Sixth grader's internet-famous science project may have been plagiarized - <AUTHOR> http://www.cflas.org/was-lionfish-research-hijacked-by-12-year-old-from-palm-beach-florida/

<comment><USER2> Am I missing something?

It seems to me the best thing this guy and the people who want to 'help' him could have done is just leave the whole thing alone.

On its own this is just another in an endless string of _' One weird fact this amazing kid discovered!'_ stories that will be forgotten next week if not tomorrow - like the ink saving science fair kid from March [1].

People who matter will find this guy and his discovery through the paper [2] he published. People reading the viral sources of the story about this girl and 'her discovery' will forget it all in the time it takes to click on through to _' 10 Celebrities Who Look Like Their Pets!'_.

Also, the real problem here seems to be plain old bad/breathless media coverage more than anything else.

1: [http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/27/living/student-money-saving- ty...](http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/27/living/student-money-saving-typeface- garamond-schools/)

2: [http://absci.fiu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Jud-and- Laym...](http://absci.fiu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Jud-and- Layman-2012-JEMBE.pdf)

<comment><USER3> Yes, you are missing something: the narrative that the kid made a scientific discovery is spreading so far and wide that it could very plausibly become a PR/SEO problem for the grad student who is on the verge of launching his scientific career (the single time that this sort of thing matters most to a scientist).

> there is now a petition online demanding that Arrington's name be added as > an author to Jud's most recent scientific publication

This goes far beyond "one wierd fact" headlines. Authorship requests and articles published in scientific venues (CFLAS) bring this issue into the scope of things that academics care about.

People who 1: matter and 2: have time will not be fooled. #2 is the sticking point. There are many gatekeepers to prestige in the academic world (journals, conference hosts, departments inviting each other around for guest lectures, people running outreach programs, etc). Many of them don't have the time or the inclination to get to the bottom of PR scandals. The ones that _do_ have the time (e.g. hiring committees) pay attention to metrics representing the opinions of those who _don 't_ have time, so ignoring the problem won't make it go away.

He is doing the very minimum required to avoid being hurt by someone else's lie. The way I see it, he has handled the issue with admirable delicacy.

<comment><USER2> _> 'This goes far beyond "one wierd fact" headlines. Authorship requests and articles published in scientific venues (CFLAS) bring this issue into the scope of things that academics care about.'_

Not really.

Worrying about one of thousands if not millions of online petitions [1] that anyone can create is on par with fretting over whatever foolishness someone publishes on their blog.

There are a lot of people quoting and re-quoting that petition claim with anger and horror but there's not a single link to it and Google uncovers nothing.

I would not surprise me if such a petition exists, but whether it matters at all is highly questionable.

 _> 'Many of them don't have the time or the inclination to get to the bottom of PR scandals.'_

What scandal? The story of the girl will/would be forgotten tomorrow. It only becomes anything resembling scandal Streisand style as a result of the response [2].

1: [https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/outlaw- offending-p...](https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/outlaw-offending- prophets-major-religions/94kL1tsN)

2: [http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/07/23/marine- biologi...](http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/07/23/marine-biologist- stolen-idea/13039871/)

<comment><USER3> > Not really.

Yes, really. Competition in academia is fierce. Professorship positions typically have dozens to hundreds of applicants each -- and all of those applicants have made significant contributions to a field of research (PhD) and then some (postdoc). Non-academic qualifications such as outreach, teaching evaluations, and so on are an important dimension along which aspiring academics can differentiate themselves.

> What scandal?

If the girl helped put together the paper and wasn't listed as an author, that would be a scandal. If you search Jud's name on google and a petition to add someone to one of his papers pops up, even the most rational person would assign a nonzero probability to the possibility that he did, in fact, wrong her. It _is_ a SEO/PR problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Hopefully this was all a huge misunderstanding...but we really need to hear from the girl's father, who likely would've been the primary enabler of this given his relationship to the plagiarized researcher. I mean, I just have to give him the benefit of the doubt for now...that perhaps he helped his daughter with her science project and then was called away to an emergency, or a stretch of focused work, during which point he forgot about the science fair and the story took a life of its own. Because...even if he were being malicious...how dumb would he have to be to think he could gain from this, or get away with it?

Edit: Worth mentioning, but in the NPR piece from yesterday, there's this:

[http://www.npr.org/2014/07/20/333192387/sixth-graders- scienc...](http://www.npr.org/2014/07/20/333192387/sixth-graders-science-fair- finding-shocks-ecologists)

> _Her research did not stop there. Craig Layman, an ecology professor at > North Carolina State University, confirmed Lauren 's results. "He credited a > sixth-grader for coming up with his idea," Lauren says ecstatically. > Layman's findings were published this year in the science journal > Environmental Biology of Fishes. Lauren is mentioned in the > acknowledgments._

OK...this science journal has a little explaining to do, too.

<comment><AUTHOR> The thing is: there is no Solomon/neutral solution to this. Either the original researcher was harmed or not. I feel a need to be fair to the original researcher as well. This entails calling out people who harmed them, or allowed harm they could have stopped to continue. Keeping silent and waiting plays to one side.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think this is on the media that reported it for not doing their research. It seems harsh to claim that it's plagiarized. I didn't realize sixth grade science projects were supposed to be original research. Are all those papier- mache and baking soda/vinegar volcanoes novel insights into how volcanoes work?

<comment><USER6> There is a strange coincidence that the girl is not some random kid. She is daughter of the friend of professor who supervised original researcher. It is possible she overheard her father and supervisor talking about the problem and figured things out herself, but what are the chances of that?

<comment><USER7> For the last eight or so years, I have been a judge at the California State Science fair. At this level, the projects must have won the county or city level (not quite the same for all of them, but it is usually their second or third fair presenting their projects).

There is a a Senior division (for anyone in high school) and a Junior division for everyone younger.

Let me tell you, even though it is usually the kids second or third career fairs, all of the Junior level kids that I have judge have only a very basic idea of the science that they are doing. They are usually very unprepared to talk about their methods or accurately understand the scientific method and what they are measuring. Granted, it is usually the first time talking to a "scientist" with industry or academic experience (rather than elementary school teachers), but usually the conclusions that they draw are rather unlikely. The experiments are never setup properly, they do not measure anything really, they get their ideas off of the internet or out of a "science experiments for science fairs" book (and usually tweak it to win their way to the state level).

This may be different with a professor for a father, but I am skeptical that any child ,even at the high school level, can come up with independent ideas for applicable science experiments.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I find children love to copy and build on other people's works. That's how many of us, maybe even all of us learn as children. It's unfortunate some parents don't teach children the difference between studying and replicating other people's work and plagiarism. A simple credit to the original author would have been ample, but then it probably would have meant no e-celebrity for the little girl.

<comment><USER9> I doubt she hired a PR agency to promote her science fair project, I'm imagining that her Mom/Dad knew about the lionfish thing told her about it, she did a typical science fair job of things, and the media grabbed ahold of it after someone told them about it.

Science + Media = Science Fiction

Like most things science fiction, the science is there purely as a backdrop for what is a human interest story.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This issue isn't expecting new research from science fairs (which would be a bit over the top), but claiming something your parent published in 2011 is your work and novel in 2014. But yeah, at least it wasn't a papier-mâché volcano or a potato clock.

<comment><USER10> What? A parent's work appearing in a child's science project?!

<comment><USER9> Haha such a good call. Personally, I'm looking forward to building a farnsworth fusor with my daughter when it comes science fair time.

<comment><USER10> Since uptight school district frowns upon explosive, I think we're going with lasers.

I've also considered helping my son learn the math to do something most of the judges wouldn't be able to follow.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I haven't been able to find any information that Zack Jud (the "original scientist") actually performed the same experiment that Lauren Arrington did. If such information exists, I'd be very happy to change my mind. Until then, here's what it looks like:

\- Jud did some good science and discovered some fish where they shouldn't be (in fresher water than had been previously thought possible)

\- He published his work, and one of the co-authors is associated with Arrington, the kid scientist at the centre of this. (a co-author is a friend of Lauren's dad)

\- Lauren (some years later) did a series of experiments where she kept the fish in tanks and gradually exposed them to fresher and fresher water, and the fish did not die.

Unless I'm very much mistaken, Jud discovered fish living in fresher water than previously thought possible, but _did not perform controlled experiments in tanks_. While his results are similar to those that Lauren is becoming famous for, they are not the same.

I agree that his work was probably crucial to the formation of Lauren's experiments (and that the core of the result--that the fish can live in fresher water than thought possible before Jud's work--is not original), but can't help think that there's an inappropriate conflation going on here, if not more than one.

<comment><USER12> Not quite, Jud did a ecological survey in 2011 and followed-up with experimental tests of the ability of Lionfish to tolerate a range of salinity. This was published in February 2014: "Broad salinity tolerance in the invasive lionfish Pterois spp. may facilitate estuarine colonization"[1].

Arrington Snr is not an author on this later manuscript, but was presumably aware of the work.

[http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10641-014-0242-y](http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10641-014-0242-y)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Apparently her father, Albrey Arrington, was a signatory to a creationist declaration, which at least raises questions about his scientific integrity:

[http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/](http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/)

I think her father, or his friend Craig Layman, who was Jud's former adviser, had a falling-out with Jud, and so her father is trying to retaliate against Jud passive-aggressively, by taking credit away from him by using his daughter as a pawn. It is very disturbing, if true.

This is just my gut instinct, from all that I've read, skipping over the technicalities of the papers and who cited whom. There's something bigger going on.

(See also: [http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/science- sushi/2014/07/24/p...](http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/science- sushi/2014/07/24/proceeding-upriver-timeline-arrington-jud-dispute-estuarine- lionfish/) )

</comment><comment><USER14> Couldn't this have been _easily_ prevented if they had done proper journalism in the first place?

Instead all these "news" outlets(including BoingBoing) mindlessly linked to an _untrue story_ and have potentially ruined a man's career. All for some ad dollars.

RIP journalism.

EDIT: I love that cflas.org lists more than 10 sources that _immediately discredits the claims by this young girl_. Obviously, not a single person at any of these "news organizations"(BoingBoing, CBS, etc.) could have been bothered to do _any research_ to fact check this story. Absolutely incredible.

<comment><USER15> That pretty much sums it up. This article included:

> _A month following the announced lionfish ban in Florida [1], a 12-year-old > south Florida girl accredited [2] for breakthrough in lionfish research; > mistaken accreditation, or plagiarism? [3]_

Notice how the sentence sets up extremely strong [1], dwarfing its extremely flat passive voice [2]. _Then_ it uses to the standard "reasonable explanation or sensationalism?" linkbait construction [3].

Perhaps this girl should have learned about giving proper attribution for her science fair project, or perhaps an elementary schooler has _no fucking ability_ to judge what is original research versus playing/copying (ie how one learns). Please tell me who was given attribution for the inevitable crop of vinegar volcanoes exhibited concurrently.

And I can understand Jud's reaction thinking "that could be my research in the spotlight", but honestly the story isn't about the _science_ , it's a hollow attention-grabbing trope of "You won't believe a 12 year old girl did THIS".

Everyone involved in this situation has had their lives worsened by sensationalist attention parasites. IMHO, it's our duty install Adblock (etc) so they will hopefully dry up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is pretty blogspammy, the better source that is linked to in the article is [http://www.cflas.org/was-lionfish-research-hijacked- by-12-ye...](http://www.cflas.org/was-lionfish-research-hijacked-by-12-year- old-from-palm-beach-florida/).

<comment><USER17> Thanks. We changed the url from [http://boingboing.net/2014/07/23/sixth- graders-internet-famo...](http://boingboing.net/2014/07/23/sixth-graders- internet-famou.html). We'll keep the latter's title, though, as less baity.

<comment><USER18> Aaaand you killed their database.

<comment><AUTHOR> Anticipating the web-site not being able to take the load is why I linked to Boing Boing (also the slightly less provocative title). The thing I mind about titles and links being changed (which probably is in fact a good idea) is the common additional implication the titles and links intentionally broke guidelines, were malicious, or ill-concieved. But I do get the complaint that Boing Boing is sort of making hey of their own failure in reporting when they promoted this story without any investigation on their own part.

<comment><USER17> > is the common additional implication the titles and links intentionally > broke guidelines, were malicious, or ill-concieved

I'm not sure what you mean, but if you think the comments I've been posting when changing urls or titles are unfair, I'd appreciate suggestions for rewording them. The more specific the better.

<comment><AUTHOR> Not your comments, just the occasional comments snarks of others (sorry, I don't actually have a specific example at hand). Your comment is actually helpful (mentions a change has been made, explains the decision, and even mentions the original URL).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Seeing a Twitter #Hashtag Spread - <AUTHOR> http://giladlotan.com/blog/2010/01/seeing-a-twitter-hashtag-spread/ <comment><USER2> Watching things spread on twitter is an interesting pastime.

Story:

I posted one link in <http://twitter.com/mattsta/statuses/7925973758>

It got re-tweeted at <http://twitter.com/diakopter/statuses/7928647495>

Now, diakopter seems to be a gatekeeper to the perl community because from him it got picked up by merlyn, who has a high perl community eigenvector centrality, at <http://twitter.com/merlyn/statuses/7929928766>. After bouncing around the perl circle for about 24 hours, it quickly died. The internet is a fickle mistress.

In short: I have no substantial twitter following, yet one post with a link generated over 1000 visits.

</comment><comment><USER3> here is another example of #hashtag "manipulation"

<http://stilgherrian.com/human-nature/fisting-twitter/></comment>


Why You Need a Lawyer - <AUTHOR> http://millarslaw.com/2016/04/19/why-you-need-a-lawyer/ <comment><USER2> Jail is an extreme punishment that should be reserved for very serious offenses. In this country, we are conditioned to think of it as no big deal. No one bats an eye if someone sits in jails for months or years without being proven guilty. If you are eventually convicted, you get credit for the time you Sat in jail as an innocent. You were being punished although you were innocent. Yet people will recite that in America you are innocent until proven guilty. What good is your innocence if you are being punished. Land of the free with the most people in prison. All men are created equal in a nation built by slaves.

The only folks who know what the criminal justice system is like are those who have been through it. People have been screaming from the mountain tops that the system is screwed up, but as long as the folks being locked up don't look like the majority, the majority is happy to turn a blind eye. As long as the neighborhoods that poli e drive around all day looking to lock people in cages don't look like the majority's, the majority doesn't care.

</comment><comment><USER3> Happened to me in January, very similar, a bit more severe.. in Mountain View.. Got into an accident ( not my fault, somebody just stopped, 40mph to 0.. i reacted, slightly bumped into him.. my bumper got damaged, little damage to his car. he was a visitor in a rental car. ), called the police hoping they will help to resolve the accident.. police came minutes later, stopped me from taking his information and immediately accused me of being drunk. i was polite, a bit informal and confident that it will get resolved since i was absolutely sober. they made me close my eyes, count 30 seconds.. i counted 25... then made me stay in one leg for 30 seconds, i only managed 20 ( even now i cant do it on even ground ). then field sobriety test, which i thought is finally when they turn attention to the accident which could have killed me. test came as 0, next thing i heard was you are arrested for driving under the influence of drugs. they kept saying i am slurring my speech and am swaying also that my car was reported driving erratically ( weeks later when i got the police report, it mentioned a phone call reporting my license plate, but in a part of town where i haven't been for over a year. and my phone tracking proves it ). they drive me to police station then search my car under the pretense of looking for weapons (i was driving to work, at 5PM, work in a very senior position at a big tech company. drive a simple sports car. not much about me screamed he has weapons ). now the bad part, they found some substances in my car, a toiletry bag in my gym bag. it had an altoids can, which had some stuff from new years, which i for got was there.. they only real drug there was half a pill of ecstasy. which yes, i was dumb to have in my car. then they drove me into the jail, where i spent 3 days. in first 5 minutes there, i stood up to ask when i can make a phone call and that made 4-5 guards jump me and beat me for 5 minutes or so. all on camera and in front of 40 people or so. bail was set to $25.000, $5.000 for each drug they accused me of having. first phone call was allowed 17 hours after arrest. after they beat me, they chained me to a chair for 3-4 hours. they stabbed me with a needle, saying this is just a routine TB shot. on they court day my legs and hands were chained and i was left in some cold cell on a metal rack for about 7+ hours. the judge let me go, pending my blood test for drugs. i had to go back to jail and be there for another 7 or so hours before release. around midnight the nightmare was over and i could go. my work was already considering a search for me, i couldn't call them since i didn't have their number memorized. my blood came out clean a month later. they attorney i hired isn't very helpful. i cant sue them, since they didn't break any bones. now they are testing all the substances i had, to prove they weren't illegal drugs. i get drug tested weekly since. lawyer burned through $10.000 already. paid about $700 to get my car back. next hearing in a few weeks, hopefully all tests are finally done. i am 39, and never experienced anything like this. it was all pretty surreal. now doing research the jail i got in is one of the most notorious for abuse. they just killed a guy a year ago in his jail cell, 3 guards convicted. after me in February a person was killed by them through negligence. ( google Santa Clara County Jail ) So i guess i should be happy nothing worse happened. I do feel guilt for having on me this half a pill, and a few doses of designer ketamine like substances. i feel i should be cautious of how i talk to police. there were 3-4 very professional and polite guards in jail. from the 40 i interacted with. they just seemed sadistic. starting with police and ending with the attorney, all very alarming and eye opening. its like an eco system, which pulls you in. As a professional who is producing value, i told my lawyer in an argument.. after you eat us all, who is going to feed you then?...

<comment><USER2> This is what I was saying in my comment. Most people don't think of jail as extreme, even through it is. Anyone who has been through it know this. We continue to lock people up for dumb shit. Take your experience and imagine that as your everyday. That's how people in communities of color feel. Police circling around all day, inventing pretexts to search them, which is itself a pretext to locking them in cages. Then imagine having now way to bond out and sitting in jail for months over a charge like yours. Spread the word to you fellow professionals, because, like u before this happened, they have no idea what is going on in this country.</comment></comment>


The Anatomy of Determination - <AUTHOR> http://www.paulgraham.com/determination.html <comment><USER3> 1.

Easy way to become better at controlling will power is controlling your diet. Yep - glucose increases will power. <http://psr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/short/11/4/303>

2.

"Environment trumps discipline"

I'd read an article that said that for most people - their income will be very close to the average income of their 5 closest friends. Create the environment - and discipline will come on its own.

3.

Ambition either comes from having kickass heroes or from facing strong problems. England started becoming a super power only when King Henry read the book of King Arthur and his Knights of the round table. (King Arthur's story was a false story written by Thomas Malory - while in prison. A convict changed the fortunes of England which was until then a land of misfits and barbarians - by giving them a hero!)

When there is a lack of heroes, you need strong problems to build that burning ambition. Eg: how Chandragupta and Chanakya went on to unite India 2300 years ago - because Alexander threatened their existence. Up until Alexander showed up in India - no one even dreamt of uniting India...

4.

I think what is missing is luck - which can also be hacked somewhat. Book: The Luck Factor: The 4 Essential Principles: [http://www.amazon.com/Luck-Factor- Four-Essential-Principles/...](http://www.amazon.com/Luck-Factor-Four- Essential-Principles/dp/1401359418/)

<comment><USER4> About point 3, I think you have cause and effect backwards, most likely your 5 best friends are either friends from college or work, or maybe neighbors.

So it's not like having wealthier friends will make you earn more money, but rather earning more money will probably lead you to have wealthier friends.

<comment><USER3> I think its like with smiling. It goes both ways.

If you're in a good mood - you'll smile more. And if you are in a bad mood - but you make a conscious effort to smile - your mood will change to become better.

Good mood leads to smiling. And smiling leads to good mood. Its circular.

Similarly - rich friends will lead you to become richer. And once you're rich you'll make more wealthier friends. It goes both ways.

<comment><USER5> What it sounds like you are saying is that it can, in the right circumstances, create a feedback loop in either direction. And you are right.

With that said, Nico had an excellent point. For most people their friends will include a peer group that almost certainly makes similar incomes to theirs, and for most people you will only really start making a lot of friends at a higher socio-economic point on the ladder when you move up to (or are in the process of moving up to) that same higher point yourself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > I can't think of any field in which determination is overrated

Getting into land wars with Russia with winter approaching.

<comment><USER7> That's willfull. Having the discipline to wait until spring (no matter what the cost) would have been determined.

<comment><USER6> If you're "ambitious", you may be going where no one has gone before. These days, everyone knows that getting into a land war with Russia is a bad idea, but it may not have always been so. Same thing with lots of other people whose ambition caused them to push the limits (mountain climbers?). If you're at the limits, you may not know when 'determination' means pushing on despite everything to achieve some great success, and when that same pushing on will cause you to die, when turning back may have let you live to fight another day.

Not sure where I'm going with this, I guess I just like to play devil's advocate a bit:-)

It's a good essay, but perhaps what I don't care for in general terms is the vagueness that surrounds the whole issue. Some people are smart because they push on in the face of great opposition. Others win plaudits for "knowing when to quit" and changing direction. It's all a bit wishy washy, although I think that PG's elements for success are, in a generic way, about right. Just that that vagueness sort of precludes one from applying them to specific situations until after the fact.

<comment><USER5> _Some people are smart because they push on in the face of great opposition. Others win plaudits for "knowing when to quit" and changing direction. It's all a bit wishy washy,_

Its not that its wishy washy, its that one of the great keys to success is knowing the difference between the two. On the one hand, if you are on the right track you probably need to be ready to persevere in the face of enormous opposition, but if you are on the wrong track, no matter how far you have gone, change directions. Telling the difference can be quite challenging though, at least in some cases.

<comment><USER8> Exactly. It's like the old question of the difference between having an open mind versus holes in the head.

Both vary so much between even similar situations, that there is no way of knowing which side of the line cases fall on, unless they are extremely good or bad, except try it and see.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> In highschool there was this guy who used to study a lot. Everybody said he was studying too much, and that he needed to study that much because he wasn't that smart. Finally he graduated with one of the best averages in our class. Then he got into the best engineering school in Chile, and I remember thinking that maybe he wouldn't be able to make it, or that he wouldn't have such good grades. Well, I was wrong. He graduated from engineering with a great average.

Now I don't know where this guy is working or what he's doing, but I have no doubt he will achieve whatever he sets himself to accomplish. For me, he is an incredible example of how will and discipline got him to achieve the things he wanted.

2 other stories about this guy:

1\. Until he was around 12 he was fat. Then one day, after summer vacation he came back to school thin. He stayed like that at least until he finished engineering.

2\. Junior year in highschool he had the best average in the advanced math class. There was a math competition and he was not chosen to go. When he asked the teacher about this, the teacher said: "for this competition we need talent, not effort"

<comment><USER9> _"Everybody said ... that he needed to study that much because he wasn't that smart."_

That's a dead giveaway for a "fixed mindset" about intelligence. Studies show that people that think that effort is an indication of lack of ability will avoid effort to not look stupid, leading them to perform less well over time than those that don't have this mindset. See research by Carol Dweck et al.

<comment><USER4> This is a very common thing around here indeed, people don't like to admit to making an effort, at least regarding school, so lots just won't push harder, whereas others will just lie, saying they didn't study very much. Nobody wants to look like they made a great effort and then got an awful grade (fail).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > A good deal of willfulness must be inborn, because it's common to see > families where one sibling has much more of it than another.

This is a non-sequitur. The hidden assumption seems to be that siblings in the observed families are treated exactly the same and have exactly the same environment, in every way, which is blatantly false.

<comment><USER11> It's also random which kids are willful. It's not simply the firstborn.

<comment><USER12> It's also "random" (more like unpredictable) which kids receive what types of environments. Sometimes, Dad's favorite is the eldest son, sometimes Daddy's favorite is the youngest daughter.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I have a feeling that "discipline", that is, getting yourself to do things by sheer force of will, only works in short bursts. For long periods, you need create a system for yourself that takes your own weakness into account. For example, for a long time I tended to exercise in intermittent bursts. I would do it for a few weeks, then catch a cold or something and fail to pick it up again afterword. The solution to this problem was to create a schedule for myself. I wake up, eat breakfast, check the internet, work for two hours, exercise, eat lunch, etc.

Another important thing is strong _principles_. That is, you have to have clear, logical reasons for making the sacrifices necessary to achieve your goals. Every time you're tempted to do something other than pursue your goal you're going to have to argue with yourself. If you aren't completely convinced that what you're doing is truly worthwhile, temptation is eventually going to win.

<comment><USER8> I don't know where you got that definition of "discipline". Discipline is the development of or training intended to produce a habitual and specific pattern of behavior. There are several slight variations in the meaning of discipline, but none that comes close to its being used as a synonym for will-power.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's interesting that Paul believes willfulness is primarily inborn, especially since he now has a child. How would he react if his child were to exhibit lack of willfulness (a trait he clearly admires)?

I agree that among siblings in the same family, one often observes a wide range of willfulness. However, the same family may not be as homogeneous an environment as Paul assumes. It's been shown that elite universities disproportionately admit eldest children and only children. It would seem that the differential upbringing that only and eldest children receive (in undivided parental time and attention, etc.) does result in increased willfulness, discipline, and/or intelligence.

Ambitious people often hope that their children will exceed their own levels of achievement. Empirically, it seems that there is a strong regression- toward-the-mean effect among the children of parents who have done great things. I wonder how much of this is nature versus nurture - could there be a negative effect of growing up in too rich of an environment that diminishes one's chances of becoming a Steve Jobs or Paul Graham? How do you train willfulness and ambition in a child?

</comment><comment><USER15> This essay seems to be somewhat at odds with <http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html> from January 2005.

Now, PG argues that discipline is an important component of determination. For startups, determination is called "the most important predictor of success."

In the earlier essay, these comments were made:

 _Now I know a number of people who do great work, and it's the same with all of them. They have little discipline. They're all terrible procrastinators and find it almost impossible to make themselves do anything they're not interested in. One still hasn't sent out his half of the thank-you notes from his wedding, four years ago. Another has 26,000 emails in her inbox. I'm not saying you can get away with zero self-discipline. You probably need about the amount you need to go running._

PG, does this difference in opinion represent increased wisdom due to the experience gained from doing YC rounds? Or is it simply a nuanced or superficial difference?

<comment><USER11> I talk about this in the last two paragraphs. You need more discipline in a startup, because you have to work on what other people need rather than what you want.

<comment><USER16> If we assume the best case is when what you want to do also solves a need for other people and the worst case is when a need is solved for other people but is something you have no desire to do, where do you see most startups falling on this spectrum?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> As a grad student in math, i would say that determination still plays a important role. For me, there have often been periods where you lose motivation and dont see why you are doing what you are doing, and then sometimes there are moments of clarity. (someone aptly compared this to mountain climbing). I imagine this happens in lots of other fields,(music, to pick a random example) where there is a prequisite of learning lots of arbitary things before understanding/creativity happens. Determination, is what you might need to to go through these phases.

<comment><USER5> I certainly hope you are right. I am just starting my own graduate studies in math, but having limited apparant innate abilities in mathematics I am counting on practice and study to correct that deficiency.

<comment><USER18> "limited apparant innate abilities"

How does that manifest for you? What do you consider those abilities to be?

I think in maths everybody is kind of stupid. Meaning, nobody is really good at maths.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> PG's essay is an excellent exploration (and adaptation) of these ideas about determination in the Boston Globe last month: [http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/08/02/...](http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/08/02/the_truth_about_grit/)

The basic research referenced in the Globe article was done at Penn: <http://www.gritstudy.com/>

I wonder what the original researcher, Angela Duckworth, would have to say about PG's ideas.

</comment><comment><USER20> This has got to be, in my opinion, my 2nd favorite PG essay, right after the 'How Not to Die' essay.

 _So here in sum is how determination seems to work: it consists of willfulness balanced with discipline, aimed by ambition._

The essay is probably meant to help investors pick good investments. But I say that founders can use it to help pick good co-founders, as well as improve themselves. I would love to read more on things/characteristics about a person that might give evidence of a person's willfulness, discipline and ambition, or lack thereof.

</comment><comment><USER21> Like most essays of philosophy, this seems to stop at the formation of the hypothesis. And while the model is interesting, it's still important to ask "does it reflect reality?". To answer that, we need to quantify "discipline", "determination" and its sub-components. And then, see if they really are good predictors of successful founders?

</comment><comment><USER22> determination is a tricky thing. but i think there's also the ability to 'program yourself' to be determined. this usually means figuring out how to make whatever project you're working on fun -- and figuring out how to make sure the projects you're working on now and in the future are at least related to some long-term interest.

great discussion though. there is probably a 'language' of determination. and more efficient ways of being determined than others. i mean determination etymologically is related to a terminus or boundary. it is literally the ability or quality of getting to a boundary.

so if we infuse the meaning of determination with the idea of getting to a successful terminus -- we're referring to the ability to get the transaction done. in the case of startup space, one has to analyze what are the common set of obstacles that prevent getting the transaction done.

well (1) the manner in which the final terminus needs to be renegotiated as the project changes and competing views about the desired end result are brought into view -- so negotiation of the final result is key. (2) taking advantage of previous solutions, not reinventing the wheel but (3) not using any wheels which are limited or limiting and (4) spending maximum time and energy on the specific product.

but i think the most important thing is to regularly analyze whether or not one is on the optimal path to one's goal (first-round funding, e.g.) and also whether one can make the process of the development so bloody fun that one wants to spend as much time on the project as literally possible.

the most undervalued link in the whole network of the problem space is between the founders and their problem space. i.e., figuring out how to spend as much time as possible in your REPL, with your design diagrams, or otherwise amongst your code.

and now, i am just going to press 'add comment'. but yeah, nice article.

</comment><comment><USER23> Would be curious to know how he actually evaluates determination when analyzing startups. How can you tell?

<comment><USER11> It's hard; that's our biggest problem. It's straightforward to tell in a 10 minute conversation how smart someone is, but very hard to tell how determined they are. When we pick wrong it's almost always by misjudging determination.

<comment><USER24> Felix Dennis has this to say on the subject:

 _Whatever qualities the rich may have, they can be acquired by anyone with the tenacity to become rich. The key, I think, is confidence. Confidence and an unshakable belief it can be done and that you are the one to do it._

I think that last part is key. Determined people feel an obligation to succeed. Most feel like the opportunity is theirs to _lose_ and not gain. Here are some behaviours I've noticed when speaking to technical people that I think are determined:

1\. They speak calmly -- almost without emotion -- about their plans, even while responding to criticism. I think this is because they've worked out all possible scenarios in their head so many times before that spouting off about them one more time is just rote exercise. It's almost like they're an objective third person describing the plan.

2\. They confide in others about their vulnerabilities and weaknesses. I think determined people are just confident enough that they aren't over-confident. Over-confidence is what differentiates a determined winner from a stubborn loser.

3\. They never settle when it matters. We all went to school with the guy or girl that scored an A on a test and threw a fit because they wanted an A+. You never get the sense that they're satisfied until the goal is reached. Most people think this is all a show, and that these determined types are rubbing their noses in the average folks faces. That is not the case at all. The average folks don't matter to these people. They never enter the equation.

Other than these 3 things, I'm hard pressed to think of other characteristics. I've seen quiet determined people, loud mouth cocky ones, and everything in between.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Good points well made.

An interesting second-derivation of this is with co-founders. Two (or more) people who share a goal can spur each other on via internal competitiveness & a symbiotic pattern of compensating for dips in the other's discipline or willpower. For example I'm sure neither Lennon or McCartney would have achieved half of their combined output.

</comment><comment><USER25> I'm guessing this essay (at least partially) explains why Sama was included in Pg's "Five Founders" - <http://paulgraham.com/5founders.html>.

On a separate note, I think there's a typo in the 14th paragraph, second sentence: "There seem to be plenty of examples <of> confirm that."

</comment><comment><USER26> Can anyone suggest a method or example for improving self-discipline?

<comment><USER27> Sign up for a Marathon.

<comment><USER26> ew.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Determination is great for investors because it increases the chance that they'll get a return. But the number of great ideas is x, and having a bunch of companies bound and determined to do something with x * 100 is relegating them to living under a horrible opportunity cost -- eating ramen for a subsistence profitability level when they could be doing something more interesting and profitable.

A company needs to eventually have an idea that's both unique and compelling. It should optimize on having a sustainable competitive advantage. Determination is incredibly important because few companies start out with the right mix and usually have to experiment to get it right, but let's not over- idealize it. All the determination in the world won't let you make a cake with sand and olive oil. A founder has to know "when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em."

</comment><comment><USER29> _Very_ true in my experience:

"When you take people like this and put them together with other ambitious people, they bloom like dying plants given water. Probably most ambitious people are starved for the sort of encouragement they'd get from ambitious peers, whatever their age."

<comment><USER30> I've had the opposite experience, depending on what kinds of personalities are involved. Sometimes when you put several ambitious people together, they all destructively interfere with each other with the strength they radiate, particularly if they're young and inexperienced.

Ambitious people are almost always more granular and more preoccupied control freaks than people who are less ambitious. That can be a problem unless they are also diplomatic, pragmatic and wise.

<comment><USER31> This has been my experience as well. Their ambitions must align, at least somewhat. If ambitious person A wants to go one direction and ambitious person B wants to go another direction, it probably won't work. But being around other ambitious people at least gives you the opportunity to meet someone with ambition and goals that align with your goals.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Great post, again!

I think if you read the article again with categorizing all things into symptoms and cause, you'll get better understanding. Most people confuse between two and try to instill symptoms into themselves and mostly end-up at wrong end. You cannot simply say that from tomorrow I'll be more determined on my goals. There has to be passion, love and solid drive for what you do, as mentioned at the end of article. I think veterans and people who have been constantly successful at what they are doing would agree that love for what you do is an important component to success otherwise you will simply run out of your breathe by constant push without any passion.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is a very interesting essay because for the first time pg explicitly states that even if you find something you love to do, it doesn't completely do away with the need for determination. You have to make up for the diff between your love and your users' needs.

You have to try and minimise the need for determination by finding something you love to do.

But to find what you love in the first place, you need determination, mainly in the form of discipline else there's the danger of wasting away from lack of willingness or being too willful for one's own good.

There's some recursion going on here. Need to think this through to get my head around it.

</comment><comment><USER33> >>> There's a third factor in achievement: how much you like the work.

There is a lot of weight in this statement. My mantra has been "love what you do and do what you love". It has definitely served me very well and has been a catalyst for my determination. The other important aspect is your company to which PG alluded via "ambitious peers". Positive and intellectual energy around you is a great fuel for determination.

</comment><comment><USER34> Is there any hope for someone who is extremely willful but not all that disciplined? :/

<comment><USER35> Have the discipline to read the whole essay; it explicitly addresses that.

<comment><USER34> Not really. He says it's _possible_ to become more disciplined, but there's no support for that in the text beyond just the statement. On top of that, there have been all these HN links about how the traditional ways to make oneself disciplined only serve to make the willful types less likely to do them. Nothing kills one's desire to accomplish something more than trying to force oneself to do it.

All in all it's an unhelpful essay.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> How do you build self-discipline?

Offtopic: my surgeon dad always says medicine is over 50% determination. And in fact if you are too smart, you will probably quit and opt for a supposedly more rewarding, less painful profession.

<comment><USER37> Out of my own curiosity: why's medicine painful and unrewarding? I would have thought most non-medics believe it's one of the most rewarding professions to be in, along with nursing and teaching.

<comment><USER36> 4 years of pain in the ass medicial school 3-5 years of SUPER pain in the ass residency where you work 15-20hr days for $40,000.

Then depending on your concentration you can make between 150-300K.

Both my dad and my brother(who is in med school) chose medicine because of the medicial needs in the family than the monetary compensation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> "...one of the best ways to help a society generally is to create events and institutions that bring ambitious people together."

in that I'd include the internet and things like social media sites

</comment><comment><USER39> Worth reading. I don't like the word "determination" because it feels too heavy to me; too much of grim-faced men in it. But I think PG is at least close to the right idea.

</comment><comment><USER38> I'd say that sense of moral obligation to achieve -- tied in with making things better or removing an evil -- can play a large part in ambition and determination.

</comment><comment><USER40> This is extraordinarily insightful (and I admire how Paul's writing is getting stronger as he gets more and more comfortable with what he thinks).

</comment><comment><USER41> Every successful entrepreneur who has failed at least once should have his picture in the dictionary next to the word tenacity!

</comment><comment><USER42> If determination is so important then are founders who've applied to YC several times given an advantage in future rounds?

</comment><comment><USER43> "determination starts to look like talent." - can determination not be considered a talent in itself?

</comment><comment><USER44> > you can definitely learn self-discipline;

How would you go about that?

<comment> a-priori Same way as any other skill, by pushing your limits until they expand.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Fantastic Pg, one of the best essay ever ....

Loved it when you said "Ambitious people are rare, ... When you take people like this and put them together with other ambitious people, they bloom like dying plants given water. Probably most ambitious people are starved for the sort of encouragement they'd get from ambitious peers, whatever their age."

IMO, Ambitious people are like power engine or say running water - its a old saying that running water never stops at any hurdles, no mater what - <USER2> pass thru huge mountains and forests - if a ambitious person loves what he/she is doing then nothing can stop him/her - you can see the fire in their eyes to succeed, the ambition and love for their work itself becomes determination ...

</comment><comment><USER46> Engergy: exercise! Discipline: honed by time's bitter lessons.

Ambition 1, multiplying with partners: jettisoned. Uh oh. Ambition 2, outlook: had it, then found the Buddha.

Fuck!</comment>


Preschoolers better at navigating iPhone than tying their shoes - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2011/01/preschoolers-better-at-navigating-iphone-than-tying-their-shoes.ars <comment><USER2> Seems like an unfair comparison... using an iPhone and playing most games takes one finger to poke and/or drag.

Tying shoelaces takes at least four fingers -- or even more, depending on what technique you're using. That's a lot of fine coordination!

Swimming requires you to coordinate your entire body and breathing...

Riding a bike requires you to have an internal sense of balance and also to coordinate your hands separately from your feet...

It seems like this comparison is like saying "Children are better at sitting down than sprinting in a race!"</comment>


GHC 8.2.1 Released - <AUTHOR> https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.2.1/docs/html/users_guide/8.2.1-notes.html <comment><AUTHOR> > A new, more expressive Typeable mechanism, Type.Reflection

I have to look into this. So far we have:

* Template Haskell

* Data

* Typeable

* Generic

I think this is the paper describing the new system?

[https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/research/publication/typed-r...](https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/research/publication/typed-reflection-in-haskell/)</comment>


Andreessen Horowitz Raises New $1.5B Fund - <AUTHOR> http://a16z.com/2014/03/27/andreessen-horowitz-raises-new-fund/ <comment><USER2> Some interesting read on A16Z.

The keys to Andreessen Horowitz's success (February 15, 2013) [1]

Ben Horowitz on quality of good founders to be CEO (Mar 14, 2010) [2]

Mark Andreessen interview on Bloomberg about their strategy (Feb 28, 2103) [3]

On the Charlie Rose show about feature of Facebook (Nov 11, 2012) jump to min 15:00 [4]

Insights into their investing strategy based on 20 of their investments (Oct 17, 2013) [5]

Investment syndication patterns (Oct 3, 2013) [6]

Ben Horowitz presentation at DLD Conference on how they choose an investment (Feb 1, 2013) [7]

[1] [http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/02/15/andreessen- horowitz-t...](http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/02/15/andreessen-horowitz- transcript/)

[2] [http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/14/notes-on-leadership-jobs- gr...](http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/14/notes-on-leadership-jobs-grove- campbel/)

[3] [http://www.bloomberg.com/video/67149794-andreessen- interview...](http://www.bloomberg.com/video/67149794-andreessen-interview- about-investment-strategy.html)

[4] [http://www.charlierose.com/watch/60150320](http://www.charlierose.com/watch/60150320)

[5] [http://digitalmedia.strategyeye.com/article/WvR0QuYTcU/2013/...](http://digitalmedia.strategyeye.com/article/WvR0QuYTcU/2013/10/17/insight_4_things_that_20_deals_show_us_about_andreessen_horo/)

[6] [http://www.cbinsights.com/blog/trends/sequoia-a16z-investmen...](http://www.cbinsights.com/blog/trends/sequoia-a16z-investment- syndicates)

[7] [http://www.businessinsider.com/how-andreessen-horowitz- choos...](http://www.businessinsider.com/how-andreessen-horowitz-chooses- investments-2013-2?op=1)

<comment><USER3> Ben's interview with Sarah Lacy[1] is also just amazing. Some excerpts:

\- At [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sqI...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sqI7fa04atc#t=3284s):

 _the people who work at tech companies in SV are like super brilliant and incredibly capable, and the last thing a person like that wants is to not to be able to get in the game and like help fix what is wrong._

 _...and let me tell you: every company in SV like including Facebook, including Square, including Twitter, including all of them, has got shit horribly wrong, horribly horribly broken and wrong and everybody in the company knows it and the CEO knows it, so it is better to talk about it. Because that's how companies are, like stuff just breaks. If you have like 500 or 1000 people trying to do something, it is not all going to be perfect, it is gonna be ugly and you get that out there and you let people work on it. And that is probably the number 1 thing I would say about motivating people when stuff goes wrong._

\- At [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sqI...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sqI7fa04atc#t=3662s):

 _If you don't have winning product, it doesn't matter how well your company is managed, you are done_

\- At [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sqI...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sqI7fa04atc#t=3698s) :

 _Why even bother with management if that is the case? But the truth is: there are several things that are very important, one is if you get into trouble, and if you have bad management, your company will probably die. Like the people will just quit, they are not bonded to it, the don't like working there, they never liked working there, and that is that, it is a wrap. ... if you succeed at building a company that everybody just hates working at, what have you done? You just made a whole lot of people a whole lot more miserable in their lives._

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqODNbFz6EY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqODNbFz6EY)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I listened to Marc A on this week's Freakonomics podcast, giving a very plausible rationale for why we should still care about crypto-currency. (Go listen - its good)

I am trying to salve my conscience and turn open source software and public sector into a mission (#) - but despite loving his pitch and wanting to believe in the Golden future, I must have too-small-a-mindset.

How on earth can you spend 1.5 billion on startups in the next couple of years? I could take 5 million right now and do some amazing stuff in message queueing in local UK government - the future is bright, but cheaper. Are they wanting to put in for 300 small startups that will change our infrastructure but essentially make things cheaper, reducing the total cake? Or is this 100M for a few "build the next rocket" startups?

(#) oss4gov.org/manifesto - I still think its the best I have yet expressed about how angry I get seeing proprietary code running government.

<comment><USER5> It is still expensive to build big companies, and $1.5B is tiny by financial markets standards. Bond firms like Pimco and Blackrock measure things by $100Bs and trillions.

Let's say you invest in 50 startups per year for 5 years. That is 250 firms, averaging $6M/firm.

<comment><USER6> You're forgetting money that they can leverage from banks with the money they raised.

<comment><USER7> I've never heard of a VC leveraging up with borrowed money. Who would be on the hook if the fund loses money?

<comment><USER8> VCs' portfolio companies often raise debt. This is called venture debt and the lenders are banks like Silicon Valley Bank.

VCs tend to have a love/hate relationship with venture debt. On the one hand, it means they suffer less dilution as the company grows; on the other hand, it means their investment gets riskier just at the point where they are finally de-risking the company.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Software is eating the world, and a16z is eating the venture capital world. It's no surprise LPs are throwing money at them.

They've been around for less than five years and are already setting the standard by which other VCs are measured.

Case in point: they made something like a 5-10x multiple on their investment in Oculus-- _in 3 months_.

<comment><USER10> They are doing quite a good job as VCs, but lets not start painting a picture of skill based on one of their companies.

Investing in startups is gambling, and A16Z is basically rolling up to the roulette wheel and placing a bet on every square. The only difference is the payout of one success is (maybe) large enough to offset the loss of betting on everything else.

I can't look up the numbers now, but I'm pretty sure when the investments are pooled, the returns are modest, relatively in line with returns on other types of investments. (Would love for someone to back this up or correct me if I'm wrong based on the numbers).

<comment><USER11> Fred Wilson gave a nice overview.[1] Indeed not much better than other investments.

[1]: [http://avc.com/2013/02/venture-capital- returns/](http://avc.com/2013/02/venture-capital-returns/)

<comment><USER12> The returns for top notch VC firms like a16z and the returns for VC as a whole are like a difference in kind.

<comment><USER13> Sure, but they still aren't abnormally outsized, probably even before adjusting for risk. If they were they would do like the very top hedge funds and charge more than 2/20.

If you know specific rates of return please share.

<comment><USER14> A set of example return information (albeit old and only from the first fund) is here:

[http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2012/07/23/nice-ira- andreesse...](http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2012/07/23/nice-ira-andreessen- horowitz-returns-first-fund-twice-over/)

I would anticipate there would be diminishing returns over time as the "bets are spread" if you will... that being said they're doing a damned amazing job so far.

<comment><USER13> Besides being only a single data point the returns for one $300M fund aren't a good indicator of the returns for 2-3 concurrent $1+ billion dollar funds.

<comment><USER14> I concur...that's why I said: "only from the first fund" and "I would anticipate there would be diminishing returns over time as the "bets are spread" if you will".

That being said it is counter to your statement "Sure, but they still aren't abnormally outsized, probably even before adjusting for risk." That particular data point is quite higher than both the median and the means of VC returns that I've seen (and would probably lend more credence towards DaniFong's statement). I look forward to seeing how their other funds progress so that we have more data points.

note: edited in a paren that was missing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Honest question, as I've never really understood the industry: where does this money come from and why? And where does the money go that acquisitions and IPOs earn them?

<comment><USER16> Venture funds are "General Partners" that manage a pool of capital on behalf of "Limited Partners" or LPs. Limited partners in a fund this size are usually pension funds (CalPERS), university and not-for-profit endowments (Harvard, Brown, MacArthur Foundation), and maybe high-net-worth individuals.

So A16Z raises commitments of 1.5B from all of these people who have a lot of money that they want to grow. Those people deploy their capital to VC, to Hedge/PE funds, to timber, to public markets, to bonds, etc.

A16Z aren't actually given a pile of cash though, instead A16Z does capital calls on an as-needed basis. Then A16Z deploys that capital to startups and other companies over the life of the fund (often ten years with some extensions).

Most venture funds operate on something like a "two and twenty model" meaning that every year they get 2% of the funds value for operating expenses. In A16Z they have a huge staff of designers, recruiters, BD experts, etc, that help their startups. The 2% goes toward things like that.

The 20% is carry, which is earned as a percentage of net income. So let's say that A16Z invests 5M in a company on a 10M pre-money valuation. A16Z owns 1/3 of the company. The company sells for $30M the next day to Facebook. A16Z now has $10M dollars. They take $2M of that for themselves and then they distribute back to the LPs the other $8M.

(This is lacking a lot of nuance like side funds, but I hope it's helpful).

<comment><USER17> _The 20% is carry, which is earned as a percentage of net income. So let 's say that A16Z invests 5M in a company on a 10M pre-money valuation. A16Z owns 1/3 of the company. The company sells for $30M the next day to Facebook. A16Z now has $10M dollars. They take $2M of that for themselves and then they distribute back to the LPs the other $8M._

I'm pretty sure carry is _profit_ ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carried_interest](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carried_interest)), so in your example A16Z would pocket $1M, not $2M (because the $5M A16Z invested needs to be repaid to the LPs first, and then A16Z gets 20% of the remaining $5M). Please correct me if I've misunderstood.

<comment><USER16> Oh ya, that's my mistake. I was right when I called it "net income" but then didn't do the net in the actual math! I'll leave it unedited so your comment makes sense though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> It's interesting to see a mention of "full stack" startups. I hadn't realized that investors have identified such companies as being members of a distinct category.

<comment><USER17> It's a specific reference to a blog post by Chris Dixon: [http://www.cdixon.org/2014/03/15/full-stack- startups/](http://www.cdixon.org/2014/03/15/full-stack-startups/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Does anyone know what kind of IRRs a16z is seeing in previous funds?

The amount of cash available to startups right now is breathtaking.

</comment><comment><USER20> The biggest returns in this fund will be in the cryptofinance space.

</comment><comment><USER21> How does one successfully apply to a fund like this?

Warm intros only, right?

</comment><comment><USER22> Man Andreessen has come along way since Mosaic.</comment>


Designed by Apple in California – 10.2 x 12.8 inches - <AUTHOR> https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLXF2LL/A/designed-by-apple-in-california-102-x-128-inches <comment><USER2> Release date: November 2016</comment>


Mall of America Security Catfished Black Lives Matter Activists - <AUTHOR> https://theintercept.com/2015/03/18/mall-americas-intelligence-analyst-catfished-black-lives-matter-activists-collect-information/ <comment><USER2> Seems like it was a prudent move.

Lives Matter. Period.</comment>


Ask HN: Don't want to be a doctor - What should I do with my MD? - <AUTHOR>

About me: I am entering my fourth year of medical school.  I have come to realize that I do not want to continue on with my medical education to become a practicing physician.  Upon graduation in May, I will be looking for new career opportunities.  Currently, I have been working on a couple projects in the radiology department related to computer programming (and have been loving it).  My two favorite sites are HN and techcrunch.  I am open/excited to try out new options.  Speaking generally, I believe I would be happy working for a company/startup with even a remote connection to the healthcare industry (so I can leverage my knowledge base).  Ideally, I would be a part of a smart team focused on rapidly iterating solutions to problems.
Questions (because HN has the best advice):
What other career paths are available to MDs?
Do you know of any companies that need MDs?
Do you have any experience working with MDs?
Do you have any other advice for me? <comment><USER2> For a couple years, I've worked for a company founded by an MD ~20 years ago, doing PACS (Radiology IT system; basically how X-Rays and CTs and MRIs get distributed within a hospital, viewed by doctors, archived, and sent between sites; my particular client is the US military in Iraq/Afghanistan/Kuwait/etc.). The founder is an MD (Ortho), but I don't think he's ever practiced medicine. I would probably say he's a better businessman than 99% of the MDs I've met, but probably would have been a worse doctor.

Generally, the perception of MDs in business, especially outside medical startups, is that they're horrible. First, they're usually convinced they're the smartest in the room, and even if they may be, that they're also the most knowledgeable about any given domain -- even if they have no idea about it. They often end up involved in mediocre small businesses, taken advantage of in scams, etc., due to being rich and bad at business.

They're also super-expensive; education and debt. The best are probably military doctors who leave after their first tour, but even then, they're mid/late 30s.

Within medicine, having an MD as the medical interface of your company (could be CEO, could be bizdev, could just be a chief medical officer) is essential. One of the factors limiting medical IT startups is that they're really just IT startups with some additional hassle, but the pool of suitable MDs willing to work in a startup is low.

I think there are a lot of great opportunities in medicine: the PACS/Telemedicine field is open (especially for consumer-facing systems, or for SaaS); various forms of automation (pharmacy, EHR/EMR, lab, etc.) exist, but generally have been developed by large companies and aren't as well engineered as one would like, or as innovative -- the long product cycle, conservative buyers, and FDA regulations slow this, but the effect is greater than this can explain. Probably the best opportunity for disruptive innovation is direct, consumer-facing health, especially in less or unregulated areas. Scott Adams (Dilbert)'s idea of passively monitoring one's daily life, then when you get sick, go back and look at the previous N months of data archive and identify causes or lifestyle issues; then do statistical analysis across people, is one idea. Providing better realtime advice and decision support about things with health impact (diet, exercise, various drugs, ...).

I guess the most relevant question is about you -- aside from liking HN/TechCrunch, and being an MD, are you someone who wants to code? Work on hardware? Business? Do you like quick/simple projects, well-funded low risk big projects, or true startups? Are you location-specific at all?

If it were me, if I didn't have 100% answers, I would probably try to intern or contract/consult with a variety of companies or projects, just to get a feel for how they work. Founding a startup is a 5-10 year project, so spending a year figuring out exactly what kind of startup, or if you want to do a startup at all, is probably worthwhile.

My next project is actually an IT infrastructure thing, which has healthcare and defense as primary markets.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for the response - I very much appreciate the advice.

To answer some questions: I definitely want to be involved in the coding and technical aspects of a company. If I had to pick it would be a startup over the lower risk/higher stability of an established business. I would choose software over hardware due to the length of the development/approval cycle and the fact that I very much enjoy the creative process of coding. I'm flexible about location.

I agree that there are a ton of great opportunities in medicine. For the past 18 months I have been on clinical rotations and have quickly realized how poorly the current model of healthcare functions. Far too much time is wasted on tasks that distract from providing better patient care. These pain-points and inefficiencies could be easily addressed with simple software solutions. I truly believe that the talent on HN could change the way medicine is practiced. We could decrease the number of deaths due to mistakes (estimated ~100,000/year) and increase doctor/patient satisfaction.

I find the current enterprise software used in the hospital to be the most frustrating. The modern patient is a data-generating machine, yet we still use outdated programs to manage these patients. It's not customized to the clinical situation. It's ugly. It's unintuitive and difficult to use.

I'm interested in improving healthcare from a tech perspective. Providing better analysis and visualization of data. Creating a collection of tools that make everyone's job in the hospital easier. From my perspective there are a bunch of situations where the solution is an adaptation/translation of an established technology from outside the hospital.

3 examples - (I have a huge list):

1\. a twitter/yammer/googlewave-like application that would be patient-centric and keep the whole healthcare team up to date on the management of the patient (a new member to the team could easily be brought up to speed on a patient)

2\. a panic status board application for the inpatient consult service (once I call the consult I have absolutely no idea where they are in the proces - sometimes for days)

3\. a stackoverflow/wiki on location-specific hospital logistics and information (I can never remember all the details of ordering a rare test/procedure - plus it would accelerate the learning curve for the new residents/staff each year)

ps - as for your assessment of doctor's egos, you're definitely correct (you should see what happens when you put 20 or 30 in a room together).

<comment><USER2> Your 3 examples are great, but they often end up being huge amounts of consulting -- you need to integrate with the quirks of how the specific practice works, and whatever hardware and existing systems they have already. A lot of this is related to insurance as well.

I think huge conglomerates like Kaiser, which provide insurance and care through a single network, could go a long way to improving healthcare IT. At some point, they become big enough to actually become a device manufacturer, software developer, etc., or at least to allow a single product to take over their entire practice. It would almost make sense to have an IT-focused medical hedge fund which develops a great IT system, then goes around and buys practices in strategic markets to convert to the IT system; sort of like the medical borg.

Mobile interfaces to existing EMRs would be interesting -- either within a hospital, or for consults outside. Being able to quickly check and see where someone is in the process would be great. The problem is this either requires huge amounts of customization to work with existing workflow, or adjusting workflow. Radiology with PACS is really the only case where workflow has been totally changed by IT, and that was mainly to allow perhaps the laziest specialists of all to work from home or the beach.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Jasonz: I have a startup in the medical field I'd like to talk to you about. How do I contact you directly?

EDIT: I should add, I was the co-founding CTO of Hotjobs.com, amongst other things -- this isn't some mickey mouse thing.

<comment><AUTHOR> hn.jasonz (at) gmail - would love to talk

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Get a job for a company that sells alternative/homeopathic/naturopathic therapies / remedies.

It lends creedence to the placebo effect :)

seriously.

<comment><USER2> I think it would be difficult morally for a doctor to do that. "Do no harm", and all.

The most soulless way for an unethical MD to make money is probably to work with insurance companies to deny coverage, or work with lawyers to either award or defend cases, in cases where the medical science and financial interest don't align.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> How about <http://www.myca.com> ?

<comment><AUTHOR> very interesting - thanks</comment></comment>


Scam with fake delivery service - <AUTHOR> It begun with me being rather stupid for starters. I was looking for a used GPU online, initially and so I ended up seeing gtx 1080ti for cheap. I contacted the seller, asked for pictures and whatnot and paid via bitcoin.
The thing is, instead of the seller disappearing then, they sent me to a delivery service website with a tracking ID.
The website being Globallinedelservice.com I could supposedly follow my package as it traveled through the world.
I don't know why, but only a few days later I thought about using a whois on the domain, which showed me that the identity of the owner is guarded.
Posting it to the world hoping that it will prevent others from making the same mistake. I didn't expect a scam to be so elaborative. <comment><USER2> To be fair, this scam isn't really elaborative, it's basically how it _should_ be done.

But the first red flag I see here is Bitcoin; while I'm a supporter of crypto currencies myself I wouldn't use them with someone I don't trust; I'd prefer either a fiat currency payment method with some way to claim back the money (cards) or at the very least have a real-world link to the recipient (bank account, etc) so at least I have the chance to sue, or if that's not an option then crypto with a reputable escrow service.</comment>


Where are the 17 inch tablets?? - <AUTHOR> http://a1.blogspot.com/2011/07/where-are-17-inch-tablets.html

<comment><USER2> Screens are already big enough where it would be nice to run some small things side-by-side. On very large tablets it will be crucial to have "app management" (sort of like window management).

It's not only for usability, but for the software market. Most developers will be stuck at their assumed resolutions for awhile. And initially, no one will want to run an iPhone app at "10x" size, but people would probably be happy if they could at least run 4 iPhone-sized apps on the screen at once.

And this would go a long way toward true multitasking, because a tablet could present the _illusion_ of a large-screen integrated app that is in reality a collection of small utilities from more than one developer. That could make a truly valuable tablet, since at all times you could display exactly what you want to use (e.g. a stupid drawing pad app in one corner, an SSH session in another, heck a VNC session in a 3rd corner and your E-mail in the 4th).</comment>


How frontends, APIs, clean code, and smart devices all live together, happily - <AUTHOR> http://cloudspace.com/blog/2014/03/24/the-benefits-of-split-stack-development/

<comment><AUTHOR> BTW, author here. Happy to chat about any ideas you all have about this, pro or con</comment>


Show HN: Madrassa – Code and Design Courses Reduced to 5sec GIFs - <AUTHOR> http://www.madrassa.co

<comment><AUTHOR> Just launched www.madrassa.co Where I try to tackle the 90% dropout rate that online courses experience, by reducing the 10,15,30+ hours of course material to 1,2,3 minutes total. Using the native language of the web (GIF) to teach Code & Design skills. What courses would you want to see on madrassa?

<comment><USER2> Really good idea. I'm not too sure about GIF, why not use a proper video format that will use less bandwidth. You could always use GIF as a failover.

<comment><AUTHOR> Tnx! The point of GIF is to not need plugins, or pause videos etc. GIF is not super efficiently used in this beta version though. Need to improve that.

<comment><USER3> audioless mp4 or what imgur calls .gifv could also be an option.

<comment><AUTHOR> good call. checking that out

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> A few quick comments:

1\. It would be nice to be able to use arrow keys to move through the courses. Even when I have my mouse, I prefer to use my keyboard for this.

2\. Related, it would be nice to have the browser's back/forward work as expected.

3\. As another commenter noted, it's hard to see where in the gif loop it is, some indicator (or ability to restart it) would be great.

It looks great and I'm looking forward to learning using it.

<comment><AUTHOR> I love the keyboard next/prev idea, as well as your other points. Noted down and it will be there in an update 100% sure. tnx a lot!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is a truly interesting concept. By shortening the learning time like this, things seem a lot more doable, particularly on the first levels. I think one of the things that make it so hard for people not to drop out is the fact that just starting seems like this insurmountable task. I wonder how this would work on more complex levels, though. Great job, in any case!

I'd love to see a flappy bird-like game being developed.

</comment><comment><USER6> Great idea. One small comment: Some of the text needs some work, e.g. for the free lesson on prototype two of the required materials are listed as "A4 paper" (would a letter-sized paper not do, is the specific size important? Better say "a sheet of paper that's larger than ...") and "some pencils" ( _some_ sounds strange here because _pencil_ is a count noun).

Other than those, when I clicked on the next arrow on the first screen I was presented with a screen with problems (Chrome 38.0 on Mavericks): the text "2/20" was sitting on top of the instruction text and the window displayed nothing. Why not detect the user device and put a help message indicating that the site has to be used on a mobile device? When you say "You'll only need an iOS or Android device" in the course description I thought (mistakenly) that these will be required _in addition to_ my laptop.

<comment><USER7> Firefox on 8.1, I did not have the problem you experienced.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Interesting. I like the implication that content runtime is a _cost_ not a benefit of courses. And the content is accessible as text and forward- skippable nicely. As someone who avoids youtube unless it's the only source of information on a subject, this is great.

Not entirely sure about calling it "madrassa", though.

<comment><USER9> "madrassa" is simply arabic for "school"; i really like the name because for me the word brings the ancient arab scholarly traditions to mind. also it is a nicely inclusive touch to use the word despite the somewhat unfortunate connotations it has taken on in the west.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Looks like a nice idea. Here's my two cents:

1\. It's a bit hard for me to tell when the GIF starts or loops, specially when I try to read the text below it. Perhaps there could be some small delay at the end, or a progress indicator?

2\. Could you possibly make the next/previous arrows regular links (with return false or whatever is used to prevent it from reloading the page)? I'm in a setup where using the mouse is awkward, and I can't reach that arrow using only the keyboard.

<comment><AUTHOR> Both very good points indeed. Thank you.

1\. Didn't think of that before. Makes sense 2\. Agreed. Also will probably help with spreading the loading times etc. Need to work on the UI of the courses a bit

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Absolutely. Some of the sites brag about having 30+hour of content, not knowing that for many that's scaring them away.

Tnx! noting down the flappy bird-like-game course.

<comment><USER5> Exactly. Sometimes less is more.

Hit me up if you ever need anything with the project. :D

<comment><AUTHOR> awesome tnx! will definitely do

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Doesn't the name have seriously negative connotations... at least in English- language media. Until I looked it up right now, I didn't know that is a positive word in Arabic. I have always seen in portrayed negatively and associated with Islamic fundamentalism.

<comment><AUTHOR> yeah it simply means 'School'. But tnx to mainstream media, it might have some negative taste to it unfortunately. Will have to see if I keep the name or change it.

<comment><USER12> I think it's a pretty cool name

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Could not access the site in Chrome. Just got the message "Tnx, we will notify you when new courses become available."

No content available. Seems like it's premature to launch an announcement on HN when you're still invitation-only.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's not invitation only, can you try a different browser? You should be able to play around with it and access the course.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I can click on 'Get Early Access', without entering an email address.

I like it! Not so hot on the gifs, but it's short and sweet.

</comment><comment><USER15> Not sure how common this is, but isn't your logo really similar to [http://mymixify.com](http://mymixify.com)?

<comment><AUTHOR> The logo for madrassa is simply a glasses with a (commonly used) loop icon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Very innovative and fun at the same time. You should showcase this to schools, as kids would definitely love it.

<comment><AUTHOR> tnx! will absolutely do. Trying to get the concept right before really pushing it hard. I wish I had something like this for myself back in school. I might have not gotten kicked out after they bored me to death.</comment></comment>