A woman who can smell Parkinson's disease - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-34583642 <comment><USER2> This reminds me of when I was in the Navy -- at one point I had lived with hundreds of other guys in a ship's berthing and at another duty station I mentioned to a coworker that I could determine someone's race from their sweat. Of course, they called bullshit on that statement (as I'd imagine most on here would) and we tested it out with 4 guys (1 black[1], 2 white[2], 1 hispanic[3]) who sweated into the same size shirts, and I was able to identify them with 100% accuracy. Another time, I walked into a cubicle, wrinkled my nose, and said "Man! It smells like an old deck of cards in here!". One of the guys standing next to me then pulled out a rather well-played-through deck of cards out of his pocket.

One of the reasons people give for the difference in smell are the difference in foods that different cultures eat. I definitely know this is not the case, as everyone on that ship was eating the exact same food, and their smells were extremely distinct.

I understand that lack of science applied to my specific anecdotes, but I think there's something to be said for having a keen sense of smell, since people are already geared towards smelling other people's sweat to determine immunocompatibility[4].

[1] A black person's sweat is the one I can identify with absolute certainty, as it's completely unmistakable for anything else

[2] A white person's sweat smells like a distinct type of onion to me

[3] I couldn't really identify his race if it were just this shirt, but had that one by process of elimination.

[4] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_histocompatibility_compl...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_histocompatibility_complex_and_sexual_selection#MHC- mediated_mate_choice:_case_studies)

<comment><USER3> I hear anecdotally that Japanese think Americans smell like butter.

<comment><USER4> It is frowned on now, but in former decades some uncouth Japanese would say "Cheezu nioi" (smells like cheese) when encountering a foreigner.

<comment><USER5> Though I think that's mostly diet related - Japanese don't really do dairy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The thing that most surprised me were the odds that a person in the control group (no parkinson's), actually did have parkinson's (diagnosed early according to the woman) and was diagnosed later to indeed have parkinson's.

After all, the prevalence is 0.3% in the general population. The odds at least one of the six in the control group had parkinson's is around 2% (even less considering it's already a filtered audience in a way). Not impossible but very unlikely, which incidentally makes her insistence of that single particular person to have PD all the more interesting.

There's definitely something there, looking forward to more testing.

<comment><USER7> I don't understand the phrasing there, "She was adamant".

If it was a controlled test, why should she need to be "adamant" about anything, surely she would have merely identified it.

<comment><USER6> I guess after the test they told her the results (i.e., you're wrong on 1 person because he's in the control group and doesn't have Parkinson's), at which point she insisted that he smelled the same as the others, and then the journalist wrote that up as 'she was adamant he had Parkinson's'. Or she really did fully believe in her sense of smell as an ability to detect Parkinson's without doubt, at which point it as much sense for her to say a person has Parkinson's as you to say the sky is really blue because your eyes tell you and the journalist simply relayed that. There's various readings of the phrase that can make sense.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> _" Her accuracy was 11 out of 12. We were quite impressed."

Dr Kunath adds: "She got the six Parkinson's but then she was adamant one of the 'control' subjects had Parkinson's.

"But he was in our control group so he didn't have Parkinson's.

"According to him and according to us as well he didn't have Parkinson's.

"But eight months later he informed me that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's.

"So Joy wasn't correct for 11 out of 12, she was actually 12 out of 12 correct at that time.

"That really impressed us and we had to dig further into this phenomenon."_

Reminds me of the story I heard about a doctor who was diagnosing an STD a lot earlier than average. They put two other doctors in the room with him to try to spot what he was seeing and identified the eye flutter as a new symptom, I think for syphilis.

</comment><comment><USER9> Reminds me of this anecdote from Fishing with John:

"I heard a story about this woman that was swimming in the ocean, and dolphins started swimming with her, and the dolphins kept poking her in the chest above her breast. She got scared and they took her out of the water, and she had a big bruise right on the top of her breast. They took her to the doctor to examine her, and they did a mammogram, and found that she had cancer right in that spot."

– Jim Jarmusch, 'Fishing with John'

[https://youtu.be/uVa8rj1mm7A?t=912](https://youtu.be/uVa8rj1mm7A?t=912)

<comment><USER10> Not sure if it is scientifically confirmed but it is believed that dolphins can see inside a body to some extent with their sonar abilities.

<comment><USER9> Wow, link for that?

<comment><USER11> I can't vouch for dolphin sonar resolving fine anatomical detail /in vivo/, but dolphins can recognize visually obscured objects using the ability [0].

[0] [http://www.dolphin- institute.org/our_research/dolphin_resear...](http://www.dolphin- institute.org/our_research/dolphin_research/seeingthroughsound.htm)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> There are a couple people picking on this research in the thread. This is a preliminary study, just a "bullshit test" to see if this woman is crazy or if she's not. It's obvious that she's not crazy, because all she's doing is sniffing t-shirts and she doesn't know who they belong to. The sample size is large enough, we have a p-value of no more than p=0.0012, and that's under the cynical assumption that she somehow knew that exactly seven of the twelve samples would have Parkinson's... something that the scientists didn't know.

So we know that _something_ is going on here. The next steps are to control potential confounding variables and to determine the sensitivity and specificity of the test, if it's shown that she's not actually detecting some confounding variable. This is where you go double-blind, you use larger sample sizes, et cetera, now that you have money. You have money because the preliminary research was promising.

And we're not just getting a good test out of this. If there's an actual chemical that she's smelling, then there's some chemical process that's going on in people with Parkinson's which isn't happening in people without Parkinson's (or vice versa). Tracing these chemical pathways could give us clues to the etiology of the disease, which would be a REALLY BIG DEAL. Or maybe it's just a rabbit hole.

<comment><USER13> One of the great things about science is that we can determine whether a phenomenon is likely real without having to have the slightest clue what the mechanism might be. Evidence comes first, and this looks like solid evidence, and mechanism can come later; the evidence alone proves the existence of _something interesting_ , and that's what's worth a follow-up.

Hypothesis generation is important, because it helps us design the _next_ experiment, but _this_ experiment is _already_ very interesting.

<comment><USER14> > One of the great things about science is that we can determine whether a > phenomenon is likely real without having to have the slightest clue what the > mechanism might be.

You just have to ignore the people who shout "correlation is not causation" at every opportunity, appropriate or not.

<comment><USER15> Because "correlation is not causation" is just plain wrong. What is should be is "correlation does not imply causation". This is where science comes in. To answer the question, is this correlation because of causation?

The statement is only important to people doing statistical analysis not experimental science.

<comment><USER16> > _correlation does not imply causation_

It sure does. It might not prove causation, or it might not necessitate causation, but it very much implies it.

Somehow people forget that "imply" means: "indicate the truth or existence of (something) by suggestion rather than explicit reference".

In this -- the dictionary and everyday sense -- correlation DOES imply (suggest) causation. It just doesn't secure it.

<comment><USER17> That can't be right. There are so many spurious correlations that obviously imply nothing.

There's got to be some other required factor before correlation can imply causation. Like "if there's reason to believe something is relevant, and there is correlation, then that implies causation. "

<comment><USER18> But a "reason to believe something is relevant" is a prejudged correlation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I know the odor she is talking about. My husband was diagnosed in January. His previous truck and his current vehicle have developed a very distinct odor. I used to say old musty Portuguese man but I realize it is the smell she is talking about. My husband has only used deodorant for 27+ years. This came about because anti-perspirant made his entire armpit swell with bright red welts. He also does not sweat much. It is a very sad disease, but will continue to search for ways to make it easier.

</comment><comment><USER20> Interesting given the recent link between Parkinsons/Alzheimers and fungal infections: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10401344](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10401344)

<comment><USER21> I would not call that a definitive "recent link"; as many in that thread pointed out, that was not the greatest research and needs far more work to confirm

<comment><USER5> Yeah, more research needed. I also came across another 2013 "Fungus may cause symptoms of Parkinson's disease" article I found interesting.

They "found that a compound emitted by mold, called 1-octen-3-ol but more commonly known as mushroom alcohol" "attacked two genes involved in the creation of dopamine"

And speculate I think that could be related to the drop of in dopamine production in Parkinsons.

It would be interesting to try some such "volatile organic compounds emitted by fungi" with the lady who can smell Parkinson's to see it the smell was similar.

[http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/268848.php](http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/268848.php)

Also a 1990 article suggesting it's "the fungus, called Nocardia asteroides." I guess nothing much happening since 1990 suggests that didn't work out.

[http://articles.latimes.com/1990-05-17/news/mn-286_1_nocardi...](http://articles.latimes.com/1990-05-17/news/mn-286_1_nocardia- infection)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Some more truly fascinating Parkinson's news this week about nilotinib, apparently seeming to cure Parkinson in small trials... [http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and- families/...](http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and- families/health-news/parkinsons-patients-given-new-lease-of-life-after- receiving-cancer-drug-in-trial-a6699031.html)

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the link. There is another article in the New Scientist with more information [https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28357-people-with- par...](https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28357-people-with-parkinsons- walk-again-after-promising-drug-trial)

I'm on the look out for stuff for my dad who seems to have it. The data in the New Scientist article looks promising - all 12 of the patients started to improve, some dramatically and as to side effects the "team saw no unwanted effects".

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Can anybody tell us what is the current state of the art in "electronic nose" sensors technology? Could they potentially be used to identify this smell?

<comment><USER24> We're pretty good at detecting low concentrations of chemicals in the air _if we know exactly which ones to detect_. This case suggests there might be some previously unnoticed substances in the air that are indicative of one's Parkinson. If so, we'll probably quickly build dedicated sensors.

The thing that makes me wonder though - what's the state of broad-range chemical sensing? Could a chemical like this be found before if we kept taking broad "smell" samples of everyone and cross-correlating them?

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> My grandpa died of parkinson's, its a really slow and heartbreaking disorder. I think early diagnosis would be wonderful. It runs in the family, and his two older brothers and father had it, so he lived a very preventative lifestyle - especially with respect to daily exercise. I think it paid off, he lived to 85 while both his brothers died 20 years younger.

</comment><comment><USER26> Galen relied on sense of smell for diagnosing illnesses. Aristotle wrote about it. Until the late 20th century doctors often used smell for diagnostics.

</comment><comment><USER27> It would seem there are some major confounding factors here not detailed in the article.

1) The population doesn't reflect a realistic test--if the overall incidence is 0.3%, but the sample size had 50% (or more given her adamant hit), then we need to know whether she was expecting more. 2) More importantly, the incidence in men is 1.49x that of women [1], and age also plays a factor. So given that the sample is already skewed towards a higher incidence of positives, the gender differences might be factored into her senses-- especially since it was her husband who was her training set. With n=12, it would be very easy for the probabilities/priors to be much different than truly random. (E.g., the learning function of her nose might be "men + people over 65" which happened to match up with the test and control group quite well.") Or it could tune into medication used to treat the disease.

Great if true, but I am skeptical.

[1] [http://jnnp.bmj.com/content/75/4/637.full](http://jnnp.bmj.com/content/75/4/637.full)

<comment><USER28> If you look at the Bayesian analyses and the frequentist analyses assuming she knew how many AD shirts there would be, you'd see that point 1 doesn't matter. We can statistically test this without the need to make her sniff 1000's of shirts.

Point 2 is interesting though, and the first thoughtful criticism I've seen in the thread. What if she's both a bit lucky, and also picking up on some correlated marker like age/gender?

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> The question they did not ask what makes the body smell. When we eat garlic we smell like garlic. So the smell must be related to how the food is digested. The researchers should look at the gut flora, in other words they should do a study similar to this [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10439129](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10439129) All disease start in the gut.

</comment><comment><USER30> Seems like they are going the long way about it to determine a molecule for a test.

Why not just train a dog to smell it?

<comment><USER31> Smell what?

It seems that _how_ this works is still unclear, if it works at all. Once validated, it seems plausible that a device/trained animal could replicate the results, assuming its not like this guy: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Harrison_(blood_donor)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Harrison_\(blood_donor\))

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Looking forward to hearing more--reminds me of work done to detect cancer by scent with help from dogs:

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

</comment><comment><USER8> This also reminds me of the breathe test being developed to check ammonia levels for certain kinds of patients:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10402816](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10402816)

</comment><comment><USER33> I'm too lazy to do the math, but I'm just going to say a test like this needs more than a sample size of 12 to show significance for detecting something that happens 1 in 500. The woman also was predisposed to thinking that at least some of the 12 had Parkinson's and the sample selection ensured that at least half did have Parkinson's. An actual test would need to allow any possible sample including those that had zero Parkinson's patients.

<comment><USER12> You're right... you are too lazy.

Traditional null hypothesis would be something like "she guesses right 50% of the time", which gives a likelihood of 1/16384 that she would get the correct answer. Let's be cynical, and suppose that she knew or guessed that there were 5-7 patients with Parkinson's, the likelihood is now 1/2538, still pretty low. Even if she knew there were exactly 7 patients with Parkinson's (quite a cynical null hypothesis!) the likelihood is only 1/792\. Hey, that's a p-value of 0.0012!

Yes, p-values suck. But, the significance is absolutely there, but we would want to follow this research up with a larger sample size and control more of the variables.

<comment><USER34> Let's apply Bayesian reasoning. :P

P(skill): Let's choose a prior that someone can smell parkinson's as one in a million, or 10^-6. (Not very well argued, I admit.)

P(data): This exact data's random occurrence probability is 1/2538.

P(data|skill): The probability of the result, taking account that she has the skill, is 1 (this assumes she never errs).

So we get

        P(skill|data) = P(data|skill) x P(skill) / P(data)

        P(skill) = 1 x 10^-6 / (1/2538) = 0.002538

Or 0.25 percent probability, based on this test, that she has the skill. Which is low.

Intuitively, I would have expected the calculation to yield a much higher number. The prior was very low though.

So I think the grandparent post has some merit. It can be argued that the claim is so extraordinary (the prior) that even twelve "coin tosses" guessed right in a row is more likely.

<comment><USER35> How many people claim they can smell Parkinson's? How many otherwise truthful, sane people have falsely made this claim? Perhaps a better approach to a prior would take into consideration that she claims that she can smell Parkinson's and her reputation as a truthful, sane person. My prior wouldn't be less that 0.1.

<comment><USER33> So, with no scientific basis at all you believe there is a 10% chance that people can detect disease by smell, something that has AFAIK never been proven for any disease? We don't go to the doctor and have him or her smell our armpits. Do you use a psychic? What we have here is an organization that is basing their research funding on math tricks that I, ten years out of undergrad, maybe didn't remember exactly as it was characterized but was able to see through.

<comment><USER12> There are so many things wrong in this comment it's hard to figure out where to begin.

"We don't go to the doctor and have him or her smell our armpits" is an argument to authority. Just because a doctor doesn't use test X does not mean that test X is not useful. Every single diagnosis test we use today was, at some point in the past, unknown and unused by doctors. It is scientific research which gave us those tests. And, because you seem to be uninformed about the subject, I'd like to tell you that there are a number of things that a doctor will smell when they diagnose you. Famously, you can diagnose phenylketonuria by smell, and you can also diagnose diabetes by smell.

This comment also seems to reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of the scientific process. The whole point of scientific research--which requires funding, usually--is to figure out if a hypothesis is true or false. If you already know whether your hypothesis is true or false, you're not doing research, you're replicating results.

When you do preliminary research, it's because you don't have very good information about some particular subject. You're complaining about the shaky ground that they base their research funding on--but these scientists did the right thing. Because the hypothesis seemed improbable, they conducted a dirt cheap experiment. It's an experiment that you could have conducted yourself for $20.

<comment><USER33> > If you already know whether your hypothesis is true or false, you're not > doing research

That's exactly what this is. People believe the claim 100% so we do a simple coin flip, and, yes, there it is. It's confirmed! No extraordinary evidence required for this extraordinary claim. Let the research money flow and the BBC reporting commence. If it were my money I would have another lab repeat the experiment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I bet they didn't randomise for brand of deodorant and diet which makes this research almost meaningless.

<comment><USER37> it was a sample of 12 people, so it's already meaningless. this "research" is the justification for a study, not a study in and of itself.

<comment><USER38> How is it simultaneously meaningless and also a justification for further study?

<comment><USER39> Meaningless to draw large scale conclusions on. It's a "This is something we should look more closely at" not a "Send this person around the country STAT"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Impressive but I don't see the point of diagnosing Parkinsons in early stages when there is no cure available.

<comment><USER41> Fortunately, everybody else does. Why would we not want to be able to discern life-threatening information sooner?

Not to mention the value in correlating another physiological change with the disease. Maybe research into how this works can get us closer to a cure.

<comment><USER42> > Why would we not want to be able to discern life-threatening information > sooner?

Because there's a good chance you'll receive a treatment that will cause you to die sooner than had you not known about the disease for another decade. C.f. why they pushed back the recommended age for mammograms this week.

<comment><USER41> That sounds like a problem with the treatment, not a reason to remain ignorant about your own health for longer.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Red Cross Wants Real Life Laws Enforced Within Virtual Worlds - <AUTHOR> http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111202/08350416953/red-cross-wants-real-life-laws-enforced-within-virtual-worlds.shtml

<comment><USER2> First, follow the link to the source. The Red Cross is currently debating this issue. They don't have any position yet.

That said, the phenomenon is not limited to video games. Almost all forms of violent media (action movies, video games, etc) trivialize "collateral damage". If the main character survives and the bad guy dies, it's supposed to be interpreted as a happy ending, _even if dozens, hundreds, or thousands of civilians are killed_.

But really this is still a subset of a larger phenomenon. Media in general depict main characters as real and non-characters or secondary characters as less-than-real, subhuman props.

Maybe this isn't a problem, but I think the Red Cross is right to at least bring it up.

<comment><USER3> Problem is, that's exactly how the human brain interprets real-life people, too. You can call it the Monkeysphere or Dunbar's Number, but fact is that people are incapable of conceptualizing random strangers on anything like the same level as familiar people. It's the reason you have more emotional reaction to a package being delayed than you have to a suicide bombing in Afghanistan. It's a limitation of the human brain. Movies and games with collateral casualties reflect the way every single human being actually looks at the world; you just notice it because it's someone else's version of who's important and who isn't instead of your own.

<comment><USER2> Consider these two statements:

What you would do for your closest friends, you should do for everyone.

What you wouldn't do to your closest friends, you shouldn't do to anyone.

Your post explains why the first doesn't work, but that has no bearing only the second.

I may not feel as strongly for random strangers as I do for my closest friends, but I still wouldn't kill or torture or otherwise dehumanize them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> > These types of arguments are very similar to the arguments made by those who > have requested laws regulating violence in video games in the past. Those > people argued that the lack of consequences in the game would influence > player behavior in real life.

Of course. Mowing down countless pedestrians in Grand Theft Auto, then climbing up to a high building and sniping the police officers that come to arrest me most certainly affects me - it lets me blow off steam in a way that doesn't actually harm anyone.

I'm too lazy to find a link, but consider this a virtual citation to the study that showed that availability of pornography actually decreases sex crimes.

I'm all for war-themed videogames to acknowledge that there's more to combat than spewing bullets until you win, but I've been playing violent video games for years, and I've yet to Gouranga any Hare Krishnas with my car.

</comment><comment><USER5> The Red Cross should focus on real-world laws being enforced in the real world.

Also, video games are "art" (regardless of how artistic they may appear, or you personally feel toward them). Art is protected speech in many countries. I know, for instance, that Nazi symbols are banned in Germany, except in art. The spirit of such exemptions makes sense; we don't want to pretend negative ideas don't exist by banning them.

My point is torture happens in the real world. War crimes are real. Maybe the Red Cross needs to focus on trying to stop these real world events, instead of attempting to stop their depiction in media.

<comment><USER2> The Red Cross does focus on real-world issues. They have almost 100 million volunteers worldwide. This is a tiny portion of their overall humanitarian effort. And if their goal is a peaceful world, they are right to consider factors that could lead to violence. They are trying to find the disease instead of just treating the symptoms.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Oddly enough, most games that impose some sort of ethical behavior (either through law, social, or gameplay aspects) exist either before the Convention (Assassin's Creed doesn't allow you to get stab-happy on civilians), after most participating entities have ceased to exist (Fallout), or outside it's jurisdiction entirely (Elder Scrolls, many other fantasy RPGs)

</comment><comment><USER7> While using legislation might be an overkill, I think that games would use mentioning Conventions. Not even to enforce certain decisions on player, but as a background (e.g. NPCs restraining themselves from torturing enemy soldiers). People pick up a lot of knowledge and awareness from computer games; even mentioning the Red Cross message would help players better understand the reality of real-world combat.

</comment><comment><USER8> > It would be highly appreciated if games reproducing armed conflicts were to > include the rules which apply to real armed conflicts. These rules and > values are given by international humanitarian law and human rights law.

I never got this way of thinking and I'm a bit disappointed Red Cross "accepts" it. Rules in an armed conflict? Why did we start accepting any kind of killing? How is shooting someone opposed to you better than stabbing them in the eye and then shooting them? The US which should be counted as a developed and civilised country does not even care sometimes to "play by the rules" (torture outside of the country, treatment of jailed people), yet the games should give you an illusion world conflicts do?

I don't oppose cruel games and think they reflect the situation, rather than influence it, but I expected the Red Cross to have a different view on this (and a more strict one).

</comment><comment><USER9> Note that the Red Cross is not asking for this to be legally enforced, they're just saying that it would be "appreciated".

<comment><USER10> That is until the US Government uses the Red Cross's idea as an excuse to push for censoring video games.

<comment><USER11> Fear of government abuse is a terrible reason to self-censor. And frankly, governments don't need anyone's help to find excuses for stupid behavior.

Oh, and really, more and more of the electoral base are game players now. The politics have changed.

<comment><USER10> > Fear of government abuse is a terrible reason to self-censor

I never said anything about self-censoring, just that the Red Cross's stance on this might encourage the government to try and push for new laws. I hate censorship in all its forms.

> Oh, and really, more and more of the electoral base are game players now. > The politics have changed.

"more and more of the electoral base are internet users now", so surely the government won't try to push laws that censor that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> killing virtual people in a virtual world - violence, bad. At the same time each and every of us oppresses, brutalizes, tortures and kills in real-life through our hired-for-money agents - governments at all levels.

"Come on, let us shoot"

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=5rXPrfnU3G0#t=563s)

Games are to blame? Or hysterical propaganada dehumanizing arabs, Afgans, etc... and blessing violence against them.</comment>


Evernote to End Support for Clearly, Evernote for Pebble, and Versions of Skitch - <AUTHOR> https://blog.evernote.com/blog/2015/12/17/evernote-to-end-support-for-clearly-evernote-for-pebble-and-versions-of-skitch/ <comment><USER2> How many of these product buyout and eventual shutdown's do we need to have before people _stop_ getting all excited and giddy when a company is bought out.

</comment><comment><USER3> That's annoying. Evernote doesn't have the actually useful bits of Skitch (iOS photo editing, annotating maps, annotating web pages, etc.)</comment>


How Much Does It Cost to Make Food Delivery App? - <AUTHOR> https://themindstudios.com/blog/how-to-create-an-app-like-postmates-for-food-delivery-business-2/ <comment><USER2> maybe it's me but why would someone want to compete with such highly funded competitors?</comment>


My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk. - <AUTHOR> http://thingist.com/t/item/4372/ <comment><USER3> Condescending feedback says more about the speaker than the listener. It is almost invariably about their own insecurity. This is true is almost all fields of endeavor, not just programming.

Just a few examples of my own:

Insecure bridge player: The queen of spades was a stupid play. What's wrong with you?

Excellent bridge player: The queen of spades would have been a great play against a 4/2 split. But since you had a 3/3 split, what do you think would have happened if you had played the ace instead?

Insecure public speaker: You look like an idiot playing with your hands like that.

Excellent public speaker: You talked about a lot of cool things. I bet I would have been even more interested if I wasn't distracted so much by your hand gestures.

Insecure parent: If you can't keep that baby quiet, you should just stay at home!

Excellent parent: Here's something that has really worked well for me when my kids cried in public...

Insecure programmer: How lame. I can't believe you <insert almost anything you could have done>.

Excellent programmer: I see that works. I have found a few ways to make it work even better. Let me know what you think.

<comment><USER4> Can someone please explain the logic behind "condescending feedback = insecurity"?

And I mean that sincerely. I have been thinking about this for a long time now, and I just cannot come up with any supporting evidence to explain the corelation. It might sound like a stupid request, but I think it is a hard argument to make totally water proof.

<comment> DanI-S I see it this way: The only reason to give condescending feedback is to demonstrate your superiority over the person you're criticizing. If you truly wanted to be helpful, you'd be giving helpful feedback. If you were truly confident in your own abilities, you wouldn't feel the need to demonstrate your superiority.

<comment><USER5> I think condescending feedback = insecurity is a bit of a generalization.Maybe sometimes it is true but not all the time - for example Linus' "feedback" on CVS was pretty condescending but I doubt that was because he was insecure

<comment> DanI-S It's definitely a generalization; it just seems to be a reasonably reliable one :).

I suppose the insecurity doesn't have to be about domain knowledge, either - it could be about communication skills. Perhaps some people giving condescending feedback don't feel like they are able to communicate in any other way. They experience the desire to contribute, but aren't confident in their tutoring skills and don't want to risk sounding stupid by bungling an explanation.

This is admittedly pure speculation...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's true. I don't know how many times I've watched eager hackers get lambasted for "reinventing the wheel," or "don't bother doing it yourself, you'll just screw it up -- someone has probably done it already and did it better than you could." This happens most often at the intersection of technology and entrepreneurship.

The business advice is that it's cheaper to buy it than build it.

The engineer's perspective is that a square peg isn't going to fit in every hole.

"Geeks," are harsh. I mean that in the very broad, general, and discriminatory sense. We have to work with bad code all day written by bad programmers. Some of us make a career out of saving businesses from bad technology decisions and poorly written programs (it is NOT good work, btw. Just pays well). So when yet another new-comer comes on board with bright, eager enthusiasm to revolutionize the Internet (yet again) we do tend to be rather cynical.

I agree w/ the poster that the cynicism is a bad thing. We could be more constructive. Don't stop them from writing their own web server... show them where to look up the RFCs, reference implementations, etc. Encourage them to learn. We could all benefit from having more knowledgeable people around.

<comment><USER7> There is reinventing the wheel and reinventing the wheel.

It's cute when a person, learning as she goes, comes up with something that's been already invented. Only goes to show she understands the field. [1]

It's unbelievably irritating when something that was widely implemented 10 or 20 or 30 years ago (and then even improved significantly) is now asserted as _the_ next big thing. C'mon, be serious -_-' [2]

[1] a nice guy thinks of swap (in userspace) just to hold strings of arbitrary length, calls it ``backed by file storage'': <http://9fans.net/archive/2011/02/94>

[2] no example I can think of ATM; but perhaps the above one could fit?

<comment><USER8> Garbage collection back in the 90's. Java really ran with that one.

<comment><USER7> "We were not out to win over the Lisp programmers; we were after the C++ programmers. We managed to drag a lot of them about halfway to Lisp."

\- Guy Steele, Java spec co-author

<http://www.paulgraham.com/quotes.html>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I would direct anyone who thinks geeks are harsh now to read chapter 10 of "Dealers of Lightning," about the early days of Xerox PARC.

They had a weekly meeting called DEALER, where the boffins would present their ideas to the group at large.

A quote:

"But the argument had best be carefully thought out. Anyone trying to slip an unsound concept past this group was sure to be stopped short by an explosive "Bullshit!" from Thacker or "Nonsense!" from the beetle-browed ARPANET veteran Severo Ornstein. Then would follow a cascade of angry denunciations: "You don't know what you're talking about!" "That'll never work!" "That's the stupidest idea I've ever heard!" Lampson might add a warp-speed chapter-and- verse deconstruction of the speaker's sorry reasoning. If the chastened dealer was lucky (and still standing), the discussion might finally turn to how he might improve on his poor first effort."

<comment><USER10> Did they begin every sentence with "Silence!" as well?

<comment><USER9> Haha. Possibly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> What would we think of an American who walked into an Egyptian coffeehouse or a Japanese board room and interpreted all the behavior he saw there as if he were seeing it in a church in Iowa? It's fine to demand that geeks develop some social sophistication, but it's also fine to expect that non-geeks will have enough social sophistication not to rush to judgment about behavior in an unfamiliar cultural context. Cultures vary from place to place, subgroup to subgroup, and there's no reason people shouldn't adapt to us if they want to join our subculture. That's the way it works.

As other people have pointed out, the argumentative, ruthless nature of computing culture has very adaptive aspects because it mirrors the persistent, ruthless, and logical nature of the computers we deal with. Once you're used to dealing with _computers_ \-- once you've learned that computers don't compromise, but it isn't personal -- you perceive computer geek behavior differently. The only reason to enter the subculture, except as a tourist, is to learn about computing, so it is reasonable to assume that anybody arguing about how to program a microcontroller either gets us or is in the process of getting us.

Obviously, different rules apply when geeks interact with non-geeks in other contexts. When in Rome, do as the Romans do. When in Xerox PARC, or less exalted forums for discussing computing, do as the computer geeks do.

<comment><USER12> There's a huge difference between "You're wrong and here's why", and "You did X??? What are you, stupid? You suck and you should just gtfo because you'll never amount to anything. You'd be so fired if you worked in my company. Bullet. Brain. Make the connection."

Both are uncompromising. Only one is civil.

<comment><USER13> But both are personal. A better take would be "This solution/process/method is wrong and here's why". Make it about the issue, not the person.

<comment><USER14> Unfortunately not even this works for many/most regular (read: non geek) folks:

"Why prove to a man he is wrong? Is that going to make him like you? Why not let him save face? He didn't ask for your opinion. He didn't want it. Why argue with him? You can't win an argument, because if you lose, you lose it; and if you win it, you lose it. Why? You will feel fine. But what about him? You have made him feel inferior, you hurt his pride, insult his intelligence, his judgement, and his self-respect, and he'll resent your triumph. That will make him strike back, but it will never make him want to change his mind. A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." - Dale Carnegie, 1936

Sigh.. sometime I feel I'm of a different species from people that take almost everything personally.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> My policy: be nice to people. Don't be nice to ideas.

IMO, ideas need harsh critique, and it's not always easy or worth it to spend the extra time padding the conversation to soften your point - it can even be counterproductive.

So while I won't say that someone is stupid or dumb for suggesting the idea, I _may_ say an idea was not well thought out if it really isn't. I expect my peers to do the same, because we're not going to see which ideas stick if we bicker over how we iterate on them.

<comment><USER16> The real problem seems to be people who can't separate themselves from the mistakes they make and take everything as an affront to their person. Receiving criticism means that your idea or work is at least worth considering.

<comment><USER17> When receiving criticism, I should do as you say, and assume my mistakes are the target, not my (oh so sensitive) self. But when handing out criticism, I should assume the other person will take it personally. It's like that principal for Internet robustness: be conservative in what you send, and liberal in what you accept.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> While I agree with this to some extent, I'd just like to comment on the the skateboarding analogy; You were probably taking it one step at a time, learning to stand on the board, increase your speed, make turns. Once you got all that done, you might move on to try some tricks, perhaps trying to learn the rock to fakie trick. What you _didn't_ do was, on your 2nd day, to scream out "why am I not sticking my 720 kickflip?!?!".

The latter is fairly common in the world of programming, in my experience.

(There's obviously also a big difference between being physically together with the people in a skatepark and sitting on the other end of an IRC session.)

<comment><USER19> I suspect the reason why hackers are harsh compared to skateboarders probably has something to do with the fact that when skateboarders fuck up, it tends to _hurt_. Bad hacking rarely carries such a strong disincentive, so we have to create one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> There is a major difference between sports and programming: In sports, everyone is a critic, and it is really obvious if people cannot skateboard, or cannot throw a basketball.

Compare with programming, where overt effect and actual competence are not always related. Criticizing programming and programmers is nontrivial, and hence people have to do it all the time to build up a shared understanding of good and bad practices.

Looking at visual arts, you'll probably find a similar asymmetry between drawing (where it's difficult to get to even a barely mediocre level) and layout/typography (where it's easy to do something that looks "good" to the layman yet is totally horrible). Needless to say, there are more pages bashing bad layout and bad typography than there are sites dedicated to bashing bad drawings.

<comment><USER21> Except there is much more to a sport than, for example, shooting a basketball. There's offense, there's defense. There's fundamental skills, there's game strategy, there's different sorts of matchups. It goes on and on to subtler and more intricate detail. It's not simply whether one can skateboard or not, program or not, and it would seem that is what the author of the article was getting at.

In your visual arts examples, there is a much simpler explanation. The reason there are more pages devoted toward layout principles is because the medium of expression (i.e. the web) fundamentally uses layout principles. Drawing doesn't express using the web. It's a selection effect, just as it's more likely that you will find soccer players in Brazil, and hockey players in Canada, rather than the other way around.

<comment><USER22> OK, but there are degrees of subtlety though. A casual fan might see someone score 40 points in a basketball game and say "wow, he must be a great player" while a hardcore fan might chime in and say "actually he's way overrated. He's a poor defender, way too selfish and lazy in rebounding." but the fact remains, if you score 40 points a game in basketball, you are at least a 'good' player at your level. I can say that categorically. Can we say "If you X, you must be a good programmer."?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Yep, I agree entirely. Stop being such sanctimonious fuckwits.

<comment><USER24> If "fuckwit" adds anything to your comment, can you explain what that is?

<comment><USER23> It's a noun I've used to attach the adjective sanctimonious to which adds more emphasis than the word "person" would have, and also confirms to the reader that I disapprove of a holier than thou attitude.

<comment><USER25> To be honest, I thought you were being sarcastic. OP was all about how people ought to be less harsh, less judgmental, more open-minded, kinder and more welcoming. 'Fuckwit' might as well be the poster child for the culture of unquestioning, caustic certitude of which he disapproves.

<comment><USER23> _"'Fuckwit' might as well be the poster child for the culture of unquestioning, caustic certitude of which he disapproves"_

Hmm. You're right. In hindsight I _definitely_ should have said fuckTARD.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Fascinating post.

Coming from an Engineering background I'd like to echo what another commenter said - Ideas must be treated harshly. If it's a bad idea then it needs to be vetted and corrected, especially if it's likely to kill someone. You owe it to the honor of the profession to do so. But you have to attack the idea and not the person. When egos are involved that's not easy, because the person may view an attack on their idea as a personal attack. Just assume the person is as intelligent as you and had a good reason for their "bad" idea. Maybe you can build on it without completely discarding it.

As for language, I've never understood the online "geek" community's tendancy to be grammar and spelling "nazis." There have been times where I've been the only native English speaker on a team, both professionally and in college. If we spent all of our time discussing Strunk and White we would have never finished what we were doing. Yet on the internet, where "exposure" to non- native speakers is commonplace, these practices seem to be the norm. Boggling. (It's one thing to be helpful, it's another to be petty. Petty strikes me as professionally immature.)

In short: A crash-course in interpersonal communications would help everybody.

Thanks for the blog post.

</comment><comment><USER27> It's nice to see someone stand up and say whoa. I mean my first youtube post of an arduino project I did - someone had to explain my miss-pronucenation of a word and paid no attention to the project itself. User comment boxes are not always as helpful as it might seem.

<comment><USER28> As someone who occasionally finds myself nitpicking things (mispronunciation, you're/your, etc), I don't do it out of malice. In fact, I often like and agree with what the person was saying, I was just bothered by that minor issue.

Just pointing out a nitpick by itself sounds harsh, though. Instead of just posting "It's 'you're' for the contraction of 'you are'. It's easier to remember if you think of it as just replacing the 'a' with and apostrophe.", I always try to add my positive thoughts as well, even if I feel they add very little. For example, 'Great post, I know exactly what you mean when you say some people are just overly critical for no reason. One thing, though...".

Obviously, this will still make me sound like a nitpicking asshole at times, so I try to avoid the the truly small corrections (you're/your, its/it's, grammar/mispellings in general). The key is to point out that you aren't dismissing or ignoring the rest of the work, and that the nitpicks you had were really the only part you disagreed with.

<comment><USER29> Most critiques by grammar Nazis add zero value to the conversation and distract from the topic at hand. Have a cookie, you payed attention in English class, now gtfo

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I disagree with this.

The difference in the examples cited is not sports vs hackers, it's communication in real life vs over the interwebs.

In my experience most hackers are perfectly pleasant in person, happy to help if asked, and not substantially different to how the article describes the skaters.

Conversely, I bet if you look at some skater videos on youtube they would be full of sarcasm and piss-taking (well they would be if youtube comments weren't a massive fail in their own right)

Geeks and nerds more frequently use online media to communicate, but I don't think they are otherwise more predisposed to antosocial behaviour than anyone else.

As a datapoint, my wife uses babycentre a lot, and the disproportionate flamewars you get there are ridiculous. Put those mothers together in a room and I bet they'd be completely pleasant.

<comment><USER31> I agree with you.

One of the things to learn in life is who to listen to and who to ignore.

I can align with the author - being around people who do not accept mistakes or shortcomings as part of a positive learning process is frustrating - <USER2> saying that "Geeks" do this too often and more than other circles is untrue.

That idiot should just quit writing blog posts.

<comment><USER32> Not really. I hang out with homeless people, hippies, frat guys, and any group I can work my way into.

Geeks ARE angry. They seem to have shittons of pentup rage

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> It's a little more advantageous to firmly establish your current language/style/concept as the standard than it is in skateboarding. The job market is all about hype. If RoR is the latest trend, a RoR programmer is better off. Same with Node.js. Same with HTML5 over flash.

While I doubt people actually think "I'm going to tell you that your choice of language sucks because I want more work" I also doubt bullies on the playground think "I don't have a lot of self esteem, so I'm going to pick on kids smaller than me to make myself feel better".

Some communities are more harsh than others. Ask a stupid question in #perl and compare the response with #python. The perl community is well established and isn't trying to evangelize. Python is (or was) less commonly used. They don't want to scare away new users because more python programmers means more support for the language.

It's not an excuse, but it is a possible explanation.

<comment><USER34> I was just under the impression the python community has a long tradition of getting things done while being far from experts in the language, i.e., a far greater proportion of non-professional programmers who just use python to make one part of their real job go smoother.

This leads to a very high tolerance of people new to the language, and to misunderstandings.

Ruby and perl seem to have more typical professional programmer types is all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Much of this isn't "geekdom" it's the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory in action: [http://www.crunchgear.com/wp- content/uploads/2009/05/shitcoc...](http://www.crunchgear.com/wp- content/uploads/2009/05/shitcock.jpg)

I've been to many BarCamps, local Ruby on Rails and Web design meetups and people are incredibly giving of their time, knowledge and patience.

It is a profoundly different thing to meet someone in person, who is struggling with some technical issue, than to read about it (devoid of all context) on some wall of electronic text.

</comment><comment><USER36> The author's point is well taken. But:

* Stop using comic sans

* What are you, illiterate?

* Tables? What is this, the 1990s? Ha ha ha!.

* This design looks like myspace

* You're using the default hashing algorithm in mysql instead of bcrypt?

* God I hate the arduino. It's not real hacking.

Which of these _things_ is _not_ like-the _ooooother_?

<comment><AUTHOR> One of them offers a solution (use bcrypt).

It's the delivery that matters.

<comment><USER36> It's true, but it's also the case that that's the only non-subjective point in the list. You can zip it on things like Comic Sans and table layout, but you probably shouldn't hold your tongue on security flaws.

I agree, delivery counts.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I'm reminded of something a wise man once told me (HNified a bit):

In every pairwise conversation there are 6 people:

1\. Alice

2\. Bob

3\. Who Alice thinks she is.

4\. Who Bob thinks he is.

5\. Who Bob thinks Alice is

6\. Who Alice things Bob is.

Perception plays an absurdly large part in communication, as do nonverbal cues. Frequently we adjust our message based on feedback we get from the listener. Those lacking "social graces" or communicating in just text on the internet don't get these cues, so the message comes out "harsher".

Complicating this, there is a lot of baggage each person attaches to words, phrases and general styles of questioning/commenting. So one person's harsh may be another's "in to it".

One example of all this I have experienced:

One time at a vendor show, me and some colleagues were in a small demo, presented by a sales guy and a few engineers from the company. During the Q&A, I started questioning the engineer pretty intensely with questions like:

Does it do $X? Why not? Do you plan on adding it?

(These are actually pretty neutral questions)

Then about another aspect I was really into some possibilities of:

Can I use it for $Y? Can I make $Y happen by this? What happens if I do $Z? How about if I work around that limitation like this and get $Y + $Z effectively?

(these are not neutral questions, they are me geeking out)

So after the demo some people thought I broke the engineer and ripped him a new one with the second set of questions, because I was rapid fire asking questions towards a goal. One engineer thought it was a fun "play with an idea time". The other engineer thought I was severely criticizing his work.

The sales guy and several of the audience members thought I was being unduly harsh by asking about the feature $X. Apparently this was a contentious issue that I knew nothing about. The engineers and others thought nothing of those questions.

Similarly: I frequently get frustrated when people wrap up valid criticism in fake nice BS. I don't want to hear "great thing, what if instead you did this". I really would rather just hear "What about this other method? Why not use that?" or even "Dude, 10s of googling would have shown you the flaws in that". Because an honest self assessment includes the fact that I don't know everything, and that many (most) of the things I come up with have also been thought of by other people, who may have found flaws in that reasoning.

I guess my point is there is a lot more than just "nerds are mean to each other" going on.

<comment><USER38> The enumeration at the top of your comment is the best thing I've read yet today. Douglas Hofstadter expands on similar ideas in _I Am a Strange Loop_.

<comment><USER39> That enumeration has its origins in Freud, if I remember correctly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hey all, I submitted this this morning, but never anticipated getting _this_ much traffic.

I _really_ appreciate all the comments :) If the site is slow to load, there is a static version of the page here:

<http://thingist.com/static/4372.html>

</comment><comment><USER40> Coming from the same situation as the OP, only reversed (grew up a skating every single day, got addicted to programming later on), I would like to contribute a little context to the OP's brush with skateboarding. Sure, I remember ollieing backpacks with my friends in the morning before school, when we had pretty much nothing but encouraging words for each other. But I also remember years later, being on tours/roadtrips with pro's and video deadlines and magazine articles. In those latter years, the cynicism and shit-talking that I'd witnessed (ok, and took part in) was unparalleled by any other sub- culture I've ever crossed paths with. Someone with a forced/contrived style of skating could be made to hate their own life after enduring little more than 2 min. of criticism from certain, fellow skateboarders.

My interpretation of all this is that anytime you're doing something around the upper echelon of people that do that same thing you're doing, expect tests of your will, whether technical or emotional. I just think of it as human nature's way of weeding out the weaklings of any group.

Personally, I'm quite fond of and entertained by the pretentiousness I receive on certain irc channels… brings me back to the days when and skate spots and chicks were literally my only cares in the world.

</comment><comment><USER41> I don't like this generalization. I've met all sorts of geeks, nerds and hackers. Some are horrible to each other, some are very nice. I can't see that it's helpful to accuse all of us of being bastards.

On the other hand, I have seen code that I found horribly upsetting and I'm sure I've expressed my opinion of it. I know that I have the patience of something with a very small amount of patience when I come across someone who just doesn't instantly get concepts (for this reason I cannot do family tech support) and I did make my college girlfriend (also doing computer science) cry once because I just rattled off an entire programming assignment without touching the computer (she switched courses).

So, it really depends. If it was someone junior to me I'd cut them a lot of slack, if it was someone I considered my intellectual peer they'd need to roll with the punches.

</comment><comment><USER42> Agreed. Next time I shall condescendingly refer people to this post with one eyebrow raised if I hear any of those 'lines'.

<comment><USER43> My sarcasm detector is beeping, but very faintly. If you are being serious, wouldn't it kindof defeat the purpose to be condescending towards people spouting that stuff?

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> I've had lots of moments where I let bitterness get the best of me, and started flaming. Upon reflection, I think I understand why.

As programmers, we are part of a giant ecosystem of software. What one programmer does affects another, even for two people who don't directly work together. This is unlike (say) sports. If there are other skateboarders who have terrible form, it doesn't affect me.

On the other hand, if a large number of people make what I perceive to be a bad engineering decision, like using SOAP (SOAP's safe to hate on these days, right?), that affects me because I'll have to write software that interfaces with their systems that use a terrible protocol.

And if I see a person arguing in favor of a terrible idea like SOAP, I perceive that they are not only using SOAP themselves, but encouraging others to do so also -- if they succeed my life gets even _harder_. If other people seem to be agreeing that it's a good idea, instead of recognizing it for the insanity that it is, the frustration grows. And if the person is arguing in a self-righteous way, that makes it seem justified to be snippy back.

It's probably not the most healthy reaction, but there you have it. This is what led me to post rants in the past like: [http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=446030&ci...](http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=446030&cid=22346032)

</comment><comment><USER45> I think that the issue of open hostility in online communities stems from Anonymity more than anything else. Most people are very conciliatory face to face. Honestly, I'd prefer something between open hostility and straight up pacification. I definitely want constructive criticism, which is why I tend to like Hacker News. The comments that I have seen here tend to be more constructive than other places on the intertubes.

<comment><USER46> There is something about hiding behind machines that makes people treat each other much worse. I've noticed this in traffic jam situations, when everybody is hiding behind a couple tons of steel people are much more rude than, for example waiting in a human line, with everybody cutting each other off, flipping the finger, honking horns, etc. There's been a couple times where someone who has been rude on the road pulls up next to me at a stop and I wave, smile, say hello, and they act completely awkward and apparently ashamed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> I agree with the author's observation. Geek culture is incredibly unforgiving, and proudly so. To some extent this might be just a part of hacker tradition, but I think there's a deeper problem - it isn't always easy to tell who the authority on a subject is in a random group discussing a highly technical issue.

Let's take the sports analogy the author used. It is immediately clear who is more apt at skateboarding and thus should be doling out advice. The power relation is clear and accepted on both sides, which allows for constructive instruction to take place.

Discussing things on HN, however is different. In general, technical discussions amongst people who don't generally know each other are a process of _discovering_ the appropriate power relation. We are exchanging comments and trying to gauge who is more knowledgeable. If I were to try to teach someone before they've acknowledged I have something to teach them, I'll come across as arrogant and an unpleasant argument will likely begin.

I'm not sure what the answer is. Sometimes I'd like to see more humility in the communities we're referring to here, but I also don't want to read insecure, watered-down opinion. It would be the best of all worlds if people stated their case as strongly as possible, confident that everyone knows they're aware of the possibility or even overwhelming probability they're wrong. I think that would eliminate a lot of the pain and noise in discussions on forums such as this.

</comment><comment><USER48> In most cases, there's a social normative function that teaches people that this kind of behavior doesn't work. Are you an asshole in real life? People won't deal with you and you'll find yourself shut out of many social opportunities. People tend to learn to stop being assholes real quick when everybody else gets an office birthday party and they don't.

The problem with life on the Internet is that this social normative function doesn't work. Are you an asshole that nobody will talk to? No problem! Just invite yourself to the office parties and start running your mouth!

Admin lock out your account from your favorite forum because of flame wars? No problem! There's a million other forums you can head to and be a complete jerk in!

There _are_ exceptions, HN for example is fairly unique in terms of the social environment it provides, and flaming out here can have consequences, hence people tend to behave a bit better here in order to maintain their social status in the group.

However, in addition to behavior and tone, down arrows represent a kind of social normative function that includes semantics that might push people towards a kind of consensus in group think (flags usually deal with purely bad behavior). The problem is that it's very hard on HN to have a dissenting opinion without getting knocked down a few points. If want to keep socializing here, you either conform or get out.

</comment><comment><USER22> If we were to generalize and put nerds into three broad categories-

1\. Lower-case 'n' nerds for whom coding is as much of a day job as it possibly can be and lead rewarding and socially active lives away from their computers.

2\. Nerds who are completely immersed in what they do because they find it to be rewarding in and of itself.

3\. Nerds who are completely immersed in what they do because they aren't very good at anything else, and are bitter that being good at what they do isn't really socially rewarding.

I think most of our problems come from group #3.

<comment><USER49> 1 and 2 sound like distinct personality types and 3 sounds like a neurotic person

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> <http://lesswrong.com/lw/3h/why_our_kind_cant_cooperate/>

</comment><comment><USER51> Thank you. I don't think this will do any good, but I'm still glad somebody is saying it loudly.

</comment><comment><USER52> Honestly, I'm on the other side of the fence. I've found that good programming shops are a bit offensive and a bit agro when discussing code, and it leaks playfully out into regular relations. It needs to be offensive, but not about the person themselves (like all good criticism)

"What? This sorting code is slower the a walrus walking uphill" "Dude, your lunch STINKS, are you cooking a month-dead skunk?" "That's retarded. It won't work. At all. Ever."

Sure, they sound a bit harsh, but they're not actually offensive because you KNOW they're not about you, or are only peripherally about your judgment, and it's an unavoidable fact that some people have terrible judgment.

The shops I've worked in with quiet, softly given feedback have been those that aren't doing anything interesting, are moving slowly and don't really have any great developers, or even better then average ones. In my mind there's a definite correlation between boisterous shops and great ones.

</comment><comment><USER53> The old stereotype of the socially awkward nerd is just as true now as it ever was. The points the author brings up are classic signs of lack of ability to articulate in a social context.

It's not a popular thing to say but programming and hacking is, at the end of the day, a mostly solitary endeavour. Why would someone who spends most of their time stuck in their own head know how to converse about technical matters, especially when it's online and behind a wall of anonymity?

I'm not saying all geeks are antisocial. I'm saying that the kind of person who would call another an idiot over a minor disagreement isn't demonstrating a lack of confidence but rather an inability to communicate in a friendly way.

</comment><comment><USER54> The worst part is the practice of _deliberately trying to make someone feel bad about themselves_ over a discussion about iPods or something. What sort of person does that? Thankfully I hardly ever see it on HN, but elsewhere it's rife.

<comment><USER55> You see it a lot between iOS and Android camps. I get flak from Android fanboys constantly and I _don't even use an iPhone_. If each system was so perfect, there wouldn't be a need for anyone to prove anything. We're pitted into camps of imperfect systems in which each side is perfectly aware of their side's flaws but avoid the geek-sin of admitting they use something less than perfect by only pointing out everything wrong with the "other side" rather than admitting that everything is broken and telling Google and Apple about it instead.

<comment><USER54> I know one guy who used to actually reply saying, 'read what you just wrote, and feel bad about yourself.' One of the main problems though is that half the people on these forums are 10-18 year olds. I mean even Hacker News has a median age of only 25 (according to a recent poll), and it seems super-grown- up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> I think there's two main problems here at play: excessive criticism and discouragement.

I actually like the first one, and most hackers I know do too. I've seen geeks take (possibly harsh) critics very well, way better than "normal" people. Personally, I find it useful as a route to self-development, but it's certainly more frequent than in other places.

About discouragement, I think the author is just visiting the wrong communities. Or maybe I've been really lucky all this time. Either way, I don't see evidences of this behavior being more common in our circles.

</comment><comment><USER57> Getting in the habit of _kindly_ offering _constructive_ criticism will pay off big-time when and if you raise kids -- at least if you want them to like you when they're adults.

</comment><comment><USER58> Ehn. There's a reason he rhetorically asks whether we're back in high school - this isn't just _geek_ behavior. I've experienced this attitude from plenty of people who aren't at all geeky, and I've encountered some very nice geeks.

Under certain sets of circumstances, people just tend to be dicks - and the internet contains many cases of those circumstances.

<http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19/>

</comment><comment><USER59> That happens everywhere; however, the author is comparing two different places: The Internet and a skate-park.

He just find a good place and also people don't tell strangers and guests "you are an idiots" in your face. On the Internet, it's different. That applies to a skateboard forum, just search and you'll find out!

End of the story: Work on improving yourself and forget about what sh*t the others say.

</comment><comment><USER60> I'm glad that HN is a place where people are normally really helpful to each other, but I see it even occasionally here.

On the other hand, let's not take it too far. It's nice for people to have a little bit of backbone. They don't need to endure jackasses unnecessarily, but there are times when criticism is rightly required and backbone is rightly needed to respond well.

<comment><USER34> Yes, however the criticism the author is complaining about it not any criticism at all, it's about the low order, non substantive, non-topical type.

Spolsky or PG wrote up a piece on this a bit back.

<comment><AUTHOR> >Spolsky or PG wrote up a piece on this a bit back.

I'd love to see it if you can remember the title...

<comment><USER34> Found it: <http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> That's it, I'm admitting it.

"Tom, no, not among the hall of nerds."

No, it's the best time. Everyone, I have an announcement to make! I...am kind of like a hipster.

 _reveals fedora hat and threadless shirt_

<<My word! They do exist!>>

No longer will I be prosecuted for enjoying a cultural product that is making it's first appearance in the cultural scene.

I also speak for every newbie who dislikes dealing with the console and I speak for every newbie who doesn't posses the skills of a sysadmin, but wants to understand their way around unix. I also speak for every CS major who thinks caustic arguments, over which programming language sucks, are a waste of time.

And yes, I am currently learning Haskell, not because it is underground but because I enjoy recursively declaring functions. Now who here will help me understand side effects?

</comment><comment><USER62> "...give people constructive criticisms. If their design is bad, tell them what they can do to improve it. If there code is bad, offer to help them patch it and make it better. If there spelling or grammar is off, just let it go."

I perceive a profound inconsistency.

</comment><comment><USER63> This seems like someone just discovered that once you consider a large enough group of people, a bunch of them happen to be narrow-minded people thinking they know The Truth and feel they have a Mission to teach Gospel. The best thing to do is to actually ignore them lest one risks engaging into void arguments. Once you learn to get over the empty side of the Internet you discover that you can also find a bunch of open-minded, constructive people (of which hackers are - by the idealistic definition - a subset).

Trains can be late and one can be quite vocal about that, but few talk about those that are actually on time.

Also, <http://xkcd.com/386/>

</comment><comment><USER64> Partially responsible for the situation is the fact that many (if not most) of us (nerdy geeks) are to some extend autistic, or rather "aspergerish". Go read about Asperger Syndrome (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asperger_syndrome>) and tell me that you don't recognize your own traits. Not only we enjoy being abrupt and critical, but we are also better fit for being around people who are like us and so we don't mind it as much as other people do. That said, it wouldn't hurt to learn some human interaction skills.

</comment><comment><USER65> Aged skateboarder here. Been a few years since I have even rode one. The nature of skateboarders is something that I am glad the blog author got a taste of. I seem to compare every "culture" that I get involved in to skateboarders. I don't think you will find the same camaraderie in many other places.

It's very hard to explain. For something that is rather competitive, it is also very much a competition with yourself. Just the act of truly wanting to be a part of it will make you part of a family so to speak.

</comment><comment><USER66> I see a lot of threads go by on HN along the lines of "why aren't there more women in technology?" and then lots of replies along the lines of "I guess they are just allergic to keyboards. Too bad!"

This article, particularly the section about attitude towards noobs, is all tied up in why some women never go deep into programming. There are lots of other reasons too, but this one is especially well articulated by the OP.

If you are in the keyboard-allergist camp, ponder this one long and hard.

</comment><comment><USER67> I'm happy to point out one thing: this is less true on Hacker News. More broadly, this is less true in the "Startup Scene".

Even though a _lot_ of us come from an engineering background, I've always seen people get _great_ feedback, helpful and not condescending at all. This is even more true for people's "Review my startup" posts, which usually present a pretty early beta, but tend to get great responses.

</comment><comment><USER68> What the poster misses is that many people don't come to online forums for just polite intelligent discussion. You might as well tell football fans to be quiet so everyone can concentrate on the game better.

Is he comparing online forums with in-person experiences?

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y&feature=youtu...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

</comment><comment><USER69> I really enjoyed this post, and skateboarding has been one of my greatest teachers in life (which probably isn't saying much). I do believe in Machiavellian criticism, but progressive Machiavellian criticism with the intend of doing whatever you're focused on better.Not for the sake of the critic feeding their own ego, although the two can mutually interact. :)

</comment><comment><USER70> As a related matter, harsh criticism sometimes makes it easier to distinguish good products/people from those that are not worth your time. I tend to appreciate the opinion of people who do not hold back criticism, certainly their praise is a lot more meaningful. Reading between the lines is not the most efficient way to discern quality.

</comment><comment><USER71> I don't think it's true in general that hackers (or geeks) "are jackasses to one another". Rather, it seems to depend a lot on the community. For example, I tend to work with Rails software, and the communities that I've encountered have (without exception!) been very friendly.

Though pessimism aside, I think the post is spot-on with its argument!

</comment><comment><USER72> I recently started working at a startup and before that my perception of criticism was what I saw on tv and heard from people. Fortunately, my coworks and seniors give me some good feedback.

But I myself still can't have the patience to listen and learn, after reading this, I feel like there's an incentive for me to change my behavior :)

</comment><comment><USER73> From my comment on the post on Thingist:

>I don't think you can fight human nature, only work around it. Ignore the haters that don't get $x. Ignore the haters that think what you've made sucks, or doesn't do $x and is therefore useless. Build shit. Write about how to do shit. Let them know you by the trail of OC you leave behind.

</comment><comment><USER74> This is a great idea. A bunch of us in the software craftsmanship community engaged in what we called "Positivember" last fall in a similar vein: [http://programmingtour.blogspot.com/2010/11/positivember.htm...](http://programmingtour.blogspot.com/2010/11/positivember.html)

</comment><comment><USER75> But Arduino fanboys really deserve it :P

</comment><comment><USER76> i started learning to code in December/January. I've been pleasantly surprised by how helpful I've found people to be in places like #rubyonrails, #jquery, ...

I come across a random jerk here or there, or just some snarky, passive- aggressive commentary from time to time from otherwise OK people. I find if I am nice, humble, and honest about my abilities/intentions, people are generally nice in response.

Sarcasm has proven to be pretty successful on the web, which doesn't help your cause. How many successful blogs were built on a glib and critical tone? Being a jackass is an easy way to differentiate...I think this influences the general discourse on the web, especially among the savvy. That said, from what I remember, "web people" were far more ruthless 15 years ago.

</comment><comment><USER77> I have to say, as a former sk8er (too old now), this is typical. Skateboarders have been social Switzerland for decades. Often un-critical of ones appearance and always deep into their sport, I'm not surprised by Steve's attitude.

</comment><comment><USER78> Made me remember this: [http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/9953/could-we- please...](http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/9953/could-we-please-be-a- bit-nicer-to-the-noobs)

</comment><comment><USER79> Damn straight, all intolerant people should be taken out and shot.

</comment><comment><USER80> While I generally agree with the statement, my personal experience says that hardcore drilling is the most effective way of teaching sometimes.

</comment><comment><USER81> _If there spelling or grammar is off, just let it go._

I'm not sure if we are being trolled here or whether it was an actual mistake.

</comment><comment><USER82> Meh. It isn't actually that important at the end of day.

There are the geeks that help out and the geeks that criticise.

<comment><USER83> It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice.

</comment></comment><comment><USER84> Could not have said it better though I doubt things will change. I hope so though!

</comment><comment><USER85> Everyone (in the world) should just be less critical and stop thinking their shit doesn't smell. But as far as hipsters are concerned, I won't ever respect someone who trades their individuality for conformity.

</comment><comment><USER86> all of you guys missed the big one... RTFM!

</comment><comment><USER87> I hate haters.

</comment><comment><USER88> still, i think hipsters are wannabes, and clothes don't make the man

<comment><USER28> To further my attempt at inserting George Orwell's Politics and the English Language into every conversation, I think this quote applies. :-)

 _The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides._ \- George Orwell, Politics and the English Language (<http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm>)

I think "hipster" is generally one of those meaningless words in a lot of cases. Often times it's not pointing at what should truly be denouncing IMO (doing things for "irony", hating on popular things for no reason, being elitist, etc), but simply as a way of just generally denouncing people.

"Oh you listen to bands I haven't heard of? You fucking hipster." as if there's no way the person in question _truly_ likes that band regardless of their popularity.

That's just an example from the cases where there's a specific objection other than "hipster". It's just become a popular nebulous term to hate on, and I've gotten tired of seeing it everywhere. I luckily rarely come across "hipsters" so I'm not too annoyed by them, but "hipster-haters" are constantly bitching about whatever "hipsters" do.

<comment><USER89> The anti-hipster culture is hilarious.

It is impossible for me to read this without pointing out that after a very well-reasoned and largely accurate argument against the completely irrational spite, you close with a (admittedly small) taste of the very disgust you just denounced. "I _luckily_ rarely come across 'hipsters'."

It's pervasive, even in the group itself. Hipster doesn't actually mean anything specific to anyone, it simply means, "a member of the counterculture which I find offensive at the moment." And, shocker, the people who you would consider, "hipsters," are just as guilty of this.

The problem with this, from my perspective, is that it's also a catch-all for people who are difficult to categorize. Even before the word was co-opted to be a generally negative term, it was nebulous at best, referring generally to young people who are interested in culture or art or food or music or, really, anything.

As a result of this, people get lumped into this group based on these very general terms, and then assumptions are made about their character by regurgitating every complaint anyone has slapped the word "hipster" after, as though it's representative of everyone who wears sweaters. No, not everyone who has a moustache is an elitist. Not everyone who smoked pot in college loves Bob Marley, do they?

I encourage people to stop using this word at all. It's just stupid, meaningless, and devoid of positive connotations for most of the world.

<comment><USER90> Well, by that logic, we should abandon all labels altogether. Down with identification of groups of people! Cast off the oppressive shackles of classification!

Down here in Australia, "Hipsters" are an easily recognizable and quite specific cultural subgroup: Thick-rim glasses, no actual vision impediment to justify them, Impractically skinny jeans, Borderline offensively cliched facial hair (ie. Hercule Poirot-esque moustaches) and - most importantly - Irrational dislike of anything "mainstream" or "commercial" (with little/no other justification)

It's no longer meaningful counter-culture, it's become a very specific subculture in and of itself (at least down here) - a culture I would describe not as counter-culture, but anti-culture. It's ceased to be productive and meaningful, and simply become (like Monty Python's Argument Clinic) the automatic gainsay of anything "mainstream".

I've no tolerance for it, because (in my opinion, at least) it's highly pretentious and offers very little in the way of positive change. I find that subculture to be, in general, very negative (often for very little reason).

When I talk about Hipsters, I'm generally referring not to the dress, but to the attitude. Maybe you're right, and I should be referring to those specific attitudes as what I take issue with - but sometimes convenient (if inaccurate) labels make communication faster.

<comment><USER89> Frankly, we _have_ made efforts for quite a while to eliminate classifications which are used solely to put people down. While it is true that hipster is not as offensive as some other classifying words and carries none of the historical baggage, it has become a slur, nothing more.

What you've described sounds like a caricature. While it is possible that the more nuanced culture formed elsewhere and was made extreme on it's way to your shores (and, indeed, there is evidence of this having happened in many other cases), I am not sure that is what is going on here. The specific attitude you describe is one I see commonly attributed to hipsters, and only in very rare cases a fair characterization. I think that The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Radiohead (to throw something out there) are examples of incredibly commercial, mainstream bands which most of the people you are describing would be into.

Saying that you don't like the new Shins album because it is very mainstream doesn't actually mean that you don't like it because people are buying it (they aren't), it means that it doesn't seem challenging or interesting to you. It seems designed for mainstream appeal.

In the US, the word is not applied solely to the group that you describe, either. It's used to describe people who live in particular areas, people who ride bicycles, people who shop at thrift stores, people who listen to public radio, people who see lots of live music, and people who listen to records on vinyl, and this is by no means an exhaustive list. The most important thing is that people seem to have flipped your description of the attitude on it's head; It's not about whether or not you dislike "mainstream" or "commercial" things, it's about whether or not you like something which _doesn't_ fall into one of these categories.

I agree that your description of this group doesn't make me want to hang out with anyone in it, but it certainly doesn't make me feel like I shouldn't tollerate it. If there is a group of people who want to be very bad at conversation at parties, more power to them.

If I believed that most people made these judgements on a case by case basis, that would be one thing, but that's not the case in my experience. The assumption seems to be that if you match one of these very superficial and general categories, I can mantle your personality and judge you (with little/no other justification, see what I did there?)

<comment><USER90> Mmm. Thinking about it, I can't think of a positive connotation of the word "hipster", or even a neutral one, so given that; you're right - it's become a slur, and probably worth abandoning as a term.

I realise what I'm describing sounds like a caricature. I wish I was simply being snarky, but spend 10 minutes at a bar on Brunswick Street in Fitzroy, Melbourne and you'd definitely witness what I describe. There are quite a significant proportion of people in that area who do indeed dress as described (for whatever reason) and who will hold conversations - at length - about the invalidity of any artistic endeavour that gives itself over to financial motivation.

I neither agree nor disagree with them on that point, but I feel I certainly have more productive things to talk about!

I think the usage of the word has probably varied within Australia from its usage in the US. Certainly when I read articles in Wired about 'hipster' culture, I'm left scratching my head (behaviours or purchasing patterns they describe therein tend to amount to the local use of the word 'trendy', which is rarely construed as an insult).

There's probably a PhD in sociological studies to be gained from the comparative usage of that word in Australia vs. the US. :P</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Stellar Consensus Protocol and Federated Byzantine Agreement - <AUTHOR> https://achainofblocks.com/2018/12/13/what-is-stellar-consensus-protocol-federated-byzantine-agreement/ <comment><USER2> It's not clear why this wordy, rambling article is being upvoted.

I expected to see a deep-dive into the Stellar Consensus protocol. Instead, the article takes until its second half to finish its introduction for beginners. Nevertheless, what's described still sounds like the Ripple Consensus Process.

For those interested in an informed, technical deep-dive into RCP, this video may be helpful:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7abKUs9tYZg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7abKUs9tYZg)

<comment><USER3> Stellar is a centralized network in disguise. Most of the servers that power the services are being run by IBM.

<comment><AUTHOR> Please provide solid support to back this claim.

IBM controls most of the validators? Do you even know the total number?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> From [1]: "Stellar takes an alternative approach to using Byzantine consensus in a cryptocurrency, where each user can trust quorums of other users, forming a trust hierarchy. Consistency is ensured as long as all transactions share at least one transitively trusted quorum of users, and sufficiently many of these users are honest. Algorand avoids this assumption, which means that users do not have to make complex trust decisions when configuring their client software".

Many questions remain unanswered according to [2].

[1] Algorand: Scaling Byzantine Agreements for Cryptocurrencies.

[2] [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1707.01873](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1707.01873)

</comment><comment><USER5> Here is a summary of the stellar consensus whitepaper [http://muratbuffalo.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-stellar- consens...](http://muratbuffalo.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-stellar-consensus- protocol.html)

</comment><comment><USER6> Stellar seems interesting until you realize it's just another attempt at making a database to sell scrip to speculators.

What's the "value" of a database designed for plutocracy?

<comment><USER7> > What's the "value" of a database designed for plutocracy?

Being a future plutocrat :)

In both Stellar and Ripple every new address effectively burns a small amount of the native token. Let it spread

<comment><USER6> You've missed the important point entirely, you're not making the "money"

I'll take a wild guess that you've given your money that's accepted everywhere, in exchange for Stellar and Ripple because you want to sell it to someone else for more than you bought it?

Once you look past the marketing facades it's basically penny stock with a slow database that's incompatible with almost everything else.

It's good to look into the details behind the folks who make all these free tokens:

[https://www.coindesk.com/ripple-jed-mccaleb-settle-suit- over...](https://www.coindesk.com/ripple-jed-mccaleb-settle-suit- over-1-million-in-disputed-funds)

      As part of the settlement, McCaleb has sold his equity in
      Ripple, and has agreed to sale controls on 5.3bn XRP owned
      by him and his children.

<comment><USER7> I didn't miss a thing, I responded to you

You asked whats the value in a slow database for plutocrats? When you clearly and obviously undervalued the value of the idea of being a future plutocrat

That is the value, you just spelled it out, and then undervalued it!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The SEC might give you an upvote on this one.</comment>


Did I Get into MIT Because I Was a Girl? - <AUTHOR> http://obsessionwithregression.blogspot.com/2015/06/so-maybe-i-am-partly-affirmative-action.html <comment><USER2> "...To get more women into their ranks, many orchestras use blind auditions where musicians perform behind a [curtain]..."

[http://www.theguardian.com/women-in- leadership/2013/oct/14/b...](http://www.theguardian.com/women-in- leadership/2013/oct/14/blind-auditions-orchestras-gender-bias)

This has helped orchestras in preventing gender/racial discrimination reasonably well. It's very fair and reasonable too because one either hits the note or they don't.

Now, what if every student applicant to elite colleges and universities were given a randomized number and their acceptance therein was solely based upon academic achievement, psychological testing and a resume, is that the "fair" way to do it as well?

I think it would be a fast curtain to "hive mind" creating less opportunities for the underprivileged no matter what their race, gender or otherwise.

<comment><USER3> There is no higher ideal than a pure meritocracy. We want to allocate the best educational resources to the people most able to put them to use benefiting all humanity. I'm not willing to compromise on this principle. Admitting the less qualified because of their ethnic groups or gonads is simply antithetical to the entire project of civilization and progress.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hm. So would you be okay with admitting someone who had grown up with less money and scored less high on math tests because he hadn't had access to the best teachers?

<comment><USER3> Yes. You can't distinguish that case from a lack of innate ability, and history is full of examples of poor people doing well in academia and elevating themselves. Standardized testing, not affirmative action, is the great equalizer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Standardized testing is hugely influenced by unfair factors. Like the fact that if I'm rich, I can pay for my kids to get better tutoring which boosts scores by hundreds of points. Or the fact that stereotype threat may keep minorities from doing well on tests. Or that tests can be culturally biased against people from certain backgrounds.

<comment><USER4> So instead of giving these positions to the people most qualified and capable of making the most out of them based on the metrics we have chosen to measure success. We should give them to people because of their upbringing or gonads? Regardless if they are the most qualified person to fill that position?

So the student (let's call them Sally) was afforded a better education, and using their superior knowledge are more qualified for a position. So Sally should be told "Sorry, this spot is being given to Sam because they are an ethnic minority."?

Remind me how that is fair for Sally and not benevolent racism towards Sam?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


1.7B Reddit comments loaded on BigQuery - <AUTHOR> https://www.reddit.com/r/bigquery/comments/3cej2b/17_billion_reddit_comments_loaded_on_bigquery/ <comment><USER2> The correlation between participants in certain subreddits is quite interesting. hiphopheads and nba, europe and soccer, 4chan and fatpeoplehate etc.

Visualised: [http://arborjs.org/halfviz/#/ODg3MA](http://arborjs.org/halfviz/#/ODg3MA)</comment>


Ask HN: International Credit Cards ? - <AUTHOR>

I've been several months in Japan the past two years and I'm going for another two months shortly. I'm holder of a Danish VISA credit card which I've been using extensively so far, since I don't like running around with a lot of cash all the time. This however is quite expensive as every time I withdraw money from it I'm charged the equivalent of ~5 USD in VISA fees. With a withdraw limit of ~325 USD per day this amounts to a fair share..
I've been thinking of finding a more international bank that might be able to offer a better deal, but I have no idea where to even start.
It might be worth mentioning I'm located in Denmark, and only hold a Danish citizenship, which might limit the selection of banks.
Can anyone recommend any possibly cheaper card/solution ? <comment><USER2> \- talk to your bank to increase your withdrawal limit \- japan is a pretty safe place to walk around w/ a bit of money, so u may wish to revisit your assumptions \- are you sure it's a credit card and not a debit card? if you're looking to withdraw cash, a debit card can be more cost-efficient by not charging you interest fees \- in the u.s. credit unions have a network that provides cheap debit card usage at other banks in their network. of course these are often out of the way, so if you find the equivalent in japan and denmark, it'll likely cost you more than $5 in time and travel to get to the place.

good luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. I'm equally interested in a debit card if it would provide cheaper withdrawal. In my current bank the debit VISA Electron card would be the same, but the limit is about 820 USD instead. I might go for that. The problem, I'm told, is not the interest fees on the VISA credit card but the fact that VISA takes a foreign currency exchange fee, which my bank then passes on to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Citibank ought to let you open a Yen account. I'm English but when I was working in the US I had no problems opening a USD account with them (via my branch in England).

<comment><AUTHOR> I was initially thinking Citibank, but they don't seem to have any foothold in Denmark. Then I tried to contact them, but their site is a confusing mess of links back and forth. The only thing I ever found was the American support phone line.

Thanks for the tip though. I'll give it another shot.</comment></comment>


Letter to a Young Woman in Engineering - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@carbonrobotics/letter-to-a-young-woman-in-engineering-600fe4479937 <comment><USER2> I'm happy to see this small act of encouragement. While this letter may not go viral, it is the small effort and this "unsolicited advice" that leaves great positive impressions on young engineers (men or women).</comment>