I'm Paul Graham - <AUTHOR> http://www.southwaterfront.com/art_and_design/portland-actors-conservatory-i-am-paul-graham/ Wow, see you in Portland Paul...
An invitation from Paul Graham: I'm Paul Graham.  I made it rich several years ago selling a company to Yahoo!  I now spend my days thinking about problems, and publishing solutions to those problems.  I have been on stage many times but I have never been portrayed by an actor on stage.  At first, I had reservations, but I was pleased to find that an attractive, strapping man has been cast for my role.  So come on November 11th to hear him, oh..ah me, give a lecture on constructive disagreement requiring the evacuation of the theatre and cake for all.
Stay for the Cake is an all-original work written, directed, designed and performed by The Montgomery Street Players, Portland Actors Conservatory's new alumni performance group. Each of the three slices skewer the creative process with sardonic hilarity and cake for all! PAC will present one slice of the Cake at South Waterfront: "I Am Paul Graham." We've heard it's delicious!
Portland Actors Conservatory has been providing quality stage productions to the greater Portland community for 24 years. The Conservatory gives student actors the opportunity to put acting theory into practice in weekly performance labs, public showcases and the Conservatory Season of Plays.
Shows run Friday through Sunday October 30 through November 15 <comment><USER2> Congrats PG. Reminds me of <http://www.sl4.org/archive/0707/16399.html>. Though Eliezer as a mad genius sounds more entertaining than you as a guy giving monologues.

Alternative title is _How to Have an Argument_. "A presentation from philanthropist and technologist Paul Graham on engaging in constructive disagreement results in an existential crisis, an exploration of the creative process, gratuitous accents and cake." From the director's blog: <http://boegle.blogspot.com/2009/10/stay-for-cake.html>

<comment><USER3> _Congrats PG._

Crossing the chasm from startup famous to community theater famous is always something to celebrate. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I am so confused.

<comment><USER5> Me too. This is one case where some "blogspam" commentary would have been very helpful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Is that actually endorsed by the actual Paul Graham?

<comment><USER7> Are you kidding? <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=926922>

<comment><USER8> [http://portlandactorsconservatory.blogspot.com/2009/10/25-re...](http://portlandactorsconservatory.blogspot.com/2009/10/25-reasons- to-see-stay-for-cake.html)

"10. Paul Graham doesn't know (yet) that he's being portrayed on the stage."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm almost tempted to go to Portland to see this. Is there anyone there who can see it and report back?

More: "Wrapping up the evening, a character based on philanthropist Paul Graham instructs the audience on constructive disagreement in How to Have an Argument. The existential crisis that interrupts him brings about an exploration of the creative process, gratuitous accents and cake for all." ([http://portlandactorsconservatory.blogspot.com/2009/10/stay-...](http://portlandactorsconservatory.blogspot.com/2009/10/stay- for-cake-opens-oct-30.html))

</comment><comment><USER9> Extremely weird. Of course I would jump at the opportunity for another person to play me, if only to get a better sense of what others really think of my mannerisms, speech, actions, etc...

</comment><comment><USER10> I'm not sure you can mimic pg's ability to inspire, even in a theatrical setting. That being said, I'm sure it's an enjoyable show, for those who know who he is.

<comment><USER5> Not sure why this is downmodded, as the parent has a good point. PG is definitely known for an ability to sell people their own ideas with good arguments. A person thinks, "I like programming and I program" and PG writes "Hackers and Painters" which obviously helps the original person feel good about his decision and gives him something to use to help explain his life to others. A reader of PG's essays will end up better understanding themselves because the ideas are in a context that the reader already somewhat understands.

(I think I did this for my "Why I Stick With Perl" conference talk. Instead of trying to sell Perl to people that have no liking of Perl, I tried to sell it more strongly to people that already like it a little bit. The result is a sense of well-being and a strong community.)

I was going to say, "I think this is rare", but I guess everything is like this. Fox News spins their articles to the right to make their viewers happy. The New York Times is a bit on the liberal side, which appeals to its liberal readers in a way that pure neutrality wouldn't. "A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down."?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Front page. Top of the list. Really?

(edit: oh and no, I'm not implying anything. Merely expressing my confusion)

</comment><comment><USER12> No! I'm Paul Graham and so is my wife!

<comment><USER13> (defun you-and-your-wife () (you-and-your-wife))

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Crap, I fly into Portland on the 11th, but don't arrive until just after 9pm.</comment>


Apple ID voes - <AUTHOR> http://thefrustum.com/blog/2013/8/28/apple-id-voes

<comment><USER2> My relatively nontechnical parents have no fewer than 5 AppleIDs, due to various fuckups like iCloud creating them new accounts, email changes etc.

The most annoying situation I've ran into dealing with these headaches was when the (then new iCloud) automatically enabled itself, and somehow resulted in a new account being created, and the old one getting mysteriously "masked" (it was somehow associated to the same email), and unable to be logged into (took a call to apple support to fix this). Apps associated with the different accounts cannot be updated while logged into a different account, nor music etc.

This results in them having to sign into no fewer than 3 different accounts just to update everything on their idevices.

Its a complete and utter mess, and apple support has zero ability to merge accounts, or move purchases around.

Why cant they do better.</comment>


Bringing Craigslist Back - <AUTHOR> http://blog.padmapper.com/2012/07/09/bringing-craigslist-back/ <comment><USER3> I think it's perfectly fine if you want to play games dancing around what's legal and forge ahead against Craigslist's wishes. There's a long history of that kind of behavior in information services and they may or may not be able to stop you.

But making a big deal out of being some kind of ux hero is pretty tacky. At the end of the day, no matter how small you are you're still a commercial enterprise gaining benefit at another commercial enterprise's expense. You're bidding on eyeballs with an offer of time savings.

A vast majority of the web deliberately degrades their user experience in order to achieve business goals. Ads are almost always at least somewhat distracting, retailers stretch out checkout flows for up selling, sites "recommend" their high margin items ebay requires paypal and facebook sabotages their privacy management so you're less likely to bother.

If CL was to build a bunch of sweet vertical specific apps for their sections they'd need a ton more developers, designers, testers, project managers and so on. To compensate for the greatly increased burn rate they'd need to monetize a lot better which almost always means features, content or policies that negatively impact the user. Or maybe they'd have just taken too much VC to pay for it and gone under in '02 when the bottom fell out.

So by all means jockey away it's healthy for the industry. But crowing about it is a bit like taking a shit on the guy whose shoulders you're standing on while bragging about how tall you are.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm not making a big deal about this, and I have a lot of respect for Craigslist, don't put words in my mouth. I think Craigslist is nearly perfect for the vast majority of things, I'm not on a crusade to "disrupt" them. It's just that for a long, drawn out, location-based search, it's objectively terrible, and I'm trying to patch that bug.

<comment><USER3> It would seem like the definition of respect mostly conflicts with your behavior.

       re·spect
         1. To feel or show deferential regard for; esteem.
         2. to pay proper attention to; not violate "to respect Swiss neutrality"
         3. to show consideration for; treat courteously or kindly

<comment><USER4> His behavior is not incompatible with respect, and you're being pedantic. I really wish "beating an argument to death with Merriam-Webster" wasn't as common on HN as it is.

One can respect Craigslist for their history, and what they have done for the online community in the past, without conceding the right to say that they're wrong _now_ , and that you'll be proceeding without their blessing.

One can also respect and understand Craigslist's objection to Padmapper scraping their site, without conceding that the good vastly outweighs whatever valid concerns may exist.

Respect is a complicated social concept, the colloquial usage of the word even more so. Using dictionary definitions to try and corner complex social phenomena is at best a poor idea, at worst an attempt at being disingenuous.

<comment><USER5> back in the usenet days, it was generally[0] held that the first person to reach for the dictionary had implicitly conceded the argument.

[0] at least on the newsgroups i used to frequent

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> >I've been wrestling with whether to bring back Craigslist listings in the search results. I've found a way to include them that I'm told is legally kosher since it doesn't touch their servers at all, but it still seems somewhat dickish to go against their wishes in this, and I've always had a lot of respect for what they've done for the world. Also, who wants to waste their time in court?

>But then I did some back of the envelope estimates of how much of people's time and effort it would waste if I didn't, and it became clear how much less nice it is to waste the time of millions of apartment hunters out of stubbornness or some clearly inaccurate assumption about the will of the community.

Christ, what an asshole.

Translation: "We found a loophole that lets us get around the spirit of what was communicated to us so we could continue to build out our product. I'm going to conveniently step over the moral grey lines of using someone else's data without their consent by claiming my service is better."

<comment><AUTHOR> Ouch, sorry, I thought it was the right thing to do, on the balance. Like you said, it's a really morally gray decision, either way, but I think it's actually worse to do nothing.

<comment><USER6> Dude, I have no doubt your service IS way more useful than craiglist. I look forward to using it when I next move.

Just… don't dance around your motivations here. You want to build a better service, and you need CL's data for that. CL doesn't want you to use their data. You said that's too bad.

That's all there is to say.

<comment><USER7> Is it really Craiglist's data? When I post to Craigslist, I think of the listing as my listing, not Craigslist's.

<comment><USER8> Here's a comparison. You walk into a used instrument store looking for an eight string bass. Another fellow walks in at the same time looking to sell the bass. You wink at each other and meet outside, buy that bass, and cut out the middleman.

It's his bass and your money, but the reason you knew he had a bass to sell was the store. Likewise, it's "your" listing data, but the reason padmapper is able to hire someone in the third world to read the internet and manually screen scrape the data—or whatever it is they're going to do—is because craigslist aggregated it for them.

This is very similar to the kerfuffle over allegations that Bing was scraping results from Google rather than organically indexing the web. It's quite possibly legal, but it's not particularly admirable.

And I join Phil (disclosure: He once called me a "giant," so I owe him) in suggesting that arguments that the ends justify the means are suspect.

I'd prefer to see the padmapper folks put up a pirate flag and openly declare war on craigslist. Just come right out and call them the evil empire already.

<comment><USER7> _> the reason padmapper is able to hire someone in the third world to read the internet and manually screen scrape the data—or whatever it is they're going to do—is because craigslist aggregated it for them._

Here's where the rubber meets the road. As far as I can tell, 3taps is taking data out of the Google Cache and re-aggregating it. While stealing someone's aggregation of data is clearly wrong, re-aggregating data from public sources clearly isn't, both from a legal and moral sense, at least in the US.

The material facts in each ad are public data. The fact that such an ad appeared on Craigslist with such facts is also public data.

 _> And I join Phil...in suggesting that arguments that the ends justify the means are suspect._

I'm also suspicious of ends justifying the means, but that isn't the whole story here.

 _> I'd prefer to see the padmapper folks put up a pirate flag and openly declare war on Craigslist. Just come right out and call them the evil empire already._

To me, Craigslist is the one being selfish and shortsighted here. If they back legislation seeking ownership rights over re-aggregation of data, that would be an "evil empire" move. It would be better for everyone if they subvert Padmapper instead of fighting it.

<comment><USER5> from a moral standpoint, how does scraping the google cache of craigslist differ from scraping craigslist directly? it's the same information and the google cache is clearly filling in some "infrastructure of the interwebs" role here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Cartographers, encyclopedicians, and dictionary aggregators have always included some false data as a honeypot: An alleyway might not really exist. An obscure word might have been made up. A famous person might be entirely fictitious. The goal is to catch people copying their books. If you use "original research," you'd never say that Braythwayt Street runs parallel to Rhodes Avenue in Toronto, you must have copied our map data without permission.

I'm curious as to how padmapper intendeds to solve this problem. If Craigslist seed their listings with something false, that something is entirely craigslist's copyright. It isn't a "fact." They don't have a right to reproduce it. Lawyers, please chime in.

<comment><USER9> I believe padmapper is kind of relying on 3taps to take the hit. 3taps apparently is DMCA compliant.

Long story short I'd expect 3taps to be craigslist legal target.

(though actually I guess 3taps doesn't actually _use_ the data so I'm not sure if what they're doing is technically illegal until padmapper uses it - I'm going to stop armchair lawyering now)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's not the goal, no. The point there is that neither PadMapper nor 3taps interact with their servers, so neither has to implicitly agree to their ridiculous TOU in order to summarize the listings. That's the only reason for that.

<comment><USER9> I don't believe the methodology used to collect the data actually matters does it? The question is fully around the copyright ownership of the content.

I can record TV content from an over the air broadcast and never touch a thing and still not have the right to retransmit the content.

<comment><AUTHOR> I should have made it clear in the post (I just updated it), but their complaint wasn't a copyright one, but a TOU violation one. PadMapper isn't displaying the listings themselves, it just lists #BR, #BA, Price, and a few other things, and links you to the original to read more.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Can 3taps get me the content of the NY Times website via indirect means, so I can publish it on my website? I did a back of the envelope calculation that a lot of people are losing time by having to go somewhere else to get that content, and it's pissing me off.

<comment><USER11> Only if the NY Times publishes their content in a fashion that makes it hard to read, undiscovered and freakishly difficult to use in any useful manner, and your site makes it readily discoverable and very useful.

<comment> mkr-hn As a content creator, I would prefer you bring the issues to my attention, not subvert my protections under copyright law. You don't get to do as you wish with my creations just because you don't like how they're displayed. It doesn't matter whether we're talking about the NYT or some random blog.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't understand how CL can even exercise this kind of control. I'm not a lawyer, of course, but it seems reasonable to me that apartment listings would be considered "facts", just like baseball statistics.

So then the CL terms of use are the only obstacle, but can you really be held to those if you didn't read them and weren't somehow forced/encouraged to do so? Perhaps so, but then I would find that a little scary.

Just seems like a bad situation all around, but in my mind Padmapper has the moral (though perhaps not legal, again, not a lawyer) high ground, at least relatively speaking.

<comment><USER13> Let me try. What you say is correct. The listing is "fact". And CL is not preventing posting this fact to other services. The user can post the same listing to CL, Rent.com and dozen other sites. What they are controlling is access to their servers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I can't help but think you played this poorly.

It sucks CL isn't going to let you get their data, but I really don't think this workaround is going to change anything (although kudos for the neat Google cache hack from 3taps).

I imagine your development efforts would be better spent by leveraging the small but dedicated following you clearly have. There must be ways to take advantage of it without opening yourself up to more litigation.

<comment><AUTHOR> You may be right, I'm flying by the seat of my pants here (after having talked to some lawyers). My goal isn't to supplant Craigslist, which is what you seem to be suggesting - that's far too big a task to take on, even with my sites' substantial usage, and not really something I'm personally interested in - <USER2> think that classifieds are a mostly-solved problem, with the exception of reputation and security. I think CL can get there, they seem to be hiring devs.

<comment><USER14> Yea it sucks your dealing with CL and not Facebook or you probably would have been acquired.

I say try and move the traffic to pad. It's certainly a big task, but not "far too big". Pick the region where you have the most significant traffic and start there. I haven't looked deeply into your site at all, but I know you have Garry Tans support, ask him what you need to do to get in YC. Get "Craigslist _is_ the Killer" as a headline on TechCrunch. Piggyback the Padlister browser add-on with other common downloads, then push a popup to users posting apartment listings on craigslist saying "Also list on Padmapper?" There are all sorts of things you can try.

There are hundreds of people on HN that wish they had the traffic you have. Use that momentum before it dies off. <http://siteanalytics.compete.com/padmapper.com/>

<comment><USER15> I think if you look up "network effect" in the dictionary, it's going to talk about Craigslist. Good luck overcoming that.

A great strategy here would have been to establish a strong relationship with the people at Craigslist from the beginning. No idea if that was tried or not. Seriously, was the C&D letter the first communication exchanged between Padmapper and CL? What a missed opportunity. I wonder if this entire disaster could have been averted by calling the CL guys up early on and taking them out to lunch. Make friends, send them Christmas cards, then when this disagreement comes up you handle it over a round of golf instead of a C&D letter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I think everyone should just step back and look at the big picture.

This guy is finding any means necessary to add Craiglist data back into his application and Craigslist does not want him to. I think the "gray" area is pretty black and white. Craigslist said no. He's doing it anyway - even if indirectly.

Here's how I see it:

Me: Don't go in my house.

You: But you left the back door unlocked by accident, so I thought I'd just come in and eat your food.

In the real world this would not be acceptable.

Even though we are talking apples, bananas, and oranges, the same ethical perspective should be employed. Craig said no, so we respect his wishes. It's the RIGHT thing to do. If he adds an API someday, then he's sharing the key to his house with us, until then. Doors are locked, too bad, move on.

<comment><USER17> I think you need to take one more step back. Craigslist doesn't own the listing data on their site. They even say so and for a VERY important reason.

If they own the listing data, they're responsible for it's content. So, in some cases, they'd be responsible for selling sex, drugs, and stolen property. Not to mention responsible for a murder or two.

As soon as they claim they own the user generated content, they'll be opening themselves to thousands of lawsuits for their complicity in thousands of illegal acts.

Reference: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230_of_the_Communicatio...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230_of_the_Communications_Decency_Act)

<comment><USER16> I'm not talking about who owns information.

My point is that company A is asking company B not to use the content that was submitted directly to company A's site on company B's site.

Company B is finding a round-about way to do it anyway.

In my opinion, this is the wrong thing to do. They should respect the wishes of company A and just not do it because they were told/asked not to.

I believe that just because you "can" doesn't always mean you "should".

<comment><USER18> So? Microsoft, Autodesk, Dell, EA, etc. would prefer you not be able to sell used copies of software or hardware. As long as it's legal, what's wrong with doing so?

I agree that legal is not equivalent to right, but in this case, I don't see the moral argument against this. Everyone benefits from this; the overall benefit to society is positive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The founder of 3Taps posted this on Quora last year, in response to a question about disrupting Craigslist:

 _... the postings in question are public facts about exchanges. Just as any price/supply/demand in a marketplace is open for any and all to notate and republish, so too is the entire set of Craigslist data -- as these offers between seekers and providers are clearly in the public domain. Historically, Craigslist has attempted to block access by others to the comprehensive use of this data. They block many 3rd parties who try to gain access to the data, and sometimes threaten to sue and bankrupt others as if they themselves created the underlying data and hold copyright like property rights over the same.

But public facts are public property. And while some think that predatory Terms of Use demanding that you hand over the Brooklyn Bridge in liquidated damages if you don't comply with some obscure (and potentially constitutionally void) constraint will stand in court -- such absurdities will break if exposed.

A fear, uncertainty,dread approach over access to data breaks down in a world where Google already indexes all of Craigslist data and caches that information all over the internet (for search performance results). If its possible and legal for Google, then why not for any and everyone else to also index and offer access to the same data. In short, Google doesn't get special secondary property rights to privatize public data to the exclusion of anyone else. Equal access to exchange data and search data is a principle in parallel to the notions of net neutrality.

The points above are not a theoretical discourse. Look at 3taps.com/developers to see the execution of this concept. And look at what a 3rd party application (craiggers.com) can do in recreating the whole of Craigslist in a format that gives access to data in a way that is not remotely possible in the legacy Craigslist offering. Craiggers is a perfect example that the function of displaying Craigslist data (rather than gathering it) is a totally distinct (and competitive) marketplace, even if there are still huge network effects in the gathering of Craigslist postings.

Note, Craiggers does NOT disrupt the existing Craigslist revenue model for Craigslist. It simply opens up the field (along with any other developer building on 3taps assisted access to Craigslist data) that wants to build on top of (rather than compete with) the network effects of Craigslist. Think Kayak and Indeed, but now for the whole body of data covered by Craigslist accessible, rather than just a single vertical._

[http://www.quora.com/Craigslist/Why-hasnt-another-product- di...](http://www.quora.com/Craigslist/Why-hasnt-another-product-disrupted- and-replaced-Craigslist/answer/Greg-Kidd)

<comment><USER20> His post is chock full of BS:

> If its possible and legal for Google, then why not for any and everyone else > to also index and offer access to the same data.

Because Craigslist isn't suing Google. If they didn't want Google indexing their stuff, Google would comply.

> Google doesn't get special secondary property rights to privatize public > data to the exclusion of anyone else.

They can and _do_. That's why it's beneficial to set your user agent to Google Bot when browsing news sites.

> Equal access to exchange data and search data is a principle in parallel to > the notions of net neutrality.

Full of shit. It takes effort to provide the service that Craigslist does. Claiming that you have a right to that data is wrong, and moreover has already been decided by case law (you can find links in other comments on this page).

> And look at what a 3rd party application (craiggers.com) can do in > recreating the whole of Craigslist in a format that gives access to data in > a way that is not remotely possible in the legacy Craigslist offering.

There is a reason Craigslist doesn't make that data available - it would reduce the utility for sellers of their website, reducing their revenue and potentially drying up their business. Trying to squeeze it out of Google's cache is still copyright infringement.

> Note, Craiggers does NOT disrupt the existing Craigslist revenue model for > Craigslist.

Yes, it does. By scraping craigslist in an attempt to undermine their platform you are eliminating their site's relatively utility for buyers, which eliminates the impetus for sellers to list there.

<comment><USER21> All of your points rely upon the assumption that Craisglist "owns" all of the posts submitted. I'm not saying that's right or wrong, but if that is true then wouldn't that extend to Facebook owning all content submitted to their service, Twitter owning all tweets, Flickr owning all hosted photos, and Stack Overflow owning all submitted answers?

<comment><USER20> Craigslists owns the unique compilation of their listings. That's what is at stake here.

<comment><USER22> And there's no copyright infringement as long as your compilation, based on their publicly available data, is also unique, which PadMapper's is. This has lots of precedents dating back to services derived from phonebooks.

<comment><USER23> I am interested in this. Can you point me to one or more of these precedents? Thanks in advance.

<comment><USER22> [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_Publications_v._Rural_Tel...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_Publications_v._Rural_Telephone_Service)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> It's funny how many people are demanding that Craigslist sell out its user- generated content. I understand why people want this, but isn't CL being incredibly respectful of its users by allowing their data to be used only for the specific purpose for which it was posted and that's it?

<comment><USER25> I don't think so.

Users are on Craigslist to buy/sell, because it's the biggest place for that. If you post to CL, virtually everyone wants the largest audience possible, so 99.9% of people will be thrilled to have their post copied to other services.

The only annoying thing would be if you take down your post from CL after you've bought/sold your thing, and you continue to get calls/emails from people getting it via copied data. But sites that copy just need to stay up- to-date on whether postings are still up or not...

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> As someone apartment hunting in NYC I appreciate this. If I wasn't my feelings would be pretty mixed.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, I went back and forth on it quite a lot. That said, the law protects this sort of thing (facts can't be copyrighted, and that's all PadMapper is showing from CL), and it seems like a pretty large net loss for the world if this isn't continued. But I'm obviously biased.

<comment><USER27> Facts can't be copyrighted. But how is an advertisement a "fact"? Can I create a website of all the Coca-cola advertisements over the years, and call them facts?

Ads aren't facts. You're still intentionally copying the CL website without the right to do that. Good luck to you.

Edited: Not trying to start a "copyright isn't theft" debate.

<comment><USER28> Copying is not stealing! Christ, the music and movie industries have really fucked up the meaning of that word in recent years.

<comment><USER29> Craigslist's #1 asset is their gigantic amount of classifieds. There's really nothing else going for them.

Any service competing with Craigslist that uses those classifieds might not be _stealing_ them, but its certainly in Craigslist's best interest to keep their most valuable asset safe.

<comment><USER28> I'm still technically correct, which is the best kind of correct.

<comment><USER29> I wasn't saying you were incorrect, mainly because I'm not nearly well-versed in law enough to define 'stealing' in such a nuanced context.

I'm simply saying that Craigslist has a vested interest in keeping their data/facts/ads/whatever on their platform.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I have a feeling there will be another C+D soon, but since I'm looking for an apartment at this moment, great.

I am annoyed that CL hasn't uttered a single peep about all this. They killed a great app, and didn't even respond to the outcry. A simple 'we don't want to support competitors' would have sufficed, but their silence damns them.

<comment><USER31> Padmapper already received a C&D... IANAL, but i think a lawsuit may be the next step.

<comment><USER32> If the circumstances have changed, the appropriate course of action would be a further cease & desist. This would allow Padmapper the opportunity to desist from their activity which is always the right course of action before instituting proceedings.

<comment><USER31> The C&D mentions not just accessing CL content, but republishing it. That the content was transmitted through third parties is irrelevant for this copyright claim.

<comment><USER32> It may be irrelevant, however you will get penalised on costs (at least in the UK) if you do not attempt to resolve the dispute prior to issuance of proceedings.

I personally wouldn't want to risk the ire of a judge in issuing proceedings when at least on the face of it, PM complied with at least part of the initial cease & desist sent by CL.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Can someone explain to me how this works legally? It seems a bit too convenient that you can ignore someone's T&Cs and use an unlicensed third- party service instead.

<comment><USER34> From what I gather, the Craigslist T&Cs specifically forbid scraping data off their website. They explicitly call out the fact that they do not own the actual data/listings/facts on their website, so those are public domain (or possibly owned by the person who created the listing, who knows). By scraping the data from Google's cache, you're no longer in violation of the T&Cs because you're not scraping from Craigslist's website anymore. You are free to use the data obtained in this method because Craigslist doesn't own the data. (IANAL)

<comment><USER35> What about breaking Google's TOS by using a bot to scrap data from them?

<comment><USER34> Do they really have a rule against scraping their scraped data? If so, you'd be in violation of that, but that's your problem with Google now, not Craigslist.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> For all the people mis-interpreting CL's TOUs: "You automatically grant and assign to CL, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant and assign to CL, a perpetual, irrevocable, unlimited, fully paid, fully sub- licensable (through multiple tiers), worldwide license to copy, perform, display, distribute, prepare derivative works from (including, without limitation, incorporating into other works) and otherwise use any content that you post. You also expressly grant and assign to CL all rights and causes of action to prohibit and enforce against any unauthorized copying, performance, display, distribution, use or exploitation of, or creation of derivative works from, any content that you post (including but not limited to any unauthorized downloading, extraction, harvesting, collection or aggregation of content that you post)."

</comment><comment><USER32> There's obviously a big fat indemnity clause in 3Taps' terms which means you're on the hook for claims made by third parties against 3Taps for loss arising as a result of the usage of the service.

Having said that if CL provides access to 3Taps on terms which allow third parties to take data from 3Taps, then this may be permissible. It of course depends on the terms of 3Taps' access though (I admit to not being completely familiar with the ins and outs of 3Taps' service though).

The problem of course is that CL have already shown a dislike of Padmapper's methods and as a result this workaround is unlikely to meet with CL's approval. Common sense would suffice to tell you that.

Having said that, it's a real shame CL aren't open to discussions over licensing data (maybe they are of course but the price is too high).

<comment><AUTHOR> Nah, they weren't open to discussing any sort of deal involving the website (they were willing to license data for the mobile app).

<comment><USER7> Why didn't you go that route? There are so many phones and tablets out there now, you'd have accomplished almost as much public good with far less controversy.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good question. Basically, it's not really the best way for people to browse this kind of stuff, and there are still lots of people without phones/tablets. You can get a much better picture of things with PM maximized on a 20" screen than you can with a 4" one. The phone is more of a backup for when you're on the road or in a pinch.

<comment><USER7> _The phone is more of a backup for when you're on the road or in a pinch._

My girlfriend is looking for an apartment in Houston, and sometimes browses Craiglist with her iPad.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, the iPad is a pretty good substitute for those that have one (and I'm happier with the PadMapper iPad app than with the phone apps).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Bold move. Curious if CL's next step will be to add noarchive tags to prevent google cache content from being crawled.

<comment><USER38> I can't see why they wouldn't do that. It's not like the Google cache offers much utility for Craigslist posts to begin with.

Anyway, it doesn't seem right for Padmapper to be doing this, but for god's sake, could people browsing the primary source for residential ads please have a way of doing that with a map?! That's really all anyone is asking for here. Sheesh.

<comment><USER39> > _I can't see why they wouldn't do that. It's not like the Google cache > offers much utility for Craigslist posts to begin with._

Then there's no harm in their putting the tags in.

<comment><USER38> Uh, okay?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I appreciate that Eric is doing this in the open. The moral argument could go either way, but he is letting everyone know what he is doing and why. He deserves credit for inviting feedback on it. Personally, I hope padmapper does well.

</comment><comment><USER41> I see some very interesting comments on this thread. I remember not long ago lots of people where upset that people where scraping stackoverflow and getting a higher ranking in google results. This was a threat to S/O's business model model and it made lots of people on this board uneasy.

How is Pad mapper any different? How does the fact that this site has a better UI design somehow give them a pass to use data a company has spent millions of dollars gathering and feels is being used in a way that is a threat to their business model?

<comment><USER42> Spent millions gathering? Two basic problems with that mindset. First, spending money to assemble a database of public facts does not magically give you a right to protect your investment in an uncopyrightable asset. Second, I don't know what millions you are talking about since craiglist's only asset is the users, and the users are just a result of tremendous network effects. They had a great idea and got very lucky, but gathering their massive userbase had nothing to do with spending money.

<comment><USER42> Could someone explain what they disagree with? Do you disagree that databases of public facts are not copyrightable? With the idea that craigslist's investment in their system is irrelevant compared to the value of their userbase? With the idea that craigslist's main success is just being lucky?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> The last few places I've acquired we're through padmapper aggregation of CL posts, so when PM got the C&D, I felt compelled to email CraigsList asking them to implement a fee-based API as it would be a win-win-win for everyone involved. Sadly, no reply.

</comment><comment><USER7> After reading the post and discussion, my conclusion is that Craigslist is making a policy mistake.

They should make the same calculation of public good that ericd made and license 3rd party websites that add value to Craigslist, provided the 3rd parties do not harm the Craigslist infrastructure or business models. Doing otherwise is just holding up progress, and is a losing game in the long run. Facilitating value to users would be a win for them, as it was in the past.

<comment><USER20> Creating a site where buyers can browse property listings does harm the Craigslist business model. To say otherwise expresses a lack of understanding of online ecosystems.

<comment><USER7> As far as I can tell, they aren't posting the full listing. They are only aggregating the material facts about the listing. As far as I can tell, short of actually hoofing it to the place, you still have to get on Craigslist to make contact with the landlord.

<comment><USER44> What Craigslist is afraid of (probably) is Padmapper becoming the first place most people turn to when looking for an apartment. Once that happens, Padmapper can cut Craigslist out of the loop by inviting landlords to make Padmapper listings instead of Craigslist listings. (Note that once Padmapper become to "go to" place for apartment hunters, Padmapper's refusing to continue to host or "index" Craigslist listings _helps_ towards that goal.)

Regardless the morality or legality of Padmapper's latest action, it is pretty clear to those of us who have spent a lot of time observing online ecosystems and software ecosystems that Padmapper's latest action is _not in the interests of Craigslist_ since (even if Craigslist is not out to make money, but rather out to influence the world for the better) the only important source of Craigslist's potential for making money and of Craigslist's influence is Craigslist's being the first place people turn to when apartment hunting and doing other important things.

That is why Craigslist is against Padmapper's latest action even if Padmapper never posts the full Craigslist listing.

<comment><USER7> And in that, Craigslist is clearly acting in its own interests contrary to the interests of its users.

<comment><USER29> Contrary to the interests of Padmapper users (some of whom are also Craigslist users.)

The vast majority of Craigslist users don't want to use anything else, nor are aware of anything else.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Eric's confusing method with goal.

Craigslist's past _method_ was to claim TOU violation on the part of PadMapper, denying PM ready use of its content.

Its _goal_ is to maintain market position as _the_ dominant classifieds listing service. TOU is just one way for CL to enforce its market position, and as a commercial entity, it's very likely it will continue to do so.

There's very little reason CL couldn't create an alternate legal claim based on content (the cartographic watermarking example comes to mind) to make multiple infringement claims against PM, which would invoke a whole host of copyright remedies ranging from injunctions and monetary damages to DMCA takedown notices (which could comprise the entire service depending on how construed by PM's hosting provider(s)). There's also the notion of a compilation copyright, in which a collection of CL postings could have standing. While Feist v. Rural Electric holds that a simple compilation of facts doesn't meet the minimal authorship requirements of copyright, a compilation of _postings_ with some level of curation to CL might. I'm not aware of relevant caselaw here.

My own suggestion would be that PM pursue a dual strategy of coming to a business agreement with CL (PM's interface _is_ vastly superior) while curating its own set of rental listings independently (CL is ripe for disruption here).

Disclaimer: I'm a long-time CL user and fan of much of its philosophy. I'm also a recent fan of PM. I hope the two will either work something out cooperatively, or manage to improve apartment and classifieds search by competitive means. I don't particularly care which.

</comment><comment><USER46> Thank you for doing this. My only problem with it is that you're rewarding craigslist for being obnoxious tools, but ultimately it's better for the users, so that's an acceptable sacrifice.

3taps is pretty awesome. I wish they'd do an AMA or something.

</comment><comment><USER29> As a satisfied padmapper user, I'm glad to see this, but somewhat troubled at the same time.

The original hubbub about Craigslist pulling padmapper's access, regardless of your stance on Craigslist's actions, was to me a cautionary tale about building apps around external APIs. (See the Twitter drama of the past weeks.)

What happens next if Craigslist does the same thing to 3taps?

</comment><comment><USER47> So does 3taps gather data with humans or what?

<comment><USER48> "Any copying, aggregation, display, distribution, performance or derivative use of craigslist or any content posted on craigslist whether done directly or through intermediaries (including but not limited to by means of spiders, robots, crawlers, scrapers, framing, iframes or RSS feeds) is prohibited"

I think this covers Google cache or any other method of gathering data. You're still in violation of their Terms of Use even if you find a clever means of getting around it.

<comment><USER49> Simply because it exists in the ToS doesn't mean it is legally enforceable. Hopefully the "legally kosher" claim means he had a lawyer look over everything, and conclude that clause in the ToS is for the courts to decide.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> I posted a look at the legal issues on Google+ here: [https://plus.google.com/112961607570158342254/posts/HcCuHVG7...](https://plus.google.com/112961607570158342254/posts/HcCuHVG7rLM)

Here's an excerpt from the post: Eric's blog post today says that "using 3taps just makes it so it's not a TOU issue." The problem is it doesn't. Craigslist's lawyers already thought of this, which is why the TOU also prohibits the "display" and "derivative use" of "any content posted on craigslist," which PadMapper is clearly doing. As Craiglist's lawyer is likely to put it in the next C&D, assent to the TOU is still implied. [...]

If 3taps is in fact scraping Google's cache, they're also violating Google's terms of use, which prohibits any effort "to access [search results] using a method other than the interface and the instructions that we provide." Anyone want to bet on how long it will be before Google blocks them through technical countermeasures, or sends its own C&D? And if 3taps is in the business of the TOU-prohibited "distribution" of Craigslist data, which it appears to be, it should expect to get a C&D from Craigslist too.

</comment><comment><USER51> "Certainly by the time you read this." Code isn't live yet, at least for me, ericd - is this conversation giving you pause about deploying the new feature, or is it standard ops issues?

Also, this couldn't come at a better time for me. I love padmapper and am moving to the bay area in 3 weeks, I need this, man!

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, was having some sysops issues, thanks for the heads up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> What about a service that lets you _post_ to every barter site at the same time, not just craigslist. Has that been tried? If you could get people to use it (through better UI and more exposure for what they're selling) you could break craigslist's hold on the marketplace.

</comment><comment><USER53> Padmapper is awesome, way way better than using Craiglist to apartment hunt, even if the data ultimately comes from Craigslist (among others).

Maybe craigslist should buy padmapper instead of getting all lawsuity and take advantage of just how good their interface is for apartment hunting

</comment><comment><USER54> Not sure if this has been asked, but a philosophical question for Eric: if someone decided to start a padmapper competitor tomorrow, would you be okay with them using your data for free?

<comment><USER55> I don't see why not. By being a competitor that scrapes PM, they are accepting that there will be a delay in their data versus when it's available on PM. So unless their site was significantly better than PM in some way, in the really competitive apartment hunting markets, they would be strictly inferior to PM.

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> How do 3taps do it? Some comments say they "use Google cache", which doesn't explain much:

\- Google is notorious for fighting bots pretty aggressively, how do 3taps avoid this?

\- even if 3taps found a special access to Google cache, it would be trivial for CL to prevent Google or anyone else from caching its listings, thus cutting off the rest of the food chain that feeds on caches; why don't they do it?

Is it possible that 3taps use another method, such as "manually" copy-pasting listings with Mechanical Turk?

</comment><comment><USER57> Really, really stupid. I mean pretending you want to help people find apartment to justify you're action is ridiculous. You're running a business, be honest about it. Now craigislist do what they want with their data, you are just trying to build a service that "adds value" on top of someone else infrastructure( I mean "add" because I am one of the few who actually like the way cragislist display posts no bloaty js, no ugly pics no maps ... fast and simple).

<comment><USER58> I find it difficult to believe that you have searched for an apartment in a tough rental market on Craigslist and consider their interface "fast and simple." If you've never had the task of finding an apartment within a mile of a given spot in a big metro area, you're not looking for what PadMapper offers. If you _have_ had that problem, and you've never sworn out loud at Craigslist, you're a saint.

<comment><USER57> I was looking for an apartment 6 month ago in Reston, VA and I used craigslist for that purpose. I looked for a couple of zipcode (that I heard were good, since I was just moving in the US at that time) and honestly it worked great. Wouldn't it be the same in a big metro area ? just looking for interesting zipcodes ?

<comment><USER59> You realize in some cities a few blocks makes a GIANT difference in neighborhood, right? Same zip code.

Being able to visually filter those out is a major time saver.

<comment><USER58> The other issue is where I live, people put all kinds of random keywords in their Craigslist apartment ads to try to get attention. "Just 25 minutes' walk to Foo Square, Bar Square, and Baz Square! Four hours by horse to Lexington, and a short plane ride to London!" If I want to know what's within a 10-minute walk of a given location, I basically have to read every listing with my town's name in it every day and see if they included an address. Or spend 5 seconds glancing at PadMapper.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> [http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=400&h=220&o=f&c...](http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=400&h=220&o=f&c=1&y=t&b=ffffff&n=666666&r=3m&u=padmapper.com&);

Traffic took a great nosedive from the day they announced "bye bye" to CL.

<comment><USER55> By your own metric, so did traffic for CL, and CL is the 8th most visited site in the US, so their Alexa traffic data is probably more stable than traffic data for PadMapper. [http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=400&h=220&o=f&c...](http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=400&h=220&o=f&c=1&y=r&b=ffffff&n=666666&r=3m&u=craigslist.org&);

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> My question is: Why are people using craigslist?

Fortunately for me, I purchased a home before all apartment ads migrated to CL. For the life of me, I don't get why it's so popular.

The site is awful in at least a half dozen different ways.

<comment><USER62> It's free and easily accessible. Compare to the costs involved in getting an ad listed in a dead tree.

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> So, instead of directly scraping CL's data, they are now using an API that scrapes Google's cache of CL's data? That seems kind of sleazy.

</comment><comment><USER64> Would a client-side padmapper be less morally gray?

</comment><comment><USER65> Consider, if the situation was reversed, and Craiglist was taking Padmapper's data without permission, would everyone on HN would be supporting Padmapper attempting to block Craiglist from reposting its listings?

In such a scenario, Craiglist reposting the Padmapper listings would be a net gain for user's and posters (even though the posters never gave Craiglist such permission) because the listings would be exposed to an exponentially larger viewership.

Being a startup is not a license (pun intended) to ignore other people's rights. Padmapper is in the wrong here, and if they proceed down this path they could face a ruinous (and fully justified) lawsuit.

</comment><comment><USER66> >I've always had a lot of respect for what they've done for the world

Did I miss something? What has Craigslist done for the world besides put newspapers out of business?

<comment><USER67> Using CL I furnished a whole house with super high-quality stuff for less than US$2K. Wouldn't have been realistic pre-CL since traditional classified ads don't have pictures. I also found my house through CL.

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> Dear PadMapper,

We hate your app and you can't use our API.

Sincerely, Craigslist

\+ + +

Dear Cragislist,

Fuck you.

Love, PadMapper</comment>


How I lost 30 lbs - <AUTHOR> http://paulrouget.com/e/diet/

<comment><USER2> Carbs bad. Fat good.

By far the most compelling argument is made by Gary Taubes: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTUspjZG-wc>

This literary changed my life. By changing ONLY what I eat, I've managed to loose weight. Without any effort! I wasn't fat per se, but man, I feel way better now!

No need to eat "fresh" (salads, fruits...), but you MUST eat fat!

</comment><comment><USER3> Also, start boxing. Short of military boot camp there is no more effective, more intensive (and, frankly, more badass) exercise out there. Three times a week for 60-80 minutes is all you need.

Think it looks easy? Pick up a 1lb weight in each hand (16oz gloves are standard), make a fist around it, and throw fast punches continuously for three minutes.

Finally, take the weekend off paleo. Get a pizza on Friday, have some beers on Saturday. Make a giant bolognese, cover it in parmesan. Enjoy the things mankind discovered between leaving the caves and building cities.

</comment><comment><USER4> I would be interested in more opinions about Paleo. I'm actually on this diet myself and experiencing similar results (however I've added Crossfit and I think that's been more influential than my diet). My curiosity is about the notion that somehow Vegetarian style diets or even diets with grains is truly damaging. I read the Paleo Solution. I want to know how much is Robb Wolf just spreading his own bias around?

<comment><USER5> The ironic thing about Robb is that he only lives Paleo 80% of the time. His disciples are quite radical on living 100% Paleo.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Great post from Paul Rouget (Mozilla) on his experience losing weight. Very interesting read as I have been following similar practices for a few months.

</comment><comment><USER5> Great work!

As an avid crossfitter and Paleo adherent, Paleo does wonderings for losing weight. I have seen people shed 20 pounds over a summer. You don't lose weight by going to the gym, it is through your diet. "Abs are made in the kitchen, not in the gym".

</comment><comment><USER6> Does anyone know if Stevia is healthy to use with tea?

<comment><USER7> Just go without any sugar. Seriously. It'll taste bad for the first few days, but after that you'll get used to the taste and it'll feel just as good. It's the same thing with coffee.

<comment><USER8> I would have to agree with that. I used to drink tea with sugar all the time and now I don't like tea that has sugar.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Bzinga Games – Making Sales Fun - <AUTHOR> http://bzingagames.com/

<comment><USER2> I truly hate sites like this. While I believe in "ask for the order", this site follows the plan of "You can't know what we sell until you sign up for a free trial." Want to know what it is, see a half page of text followed by sign up for a trial. You really think my time is useless to me?

For those who care, there exists videos on Vimeo. [https://vimeo.com/93470015](https://vimeo.com/93470015)

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree with your point and let me forward it to the owner of this concept. Thank you for your time.</comment></comment>


The car century was a mistake. It's time to move on - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/in-theory/wp/2016/02/29/the-car-century-was-a-mistake-its-time-to-move-on/ <comment><USER2> Nonsense, new levels of tech will not be reached without current levels of tech. The automobile was needed to deliver new levels of tech in a flexible form. Railroad and boat would never be able to do that. Funny how people always think that tech is in some kind of vacuum, probably same way how people think that creation of things can be done without standing on the shoulders of our forefathers (see whole copyright debate).</comment>


1 in 2 Americans Will Have a Smartphone by Christmas 2011	 - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2010/03/26/1-in-2-americans-will-have-a-smartphone-by-christmas-2011/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OmMalik+%28GigaOM%29&utm_content=Google+Reader <comment><USER2> This is pretty significant news. Pew's last estimate as to home internet penetration in the US was hovering at around 74%ish, last time I checked, and that's over the decades it's been around now.

A 50% penetration rate for smartphones, and their web-ready state and app markets, within a scant few years of its start says interesting things about where software development's headed in the surprisingly near future.</comment>


Show HN: A Huge Collection of Fancy Cool Fonts for Free Download - <AUTHOR> https://coolfont.org <comment><USER2> Any differentiating features from 1001freefonts? Seems so visually similar it'd need a decent USP. Not a criticism, just not sure I missed something.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes you're right. Thanks.</comment></comment>


Compiled data from the Hadley's supercomputer shows alarming climate trajectory - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/may/27/hadley-climate-centre-turns-30-the-human-fingerprint-is-everywhere <comment><USER2> Ho-hum, another alarming article about how we're all going to hell in a handbasket. If the virii don't kill us, the climate change will.

It's all about globalist control, and people are waking up.

<comment><USER3> I just enjoyed a Hydrosphere course at the local uni.

The point was made that humanity is just putting a lot of crap into a system whose limits are poorly understood, and we might want to rethink that a bit.

I found the dispassionate, factual presentation more compelling than the Chicken Little fare.

The irony may come if it is shown that all of the anthropogenic global warming is what staves off an ice age in the presence of a quiescent sun.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2020/05/12/th...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2020/05/12/the- sun-is-asleep-deep-solar-minimum-feared-as-2020-sees-record-setting-100-day- slump/#14272295e283)

<comment><USER4> Not to forget some possible (super)volcanic burps, leading to events like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer) and similar, listed there.

edit: Don't get this the wrong way! I'm not for dismissing any environmental concerns, the opposite. Just understanding them better.

<comment><USER3> Tambora was a VEI7 (whereas the better-known Krakatoa eruption was VEI6).

Yellowstone could hit VEI8, but has apparently taken a mellower view of late: [https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/yellowstone-overdue-eruption- when-...](https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/yellowstone-overdue-eruption-when-will- yellowstone-erupt)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Starting is easier than sustaining. - <AUTHOR> http://garrettdimon.com/post/1704243431/starting-is-easier-than-sustaining

<comment><USER2> It's weird but for me its the other way around.

Once something is going, if executed properly, I find structure forms and you get slowly sucked into the momentum. New problems and challenges are discovered and you can plan what the fixes are. Your strategy changes as you see the fruits of your labor turn a theory into something tangible.

Milestones become clearer and you just want to drive forward to the next one.

...whereas starting (for me) is really hard. Sure I have a million startup ideas and I could just pick any one and run with it. But I know I'm not at a point in my career anymore where I can just hack away at something for shits and giggles and see what comes out of it. I know I have to pre-plan and test theories, examine size of addressable markets, look at the competition, etc... all to ensure the idea I run with is 'crap tested'.

But at that point a) it is hard to find the drive to do the boring due- diligence and b) the long-term goal seems so far off it is hard to build those shorter milestones.

So for me, I love jumping into a project that is slowly beginning to ramp up rather than sitting with a blank piece of paper and having to start.

</comment><comment><USER3> I am in 3 months of sustained running. I don't know how I did it, but I always run 5 days a week. Really, I run on days when I have free time.

Once upon a time, I failed to fill my running quota for Friday, so I ran two time on Saturday.

However, all my other efforts doesn't have these kind of runs, including my startup. I don't know why that is, though.

On the other hand, I am drawing every single day, when I don't have classes for a week or so. So every night, I basically upload and sell my arts for microprofit. It's rewarding and addicting like an MMORPG.

I don't know why I am able to make certain things into habits. It's just weird. I always code on and off for five years though.

Starting is sure hard. Sustaining activities are even harder.

<comment><USER4> It might be worth it to take some time out of your day to journal about why the two things effect you so differently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Completely offtopic, but this is the first time I've been to Garrett's blog in a long while, and the new layout is gorgeous.

His old layout was too, so that probably shouldn't be news, really, but it's always impressive to me how some people (Snook, Garrett, et al) always have the most beautiful pages.

<comment><USER6> Agreed, but I wished he removed the shadows from the body text. It distracts and makes it harder to read (a bit like moving pictures next to the text).

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree. However, it's just a theme that I purchased. I'll have to look into doing some custom CSS to see if I can easily remove it.

<comment><USER6> Shouldn't be too hard. I think the shadow behind the titles look great, tho.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Salary Negotiation Advice - <AUTHOR>

Situation: You are working in your first engineer job at a startup, but you are young so you made the mistake of working for cheap on what was supposed to be a 3-week trial contract, but inevitably lasted a little longer. No big deal, the venture is funded the boss wants to put you on salary now. He's already asking you to name a number and for various reasons it feels really wrong to stick it to him and say "no, you name a number and I'll let you know." What do you do? <comment><USER2> Something to consider: For an employer, hiring is a risky business. You are now a _known_ quantity so you should feel comfortable asking for a higher salary than someone of off the street with "equivalent experience" IMO.

As you may have discovered, instead of just appreciating the work you did for cheap money, they will be somewhat taken aback when asked to pay market rate. It's a human thing I think.

("I'm not going to pay Dr Heary Surgeon $500 hr! I didn't pay little Bobby Surgeon anywhere near that when he was mowing my lawn as a boy! I gave him his first job fer c __*t sakes!")

</comment><comment><USER3> Depending on where you live, you're in a strong position and he's surprisingly in a weak position.

This is your career, and your salary. He won't think about this moment 2 minutes after you agree. Use AngelList to find similar offers. Then decide on the very high end of what you want - say that's $55k (picking a number). Say "I'm worth $55k and can bring much more in value to you. I'll first do these three things to make you more money. ...."

<https://angel.co/salaries>

</comment><comment><USER4> I have read below article many times and recommend this to everyone I know on this topic.

Hope it helps you: <http://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/>

</comment><comment><USER5> tl;dr So many variables it is impossible to give you good advice without a lot more information (some of which is probably sensitive). Anybody who pretends otherwise is lying.

The generic advice you get will be stuff you've probably heard already or common sense.

Best generic advice: Imagine you are in your employers position, and figure out what the best possible outcome you can get is by giving him/her one or two concerns at most.</comment>


Ask HN: Should I use OpenVPN or Algo? - <AUTHOR> I've used OpenVPN to tunnel to my home office when out on the road for about a year with great success. However, there's a new kid on the block and my googling suggests it is more secure and flexible. Which is more secure for an intermediate user? Use case: I typically connect with a Macbook and an iPad. <comment><USER2> If you have total control of the ports at home then there is a speed benefit to using IPSEC since it runs in the kernel and will be much faster than a userspace openvpn process. This speed benefit is especially noticeable with lower powered CPU's.</comment>


The Power and the Gory (1990) - <AUTHOR> http://www.bronxbanterblog.com/2013/10/01/the-power-and-the-gory/ <comment><USER2> The story mentions a detox program involving running and saunas - does anyone know more about it? How is it supposed to work? Why would running help sweat out toxins afterwards?</comment>


5 Reasons why we didn't go for Crowdfunding - <AUTHOR> http://startupjuncture.com/2013/03/07/5-reasons-why-we-didnt-go-for-crowdfunding/

<comment><USER2> Jean-Pierre forgets to mention the appeal of receiving funding vs. no equity...</comment>