Ask HN: Is it too late to make a side income by creating Udemy courses/similar? - <AUTHOR> I'm almost 30, and since I was 15 I've on/off wrote blog posts and written tutorials (some on my personal site, some paid articles + paid series a long time ago). One of the few things I enjoy doing at work (DevOps engineer) is teaching/training other people. I run a few small online side projects for beer money, but I'm not that interested in most of them, whereas making money from creating courses would be a dream for me.
For the last few years I've been using Python to build internal REST APIs and so on, and I'm also fairly well versed in PHP/Laravel. I'm not actually a SW Developer by trade, but feel I know more than enough to write/record courses for something like Udemy.
My issue is searching Udemy for any phrase such as 'Python rest', 'Python flask', 'Python web scraping' yields thousands upon thousands of results. Is it too late to start creating content for subjects like these? I'm not really a software developer, and I have more passion for monitoring (Prometheus, Grafana, Graphite, Icinga2, Statsd...) but these kind of topics don't seem worth approaching as anyone with an interest is likely already technical enough to get by, whereas learning to code has a much larger audience.
Interested to hear if I'm just being pessimistic, or whether others think the ship may have already sailed on a majority of topics. <comment><USER2> The best time to have started was 3 years ago. The second best time to start is right now.

I would say to follow your passion. If it would be fun and easy for you to put together some sort of monitoring course I say go for it! I wouldn't worry about people being able to buy it on their own. I know that I could figure out how to snap together these monitoring tools, but if I can pay $8.99 for someone to do all of that research and spoonfeed me the info that is totally worth it.

In terms of expected payout, I wouldn't expect a windfall. I definitely think it would be valuable as a portfolio item, especially if you think you would enjoy a career in teaching/training. If you have a reader base from your blog/tutorials you might be able to leverage that.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the input. That was kind of my thinking, I'm not expecting to start making courses and leave my job in 12 months time, this is more something to keep me occupied, give me a reason to keep learning new skills, and a definitely portfolio/cv padder.

I've been sat doing some research on Udemy for a couple of hours and it really seems things like Python are heavily covered, and even though I'm not aiming to do this purely to make money, it would be disheartening to put effort in to a course that's buried amongst 10,000 others. Maybe niche subjects like monitoring, where most won't bother due to low viewer counts, are where it's at nowadays.

<comment><USER2> Make sure you post it to HN when you are done! I'm definitely interested in checking it out.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the extra motivation!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Absolutely not too late, especially if you're creating in niche topics like monitoring. Niches are a great place to work because you can build expertise and a following. patio11 sold bingo card software to schoolteachers for years and it was foundational to his success.

I recommend the book "Authority" by Nathan Barry as a step-by-step guide to getting started creating information products online.

<comment><AUTHOR> I remember seeing the bingo card software, sometimes it's nice to have a subtle reminder that if you just start you've already beaten 90% of everyone else that's had the idea.

I'll check that book out, thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I can suggest an experiment here. I just quickly searched "python rest" like you said and top 2 results are flask vs django. So yes, I agree with you, it's a crowded space.

However... both courses are several hours long. Personally I'm sufficiently proficient in python and would never spend 10h+ to watch these lectures, in 10h I have an api up and running. So maybe there's opportunity for a 1-2h quick course, designed for people who want a refresh or a gasp in a specific technology but they don't have to learn everything from 0.

Advantage on your side, you can create it faster, test faster if you like it and decide whether to invest further. Best of luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> Whenever I think of Udemy I always just think of learning a subject from scratch, I hadn't really thought about making a programming course in the way you'd described, good food for thought - thanks.

<comment><USER4> FWIW I have Udemy at work and from time to time, typically in the weekend, I follow a random course. Generally 2-4h max, typically 1.5-2x speed. Last one was on screenwriting, though I'll certainly never make a movie. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "I have more passion for monitoring (Prometheus, Grafana, Graphite, Icinga2, Statsd...) "

I would say create courses on devops and these topics. The overall number of audience may be lower for these but it is a growing field and there is hardly any good tutorials out there. You can even charge a premium if you create good content.

You are right that web dev. courses are dime a dozen these days even though you can always create content that you like and see how people take it. But the issue is that sites like udemy or even youtube already has tons of content for those. Lot of bad ones but plenty of good ones as well.

<comment><AUTHOR> I suppose it would be easier to write about DevOps subjects, it's not that I don't enjoy programming, I just enjoy the 'ops-y' tasks more (who doesn't love a graph). Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Shift your position from one of "Will people buy this information?" to "Which information do I sell first?". Choose simple. Figure out the logistics. Then tackle the popular topics.

Selling information is the same as any other product. You need to iterate and test. It seems harder because information is not tangible. It does nothing, unless you seek it. Focus on the seekers. Seek them out.

</comment><comment><USER7> I work for a company that offers hosted Prometheus + Graphite + Grafana services. We're always looking for more good content.

If you'd be interested in chatting about potentially doing some paid tutorial creation for us, shoot me an email: firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment><comment><USER8> With your side projects - do they revolve around web apps or code? I'm interested to know as a non dev what area you chose.

<comment><AUTHOR> They're small SaaS apps that need more work, or small projects for clients (like a JS driven animated scoreboard that a client puts up at corporate events - they take games to corporate parties)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Drop me a line: ste.grider at gmail</comment>


Why Every Startup Community is the Same - <AUTHOR> http://sprouter.com/blog/the-6-reasons-every-startup-community-is-the-same/

<comment><USER2> I think this would have been better titles, "6 Things Every Startup Community has in Common", and under that title, it's a pretty insightful article, especially in reference to wantrepreneurs.

The title implies every startup community is actually the same, which is provably, empirically false. Some communities have many more and more valuable startup successes than others. Not the same.

</comment><comment><USER3> These are some very interesting observations, my 3 favorite were: every community has talkers and doers, a team must have a hacker and a hustler, and how to handle haters.</comment>


Renewables are no longer 'alternative.' Fossil fuels are 'legacy.' - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@davidmbank/renewables-are-no-longer-alternative-fossil-fuels-are-legacy-cb396db8bd15#.wk2xsvki6 <comment><USER2> Trying to change what words mean is a lousy way to achieve your goals.</comment>


Googling for Sociopaths - <AUTHOR> http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/googled <comment><USER2> _Google gets a lot of criticism (often deserved), but it's worth taking a moment to think of all the things they haven't done. If Microsoft had Google's market share in search, is there any doubt that they'd be systematically demoting or even banning their competitors in the search results? Demoting someone in Google is a virtual death sentence, and yet not only has Google ever been accused of using this vast power, the idea itself is almost unimaginable._

Oh _please_. This is so weak that it's laughable. First, Google hasn't always had this much market share in search and the other big search providers (to my knowledge) didn't ban their competitors. Microsoft didn't ban other office suite products from working on Windows. They didn't ban other browsers. Yeah, IE might have been more tightly integrated, but please explain how this is different from the incestuous pile of Google products that promote Google search at every turn?

Instead of glossing over how Google gets some criticism and then beating your anti-Microsoft strawman, maybe we should take a look at some of the questionable things Google has done (China).

It'd be nice if I was wrong, but in my opinion, Google isn't some special orgy of love and kindness towards humankind. It's a multi-billion dollar company with millions of shareholders and it'll do whatever it thinks is best for turning a profit. If that happens to be stuff that isn't "evil", so much the better. If not (China), so be it.

Let's revisit when Google is as old as Microsoft or Disney or News Corp. is now and see how it all turned out. I'm betting the only difference is that now articles like this will make Google out to be the big bad corporation filled with sociopaths trying to destroy the world.

EDIT: added a closing thought

<comment><USER3> > Microsoft didn't ban other office suite products from working on Windows.

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

<comment><USER2> Interesting, for two reasons:

1\. It states that it was only in a beta release of Windows 3.1 and was removed for the final product. Is this really the basis of your argument here?

2\. They clearly went about it in a deceptive way, but is what they were doing at the core wrong? Was Windows 3.1 considered an upgrade from MS-DOS? If so, I don't see how requiring users to have the base package is wrong, any more than Apple is unwilling to allow you to upgrade from Windows 95 to Snow Leopard. Maybe I'm not understanding the situation?

<comment><USER4> Larry Osterman has a good post on the AARD code here [http://blogs.msdn.com/larryosterman/archive/2004/08/12/21368...](http://blogs.msdn.com/larryosterman/archive/2004/08/12/213681.aspx)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The implicit claim is that the people running Google are not sociopaths, yet he presents no evidence to support this claim. He attributes these upheavals to the "march of technology" and expects the reader to swallow this without objection.

What exactly makes Eisner a "sociopath" and Brin & Page "normal decent people"? It's apparently that Google makes things people want and Disney does not. I'm not sure this holds up. Disney doesn't make desirable things?

<comment><USER6> "The thing that's hard for the sociopaths to get their head around is that this isn't because one of their rivals has outsmarted them — it's just the march of technology. "

I don't get this quote. It's quite clear Brin and Page _did_ outsmart them. Murdoch's latest rantings clearly show he doesn't understand we live in a world of algorithms now and just having a team of content producers has nothing on having a team of programmers, a host of servers and the capacity to find people the content they need in the vast expanse of the Internet/long tail.

Newspapers are second best at almost everything now, world news (vs. the top blogs or state-funded like BBC), local news (vs. long tail of blogs), dating (vs. numerous sites, craigslist), classifieds (vs. ebay, craigslist), book reviews/sales (vs. amazon), reviews (vs. tons of sites), advertising (vs. algorithmically placed ads). A bundle of second bests, the newspaper, _was_ the best when it was the only thing you could buy. It was a very effective delivery mechanism that far exceeded trying to subscribe to multiple newsletters/pamphlets/zines to cover each base. But tabbed browsing (or even sequential browsing untabbed) just slaughters that delivery mechanism in specialization/choice, cost and cost of delivery, time of delivery and place of delivery.

Murdoch will be able to charge for some financial news, perhaps even some political news for a while, he will be able to put some sports he gets the exclusive rights to on mobile pay-per-view (banning twittering sportsmen/women and banning video/enforcing "IP rights" at sports events). But in the end he can't beat the fact that a newspaper or a TV station is just a bundle of second bests and isn't customized. He probably knows this deep down and is just looking to "hide the decline" until he retires (which has to be in the next 10 years given how old he is) so that his legacy is intact. But my will he be biting his fingernails in retirement.

And frankly, this is how it should be in any somewhat capitalist system. I don't want to hear a journalist expound on economic matters when they don't have a degree in economics, only in journalism (or no degree at all). I can just go onto one of the many economic blogs, quite a few run by professors of economics. Ditto political news. Ditto tech news on reddit, HN or slashdot where there are multiple commentators who often have graduate degrees in the subject matter and certainly many links posted to peer reviewed articles or at least Wikipedia. So often tech journalism is just the recycling of press releases, or science journalism pops up with, _yet again_ , a correlation/causation fallacy with all of the interesting details cropped out for a mass audience. I am glad journalism is dying, the bailouts were insane enough, but there was actually a stage where some journalists tried to float the idea of bailouts for all the big newspapers and media groups. Absolutely disgusting. Hopefully they will never get any more "IP" rules passed or sabotage net neutrality and the world of information plenty that we happy few live in can be expanded to the rest of the population on the planet (half of whom have yet to make a phonecall, which is humbling when you see the resources at our fingertips).

<comment><USER2> _I don't want to hear a journalist expound on economic matters when they don't have a degree in economics, only in journalism (or no degree at all). I can just go onto one of the many economic blogs, quite a few run by professors of economics. Ditto political news. Ditto tech news on reddit, HN or slashdot where there are multiple commentators who often have graduate degrees in the subject matter and certainly many links posted to peer reviewed articles or at least Wikipedia. So often tech journalism is just the recycling of press releases, or science journalism pops up with, yet again, a correlation/causation fallacy with all of the interesting details cropped out for a mass audience. I am glad journalism is dying..._

The thing is, journalism as you paint it isn't dying. The medium is changing, but the landscape is still dominated by _journalists_ , meaning people who write stories on subjects they don't deeply understand, for a mass audience who doesn't know any better. And I'm really not sure that the quality is improving at all. Look at the top 10 tech blogs, or political news sites, or whatever, and tell me I'm wrong. The fact of human nature is that we're predisposed to believe people who sound like they know what they're talking about, and who can write in a persuasive manner. And our info economy has driven us to a shallower understanding of the world, I think, so we're satisfied with getting Twitter-sized updates every 10 seconds on a thousand different topics. The places like Aol and Demand Media who build content farms get this, and that's why they're going for volume and scale instead of deep quality. HN and places like it will never be mainstream, because people don't like to spend this much time thinking about stuff.

<comment><USER7> <http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com>

I'm interested if you can name one mainstream economist or economic commentator, __especially __a famous one, who comes even close to being as factual and prescient as Mish.

This is just one site...the blogosphere was all over the impending economic collapse for years, while the mainstream economic journalists, many with economics degrees, had it exactly backwards. And if your retort is that it wasn't a big deal, all is well now, I recommend you do more reading and decide for yourself if that is true.

<comment><USER2> Nope, my retort is that people _do not care_.

On HN, we (usually) seek out the best information and data by using rationality and logic and having a high standard for what constitutes intellectual discussion. We hold subject matter experts in high regard and we seek to sidestep fallacies and gratuitous displays of emotion.

 _Most people are not this way._

Witness the rise of 24/7 cable news that blathers endlessly about whatever is the big story of the minute, or conservative talk radio, designed to whip people into an emotional frenzy. Or Twitter! I'm pretty sure that if Mish was restricted to 140 characters, he'd be a lot less insightful.

The medium is changing, but human nature hasn't changed. And the result of making everyone a content producer is that there are many orders of magnitude of content out there, which means you have to get attention by being intensely targeted (HN), or by pure volume (Demand Media). My point is that human nature seems to be driving more people to the latter.

<comment><USER7> Ahhh....agreed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Alarmist and self-congratulatory tripe to the max. And without much backup to boot.

Alarmist: Big corporations are run by sociopaths! What this means is never really defined (are we using the lay or clinical definition of sociopathy? If lay, then what definition?), but more tossed about as a straw man for why big companies are Bad(tm).

Self-congratulatory: Big companies are Bad(tm), but us feisty startups are so awesome. We're a force of _good_ in this world! Us technical folk sure are more moral and just plain _better_ than them durned "sociopaths"!

I find the constant overuse (and lack of definition or apparent understanding) of the word "sociopath" to be particularly stomach-churning, and it reads of alarmist hate-scribe not much unlike the racist, sexist, and other reprehensible things extremists tend to write about "them" (where "them" is a convenient, sometimes made up, demographic to blame). The consistent attempt to dehumanize these "sociopaths" (again, never defined) is really kind of sickening.

</comment><comment><USER9> A lot of these comments are pretty harsh, but there is truth in what he says. There is a difference between Google and most preceding big companies. Google wins more by doing good work and less by deals and scheming that most big companies have in the past. When they crush competitors, they usually don't do it by deliberately trying to crush them, but by doing very good work, and crushing them as a matter of course.

Google wins the way better scientists do.

I don't think they're simply benevolent. I think what they've discovered is that focusing on doing good work actually makes you more dangerous.

</comment><comment><USER10> Ah good old fashioned tech-industry elitism. Our guys are brilliant engineers changing the world for the better. Everyone in every other industry is a mere sociopath exploiting customers for their own selfish gains.

<comment><USER11> Well, technically, "brilliant engineer changing the world for the better" and "sociopath exploiting customers" aren't actually mutually exclusive categories...

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> A referral upsale channel for Amazon's affiliate sales program -let's count them tricks of trade: misleading title (checked), inflammatory content (checked) targeted at a controversial topic (traditional pattern-matching makes people want to see google as the enemy by now); claims without proof, or evidence to back it up (checked), with a small hint of techno-superiority, that makes the target audience feel good (increased clickthrough&checkout of the book: checked). Deterministic geek-buzzing about content (triggering the network-reading effect): checked.

Oh, yes, someone's going to have a marry christmas.

</comment><comment><USER13> I'm afraid Aaronsw has gone too far. But there is an element of truth here.

The men who created the media empires were incredibly aggressive. Many of their business practices were rooted in organized crime.

For instance, Lew Wasserman, creator of MCA and Universal. He inspired terror throughout Los Angeles. No, he was not going to have you killed (despite one minor flirtation with the real mafia) but he could kill your career or your company.

Wasserman was every bit a latter-day Genghis Khan. And I think it's true that capitalism directed his energies into making movies rather than building a mountain of skulls.

There is an undeniable style difference between MCA/Wasserman and Google/Schmidt.

</comment><comment><USER14> _Demoting someone in Google is a virtual death sentence, and yet not only has Google ever been accused of using this vast power, the idea itself is almost unimaginable._

A total ban of an obvious competitor would clearly raise so much controversy that it is "almost unimaginable", I agree.

But Google's smaller-scale bans and reorderings, always for ostensibly legitimate purposes, have sometimes caused accusations about Google's real goals by the webmasters affected. That's not to say their paranoia is correct -- but "[n]ever been accused" and "unimaginable" is a bit strong given the real history.

And they are 'demoting' other content incrementally all the time -- whenever they promote their own content in the first few vertical positions. Tried any health-related search on Google recently? As of a couple months ago, 'Google Health', with an image, is almost always the top hit.

Do non-YouTube videos get as prominent placement as YouTube videos?

<comment><USER15> I've never once seen a website owner complaining about Google that wasn't operating an obvious (to me) spam, or otherwise nefarious, site of some sort. I've even seen a few HN users commenting on such Google evils, and when I looked at the "innocent" site they were talking about, it was inarguably blog spam, content spam, used black hat SEO techniques, or some other nasty type of thing that provided no or negative value for users, and was carefully engineered to maximize ad or referral revenue at the expense of all else. I'm sure somewhere, sometime, some actually innocent website has moved downward in the search rankings, but I've never once seen a complaint about it that was legitimate (it's probably just lost in the noise of all the black hats that complain loudest, since I've never looked for innocent site owners with stories to tell...I just come upon the assholes who scream loudest).

<comment><USER16> Patrick McKenzie complains about Google here with some regularity, and it's not all just about customer service (lack of transparency another one).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Also, I've always enjoyed this GapingVoid cartoon on sociopaths and the corporate hierarchy:

<http://gapingvoid.com/2004/06/27/company-hierarchy/>

<comment><USER18> If you like that, you might also like [http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais- principle-o...](http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or- the-office-according-to-the-office/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I think Aaron misses the point about sociopaths. Individual behavior has nothing to do with corporate behavior. Larry and Sergey's personal niceness or lack thereof is irrelevant.

Most people who work for giant tech corporations aren't sociopaths -- far from it. The top American tech firms are filled with people that are almost painfully conscientious, in an upper-middle-class way. Don't even think about cancelling the recycling program or face a general uprising at the next assembly. This is true whether you work for Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Apple, Oracle, or whatever. I don't know the telecom or media industry, but I bet it's about the same there.

The sociopath angle makes sense to describe the behavior of the corporation itself. (viz. "The Corporation" film). Even if there's an opportunity you have qualms about (subprime mortgages, expanding into China), the shareholders will insist you get into that market as long as competitors are making money.

Google's corporate behavior is pretty "evil". To their competitors. And sometimes even their partners. Consider how they are bootstrapping off TeleAtlas' mapping data product to basically make that entire industry obsolete, once people are carrying around iPhones that constantly map everything.

But as long as they are "evil" to competitors in the service of making a better product, they are "good" for everyone else.

The traditional media monopolies stopped really competing a generation ago, and after the consolidation of the 80s and 90s it's all been about denying entry to competitors, and controlling access to markets. That's what makes them "evil".

Google isn't in any position where they can do that yet, except maybe online advertising (sort of). So for the most part Google is focused on breaking open markets. That might change if they ever start "owning" a consumer, like say with a Chrome-powered netbook. Just you wait.

</comment><comment><USER20> This is a little too sycophantic. Both Google and other firms want their products to succeed, which means an increase in market share, or an "Alexander the great" share of the market, if you will.

Both Google and other firms believe they are bringing value to the market. It's hard to believe Rupert Murdoch, for example, believes his companies bring nothing of value. You may not like what he produces, but it's hard to accept he doesn't in some way, and his customers certainly do.

It's pleasing to believe Google is full of salt o' the earth types out to make the world a better place, and Newscorp, for example, and its like is full of evil men and women--but this is a picture far too black and white to be taken seriously.

Essentially assuming two giant companies are so different to the extent that one wishes to make people lives happier, and has the success of the business as a second priority, and the other is inversed seems very fantastical, and without evidence.

</comment><comment><USER21> The first paragraph says it all: capitalism is a good system for handling sociopaths.

After all we know, it is probably the best. In every other system known to mankind psychopath cause incredibly more damage. Think Soviet Russia, North Korea, the Roman Empire, Nazy Germany, Cold War Romania, ...

The irony: Aaron Swartz probably had some idealistic system in mind when he wrote it (correct me if I'm wrong or if I am erecting a straw man), that would handle everything better if only the "right" people were in charge. The available data speaks otherwise.

"Not to be a socialist at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head." Georges Clemencea

</comment><comment><USER17> I've been having a thought recently that Google is Microsoft done right. Sure, they have massive influence. But I never find myself switching to a new Google product because I have to--I switch because they're better products.

<comment><USER22> I don't agree. Nowadays I'm practically forced to communicate with people using Gmail accounts, which means that _my_ mail is scanned at Google against my will. This is not much different from being forced to communicate with people using Word documents.

<comment><USER23> It's very different: you don't have to own a gmail account to send an email to a persons gmail account.

<comment><USER24> You're right. His complaint, on the other hand, is that although you can use whatever "word processor" you want, you know that at the other end Microsoft will have full access when your colleague reads the document in Word.

Substitute "word processor", Microsoft, and Word with email client, Google, and Gmail as appropriate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> The view of "major executives" (and Alexander for that matter) in the first paragraph is so ludicrously naive and shallow that I'm forced to believe anything else author has to say is utter waste of my time.

</comment><comment><USER26> Wherein Aaron Swartz further confirms his status as a petty intellectual tyrant, pathologically obsessed with setting up nonexistent us-vs-them, good- vs-evil dichotomies.

<comment><USER27> Uh..I don't agree fully with what he is saying here but 'tyrant'? When did Aaron acquire dictatorial powers?

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I've been reading aaronsw's blog for years, and it surprises me how uniformly antagonistic the comments are -- both on the blog itself, and on HN and reddit -- compared to other blogs. He's either an incredibly skilled troll, or he's really on to something.

</comment><comment><USER29> I missed the point in the script where Aaron went from Google-paranoid (witness his online novella) to Google-booster.

Very odd.

</comment><comment><USER30> I was hoping this article would be a list of keywords search terms, like people use to find webcams.

</comment><comment><USER31> Technically speaking, most corporate leaders are _psychopaths_ , not sociopaths.

A sociopath has conscience, empathy, and ethics but his differ radically from those of mainstream society. For example, a gang member who'll kill someone in a rival gang-- breaking the law in most societies-- but would take a bullet to save his mother, is a sociopath-- not a psychopath.

Psychopaths are selfish and devoid of any conscience or empathy. However, they're very manipulative and often skilled at playing within society's rules, which sociopaths rarely do (because they have so much contempt for society). Dr. House might be considered a very mild sociopath, but he's not a psychopath: he's never cruel, and he has very strong ethics, but absolutely no regard for the ethical principles society expects him to hold.

The difference is that sociopaths reject society's superego and conscience but still have their own. Psychopaths have none. So the corporate barons and media moguls are correctly typed as psychopaths, _not_ sociopaths.

Otherwise, good article.

<comment><USER32> Doesn't this depend on where your definition is taken from? I remember reading in something reputable (or it might have been a BBC Radio documentary) that at one time they were synonyms for the same thing, but that one was used in the USA and other was used elsewhere. This has to be taken with a pinch of salt as my memory appears to be very vague on this. I'm sure though that historically they have been used to describe the same condition and that differences in their usage have only appeared recently.

<comment><USER33> According to this:

[http://www.mental-health- matters.com/index.php?option=com_co...](http://www.mental-health- matters.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=94)

Psychopath is not a technical term.

<comment><USER34> Addendum: <http://allpsych.com/disorders/personality/antisocial.html> (Actual DSM-IV reference)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> A nice summary of why Google is different. How refreshing for a company to ask themselves, "How can we create more value?" instead of scheming how to extract more value from the existing market.</comment>


Easy Book: book publishing as easy as it should be - <AUTHOR> http://easybook-project.org/ <comment><USER2> If I'm reading the license, which the README says is MIT but actually is a modified version of the MIT license, correctly it means anything you publish that is created using the software has to be published under the MIT license.

"You must publish your work as open source under the very same conditions."

[https://github.com/javiereguiluz/easybook/blob/master/LICENS...](https://github.com/javiereguiluz/easybook/blob/master/LICENSE.md)

<comment><USER3> Yeah the license wording is very unclear but in the docs he tries to clarify. From the docs:

        You must publish your work under the very same conditions. This means that other people could use and profit from your derived work.

        In any case, you are the sole proprietor of the books published with easybook, including all the copyright and related rights applicable in your country of residence. You are not obliged to share these works in any way, even if you benefit from them financially.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, so changes to Easy Book need to be open sourced, but books written with easy book are kept as is.

IMO MIT should mean MIT, not a modified form of GNU.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> First, thank you all for your comments and suggestions.

1\. You are right about the license. It's (unintentionally) misleading. I'll change it soon to pure MIT license.

2\. @okal, @Turing_Machine: yes, ePub will be supported and more formats will follow.

3\. @gnufs: it uses PrinceXML for PDF publishing because it's, by far, the best library I've found for HTML to PDF conversion. Do you know any other free/open-source library with the same or superior features?

4\. @mrleinad: yes, I'd love to use a shorter and cleaner URL; but it's really tough to find a good and unregistered domain with the word "book".

<comment><USER6> re (3): I have used the headless webkit engine to render high quality PDFs from HTML in the past. It's free. See: <https://code.google.com/p/wkhtmltopdf/>

<comment><USER5> Thanks for your reference. I'll try it, but after reading its documentation I'm afraid it doesn't have support for the much needed and non-standard CSS properties invented by PrinceXML (<http://princexml.com/doc/8.0/properties/>)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This seems perfect for a project I'm planning to start soon. Any chance of supporting epub/mobi formats in the near future? The licensing is also a concern. If the creator wanted a copyleft license, why not just go with the GPL with additional clauses? People already have certain expectations the moment they see a BSD or MIT license. Slightly misleading, if you ask me.

</comment><comment><USER8> Looks nice! If you could make it generate _nice-looking_ epub and mobipocket from the same source, you'd really have something excellent.

<comment><USER9> Checkout Pandoc <http://johnmacfarlane.net/pandoc/epub.html>

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Note that it depends on a proprietary shareware called Prince XML for PDF publishing.

It can publish HTML without it though.

</comment><comment><USER11> You should lose the -project part of the URL, and maybe brush up the UI for the webpage a bit. Other than that, sounds like an awesome app for writers.

</comment><comment><USER12> Would be neat to see braile, voice-menu outputs.

</comment><comment><USER13> I am still searching for the holy grail that allows me to blend markdown and LaTeX.

<comment><USER14> I've had decent sucess with pandoc (<http://johnmacfarlane.net/pandoc/>). MutiMarkdown also allows you to put raw LaTeX inline if you specify the right flags.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Anyone know how this compares to Scrivener?

<comment><USER16> Actually, the more correct question should be, "how to make it work with Scrivener" as I think this project more like command-line build tool (make/ant/sbt) and Scrivener being the IDE. And I'm also interested to know the answer :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Excellent

</comment><comment><USER18> The video makes this seem really awesome, I can't wait to get home and try it. Thanks for sharing.

</comment><comment><USER19> Fantastic - thank you for sharing this!</comment>


Providers of Free MOOC's Now Charge Employers for Access to Student Data - <AUTHOR> http://chronicle.com/article/Providers-of-Free-MOOCs-Now/136117/

<comment><USER2> As the Coursera one is a student opt-in option this looks like a really good idea to me. It sounds like the Udacity one is opt-in too so it sounds completely positive.

</comment><comment><USER3> They want to help me find a job - if I let them. I can live with that.

<comment><USER4> I'm curious, would you opt in if it meant mining through your minute by minute click history?

if you're hiring, you can get alot more data about the udacity student you're hiring than you can about the U Phoenix student, or the Big State U student

with U Phoenix student, or the Big State U, you get a list of classes taken and a letter grade earned

with Udacity you could get that, plus a detailed click history, do they do things early? do they wait until the last minute for everything? do they stick to a set schedule? do they comment in class forums?

there is alot more data that can be mined to predict successful hires

would you be open to opting in to let companies sift through that data?</comment></comment>


Google Maps Pulls Calorie-Counting Feature After Criticism - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/17/technology/google-maps-calories.html <comment><USER2> In the other direction, I'd like to see food labels list "miles" instead of "calories". I'll look at something that's 250 (kilo)calories and say to myself "that's an extra 2.5 miles I have to run" and dissuade myself from eating it.

The amount of energy in even a small amount of food is rather remarkable.

</comment><comment><USER3> Probably someone read Nudge [0] and thought this was a good idea. It would be, if it was optional and also included a variety of choices instead of the cupcakes (beer, hamburgers, oreos)

0: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_(book)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_\(book\))</comment>


A Dell Customer Service Dispute - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/Dell/posts/10206079690990070 <comment><USER2> Facebook comment thread is cute.

Memorializing their intial response before their social media team is paged and freaks out...

We apologize for the inconvenience caused to you. We will take this as a feedback and we will forward it to the relevant team. As per our records, we see that the Escalation team is handling this case and they are the highest point of contact. Please continue to work with them to avoid any confusion. Our team defers to the Escalation team.

-Senthil

As this case has been escalated to the highest authority, we will have limited options to work on it. Apologize as I cannot comment on this but I would still recommend you to contact them as they are the only team who can help you to resolve the issues on your system. -Krishna

</comment><comment><USER3> There's one missing piece in the story here:

 _I told him if [returning the laptop again is] the best solution that he can provide (customer care is not an iterative process), I would have no option but to pursue this through my university 's legal department._

So what was the best solution that the complainer wanted? It seems like a replacement would have been a pretty reasonable thing to ask for at this point.

This, on the other hand, from one of the complainant's Facebook replies: _In that case, please give me all the details of Prawin K from Dells Bangalore office so that I can sue him in India and the US._

Pro tip from someone running a support team: threatening legal action is usually a surefire way to cause your support case to screech to a grinding halt, since this requires that lawyers get called in and support engineers have to stop work until they've done their due diligence. What's more, the result of that due diligence may be "we'd prefer not to have you as a customer anymore, kthxbai".

Then again, this buffoon on Dell's side clearly hasn't received that particular memo: _He simply told me that Dell was a very big company and had ample resources to outlast me and my university in a legal battle._ Facepalm.

<comment><USER4> For sure, I think the "complainer" here didn't handle things perfectly, but I am prepared to give him a lot of leeway considering what he has endured so far.

The fact that the issue persisted after the out-of-pocket repair, makes it obvious that the original product was defective. I know if I paid the price of laptop, was told it was my fault (when it wasn't), paid the price of a repair that didn't fix the issue, and was without the laptop for 60 days, I would be seeing red and probably prone to making belligerent statements.

After bungling so badly, Dell should be tripping over themselves to offer him a refund.

<comment><USER5> I know that I that I did not handle this properly.

But I desperately needed this laptop working since I had two computational projects that were up for review.

What Dell does not understand is that for each trip my laptop takes to the depot, I am left without a laptop (these 2 months, for example). They said that this was not their problem, and compensating me for these hassles is not their headache.

<comment><USER6> I ask this only because I'm generously curious, and not out of any malice: has this incident caused you to reconsider Dell products and perhaps look at other manufacturers who might have handled this better, like Lenovo or Apple?

<comment><USER5> I will never buy anything branded with Dell, be it a laptop, monitor or even a mouse.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Dell's focus on selling cheaper laptops has resulted in treating the consumer as fungible; and that's the reason for their absolutely appalling customer service.

You're starting to see this across industries where their products and services are commoditized. Quite surprisingly, when the service / product turns into a commodity (due to competition), so does the customer (due to budgetary constraints)

<comment><USER8> I understand why this school bought the laptops they did, but I have to point out: The support costs of the requested help for these laptops outweigh the actual laptops themselves value, and certainly Dell's profit in it. Cheap laptops include cheap support.

If the school had purchased business-line PCs which are more suited to large organization use, they'd likely A. have gotten much better laptops, and B. gotten drastically better, on-site next day repairs.

But that costs about five times what they paid. So while I acknowledge, this situation sucks for the school, I kinda feel like we need to point out that they got what they paid for.

<comment><USER9> Just wondering: would refurbished core-duo Thinkpads with something like neverware's ChromeOS on them be a better way forward for a cash strapped school?

Cheap to buy, the machines have survived N years so by a Darwinian process any clunkers have been removed from the pool and they are built to a decent standard to start with. ChromeOS would imply cloud storage so students don't lose work &c. Depends on the use cases I imagine.

<comment><USER8> Plausibly. An aged Dell Latitude or Thinkpad today still works great, and has as much power as the sort of cheap hardware they bought.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Reading the separate petition about the same support rep that's linked from there[1], the corporate nonsense is worse even that what's described in the Facebook post.

[1] [https://www.change.org/p/prawin-k-dell-com-dell-computers- fi...](https://www.change.org/p/prawin-k-dell-com-dell-computers-fix-38-of- our-school-laptops-you-sold-us-15f5ede6-6a6e-447d-ace7-2e022e9957cf)

<comment><USER11> Seems like these are different situations under the same support rep. I feel bad for the rep honestly, they're probably not allowed to do any more and I wouldn't be surprised if they ended up taking the fall for this.

<comment><USER12> Support reps are always allowed to do more. There's always a path of escalation that ends at the CEO. If a Dell-partnered senior exec (like from Fry's or Best Buy) was having a terrible customer support experience trying to RMA their Dell device, you can bet that if it didn't get resolved ASAP that there'd be a Dell exec personally flying out a new device and repairing their business ties in-person.

It just sucks for us little guys, because the only way to apply the same pressure is with publicity.

<comment><USER11> True that the path exists, not that they're supposed to use it for some guy trying to get his laptop fixed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I work for one of the largest PR companies in the world (we are in the EU, where customer protection laws are kinda okay, too) and as a rule of thumb they buy Dell when it comes to PCs, don't ask me why!). When I was employed, I chose to go with a Mac and my manager had his old HP replaced with an XPS 15 at the same time. We all got brand new machines, but his XPS bit the dust within 2 weeks, so he sent it back to IT. We have premium enterprise support from Dell. They took 3 weeks to send a deffective machine back, which got returned instantly. Not sure if they eventually replaced it or not because after another 3 weeks of waiting IT just told him to pick another Dell. He went with a Mac instead.

Thought I'd share this with you to underline how bad their support is on every level.

<comment><USER14> I run both Dell and Mac systems in my office too and my Dells regularly outperform and outlast my Macs. Not only that, but Dell offers premium support and they actually come onsite. Apple would rather waste your time so they can make their store look busy, which is the same reason why they space their stores so far apart.

Furthermore, Apple engineers just about everything to polarize you against the vast, vast majority which run Windows and Android. They also have an severely anemic selection of hardware that they are always using to experiment on how to get most of your money without providing any value.

In short, I'm sharing this with you to underline how shitty Apple is to their customers in every area, including support.

<comment><USER15> While I agree getting support from Apple in-store can currently require multiple trips, hours waiting for an appointment and potentially $800 or more to replace a motherboard everything's stuck to, there are alternatives, including AppleCare, which allows for phone support from the US, a very easy escalation process to senior support and managers, and again with AppleCare, if urgent, you can get service from local authorised repair centres (not Apple Stores) where Apple foots the bill. Apple will even pay for an on-site visit if your computer is less portable, like an iMac. And AppleCare covers select accessories from Apple purchased for use with your Mac, but that's less relevant as Apple exits the networking and display business. Frankly that's my main concern about buying an LG display, will I get Apple-like support and repair?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'm very sympathetic to the plight of this school, however I'm also very concerned as to the emerging trend of 'customer service only to those who have the ability to make a PR issue of it'.

My advice: Just buy a $5 usb wifi for each of these computers.

<comment><USER17> > I'm also very concerned as to the emerging trend of 'customer service only > to those who have the ability to make a PR issue of it'.

Established companies are looking at these "new-fangled startups" and how the newer companies don't have expenses for cost centers like "inbound call queues" and "customer service" and managers at the older ones are thinking, "hey, how can we cut those costs, too?"

If customer service is made so difficult to obtain as to be nearly impossible to receive except under the most outlying of circumstances, surely the companies in question will go out of business...or become Google.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I thought it is generally known that Dell customer support has been rated appalling for the last dozen years or so. People keep buying products manufactured by this company at budget prices. By now they should know what they buy: a lottery ticket.

<comment><USER19> Can only have got worse since the EMC merger.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Back in 2008, I had an XPS M1330 with an Nvidia 8400M GS. Now, if you guys remember this, it was the infamous integrated GPU which it would fail after some heat/cool cycle because the BGA would crack or some such rubbish. I was covered under warranty when I first bought it, but as soon as I exited the period, they clammed up. It was comical - the thing came with a built-in expiry date! Eventually, of course, they caved and extended the warranty on the motherboard to 1 year longer for everyone who bought that. But before that, man, they denied everything.

<comment><USER21> I had that Nvidia card replaced 3 times. Each time an 'expert' came to my home and replaced the motherboard in front of me.

Each time I had it replaced apparently it extended the warranty for 1 more year.

The laptop scorched a mark in my table.

The charger exploded and scorched my carpet. They wouldn't exchange it until I told them I would send my bill for the carpet as well....

I didn't buy a Dell again for 8 years...wonder what is going to happen with this one.

<comment><USER22> In EU the warranty resets for the component that is replaced. Of course there are many times the seller/manufacturer will try to present it in a different way and you might have to contact the chamber of commerce or even a lawyer but the EU law is there for the consumer to use.

<comment><USER23> > In EU the warranty resets for the component that is replaced.

Do you happen to have a link stating this?

I only found [http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guar...](http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guarantees- returns/faq/index_en.htm) but it doesn't say exactly what you say.

<comment><USER22> You might have a point here because there is the general direction for 2+ years of guarantee and then each country in its legislation can provide even more benefits like this one. For example if you check here

[http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guar...](http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guarantees- returns/czech-republic/index_en.htm)

Per country you'll see that eg. Germany and Greece reset the warranty period after repair/part exchange but Czech Republic and UK don't. As I come from a country that does reset the warranty period I wrongly assumed it is part of the EU regulation.

Bottom line some countries respect the consumer more :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I've had experience with Dell, but it was a nice one. I'm from the UK, so not sure if the service is better than the US counterpart of I just got lucky.

Like an idiot, I bought a cheap 3D printer called OneUp, built it, plugged it into the laptop and blew the laptop up. The 3D printer company both refused responsibility for printer replacement and laptop replacement despite somehow putting 240V onto the USB like due to bad circuit design.

Last port of call was to contact Dell for advice how to fix it, who then informed me it's still in warranty (bought the laptop from eBay so had no idea).

Sent it away, got it back and the parts sheet mentioned that they replaced everything in it. Everything. They gave me a brand new laptop inside it's slightly older chasis!

<comment><USER25> I had the same around 8 years ago. My girlfriend spilt Coke on her laptop, and half the keys stopped working. They sent a guy to repair it (for a £300 laptop with standard warranty) he said "looked like someone spilt Coke on it", and proceeded with the replacement. I didn't get any charges for the repair even though it was obviously accidental damage.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Dell's customer service is terrible. I had my harddrive die. My laptop was still under warranty, so I decided call Dell to get it fixed. After about 4 hours, I was able to get someone to start working on my case (I was transferred between departments 5 times, and only got someone to deal with the issue after I insisted that the previous person stay on the line until I did).

We than spent the next hour diagnosing the fact that it was, in fact, a broken harddrive. Although I told them this from the start, I can understand them wanting to verify this, but the we had found what seemed to be enough evidence that it was a broken HDD within the first 10 minutes, then just ran around in circles (I assume looking for a scripted error code that never showed up for some reason).

Once we were done, they agreed to send me a replacement drive, and I asked if it would be possible to upgrade the drive and pay for the difference. They then spent about half an hour looking up what HDD options were available. Once I decided which one I wanted, I was informed that I would be paying for the full price of the drive (but they could still send it instead of the free, non upgraded, one I was entitled to by warranty). I declined and asked for the free one.

Once that was done, as we were finalizing the shipping details, I was informed that I would need to send back my broken drive, which I was not willing to do. Eventually I agreed to just pay for a new drive (in retrospect, I should have hung up and bought the drive from another source). They sent me a drive and told me I would be receiving a bill.

The bill never came. Two weeks later, I called them again and spent another two hours trying to pay; before being told that I cannot pay because I have not been billed yet because I had not yet failed to return my broken drive in time. About a month after that, I get a voicemail from them about my failure to return my drive.

I try to call back, but due to ( I presume) time zone differences I never managed to reach them during office hours, so I just got to voice mail where I had to leave a message asking them to call me back. Despite this, I still had to wait through about half an hour of holding to get a line to the voicemail. After going through this dance a few times, I just asked them to email me the bill, after which point I payed them the $70 for the hard drive.

<comment><USER27> I have to be honest, quite a bit of this seems reasonable in Dell's part -- I would expect a like for like swap, and to have to give back the broken part, else the possibility for fraud is too high.

<comment><USER28> Well, logitech is very different in this case. Couple years ago my trackball got broken and i was a fan of trackballs, but they started to disappear from shops. Then i just emailed them that my device broken and they immediately send me a replacement, they even didn't ask about check or any warranty proof.

<comment><USER29> Same happened to me. I have an unreasonable loyalty to Logitech not just because their product are decent but because their customer service is great.

The only other company to come close is Sandisk, who once sent me an upgraded version of my mp3 player when my head phone jack broke

<comment><USER30> MSI sent me 5 out of warranty mobo's during the 'great capacitor plague'[0]. Never before or since have I had anything that close to painless doing warranty work.

[0]

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> It's very strange how far Dell's support has slid

The first machine I bought from Dell (A Studio XPS 1640) I wound up breaking the charger on during a flight to the US (I lived in Australia at the time)

I called Dell's support at 4:55 PM (they closed at 5:00, I'd literally just gotten home)

The agent immediately booked me a tech for 8:00 AM the very next day! said tech arrived promptly at 8:00 and also "as per policy" as he stated, came with literally every single part to my laptop, he could've built an identical replacement right there on the dining room table!

This initial impression of Dell lead me to purchase a machine of theirs again, an Alienware M17xR2

Unfortunately upon even first booting the machine, it immediately began to display issues. Connecting or disconnecting the AC adapter would freeze the machine (even at the login prompt). Running it on battery it'd freeze after a few minutes, even idle on a desktop

Dell took the unit back, then returned it after about two days. Unit still defective!

I shipped the unit back AGAIN for repairs. After two weeks, the unit was returned!...with no hard drives or battery

AGAIN I sent the unit off, Dell then helpfully informed me it'd be 45 days(!) until I received the unit back, due to a "shortage of parts"

After about 60 days I received the unit back again. The unit did indeed have the hard drives and battery inserted this time however.

Though when I went to turn on the unit, there was no operating system installed. Upon calling Dell, one of their (seemingly endless) Indian support agents helpfully offered to send me an install CD...For $180 (AUD)

How is a company able to continually be simply this incompetent, without collapsing under its own weight?

</comment><comment><USER26> At what point does this rise to making the "warranty" Dell offers rise to the level of fraud?

</comment><comment><USER12> This is absolutely horrendous. Dell is continuously denying the customer from escalating their case. Probably because this customer isn't a VIP partner like a BestBuy executive. Anecdotally, customer support escalations for individuals such as those can go all the way up to the CEO. There's definitely someone higher that could handle the case. But this level of strict-adherence-to- policy without escalating internally is an awful sight to see:

 _They are highest level of escalation team at Dell and we cannot supersede their decision._

 _As per our records, we see that the Escalation team is handling this case and they are the highest point of contact._

 _ARG and the executive escalation team that you are mentioning are the same and they are the highest level of contact at Dell._

 _As this case has been escalated to the highest authority, we will have limited options to work on it._

<comment><AUTHOR> Exactly, that's my friend who's suffering, he bieng a US buyer, I'm pretty sure that there will be a local customer support team who can help him.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Wait. 38 computers have the same problem, and Dell is saying it's customer induced?

<comment><USER33> I think that the problem outlined in the Facebook post (laptop display does not work, Dell and customer disagree about whether customer damaged the unit) is unrelated to the problem mentioned at the very end of the Facebook post (change.org petition about a Canadian school which bought a lot of Dell devices, each of which had a problem, and was told to file 1 work order per device in order to get the units serviced).

I think the only connection between the two cases is that the escalated customer service complaint was handled by the same Dell employee working in their escalations department.

This confused me too -- after I read the story in the Facebook post I followed the link at the end and struggled to understand how the two were related. I think this customer is saying in their Facebook post that they think they are not the only customer who has had an unpleasant interaction with this CS agent.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Public shaming to get better service... I guess it works at first, but seems like it doesn't scale.

<comment><USER5> This was the only option left.

I could think of nothing else. Reasoning with and threatening customer care (or customer harassment?) failed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> This is pathetic. I cannot imagine how horrible it would be for that person. I was considering buying a dell next. Looks like I have to stick to a mac again!

<comment><USER36> Get a ThinkPad

<comment><USER35> ah yeah. Thanks for the good suggestion. Thats a decent one. Will check it out.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I do admit in this case Dell has messed up a lot. But for heaven's sake, why does a school buy Inspiron? Here in Europe, we buy Dell latitude - thru Dell Education Portal. I got 2 harddrives for my group with 10 machines in the University - next business day. No waiting with my express code. These days I recommend Latitude even for my friends and family (unless they want OSX).

<comment><USER26> Does Dell offer different customer support for Latitudes than it does for Inspirons? I collected on my warranty for a broken harddrive on my Latitude laptop and also had a terrible time with their support.

If you are just going through the common path of buying their product, it is not surprising that they offer a painless experience. The problem comes when something goes wrong and you need support.

<comment><USER38> Dell offers different warranties depending on the channel you use to buy. I always buy through the small business section and buy next business day service. It's far less of a hassle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> This sort of thing is why I no longer buy Dell.

<comment><USER40> And what do you buy?

<comment><USER41> I've moved years ago from Dell to Lenovo. And specifically to professional models which come with onsite warranty.

The onsite warranty is of course very good thing on its own, but I also believe it puts pressure on the vendor to focus on quality and getting issues sorted out quickly (because doing onsite visits is not cheap). It also indicates the computer is built in a way I can also replace parts, because you can't field service a machine that has been glued together.

<comment><USER42> And what about the backslash from Lenovo SSL hijack from some months ago ?

It really looks like there are no pro or business solution, just a more expensive variant of `pick your poison`.

<comment><USER43> What about Dell's SSL cert debacle? It's not much better.

[https://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/870761](https://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/870761)

Only way to escape the issues is to remove the bloated OEM OS that vendors provide and do a clean OS install (e.g. Linux)

<comment><USER42> Pfff. I missed that one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Looks like complaints from personal buyers.

I always thought that Dell was for "entreprisey-clients only". If you try to get one for yourself as an individual, you're on your own.

That seems confirmed.

</comment><comment><USER5> I am the OP of the Facebook post. I just wanted to clarify some points:

1\. The dept that I have dealt with is called the Advanced Resolution Group (ARG). No one from basic customer care or tech support or out-of-warranty- repairs has heard of them. So far, I know of only one person in ARG, Prawin K. He first told me that he had no manager. When I spoke to a supervisor from tech support, she told me that she will speak to Prawin's manager. When I pointed this out, and told him that he had lied, he said "You are assuming too many things. I did not lie because my manager does not take calls and I AM the HIGHEST point of contact". Since I had complained to BBB, he told me that no matter who I complained to, it will all circle back and I will end up dealing with him each time. Repeated to pleas to get my case tranferred have fallen on deaf ears.

2\. The tech support initially (read, October) ran diagnostics on my laptop using remote access. They said that it seemed to be a software issue. After the laptop reached the depot, I was told that it is possible that someone spilled something on my laptop when I was not around, and so the damage is customer induced. I was asked to pay 450$ for the repairs (motherboard, keyboard, mousepad). I could not pay such money upfront (I paid only 800$ for the laptop) since I felt that it was a lot for repairing a 1 year old laptop. They sent me my laptop unrepaired.

3\. After reasoning with them I was asked to pay $350 for the repairs. The out-of-warranty dept was frank enough to tell me that the replacement parts will be refurbished ones, but the seal will be broken by the techician in the depot.

4\. After paying for the repairs, I was told that I will receive the shipping box within 1-2 business days (email proof). It took them 11 days. First due to delays because of the weekend, and then for some reason they wanted to verify my address to mail me an empty box.

5\. After getting the laptop back, it still has the existing issues in addition to the old one (screen becomes white along the edges). The only way to get rid of it is it keep tilting the laptop. The way I look at it there are three possilbilties : the replacement parts are faulty, the laptop itself has issues that they are unwilling to accept, the technician screwed up and did not check my system before shipping it back, all of are Dell's mistakes.

6\. I finally got fed up and asked for a refund. I gave them 4 options: Refund 1200$ so that I can take my business elsewhere Refund the out of warranty repair charge so that I can recover at least some money and rest peacefully Give me a replacement system of equivalent cost (i undestand the problem of depreciation of cost) Give me an extension on warranty on the replaced parts (it only has 90 day warranty). Since the parts failed in less than 2 hours, I find it impossible to believe that the next set will last as long. I do not want to end up going through this cycle after 3 months, again.

7\. I have been told that this beyond the ability of the onsite engineer and the only way is to send the laptop to their depot again.

</comment><comment><USER45> Did someone change the link? This originally pointed to: [https://www.facebook.com/Dell/posts/10206079690990070](https://www.facebook.com/Dell/posts/10206079690990070), but it now points to the change.org petition referred to at the end of the aforementioned FB post.

<comment><USER19> Someone switched it then switched it back and changed the title. Mods on HN aren't doing a great job lately :(

<comment><USER10> Didn't quite switch it back properly, it's the mobile link now.

<comment><USER19> Thanks, I was probably a might harsh.

<comment><USER10> Looks like they've fixed it, it's the original non-mobile link again now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Oh, I had massively confused expectations because of the title of "Dell's customer care is forcing a US customer to deal with a rude support exec".

Apparently "support exec" is euphemism I hadn't heard for support tech, and not an executive position. And "rude" is more of "completely unhelpful".

So yes, this sucks, but I thought something surprising was happening; it's not.

</comment><comment><USER19> Not sure what happened to the original post, but it can be found here:

[https://m.facebook.com/Dell/posts/10206079690990070](https://m.facebook.com/Dell/posts/10206079690990070)</comment>


Is Math a Young Man's Game? No - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/id/2082960/

<comment><USER2> >What's changed? For one thing, there's simply much more mathematics to learn than there was 100 years ago.

Also, our early education is excruciatingly slow. It would be interesting to follow the children who are allowed to skip through the system at their own pace and see if their period of mathematical creativity still begins later than before.

<comment><USER3> Early education is slow for a tiny minority of people. You can't change the system to suit the _most priviledged_. That's a fast track towards creating a two-tier society.

If a child is so clever, he can read books himself and he can skip grades. But if a child is lagging behind, he requires help from others.

<comment><USER2> Why are colleges able to cater to people of all abilities whereas our early education can not?

It is a fallacy to think that we must have one system for everybody.

<comment><USER4> Because colleges select applicants by aptitude, and elementary schools by proximity.

<comment><USER2> What accounts for the difference here? Why can't K-12 institutions select by aptitude?

<comment><USER4> Because you can't pack enough different institutions within a sufficiently small radius.

Parents want 5 year olds to live at home. They're ok with 18 year olds not.

<comment><USER2> Most people live within range of a few different schools. Why are they all the same?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Interesting article, but it does not prove the assertion in the title.

Grigori Perelman was already exceptional in his teens.

If one does not get the basics(meaning calculus, linear, discrete math) down pat by 20, IMHO, one doesn't have much of a chance at serious math discoveries by later age.

</comment><comment><USER6> There are athletes who are great into their late 30s too, but it's still a young man's game. The article doesn't support the title.

</comment><comment><USER7> _It is by logic we prove, it is by intuition that we invent. — Henri Poincare_

[to the tiny minority of fellow 40+ HWers] Intuition comes from being open to it, which comes from doing new things. I'm sure that as we get older, there is some decrease in mental flexibility and energy - but a big part of it is a choice to be less daring, less open.

By analogy: it seems inevitable that old age means loss of bone density. But a study gave some menopausal women weight training - yielding dramatic (50%) increase in bone density. Use it or lose it.

</comment><comment><USER8> This is wonderfully well-written.</comment>


Verizon to stop honoring FCC restriction, start SIM-locking phones - <AUTHOR> https://www.androidpolice.com/2018/02/12/verizon-stop-honoring-fcc-restriction-not-sim-locking-phones-nothing-matters-anymore/ <comment><USER2> See: the FCC's commitment to deregulation has already unleashed innovation in the phone sector!

</comment><comment><USER3> So... Folks love t mobile. Better get out of Verizon while you still can.

</comment><comment><USER4> >complete and utter bullshit

Why must one drop that word choice?

<comment><USER5> Well it's pretty fucked up.</comment></comment>


In Praise of Online Obscurity - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/01/st_thompson_obscurity/

<comment><USER2> "People who suddenly find themselves with really huge audiences often start writing more cautiously, like politicians."

This happens way to much, and it causes an echo-chamber of mediocre ideas to be propagated across the web. This is why I don't always trust the wisdom of crowds. Just because 10,000 retweeted an article, doesn't make it interesting. The same goes if X thousand people bought a book. But they'll get exposure, and more reads/sales.

Another area where the "wisdom of crowds" can perform poorly is in democracy, for example where a majority takes rights away from some other minority.

<comment><USER3> I've been accutely aware of this as my reader base has expanded over the last several months to several thousand readers and 10s of thousands of page views. My goal is to stay honest and still be willing to make a fool of myself.

The main difference now, as I prepare myself and my writing to share things I find uncomfortable to share, is that I'm aware that it's possible that my grandmother will see it.

My strategy in dealing with that isn't to be more cautious. Instead, it's to level with my grandmother. Because of the strange dynamic of the net there are things I'm okay sharing with the anonymous masses that I'd be pretty upset if my grandmother or my kids found out. So I'm going through the process of making sure my grandmother and kids know everything there is to know.

That's scary and difficult. But in the end, I think it's positive.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> " . . . in democracy, for example where a majority takes rights away from some other minority."

That's the Tyranny of the Majority. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority>

</comment><comment><USER5> A very interesting problem. How do we solve it?

<comment><USER6> One way is to do more of your discussion in less-networked communities, and think of ways to support them. If you chat in an IRC channel with 50 regulars, the chances that you'll suddenly become a celebrity with 5000 people lurking in that channel to hear your next word are pretty close to zero. Same with posting in most forums.

I'm not sure IRC or webforums in particular are the future---to a certain extent they're canonical 90s and early 2000s past---but I think looking back towards communities and away from everyone-networked-into-one-huge-community- the-size-of-the-internet might be the way to go.</comment></comment>


Tee-Ball - <AUTHOR> https://blog.cjeller.site/tee-ball <comment><USER2> The list of crap to consider when deploying code is disgusting: Do you ship a single binary or do you copy a boat load of language files over? Do you use your languages special packaging tool or do you use something like rpm? How do you handle dependency conflicts? Where on the box do you store your files? What should the default config look like? How do I populate my prod config? What about app install scripts? Do I use puppet or ansible to manage packages and configs? How do I know if my application stops running? What if it hangs? Should I put my app behind nginx or apache? How do I configure my firewall? What about backups? Is your SSL cert up to date?

<comment><USER3> > The list of crap to consider when deploying code is disgusting

This is why we get paid enough that we can retire in a mere decade.

> Do you ship a single binary or do you copy a boat load of language files > over?

Rust or Go? Single binary. But you should ship containers regardless of language and just not care.

> Do you use your languages special packaging tool or do you use something > like rpm?

DO NOT USE THE HOST PACKAGE MANAGER. Version and lock your dependencies. Vendor them. Don't get tangled up in the OS. That'll double the trouble. Then build and ship containers. Don't ever run bare metal unless you want to be tied to it as a design contract.

> How do you handle dependency conflicts?

A monorepo helps tremendously. You seldom deal with dependency issues, and every bump is handled by one person once in most cases. But people tend to hate these for some reason. I happen to think they work even for small orgs.

> Where on the box do you store your files?

Firstly, use containers. But as for where to place them, the homedir or /data is perfect. But it doesn't really matter that much if you make a single choice and stick with it across your apps.

> What should the default config look like?

Like development.

> How do I populate my prod config?

prod = development, but overrides for the prod topology. Perhaps this varies wildly for apps that use many sharded databases. This is the nature of our work.

> What about app install scripts?

Docker / K8S. Don't bake them into the runtime lifecycle if possible.

> Do I use puppet or ansible to manage packages and configs?

Version control your config. You won't have secrets in them.

> How do I know if my application stops running?

Metrics + PagerDuty

> What if it hangs?

Metrics + PagerDuty

> Should I put my app behind nginx or apache?

Rust or Go won't need this. Swift might work too. Ruby and Python, maybe. Sounds like a lot of work. You can launch it as a sidecar or DaemonSet, perhaps. I shy away from scripting languages that need to be load balanced. You're stretching a solution beyond its limits, and there are modern languages and platforms that won't need this.

> How do I configure my firewall?

Envoy, Calico. Default policies to DENY all except what you carve out.

> What about backups?

For your databases, file uploads, and last few weeks of production builds.

> Is your SSL cert up to date?

Monitoring and paging helps here too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Isn't the author just asking for a shared hosting plan? That used to be the default thing that everyone started with. (well, unless you had a shell account with a `public_html` already)

They aren't the trendy new thing, but they're more than adequate for most beginner projects. They work quite well even up to pretty reasonable scale for SPA frontend-focused apps, and "deployment" consists of `scp` or a friendly gui client.

<comment><USER5> repl.it, a YC company, is tee ball for deploying software.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Well most of us older devs had what could be called "Tee-Ball" for software developers. Back in the day it was generally referred to as the home computer. You had multiple kinds, that stressed different priorities - like the Commodore 64, Atari 800 series, Apple II etc. Pick your favorite.

The unifying concept was they were simple machines, with a basic feature set. Came well documented and when you turned them on they dumped you into a BASIC shell.

Everyone typed in something to the effect:

10 print "Hello"

20 goto 10

Run

No compilers, editors, linkers, deployment, security rights. Nothing. Just turn it on and type simple stuff. Screw up the machine -- just power on, power off. Bam - you get to the default stable state to try again. Get into the complexity when you are ready and willing to deal with it. Brilliant.

Kids today don't have that.

</comment><comment><USER7> >There is no assistance like a sticky ball or glove.

Maybe no kids leagues use it, but there are sticky balls and gloves using velcro that are used in informal play, usually in indoor gyms and/or just for little kids playing in the backyard.

</comment><comment><USER8> Let's refactor the posed question to: what natural forces circumstances and history of evolution have led to the current situation?

MS Access (1992) and Visual Basic (1991) could be pitched as a Tee-stand for software. Why didn't they take over? What happened in the 90s? The world wide web. Microsoft was over here playing desktop tee-ball while web technologies ate their lunch.

It takes time to smooth out a software stack, but it keeps getting disrupted every ten years.

<comment><USER9> Well, they did took over when it came to desktop. But in the 2000s the web became popular as a target for applications so their desktop dominance wasn't the only thing that mattered.

However in their niches MS Access and Excel (VB not anymore but that was because Microsoft forcefully killed it, not because the developers that used it decided by themselves to move away from it) are still dominant (in fact so dominant that they overflow from these "niches" \- see how many stories of Excel VBA doing things that weren't "supposed" to be done in Excel).

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Somewhat off topic, but is there any other stick-and-ball game (other than baseball and it's derivatives) where the fielders use a mitt/glove?

The other related sports (including baseball's origin sport 'rounders') all require barehanded fielding (AFAIK), with the occasional exception on a specialist backstop (e.g. the wicket keeper in cricket)

<comment><USER11> The closest I can think of is a trapper, worn by a goalie in hockey. See [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trapper_(ice_hockey)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trapper_\(ice_hockey\))

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> For me, tee-ball was writing C into the Pico text editor, gcc'ing it, and running it.

Pitching and hitting was the first time I ever opened an IDE. Now I know my way around, but the learning curve on firing up VS or Eclipse the first time (can't remember which it was): holy crap.

</comment><comment><USER13> Naive question - What makes deployment more difficult than development?

<comment><USER14> The same thing that makes writing a grade-A essay harder than verbally explaining your idea to the professor. Both require slinging words with meaning, but the stakes are higher for the written paper: it needs to stand on its own and "defend itself".</comment></comment>


Verizon to Stores: Wednesday is a big day (Possible Verizon iPhone/iSlate) - <AUTHOR> http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/01/25/verizon-wireless-to-store-managers-wednesday-is-a-big-day/

<comment><AUTHOR> Additional Info on this: [http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/ATandT- Losing-E...](http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/ATandT-Losing- Exclusive-iPhone-Rights-this-Week-281758/)</comment>


Flow for Windows - <AUTHOR> https://flowtype.org/blog/2016/08/01/Windows-Support.html <comment><USER2> "Flow is a static typechecker for JavaScript"

</comment><comment><USER3> It's been a long time since I programmed in Pascal ;-)</comment>


How To Set Up a Wiki For Family and Business - <AUTHOR> http://tracksuitceo.wordpress.com/2007/06/20/how-to-set-up-a-family-wiki/ <comment><USER2> well that was so intriguing I had to check out his article - it's a good idea he has - I never thought about my family as being the most important collaboration I have going, but it's true. And collaboration software fits. I signed up for the tracksuit site, I want to see how that wiki works out.</comment>


OnlyOffice Community Server: open-source collaboration projects - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/ONLYOFFICE/CommunityServer <comment><USER2> I had a short look at compiling their Desktop Editors. Not only do they not provide any build instructions, but a ticket for it has been unanswered for years. Since they provide binary rpms but no srpms/spec files (which would not only document, but most likely implement a fully automatic build system), I can only conclude this is intentional.

This is a big red flag for anything "open source" for me.

<comment><USER3> You didn't look too well:

[https://github.com/ONLYOFFICE/desktop- apps/tree/master/win-l...](https://github.com/ONLYOFFICE/desktop- apps/tree/master/win-linux/package/linux/rpm)

Hint: github has a find file button

<comment><USER4> These don't look like instructions, unless I'm misunderstanding something.

<comment><USER5> The spec files (also mentioned in the GP post) are what RPM uses to describe how to build the software and then package it into a .rpm file for later installation. This includes things like build and runtime dependencies, along with the actual steps to compile the software. They're not the most human friendly things to work with but they will certainly give all the information needed to build everything.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> One thing that stops me from using OnlyOffice is that it uses MSOffice file format internally. It is wrong idea and using it would only increase amount of .docx/.xlsx files, solidifying grip on the market.

They should have used ODT.

<comment><USER7> Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. An open source way for people to continue to use the formats that are well-used in the business space is inherently better than everyone just using Microsoft Office, which is what everyone will do if Office support isn't good.

<comment><USER6> I agree, that perfect isn't the enemy of good, but this reasoning has led me to a totally different path: I chose to use good old LibreOffice, missing on those sweet collaborative and online features, for the goal of changing the formats that are used in the business space.

<comment><USER7> While Microsoft Office is the default, you have zero chance of changing the formats used in the business space. Full stop.

However, if you can maintain compatibility, by using an Office-format-first option, and win people over to your open software, the idea of using open software and non-standard formats becomes baseline viable.

<comment><USER6> No. I managed to run a business since 2007 without sending out a MSOffice file to a business partner even _once_.

The dependability on MSO file formats is a myth, perpetuated by those who are too intimidated to fight for the right thing against the indifferent majority.

Also. Office-format-first approach is NEVER going to work for alternative products, MS has taken care of it, and will continue to do so.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I've installed this on my home server. It's pretty damn neat. I'm sure the spreadsheets won't win over those that use advanced Excel features, and I had to do weird things because I'm using a residential connection and outgoing SMTP is blocked, but if you want to host anything even resembling an online office suite at your house this works well.

<comment><USER9> Documentation says there is a client/connection limit on the community edition, how is that enforced? Since you have installed it already, I thought you might have checked that already too.

</comment></comment><comment> mickael-kerjean I made an integration with only office a few days ago for my open source project: [https://github.com/mickael- kerjean/filestash](https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash) Got very impressed compared to collabora and libre office online. Thank you for making this!

</comment><comment><USER10> Would be nice to have something like this but for LibreOffice, since the latter has better support for various formats.

<comment><USER11> It exists and is called LibreOffice Online.

<comment><USER12> Link: [https://www.libreoffice.org/download/libreoffice- online/](https://www.libreoffice.org/download/libreoffice-online/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I made a self hosting solution for OnlyOffice but I don't know what to do with it. Seems like a lot more trouble than most people would want though my solution is as simple as selecting some menus and options. What kind of business angle can there be for self hosting your own office suite? Who needs it and who would be willing to part money for a setup tool if it was flawless?

<comment><USER14> I don't know a canonical answer to your question, but one possible idea that comes to mind is making a simple "coming soon" landing page (and domain) with the stereotypical email address box on it, and an extra field to let people say what they'd do with it. Thus you could crowdfund an answer to this question for just the costs of hosting (and the time taken to put the page together).

<comment><USER13> Pretty good idea actually. I think I will try this!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> We had good experience with this on-premise

</comment><comment><USER16> OnlyOffice is awesome.</comment>


Study underscores complexity of geopolitics in the age of the Aztec empire - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/03/150325082719.htm

<comment><USER2> Very interesting, thanks for sharing!</comment>


A Pixel Qi Tablet Spotted In America - <AUTHOR> http://mikecanex.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/a-pixel-qi-tablet-spotted-in-america/

<comment><USER2> Why are you ignoring the Notion Ink Adams? It's not the finest tablet, but it is surely more real than a "non-production tablet on loan".

I bought the Notion Ink more for the intrigue of testing an Android tablet and the Pixel Qi technology. I can't say I recommend it, but it is not so horrible as to be completely ignored.

Also, who knows if ice cream sandwich might finally give it an operating system to properly perform on and give proper value to the fantastic technology they have locked up inside the device.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a non-production tablet that was on loan for Pixel Qi. Mary Lou Jepsen (Pixel Qi founder) spoke at our Books in Browsers conference a couple months ago. We borrowed it to test reading using the archive.org bookreader and took this pic.

The widescreen aspect ratio actually works better than expected. You can display a full page and still have room to display controls below the text without obscuring the page. Also, the Pixel Qi screen outdoors in full sunlight is great for reading!

</comment><comment><USER4> This reminds me of the other big problem with tablets: touch resolution. Until I can use a stylus on a capacitive touch screen accurate to a few pixels, I'm still not ready to completely leave my paper pads behind. When taking notes, writing is still so much better than typing.

It would be even better if you could combine the capacitive touch tech with the other more accurate tech and switch between the two modes, so you can write one the screen with your hand touching it (another pet peeve of using a stylus with a capacitive touch screen).

<comment><USER5> What you describe does exist today.

I've had an Asus EP-121 for about a year now. And I absolutely love it for exactly those properties.

<http://www.asus.com/Eee/Eee_Pad/Eee_Slate_EP121/>

<comment><USER4> Oh wow, that's awesome. Now if they can just combine that with a Pixel Qi screen, it would be just about perfect. Thanks for the heads up!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Pixel Qi has been teasing us for 3 years now. It really makes me angry. Put up or shut up.

</comment><comment><USER5> Any leads on the device ?

I'd love to be able to replace my ageing, worn Nook with one of these.

<comment><USER5> Looks like the same device I was able to find here:

[http://www.phonesreview.co.uk/2011/05/31/apple-ipad- compared...](http://www.phonesreview.co.uk/2011/05/31/apple-ipad-compared-to- pixel-qi-tablet-beats-ios-outside-video/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Device should be named "Waldo".</comment>


My Path to Becoming a Python Core Developer - <AUTHOR> http://emilyemorehouse.com/blog/015-my-path-to-becoming-a-python-core-developer/ <comment><USER2> Great read. It sometimes only takes one or two key conversations to bootstrap but the core message for me was the internal drive was there, latent maybe, but present.

If I had a time machine I'd want to do something like this.</comment>


Early Bird Special $1 for the new kickstarter invention "Intelishake" - <AUTHOR> http://shop.newtonstein.com/products/1

<comment><AUTHOR> We are launching next month on Kickstarter.com, your feedback on our campaign or any comments would be appreciated! [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1593175966/1002071867?t...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1593175966/1002071867?token=56fd5a61)

Back it if you like it, first 100 backers will get the bottle delivered to their door for FREE worldwide. Your support is greatly appreciated in Newtonstein's journey of inventing products that make the world a better place!</comment>


ESP32 WiFi Range Testing – 10km Using Directional Antenna (and MON Mode) - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCLb2eItDyE <comment><USER2> This is similar to what the Wifibroadcast people are doing to make low-cost First-person-video from drones:

[https://befinitiv.wordpress.com/wifibroadcast-analog-like- tr...](https://befinitiv.wordpress.com/wifibroadcast-analog-like-transmission- of-live-video-data/)

</comment><comment><USER3> It's pretty amazing how far you can push standard wifi with line of sight.

<comment><USER4> ..And nothing else competing for the bandwidth</comment></comment>


Serving static files: a comparison between Apache, Nginx, Varnish and G-WAN - <AUTHOR> http://nbonvin.wordpress.com/2011/03/14/apache-vs-nginx-vs-varnish-vs-gwan/

<comment><USER2> What is this G-WAN and how does it manage to serve files so much faster than other servers? I could not find technical docs on its site.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's closed source. You can only download a linux binary for it. There seemed to be some Windows version, but it stopped working (deliberately sabotaged by Microsoft using Windows Update, according to the web site as a retaliation for comparing G-WAN to IIS).</comment>


Ask HN: Shoud I stay or should I go? - <AUTHOR>

I'm working for an Internet start-up who promised land and titles when I initially joined.
Almost a year later, although I have taken the company from strength to strength, when it came to promotions, those with the right surname have seen rapid progression - even though their technical ability is hopeless to say the least!
There is still no sight of the venture capital money which they promised would come over three months ago.
I now have an opportunity to move to a profitable company closer to home - although it is a step backward in my career as I will go back to being a senior developer as opposed to the lead developer which I am now.
Any advice would be appreciated.
Thanks <comment><USER2> My mom thinks I'm Supreme Lord of all Technology, so I would be selling myself short if I got a job as a mere "senior developer", right?

Ignore the job titles and all that. Where will you be happiest? Where will you be challenged and be able to grow, and where will you stagnate and end up with an obsolete skillset in five years? (Hint: you won't be motivated to grow your skills as much if you're already resting at the "top")

I obviously don't know all the details, but if you're even asking this question I'm guessing that you want us all to tell you to break from this place and move on to better things. So I'll suggest you do exactly that.

Go.

</comment><comment><USER3> Is there a difference between Senior Developer and Lead Developer (in your case Lead might mean solo?). VC can sometimes take a long time to work out so I'm not sure we're told enough to know if they are being disingenuous.

But here is the important bit,

"although I have taken the company from strength to strength, when it came to promotions, those with the right surname have seen rapid progression"

Disregarding your mention of discrimination (not relevant to this discussion) you don't feel like you have any upward mobility, and if you don't feel like you have a founder you can talk frankly to about this I think you need to move on.

</comment><comment><USER4> Take the new position. A few thoughts:

1\. yes, it's a 'step back' - but so what? You don't have to stay there forever.

2\. You're obviously not appreciated to the level you want to be where you're at. You can't ever change that.

3\. If you leave and they're really that bad technically, they'll suffer and you can gloat a bit. They may surprise you, either by getting along without you or finding a replacement who they don't have to string along with broken promises and lies.

4\. You will probably be happier simply because you're not dealing with the broken promises. I've been in that situation, and it distracts you from more important things, but is often hard to shake off.

5\. Only _you_ can look out for yourself - no one else, however well- intentioned they may be - will ever really look out for you (certainly not in the long haul).

It sounds like something closer to home with perhaps even a bit less responsibility will allow you to get settled mentally, rethink your career, and give you some more options without being distracted by the atmosphere at your current situation. Maybe I'm reading too much in to it, but that's how I'm reading it.

Good luck.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for the replies, I think the message was clear enough.

I have now accepted the new position and will be handing in my notice.

Thanks again</comment>