects and keeping your personal life organized I really like OmniFocus.

Edit: oh, yes, for teams <http://asana.com/> is good. I tried TaskPaper and keeping the document in a Dropbox share -- didn't work too well. The first time we heard "where the hell did my changes go?!" it was time to drop it.

<comment><USER3> OK, Asana looks pretty much what I was looking for (about the only thing I'd "like" though probably not need is the ability to link tasks (ie Task x is blocked until Task y is complete)

Thanks for the tip, I can see this being the answer (for me at least)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Couple of suggestions:

1\. You mention "sites" plural. You may want to focus on just ONE site and pour your energy into that.

2\. Start self-project management small and simple, stick to it, then get more complicated as you need it. I like to start with just a Google Doc/Excel spread sheet. After doing that well for a few months, try something more sophisticated. The worst thing to do is get too deep into project _management_ and not your project.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you.

At the moment, I am trying to primarily focus on my health site for development: <http://www.healthgazelle.com/> But I also have a blog which is mostly intended as a personal outlet. I don't feel my health site really has an audience. It is far easier to write for the blog. Any suggestions on how to do audience development or otherwise get more focused on what to do for the health site?

<comment><USER5> Focusing on the blog is a good idea. In my limited blog experience, I've only seen one real approach: write like Hell, tell everyone you can about it, swallow sadness for the first year while no one reads it, then randomly after a year of hard work it'll start getting a bunch of traffic and take off.

<comment><AUTHOR> Trying to wrap my brain around this feedback. Here are some additional details: The blog isn't intended to be commercial. It is intended to be a personal outlet to help keep my big fat mouth from keeping me mired in controversy and drowning in hot water in online forums. I have debated taking it down, in part because some of it is extremely personal. But I get a great deal out of doing the writing and I think some posts are really good, so I have left it up for now.

Long term, I still hope to do a comic. Short term, I am trying to get more traffic and monetize my health site, which is the site people keep expressing interest in and willingness to support. I am homeless at the moment. I have time to write but no money. I need an income stream and the health site _seems_ like the best place to start.

Thoughts? I keep wrestling with these questions and don't have good answers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I also posted this question elsewhere and have been directed to A List Apart, which I already knew about but hadn't thought of. I was specifically directed here: [http://m.alistapart.com/topics/process/projectmanagementwork...](http://m.alistapart.com/topics/process/projectmanagementworkflow/)

And I am happy to report that I have already found an article of interest. But I am still interested in hearing personal anecdotes and/or getting links to similar.

Thanks.

</comment><comment><USER6> use evernote

<comment><AUTHOR> I am on a tablet. Is that compatible with a tablet?

Thanks.

<comment><USER6> Yes it is. check it out <http://evernote.com/></comment></comment></comment>


Nasa Study Reproduces Origins of Life on Ocean Floor - <AUTHOR> https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/nasa-study-reproduces-origins-of-life-on-ocean-floor <comment><USER2> Title of the research paper: " _Redox and pH gradients drive amino acid synthesis in iron oxyhydroxide mineral systems_ "

This looks like an interesting result about another posible way for the formation of the amino acids pre life. The formation of the amino acids is an important step, and there are a few alternatives, and IIUC we still don't know which one is the most important alternative.

Anyway, the formation of the amino acids is only a small initial step, so the title of the press release " _Nasa Study Reproduces Origins of Life on Ocean Floor_ " is an exaggeration.

It's hard to pick a good alternative title following the guidelines, but my out-of-guideline alternative is: " _Nasa study reproduces abiotic synthesis of amino acid in ancient ocean floor_ "</comment>


How to properly secure cryptocurrencies exchanges: HSM based architecture - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@Ledger/how-to-properly-secure-cryptocurrencies-exchanges-511fe7a669a3 <comment><USER2> Wouldn't it be better to not trust an exchange at all? [https://github.com/mappum/mercury](https://github.com/mappum/mercury)</comment>


Ask HN: Could company force departing co-founder to sign non-compete? - <AUTHOR>

Dear HN:
I am running into a situation where I am being forced out of the company I co-founded. I have not signed any Non-Compete agreements in the past, and I don't want to sign it as it will severely limit my ability to work in the future.
The only piece of legal document we have signed so far is a non-binding MoU that states if I want to claim a director seat, I need to sign a non-compete. Since that document was never entered into a formal agreement, and I no longer seek the director seat, I feel no longer obligated to sign away my rights.
It'd be great if someone can give me some advice on this matter before I escalate to the lawyers. I'm turning to HN for help because I feel this might be a pretty common issue with the audience here.
Thanks in advance for your advice! <comment><USER2> I'd ask an attorney to review the MoU and any corporate formation documents. As well as which state you are in and any obligations you may have if you remain in an equity position over a certain amount.

Overall though, from what I know and IANAL, you are not obligated to sign any documents on the way out. However, there could be ramifications like the forfeiture of your equity (if that was in the original agreement etc). So that's why I suggest letting an attorney review all the documents. My bet though is if you didn't have all the standard non-compete etc up front then they don't exist and you are probably safe to walk away without signing it, losing the board seat of course.

Good luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> The parent company is based out of HK, but the operating company is based in Philippines.

My co-founder threatened to sue me in the US as I am a US citizen.

Funny enough, if I recall correctly, my home state California has one of the weakest non-compete law.

<comment><USER2> Yea, California is one of the weakest for non-competes from what I understand too.

I don't think your co-founder really stands much of a chance honestly, except he/she can hold any money etc that you put into the company. So honestly, it might be worth an hour of time with a competent attorney to ask a few questions and make sure you do things to insulate yourself.

That all said, I can't imagine what they would sue you over in this case for not signing. They are literally on the other side of the world, and unless your co-founder is just flush with cash and an ass that is willing to tie up your time in court etc then I doubt this amounts to anything other than hurt feelings and a shit relationship, at least for a while.

<comment><AUTHOR> Really appreciate your comment! Very helpful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> If you live in California, non-competes are not allowed under section 16600 of the Business and Professions code. They could file a lawsuit, but it would be thrown out by the California courts. Lawyers have a term for this tactic: "in terrorem". It is used against persons not familiar with the law.

<comment><USER4> That's not _entirely_ true.

There are specific cases where non-competes _are_ valid in California, relating to being the business owner (aka having an equity stake), which OP has, to some degree.

See Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code §§ 16602.5 or Wikipedia for more. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non- compete_clause#Exceptions_-...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non- compete_clause#Exceptions_-_valid_non-compete_agreements_in_California)

OP, time to lawyer up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> No.

They can offer you an incentive to sign one (bag of cash etc) but they can't make you sign a legal contract.

</comment><comment><USER6> In all likelihood you'll be crossing paths with these folks again at some time. So, be professional.

If you don't like the non-compete because it is too all encompassing then counter with something more narrow in scope.

However, if you don't like the non-compete because you were forced out and you have an axe to grind, then own that and separate your personal feelings from the business. With your newfound clarity re-examine the situation and you may realize the non-compete isn't a big deal after all. Are you really planning on starting your own startup to compete directly with them?

</comment><comment><USER7> Do you want anything from them? Equity, severance, back pay, health care for 18 months (i mean besides cobra). If so, this is your chance to negotiate something. All the advice about a attorney, i agree with.

</comment><comment><USER8> > Could company force departing co-founder to sign non-compete?

Probably not, though the answer will depend on the law of the specific jurisdiction that governs your relationship. They could offer something in exchange for signing a non-compete, but if you haven't previously agreed in a legal-binding way to a non-compete, and or made a binding agreement pledging to do so in the future, then even if the conditions apply in which a non- compete would be valid and enforceable in your jurisdiction, there doesn't seem any way that they could legally compel you to sign it or legally withhold anything to which you are already entitled if you do not.

But if you are being forced out of a company you cofounded, you probably should talk to a lawyer familiar with the law of your jurisdiction about the whole situation (not just the non-compete aspects.) And if they are attempting to withhold things that belong to you unless you sign a non-compete, then you _really_ need to talk to a lawyer, because the issue then becomes "can I compel them to honor my existing rights, and, if so, how" more than "can they force me to sign a non-compete".

</comment><comment><USER9> Unless they have other reasons to blackmail you into signing - then not.

<comment><AUTHOR> They are withholding my investment into the company, and my equity. They are also threatening to sue me in the US even though this is a non-US company.

I think they are bluffing, but I just want to double check.

<comment><USER10> If they're threatening a lawsuit, it's probably time to get a lawyer.

<comment><USER9> Second that.

You have more stuff going on than the title of your post suggests.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Talk to a lawyer.</comment>


What to Make of Finnegans Wake? (2012) - <AUTHOR> http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/07/12/what-make-finnegans-wake/ <comment><USER2> After an earlier HN discussion extolling Finnegans Wake, I read the book (and read several guide books, and listened to it on several versions of audio), and I have to say that for me it was an epic waste of time. I hate to brand myself a philistine, but want to provide a counterpoint to people who say the book is _so funny_ and a _grand experience_.

I recommend reading a couple pages [1] to get a feeling for Finnegans Wake - it's amazing the density of concepts Joyce crams into words, with multiple meanings in almost every word. I kept thinking the book would make more sense if I kept reading, but no, it's like this the whole way through. A few things get better, for instance, the initials HCE constantly appear, so in the first sentence you should get an aha feeling from "Howth Castle and Environs". But that's a pretty small payoff.

If you enjoyed the book and found it hilarious, more power to you. But as someone who likes challenging books and put a lot of time into Finnegans Wake, the book didn't do it for me.

[1] Finnegans Wake is online at [http://finwake.com/1024chapter1/1024finn1.htm](http://finwake.com/1024chapter1/1024finn1.htm) along with detailed notes, but unlike Shakespeare, looking up mystery words doesn't make things any clearer.

<comment><USER3> There's always something on Earth to remind me that I'm an idiot. The first page of this is a disaster.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I like to think that Finnehans Wake was an elaborate practical joke aimed at the literary establishment.

Can imagine Joyce chuckling to himself as he imagined generation of literary critics and bedevilled students trying to make sense from its fractured dreamscape.

I love the book, though. It's words come closest to capturing in words what it is like to dream. Glimpsed fragments of meaning, locations and people and ideas that shift and stir in and out of existence. A lingering sense that there was some kind of narrative there, but there's no way you could ever describe in words what it was.

<comment><USER5> So you'd subscribe to (g) in his list of possible interpretations:

 _(g) The reliable readiness of critics, doctoral candidates, and know-it-alls to enshrine difficulty for its own sake, to rise to the bait of erudite obscurity that Joyce laid for us in this, the greatest literary prank ever played (outside of revealed religion)._

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Came across this nice quote by Kafka recently, which seems relevant:

"I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound or stab us. If the book we're reading doesn't wake us up with a blow to the head, what are we reading for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us."

<comment><USER7> i think everyone ought to read whatever books they fucking want. what's with pretentious assholes always telling everybody what they should and shouldn't do?

<comment><USER8> He isn't telling you what to do. He is struggling with the question of what the best way to live is, he assumes you are doing the same, and he's offering his opinion on one aspect of it.

"Everyone ought to read whatever books they fucking want" isn't that useful as an intellectual opinion. Yes, fine, but what kind of books should we want to read if we want to lead our lives the best way possible? Why read at all?

<comment><USER9> Honest question: what is the philosophical basis for the trend I seem to often see (expressed here as "Why read at all?") that pure entertainment is not a valid part of "the best way to live"?

<comment><USER10> Just off the top of my head, some schools of Buddhism come to mind. Then after a few more seconds it occurs to me that most major religions have some form of ascetic system that frowns upon indulgences such as pure entertainment. In other words, you can have your choice of philosophical bases.

That addresses the "where does it come from?" but not the "why", which I would generalize as entertainment distracts from the pursuit of a better way of living.

<comment><USER9> Thanks for the answer! I was hoping for more specifics than "some schools of Buddhism" and "ascetic systems from most major religions", but on hindsight I see that asking people to do that level of research for me on a forum like this is too big an ask.

<comment><USER10> There aren't any specifics, because asceticism is everywhere. From the Zen Buddhist writings of Dogen in the 1200s to modern U. S. Christian Baptists, there's going to be someone standing nearby telling you music and dancing are not good things (one example common to both Dogen and some Baptists).

So where did it originally come from? Who did it or said it first? I have absolutely no idea, nor do I care. So, yeah, you're on your own. :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> "At times the book would wash up on the beach of my life and I would hear the bottled voice of its djinn, promising everlasting bliss to puzzle hermits, inexhaustible cred to know-it-alls. I always forebore."

I may be in the minority, but when I read someone's thoughts on Joyce I don't particularly want to decipher a new metaphor or two per sentence. If that was my intention I would just pick up the original.

<comment><AUTHOR> For me it was a supremely enjoyable sentence. The article itself is complex, and what it had to say it could've said in simpler words. But brevity need always not be the soul of wit; at least for some, these flourishes, this showmanship of language, they are a gift to savour.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'd recommend John Huston's film 'The Dead' to anyone who would like experience something by Joyce. I did read a bit of 'A portrait of the artist as a young man'. He really got into the head of a small boy who was being bullied in one part. I never finished it though, I can't remember why. I don't think that I could ever read Ulysses, I did listen to a reading of it on the BBC's book at bedtime many years ago and liked parts of it. Finnegan's Wake would drive me insane, I'm certain.

<comment><USER13> If you want to try tackling _Ulysses_ again, I have two recommendations:

First, Frank Delaney is doing a wonderful podcast, "Re: Joyce"[1], unpacking the novel in short segments. The original episodes cover just a few sentences each; lately the format has expanded to a whole page, in the hope that he'll finish before 2040! Currently, he's just started in on "Scylla and Charybdis", the ninth chapter. His enthusiasm for Joyce and _Ulysses_ is deep and delightful.

Second, in 1982, the Irish radio station RTE produced an essentially unabridged dramatic reading of the novel. Besides being a terrific way to experience the book, it nicely counters one of the major difficulties for newcomers to _Ulysses_ : Distinguishing dialog and internal monologue from narration, and deciding who, exactly, is saying what! It's available for free on archive.org[2].

[1] [http://blog.frankdelaney.com/re-joyce/](http://blog.frankdelaney.com/re- joyce/)

[2] [https://archive.org/details/Ulysses- Audiobook](https://archive.org/details/Ulysses-Audiobook)

<comment><USER12> That's an amazing resource. I remember frank delaney from bbc radio years ago, I had no idea he was still around, looks like he's moved to america and reinvented himself. Thanks for the info.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> "bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonnerronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk" Oh the sweet sound of lightning that only Joyce could've understood. Finnegans Wake's concept is great in terms of challenging language and structure, but the unfinished result is a disaster. If anyone dedicates time to analyze FW, then they misspent years trying to understand gibberish.

<comment><USER15> I would characterize it as "an Ulysses too far." Ulysses was great, Finnegan's Wake incomprehensible.

<comment><USER11> you mean a Ulysses. Hard vowel and all that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> There is a rather fine (abridged) audio book of Finnegans Wake by Jim Norton (Bishop Brennan in Father Ted), some of which is on Youtube:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ks60VrtJ4Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ks60VrtJ4Y)

</comment><comment><USER17> Ulysses is one of, if not my absolute, favourite books. And I don't share the post's dislike of Portrait, either.

But Finnegan's Wake, yeah. Too much for me. There are moments in Ulysses that touch that, but then reign back into focus, but Wake is just beyond me.

<comment><USER18> "Portrait" is a little masterpiece. There are sentences and passages in it that make me want to stand up and applaud the genius that is Joyce.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> "Dubliners there was the unlovable A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, which starts well, charting bold, clear routes, like "Araby," through the trackless waters of childhood, then fouls its rotors in a dense kelpy snarl of cathected horniness, late-Victorian aesthetics, and the Jesuitical cleverness that, even in Ulysses, wearies the most true-hearted lover of Joyce."

Do others also find this article very hard to read? (Esp sentences like the one above)

<comment><USER20> I found the writing beautiful. I enjoyed the essay very much, including the sentence you quote.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> its actually the kind of novel you can generate from ai, the methods he used created a result that reminds me of neural network generated text.

</comment><comment><USER22> Nobody cares.</comment>


Does Pi contain all possible number combinations? - <AUTHOR> http://math.stackexchange.com/questions/216343/does-pi-contain-all-possible-number-combinations

<comment><USER2> A quote: "Converted into ASCII text, somewhere in that infinite string if digits is the name of every person you will ever love, the date, time and manner of your death, and the answers to all the great questions of the universe. ... Is this true? Does it make absolutely any sense?"

Umm, we just had this discussion yesterday:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4672601>

And the answer is that it depends on whether Pi is normal (in the mathematical sense), which is not known. If Pi is normal, then yes, it's true. But (as explained in the earlier discussion), the problem is not the question of the existence of every imaginable text within Pi, the problem is locating it.

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

A quote: "In mathematics, a normal number is a real number whose infinite sequence of digits in every base b is distributed uniformly in the sense that each of the b digit values has the same natural density 1/b, also all possible b^2 pairs of digits are equally likely with density b^−2, all b^3 triplets of digits equally likely with density b^−3, etc."

"While a general proof can be given that almost all numbers are normal (in the sense that the set of exceptions has Lebesgue measure zero), this proof is not constructive and only very few specific numbers have been shown to be normal. For example, it is widely believed that the numbers √2, π, and e are normal, but a proof remains elusive."</comment>


Introducing Facebook Marketplace - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> I haven't checked it out, but it seems like a natural addition to unload textbooks. Classifieds attached to profiles and faces will do wonders, as well as having them within set networks.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I wonder if this will be able to take on the many de-centralized college classified websites. I've been expecting this to happen for a while now. What do you guys think?

<comment><USER3> i think facebook has enough leverage and coverage to dominate whichever area in the college student audience they wish. they are a nimble monster = terrifying for competitors.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Startup Idea – Income/expense smoothing for freelancers/SMBs? - <AUTHOR> We've been freelancers for a decent chunk of our lives, and have faced irregular income and resulting financial anxiety for the most part. We're now devising ways to make that income/expenses consistent and eject "stockpiling syndrome". We were hoping for some feedback from the freelance/SMB community about this, would this be of interest?
Eternally grateful for your responses, stay safe! <comment><USER2> If money is already an issue, why would I want to give you a cut?

I think the effort is better spent developing one's self and brand so that work comes in faster than can be handled

<comment><AUTHOR> Not sure where the impression of giving a cut is involved, there is no mention of that in the description?

Re your point, developing ones brand does not discount the possibility of falling into a blind spot anyway, it is one of the side effects of a sporadic cashflow lifestyle.</comment></comment>