How to Teach a Child to Argue - <AUTHOR> http://inpraiseofargument.squarespace.com/teach-a-kid-to-argue/

<comment><USER2> There was significant discussion when this was submitted four years ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=632518](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=632518)

It includes both unalloyed praise and contemptuous criticism - interesting to see the subject debated.</comment>


Npm registry in a box - <AUTHOR> http://yahooeng.tumblr.com/post/118110129916/registry-in-a-box

<comment><AUTHOR> Yahoo has a lot of projects on GitHub: [https://github.com/yahoo](https://github.com/yahoo) They're fairly active and I find many of the projects quite interesting.

</comment><comment><USER2> Why clone the entire npm registry as opposed to a small relevant subset?</comment>


Booked: When Slaveholders Controlled the Government - <AUTHOR> https://www.dissentmagazine.org/blog/booked-slaveholders-controlled-government-matthew-karp <comment><USER2> Watch 13th on Netflix, slavery is still here in the US. The Constitution legalizes it for people convicted of crimes and there is a big business built around it.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/13th_(film)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/13th_\(film\))

<comment><USER3> I consider this one of the biggest problems facing the US presently.

It has deep connections to the war on drugs, to institutionalized racism, and a number of other darker areas we have a hard time talking about.

Thank you for pointing it out.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This, especially the end, reminded me of:

[https://www.thenation.com/article/new- abolitionism/](https://www.thenation.com/article/new-abolitionism/)

Which draws a parallel between the enormous wealth tied up in slaves at the time of abolition and the immense investment in oil and gas reserves that can never be burnt if climate change goals are to be met.

<comment><USER5> This why we need to buy out the oil and gas owners. Anything else is just a heist.

<comment><USER6> Would you have compensated the slave drivers for their slaves?

<comment><USER5> Yes I would have. Much better than killing half a million people in a pointless civil war.

Actually the English bought out the slave owners in the West Indies when they outlawed slavery and it worked fine [1].

1\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_Abolition_Act_1833](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_Abolition_Act_1833)

<comment><USER6> So not only would you have let men walk off scot-free after being slavedrivers, you would have rewarded them with cash. But I bet you care about precedents and incentives right?

<comment><USER5> If it freed the slaves without bloodshed then yes. The English approach was much better than the American approach.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Unfortunately this was the status quo of the time all over the world until the things started to change slowly. It took almost one century to settle most of this issue around the world, maybe even longer and is still not completely settled or even solved.

When I look back to this time I feel so ashamed (full disclosure: I am not an American), even though some of my predecessors went through a similar hardship.

Unfortunately the value of human life has again started to devaluate. If you print money without backing it up with some real value you will get inflation. Unfortunately if you increase the size of human population the same thing starts to happen from some threshold from where there just are no resources to provide the expected "riches" for every human being.

Then what ever we do will make someone to suffer. Our only hope is then to expand.

</comment><comment><USER8> I think there's a nonzero chance that slavery reemerges in a different form in the next century. We're not that far from it now.

Imagine this: you are offered an LEC (Lifetime Employment Contract) with some property owner. The contract states that you are to give the holder of the LEC 8 hours a day of your labor, and that's it. Beatings and other forms of physical punishment are illegal. In return, you get guaranteed room and board, education for you and your kids, free medical care, _for life_ , even into retirement. And in exchange for that contract, they will give you 500,000 dollars. And hey, you can always work extra hours and buy your contract back, right? Of course, if you learn new skills, your contract will become more valuable, so harder to buy back.. but if your contract is bought for more money, then your new contract holder will likely put you up in a nicer residence anyway. Would you make that deal? Or the real question is- if you offered that deal to that lady working at the local supermarket checkout counter, would she take that deal? Of course she would. Slavery is evil and soul-crushing even if it could be stripped of its racial and more brutal elements. But how different is the life of my hypothetical contractual slave from the life of the average low wage worker today? If anything, I'd say they are treated worse now than they would be under slavery. I mean, how free are we really? It seems that the situation described in the article where slaveholders run the government is not too different from our situation today, and I'd argue that people with a lot of power think like slaveholders too.

<comment><USER9> A lot of people hold the misconception that slavery is simply a system of working without pay. In some times and in some places, possibly that is true. But that's not how it worked in America. We're pretty far from slavery in America now.

There are so many obvious differences, but let's start with the foundation. A slave is not a person and therefore has no more legal rights than my armchair or my goldfish. A slave is personal property, livestock. Being able to enter (and breach) contracts is something people can freely choose to do.

The holder of an LEC would have obligations and limits specified in advance. Beatings: illegal. Room and board must meet certain standards. Any deviation and the LEC laborer can sue for breach. Slaves are livestock and can be treated in the manner of the worst factory farms, subject to the owner's whims. The slaveowner cannot breach a contract with livestock. The very idea is absurd.

> you can always work extra hours and buy your contract back, right?

Say what? No, slaves can't buy anything. Livestock doesn't get to possess anything.

> But how different is the life of my hypothetical contractual slave from the > life of the average low wage worker today?

Let's go back to the livestock example. The offspring of livestock are livestock, and under law are also owned by the owner of the parent stock. There is no analogue to this in the world of people with any rights under the law. People can have hopes and dreams for their children; human livestock knows their offspring will suffer as they have, if they are even allowed to meet them before they are sold.

We're pretty far from slavery.

(Yes, there are real slaves even now, but it looks like the OP is referring to poor people and not actual modern slaves.)

<comment><USER10> " A slave is not a person and therefore has no more legal rights than my armchair or my goldfish."

"No, slaves can't buy anything. "

Your mistake is in assuming that "slavery" is a monolithic phenomenon, with identical details across all of history. It wasn't.

For instance, Roman slaves could own property and earn their own money in their free time, and could in fact buy themselves free. It didn't happen _often_ , but it wasn't impossible. The rights of Roman slaves increased even more during the later periods of Roman history.

Similarly, during the period when Europeans were being enslaved into North Africa by the Barbary corsairs, some freed themselves by converting to Islam (it being technically disallowed to enslave a Muslim).

<comment><USER9> The linked article, and my comments, are about American slavery. (Since we're being pedantic: it's about slavery in the United States of America, and may not apply over the entire American continents.)

<comment><USER10> Actually, no, you were responding to a post about a hypothetical future "Lifetime Employment Contract", not about historical American slavery.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Thanks for the suggestion, I picked it up on Kindle and will give it a go over the weekend. Granted I'm not sure if I can handle too many more Marxist views of the Antebellum South --especially if they are name dropping Hofstadter.

</comment><comment><USER12> Rants like these are of little meaning as long as the people who insist the government is run by slaveholders keep voting for politicians who want to give the government more power. Put your ballot where your mouth is, guys.

<comment><USER13> "More power" is naive, all politicians get into the game to exercise power. Small government politics is never about reducing the power of the parts of government you like.

<comment><USER14> Decentralization of power is not about reducing the power of government, it's about bringing power closer to the governed and reducing the ability of people to misapply the power that there is. Your offhand dismissal shows you aren't looking at the problem from the same perspective.

<comment><USER15> I'm very much in favor of the concept of keeping government as local as possible/practical, but it's possible that the poster wasn't dismissing the idea, rather how the principle tends to be applied in practice. I frequently see politicians misusing arguments in favor of decentralization as a roundabout way to get rid of some piece of federal legislation they don't like, because then they aren't obligated to argue in favor of the thing the legislation banned. Example: rejecting the abolition of slavery using the argument that such an abolition would have been federal overreach. The person fighting against abolition no longer has to argue in favor of slavery; rather they're claiming to fight in favor of states' rights, which is a much more comfortable argument for them to have. Likewise for Dixiecrats during the Jim Crow days.

I fear that the decentralization argument has been misused in this way so many times that invoking it makes people assume it's an intellectually dishonest, roundabout argument that is selectively promoting states' rights in an attempt to accomplish some other, much more nefarious goal. This is really unfortunate, as I am a big believer in minimizing the role of the federal government wherever it's feasible and practical to do so.

<comment><USER13> History describes many examples of completely localized power, and these days good examples can be viewed through the lens of legality for prosecutorial misconduct.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Startup redux.  How I created a new market. - <AUTHOR>

Back in 2000 I left the public sector (where I did computer security for a prominent government agency) and I went out on my own.  It was a scary time.  I started as an assistant for the #5 real estate agent in my area and then later was on my own.  In the middle of it all, I realized the software we had to look up homes was downloading all the current homes-for-sale data in a DB form that I could publish on the web.  So I set up my own website and it boosted my sales by quite a bit.  I even built in the ability for customers to program their "wants" and it would then email them when homes came on the market matching their criteria.  Thus was born the Alaska Home Search Network.  Since then, the MLS folks have created an API so others can do the same.  At my peak I was making about $30K per year simply keeping my little eMachines server running in my garage with about 100 websites on it.
There were one or two competitors, and one of them was heavily funded by a prominent real estate company.  But competition is no big deal if your product is what the customers want, so I was able to trash them in the marketplace.  I charged $50/month for the service.
So now, I am about to do the same in another market.  Something nobody has done yet.  Yeah, there are one or two dabbling with he same idea, but competition simply gives us the tools to improve our own product.
The reason I posted this is to assure folks that it is highly possible to create entirely new markets.  It is also possible to charge recurring fees for the service you provide.
I am an oddity in that I have never had a failed product launch.  (granted I've only done three serious products)  The key is research.
Look at the elements of a business plan.  The idea, the analysis of the possible market, detailing possible competitors, and the bottom line for the ROI.  Some due diligence up front is the most important factor.
Have fun developing your own companies!  And remember:  the US economy is dependent on SMBs (small and Medium Businesses) - we generate more than 80% of the overall GDP. <comment><USER2> Hey one010101, firstly, let me say that I love your story.

I am doing a podcast about various ideas/projects/stuff that HN members are working on.

Interested in being on one of the episodes? Even though I know you probably don't want to talk about what you are currently working on, I think the community would love to hear more about your story.

I put up the first episode and am pivoting based on the feedback I got from the HN community: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1379942>

If you are interested, email me: marc {at} ideatin {dot} com

Thanks.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for your kind words. Yes! That sounds fun. You'll get an email from me soon. btw, I am happy to talk about anything I am currently working on, with one single exception (because it is the first worldwide). Competition is a good thing, and we learn from each other. I'm a very agile developer and am not the slightest bit concerned about talking about what I'm doing. If I do it might bring new customers. And in the final analysis, there is very little we can do that is ground-breaking in concept. It is the execution that distinguishes companies. For example, honesty and prompt payment appear to be in short supply. So even if we're in a highly competitive market we can always rise above the middle of the bell curve.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Just a note: You may want to reformat your post and make it easier to read. Thanks

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point. Maybe you can see by the
 tags that HN removed the formatting I attempted. I agree it would look better if they had retained my intended presentation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> How do you find market opportunities, other than by merely stumbling through them in the course of your own life (e.g. "I used to do X and found out that Y sucked so I set out to build a better Y") As a developer, the number of domains (X) I've worked in are small, so I find it difficult to look for opportunities in non-development domains.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't have a general answer, but in my case it really does come from life experience. Let me give you an example, using one of my current projects. I met two friends (about a month ago) for a brewski. Turns out they are golfers. We went to Harding driving range and Lincoln golf course. When we were on the 2nd hole at Lincoln it occurred to me that there are people who would probably like a photo survey of the local golf courses. We have roughly 15,000,000 visitors a year here. So now I'm building an iPhone app that will help tourists plan their golfing forays.

I see opportunities everywhere I look. And so far, I have not had a failure. Not all ideas are reachable, but there are always many that require no investment other than my time and energy. (and always remember: Time is non- renewable. Budget your time very carefully so it is profitable)

I think the most valuable lesson I've learned is that being successful in business is not based on how much money you have. It is much more based on how you allocate your resources. Time is the most important one, because it is non-renewable.

I wish you great success in the future!</comment></comment>


Sources: Cyanogen Inc. is undergoing major layoffs, may "pivot" to apps - <AUTHOR> http://www.androidpolice.com/2016/07/22/sources-cyanogen-inc-is-undergoing-major-layoffs-may-pivot-to-apps/ <comment><USER2> It's unbelievable that they were not able to capitalize on all those Android devices that are still running very old versions of Android. Given that Google and the device manufacturers basically disowned those devices, I was expecting (or rather hoping) that someone will fill in that gap/need. I guess its more complicated than it seems, but I do wonder how.

<comment><USER3> Have you tried rooting and re-imaging an android phone with a custom rom? I'm an experienced software engineer and it took me a painful while to make it happen. I supposed they could make it easier, but the amount of effort that would go into maintaining install kits for every phone out there would be crazy.

<comment><USER4> I agree it's a pain - I've installed Cyanogenmod on a few Nexus devices (which are supposed to be the easiest ones) and it wasn't simple.

However is it intrinsically hard? Could you imagine a software tool you would run which would ask a few questions, automate as much as possible over the OTG port, and guide the user for the rest?

That's the kind of tool Cyanogen Inc could write. Of course monetizing it is another thing.

<comment><USER5> I wrote something a while back that did this as a proof of concept/learning exercise... but it never took off:

[http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2391493](http://forum.xda- developers.com/showthread.php?t=2391493)

<comment><USER6> Hey tire!

I've been wanting to do something like that for a long time, get away from the recoveries and politics of the different factions. Make something a user can just pick up an old device, run an install process, and have a fast new OS.

Google of course doesn't make it easy, mostly due to carrier and manufacturer demands. But also due to the lack of a defined ABI between the user interactive parts and the libraries for talking to hardware.

There's really no reason an operating environment couldn't be compiled for ARM and run on the majority of devices if this specification was enforced. I'm looking to gonk and a new Google initiative as a possible solution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Layoffs reportedly came after a long executive retreat for the company's > leaders and were conducted with no advanced notice. Employees who were not > let go were told not to show up to work today. Those who did show up were > the unlucky ones: they had generic human resources meetings rather ominously > added to their calendars last night. So, everyone who arrived at Cyanogen > Inc. in Seattle this morning did so to lose their job (aside from those > conducting the layoffs). That's a bit grim.

It's like startups are looking to one-up each other in terms of "crappy ways to treat employees you're letting go."

<comment><USER8> Wow - if this really is true, I am so happy to be living in a country with at least basic employee protection.

<comment><USER9> I am too but I'm not sure a drawn out layoff process benefits anyone. When looking from either side of the table, I think I'd prefer short, sharp and with good severance.

<comment><USER10> I disagree. I once worked for a services company that basically had a "6 month notice" policy, meaning if they let someone know July 23th 2016, he still has a job until January 31 2017. This gives people the opportunity to start looking for work elsewhere, without even having to reveal that they "got fired". And it's just not as much of a psychological shock for the employees. Plus, if the firing was not performance related, but due to the company not being hired for enough projects, this was something that could change after 4+ months if the company had a lucky streak, and it sometimes did happen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Personally I will not buy a phone that does not support CynagonMod (or visa- versa). Not sure on the long-term impact of this. Yes and I would gladly pay to get Cyanogen on my phone (with root, but they don't so I had to replace it with CynagonMod).

<comment><USER12> As someone who's dealt with this for years and years, let me tell you CyanogenMod is crap.

1) They don't actually support any devices. All devices, except the ones they sell (like that Chinese one they struggled for over one year to release, the OnePlus) are community supported.

2) Their own stuff (everything they put on top of AOSP) is of a very very bad quality, code-wise and UX-wise.

3) They are highly irresponsible. They have a Jira bug tracker with triagers that don't know anything about coding or Android at all. They have a Gerrit code review system where they antagonise all external contributors, nitpicking on everything, while Cyanogen, Inc. employees push everything they want into the tree without any code review, breaking stuff in the process (something that happens very often).

<comment><USER11> Ouch, well I'm new to android, feel free to recommend any other android OS that doesn't depend on the manufacturer to update them. (A lot don't do this).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> There seems to be a large amount of confusion in this thread about what Cyanogen Inc is and what CyanogenMod (open-source project) is...

Here is a good article: [http://www.xda-developers.com/corporate-explained- whos-cyano...](http://www.xda-developers.com/corporate-explained-whos- cyanogen-whats-cyanogen-os/)

</comment><comment><USER14> How is this news related to the "Cyanogen launches the 'Mod' platform with lots of Microsoft integration"? Is it a consequence of the mentioned strategic partnership? [http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/02/cyanogen-launches- the...](http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/02/cyanogen-launches-the-mod- platform-with-lots-of-microsoft-integration/)

</comment><comment><USER15> Cyanogen had a great team and a very promising business model . Where they screwed up badly is relationships and partnerships with OEMs and vendors.

The massive fiasco with Oneplus (which by the way is going strong) or the short-lived partnership with Micromax-Yu which was terminated for reasons unknown. I think they got greedy too fast without building loyal customers. At some level they believed that customers would have no real choice for older devices .

What instead happened was that Xiaomi and Oneplus completely destroyed incentives to hold on to older phones for any reasonable amount of time. And Cyanogen had already burned those bridges.

I am willing to bet CM will either build their own phone (the cyanogen "Nexus") or get acquired by Google or someone - who anyway are looking for some kind of replacement for the Android One/Silver program.

I bet all those who are being let go are partner services.

</comment><comment><USER16> It's a bit late to be entering the "app" business.

<comment><USER17> I suspect they're planning 'CyanogenMod GO'.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I hope the OS team starts up as a new firm. Cyanogen absorbed many players in the ROM community and there's literally no alternative unless you want to use a Chinese ROM. No offence to Xiaomi - but their quality was lacking. And they largely relied on CMs work.

This is a massive blow to the Android ecosystem and one that would move them closer to that of iOS. AOSP doesn't stand up to proprietary Android.

Cyanogen was the best lifeline for old hardware.

<comment><USER13> Are you confusing Cyanogen (the company) with CyanogenMod (the open-source project)?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> They are an arrogant company with zero suspicion of the limits of their own knowledge. Before they started spouting off about their "We're putting a bullet through Google's head" nonsense I tried engaging with their management. About an interesting phone concept that I have / had. After they said that, it was like, what's the point. So I gave up trying to get their attention and went another route.

Long story short, I'm working with a Chinese company on my phone product. I have a prototype sitting on my desk that's been produced on a skeleton budget. It's better than anything I've seen Cyanogen ship.

If any ex-Cyanogen engineers are interested in a chat, hit up the email in my profile. :)

</comment><comment><USER20> Quite a shame really, although my main phone is an iPhone I did like how their spin of Android made it a bit easier to de-google the OS. Sorry to anyone out of a job due to this.

</comment><comment><USER21> Is this the normal sort of practice for layoffs in a startup?

<comment><USER22> Pretty much, whilst it sounds harsh there are plenty of examples of worse layoffs.

Working for a bigger company means you are less in control of your destiny.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Awww crap, I'm using their android 6 ROM on my S2 and it works surprisingly well. I wonder what will happen to it.

<comment><USER13> You are very likely using CyanogenMod (an open-source project) which is _not_ a product of Cyanogen.

<comment><USER23> That's good to hear, thank you. I heard a while ago that CyanogenMod turned in a company. I mixed things up

<comment><USER13> So did I and many others... :(

I really wish they had not chose "Cyanogen" as the company name.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> What does this mean for CyanogenMod?

<comment><USER25> Nothing.

<comment><USER13> Some Cyanogen devs did/do contribute to CyanogenMod, so I would expect _some_ impact to CyanogenMod.</comment></comment></comment>