Show HN: CleverDeck – I built the spaced repetition app I always wanted - <AUTHOR> http://cleverdeck.com <comment><AUTHOR> Hey HN - a little background, which might be interesting to some. I went through YC twice, the second time with a company called EveryArt. After working on that for two years as a solo founder, I decided to close it down. I moved from San Francisco to Istanbul and started a niche business (actually, just renamed EveryArt, Inc. in fairness to investors) that has done well enough to support me. I started teaching myself objective C in January to eventually build CleverDeck, which was motivated out of dissatisfaction with the available spaced repetition apps available (Anki, Memrise, etc.) I'll be hanging around if you have any questions. Thanks!

<comment><USER3> What especially were you dissatisfied with using Anki and Memrise? And how do CleverDeck do them better?

<comment><USER4> My main beef with Anki is the developer's unwillingness to open up the API. Card creation is currently a pretty unpleasant experience, but I can't currently build a browser extension without doing a lot of hacky bullshit because the the developer won't expose any public endpoints.

<comment><USER5> AnkiMobile developer here. Are you referring to the mobile app or the desktop app? Because the desktop has API endpoints you can hook into with extensions [0]. If you're talking about the mobile app, I believe we originally decided not to provide an extension API because Apple forbids it.

[0]: [http://ankisrs.net/docs/addons.html](http://ankisrs.net/docs/addons.html)

<comment><USER4> I am talking about a REST API that hooks into your AnkiWeb infrastructure. I believe I asked about this in one of the google groups and was told you aren't interested in doing that because of the additional load it could put on the service. I would love to put together something like the Evernote webclipper for creating cards right here in the browser without doing this awkward alt+tab+click+click+click+etc dance to create cards on the desktop client. I admire the work you and others have done on Anki and its extensions, but if I'm going to use Anki as my primary learning tool it needs to be delightful and effortless to create/delete cards as needed.

<comment><USER5> Ah OK, in that case I can see both sides. From Damien's perspective, AnkiWeb is a free service, so development/support time and server load have to be considered for any new feature. From the user perspective, web clipping tools would be really nice.

Is there anything to prevent interacting between the desktop app API and a web clipping browser plugin, in the same way that the Zotero connector plugin does with the Zotero app API for example?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Nice UI. I would love if you add a "Advanced English" deck. I have a 11 years old vocabluary (according to some online test I forgot the name).

There is a place for people learning english as a second language where you know enough to be able to communicate, but you don't have a good enough vocabulary to express more sophisticated ideas, or express simple ideas more elegantly. I am at this place and I am sure there are lots of others here.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, when talking about the language learning market, English is the whale. We're going to get there as fast a possible, but it means we'll have to be prepared for everything that comes with having non-English speaking customers.

Though, having an Advanced English deck - so people have good enough English to tell us all the problems we have - sounds like a terrific way to start :)

<comment><USER7> As a non-native English speaker myself, I agree with GP. I have a bunch "English Vocabulary in Use" books of various levels which I almost never open because, you know, it's hard to carry it around with you.

$14.99 seems to be a right price, too.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Looks and works really, really nicely. I am currently in the midst of cramming Spanish (trip to Barcelona in two weeks, trip to Cuba in four months, woo hoo!) and I've been using these two trips as a motivation to finally learn the Spanish I've always wanted to know.

I've been using Duolingo a lot, as well as Memrise. Memrise has been quite good so far, but it is certainly not very polished, whereas this seems extremely well-done.

Congratulations on the launch, this looks like a superb product and if it works for me I'd be happy to pay for it. That's a clever idea for in-app purchases too, by the way.

<comment><USER9> Hey, I lived in Barcelona throughout March this year and Catalan is the dominant language. I felt (and perhaps I was too self conscious) that when I spoke Spanish they worked out pretty quickly I was English and defaulted back to that.

Either way, learning Spanish is definitely an advantage as there's crossover to Catalan. Hope you have a wicked time :)

<comment><USER8> Well hey now. I can't believe I never came across that piece of advice before, but you're right! I knew that Catalan was spoken but did not realize it was the dominant language.

I guess I better learn some basics...as if I didn't have enough to learn already. ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Everyone seems to be focused on languages but is there something like this for music? Especially instrument specific, for example a card for finger placement?

Would something like that require me custom adding every card? and somehow figuring out how to get pictures/symbols on the cards instead of just text? FWIW I don't know how hard that is with existing apps, maybe it's gotten easier.

Sorry if it is a derail.

<comment><USER11> The thing is though that you need to build muscle memory not just memorize the finger placement (thats the easy part)

<comment><USER10> That's a good point. Something I hadn't really thought of.

I had been thinking of this (flashcards/learning) for a while and I ended up buying physical flash cards[1] that I can keep at my desk. At the time though I couldn't tell one note from another and like learning anything it seems impossible and pointless to start (and I'm not THAT old).

I sometimes wish I had the feedback (stats) that the apps have but I have learned and that was the goal.

I will probably end up coming back to this app when there are more languages though.

[1] I had downloaded Anki but got discouraged at the thought of building every single card myself and figuring out how to import it all. I tried to find some online that were premade but with no success I moved on. I don't consider myself lazier than the next person but this kind of made me feel like it.

<comment><USER12> I want to reinforce ThomPete's point. Most of learning a musical instrument is muscle memory. I really don't think flash cards / spaced repetition will help you for learning an instrument. In fact, it seems to me that it could actually make it more difficult for you because you would start to associate notes with visual neural pathways rather than motor pathways. To learn any activity involving muscle memory there's really no substitute for hours of actual practice and quality instruction.

<comment><USER13> Actually, that brings up an interesting question: does muscle memory act like "regular" memory, with a curve of forgetting and with spaced repetition being a viable solution? If it did, then you could adapt at least some of these SR programs to, say, "perform this piece" or "do the following exercise" and learning an instrument might get considerably easier.

<comment><USER14> There's a great deal to performance which is more intellectual than motor, and I'd be very surprised if there were no spacing effect for either aspect.

My experience is that this kind of spaced repetition is dramatically effective. I'm working on an app ([http://pianopracticeassistant.com/](http://pianopracticeassistant.com/)) to manage it, since I found that Anki is a poor fit for the real structure of practice. I started it to help me learn a pretty huge piece (The People United Will Never Be Defeated) with very limited practice time. I've made way more progress in the last six months managing my spacing/interleaving this way than in the six months before that with equally sparing practice.

Like gwern says, there's not a lot of direct evidence on music. I'm not aware of any studies in a laboratory setting that were equipped to directly show realistic spacing effects, as opposed to "non-musicians who played a fifteen- note passage once per day remembered it better." (Gwern links the Stambaugh 2009 study in his overview, which is a good one but which I interpret as more about interleaving than spacing.) But even though there aren't good lab studies, there are good expert case studies (The Practice of Practising has a good set [1]).

Actual real-world effective practice, as done by experts, seems to combine long-term spacing of practice between sessions with massed focused work on subsections within practice sessions. You also see interleaving patterns of section-by-section and integrative practice ("work and runs") in both the long- and short-term. Amateurs on the other hand tend to practice mostly in runs (playing things all the way through), and I'm not sure how much spacing alone can help otherwise ineffective practice.

[1]: The Practice of Practising, a figure showing "work and runs": [http://books.google.com/books?id=IW9wKssw2hsC&lpg=PA9&ots=zg...](http://books.google.com/books?id=IW9wKssw2hsC&lpg=PA9&ots=zgcqrs77Ha&lr&pg=PA14#v=onepage&q&f=false)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> One thing that's unclear in the app description: does the free app come with 3000 words? And then is the $15 purchase is for an additional 3000? That would be amazing!

Are all the words nouns? Or are there verbs/adjectives/adverbs, too?

Is there a way to create a set of flashcards via a file upload? That'd be a wonderful feature!

<comment><AUTHOR> Good questions! The free app (there's only one freemium app, actually), has all 3000 words built-in. We charge based on how many you swipe into your deck (i.e. you decide to actively learn). The app comes with a free deck size of 50, then you can increase that incrementally with in-app purchases.

There is a healthy mix of nouns, verbs, adjective, and adverbs.

There isn't currently anyway to add your own content outside of creating individual cards within the app. It's something that I'd like to get to (if people find the SRS system useful, I'd like people to do whatever they want with it).

<comment><USER16> I was genuinely confused about this too, and am still not 100% sure I get it after your comment. So the deck size means it's 50 concurrent cards, but I can add/remove card sets to my deck as much as I'd like using the free version?

If I remove cards from my deck to make room, does this mean any training on how well I've told it I know those words is lost?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Android version in the pipeline? Should I sign up for email updates?

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah man - one of the things I've learned from my launching my first iOS app is how painful it is to answer this question.

Painful because yes, I would LOVE to. Let's see how people like it on iOS, then I can decide the best way to go about getting it in the pipeline as quickly as possible.

<comment><USER18> I concur with the other post; I would buy this app if there's an android version.

While I understand that porting and maintaining two applications is difficult, you're ignoring half your potential market.

Good luck, I hope to see the droid version soon.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I appreciate the nudge. :)

<comment><USER19> Is there a way for me to be notified if/when the Android app is available?

<comment><AUTHOR> If you sign up on the email form on the front page of cleverdeck.com, I will send something out when we launch an Android version. But that means you'll also be spammed when we launch new languages for iOS. Not ideal - I'll try to add a separate signup somewhere tomorrow.

<comment><USER20> Chrome 37.0.2062.120 m (latest version) for Win7 x64 has some sort of validation problem upon entering a perfectly valid gmail address in that signup field. Hitting subscribe just makes it highlight red. Works in IE though. PS: I'm looking for the android version too! Anki is great but clunky.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I almost hate to ask this question here because this seems like a really nice product, but does anyone know of any similar apps? I ask because I'm learning Polish, a language not yet available on CleverDeck.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll answer!

Check out Anki and Memrise. They, in my opinion, are the best SRS alternatives out there.

<comment><USER22> What's your opinion on Mnemosyne?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Is this a language learning app or a spaced repetition studying app? I'd be interested in something with a smoother UI thank Anki, but that seems to be the established app for med school

<comment><USER24> Have you tried Mnemosyne?

[http://mnemosyne-proj.org/](http://mnemosyne-proj.org/)

It may not have as many features as Anki, but it has a good plugin architecture and the UI is very simple.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Congrats! Amazing job. I'm learning Spanish and I'm a big fan of flash cards. I use FlashCards++ (for words that I add myself), but it's good to have another app that can bring me new vocabulary (I went over all Duolingo and done with it), seems like you have advanced vocabulary which is great. I've used Memrise in the past, but the UI, the offline caching, and the difficulty to know which deck was high quality turned me off. Great job and add Tagalog(Filipino) if you can one day!

</comment><comment><USER26> Great work Justin. As an intermediate/advanced Turkish speaker, I find a lot of value in being able to learn new vocabulary easily and in a manageable way. Thanks for building this.

</comment><comment><USER27> Going through the French deck, I've noticed some errors, especially with gender and homonyms - is there a built-in, effective way to report these kind of problems to the devs?

<comment><AUTHOR> Really? I'm really sorry about that. We checked those lists so many times.

If you can be bothered, please email me at firstname.lastname@example.com and let me know what you found. We'll push an update fixing any errors ASAP.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Does anyone have an idea why I get a McAffee Web Gateway error with:

Alert: This website has a Security Reputation Rating of High Risk URL: [http://cleverdeck.com/](http://cleverdeck.com/) Category: Site Reputation: Medium Risk Code: Reputation Coaching

How is "Reputation coaching" a bad thing? I don't even know what it is but unfortunately I also don't want to risk getting a red flag in the system because I'm trying to find out.

Anyone have any ideas?

<comment><USER29> No, no idea why you're running McAffee Web Gateway, sorry :(

<comment><USER28> I'm browsing from a work computer, and the network has the gateway enabled. I would never do that by choice. But it struck me as weird that they had this site blacklisted.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Looking great, just a small pet peeve, in the coming soon section, above portuguese you have the brazil flag, feels kinda weird being portuguese and seeing that :)

<comment><AUTHOR> I know, I know - I'm sorry. Despite some of the objections, I just think flags _do_ make great language icons. I do understand that complaints, though.

In that particular case, we chose the Brazilian flag because the list and audio is target at Brazilian Portuguese. We should probably explicitly write "Brazilian."

Interestingly, we couldn't find a flag icon for Arabic that was neutral enough. So we just chose the green color from the Arab League flag (which I guess could itself be controversial) and wrote "Arabic" in white text.

<comment><USER31> I would write "Portuguese (Brazil)" rather than Brazilian, similar to how you often see "English (US)" or "English (UK)". If I saw "Brazilian" my first thought would be "whoever wrote this doesn't know that Brazil speaks Portuguese".

<comment><AUTHOR> Haha, right - I was thinking "Brazilian Portuguese."

Though, we will be launching Mexican and Canadian soon as well!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> This is amazing. I've been using Anki for a few years now and have been looking for a better app. Congratulations. I can't wait to use it.

</comment><comment><USER33> You won me over immediately with the fox in a lab coat

</comment><comment><USER34> Thanks so much for building this! Just purchased the full 3k Spanish deck. You've saved me a ton of time vs. my plan of writing a script to build my own Anki decks.

One question: is there a recommendation on whether to go with English-first or target-language-first when studying? I prefer to go with Spanish-first, but I don't know if there's any data on which is more effective. Thanks again!

<comment><AUTHOR> You're welcome! :)

In building this app, we didn't survey the research addressing that question specifically (though googling "L1 vs L2 flashcards" pulls up some interesting sites).

For me personally, speaking from 15+ years learning French, Chinese, and Turkish, it's native --> target. Learning that way helps me recall faster when I need to construct my own sentences. If you're looking just to learn to read, I think target --> native is easier and might be a better approach.

I've also had success starting with native --> target to familiarize myself with the word, then quickly switching to target --> native to solidify my ability to produce it on my own.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, switch native-->target and target-->native in my last paragraph.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Would love this on Android. Currently I use Duolingo, which is great, but many of the words they teach seem irrelevant for common conversation.

</comment><comment><USER36> I'm desperate to find this kind of app for Chinese. Stuff like Duolingo and the like are all great, but no Chinese :(

But good job, this app looks great!

<comment><USER37> Check out Skritter, it's for-pay spaced repetition which also has you practice writing the characters. (Also has Japanese)

Edit: oh yeah, they were previously turned down by YC and then accepted by YC, or something. Don't know the details.

<comment><USER38> Hadn't heard of them being turned down, but they were accepted for their new project, CodeCombat. ([http://codecombat.com/](http://codecombat.com/))

<comment><USER37> Whoops, yeah that's all I'm thinking of.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Really great apps just downloaded them all. I've picked up turkish from my wife but it's still great to get more practice. Only suggestion is the right- ward swipe on cards to dismiss them as well-known should trigger earlier - <USER2> find myself having to swipe further than I feel I need to in order to dismiss the card. Otherwise great work & thanks for sharing

</comment><comment><USER40> Really nice work! I don't know about the market but given I'm about to go to Paris it's here just in time for me to bone up on my french! I like the 'learn a little everyday' approach, and I found even putting those cards back not only easy from a UX perspective but effective in that I had already forgotten 'drapeau'!

</comment><comment><USER41> I think you should consider adding a newsletter sign-up form to the website. I would love to use this for Japanese, but there is no way to 'subscribe' to your apps. (You've posted a link to your blog below, so I think I'll just add it to my RSS reader, but I wouldn't have found it without the HN comments.)

</comment><comment><USER42> Awesome, I signed up to be notified of new languages. But the field border just turned green. Does that mean it went through?

Looking at the network it seems the return value was success, but it says "We'll just need to confirm your email address".

Shouldn't there be some text or something besides a green border?

Either way this looks awesome...

<comment><AUTHOR> Shoot - I knew this was going to happen. Sorry about that. I'll go take a look.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> As someone trying to use SR to learn new things, I'm always tempted to build my own software. Congrats for doing it!

The one gripe I have--about this and every other SRS--is that it seems geared ONLY for language learning. While SRS works very well for that, I suspect it works well for much more than that.

</comment><comment><USER44> I can't install it right now as I am upgrading to iOS 8 but why is the app free and the 3000+ cards mentioned in the description cost $15?

Is it because the App store doesn't support any form of trial? It may be unfair, but I always feel like I am being tricked when a purchase is set up this way?

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh no, I really hope it doesn't give that impression. I'm open to suggestions on how to avoid that perception.

It's freemium. You can download the full-featured app with a deck size of 50 (also enough to learn just enough words for a short trip for free). If you like it, you can add different increments to the total deck size through in- app purchases: 99 cents for +100, up to 14.99 for 3000.

Didn't mean to be tricky. I thought this was a good way to price it so everyone could try it, tourists could get what they needed for free, and every gradient of language learner could only pay for the amount they needed.

<comment><USER44> Thank you for taking the time to reply. I apologize if my comment was rude or insensitive. It looks really nicely done and I can't wait to try it once the iOS 8 install has finished breaking my phone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Looks good. Any plans on allowing custom decks (for stuff other than learning langauges)?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, definitely. Learning languages seems to be the largest use-case for spaced repetition apps, so building in lots of good content for language learning seemed like a smart way to differentiate and target ourselves at first. One of the biggest annoyances I had using the others was how much time I spent building my own decks - when, really, I just wanted to learn common, useful words. It's true that some apps include user-created content you can share, but the quality was pretty hit or miss - and usually didn't come with pre-associated images, sound, and example sentences.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> How did you decide on the vocabulary list and where did you get the example sentences?

<comment><AUTHOR> We wrote in detail about how we picked the words here: [http://cleverdeck.com/blog](http://cleverdeck.com/blog).

Most of the example sentences were hand-picked from tatoeba.org. That covered about 2700 of the words - our teachers wrote the remaining 300 or so.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> How does this compare to Anki?

Duolingo is nice, but it's not as good for cramming as for low-intensity, long-term learning. Anki is awesome for just "I'm going to memorize this speech like a poem"

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree with you on DuoLingo - great app, not good for vocab learning.

Anki was my main SRS app for many, many years. I didn't like managing all my own lists (and was often buggy). I didn't like the UI. Adding pictures and audio was awkward. It didn't have some basic features like reminders or notifications built-in.

Also, I had to add all my own stuff to Anki. If you want to learn Spanish (for example), we've already done all the work of picking the 3000 words we think you should learn, added high quality images and audio to each one, and gave each an example sentence with translation. I think that's what's most exciting to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> This looks really cool, definitely going to download it and give it a shot. (btw I didn't know what spaced repetition was and your wikipedia link is missing the colon on your about page)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! All fixed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> This looks great, would buy if it was in the Android Play store. :(

</comment><comment><USER19> > "We can email you when we launch new languages."

How? Presumably I'm being slow because others have managed it, but I can't figure out how to sign up to be notified...

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, is there not an email input there? Sorry about that. Feel free to email me at email@example.com.

<comment><USER19> Ah-ha, Adblock was to blame!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Looks marvelous, very handsome UX, wonderful idea to have native speakers to help with pronunciation.

I've been using Duolingo to learn Italian, and I'd love to see an Italian deck!

</comment><comment><USER51> Why didn't you create a single app with all card sets as in app purchases? I use Mental Case which allows you to share sets and download sets from other people.

</comment><comment><USER52> German and Mandarin are my two requests (even just 300 or so Mandarin cards would be great! I'll help!). Just started on French while I wait, looks great! :)

<comment><USER53> There is a fantastic dictionary app for Mandarin called Pleco that includes a SRS-based flashcards feature as an in-app purchase (around $10-15 if I recall). The base dictionary itself is free.

While of course you can just program your own cards into Anki or the like, being able to create new cards from dictionary definitions with one tap is very handy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> I have been using Anki for a while now and i love it. I wish there are more spaced repetition apps out there that are not limited to learning a language.

</comment><comment><USER55> China is a huge market and people there are crazy about learning English, so definitely add English and then you can expand to international market

</comment><comment><USER56> Very nice, I wish I'd done this :-) Maybe I can finally learn Spanish and relearn all the German vocabulary I've forgotten.

</comment><comment><USER57> Signed up to be notified, awaiting German :)

</comment><comment><USER58> I learned 850 chinese characters over a 3 week period one summer using this technique. It's amazingly powerful.

</comment><comment><USER59> Who is the designer? Did you outsource this part to a freelancer?

<comment><AUTHOR> I did all the UX design myself then passed it to the very talented Yoshini who made it pretty.

yoshinig.com

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> Looks great! I cast my votes for Hebrew and Japanese.

</comment><comment><USER61> Looks great, but does it have pronunciation?

<comment><AUTHOR> Absolutely. All 3000 included cards have native-speaker audio. We recorded it ourselves.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> Congrats Justin!

</comment><comment><USER63> Good work, Justin. Hope Turkey is fun.

</comment><comment><USER64> Looks great.

</comment><comment> saiko-chriskun I was so excited... then saw the ios only :/

EDIT: then I even realized there are only specific languages supported? we can't add our own? this is useless..

<comment><USER65> This comment deserves to be downvoted into oblivion.

You must come from a very special place where you deserve so much more than this. This guy busted his ass to release something. Yes, it's on a single platform (for now). Yes, it only has three different languages (for now). Woe is you that he hasn't built precisely what you want on the platform of your choice.

Give me a break.

Makers and makers-to-be, don't be dissuaded by this kind of garbage attitude.</comment></comment>


Multitasking is the Way - <AUTHOR> http://www.zeaun.com/business/multitasking-is-the-way.html

<comment><AUTHOR> I wonder how many other Hackers are Multitaskers too.</comment>


Barbarians at the Gate 2.0 - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/daily/columns/businessview/displayStory.cfm?story_id=12499201

<comment><USER2> For great finance reads, read this and Den of Thieves by James B. Stewart.

</comment><comment><USER3> Does anyone recommend Barbarians at the Gate? Useful to startup founders or another big business story?

<comment><USER4> Yes. Also watch the movie, it was based on the book.</comment></comment>


Nebia (YC S15), a Shower Head Start-Up, Receives Funding from Tim Cook of Apple - <AUTHOR> http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/11/nebia-a-shower-head-start-up-gets-funded-by-apple-ceo-cook/?_r=0 <comment><USER2> For those surprised by the cost, I did a quick search on HomeDepot.com for the current line up of "shower head"s.

The largest category is the $50-100 group where HomeDepot lists 633 products. In the $200-250 category, where the Nebia is priced there are 95. Above $250, HomeDepot carries nearly 450 products including a $5500 shower head.

So if you think this is too much money to pay for a shower head, think again. It's the same discussion that appears every time Dyson launches a product (see LED light).

<comment><USER3> Remember, too, that Home Depot has the advantage of not having to stock everything everywhere. If they have 450 shower heads that cost over $250, it's a good bet that most of their stores carry one or two of them at most -- and that they can all be ordered, if that's what you want.

I wouldn't be too surprised if HD actually has no warehouse where you can find a $5500 shower head -- but the manufacturer will happily ship you one when HD orders it. Or perhaps they will make one when you order it. I don't see the $5500 shower head as being in high demand or time-sensitive.

<comment><USER2> You are correct, the HD page lists 124 shower heads as "in store". And even then I'm sure it varies store to store.

My comment was more to say, $250 isn't a crazy expensive shower head. I wouldn't consider it to be in the elite category only accessible to the world's 1%. Even at $400 (the eventual retail price) it's not bad. HD has nearly 200 shower heads between $300-$500. Restoration Hardware has a similar shower head to the Nedia (minus the small droplet water) for $1000 and Restoration Hardware exists in many malls around NA ([https://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product....](https://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product.jsp?productId=prod6510241&categoryId=cat3850062)).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why on earth would they focus on the payback period when the point is that _it 's a better shower_? Is this because Kickstarter backers are supposedly more rational consumers than other people? I doubt that. If it's a more pleasant shower, then _sell that_.

<comment><USER5> Agreed, with a price tag of $400 this is a luxury product. Early adopters aren't going to care about a payback period in the slightest - they just want to experience the cool factor of a new shower + the feel good factor of saving water.

Maybe the company foresees on some kind of government subsidy to make these more affordable in the future?

Side note: Without having tried it, I find the idea of being misted like a vegetable in a grocery store somewhat unappealing as opposed to a nice hot shower after a long day of work. Perhaps the actual feeling is a lot nicer than I'm imagining with this level of VC/investor support.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm curious to know how the droplet size effects the water temperature required to take, "a nice hot shower." Wouldn't the smaller droplets increase surface area and convection/radiative heat loss? There is a certain sublime feeling of having hot droplets rain down on you.

</comment><comment><USER7> Buckminster Fuller had the same idea in the early 1930's with the fog gun shower[1]. I sometimes wonder how many of his ideas will be recycled and gain traction in the years to come.

[1]: [http://www.bfi.org/about-fuller/big-ideas/dymaxion- world/dym...](http://www.bfi.org/about-fuller/big-ideas/dymaxion- world/dymaxion-bathroom)

</comment><comment><USER8> anyone really think a $250 shower head is going to withstand pressure from the sub $30 knockoffs that hit the market a year later?

<comment><USER9> Does Dyson have trouble fighting knockoffs?

<comment><USER10> The bestselling upright vacuum on Amazon, the Bissell Cleanview, looks quite a bit like the original Dysons.

<comment><USER9> [http://patentblast.com/patent_litigation_cases/dyson-inc- v-b...](http://patentblast.com/patent_litigation_cases/dyson-inc-v-bissell- homecare-inc/)

Not sure if it's been resolved.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> A "shower head" start up? Atomized water? From YC?

Digging into the multiple reviews / press articles I think I figured out why investors love this and we should be compelled.

This is not a "shower head".

This is something new that has the same end-game of getting you clean like a shower head, but much more efficiently:

"It's like walking into a humid environment that gets you super drenched," Winter [Nebia's CEO] said, insisting that the mist is powerful enough to handle elaborate shampoo and conditioner rituals. (1)

and

"So I'm standing under it, and one of the things I realize is that it's really hard to explain," says Parisi-Amon [Nebia's CTO] "You tell people it's fundamentally different and they're like, 'Whatever, it's a shower.'" (2)

It's fascinating to see the press then try to get their head around it too:

NYT - "In my testing of a prototype, the multinozzle shower head produced a misty spray (the word nebbia in Italian means mist) that immersed me in water, unlike traditional shower heads that shoot pressurized streams of water. It made my hair feel flat and uncooperative, though my skin felt soft and relaxed." (3)

Buzzfeed - "Instead, at first, I felt nothing — as if there weren't enough water to get wet, let alone shower. It felt like stepping under the nozzle that mists vegetables at the grocery store, and the mist kept recirculating — like a sauna with whatever makes saunas work on overdrive. While I didn't think it would, the mist eventually got the job done. I still got wet. The soap still foamed, and it still came off. I felt clean. . . BuzzFeed News can confirm that this is definitely a shower."

I'd love to try one before committing to $400 (consumer price) and a plumbing project.

And I think they've covered that with the brilliant strategy of pulling in Equinox Gyms and the implication that Goog/Apple will have these installed on campus.

Cool!

\- - - -

(1) [http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/S-F-startup- clai...](http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/S-F-startup-claims-its- misty-shower-uses-70-6436306.php?t=8a27cb5cff#photo-8422884)

(2) [http://www.wired.com/2015/08/nebia/](http://www.wired.com/2015/08/nebia/)

(3) [http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/11/nebia-a-shower- head...](http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/11/nebia-a-shower-head-start- up-gets-funded-by-apple-ceo-cook/)

(4) [http://www.buzzfeed.com/brendanklinkenberg/i-tried- silicon-v...](http://www.buzzfeed.com/brendanklinkenberg/i-tried-silicon- valleys-hottest-shower?utm_term=.vk5PERomw1#.qrGg3bj7O3)

<comment><USER12> I showered with it, and it convinced me.

It does lack the mechanical blasting action of regular showers, which is good for removing caked mud. But that doesn't come up often in my life. I found it more pleasant and just as fast for normal feel-good, smell-good showering purposes.

<comment><USER13> > "It does lack the mechanical blasting action of regular showers, which is > good for removing caked mud"

Hmm, I need that, just due to playing with (and having) kids and doing yard work. I could imagine redoing a bathroom and having a shower large enough for a traditional shower head on one side, and this on the other.

<comment><USER14> Maybe they need to add a button that converts it to a normal spray?

<comment><USER15> We have added in a secondary mode which does exactly this, offers a more traditional, even forceful feel, yet still uses about 60% less water than a regular shower.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The drawback to smaller droplets is that the larger surface area means they lose heat quicker, and so can consume more energy. The same problem occurs with those heads that put air into the center of each droplet.

I recommend trying out h2okinetic shower heads (now owned by delta in the US). They have channels that cause something similar to cavitation which then results in large droplets widely spread. It is like being in a rain storm. The result is feeling like more water is flowing than actually is, so flow rates can be reduced.

Their 90 second fluff piece video explains it, with the actual working (not moving) part shown at 30 seconds in: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxWeyd- pnK8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxWeyd-pnK8)

</comment><comment><USER17> I wonder how it copes with calcium scaling?

</comment><comment><USER18> YC seems to have taken in a lot of unusual startups this year.

<comment><USER19> Perhaps its a sign that its getting harder to find ideas with huge growth potential?

With that said, it does look like Nebia is solving a real problem (their shower head uses 6 gallons of water for a shower vs the traditional 20 gallons).

It appears they have a Kickstarter as well: [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1499369835/nebia- shower...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1499369835/nebia-shower- better-experience-70-less-water)

<comment><USER20> Sure, but at $250, I can afford a lot of water before it becomes cost- effective. They look like they're aiming at making a premium shower experience.I'm skeptical that it would take the soap off my body, though.

<comment><USER19> Their copy on Kickstarter says it pays for itself in 2 years.

Think of it like Tesla for shower heads: Yeah, its expensive. Yeah, they're selling upmarket first. But it has a the potential to save _a lot_ of water across the world if they ramp quickly and can drive the price down. (EDIT: Luckily, you don't need gigafactories for showerheads. It appears that their design can use traditional manufacturing methods, so it won't be terribly capital intensive.)

Places where water is a cost center (Hotels, AirBnB hosts, gyms, etc) would probably be the primary demand drivers to start.

<comment><USER21> The analogy to Tesla is a poor one; this product is easily reproducible, and the homeware space is rife with imitation products that are notoriously difficult to protect with IP. I feel this product is more suitable for an infomercial than VC investment.

<comment><USER19> Disagree. Tesla _gave its patents away_ (short answer. long answer is they'll license them to you for no cost if you play nicely). You _can_ still patent things in the US, as well as enforce your trademarks.

<comment><USER22> Tesla's products are not easily reproducible regardless

<comment><USER19> Technically, the hardware is easily reproducible (battery pack and electric motors). Its the software and firmware where the magic sauce lies, as well as the supercharger network and their unbeatable service.

I concede that anyone could copy a shower head and that you're relying on the rule of law to protect your invention. I don't see the problem with that, as that's how most manufacturing operates in the 21st century.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I slightly cringe when startups that receive funding start a kickstarter campaign just for the hype.

Nevertheless, the product looks really awesome and I would love to try it.

<comment><USER24> I couldn't agree more. You would think with the funding they receive they wouldn't need to raise a 100k. I like the idea and would be definitely interested in trying it out, but there are other ways to advertise your product.

<comment><USER15> dan and snake, thanks for your comments. We decided to launch on Kickstarter because we wanted to gauge what the interest level among consumers would be. Furthermore, KS is the best place to gather significant quantities of feedback on product features and finishing touches before going to mass production. Our decision to raise funds on KS is more about learning from our backers and gauging initial interest than anything else.

<comment><USER23> I hope that's true, but I have reasons to doubt it. While the consumer bit might be accuratr (albeit it's more early adopters oriented), I don't think KS is "the best place to gather feedback" since your partnerships with the various institutes and companies should have given you just that without the pressure and obligations that come with KS campaigns.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> With some quick back-of-the-napkin math, I get just under 4 years of daily showers to break even (with their $400 retail price, assuming a generous $0.02/gal ($15/CCF), which is the highest residential marginal seasonal rate where I am).

If I wanted to reduce my water usage, I'd just take shorter showers and alternate days when I've not yet become smelly. These cost $0 and yield immediate savings.

<comment><USER26> _If I wanted to reduce my water usage, I 'd just take shorter showers and alternate days when I've not yet become smelly. These cost $0 and yield immediate savings._

Changing a person's behaviour, including your own, is pretty hard, its its less likely you'll actually follow through and take less showers.

Some people also live in households with multiple people, so that can affect your math as well.

<comment><USER27> Changing a person's ability to recognise this is even harder.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Power saving/ water saving FWIW is a social fashion, which the consumer need to show up. You need to show up your priuses and teslas. Your shower head might not make that ecological concern statement that people might be looking for.

I am not sure how much water to energy to dollars it would save against a conventional shower-head for to be positioned for budget customers, like say a energy consuming light bulbs.

May be it gives a different shower feeling and people will like it simply based on that.

Whatever the concern may be the product is worth building, if nothing else to expand our horizons, be it in our success or be it in our failures.

</comment><comment><USER29> Wouldn't minerals residue become a problem quite quickly in some places. I don't think it will be as easy to remove as from regular shower head.

</comment><comment><USER30> Does any one know if it'll wash out shampoo or conditioner? I have trouble believing you can wash your hair with it, which makes $400 seem steep.

</comment><comment><USER31> I would be surprised if anyone who would but a $250 shower head cares about saving money on their water bill.

</comment><comment><USER32> Interesting but too expensive for just a shower head, if it did something else, for example remove fluoride from the water, then I might be more inclined to buy it.

</comment><comment><USER33> Every time I see such startup attempt with an invention I think of this: They have made an invention, then they've patented it to prevent others from making the same product and selling it, then they'll start selling this thing and if they are somehow happen to be very successful (microsoft, apple, google, etc.) we'll accuse them of becoming trusts, as if they've not shown the intent thereof with the very action of patenting the invention, and as if when a startup comes out with the slogan "our invention will revolutionise the world," they are not willing to be the one company that sells every single instance of the product, which is, well, the very definition of a trust. So at the end of the day it is legitimate to feed the aspiring trusts until the day they become actual trusts bashing others with their patents, when we'll call them patent trolls that are killing the startup arena, market, world or whatever. Enter out two-faced deceitful and hypocritical western culture.

Then, a "shower-head startup" sounds more like a name for a comic strip than an actual business. I'm sorry, and I know that here is news dot _ycombinator_ dot com, but yet, this startup thing is really becoming a big joke.

<comment><USER34> I don't even know what you are rambling on and on about esoterically in the first paragraph, but as for your argument in the second paragraph, there are actual existing "businesses" that _do_ sell showerheads. You bought it. I bought it. Everyone who lives in a house with a bathroom bought it. Otherwise we wouldn't have showerheads. It's not a comic strip.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do I create a poll on HN? - <AUTHOR>

How do you create a poll for HNers to reply to? <comment><USER2> A question: You've been on HN for about 4 months, so you probably know about karma and upvoting. Indeed, two weeks ago you asked about karma and had various points explained.

I can understand why you might not know how to create a poll, and hence your question here.

What I don't understand is this. Someone has taken the time to answer your question - quite promptly - and clearly you read their answer because you created a poll fairly soon thereafter.

Why did you not upvote them?

</comment><comment><USER3> <http://ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html></comment>


Gremlin.js: Throw a thousand monkeys at your page - <AUTHOR> http://dailyjs.com/2014/03/11/gremlins-customsync/

<comment><USER2> For those who don't know: this is PROBABLY named after Palm OS Gremlins. Palm OS had a debugging tool called "gremlins" that would randomly tap and type and gesture all over your Palm OS app. This debugging tool would often find edge cases that would end up crashing your app.

As someone who used to program for Palm OS a lot, I was pretty happy to see this name. :)

<comment><USER3> Back in the very early days of Palm OS, Palm had a "Quality Certification" you could apply for, and if your app passed, you'd get a bunch of marketing benefits. So we went for the highest-level certification on our products, which required surviving 1,000,000 gremlins.

At first I was very skeptical that it would find any meaningful bugs, but in fact it was very good at finding memory leaks and edge cases. In the end it took us several weeks to finally be able to survive the 1M gremlins without a crash. A single run of 1M gremlins would take about 24 hours.

In later years they added the capability to supply your own dictionary of values to apply to certain inputs so that gremlins could get past validation, and it would also save the entire state of the device every 10K events so that you could easily reproduce errors that Gremlins found.

I could definitely see this as a good way to stress-test certain parts of your app, though it takes a ton of time, and frankly without surrounding tooling (like resource monitoring, saving "state") it wouldn't be practical.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The 1984 Macintosh had a similar testing tool called The Monkey.

Andy Hertzfeld: [http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=Monkey_Lives.txt](http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=Monkey_Lives.txt)

</comment><comment><USER5> I think this is essentially "Fuzz testing"[1]. Something I read about in a book years ago but never saw done in real-life. The term may be antiquated at this point. [1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzz_testing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzz_testing)

<comment><USER6> I wouldn't call this fuzz test because it focuses on simulating legitimate actions. Do random clicking. Do random scrolling. Do random mouseovers. Do random [any DOM event]. Yes, they are doing this at a massive scale, but the key here is that germlin.js can only do things a user can do. In short, Gremlin is just automating actions; basic legal, legitimate actions. Still cool, and great for stress testing or looking for race conditions in your UI code, but not fuzz testing.

Fuzz testing, on the other hand, is about modifying the data, to interacting with the UI. To use an analogy, fuzz testing Microsoft word might involve corrupting various structures in the DOC or DOCX file or in an OLE embed with malformed data and seeing how the parser/program reacts. The Gremlin.js equivlent would be just clicking on a bunch of buttons in the Word UI really really fast.

Both are helpful, but they are testing different things

<comment><USER7> Not entirely true.

Fuzzing _is not_ about modifying data. I don't think that's the right way to describe fuzzing.

It's about testing the durability of a program by trying all kinds of data, as greedy as possible. This includes known problematic inputs and random inputs to match some expectations. By random it can either be totally random (any length, any pattern) or protocol-aware.

Random clicking is a form of random data testing because you are trying random input stream to a program. Your argument is not entirely wrong either. By fuzzing his UI he may trigger the browser to crash. He may trigger his monkey to crash. Fuzzing is a very general technique. I can write a fuzzer that fuzz Firefox's UI Australis. What will I look for? Maybe after opening 100 tabs and closing the 45th tab the titlebar disappeared. Or resize the browser from range s to range w I will find some range will cause the UI to look ugly (style overflow, etc). Or after clicking on the scrollbar several times consecutively the browser crashed.

Barton Miller, the "Father of Fuzzing" did UI fuzzing by simulating actual keystrokes and mouse clicks. See ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/paradyn/technical_papers/fuzz-nt.pdf

In his Forwards page, he even mentioned "Monkey" [http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~bart/fuzz/Foreword1.html](http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~bart/fuzz/Foreword1.html)

<comment><USER8> One nice way of describing fuzzing is that it is running a search problem (searching for bugs) using more or less guided Monte Carlo method for the program's input space. Generally the testing should also be automated (test case injection and testing oracle), so that one can beat the program with enough test cases for the fuzzing to be viable.

Relating to the practical example: if one is trying to find bugs from the UI code (or it is the only way to feed inputs to the program), monkey method of fuzzing is the way to go. But if one tries to test the deeper layers of the program, it is beneficial to try to find the lowest layer of inputs we can access, since it enables faster input of test cases and thus makes the fuzzing more effective.

One way of the other, my opinion is that both are fuzzing, by the definition I gave for it :-)

<comment><USER7> I like the way you treat fuzzing as search program.

<comment><USER8> It's a nice way of summing up the general principle. Unfortunately I can't take the credit for coming up with that one :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Netflix also has a famous division of monkeys that they unleash to take down servers in the hive, and generally muck about.

They want to break as many things as possible while keeping uptime and that sounds freaking awesome! :D

<comment><USER10> More info (the open sourced it): [http://techblog.netflix.com/2012/07/chaos- monkey-released-in...](http://techblog.netflix.com/2012/07/chaos-monkey- released-into-wild.html)

<comment><USER11> That is pretty darn cool!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Hi! I'm one of the authors of Gremlins.js. Glad to see that some of you find it interesting.

I wrote a blog post a while ago about the purpose of the lib, it's called "Completing the JavaScript Test Stack". Worth reading if you wonder what this is all about.

[http://redotheweb.com/2014/01/07/completing-the-js-test- stac...](http://redotheweb.com/2014/01/07/completing-the-js-test-stack- introducing-greminsjs.html)

</comment><comment><USER13> lol I'm gonna call this "Twitch Plays the Internet"

<comment><USER14> You read my mind, that totally looks like anarchy mode applied to to the web :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> For Android: [http://developer.android.com/tools/help/monkey.html](http://developer.android.com/tools/help/monkey.html)

</comment><comment> atom-morgan The GIF in Github makes me think TwitchPlaysYourApplication.js would be a better name :)

</comment><comment><USER16> That looks really cool, though I think it would have a hard time navigating past the first few menus, and could hit features that are only rarely meant to be touched (e.g. "delete everything".) Perhaps a searching algorithm that intentionally tries to explore every menu and feature, navigate to them and then test them. Or intentionally tries things it knows are more likely to find bugs.

<comment><USER12> All the gremlins are configurable, you can specify which elements they can interact on (and therefore exclude "dangerous" elements).

Relevant doc: [https://github.com/marmelab/gremlins.js#configuring- gremlins](https://github.com/marmelab/gremlins.js#configuring-gremlins)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Now have this play the 2048 game.

</comment><comment><USER18> So the person who named this is old enough to have seen (and liked) [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gremlins](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gremlins)

I guess 40-something.

<comment><USER19> The gremlin is older (and broader) than that movie: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gremlin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gremlin)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> A similar library that I wrote: [https://github.com/ianb/walkabout.js](https://github.com/ianb/walkabout.js)

</comment><comment><USER21> Not to be confused with the Gremlin graph traversal language ([https://github.com/tinkerpop/gremlin/wiki](https://github.com/tinkerpop/gremlin/wiki)) or the JavaScript version of Gremlin.

</comment><comment><USER22> I just give my laptop or iPad to 2 year old son and it does the same trick!</comment>


Can't resolve time.nist.gov - emin-gun-sirer The popular NTP server time.nist.gov is having DNS problems, at least from our vantage point on the US east coast. For us, this has meant that regularly scheduled security reports could not be sent, but there may be other consequences. Now is a good time to check your NTP settings and designate redundant time servers. <comment><AUTHOR> Try [http://time.gov](http://time.gov)

<comment> emin-gun-sirer Thanks, indeed, there are many alternative NTP servers [1]. But I believe time.nist.gov is the default time server during Ubuntu installation, so there are many hosts that depend entirely on time.nist.gov.

[1] [http://www.pool.ntp.org/en/](http://www.pool.ntp.org/en/)</comment></comment>


Are Android intents supposed to be like Smalltalk/Erlang message passing? - <AUTHOR> The whole Activity/Service/Intent structure in Android seems very actor-y to me. I mean, you're basically formatting your call into what's essentially an IPC object, and these intents might be passed to a component (activities/services/etc.) that may or may not actually be in the same process.<p>I know the idea isn't exclusive to Smalltalk etc., but in this case, is the Android data hiding model explicitly supposed to be inspired by Smalltalk actors, or am I just misunderstanding lots of things? <comment><USER2> Yes, but as you've said, the idea isn't exclusive to Smalltalk/Erlang. Message passing is a very common pattern [1], but some languages decide to support them with built-in constructs.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_passing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_passing)</comment>


Microsoft goes its own way with Web audio/video spec, despite W3C rebuff - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/01/microsoft-goes-its-own-way-with-web-audiovideo-spec-despite-w3c-rebuff/ <comment><USER4> The big problem with Microsoft's spec is that it doesn't specify a protocol, so it is impossible for other browsers to implement the standard. The spec only says that RTP will be used but not what specific profile or codecs. Microsoft's prototype uses a plugin for Chrome and IE that implements their proprietary protocol.

The WebRTC spec on the other hand does specify a protocol via the RTCWeb IETF specs. The SDP used in WebRTC is part of that. Also the Chrome and Firefox teams are working hard to get the two browsers talking to each without resorting to prototype plugins and instead using their own separate implementations of the WebRTC protocol.

When/if Microsoft publishes the protocol specs, then their UC-RTC-Web spec will truly be complete and we can judge it on its merits compared to WebRTC. Also in a very real sense the WebRTC spec is more complete since it does specify a protocol.

<comment><USER5> Small correction: Chrome and Firefox teams are using basically the same implementation of WebRTC; see [http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla- central/source/media/webrtc/t...](http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla- central/source/media/webrtc/trunk/README) \- it's an import of the Chromium code into Mozilla. Having the source available definitely makes interoperability easier and is better than having a blobby bit, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> A lot of people here are arguing that "Microsoft has legitimate concerns". Of course MS are framing it like that - would you really expect them to say "We made this proposal because Google+Firefox+Apple are neutering our Embrace+Extend+Extinguish ritual, and additionally the WebRTC thing is going to demolish the $8B value of our skype purchase"?

The fact that they may have good technical arguments should not confuse you. They're not doing anything to make the web better. They are doing everything to make Microsoft's hold in the market stronger. Everything else is incidental.

Story time:

Back in 1999, I worked on instant messaging infrastructure, and as a result followed the related IETF workgroup closely. That workgroup had very interesting discussions that went absolutely nowhere over a few years. At some point, everyone threw their hands up in the air and adopted XMPP - not because it was good (far from it, compared to other suggestions that were made) - <USER2> because an implementation was made and progressing, and becoming a de-facto standard.

What I realized through 1999-2002 following the standardization process was that, although every single argument ever made was of a technical nature, it was a game played between AOL, MS, Netscape and the other members of the workgroup, the game being "either you guys accept my existing infrastructure and give me dominance, or I'm not sharing my toys". And since no one gave up, toys -- to this day -- are not shared, and IM networks are still mostly disjoint.

The WebRTC game might be more delicate, but the validity of the technical arguments (which was there in the IM discussions too) should not confuse you. It's about market control and dominance, not about technical excellence.

<comment><USER7> Sure, but are the other players completely disinterested?

Some of them might have pure motives: take Mozilla, for instance, which seems to see WebRTC as a trojan horse to force the market to adopt non-MPEG codecs. They have the users' best interests in mind, but it's not obvious that their focus on that aspect necessarily yields the best web RTC standard.

<comment><USER6> > but it's not obvious that their focus on that aspect necessarily yields the > best web RTC standard.

Best RTC standard for who?

I believe that patent-free RTC (as WebRTC provides by virtue of preferring WebM) is better than a patent-encumbered even if it has a slightly better session initiation/description protocol.

Regardless - yes, one should definitely try to map the underlying reasons and subtext of every statement. But the bottom line is:

Google has been working, in public and with a freely usable implementation, on a specification. Mozilla adopts same specification (and mostly same codebase). Said specification ALREADY works on iphones, android phones, Chrome, Firefox and even IE (with the right plugin).

Microsoft proposes something, not completely defined, only provides a plugin implementation, only for IE and Chrome, unsupported on any phone. In my book, it needs a much better story than just "better session descriptor".

And frankly, with Microsoft's past of hijacking the web standards, the office openxml iso process hijacking, all the linux patent threats and the android patent extortion that is STILL ongoing, they need to work much, much, harder before I even give them the benefit of a doubt.

<comment><USER8> There seems to be widespread confusion about WebRTC already adopting VP8/Webm as a mandatory-to-implement codec. No such decision has been made. Though the two furthest along implementations (Chrome and Firefox), which also happen to have about a billion users between them are both pushing VP8 which might make it a defacto standard anyway.

They (IETF WebRTC) _have_ adopted the Opus audio codec as mandatory-to- implement, which isn't officially part of WebM (though apparently Chrome 25 can play it in that container) as it's far more suited to real-time communication than Vorbis.

For the video codec, they were going to call for consensus (basically on VP8 vs H.264) but Google mysteriously suggested that the decision be delayed on the day before it was supposed to have happened, claiming to have something in the works that would solve the whole problem to everyone's satisfaction.

My wild guess (given the fact that the VP9 encoder and decoder is now available to download from mainline codebase and is beating x264 and H.265 objectively and subjectively [1] for pre-recorded content--and I'd maybe guess that even VP8 beats H.264 for standard WebRTC use cases) is that they're working out some behind the scenes political deal with other industry partners to jump straight to VP9, either by getting all relevant parties on board regardless of patent sabre-rattling, or by working something out with patent holders to neutralise that threat. Both are a bit wild as I said, the more boring explanation is that Google feared losing the call for consensus and had something brewing to sway a few swing voters but didn't have it ready in time.

[1]: <http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1611395#post1611395>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'd like to hear the counter, but MS's rationale here seems solid. And given they have it working compatibly in IE10 and Chrome seems like they're moving in good faith.

I know that a lot of HN likes to say, "M$ can't do that because everyone knows they're evil" -- I'd like to actually see good technical arguments for why what they're doing isn't prudent.

<comment><USER10> > I'd like to hear the counter, but MS's rationale here seems solid.

That's partly because Peter Bright (the story author) overstates Microsoft's case. SDP _is_ a problematic part of the current spec, but most of those problems are just things that it can't do yet, and if you look at the mailing list thread responses to the messages he links to, you can see most of the discussion is about moving SDP expansion discussions back to the IETF working group. This will slow things down, but that's how standards work sometimes.

But, SDP is only a part of the spec. Meanwhile, Microsoft's proposal retains essentially none of the current WebRTC spec. _That_ was the real issue with their proposal, coming relatively late in the game, and why it's misleading to put the disagreement in terms of only SDP. Microsoft's reps have issues with how the connections are bootstrapped, but took the opportunity to rewrite everything else while they were at it. That's certainly their prerogative, and is again how standards are sometimes produced, but the issue is more complicated than "SDP is bad, but the W3C is clinging to it" as Peter tells the tale.

I agree that Microsoft is moving in good faith, however. As a good parallel, see Firefox's incompatible Audio Data API, produced just as the Webkit-born Web Audio API was picking up steam. When specs are early and still being worked on, sometimes the best thing is to produce a working implementation, to show others that your proposal really is as good as you say it is. That isn't _necessarily_ undermining the standards process, nor is it a sign of the process not working. It can be, but at this stage, Microsoft is still engaged, even if they are just repeating why they think their proposal is better.

It _will_ slow things down, but standards work is sometimes really slow, especially when people disagree, and growing pains are inevitable. You can only hope this gets sorted out fast enough that the spec is still relevant by the time it comes out.

<comment><USER11> Is their rewrite of everything else better? WebRTC itself is so young that a complete rewrite shouldn't be out of consideration if needed. Nobody wants to carry bad decisions over the years anymore.

<comment><USER12> I think that perspective is shortsighted. It isn't that people want to carry over bad decisions. It's that everybody needs to follow the _same_ standard, and it takes a while to get consensus among the many parties involved.

When Microsoft goes and pulls a Microsoft and completely ignores the W3C to implement their own standards, we are heading in the __wrong __direction. Only recently (IE 9+) did Microsoft start adhering to web standards and its been a relief.

This feels like they are abandoning that, and it's going to give me nightmares.

<comment><USER11> We're on the same side. But just having a 'standard' is not enough; it needs to fulfill it's purpose in the most useful way.

I'm by no means pro-MS, but they are not abandoning standards, they just proposed one. Google and Mozilla have implemented things their own way for the past half decade before _any_ discussion had started, that doesn't preclude moving to a standard later on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> >The problem is SDP. SDP wasn't originally designed for browser-to-browser communications, and some of the things that WebRTC uses it for go above and beyond the specification.

But SDP is just session description. In a way just metadata, so to speak. Hardly a big part of webRTC specification. Ok, there are some rules that govern how to choose appropriate codec and similar, which may seem complicated (but in my opinion aren't - I've worked with SIP for many years), but it seems way overboard to submit your own specification just for SDP. I think it would be many times better to try to influence webRTC specs than splitting the effort and almost certainly prolonging adoption.

</comment><comment><USER14> [Linked from the article]

Microsoft's reasons in Microsoft's own words:

[http://blogs.msdn.com/b/interoperability/archive/2012/08/06/...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/interoperability/archive/2012/08/06/customizable- ubiquitous-real-time-communication-over-the-web-cu-rtc-web.aspx)

The Ars article sums this up as:

 _Even backers of the current WebRTC specification acknowledge that the SDP problems have so far proven intractable. The WebRTC spec hinges on getting SDP fit for purpose._

So the title of the article is a bit link baity.

<comment><USER6> > Microsoft's reasons in Microsoft's own words:

Microsoft's PR official reasons in their own words.

The real reasons may or may not be related. Personally, I don't trust any statement from Microsoft about improved functionality or specification. That might be right in this case, but their past actions indicate that they care about market dominance rather than any technical detail.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'm very hopeful that MSFT will soon adopt a common standard, whether WebRTC or an adjusted WebRTC. However, the business case does not support such a push from Microsoft. They purchased Skype for $8B, and it's their every incentive to ensure web telephony remains difficult and that Skype remains the best, cheapest, and simplest way for people to communicate with video and voice. They want Skype everywhere, but Skype becomes less compelling in a world where any two engineers can effectively build Skype-level quality (or better) inside a browser.

</comment><comment><USER16> Wow, SDP and SIP that brings back nightmares about that stateful protocol. The code to handle them was unimaginably complicated

</comment><comment><USER17> The interplay between open standards versus competition is fascinating. On one hand, all browser makers sharing the same standards makes my life as a software engineer easier. On the other hand, one standard to rule them all may stifle innovation and progress. My initial reaction was, "what a shocker". Then I thought a bit more deeply about it.

</comment><comment><USER18> Seriously, why? They are basically using the exact opposite of the HTML5 video codec argument, when they and Apple said there should be only one codec. And now they say are saying there should be multiple codecs for WebRTC - <USER3> maybe now it may not completely suit them? (even though Skype uses VP8).

<comment><USER9> When did MS say there should be only one codec? MS actually said that they'll support whatever codec you had on your computer -- they just weren't going to ship <choose your favorite codec> in the box. It was Google that was saying that they'd stop supporting H264 in Chrome, period.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Digital video and audio is nothing new. At all. It's like decades old.

Getting images in browsers was never a problem.

Why is it STILL a problem to get audio and video in browsers?

<comment><USER20> <audio> and <video> pretty much work fine AFAIK. We're now talking about putting a P2P/VoIP/videoconferencing stack into the browser which is a bit more complex.

<comment><USER21> I still can't put <video src=blah></video> in a page and expect it to work in every browser. I need at least webm + mp4, or ogv + mp4, so I double the space utilization on my server for every video maintaining redundant copies, in addition to the various resolutions you make video at because ISPs are assholes and we are still in the dark ages of internet speeds.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is the exact reason we (Tinychat) never took WebRTC seriously. Its not a unified standard by any manner of speaking. Even firefox and chrome have different implementations. If we were to even attempt to get it working, we would have to have encoding and decoding since the codecs differ as well (no speex in webrtc). At least flash has the same experience across browsers.

<comment><USER6> It's work in progress. No one is expected to take it seriously in production. Yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> And in a few years from now they will be complaining again that Google is "blocking" their browsers, by not supporting their standards.

<comment><USER24> Ohh yes good ol' 302 redirect was invented and only supported by Microsoft. I suggest you re-read the article than throw in the M$ bash at the hint of Microsoft. They have legitimate reasons for proposing the alternate. I rather have all the companies heard and come to a common ground to set the standards than one company leading the others.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Thee was a time when Microsoft could do this and get away with it. It's sad that they seem to be the last ones to know that those days are behind them.

<comment><USER26> Did you read the article? This doesn't seem like the old "Microsoft bullying others into following" story, this seems like legitimate reasoning for the moment.

<comment><USER6> They are not in a position to bully anyone, just like they were when IE3 came out. So they made IE4 which mopped the floor with NS4. And it still took a lot of time until the momentum changed and IE became popular.

And then they bullied everyone with IE 5, IE 5.5 and IE 6 - like they did (and still do) with Office (OpenXML), SMB, Kerberos and a variety of other products.

Of course their statement is going to be about merit - they've never said "oh, we're bullying here" even when they were. And their statement MIGHT even have some merit - but just like in the OASIS OpenOffice document spec, instead of working with the industry, they arrive late with their own underspecified and alternative specification.

It's same old Microsoft.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Well it won't matter. By the time enough people have migrated from the old versions of IE (which will most certainly not support this tech) tablets will be the target market.

Microsoft should really realize it is a has-been and not enter new areas.

</comment><comment><USER28> As long as there is a JS implementation that they're providing (FTA) then I don't see whats worth a big fuss. I was worried from the headline that this would pre-empt serverless p2p VoIP from Chrome<->IE, but that doesn't seem to be the case.</comment>


Ask HN: Which startup biography to read? - <AUTHOR>

I'm going on a trip for 3 weeks and would like to read a book.
Was thinking about "Hatching Twitter". Heard from a friend that it has GOT moments where everybody stabs each other. Any other recommendations? <comment><USER2> Founders At Work [0] (by YC founder Jessica Livingston) has the stories of many great founders and their companies. It's my favorite book on the subject.

[0] [http://www.foundersatwork.com/](http://www.foundersatwork.com/)

<comment><AUTHOR> just read review that stories are bit outdated. does this statement stands the ground?

<comment><USER3> the stories are old, some from the 2000 dot com boom. But I find the content relevant and the mindset of the creators useful.</comment></comment></comment>


Why I really, really hate Instagram - <AUTHOR> http://seldo.com/weblog/2010/11/03/why_i_really_really_hate_instagram

<comment><USER2> This is akin to complaining that Impressionist paintings don't look "real" and therefore are not as good. I suppose we should be deploring the fact that we'll never, ever know what that starry sky in Arles really looked like because Van Gogh mucked it all up with his swirling colors.

What the author fails to understand is that most people, like artists, use photography (and many other recording media for that matter) to create or communicate a certain mood or feeling, not to document reality with the highest fidelity possible.

<comment><USER3> This is pretty different. Impressionism is creating art from scratch; this is taking art that has already been created and stamping it with a cookie-cutter filter effect. It adds no creative input at all, and in fact takes away from what is already there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> All of his complaints aside, is he aware that Instagram allows you to save the original photo (in addition to the filtered photo) to your Camera Roll?

<comment><USER3> This is not the default behaviour, and the setting is not available from within the app -- you have to exit, go to general settings, find the app in the list, and change the setting there. I would love to know how many instagram users do this, but I bet it's a tiny fraction.

<comment><USER4> A number of apps work in a similar fashion, such as Facebook, Gowalla, Twitterrific, and Weatherbug...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Wanna know what kind of photo data loss really makes me angry? Timestamps.

Big, yellow, irremovable timestamps covering a chunk of the photo.

All the time data you could possibly want is already embedded in the file. Want to print it? Ok then, go ahead and put a timestamp on the corner if you really want to. But please don't destroy the original.

</comment><comment><USER6> _Go back in your hard drive and look at photos you took with your cellphone 5 years ago._

Ha ha, oh wow. No single sentence underscores the author's misapprehension of why people take most photos better than this. What's astonishing is that this is _after_ he correctly grasps the concept of Instagram:

 _...it connects you to your friends, and it provides a way of sharing content with your friends that keeps you coming back to the app._

The astute reader will note that this doesn't sound like a solid data preservation strategy. But neither does connecting with friends sound like something particularly deleterious to the formation of memories. Quite the opposite: sharing signals memorability. If that comes at the expense of "destroying" the photo's accurate representation of the color of your couch cushions or the oiliness of your skin, so be it; those things are not memorable. The photo is not the memory.

</comment><comment><USER7> This commentary assumes, as its driving premise, that most users of apps like Instagram really care about data fidelity or picture quality as measured on a scale not immediately perceptible to them. I would wager that they don't. Furthermore, I take issue with the assertion that putting a cute filter on a photo is "destroying" its quality. To the users of Instagram, they're _finishing_ the photo by doing that. It's part and parcel of the final product. The photo is not destroyed or degraded with the filter; it's _made_ by the filter.

Not everyone (and, in fact, and perhaps a bit unfortunately, most people) cares about quality. They'll take fun and convenience every time. This is why you see people still using MP3s or lossy AACs on iTunes, for instance, and not filling up drive after drive with lossless rips directly from CDs. A lot of folks just want ease and fun and sharing, and there's nothing wrong with that in principle.

</comment><comment><USER8> What about all the people who shoot in jpeg instead of RAW? Also the camera manufacturers who don't enable RAW on their cameras, they are stealing our data! Revolt!</sarcasm>

I was a professional photographer before becoming a programmer. I think apps like instagram and hipstamatic are fantastic. Not everyone can to take the time to learn photo editing software, and filters add a new perspective on ordinary subjects.

</comment><comment><USER9> This just in: some people hate hipsters.

(I am not entirely convinced that faux-polaroid effects are a tragic loss of data as he suggests.)

<comment><USER10> This guy makes it like it's the end of the world, the end of photography... Oh no...

Instagram have made a great app, and can give anyone the chance to do something neat with their phone...

and become a hipster :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> "I'm not a photographer."

That much is apparent.

There are a couple of reasons the Instagram affects appeal to me, and I'm sure this applies to more people.

Nostalgia is fun. Memories have a way of distilling events down to their better parts. It's a natural adaptation. No one wants to remember the fight they had with their family on vacation. They want to remember the time that mom was startled by the bear that walked in to camp and went screaming in to the camper flailing the grilling instruments over her head. Mom, not the bear :)

Not everyone looks good in photographs. Maybe I don't want my likeness archived in high fidelity. When I recall fond memories, I don't remember my pale complexion and baggy eyes. I remember where I was, who I was with, and the good time we were having. This much is apparent by everyone's expression. And here's the cool thing, humans don't require a high-fidelity photograph to guess the disposition of the person in a photograph. We require very little detail. That's the great thing about our brains. It fills in the blanks very well. Personally, I prefer to fill in the blanks a little bit.

Cameras -- even film ones, and even big view cameras -- can't reproduce the full spectrum of color and dynamic range that the human eye can see. The result is that photographs often look "flat" in contrast to our memory of an event. When you look at photos taken by these old, vintage cameras, they have a certain warmth and color palette that doesn't match reality, but _feels_ more interesting than a flat photo in some cases.

<comment><USER3> The whole point of my article is that _real_ nostalgia _is_ fun. However, faked-up 1970s polaroid nostalgia is just fake. These are real photos and over time they will accumulate real nostalgia; you can't shoe-horn it in right from the beginning by using a digital filter.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm starting to wonder if stuff like this gets upvoted so people can watch it go to the top and get thoroughly trashed.

</comment><comment><USER13> Perhaps all artists of any sort should abandon all forms of media except the most recent technologies. Who needs oil paints, or working with woods, metals, etc. Let's go purely digital so everything can be absolutely perfect.

The reality is everyone thinks they are a photographer these days because everyone has a camera in their pocket. Most people take awful, horrid photos, and tools such as hipstamatic and instagram can make even bad photos visually pleasing. If it makes the user happy, it's fine by me. It's their phone/camera and their life.

</comment><comment><USER14> Odd. I set Instagram to always send my original (unedited) photo to the Camera Roll. What's wrong with that?

</comment><comment><USER15> You know, this totally reminds me of my view on games like Guitar Hero [1]. "Why spend all that time learning how to press buttons when you could learn the real thing!" I would complain. I finally came to my senses one day and realized that the game was _fun_ [2] and that I had rather been missing the point.

[1] I know there's a version out that teaches you the real thing. Hope it does well. [2] It's still not my thing--too much time required--but I'm not going to spoil someone else's fun.

</comment><comment><USER16> Technology isn't static, there will be a time when the quality from a phone camera is "good enough" that the whole first part of the diatribe becomes moot, arguably for most people it's already at that stage.

My Olympus digital camera from 2001 was a 4 megapixel item, flawed though megapixels are as a measure of quality, at those levels it did still matter, now my phone camera one-ups it in that department.

The problem is more, how and where do you store your photos so that you still have them, 40 years from now, which he does touch on to some extent. Somehow, I doubt Instagram will be the "system of record" for this, and for now, it's providing a service that some people find useful.

<comment><USER17> I think phone cameras have been at that point for a while.

I took my iPhone 4 and digital SRL on holiday this year, and my best shots where taken with the iPhone 4 simply due to serendipity.

At first I was actually annoyed when my friends and family preferred most of the iPhone shots on Flickr, but then maybe my SRL skills aren't as good as I thought they were!

<comment><USER18> At on-screen viewing sizes of web-shared photos (currently <1MP) you are going to struggle to see the better image quality that an SLR can provide. With prints of 10x8" or larger you will start to notice lack of sharpness and chroma noise.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> So does the author also hate people who rather buy records on vinyl instead of mp3?

Some people like old technologies, or simulated old technologies. It makes them feel nostalgic, escaping to allegedly simpler times for a quick moment. It's about emotions, not technology. I get it, the author doesn't like doing that, but why judge people who do?

<comment><USER20> Odd that you mention MP3 as the high-end because that is famous as a lossy encoding. He makes it clear that his beef is with wiping out detail that is already in hand.

So my dubious music analogy is scratching up your new CD so that it skips a bit.

<comment><USER6> _He makes it clear that his beef is with wiping out detail that is already in hand._

...like ripping a CD to a lossy encoding, or taking a digital photo in JPEG. There really is no way make the complaint about data-degradation without counting these things. The author's real beef is with the aesthetics.

<comment><USER20> The degree of harm (if it's considered that) caused by these cameras saving in JPEG is no where near that of heavy filters.

Though I don't think the author's tone is justified. Some people are just having fun and rightly don't care about archival.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> You can still be a geek and destroy the data in your photos. These funky photo apps give people who might ordinarily terrible at taking photos and gives them an edge. It's like a golf handicap. It adds a bit of flair and artisticness to what would otherwise potentially be some nasty looking photos of your friend's friends.

</comment><comment><USER22> It's funny how people use a lot of modern, often expensive, technology just to imitate effect of a 20yr old camera you can buy for like $50.

Archeologists one day will wonder 'why did they do that?'

<comment><USER23> > It's funny how people use a lot of modern, often expensive, technology just > to imitate effect of a 20yr old camera you can buy for like $50.

I think it's funny how you've already forgotten just how expensive it was to have film developed and printed.

The camera may cost you $50. The three good photos you get out of your roll of film will cost you $5-$10, and the photo CD with digital versions will cost you an extra couple bucks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> This reminds me of the rants akin to Twitter's 140 character limitations back in the day. Instagram is useful and _fun_. I suspect Instagram is going to be just fine!

</comment><comment><USER25> "You are fucking up your photo."

500,000 users disagree

</comment><comment><USER26> ah, I get it, this is being upvoted because it's funny _few_ I thought there for a minute we where going to go all eternal September

<comment><USER27> I spent a minute trying to figure out what you meant by saying "because it's funny few I thought..." when I realized you actually meant "because it's funny _phew_ ".

I'd also mention something about the punctuation, but frank, it was the few/phew slip that really confused me. =)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Instagram is the page curl of 1997.

</comment><comment><USER29> The best camera is on you have in your hand at the time. I don't see a problem with letting people use whatever they have -- the technology will presumably get better if it is what is demanded by the market.

</comment><comment><USER30> I stopped reading it when I realised he hates Instagram because the iPhone has a poor camera...

</comment><comment><USER31> u mad.

Images need to be uploaded. My iPhone uses T-Mobile with Edge. I do not want to wait for a 12MP photo to be transferred, ever. That is a prohibitive user barrier. Besides that, in the future they will be able to just say "ENHANCE" like in Blade Runner and this won't even be an issue.

Based on his other articles, this guy is either being intentionally inflammatory or should probably be medicated.</comment>