Zurb Foundation vs. Twitter Bootstrap - <AUTHOR> http://designshack.net/articles/css/framework-fight-zurb-foundation-vs-twitter-bootstrap/

<comment><USER2> My team compared Bootstrap, Foundation, and Skeleton in detail: <http://responsive.vermilion.com/compare.php>

We built the same layout (a real client project) in each framework and compared notes. That process really helped us understand the differences.

<comment><USER3> What was your conclusion? (Looking at the source code of the page, foundation?)

<comment><USER2> A few conclusions:

* Foundation has the best responsive grid support

* Bootstrap is the most expansive UI. For internal tools, that's great. For client sites, we end up fighting to override Bootstrap.

* Skeleton is really light. If you're prototyping with Skeleton, you'll probably need to pair it with jQuery UI or something similar.

FWIW, we're using both Bootstrap and Foundation for current projects.

<comment> dorian-graph Thanks for doing the comparison. Admittedly, those are exactly the results I would've expected and goes along with each of the respective group's plans. Is Skeleton still in active dev?

<comment><USER2> Skeleton was updated in late June, so it's still being developed as far as I can tell.

We didn't know what to expect, in part because we hadn't previously researched the history of each framework. But you're right, the results are inline with each plan.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> johnx123-up Zurb's developer Mark went Twitter and used the Foundation codebase for Bootstrap... and now claiming to be the creator of Bootstrap.

In case if anyone missed, recent note from Zurb in HN: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4588826>

Edit: And, Mark's defense <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4590315>

<comment><USER4> I think that's an oversimplification. Either way, a quick look at the source shows that they are quite different now. In my opinion zurb has the more sophisticated grid system but doesn't support IE7, and the UI javascript is not nearly as polished as bootstrap's (some jQuery spaghetti in places). Bootstrap, while having more stable UI components, is visually opinionated and difficult to rebrand, where zurb is generic by design. If I had to pick one or the other to build a web application on, I would use the zurb grid system and write my own UI components with liberal borrowing from bootstrap's javascript. If you are hacking together a weekend project, use bootstrap.

<comment><USER5> That's been my view of the two. I prefer Zurb because I know enough CSS now to extend and leverage the framework more and I find Foundation is lighter weight and more flexible and extensible than Bootstrap is. Bootstrap feel more "opinionated" but the javascript components are really, really well written though those are arguably completely portable.

I've got a pull request open to Foundation right now to add some vertical rhythm to their typography if anyone is interested.

<https://github.com/zurb/foundation/pull/954>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As someone who just wants to get as much as possible out of the box, Bootstrap is the one that seems to have the momentum, which leads to more 'extras' and goodies, and more people making sure it works.

<comment><USER7> I commented on the post, but I wanted to add that bootstrap has a larger ecosystem. I think that is really what will carry it forward. My company makes tools for bootstrap (specifically Jetstrap), and I'm confident the ecosystem will solve some of the dangling problems like helping more people customize the default theme.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Zurb has one thing going for it that really makes a big difference, SASS. From the minute I saw SASS, I became a convert. Also, it's much less all encompassing.

<comment><USER9> Read through <http://sass-lang.com/> because of your comment and just wow. Awesome.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This article might be a bit dated. Written in May 2012, but Foundation 3.0 came out on June 29, 2012.

</comment><comment><USER11> This was an easy decision for me a while back. As a non-designer, Bootstrap just gives me way more stuff out of the box. I wouldn't know where to start without it. Even if you use all of Foundation (2)'s add-ons, it still doesn't even compare with core Bootstrap, not counting Bootstrap's add-ons. With bootstrap's popularity, it's really easy to find an article explaining how to integrate it with your framework of choice. I feel for most non-designers this is the deciding factor.

Of course since f3 is almost the same as bootstrap now, I think it's more about personal taste.

<comment><USER12> As a non-designer that's not really an issue for me. There are _so_ many cheap or FOSS design templates, snippets, icons, etc available these days that it's not a huge problem to put together a package of them for Foundation.

I use Bootstrap when

1\. the default Bootstrap theme or a third party theme are sufficient

2\. I don't need Foundation's better grid system

3\. I'm using something other than Ruby (which for me is most of the time)

Foundation for:

1\. There's a specific problem that their better grid system solves. I haven't come across this yet, but am aware of it for when/if I do.

2\. Client wants a highly customized Ruby-based site with no hint of the Bootstrap look

As someone mentioned above, you can use Foundation and borrow design and/or javascript elements from Bootstrap and elsewhere if you need to go that route.

<comment><USER11> Could be just preference or even skills (my front end skills aren't that great), but I find many generic design templates to be not that great visually or a lot of work to adapt to a css framework like foundation. Time is expensive.

I like stuff with batteries included. Given bootstrap's momentum, it even has a plethora of design templates as well so you won't have a generic bootstrap looking site.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> As someone that deals with markup for the majority of their day I've been bouncing between all of these for the past year or so. I've been using Skeleton for awhile and loved the simplicity.

I tried Bootstrap but the semantics are so horrible I couldn't stand using it for more than one project. I love the tools it has but the semantics of the class names are abominable. I've since settled on Foundation as it had the best tools available while maintaining some level of sanity in the class names and semantics.

<comment><USER14> Hmm, could you give some examples of these 'abominable class names'?

<comment><USER13> The thing that really turned me off first were the classnames for the grid (one column example):

Foundation: .one.column Skeleton: .one.column Bootstrap: .span1

Then there are various other non-semantic classes: .btn, .pull-left, etc. It seems to me very much a toolkit built with a developer's mind ... in mind.

I like crafting my css by hand, making it easy to read and understand and above all - easy for me to remember so I don't have to crawl through documentation trying to remember if this element is .span4 .span-4 .span_4 or some other permutation I can't remember. I can easily remember .one.column. Its a column and its one.

<comment><USER15> See I have the complete opposite opinion. I love the spanX semantics and .pull-left etc etc make complete sense to me so I think you might be on the ball with it being made for a developer moreso than a designer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'd have to go with Bootstrap because it just seems to offer more. I extensively use their buttons, warning styles, etc. and it's just better to have those already in the framework just in case.

Also on the Foundation website I can't seem to find examples of their typography, buttons and other UI elements.

<comment><USER17> You didn't try very hard: <http://foundation.zurb.com/docs>

<comment><USER5> Actually I'll agree the docs are awkwardly placed on the landing page. They should be front and center. Bootstrap also _does_ do more. Though that's good or bad depending on your point of view.

Personally I would lean to bootstrap if I wanted everything and the kitchen sink and didn't plan on modifying much about it. For more serious work Foundation provides just that, a good foundation for building on top of. It's far less full featured but much easier to extend and modify (imo).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Others have mentioned it, but for those looking for much less than Bootstrap/Foundation offer, there is always skeleton[0], which is a very lightweight grid and only a little more. There is also a SASS port[1], or my fork[2] which handles more like the original Skeleton.

\---

[0] - <http://www.getskeleton.com>

[1] - <https://github.com/rakelley/SCSSkeleton>

[2] - <https://github.com/brcooley/SCSSkeleton>

</comment><comment><USER19> Bootstrap's fluid grid implementation is weak and fails when you want to use their responsive styles. For some reason they decided it'd be a good idea to change fluid column widths based on media types, including screens >1200px. This means you end up with oddly resizing columns, especially on desktops. This is completely pointless for fluid grids since you should be modifying the container size and not the column size. It seems like they implemented fluid columns as if they're fixed width.

</comment><comment><USER20> IMHO..

Bootstrap provides a UI design decision "out of the box". If you don't have a designer, want to BOOTSTRAP your project, you will want to use bootstrap. It's great.

Foundation to me is more of a base css framework. You don't have (m)any visual styles out of the box (though it does contain certain styles) which is great when you need to create HTML/CSS to match a concept provided to you.

I love foundation and bootstrap, but to me they both offer two very different things.

</comment><comment><USER21> We've recently done a redesign for a site at $work, but it's not using any sort of framework like Bootstrap or Foundation. Is it possible to add in Bootstrap after the fact? I would kill to have all the various UI elements available to me, but throwing everything out and starting over after a month is not an option.

<comment><USER2> I'd try a couple pages and see how it goes. Adding in Bootstrap, Foundation, or Skeleton is typically just a matter of adding some HTML wrapper divs and CSS classes, assuming your starting point is a relatively simple DOM structure and CSS composition.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Foundation's mobile grid utility classes (class="nine mobile-three columns") and source ordering are really nice. And even though BS buttons are prettier, the gradients make a quick color change very challenging!

</comment><comment><USER23> +1 for Foundation for the SASS and excellent responsive design.

</comment><comment><USER24> I've been playing with Foundation recently but I've found the lack of documentation for the Compass gem to be frustrating.

It's not clear what mixins you need to include to make a site responsive without trial and error.

There's also a few mixins missing that would be useful; for example moving a field label to the left you add the classes "right inline" but there's no mixin to do this so I have to litter my markup with styling class names.

</comment><comment><USER25> a lot of people here praise bootstrap for giving more out of the box. frankly I'd rather the framework not decide for me about the look and feel, and IMHO it's easier to customize Zurb Foundation which is a bit more modest about the default looks, than get rid of that 'twitterific' crap Bootstrap gives out of the box. and sass > less (yeah I know there are ports). I went with Zurb. too bad these frameworks don't respect semantic html much.

</comment><comment><USER26> A 5 for the article, and a 7 for the comments.

BTW, I myself is a Foundation user, mainly because of its better responsive design.

<comment><USER27> I'm not a designer but I've been trying to learn more about design stuff and I'm still trying to get a grip on responsive design stuff.

Can you tell me a little bit about why you prefer Foundation's responsive grid system over Bootstrap's? I just started using Foundation 3 for a personal project, but I picked it basically because it's developed on Sass and I already know and am comfortable with Sass.

Also, I'd love to know if anyone has any experience using Susy grid system on Sass and how it compares to Foundation and Bootstrap grid systems. I found Susy a little more difficult to get started with because their documentation isn't very good and because I don't yet have a good grasp on how to design for a responsive grid.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> The people I'm working for/with decided to use bootstrap as a foundation to speed up development. As someone who mainly does "front-end" programming, I don't see much benefit from these "frameworks", especially since we are pretty much redesigning every element. Also, since we are using CSS3/LESS, instead of slicing a PSD I have to recreate every design element from scratch. I hate "designers".

<comment><USER28> Also, they're mad at me because it is taking to long to develop the site. And because we're using bootstrap they're expecting it to be done quickly, because "I have all the components and just have to put them together."

<comment><USER29> if you were just 'putting them together' you'd be done. as much as I'm a bootstrap fan, this is not the use case for it - redesigning the look/feel of every element? you'd be better off not using any framework and building from scratch if you're not getting any value from the defaults of a framework, and instead insist on overriding/modifying everything a framework gives you.

You probably already know this, just thought I'd share your vent.

<comment><USER28> I was a bit frustrated at the time of writing that comment. And, to be fair, the js components (e.g. modal box) and the grid system turned out to be of good use. Although, bootstrap's LESS code leaves a lot to be desired. There's no system to it. Some styles are defined as mixins, others are hard-coded, variables are not used consistently, and so on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Has anyone got a decent solution for combining Foundation and RequireJS?

<comment><USER14> I would guess the same as any other library. If it doesn't support AMD, shim it? <http://requirejs.org/docs/api.html#config-shim>

I can go into specifics if you give an example of the dependency structure you're trying to define. But the basic case I suppose would just be to shim foundation.min.js to depend on jquery.</comment></comment>


Stuff - <AUTHOR> http://paulgraham.com/stuff.html <comment><USER2> When I moved into my first apartment after college, I brought a laptop, a sleeping bag, a folding chair, and a clip-lamp. It was great. I felt I could go anywhere and do anything.

Of course, with a new job, 650 square feet, and an an IKEA nearby, I couldn't turn down a few basics. So I picked up a spartan bed, a minimalist sofa, a function-oriented desk.

Then time began to pass. Though I'd resolved never to subscribe to cable, where was the harm in a TV to watch Netflix in comfort? Off to Best Buy to pick up a 20" on sale. Then IKEA to put something under it. Now I needed shelves. Accessories. Electronics.

Time passes. Books. Papers. Storage. A couple raises? Bigger TV! No need to sell the old one; it goes in the bedroom. Office reorganization? Don't throw away that table; it matches my sofa! Now I need chairs...

As I laid the cables for my home theater system last year, I had to confront just how far I had come from my theoretically nomadic self just a few years earlier. I had an apartment full of stuff. Some new opportunities had me contemplating the possibility of picking up and moving a great distance -- something that would have been easy not all that long ago, now made quite the unappealing prospect.

I'd kept pretty fit myself. But I realized that my lifestyle had put on a lot of pounds while I wasn't looking.

<comment><USER3> The key is to keep your stuff out of your lifestyle. I have an immersion blender that I use about a dozen times a year. I got it as a gift, and it lives at the back of a cabinet underneath my kitchen counter. It's awesome!

I have three kettlebells that I use two or three times a week. They live beside my couch. There's a weight belt and a medicine ball beside them that I rarely use, and I swear I keep putting them in the closet, but the kettlebells are like a magnet for exercise-related junk.

The blender is awesome, even though I could easily live without it. The kettlebells are clutter -- until I find a good way to store them. (Any suggestions?)

<comment><USER3> Bizarre downmod. Its placement as a reply to parent doesn't make sense (it mystifies even me in retrospect) but I think I made a valid point: the classic unnecessary "junk" we rarely use doesn't hurt us when it's out of sight, but valuable possessions that serve an important purpose can drag us down if they're always in sight, altering the look of a space and affecting how we behave in it.

I know this is supposed to be an inspiring "carpe diem" type essay, but everything is susceptible to practical considerations, and with "stuff" it's important to identify the right culprit. Frivolous domestic accessories and the worthless junk in the back of your closet might not be the problem -- something eminently practical that you use regularly might be your burdensome "stuff."

I hope I made myself clear this time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> _I have too much stuff. Most people in America do. In fact, the poorer people are, the more stuff they seem to have. Hardly anyone is so poor that they can't afford a front yard full of old cars._

Wow, Paul, you really don't understand what it is like to be poor. The poor people don't have a lot of cars in their yard because they can afford lots of cars. They have lots of cars because they never throw them away. Rich people throw lots of fine stuff away, but poor people keep everything forever, because they don't know when they can afford to buy another one.

I've been rich and poor and most of my family is still poor. While they don't have lots of cars in the yard, they are pack rats and worry constantly about a time in the future when they won't have anything anymore.

Poor people keep stuff because there may be a day when they'll need it but won't have the money to buy it. The regret of, "Oh... i had one of those but i got rid of it" is pretty strong when you need something you don't have but once did.

<comment><USER5> Or maybe people with marginal incomes spend themselves into sustained poverty through wasteful consumption. If they saved _money_ instead of buying minimally useful possessions and saving the possessions, maybe they wouldn't have to worry about being able to afford stuff they need. You and I have probably known different sets of poor people, but I've seen cases of this.

That doesn't justify throwing things away once you have them, though, but how does one get them in the first place and were they all really necessary at the time?

<comment><USER6> Wow, that's possibly the most arrogant, yet typically upper-middle class thing I've seen all week on HN.

Unfortunately, the "poor people are poor 'cos they're dumb!" sentiment is _way_ too prevalent just about anywhere you go.

I had the (unexpected and unintended) opportunity to live on the wrong side of the tracks, in an incredibly poor industrial neighbourhood - the reality is _far_ more complex than "poor people have poor impulse spending control". To reduce it to such is incredibly out of touch with reality.

<comment><USER7> I don't think that was his point.

His point wasn't "poor people are poor because they spend too much", his point was, "maybe spending too much is _part_ of what keeps them poor." Obviously there's a lot of factors reducing economic mobility anyway, but poor spending choices certain don't help.

The best example of this would be addiction. A lot of poor people are addicted to tobacco, alcohol, illegal drugs, etc. This puts a huge damper on any ability to save they might have.

But I'm sure he knows that sub-optimal spending decisions are just one of many reasons that poor people stay poor.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have a 90-day rule. If I have something and I haven't used it in 90 days, I probably don't need it and get rid of it (sell it, give it away, throw it out). This tends to keep my life de-cluttered and "focused". It also keeps me from waisting money on stuff I don't need. "Am I really going to be still excited about, and benefit from, using this widget I want to buy in 90 days or not?" I've lived like this for about a decade and I highly recommend trying it.

There are exceptions of course. Seasonal items like clothing, mountain bike, etc... Books too as mentioned in the essay. Having a library of coding books on-hand is not only reassuring, but has helped me save significant time solving a problem, even if I only rarely use the book. And I don't think it's a good idea throwing out your old money either. ;)

<comment><USER9> I recently decided to give away all my coding books. They were great, and I learned a lot -- but I never reference them. I remember most of the core concepts, and the details are a quick Google away. My other coworkers decided to follow suit, and our work library has grown to 4x what it was a week ago. And my apartment is slightly less cluttered.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> _Except books—but books are different._

I suspect most people have their own personal caveat to this essay. Mine isn't books (I usually give good books to friends after reading them, and bad books to ebay). My own caveat would be raw materials for building or repairing things (electrical components, nuts and bolts, tools, etc).

<comment><USER11> _It's not especially inconvenient to own several thousand books_

Until you find yourself having to move.

<comment><USER12> I have thousands of books and would love to get rid of them. I would need a future-proof platform that allows annotations, and that lets me migrate between devices (so I can keep my books for at least my lifetime). I guess I would also need a convenient book scanner, for those books that are no longer in print.

<comment><USER9> I've often wondered why Amazon doesn't have a program like "send in your books, get a free Kindle copy of them"

<comment><USER13> I think that it's fairly clear why they don't do this --would they do it only for books purchased from amazon.com? If not, would they require some sort of proof of purchase? What about used books? What about books not currently available on the Kindle? If you send them an old edition of a book, then what edition do you get on the Kindle?-- but it's such a gorgeous idea. This has been one of the biggest roadblocks in my attempts to decide whether to buy a Kindle: I have a huge library, and the idea of spending thousands of dollars in format-shifting doesn't appeal to me. If I could even just get a discount for books that I already own, it would make me much, much more likely to take the plunge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This reminds me of fight club (or at least one of the core themes), in fact one of the lines in the essay reads like it was plucked out of the movie.

Anyway, Fight Club definitely struck a cord with me and since then I have been living with incredibly little stuff. I have a computer, my iphone, my car, a desk and a bed and just enough clothes to get by for 2 weeks (do laundry once a week) and of course minor other things that you need, but basically bare essentials.

While I cant say for sure how much of an impact its had on my life, I can say without a doubt that coming home always feels very relaxing and definitely helps me prepare for a new day.

<comment><USER15> fight club: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJdfWdIBfE8>

"byproducts of a lifestyle obsession" "things you own... end up owning you" "working jobs we hate so we can buy ish we don't need"

edit: link fixed

<comment><USER16> You can cuss here, if you want.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is great. I came to the same conclusion some time ago. Of course, I never articulated it so elequently.

Anyway, anytime I bring new stuff into my house I take the same amount of stuff and put it in a box. About four times a year I call the Salvation Army and they pick up the box.

Before buying something new, I have to think about what old stuff is going in the box. Normally it isn't hard. On Christmas, when I get a lot of new stuff, it can be a challange. The worst is when someone gives me something I will never use and I have to put it right in the box, which seems ungrateful. Other than that, the box is liberating and putting stuff in it feels great.

<comment><USER18> yes I have started doing this kind of thing as well. I have a lot of crappy business casual clothes that don't really fit anymore. I don't want to toss them because I keep thinking I'll lose the weight to be able to fit back in them real soon.

What I have started doing is donating 2 pairs of old pants to Goodwill and buying 1 pair of nice pants that I will want to wash and deal with. This seems to be working well for me so far.

I also wanted to mention that our hard disks can suffer from this same problem. I have also started making an effort to delete old pdf books that I won't read, delete mp3s that I'm tired of hearing etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I find it particularly annoying that society in general, not just marketers, tends to pressure people into having stuff. Nobody respects the "miser" who is earning decent money and not spending it by buying things. I get a lot of flak from people who ask me that since I can afford something, why am I not adding it to my lifestyle? They wonder if I take pleasure in watching the numbers change in my bank balance.

My answer to them is usually that it's a slippery slope from buying things I can afford to buying things I don't actually need (slickdeals.net is especially good at exploiting this behavior). This tends not to sit well with them -- maybe it reminds them of a fact they are uncomfortable with and are trying to suppress?

</comment><comment><USER20> "I think humans constantly scan their environment to build a mental model of what's around them. And the harder a scene is to parse, the less energy you have left for conscious thoughts. A cluttered room is literally exhausting."

On a related note , Steve Jobs has no furniture.

<comment><USER21> what does he have? walls and a floor?

<comment><USER22> He just sits indian-style and uses an iPad.

<comment><USER23> Hey, I thought it was funny.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Sweet, I can post George Carlin and be on topic!

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac>

</comment><comment><USER25> What Paul doesn't really devote enough time to describing is the pleasure that getting rid of stuff brings. Reducing the amount of stuff you own is liberating. You feel physically lighter. Its not just about avoiding a burden. It is physically pleasurable to reduce the amount of stuff you are responsible for.

Go through your house and give to charity or throw out anything you haven't used in 12 months. Its amazing how much of an emotional lift this gives you.

I really dislike the cult of stuff. I'm getting married soon. We've requested people give us money or just their congratulations :) Some people however seem to think we're rude for refusing to accept stuff we don't need. Somehow we're obligated to accept a burdensome gift that we'll have to quietly dispose of. They spend money that we could use for things we do need and we have to go to the effort of getting rid of it. Its a lose lose. Yet somehow we're selfish for asking people not to buy us stuff.

<comment><USER26> This is one of the greatest insights that I have had lately - throwing stuff out is liberating and _makes you feel physically lighter_. Sorry to repeat you verbatim but that is exactly how I feel.

I fight with my wife over this. She wants to put something in the basement (which is already packed to the ceiling) and I am like: If you don't need it, for God's sake get rid of it. If I had my way I would thorw out everything in that basement today.

Ditto on the gifts stuff. We get a gift, typically crockery or plastic shit for the kids, and all I am thinking is how long do I have to keep this before I throw it out.

Here's a hack for children's birthday parties: If people want to bring gifts (which we discourage), we take the gift at the door and throw it in a closet, to be opened when everyone has left. This way people do not bring gifts out of social pressure, don't feel they have to top each other, and there is no disgusting gift feeding frenzy in front of the other children.

<comment><USER25> I was lucky with my then girlfriend, now fiancée. We were moving into a smaller place so she had no choice but to heavily cull her belongings. Although the process was painful she has now been converted and regularly voluntarily gets rid of more stuff just because it makes her feel good to have less junk around the place.

Your method of dealing with gifts is a good idea. I've always found publicly opening a stream of gifts a bit vulgar. Whenever possible I deal with any gifts in private or with only the gift giver there. Having an audience, celebrating the giving and receiving of stuff just seems distasteful.

"gift feeding frenzy" That is the perfect name for it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Books: for a long time I thought that I had done something when I acquired one. Yet clearly there's a difference between the book once dipped into and on the shelf for years, and the Indian cookbook with turmeric stains all over or the tech reference with its spine worn out. I have tried lately to be more discriminating in my book buying, and not to buy another book of some type (tech, history, fiction) before I've finished the last purchased book of that type.

<comment><USER28> Books^2: When I buy a paperback novel to read on a plane (or while waiting to get on a plane :-) I often finish it in some distant city and leave it someplace where somebody else can find it. Just too much work to sell for a pittance, and too valuable to simply toss out. So I leave its fate to Fate.

<comment><USER29> Sounds a little like the philosophy of BookCrossing: <http://www.bookcrossing.com/>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Even as a child, I was pretty indifferent to stuff (A 9th grade essay wanted us to write about our most prized possession and I couldn't come up with anything except my computer). But I think the final break for me happened when inadequate backup procedures caused me to lose several years worth of digital photos.

I was initially heartbroken but then I started thinking how many times I had actually looked at any of those photos since I took them and, for the majority of then, the answer was zero. After that, my relationship with stuff shifted radically.

A few years later, I lost a wooden spoon which was pretty much the only thing I held an emotional attachment to anymore. That thing was older than I was and had been the one constant in cooking which is a huge part of my life. I moped for a year, shrugged and got a new one.

I'm starting to seriously consider that, once a year, I will find the thing currently most precious to me and get rid of it.

<comment><USER31> It sounds to me like you might be taking the wrong lesson away from this. Try finding the five things most precious to you and throwing away everything _else_.

Being affected by the loss of a spoon shouldn't make you want to never love a spoon again (that way lies crappy romantic comedies). The idea here is to concentrate our attachment to objects, not eliminate it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> I can relate to the point about how traveling realigns your ideas about stuff. I've been traveling around South America for the last 5 months with exactly one change of clothes. The general rule for long trips like this is that if you haven't used one of your possessions in 3 days, then you shouldn't have it along.

I find that I take this concept with me back to civilization. I'll get back to my storage locker and not find anything that I want to take out. "This isn't the shirt that I wear.", and "I already have enough socks" (meaning 4).

Back home in England, I can think of exactly two possessions that I've accumulated in the 3 years since I've been living there with my girlfriend: a 22" monitor to connect to the laptop, and a really nice Italian espresso machine. Both get used every day, so evidently they meet my criteria for "stuff you're allowed to have along."

<comment><USER33> I second the bit about traveling.

I relocated from Austin to San Francisco to Japan and with each move, I drastically reduced my lifestlye. It's just as PG said: you don't really miss anything.

And I dealt with books by getting an e-reader so I could carry my library in my backpack.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Reminds of an excerpt from the book, The Romantic Ethic and the Spirit of Modern Consumerism (via [http://mrteacup.tumblr.com/post/386598513/the- consummation-o...](http://mrteacup.tumblr.com/post/386598513/the-consummation- of-desire-is-thus-a-necessarily)):

 _The consummation of desire is thus a necessarily disillusioning experience for the modern hedonist as it constitutes the 'testing' of his day-dream against reality, the resultant recognition that something is missing. The real experience in question may yield considerable pleasure, some of which may not have been anticipated, but despite this, much of the quality of the dream- pleasure is bound to be absent. In fact, the more skilled the individual is as a 'dream-artist', then the greater this element of disillusionment is likely to be. A certain dissatisfaction with reality is thus bound to mark the outlook of the dedicated hedonist, something which may, under appropriate circumstances, prompt a turning to fantasy. It is more likely, however, that the dream will be carried forward and attached to some new object of desire such that the illusory pleasures may, once more, be re-experienced. In this way, the modern hedonist is continually withdrawing from reality as fast as he encounters it, ever-casting day-dreams forward in time, attaching them to objects of desire, and then subsequently 'unhooking' from these objects as and when they are attained and experienced._

</comment><comment><USER35> You can join the 100 things challenge: <http://www.guynameddave.com/100-thing- challenge.html>

One problem I've found with it is that people buy me worthless gifts (gifts I don't derive value from because I don't use them).

I've created an online list of things I want at kaboodle.com, or more exactly, a list of things I wouldn't mind possessing, but my family refuses buying anything on the list because that's "spoiling the surprise". I would prefer they stop giving me gifts altogether, but they won't no matter what.

My favorite quote from PG's article:

 _What I didn't understand was that the value of some new acquisition wasn't the difference between its retail price and what I paid for it. It was the value I derived from it._

<comment><USER36> Being a middle-middle-class American in the Midwest, I can and do pretty much just buy what it is I want or need that is on the scale of a Christmas gift my family could or would get. That, combined with geeky tastes (y'all know what I mean) virtually guarantees things-I-value-as-garbage as presents.

Next year I'm going to try picking a charity and asking for nothing but donations in my name. I'm going to pick a popular one, too, not a obscure and ignorable "geek" charity or something, but one that may actually induce guilt if they ignore the request. Maybe that will at least cut things down.

(Come to think of it, maybe I'll pick a Celiac Disease foundation or something, since I have that. A bit more self-serving, perhaps, but even more likely to induce guilt if ignored. I hate a swing "guilt" at the issue, but I've tried mere protest for a couple of years now to no effect.)

<comment><USER37> I've been doing this for quite some time.

I make plenty of money, and I have very little interest in most stuff. The only stuff that does interest me is books, video games, and computer/electronics equipment. When I want one of those things, I buy it.

I've also been involved with an animal rights organization I co-founded for 11 years or so, so every birthday I simply ask everyone to make a donation to that organization.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I agree to being minimalist, with the notable exception of kitchen supplies. It's near impossible to cook interesting food without cabinets full of spices, various sized pots and pans, utensils of all shapes, and in some cases, specialty items like blenders, strainers, etc. Add to that a pantry full of food staples, and a full refrigerator, and suddenly moving anywhere is a painful process.

Life is too short to live on ramen.

<comment><USER39> I love to cook. My kitchen cabinets are stuffed with all sorts of kitchen appliances, pots and pans, and utensils. But even when cooking the most elaborate meals for up to 16 guests, I've found that I only use 5 or 6 tools out of my large (and expensive) arsenal.

I've actually moved most of my pots and pans into my outdoor storage. The ones I'll need, I'll go grab and keep inside, but after another 6 months, the rest will be up for sale on ebay--and there'll be a lot of them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> Reminds me of <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac>

</comment><comment><USER41> Find the few things that matter, and drop the others. This approach might apply to many areas of life.

</comment><comment><USER42> This is so funny because I was talking to my girlfriend about this recently. We recently moved from a 700 sqft condo to a 1700 sqft house and I look around and I say "why do we need all this crap" I mean do we really need that second couch or extra desk, its really just filling the space.

I honestly look at most of the stuff we have bought and thing that it was not only a horrible waste of money but a burden. We talk about possibly moving around a bit basically move where we can both work and It keeps coming back to what do you do with the stuff.

This is terrible. We aren't rich but we are not poor either, but we are kind of in a spot where we are kind of like how can we move to another country or province(we are in Canada) when we have all this stuff.

I think in the long run if you are interested in having some freedom owning less stuff is the way to go. I know thats the direction I am know moving in.

</comment><comment><USER43> I have lots and lots of stuff. Some I use regularly or at least often enough. Some I used to use and keep just in case, its not like its costing me. And some I got just in case, mostly science, math, and engineering books I found cheap and think I might get to some day (they are also a useful investment, I've been mostly living off of reselling some of them the last year that I've been out of work).

But I am not ruled by my stuff, I have in the past, and could again, just abandon most of it when I move again. What I know and can do is what is most important to me; and that is mostly what my belongings are actually about - books, tools, supplies for learning and doing.

 _"The best of all things is to learn. Money can be lost or stolen, health and strength may fail, but what you have committed to your mind is yours forever."_

\-- Louis L'Amour, The Walking Drum

</comment><comment><USER44> I wonder if this got submitted now because of my submission: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1124086> on "The Possessions Exercise:" [http://jseliger.com/2010/02/13/the-possessions-exercise- acco...](http://jseliger.com/2010/02/13/the-possessions-exercise-according-to- geoffrey-miller) .

(For those of you who don't want to click the second link, here's the money shot:

 _List the ten most expensive things (products, services, or experiences) that you have ever paid for (including houses, cars, university degrees, marriage ceremonies, divorce settlements, and taxes). Then, list the ten items that you have ever bought that gave you the most happiness. Count how many items appear on both lists._ )

<comment><USER45> Geoffry Miller, nice! If I owed a house, it would be on both lists. Other than that, my computer, education and guitar are shared on both lists. Below those, my most expensive purchases have been necessities (think bed mattress, rent, etc). Honestly, it feels wrong to regret spending money on these. I may not _love_ them, but they're part of the cost of living.

The list exercise might make more sense to non-students.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> Books ??? - Its kind of funny on my front. I live the nomadic lifestyle and the box I have never opened since my last move has been my books. I plan never too and possible avoid any more technical book purchases. ( My bit for the environment )

How do I manage technical dilemmas ??? Google ... Seriously - Google like mad.. And i end up learning/reading a whole lot more in the general direction of my problem.

<comment><USER47> Safari books online or Books 24 x 7. I may never buy a paper copy of a technical book again.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> A couple of things I've been doing:

When kids have a birthday or holiday with gifts, we tell them that they have to throw away or give away an equal amount of stuff. It works surprisingly well.

I've been thinning out my media stuff (books, videos, old records, etc.) in batches during moves, but recently began selling what I could on amazon. It's mostly CDs and books, but in the past two months it's totaled about $800. One problem, however, is many titles are worth too little for me to go through the trouble of listing, selling, packing, and shipping them. This is especially true of older books. No matter how good or important they were, about 90% sell for <$2 used on Amazon.

<comment><USER49> You can donate lower-priced titles to your local library.

<comment><USER50> Or have a used book store buy them in bulk. They won't pay much, but it's a single transaction so it doesn't use a lot of time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> I am moving to San Francisco from Nebraska. I pretty much got rid of all my stuff already except books, clothes, and computers. It felt awesome to get rid of everything, I suggest you try it.

</comment><comment><USER52> I'm always aware of this when I look at model rooms for designer furniture. They are always alarmingly spartan. With that image, it's easy to notice that without the pressure of real stuff, your mind prefers it not be there.

That always struck me about IKEA. It tries to have both by trying to appeal to high design while filling their model rooms with clutter. It's very telling and a wonderful business model since they'll sell you the stuff: moose spaghetti, tiny candles, cacti.

<comment><USER45> I remember thinking the same thing about Ikea when I went through one of their catalogs last week. But I think it seems like a bad idea; it makes their products feel less enticing. I could look at their furniture and -- though the pictures still look very nice -- think to myself "how would I navigate around that with a cup of tea and a book in my hand?".

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> I wrote something very similar in the same exact month: <http://chir.ag/20070725> \- Buy Less Stuff. I honestly don't remember if I was inspired by PG's essay or it was just a coincidence. Like 'bcowcher', I even mentioned Fight-Club.

So where am I today 3 years later? I still haven't bought a lot of stuff. But I got married in 2008 and now my house is full of my wife's stuff. However, she started to get rid of a lot of her stuff. I don't need stuff to make myself feel at home but she does, as that is her only connection with her past life. I bought some clothes for myself last year (12 single-color t-shirts @ $3/each online) and a lot of running gear for my ultramarathon but other than that, barely anything.

I think the lesson here for me is that it is indeed possible to reduce your acquisition of "stuff" and maintain it. However, it depends very much on your personality. My wife likes to dress nicely and decorate the house. So we'll be stuff every night and then, hopefully not too much.

</comment><comment><USER54> I just went through a major purge in order to downsize from a 1000 sq ft house, to a ~220 sq ft RV. I've still got too much stuff, but I'm getting closer.

Stuff weighs you down, and makes making major life changes more difficult (even if you know you need them). I stayed in Mountain View at least a year longer than I should have, from a contentment perspective, mostly because the thought of moving was just too much to handle.

Some things I will never allow myself to again have a lot of: Books, CDs and DVDs, more furniture than I use every day, more rooms than I use every day, more computers than I use every day, and _anything_ (clothes, tools, foodstuffs, kitchenwares, etc.) that can sit in a closet or on a shelf for more than a year without being needed. Even now, I think I have probably twice as much stuff as I really need, and I'm planning to move into a smaller, but nicer, RV in a few months, once I've downsized more thoroughly.

</comment><comment><USER55> Somewhat similar to Bruce Sterling's Viridian design movement <http://www.viridiandesign.org/2008_11_01_archive.html>

</comment><comment><USER56> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impermanence>

</comment><comment><USER57> I think the way to get a handle on all your stuff is to turn your life inside out (or more accurately, turn it rightside out).

From an engineering standpoint, you have to _design_ your life. You know - architect how you want to live.

From that, it's easy to deal with your stuff -- does it support your design? If it doesn't, it should go.

The computer should have a place. Kitchen stuff should live in the kitchen.

The bedroom closet is for the clothes you do use and maybe seasonal stuff at the top. It isn't for 6 boxes of cat5 and all those extra USB cables you end up with. You should not have a closet or garage full of "misc".

My personal test is the "might" test. Stuff you "might" need is not stuff you _do_ need. It goes.

<comment><USER26> > My personal test is the "might" test. Stuff you "might" need is not stuff > you do need. It goes.

Exactly. If in doubt, you don't need it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> _And yet when I got back I didn't discard so much as a box of it. Throw away a perfectly good rotary telephone? I might need that one day._

Sounds like INTP tendency:

 _Because the present is inextricably linked to a sense of the past, INTPs tend to hoard items which help solidify the connection to the past. They find it very difficult to let go of anything they have collected (or indeed created) and which may have a nostalgic meaning._

above from <http://www.intp.org/intprofile.html>

</comment><comment><USER59> I love this article.

My wife and I came to the same conclusion when we wanted to start our own thing. We needed to be flexible enough to live from anywhere a frugal life style would demand and our stuff was just weighing us down. Even storing it was going to cost alot of money - in the end we got rid of must of it.

Our books were the biggest culprits. Through bargains, we accumulated tons of novels that we've never read. Those were the first to go. The only books left were mostly references.

</comment><comment><USER60> Books are no different from other stuff. It's better to apply the same standards to books when you you are trying to get rid of useless stuff. And it's not only about paper books (it's obvious they have huge downsides, because they are heavy). Electronic books are also should be deleted if they are not useful anymore. Our attention span is very limited, and new information tends to have better quality than old information (on average).

</comment><comment><USER61> I often think about this. And of one more hidden cost of stuff, especially furniture: it occupies space in a place you pay rent for for. If that sofa takes 2 square meters out of my 40 square meters apartment, that means every 20th rent I pay is just because of this. If my rent is approximately the same as the price of that sofa was, I refinance if every 1.6 years.

<comment><USER22> > If that sofa takes 2 square meters out of my 40 square meters apartment, > that means every 20th rent I pay is just because of this.

If you get rid of the sofa, does your landlord give you a 1/20th discount? If he doesn't, then your reasoning is a bit unsound...

<comment><USER61> That's right, he does not. But you can live in a smaller apartment or live in an apartment of the same size with more empty space which arguably is better if you ever plan to do anything creative there. Or just spend better quality time relaxing. In other words, I claim that having a room with lots of empty space in it is a value in itself. And save money on the original purchase still.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> Raymond Chen (Microsoft)'s blog post on stuff: [http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2005/11/11/491780....](http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2005/11/11/491780.aspx)

</comment><comment><USER63> Thank you, Paul Graham, for talking me into buying another pair of shoes!

</comment><comment><USER64> Even with books, there exists a simpler solution: the library. Plus, it's free.

Most people's bookshelves just collect dust. It's no different than having a few cars sitting in your front yard.

</comment><comment><USER65> (July 2007)

<comment><USER66> But I am still happy to read it again. I think we need to constantly remind ourselves with advice like this. I am going to print this essay now and give copies to my wife and kids.

<comment><USER65> Sure - my comment was not a negative. The date should be in the post title though, when it's something so old (hah, 3 years old? that's ancient! What the internet does to us, eh...)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> This especially applies to buying a house.

</comment><comment><USER68> Kids don't builder a coarser model of the evironment, adults do. Once again pg doesn't do his resaarch before espousing his amateur psychology.

<comment><USER22> I came here to say just this. He's right for all the wrong reasons. In most mental areas, kids trounce adults; relevantly, their senses are _much_ sharper. (Just the other day I saw an astronomer's anecdote: he was showing adults and kids some phenomena through his observatory's telescope, and the kids politely told him that it was obviously broken since the object was upside-down - the adults never noticed.)

It's not a matter of them having a smaller coaser model, as one can see by comparing how kids & adults do with the 'pile of stuff' organizational model. They just have more energy to apply to it. As one ages, one has less energy to apply to stuff, and less energy period; and one begins to appreciate minimalism.

<comment><USER69> How can something be upside down in space?

<comment><USER70> If it's close to the horizon then there's a definite "up" - towards the zenith. Many telescopes invert the incoming image, hence why the kids would've thought it was upside-down.

(I am assuming the object in question was visible with the naked eye, probably the moon, although it's also possible that the children noticed that when the telescope moved, the image appeared to move in the "wrong" direction relative to their expectations.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> I've recently started to reduce my spending on "stuff" so I can start saving for the things I've decided actually matter (a startup, a trip to Europe with my girlfriend, as well as a ring for her for whenever that moment is right) One of the key concepts of the essay is happiness will not be reduced, and possibly increased with this change in living. To this I will attest is very true, I haven't gone on the trip yet, but I already get more pleasure out of knowing I actually WILL be going on it, then if I bought a faster laptop etc.

<comment><USER72> > as well as a ring for her for whenever that moment is right

this might be an interesting read: <http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/198202/diamond>

maybe separate the ring from the 'really great mate' part?

</comment></comment><comment><USER73> We have too many things that do too many things.

</comment><comment><USER74> How is it relevant to the community?

<comment><USER75> If stuff=software features, it is highly relevant</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Meet up in Manila, Philippines - <AUTHOR>

Hi,
I am coming to the Philippines for three weeks on Wednesday and I was wondering if there are any hackers who would like to meet in Manila?
This Saturday 19h for a dinner? <comment><USER2> I'm in Dumaguete.

</comment><comment><USER3> won't you wanna drop by here in Cebu?</comment>


"Self-esteem has gone up in the United States; achievement has not." - <AUTHOR> http://www.incharacter.org/article.php?article=147 <comment><USER2> I find the statement towards the end that in the United States now achievement has been virtually decoupled from self-esteem to be both true from my own anecodotal experience, and frightening.

With no connection there at all, it removes one of the largest motivators, especially in elementary and middle school when for many people there is very limited pressure to work for academic success in the first place. This decoupling is likely to cause a decrease in the overall amount of work put in by the students.

<comment><USER3> > _This decoupling is likely to cause a decrease in the overall amount of work > put in by the students._

I'm American but I live in a post-Communist country, and what I've seen in terms of the generations who have had their ambition destroyed is heart- rending. Yet I feel I'm seeing the same in the U.S. as these newer generations have their ambitions stoked and their work ethic demolished.

Just this morning I went to Disney.com with my 3-year-old and there was a "kite-flying" game. All you had to do was hit the enter key to make the kite do tricks. And the voice over was: "You're amazing!", "You're very good at kite tricks." and "I've _never seen_ such incredible tricks." She was hitting the enter key randomly.

And I thought, "This is so American," and I turned it off. I want her to know that she is talented, but that if she wants to be good at anything she'll have to work her ass off. The cure for the low-self-esteem disease is not mindless, superfluous praise; it's recognizing each step in the journey and encouraging the next one.

<comment><USER4> I remember visiting my cousin in Pittsburgh, P.A., in high school (from Germany, where I went to school) and they were handing out candies for solving simple arithmetic problems in math class. I was like... what???

There are many examples on how American society acts very encouraging towards kids, as opposed to Europeans.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hrmm. Many essays extolling the virtues of grit (see 'current issue), but how are they measuring it? Why do people have grit in some situations and not others? Do people with especially low self-esteem have more or less grit? There's a lot of hand-waving going on.

The most useful article of the bunch seems to be this one, focusing on how to develop and extend one's persistent side: <http://www.incharacter.org/article.php?article=151>

<comment><USER6> _The gritty person approaches achievement as a marathon._

So make marathon running a criteria by which people are evaluated. I'm not even kidding. Doesn't matter if it takes them 6 hours, since we're measuring character, not athletic ability.

<comment><USER7> Then what would happen to all the smart people who would think "why in bloody hell am I running a (filthy) marathon when I could be doing something important???"

That kind of evaluation works only when you're trying to breed a certain type of worker, like West Point is doing. But in a dynamic world (like our own capitalist environment), you can't predict where success is going to come from. Look at Bill Gates, he's a dropout...under that evaluation system he would have no "grittiness" whatsoever. What if he had approached achievement as a marathon? He probably still would have been "successful", but I doubt he would be bloody rich.

It's not grit that matters, nor is it self-esteem. The only thing that correlates with success/achievement in our day and age, for students and all of the above, is exploiting opportunity. Those who do, win. Those who don't, lose. Plain and simple.

<comment><USER6> _Then what would happen to all the smart people who would think "why in bloody hell am I running a (filthy) marathon when I could be doing something important???"_

You only think that for the first few miles. Then your mind enters a zone where you can really think about that tricky problem you were working on...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> _This is the problem with the "self-esteem at all costs" message. Self-esteem should be earned. I find that parents today, at least those in a high socioeconomic bracket, never want to say anything critical of their children._

Really? I've noticed this phenomenon in the exact opposite end of the socioeconimic spectrum.

I've heard the same story time and again from friends from disadvantaged backgrounds; how they regularly were mocked by friends and family for using proper grammar or for even going to college at all.

Education and self-improvement were seen as nothing more than pretension while their friends were damned proud of their own ignorance.

</comment><comment><USER9> I completely agree about the excesses of the self-esteem craze. My kids were in a gymnastics program once where, at the end, there was a mini "olympics" and _everybody got a gold medal_. Pathetic. (Admittedly, this was in San Francisco.)

That being said, I think it's too early to tell what this will turn out to have been: a harbinger of decadence or an overreaction against previous generations' inhumane treatment of children. There was an awful lot of violence and degradation to react against; still is, of course, but surely less so than there used to be. It's understandable if, in the course of correcting that, the pendulum swang too far the other way for a while (a generation, say). Signs are beginning to appear of American society waking up from this nonsense. I hope it does.

Oh and in the process, perhaps we can also lose the sickening "everything revolves around the children" parenting style that goes along with it.

</comment><comment><USER10> Self esteem that doesn't come from real achievement is delusion.

Great article here: [http://articles.latimes.com/2005/jan/25/opinion/oe- baumeiste...](http://articles.latimes.com/2005/jan/25/opinion/oe-baumeister25)

</comment><comment><USER11> I think there are no REAL problems inside America. Developing <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World> to First World is a good problem America can solve.

</comment><comment><USER12> > I'd say that self-discipline is at least as important as IQ for earning good > report card grades.

Or giving a shit. It's unfair to judge one's self-discipline based on their performance in an activity they deem unproductive. People often hold compulsory education in the same esteem as at-will employment, analyzing it as though it were the student's "job," which is an error. Juvenile studies that fail to acknowledge this critical factor in the K-12 experience are useless when applying their findings to adults and general human behavior.

<comment><USER13> End of that very same paragraph:

 _My conviction, having taught for some years, is that what the American school system asks children to do is not groundbreaking intellectual work. One of the reasons self-discipline is so incredibly important is that almost anybody really can do the work if they want to, though, of course, not all children want to._

<comment><USER12> Briefly noting a vital detail is very different from factoring it into one's theories.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Rate this (offline) business concept: Off-campus college tours - <AUTHOR>

I'm considering this side-business idea. Let me know what you think:
----
The problem: college-sponsored tours aren't very good. Among other things, they've overcrowded, overly-formal, generic, and only include on-campus areas. The lack of off-campus information is even more noticeable at an urban school (like mine).
I've proposed the idea on college message boards, and there seems to be some interest. I've also run into (around town) a number of visitors who would find such a tour useful. I'm aiming at $30 for a 1.5 hour tour; you'd book it online and then meet at a specific location for the tour.
The "pitch page" would be something like this (with better copy and formatting, obviously):
----
Why book a tour with OffCampusTours?
> It's personal and informal; only you and your family are on the tour. Feel comfortable asking questions.
> It's customized just for you - Fill out the "interests" form, and we'll craft your tour specifically to your interests.
> It's not included in official tours - Official campus tours only show you the campus and university buildings, not the surrounding area.
> Moving off-campus is inevitable - Most students move off campus in their sophomore or junior years. Why not familiarize yourself with the area now?
> Supports local residents and businesses - Our tours are led by students and residents of the area. Plus, you'll find hidden local restaurants and shops.
> Find the necessities - We'll show you where grocery stores, laundromats, banks, pharmacies, and other essential places are located, and how to get there.
> Safety - As in all urban areas, some parts of town can be dangerous after dark. We'll show you the safe      and unsafe areas of town
<comment>
A few potential problems:
1. The university may not be too excited about the project. Some of the off-campus areas aren't very pretty.
2. Marketing/sales: I don't have a direct sales channel, and my marketing strategy would essentially be posters on bulletin boards and word-of-mouth. The university could be an excellent referrer of customers, but again, they might not be very enthusiastic about the project.
3. I'm not technically a student, any more. I'm taking the upcoming semester off to save some money, take classes at the local community college, and work on my programming skills. My solution is: plenty of non-students live around here, so I can give tours without issue. Plus, I have plenty of student friends willing to give tours.
----
So, if you read that entire thing, thanks! Any thoughts, suggestions, or questions? Would you consider paying for such a tour, if you were visiting the school? </comment><comment><USER2> I am too old to be interested in visiting colleges, and too young to have children of college age, so I personally would not be interested in such a tour.

At my alma mater, a group of former students created their own tour: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hahvahd_tour> As far as I know, their business model is different that yours in that their focus is on history and tourists, as opposed to campus life and prospective students.

I also think that you are considering charging too little for what is essentially a private tour by an experienced guide. The Hahvahd people seem to charge about $10/person for their public tours, but I remember seeing groups of 50+ tourists being led by a single guide.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the link, I did not know of them. Unfortunately, we don't get many tourists around here (not that I'm surprised...heh.)

You are probably right on the cost, though. I didn't want to make my post any longer, but I've also considered having 2 types of tours: a group (up to 10 people) standardized tour with a pre-planned route, for $10 a person, or a private, customized tour for $25-$30 per person.

That would work out to:

$50 for a 5 person public tour

$75-90 for a 3 person private tour

Which is a bit more reasonable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> _I'm aiming at $30 for a 1.5 hour tour_

 _only you and your family are on the tour_

Does that mean you'd only collect $30 per tour? If so, the most you could ever make is $20/hour. After factoring in time between tours, unbooked time, etc., it would probably be a lot less. That doesn't leave much to pay your tour guides with.

<comment><AUTHOR> Correct, $30 per tour.

You are right, though. The slight difference would be that we wouldn't lose money on the non-booked time; there's no commute or overhead, other than the website and some printed materials. I, or my tour guides, wouldn't have any significant prep time for each tour.

I mentioned it in another comment, but perhaps a split model would work better: $10/person public generic tour vs. $30/person private customized tour.

<comment><USER4> I think you're waaaaay undercharging for the private customized tour.

This is a decision worth thousands of dollars. Have a set tour you do with dates, and have a private tour option that is X per private tour at a much higher rate.</comment></comment></comment>


The slowly fading art of flying and maintaining Cold War fighter jets - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2016/01/the-slowly-fading-art-of-flying-and-maintaining-cold-war-fighter-jets/ <comment><USER3> YouTube channel featuring many videos on older jet engines: [https://www.youtube.com/user/AgentJayZ](https://www.youtube.com/user/AgentJayZ)

</comment><comment><USER4> Ultimately there is too much to oxidise or otherwise corrode, rubber parts, e.g. those tyres can't avoid oxygen even if they can avoid use. Maybe materials science can come to the rescue with fittings that do not perish, therefore enabling things like jets (cars and other things) to live on a bit longer, or to stretch their metal-fatigue lifetime out longer.

<comment><USER5> You can keep anything running if you are willing to put in the work. You just fix what you can, replace what you can find, and manufacture what you can't. It becomes much more tricky doing it under the auspices of an FAA airworthiness certificate though.

<comment><USER6> Most of these jets are registered as Experimental-Exhibition, which has (slightly) relaxed conformance rules vs other multi-engine turbine-powered aircraft.

Single engine turbine (or multi-engine piston) operated under Part 91 (approximately "not-for-hire") was already reasonably relaxed about "owner produced parts".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Great article, great photos.

No mention of airworthy Cold War jets is complete without Thunder City [1] which until a crash in 2009 flew the last English Electric Lightnings [2] in the world.

The Lightning is a fascinating aircraft for two reasons: first, its design, optimised for intercepting Soviet bombers, was highly original and efficient at the job, beating many records, and it remains the only production fighter with vertically stacked jet engines; second, it was the very peak of British military aerospace engineering, the last time British engineers could say they were ahead or at least on par with what came out of America, and its success caused the Americans to put pressure on the British government to cancel the very promising TSR-2 [3] program, destroy the production equipment, the plans and most of the airframes, in order to favour the export market for the F-111 (which the British didn't even end up buying) and in the longer term to effectively destroy their main competition.

To give you an idea of the importance of the Lightning in the British aerospace community, I spent some time at Rolls-Royce in Derby back in the late 2000s, and the production manager managed to mention the Lightning and the techniques they derived from building the Avon engines that powered it in our first meeting, a half century later! Even Jeremy Clarkson has one in his garden [4]. The Lightning intercepted U-2s, flew as high as 88,000ft (27,000m), and in a NATO exercise in intercepting Concorde, was the only fighter to do so leaving F-15s, F-16s, F-14s, Mirages and F-104s behind.

A fun anecdote involves airframe XM135 (which is still preserved at Duxford if you are in the area, as well as an incomplete TSR-2) [5] [6]. A persistent electrical fault that appeared only when accelerating meant that the people working on the jet had to accelerate it. Whilst taxiing, with the ejector seat on safe, no canopy, and wearing only noise guards (so no radio), Wing Commander "Taffy" Holden accidentally went airborne. He had a few hours in a Tiger Moth but nothing comparable to the Lightning ("I had never flown a jet aircraft, no"), so he had to figure out how to fly it, and since he couldn't eject, how to land it, which he did eventually after three attempts, contacting Air Traffic Control via hand signals.

On another note, the most performant Cold War aircrafts flying in the US today are probably the two FAA-approved brand new SU-37s from Pride Aircraft [7] which were sold by the Ukrainian Air Force with zero hours on either the engines or the airframes and completely Westernised with English language controls and modern electronics.

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

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

[3] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAC_TSR-2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAC_TSR-2)

[4] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnGXerN0tlo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnGXerN0tlo) (Jeremy's jet fighter garden feature - Speed - BBC) "Do you stock Lightning jet fighters? Oh you do! Could you please leave one aside for me?"

[5] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfeN3FoZYj0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfeN3FoZYj0) (Wing Commander "Taffy" Holden ENGLISH ELECTRIC LIGHTNING Inadvertent Take Off Incident)

[6] [http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?20807-Lightnin...](http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?20807-Lightning- XM135-inadvertant-flight-by-W-Cdr-Holden&p=970933#post970933) ("The flight in Taffy's own words")

[7] [http://www.prideaircraft.com/flanker.htm](http://www.prideaircraft.com/flanker.htm)

<comment><USER8> While on summer camp as a university cadet in the early 1980s, I was fortunate to fly (as a passenger, of course) in the training variant of the Lightning from Binbrook, in Lincolnshire, one of their operational bases.

It has always been hard for me to recall cohesive memories of the flight. In the space of about 3 hours, and as a wet-behind-the-ears 18 year old, I was rushed through ejection seat training, sea survival training, flight suit checks, oxygen mask fitting and the flight itself. I think I also had to be squeezed into an immersion suit - the flight was over the North Sea.

As we taxied out to take off, the prevailing wind and the geometry of the airfield meant that we had to pass the rest of my cadet group as they sat outside in the sun in deckchairs, watching flight operations. I gave them a confident thumbs-up and we were off.

It turned out that I would be the only one of us to get a ride in a Lightning during that summer camp (I'd won the draw that made me the first to go) - <USER2> combination of weather and aircraft availability.

Edit: typo

<comment><USER7> Amazing! How did it compare with what you had been flying until then? Did you fly any other jets since?

<comment><USER8> Heh. We were there in the summer vacation to boost our flying hours on Bulldogs - [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Aviation_Bulldog](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Aviation_Bulldog). I had joined the cadets relatively recently and so, as it happened, my first solo occurred during that camp also. Because the Lightnings were using the main runway, we were using a parallel grass strip, and flying mirrored circuit patterns. On my solo trip (really just a flight around the airfield) a Lightning passed next to me on its approach and caught me in its wake, flipping me onto my side. Exciting but no drama - I just went around again.

After uni I did sign up as an RAF pilot, but circumstances (and my own fundamental lack of aptitude) conspired against me and I flunked the course (just) before getting my wings. Welcome back to civvy street!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


The extraordinary story of Britain's efforts to finance the First World War - <AUTHOR> https://bankunderground.co.uk/2017/08/08/your-country-needs-funds-the-extraordinary-story-of-britains-early-efforts-to-finance-the-first-world-war/ <comment><USER2> I don't understand how you can write an article like this without any mention to the gold standard.

With a floating Pound the problem of financing disappear as happened later in the Second World War. Note that they would be forced to tax heavily and emit bonds in order to retire money from the economy and avoid inflation, but it would not be a problem of 'where to get the money'.

In times of war, the veil disappear and it becomes clear that the important thing is how much the economy can really produce, not how much money the country has.

<comment><USER3> A good comment.

You don't necessarily have to tax. Saving acts like taxation, and a £10 note is just a permanent zero interest bearer bond.

Ultimately if you can't buy anything (rationing) or do anything (planning) then all you can do is pile up the money as savings.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > As the war unfolded, ministers were pilloried for rewarding investors far > too generously for surrendering capital which should have been sacrificed > gladly as a matter of patriotic principle

Interesting how much harder it was for the government to get money back then.

Wikipedia seems to say that WW2 cost the equivalent of $4.5 trillion, while the Iraq war is about $2.4 trillion.

The Gold Standard seemed to have caused trouble with wars: WW2 had to temporarily suspend gold trading, and it was canceled entirely around Vietnam. Now we can spend trillions with it causing hardly any day-to-day trouble: A blessing when needed, and a curse when not.

<comment><USER5> The economy is much larger today than back in the 1940s. My memory is something like 40% of the US economy was devoted to the war effort in WWII, while it would have been a couple of percent at most for the Iraq war.

<comment><USER6> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures)

Per this 2.2% of GDP in 2016 - after iraq with no 'hot' conflict. Google says 5.66% in iraq peak.

Percentages of estimated net world defense spending in 2016:

* US: ~36.2% of total world defense spending

* China: ~12.7%

* EU Countries listed: ~12.2%

* Russia: ~4.5%

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Niall Ferguson's _Pity of War: Explaining World War I_ describes the finances of the participants in great detail. It's a fascinating read.

<comment><USER8> Similarly, Liaquat Ahamed's Lords of Finance is a great read about finances from World War I to the Great Depression.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> You have to wonder what is currently unknown today.

</comment><comment><USER10> Truth and freedom tend to be the first casualties of war.

<comment><USER11> It makes sense to hide the truth. Deceiving the enemy is a very important tactic of war.

<comment> D-Coder Deceiving the citizens is also a very important tactic of war.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> All sides of it too!</comment>


PowerPoint Does Rocket Science--and Better Techniques for Technical Reports - <AUTHOR> http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0001yB

<comment><USER2> He references an interesting concept called Conway's Law, a law stating that: organizations which design systems ... are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations.

Here's a link to the article Melvin Conway wrote describing this insight: <http://www.melconway.com/research/committees.html>

Also the wikipedia article: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conways_Law>

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I knew the law but hadn't seen the original article. It's eerie how broadly it applies -- as another example, my degree program has 5 tracks. One of the tracks is an utterly essential topic, really the core of the discipline, and the other 4 map directly onto the tangential research areas that the most influential professors cluster into. Guess which track is being cut this year...</comment></comment>


Homeland Security Takes Down Movie Theater Patron with Google Glasses - <AUTHOR> http://www.humanevents.com/2014/01/22/homeland-security-takes-down-movie-theater-patron-with-google-glasses/

<comment><USER2> PLEASE stop reposting this.</comment>


The Great Sriracha Battle Is Coming to America - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-04-06/thaitheparos-sriraja-panich-sriracha-comes-to-the-u-s-market <comment><USER2> The chili-garlic paste is good, but I don't like Sriracha; too sweet.

<comment><USER3> I find the Thai versions of sriracha sweeter than Huy Fong's version, which suits its original use as a dip for seafood. I prefer Huy Fong's sriracha with western foods.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> My love for Sriracha led me to discover my real, true love: Marie Sharp's Belizean Heat!

</comment><comment><USER5> Why add the sugar and (dry powdered!) garlic?

Real chili sauce is just chili, vinegar, salt (hint _Tabasco_ ).</comment>


Cathay Pacific flags data breach affecting 9.4M passengers - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cathay-pacific-cyber/cathay-pacific-flags-data-breach-affecting-94-million-passengers-idUSKCN1MY26L <comment><USER2> I wonder how long until companies start regarding customer data as a liability (and a risky one at that), rather than an asset.

<comment><USER3> To my knowledge there are very few negative consequences, outside of the immediate and obvious ones like reputation, that actually occur when companies leak customer data. I suspect they won't regard keeping vast troves of customer data as a liability until that changes.

<comment><USER4> Just look at Facebook. How many people have deleted their accounts...

<comment><USER3> I strongly suspect the amount of money Facebook makes utilizing that data greatly outweighs the cost incurred by the "customers" they've lost as a result of poor data handling.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Interesting how it's always worded in a way that frames the negligent company as the victim instead of the customers whose data was exfiltrated: "Company X was attacked by hackers," "Company Y was the victim of a data breach." Its never: "Company Z failed to secure customers' information."

<comment><USER6> I used to do contract pentesting for a big fortune 500 company, and they were able to cut all kinds of security corners because they knew people would perceive them as the victim. The person running our contract at the company said that the people making budget decisions know that at worst there'll be a small stock dip for 1-2 days in the event of a compromise, so they said it's not worth the money to actually have good security because the general public will just see the headlines and consider the company the equivalent of a robbery victim.

<comment><USER7> When people say _there are no consequences for the company yadda yadda yadda_ what they neglect to also mention is that, typically, there are no consequences for those affected either.

If the _one billion_ odd people affected by major data breaches since 2005¹ all experienced some significant difficulty as a result, we could probably expect a louder outcry and subsequent changes in behaviour by those we entrust(?) our personal identifying information to.

I've been online since well before 2005, and the worst I've experience is one debit card being cancelled due to a failed fraudulent transaction attempt ~10 years ago, and ~2 months ago a successful fraudulent transaction of AU$13.36 which I noticed immediately (thanks mobile banking app notifications), which resulted in the me calling and cancelling the card and the charge being reversed.

Of course, we're all paying more in fees due to insurance against such events, but that appears to be an inconvenience that most people simply don't rate.

1\. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18297966](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18297966)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> So, I just glanced through this¹ Wikipedia entry and quickly added up all the numbers in the yearly lists of major data breaches and came up with this number:

929 million users / customers affected by _major_ data breaches since 2005.

There's probably at least some / a whole lot of overlap in some, but still...

Thusly, it'd be unusual if any particular individual hasn't had at least some of their identity go astray.

1\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_breach](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_breach)

<comment><USER8> Seriously, check out Troy Hunt's Have I Been Pwned?

[https://haveibeenpwned.com/PwnedWebsites](https://haveibeenpwned.com/PwnedWebsites)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Just realized that with the information leaked (passport number , birthday, name and asiamiles/MPC number), it would be enough to do the phone verification with them and redeem miles from the account. So, not having leaked passwords is really not that much of an achievement.

</comment><comment><USER10> I'm curious how this is going to be handled by the HK government. Hong Kong does have a privacy bureau (PCPD) but I am not sure what their jurisdiction is and what litigation weapons they have.

That being said, Cathay Pacific has been really going downhill these past couple of years. Not surprised that their IT side of things are effected as well.

</comment><comment><USER11> I don't know why, this reminds me of Singapore Airline's account login/signup flow. It's cringy to think that the only allow 6 numbers for their password field. Yes, in 2018!

<comment><USER12> My bank (Westpac) only allows 6 alphanumeric characters in their passwords.

<comment><USER13> Westpac's interface is quite funny. Only very recently did they allow pasting passwords from a password manager, previously you had to use an on screen keyboard (presumably to stop keyloggers).

On that note; any recommendations for Aussie banks that have a secure and modern interface?

<comment><USER14> Westpac customer here. If you just need basic banking, you can't beat ING. They still have a dumb type-a-PIN-by-pressing-buttons login screen, and the customer ID field doesn't accept pasted data, but other than that I love them. No fees, even on international transactions. Apple Pay if you want it.

<comment><USER15> I'd love to endorse ING, but i must say, their security really worries me. I'm just putting this out there: you log in to internet banking with your "customer number" which is printed on your bank card, and then you have exactly 4-digit PIN you key in with their stupid on-screen keypad.

I love that they're relatively modern for Australian standards (fast payments, no fees ever, basically) so i'd love to endorse them, but i, too, am on the lookout for a replacement bank that has e.g. MFA with TOTP or a physical challenge-response box like my otherwise overpriced ABN bank account gave me back in 2002, in the Netherlands...

So i, too, am all ears for recommendations.

EDIT: and once you're in internet banking, you can willy nilly transfer cash out if you either use a "saved address" (someone you've paid before) or you'd need to hijack my mobile number. But $deity knows that's easy - just claim you own a number and get it ported over to a new service no-questions-asked. Facepalm, really.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It'd be good if there was a law that'd fine corporations for being unable to protect user data.

Make the fine directly proportional to: number of people affected * bits of leaked data for each user.

</comment><comment><USER17> >data of about 9.4 million passengers of Cathay and its unit Hong Kong Dragon Airlines Limited had been accessed without authorization.

>860,000 passport numbers, about 245,000 Hong Kong identity card numbers, 403 expired credit card numbers and 27 credit card numbers with no card verification value (CVV) were accessed in the breach.

Those numbers don't seem to add up to anything close to 9.4 million. Feel like I'm missing something.

<comment><USER18> My assumption is a bunch of "less critical" info on ~8m pasengers was accessed (phone numbers? names?), and then ~1m had passport or credit card numbers leaked, and they itemised the "more important" ones explicitly.

It doesn't make a lot of sense however I parse it, but that's the only thing that makes the numbers work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> _Reposting from the other thread at[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18299015*](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18299015*)

It is unclear from any reporting as to how this technically happened, which is a shame but hopefully that will be made public in the coming days. Some other outlets[0] have an interesting statement:

> _The breach also included details about where each passenger had traveled > and any comments made by customer service representatives. The amount of > data accessed varied among passengers.*

Based on those details, and the mention of 'no passwords were compromised', chances are this breach has come from an internal helpdesk type system, or possibly CRM. If however the statement around the passwords changes, that opens up a few other possibilities.

What this doesn't sound like, are the attacks we saw on British Airways[1] and Ticketmaster[2], where javascript was injected into the payment pages to vacuum up payment details from customers.

The statement around "The company has no evidence that any personal information has been misused" is always an interesting one, and is one of the many reasons I created my startup Breach Insider[3], so that data breaches like this could be detected much sooner (not 7 months later, as we have seen here), with minimal false positive alerts, and definitive evidence if any data has been misused. By using real email addresses that are unique to each company/business, you can be sure to find out if that data ever leaks & is abused for things like spam or phishing.

[0] [https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/24/18019958/cathay- pacific-...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/24/18019958/cathay-pacific- airline-data-breach)

[1] [https://www.britishairways.com/en- gb/information/incident/da...](https://www.britishairways.com/en- gb/information/incident/data-theft/latest-information#)

[2] [https://www.riskiq.com/blog/labs/magecart-ticketmaster- breac...](https://www.riskiq.com/blog/labs/magecart-ticketmaster-breach/)

[3] [https://breachinsider.com](https://breachinsider.com)

</comment><comment><USER20> One important thing to note.

PCCW the main local telco uses Hong Kong ID numbers as passwords by default, or at least they used to do so. This means that this database contains usernames and passwords in cleartext for a significant number of users who have never changed their accounts.

<comment><USER21> Certainly not just PCCW: [https://webb- site.com/dbpub/subject.asp?t=72](https://webb-site.com/dbpub/subject.asp?t=72)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Just got an email. My name and addressed was leaked from this breach. Even the email they sent the message from has failed domain authentication. They have become a joke to me.

</comment><comment><USER23> > Hogg said no passwords were compromised in the breach and the company was > contacting affected passengers to give them information on how to protect > themselves.

Well that's good! My precious password that can be easily changed wasn't leaked!

> Cathay in a statement said accessed data includes names of passengers, their > nationalities, dates of birth, telephone numbers, email and physical > addresses, passport numbers, identity card numbers and historical travel > information.

oh...

<comment><USER24> I hear you. One issue is that most people use similar passwords for all their services, which yes is problematic and a travesty but that's how it is.

So getting someone's name and personal information (that yes, can also be used for identity theft) is not as bad as now having a list of names and passwords to try to use on bank websites, for example.

<comment><USER9> Passport number + date of birth and name is enough for a social engineering attack against a lot of banks (hopefully they didn't like my credit card BIN to make it extra helpful to identify my bank).

So my passport number leaking is personally much worse for me than if my password leaked (which I'm very careful to protect).

<comment><USER25> Do a lot of banks have access to your passport number and use that as identifying info or is there another leg like passport -> ssn -> bank?

<comment><USER26> If you live (and are opening a bank account) in a country other than your own, your passport is one of the only ways to prove your identity for KYC. I had to show both my HKID and my passport to get an account at HSBC, and I can use either of them as ID at the teller window.

<comment><USER27> Sure, although in that case it's having a passport in your possession that serves as ID, as distinct from merely knowing the number.

I suspect you might find that a different passport with a different number, expiry date, or even nationality but the same name and date of birth would work equally well.

<comment><USER26> > I suspect you might find that a different passport with a different number, > expiry date, or even nationality but the same name and date of birth would > work equally well

Nope. All of the information must match, and they even (excruciatingly) compare the signature in my passport to the one they have on file. At another bank where I used only my HKID to open the account, I'm not permitted to use my passport.

<comment><USER9> Banks and signatures in HK, that's a true love story in itself. I've never seen banks that are so obsessed with signatures and will reject documents because the signature doesn't exactly match the one they have on file...

Which means you need to have a photo of any signature you register with a bank there or later on forms you sign will be rejected.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Keylogger protection bypass - <AUTHOR> This research article introduced a groundbreaking discovery: a new keylogger applying a window?!?! Link: http://eudl.eu/doi/10.4108/eai.15-10-2018.155740 <comment><USER2> The submissions with text instead of a URL have a penalty here, so it's more difficult for them to get to the front page. Next time it's better to submit the link directly.

Also, you have a username that is too relevant. Please pick one username and stick to it. (It may be your real name, some variation, something you like, but don't create a new account for each post. (Unless it's a very sensitive post.))

</comment><comment><USER3> too scared to go to link

<comment><AUTHOR> That is journal.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Alliance_for_Innovati...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Alliance_for_Innovation)</comment></comment>


Python experiences, or: Why I like C++ more ;-) - <AUTHOR> http://majewsky.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/python-experiences-or-why-i-like-c-more/ <comment><USER2> A Google cache text-only version that doesn't burn your eyes out: [http://126.96.36.199/search?q=cache:zNgbhUvoAokJ:majewsky.wo...](http://188.8.131.52/search?q=cache:zNgbhUvoAokJ:majewsky.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/python- experiences-or-why-i-like-c- more/+http://majewsky.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/python-experiences-or-why-i- like-c-more/&hl=nl&gl=be&strip=1)</comment>