Harvard and M.I.T. Are Sued Over Lack of Closed Captions - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/13/education/harvard-and-mit-sued-over-failing-to-caption-online-courses.html <comment><USER2> If this causes a chilling effect such that universities find it easier or less costly to withhold the free lectures, it means the _net effect on society_ from ADA lawsuits [about the free learning videos] is harmful.

Similar discussion as previous thread on UC Berkley: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12519761](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12519761)

If the universities avoid releasing free videos, that punishes _all of us_ including the majority of people who don't have disabilities. I'd prefer to find another way to caption these videos besides throwing around lawsuits.

If a Federal appeals court rules that Netflix doesn't have to caption their commercial videos[1], surely we can cut some slack for _free education_ videos.

[1][http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/04/9th-circuit- rules...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/04/9th-circuit-rules- netflix-isnt-subject-to-disability-law/)

<comment><USER3> If you believe the ADA is a net negative, it's good thing that you have no opportunity to ever become disabled then.

> the majority of people who don't have disabilities

Almost 19% of the US' population is disabled in one way or another. That's a lot of folks to discriminate against. But you're right, they're the minority, so what rights should they have to get access to publicly available services? Rip out those ramps, get rid of the parking spaces, close up the isles, and shut down those elevators.

> Netflix doesn't have to caption

Netflix won that appeal, and lost the next. Rather than take it further, they made a deal and added closed captioning. So, yes, if you offer public content, it should be available for everybody. Cost of doing business.

While this content may be nominally free, it's an advertisement for MIT and Harvard classes. As much money as these universities spend on their regular marketing materials, they can afford a few TAs to add captions to their video courses.

<comment><USER4> Unfortunately, I have to agree with GP here. Even if they're ads for MIT and Harvard, they're "good ads". We absolutely don't want to disincentivize them. Forcing these kind of regulations against them is a disservice to society, as it puts more knowledge away.

It'd be great if they were closed captioned, true. But it's already "good enough" that they're public. Giving them even a moment's doubt about the value of putting their knowledge in the public is a bad idea.

<comment><USER3> > a disservice to society

A disservice to society is treating some people who, through no fault of their own, as worth less than everyone else.

> Giving them even a moment's doubt about the value of putting their knowledge > in the public is a bad idea.

So you'll allow them to hold their data hostage to get special favors and exceptions from federal law? Where do you draw the line then?

They already provide wheelchair ramps, braille (and low vision) compatible signs, ARIA tags on their websites, door openers, all for free for anybody who comes to their campus; what makes their videos exempt?

That they have gotten away this long is them not paying attention to the laws; these lawsuits are simply an attempt to get them to follow the laws in the country they live and work in.

<comment><USER5> So you'd rather have it be that no one has access to these free educational lectures/videos than that a small minority (<20%) can't use them? That's pretty much the perfect example of cutting of your nose to spite your face.

If these laws go through, Harvard and MIT should just set up a small subsidiary in another country and upload the videos through those. Problem solved.

<comment><USER3> The laws already exist, and Harvard et.al. have been operating under them for years. If they followed those laws and subtitled the videos, the problem would also be solved.

<comment><USER6> But why should the extra expense be forced upon them ? As has been announced, this will result in the videos being taken offline, not in anything that helps the disabled.

[https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/09/20/berkeley- may-...](https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/09/20/berkeley-may-remove- free-online-content-rather-complying-disability-law)

So rather than helping anyone, you're sabotaging many.

I would like to point out though that merely uploading a video to YouTube results in it being captioned, for free, by a machine learning algorithm.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> So if I understand correctly, this has nothing to do with the students attending these schools and instead concerns the course materials made free to the public.

I don't know -- I understand that it must not be helpful for deaf students, but it seems like it would be cheaper for the schools to just stop sharing the courses instead of dealing with a lawsuit. What does the NAD expect to have happen?

<comment><USER8> > it seems like it would be cheaper for the schools to just stop sharing the > courses instead of dealing with a lawsuit.

Indeed. That's exactly what happened at UC Berkeley, once news of these lawsuits got out. We used to have all of our class lectures available free to the public, but now they're restricted only to students.

<comment><USER9> I see that as an embarrassing result for UC Berkeley and any institution that follows suit. Clearly, there is value to making the material available, otherwise it would not have been posted in the first place. Discriminating against a few or against everyone because of a negligible cost is a failure.

Furthermore, the fact that these considerations are not at the forefront of people's minds when releasing materials reinforces the merits of the lawsuit and the law.

<comment><USER10> > Discriminating against a few or against everyone because of a negligible > cost is a failure.

It's not a negligible cost to transcribe every single phrase the lecturer utters, for hours and hours and hours of lessons.

Would it be better if the captions were generated by Youtube? Come on, that system is not good enough yet.

<comment><USER11> They could set up a crowdsourced model for it. I don't know if they host their videos on Youtube, but it offers that option and there are services they could utilize if not such as Amara [0] which is used by Udacity and Khan Academy.

[0]: [https://pro.amara.org/education](https://pro.amara.org/education)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Even given the importance of disability accomodation, this provision doesn't make sense. Why apply it to a non-profit making giveaway that's mostly an artifact of something they wanted to do (compliantly) anyway?

That's like saying that if a store donates usable meat, they have to give a vegetarian option.

All it accomplishes is to punish those who go through the effort to make sure that byproducts of their mission can reach more people, and make it harder to "recycle" such products.

Think about it this way: it's already legal for me to make blind-incompatible blog posts and videos and give them away for free. This law is saying "hey prestigious institution, it's okay to give away your course materials for free, but you better durn well funnel it through a no-name blogger so no one knows where to find it!"

<comment><USER3> Oh, absolutely! You know how else they can save money? By stopping offering wheelchair accessible ramps. I bet they could save a few bucks by not using signs which also offer braile. And who needs elevators? Not their able-bodied students, obviously.

/s

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This article is from Feb. 12, 2015

Original discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9039798](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9039798)

</comment><comment><USER14> This is indeed ridiculous. I saw this came up at HN before. Again, I'm beyond words.

You don't sue a guy doing good deeds just because he is not 100% good to all, or missed someone in his efforts. Gosh.

<comment><USER15> That's a reasonable belief, which is why the ADA does not require compliance by individuals. However, these are not individuals; they are large institutions with the means to provide transcription. Can you formulate an argument for why online courses published by large institutions should be exempt from accessibility requirements which does not extend to an attack on accessibility requirements everywhere?

<comment><USER16> Can you formulate an argument for why course material collected, published, and shared for free--with no tie to actual courses that provide graduating credit--by large institutions should be subjected to accessibility requirements which does not extend to an attack on freely sharing information everywhere?

EDIT: For online course material that is offered to enrolled students and required for the completion of a degree, I do not believe anyone is arguing in opposition.

<comment><USER15> Excellent question! I like playing the role of gadfly, but will now try to construct my own argument for demolition to the enjoyment of others.

First, let's examine the virtue of accessibility. We start with the observation that nearly 1 in 5 Americans are disabled[0]. The source provides a breakdown by disability type. 1 in 5 is a high enough ratio to appeal to purely selfish reasons for the virtue of accessibility: there is quite a good chance you yourself will become disabled and require accommodation, so you should advocate for accessibility while you are still fortunate enough to be healthy. Other reasons to support accessibility include improved economic output by including the disabled in the workforce, ensuring a path to success for exceptional disabled people, increased quality of life among the disabled populace (about which you may or may not care), and an appeal to the abstract ideal of equality.

Now that we have established the virtue of accessibility, let's consider the virtue of enshrining accessibility requirements in law with penalty for non- compliance. Clearly, not all services desired by the disabled will implement accessibility (an example is the topic of this thread). Of those services which do not voluntarily implement accessibility, does the government have any interest in compelling implementation? Your answer to this question will depend on your own beliefs about the role of government; to head off an enormous digression, we'll just assume that yes, the government does have such an interest.

If the government has an interest in compelling implementation of accessibility, to what services does this interest extend? Certainly not all; it would be absurd to require every favor or interaction between individuals maintain full access compliance. For our purposes here let's use a classification function unlikely to be controversial (and more restrictive than is practiced): services provided by the government, and services provided by institutions receiving money from the government.

Both MIT ($460m in 2015[1]) and Harvard ($656m in 2012[2]) receive funding from the federal government. Thus they satisfy our restrictive classification, and so services offered should implement accessibility measures subject to penalty. These free online courses are services offered by MIT and Harvard. Thus they should implement accessibility measures. They certainly have the means.

[0] [https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/miscellane...](https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/miscellaneous/cb12-134.html)

[1] [http://web.mit.edu/ir/financial/re.html](http://web.mit.edu/ir/financial/re.html)

[2] [http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/12/30/sequestration-r...](http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/12/30/sequestration- research-budget-cuts/)

<comment><USER16> In an effort to both help and ensure I am responding to the strongest form of an argument, and not just picking apart easy weaknesses, would you care to bolster your claims that:

\- freely publishing course materials to the internet-at-large is the same thing as providing educational services for which the universities receive federal funding

\- services provided by institutions receiving money from the government includes all services provided--pending your clarification on how releasing information equates to a service provided--entirely, without exemption, and not just those services to which federal funds are directly allocated

\- applying federal compulsion to meet desired accessibility goals should apply to individuals who are not the official recipients of the benefits of the programs funded by the federal government (in this instance, meaning the general public of internet users who are non-students desiring to consume freely available information)

I find this automatic set of claims/assumptions to be highly dubious, as it equates releasing information--even if organized by originating course, thus giving the appearance of being an "online course", but actually lacking any involvement or service from the university beyond releasing the material, and thus not really an "online course"\--to providing education to enrolled students (for which the university receives funding and is inarguably subject to accessibility restrictions with associated penalties). I think these are, if one does not ignore the nuances of the circumstances, quite different things that weaken the argument for considering them to be services provided by the university. How do you enshrine this in a principle that applies to all actors? Does everything a university sponsors or engages in fall under these principles? Meaning, because they received federal funding for programs A, B, and C, do programs X, Y, and Z fall under federal purview and penalty, as well? Should the internet public really be granted the latitude to expect they can have their cake and eat it, too, where consuming course material for personal edification as a non-student is concerned?

You can check my much lengthier thoughts elsewhere in the thread on this, if you'd like. Also, let's exclude your "They certainly have the means" comment. That, to me, diminishes the force of your argument for principles by concluding it as an argument that the alleged principles only matter because the affected party has the perceived means. I think that severely weakens the case for why this isn't just a grab to hold an entity to a higher standard because they have the money to pay for the burden.

<comment><USER15> All good areas of inquiry. You call for a stronger chain of reasoning connecting the free online courses to federal funding. I'll start by setting myself back a bit: I don't think Harvard and MIT receive federal funding earmarked for educational services, only research. We can toss in a caveat characterizing federal student loans as funding, but it doesn't change the central issue: no federal funds are explicitly earmarked for free online courses. All that said, it isn't obvious why this should be an issue; the above classification function is significantly weaker than that used in real life, and federal funding binding an entire organization avoids the hairy problems that come with tracking what money goes where in fungible currency. Organizations know the strings attached to federal dollars before choosing to accept them. So yes, receiving federal funding for programs A, B, and C require programs X, Y, and Z to fall under federal purview and penalty.

You raise a possible distinction between free online courses, which you reduce to releasing information, and services. This might be delving into semantic argument territory. I would say the onus is on you here to argue why free online courses should not be considered a service offered by the university and thus possibly not subject to accessibility requirements.

<comment><USER16> I'll accept the onus and point you toward my tackling that matter in some depth in another comment: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12720879](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12720879)

Edit: Please forgive posting a link to another comment. I'm pointing to the other comment only because I feel it is quite thorough, and am not sure the conversation is helped by duplicating the same sentiments, thoughts, and questions.

Edit 2: I hope my consideration of the issues and perspectives can pass the smell test of invoking a semantic argument. I genuinely find this particular issue to be one that is nuanced and important, and do not wish to subvert reasoned consideration by quibbling too much over words. Suffice to say, I think this is far more a matter of situational and conceptual difference, not just whether we should rightly use a word to indicate a thing.

<comment><USER15> Well, I was being a bit unfair. Semantic arguments aren't useless per se when value is derived from satisfying a definition or not (as might be the case here). I will take a look at your linked comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> A few thoughts, somewhat orthogonal to each other:

1) Disability rights are often portrayed as a special privilege for a subgroup of society. But in reality, __all __of us start our lives mobility impaired and illiterate, and many of us who are lucky enough to grow old become sight, hearing, and mobility impaired to some extent. Accessibility helps all of us.

2) Accessibility helps not just humans. High quality captions add a lot of value to videos, because they make the videos _searchable_ , which provides immense benefits to __all __users, hearing impaired or not.

3) Disability rights are the one aspect of social policies where the USA might be ahead of much of the rest of the world. Compared to my native Switzerland, the USA is far ahead in empowering disabled individuals to participate in public life. This is something the US should be proud of.

</comment><comment><USER18> It's kind of tongue-in-cheek but NAD is ruining this great resource for he rest of us.

Thinking about what's easier if the choice is take down all material and not spend money on a lawsuit or spend even more money to add captions there is an obvious choice for universities to make :-/

<comment><USER19> What is Youtube going to do when it's their turn? Netflix already got sued. With 300-400 hours of user content uploaded _per minute_, Youtube would need to employ a small country to provide human subtitling at that rate. The automated subtitles have a ways to go still.

Do they get a pass because it's not their content? Do they get a pass because it's almost impossible to provide? Or do they suck it up and CC everything at great expense to everyone?

<comment><USER20> YouTube does not use federal funding to produce content.

<comment><USER19> Then, on what grounds was Netflix sued?

<comment><USER20> Losing grounds. Which is one reason YouTube would not be worried by a similar lawsuit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Initially I was quite confused about why the ADA/Rehabilitation Act applied to Harvard/MIT. It seemed like it was largely about employers and federal agencies, but at least the Rehabilitation Act covers "any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance", so I'm guessing that's why it applied to edX, though I wonder if it would apply if edX was an entirely separate entity that licensed the content from Harvard/MIT, or if they would still have an obligation to provide captions when licensing their content.

<comment><USER22> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_with_Disabilities_Ac...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_with_Disabilities_Act_of_1990#Title_III.E2.80.94public_accommodations_.28and_commercial_facilities.29)

> Under Title III, no individual may be discriminated against on the basis of > disability with regards to the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, > services, facilities, or accommodations of any place of public accommodation > by any person who owns, leases, or operates a place of public accommodation. > Public accommodations include most places of lodging (such as inns and > hotels), recreation, transportation, education, and dining, along with > stores, care providers, and places of public displays.

[...]

> The statutory definition of "readily achievable" calls for a balancing test > between the cost of the proposed "fix" and the wherewithal of the business > and/or owners of the business. Thus, what might be "readily achievable" for > a sophisticated and financially capable corporation might not be readily > achievable for a small or local business.

It's a 25 year old law. I don't have much sympathy for large organisations that are still choosing to discriminate against disabled people.

<comment><USER16> How exactly are they perpetrating an unjust or prejudicial treatment of the differently abled on the basis of them being differently abled?

<comment><USER22> They have chosen to not make the material accessible to deaf people, even though laws around closed captioning equipment started coming in 25 years ago (more recent changes include Internet streaming), and even though the ADA is 25 years old. There's no excuse to not know about it. They knew about it (because they provide reasonable adjustments to very many students all the time, and they have departments to do so), but they chose to ignore it.

It is clearly, unambiguously, discrimination. It might be legal (for the reasons I quoted around practicability), but that legality does not stop it being discriminatory.

<comment><USER23> It seems like what you're saying in your first paragraph supports the idea that what they're doing is wrong because it's _illegal._

But then you do a 180 and say it's wrong because it's _immoral._

Obviously, it could be both, but even if the first argument is kind of a "duh" it seems more cogent than going back and forth between those two positions (as many people seem to do in the thread).

<comment><USER22> I'm not good at communicating.

Society decided it was immoral to discriminate against people with disabilities. We tried asking nicely, and got ignored, and so we passed laws to drive change. Those laws were made some time ago, and while it takes time for change to happen we've had long enough for people to bring things into compliance with those laws.

This is especially true for large well funded organisations producing new material. There's not much excuse for a large well funded organisation, who is well aware of reasonable adjustments, to not make new material accessible.

Arguments against making material accessible are "it's too hard" or "it's too expensive". That's covered by the law (I included reference to it in my post).

But the fact that we still don't have useful speech-to-text or good transcription shows the contempt much of the tech industry has for people with disabilities. See also the choice to exclude people by choosing pale grey text on a bright white background. (Note that this doesn't just exclude people with disability levels of eyesight loss, but also people with mild visual loss).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> "The DOJ counters that the disability discrimination laws have clear jurisdiction over video on the internet, and that closed captions are required to make videos accessible to deaf or hard of hearing students.[0]"

"Harvard and MIT both requested a Motion to Stay or Dismiss the cases on the grounds that current accessibility law doesn't explicitly require universities to caption video on the web.

In June, the US Department of Justice weighed in on the issue in a statement of interest to the court. The USDOJ argued in favor of the NAD and urged the judge to deny the Motion to Stay of Dismiss. Judge Robertson agreed.

That means that, barring an objection from the District Judge, the lawsuit will proceed without delay.[1]"

[0] [http://www.3playmedia.com/2015/06/26/usdoj-sides-with-nad- in...](http://www.3playmedia.com/2015/06/26/usdoj-sides-with-nad-in-web- accessibility-lawsuit-against-harvard-mit/) [1] [http://www.3playmedia.com/2016/02/23/judge-denies-motion- to-...](http://www.3playmedia.com/2016/02/23/judge-denies-motion-to-dismiss- web-accessibility-lawsuit-against-harvard-mit/)

</comment><comment><USER24> This could set a new precedent if the decision extends beyond videos.

Sample scenarios:

\- Color red is banned because colorblind people can't see it

\- "screeching nails on blackboard" Youtube video is pulled because deaf people can't enjoy it

\- Public datasets are pulled because the numbers are too complicated for ordinary people to understand

IMO there should be a general divide between "public data" and "public accommodation". Data is just bits; 0's and 1's can be communicated to anyone. Requiring them to be something else as well is going too far. To put it another way: the accessibility problem is in the human-computer interface, not in the service on the other end of the network.

And here's Harvard's brief agreeing with me, categorizing the videos as "goods" rather than "services": [http://www.plainsite.org/dockets/download.html?id=235493653&...](http://www.plainsite.org/dockets/download.html?id=235493653&z=fc4c531a)

That being said, it seems like the NAD only expects this to apply to public accommodations, so perhaps all that's needed is to move (donate) the videos to a separate (non-public-accommodation) location, e.g. Bittorrent.

</comment><comment><USER25> Without the closed captions, how are the deaf going to find knowledge in written form??

<comment><USER26> Everywhere else on the Internet?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm really surprised to see this anti-accesibility sentiment on HN, where you see comments about contrast/scroll hijacking/Javascript requirability and numerous other things the WCAG recommends against on nearly every link posted. You'd expect Harvard and M.I.T. to have wheelchair ramps so disabled students could get to class right? It shouldn't be so controversial that their lectures should be accessible as well. Maybe some are concerned over the possible costs but there are solutions to that such as crowdsourcing. Universities are meant to spread knowledge for all and even if they're a public good, they should still be held accountable for it.

<comment><USER27> It's not an anti-accessibility sentiment, it's anger that the only reasonable thing for these organizations to do is stop giving it away for free.

It's like if an organization is giving away food and then gets sued for not providing a gluten or nut-free option.

Its the sentiment that if _some_ people can't have it, no one should.

<comment><USER17> > the only reasonable thing for these organizations to do is stop giving it > away for free

Yeah, it's not like MIT and Harvard have spare money lying around to spend on captioning (apart from the $13.5B and $37.5B, respectively, in their endowments). Let Big Deaf use their deep pockets to pay for captioning, if that's what they want!

<comment><USER27> That's such an absurd argument. "They have so much money, so let's MAKE them spend it on ME." MIT and Harvard had nothing to gain from releasing their lectures online for free, and plenty to lose by continuing to do so. When you stare a gift horse in the mouth, expect to be kicked in the face.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> The lawyers just want the ADA fees from institutions with deep pockets. It's not about these universities deliberately refusing to accommodate the hearing impaired. I think they would, if a serious student needed that assistance.

</comment><comment><USER29> This absolutely crazy.

<comment><USER30> It stinks but you probably would not think so if you absolutely needed the closed caption.

<comment><USER10> There's no reason to deny other people of the free lessons, other than green envy.

You can get the material anyways from the recommended course books, which are probably available in the public library at request. Or the course notes in the course's web page.

<comment><USER30> It almost always incurs a cost to provide convenience to the handicaps which is why laws have been created so that they are threated equally... For example, do you really need to be able to access this store with your wheel chair? probably not, you could use Amazon.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> this is a joke and Like the ADA in many ways will oppress further exposure of free education due to increasing the cost. This is absurd.

<comment><USER32> I used to be skeptical of the ADA but on a recent trip to France my girlfriend broke her foot and I had to push here around in a wheelchair. I realized how difficult life can be for disabled people when elevators are not working or a curb doesn't have a ramp. These are all very simple things and don't cost that much in comparison to other features of the building.

Since then I am a strong supporter of the ADA.</comment></comment>


Blimp: project management for doers - <AUTHOR> http://elweb.co/stuff/blimp-project-management-for-doers/

<comment><USER3> My problem with project management tools is that they often become a brain dump of every possible little thing folks can think of - and over time, those things either happen to get done as a side effect of another story or become obsolete when market, product, or user needs change.

I like "high level" goals that can be prioritized ("User signup flow" is the most important thing we're working on this week, after that, it's probably "..."); the details for the high level stories can be done just-in-time.

My perfect PM feature for this is some sort of LRU expiry of stories. If someone hasn't opened a story (no views) or modified it within the last few months, move it to an archive. After a certain period of time in the archive, delete it.

Organizations and dev teams have a memory - if something is important, it'll be in the collective cache of the team. If something is relatively unimportant, it's waste (in the lean sense) to write it down until you have to (shortly before you need to prioritize and use it).

Bugs are the same thing. A bug is usually either worth fixing immediately (aka "next") or "never". Many bug trackers get clogged with stuff like "on IE7, the user dialog is 5 px to the right". It's either worth fixing right now or "never". Delete it, and if another user complains and it's recent enough that we remember the other story, then it bumps up the priority. But if it happens long after we all forgot it happened, it's still not important enough to fix.

This would go a long way to keeping the most important things at the top and avoiding the hell of "Did we have a story for that or something like 6 months ago?" associated searching. Both Pivotal and Trello have this sort of rosy picture of the world that folks will only be entering in "this is the most important thing we must do it this week" sort of stuff, which is unfortunately not how most project teams work. A more holistic PM tool would take into account user behavior and have a solution for this. Heck, something like HackerNews' front page algorithm would be pretty interesting applied to PM.

<comment><AUTHOR> We are on the same page here. One feature that we implement is the "non-sticky DOING state". Sorry for the name, we can't come up with anything for that one.

The feature works like this. When you mark a tasks as DOING that state will only last for 24hrs. After that the "worker" will be notified that the "Blimp robot" removed the DOING state. The idea is to approach the problem you are talking about. Many times projects become filled with stuff that nobody works on. I know this is a very simplistic approach but it's a start. We have a few cards up our sleeves.

<comment><USER3> Win x 1000! I will definitely give Blimp a try!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm tired of web-based project management tools. Give me something on the desktop, that has a UI I can understand and isn't integrated with my browser, or go away. Anyone with a few hours and a CRUD generator can make a web-based project management tool.

<comment><USER5> care to explain why you dislike web based apps so much? latency is too annoying? we use Jira with GreenHopper and it's great. sluggishness is my only complaint.

it's definitely not easy to develop something like this right.

<comment><USER4> 1\. They tie my app to my browser, meaning if my browser crashes (I'm a developer, it happens), my app crashes.

2\. If I want to tie myself to a particular version, I can't, meaning that if I don't like a $hot_new_feature, I'm SOL.

3\. The browser is still very limited, and project management is very content intensive.

One single company willing to do actual applications programming could sell a ton of software.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Very clean design - you've put a lot of thought into this and it shows.

I most appreciate the ToDo->Doing->Done implementation. However it does assume that all to-do comprise an equal proportion of the job. It doesn't allow for a list with 10 items, where number 2 is actually 50% of the work. But that's probably not something easily quantifiable to begin with.

One typo I noticed on the files tab (when empty): "Upload files to share with you team."

Also I couldn't get the photo upload to work on my settings page. The spinner would appear then go back to the default image, and saving didn't help.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the report, the issue with the photo upload seems to be the cache, being too agressive. We are fixing it right now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Kudos for the nice design. I think this minimalist, flat, spaced-out, subtle- palette approach is great for for tools that people spend their whole day in.

<comment><USER8> Indeed, it feels a lot less "boxed in" than tools like Asana.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I love the way this looks. This might be outside your area of interest or might be too laser-focused on developer's needs, but I'd suggest integrating some kind of post-commit hook support, so a developer can check code in via svn or git and change the state of a to-do item. That's one thing we used extensively when tracking projects in Unfuddle tickets that I really miss.

</comment><comment><USER10> "we have plans for companies of all sizes starting at $12 a month"...couldn't find a link to more information on pricing.

<comment><AUTHOR> It slipped our minds. Here are the plans:

\- Free: $0 / 1 project / unlimited users / 10MB of file storage \- Beta testers: $12 month / unlimited projects / unlimited users / 100MB of file storage / access to new features including Dropbox support (coming later this week) which will not count against you file storage allowance.

We have other plans available but they are not relevant right now since the _beta testers plan_ is the best deal. You can see all plans after you sign up at <https://app.getblimp.com/company/billing/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Global file uploads seems a bit off, could work in fixed length projects but for ongoing projects it makes more sense to associate uploads with goals. Thinking about it dropbox integration would be ideal i.e. when a goal is created a dropbox folder is added automatically at: dropbox/blimp/project_name/goal

<comment><USER11> Ha, just found the "discuss" option. Was really wondering how you add more detail to a task, the whole product makes a lot more sense now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> The project _looks_ great, but at least for myself, I either need to see a feature tour or a 7 day free trial or something.

This is probably 'good enough' (and certainly is beautiful) for people not currently using anything for project management, but probably most of the HN audience already has something that's working somewhat for what they're trying to do now, and you're trying to supplant that.

There's almost no amount of screenshots that are going to get me to give up on the devil I know, so at the very least a product tour that shows interactivity is needed. Better than that would be a free trial, where I can get in there and try out some scenarios and compare them to the pain points I already have with my existing tools.

Like I said though, it really does look great. Fantastic even. But without being able to click on anything, I don't know that it isn't just pretty.

<comment><AUTHOR> The app is _free to sign up and use_ for as long as you want.

You can invite as many collaborators as you need. The only limitation is the number of projects that you can manage simultaneously, one for the free plan.

<comment><USER12> Ack. I don't know how I overlooked that, I just saw the $12 for unlimited projects and went from there I guess.

Thanks!

<comment><USER13> I overlooked it as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The history section totally looks like Basecamp progress section!

Nice tool though!

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes it does look a lot like Basecamp's. We had start with something. We are trying hard to make project history useful. Right now is just kind of a log in most PM apps (Blimp included). We feel it has potential to do more but haven't found how to make it happen. We'll keep at it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> So that's why I didn't get anything done today. My project management tool is not for doers!

All kidding aside, it looks pretty and well designed, but I don't see any value in yet another project management tool.

</comment><comment><USER16> Just gave it a try. It has the same use case as github issues, at least for programming projects. That said, I think you should focus on non-programmers.

<comment><AUTHOR> Initially, our target is digital agencies, design shops and small development teams. Blimp won't replace Pivotal Tracker for a team of experienced developers using scrum or other formal agile methodology. But we are OK with that.

We are trying to fix problems for folks that need help with their PM methodology. The idea is "trick" them into using a somewhat formal process.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Another great tool in this vein of "process, but not too much" is <https://sprint.ly/>

</comment><comment><USER18> "You and I know, that when we started our businesses, we where hoping" - <USER2> an h sneak into your were?

<comment><AUTHOR> ups!

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Looks wonderful, will give it a go.

</comment><comment><USER20> The "X" on the keyboard shortcut modal doesn't work. You have to press escape.</comment>


Ask HN: Why has Apple's software quality steadily gone downhill? - <AUTHOR> I've been using Apple products since 2003, starting with the iBook G4. Since then, it seems as if Apple's software quality has steadily gone downhill. My iBook wasn't the fastest, but it was certainly the most steadfast and predictable Apple computer I've owned.
Now, on my 2017 MacBook Pro running High Sierra, I get random freezes, slow/failed wakes from sleep, kernel panics, strange APFS behavior, trackpad unresponsiveness, etc.
iOS 11 is even worse, freezing during calls and sometimes keeping calls active even when the display shows no trace of an active call.
What gives? What, internally (to Apple), causes this? <comment><USER2> Podcasts is definitely worse in iOS 11

UI is worse, for example it takes more clicks to get to my podcast's timeline of episodes. I constantly feel lost.

It's buggy like hell, \- Podcasts don't update as well. Before, I could load the app, swipe the fist screen, and all my new podcasts would start loading (with the efficiency and reliability of Apps updates). Now, I walk out the front door and a plus icon jumps in and the podcast isn't downloaded.

cloud/arrow and circle/square are more intuitive. plus just pops up to tell me I'm SOL.

Yesterday I clicked through on a download in listen now to the episode screen, started play, and I had a different icon/episode in the 'playing now' zone and a completely different file playing.

These issues infuriate me every time I use Podcasts. Don't get me started about WiFi preference to pick the Cable Company's WiFi hot spot over my home even when the phone is less than 4' away!

<comment><USER3> Have you tried using alternative podcast apps? Like Overcast? I never used Apple's podcast app from the get go so I can't comment on it. It being bad and/or getting worse isn't too surprising and definitely one reason I never tried it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't think iOS has ever been a half decent operating system, but that's an example of how a lot of the discussion in this thread might be subjective.

A glimpse into what's going on in my opinion can be seen in the long awaited new Pro line of Macbooks. Many point out these were not Pro, they are (exceedingly) under powered overpriced shiny Macbooks. Machines which are still outperformed by their predecessors. Apple has stopped focusing on the tech community because we are expensive hard to please customers.

So they focus their efforts making products for regular people, who might use the product once in a while. And by focus their efforts I mean they make products people want to buy but that aren't necessarily great. Software is one aspect of that. If you are not a power user you'll likely never run into any of the issues you mention.

e: Oh boo hoo

<comment><USER5> > Software is one aspect of that. If you are not a power user you'll likely > never run into any of the issues you mention.

Most software I've seen is the opposite: consumer grade software has to work well, because a lot of times it's optional—if it doesn't do a thing well, users will just not use it. Whereas professional grade software is much rougher around the edges, because if doing a thing takes extra steps, users will take those extra steps. Because they _need_ to accomplish their goal, they're a lot more forgiving of problems along the way, so long as they get to where they need to go.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm staying with my 2015 15" MBP (i7-4870HQ, AMD R9 M370X GPU, 16GB RAM) Still running El Capitan. I hear they have M.2 to Apple SSD adapters now too.

The High Sierra root bug was embarrassing, among other issues. But bugs happen...

I also don't like the newer and thinner MBP's. I would prefer for the "Pro" line that they had more USB and other ports, and I absolutely don't want a Touch Bar.

Not sure what I'm going to do for my next laptop. Try and keep this one going for as long as possible.

<comment><USER7> The new keyboard is surprisingly amazing but the lack of ports is just embarrassing. At work we have this "who brought the dongle to the meeting?" game. With my personal laptop I will wait for the next version.

<comment><USER8> I think the new keyboard is pretty terrible honestly. So many keys get stuck and no longer press down. I've had multiple friends who have had to get their whole keyboards replaced because of stuck keys and the genius bar couldn't fix it.

<comment><USER9> Agree. Not even considering durability issues, 0.1mm of full-scale travel on a keyboard key is just not comfortable to type on at all.

<comment><USER10> And they are unbelievably clicky, too. Worse than some of the mech keyboards in my office. I find them awful to type on and have an old Retina laptop instead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Regarding High Sierra I've been telling myself that maybe Apple is is secretly busy with The Great Rewrite to migrate from Objective-C to Swift. Or maybe they are rewriting stuff to get it on the path to the one, unified OS. I really hope this is the reason because otherwise it is really, really sad.

There is still a UI bug that I must file because seemingly no one but me deactivated LCD font smoothing and discovered that text is printed in bold if it contains non-ASCII characters. It's infuriating that it is still not fixed as apparently no one has noticed since the release of High Sierra. I stopped reporting bugs because often it's a duplicate and gets closed which is demotivating. But I can't know beforehand because their bug tracker is closed.

<comment><USER12> What's worse than closed is that it doesn't correlate your closed as duplicate bug, with the bug it is a duplicate of. If they correlated them so you could see the status of the "parent" bug, then it would be miles better. I might even start logging bugs again myself.

<comment><USER13> You can ask for the status of the parent bug, I've gotten answers before.

For example, I filed a bug report for Continuity not supporting TouchID/FaceID, so that you could unlock macOS from your iDevice. It was closed as a duplicate, and when I asked for the parents' status, I was told it was it was closed as "Not to be Addressed".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Wow, just earlier today I tweeted:

> @tim_cook, What is Apple doing about the increasing bugs across Apple's > software?

I still remember pulling hair out because of Microsoft's bugs and just being able to get stuff done on Apple's software. I used to joke that PCs forced people to become experts because of bugs, whereas it was just fun to get stuff done on Apple products.

Today's Apple UX on iOS is just broken in so many places—friction everywhere. On a daily basis I encounter bugs.

What happened?

</comment><comment><USER15> I never tire of pointing to Apple's organization structure and how it impedes working on many things simultaneously with adequate focus and quality. It's much better explained here. [1]

Without a bigger change in the organization, these problems just cannot be solved. It's not about money, which Apple has a lot of (and even without tax benefits of repatriation, can borrow very easily). It's also about the top management's reluctance to change how the company works.

[1]: [https://stratechery.com/2016/apples-organizational- crossroad...](https://stratechery.com/2016/apples-organizational-crossroads/)

</comment><comment><USER16> Apple seems to have taken the direction of optimizing their experience to create beginners before supporting advanced users or pros.

There'e way more customers who are beginners, than advanced or expert users present.. until they all become more skilled.

Apple's products, and software aim to just work in the most basic way for the greatest number of people. Anything that is too far our of the range for basic users is either killed (Server.App), or sufficiently neutered.

If we start looking through the lens of creating customers who start out as beginners with Apple and grow with them...

Apple makes the iPhone so easy, it's like a feature phone. The tough App Store rules - to ensure the most stable experience for the majority of beginner and basic users.

Apple could design AppleTV off the charts - but we still have those largely basic menus, so basic that anyone can use an AppleTV easier than a cable box.

iPad Pro's could support mice for advanced users to use that amazing horsepower? No, let's go out of our way to remove it.

Mac Mini updates? Delay it until the average home is ready to have a new iHomeAutomationHub server once.

iMac Pro Updates? Probably have to sell them for $18K ea to start making it worthwhile.

Underpowered Macbooks, or Macbooks Airs? Perfect for selling lots beginners to intermediates.

MacOS, too, has fallen behind in it's UI innovation and polish. Apple's revenue largely comes from mobile, so rumors of MacOS going the way of a consistent iOS interface might not be too crazy.

What to do while the world levels up their digital skills?

We can wait, try to manage it ourselves, or switch to currently more innovative gear at the expense of other things.

MacOS has so many basic UI tweaks to install that one has to buy an app like Bartender to hide the icons. There is lots of work completed under the hood, no doublt, but not in a day to day way that we touch or use.

The main reason I'm still on Sierra is I can't handle the 4-6 month trauma of having a current OS like High Sierra that beyond the forced APFS snags, appears flaky. This is after experiencing every upgrade breaking with Panther, Tiger, leopard, Lion, Mavericks, El Capitan. Only Sierra was smooth.

It's just easier to wait to buy a mid cycle Macbook pro with the OS rattlesnakes having bit everyone else for a few years first.

<comment><USER17> There's also a difference between advanced users and power users. You can be an advanced user like people I know but not have lots of apps and thus icons installed. So no need for Bartender to hide them.

I do need Bartender like you seem to. But I've seen I'm the exception amongst my beginner and advanced friends vs the norm.

<comment><USER16> Definitely.

There's also a problem with every app thinking they're at the center of one's existence and should start on bootup, desktop icon, and status bar icon. But that's likely aimed at beginners, and not advanced or power users.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Isn't it most likely that the codebase is just like any other huge one. It gets to be a house of cards and getting all the bugs out becomes an impossible task, so you have to do the best you can. Would be nice if they would repatriate some of that overseas cash and increase their QA efforts but that doesn't help revenue in the short term. Also their competition is far worse in this area so nobody's breathing down their neck.

<comment><USER19> _Would be nice if they would repatriate some of that overseas cash and increase their QA efforts but that doesn 't help revenue in the short term. Also their competition is far worse in this area so nobody's breathing down their neck._

If Apple just made their QA efforts a minuscule fraction of the size of their efforts to get an edge in mobile chips and supply-chain logistics -- they could easily start to appear godlike again. Bad QA can be debilitating. Mediocre QA can be an anchor around your neck. Awesome QA is some kind of overpowered buff multiplier! It's exactly the sort of competitive advantage that a company like Apple would want to cultivate! So many of their competitors would fall sway to the cultural issues that go against QA getting the power to work to its full potential, making it an advantage that's very difficult to replicate.

I think if Apple could do something like this, this alone would redeem them in the eyes of its customers -- Make it Just Work Again! (Please don't walk around in that hat!)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I filed a bug to Apple regarding an issue I found with carplay. They didn't attempt to reproduce it and asked me to generate debug logs. I found this ridiculous, as a customer, I have no energy to gather debug logs.

<comment><USER21> If it's CarPlay integration related, perhaps it's involving car integration and not to ridiculous to ask for your debug logs (if you have them) as they might have the exact car or ECU firmware SDK you are testing with?

<comment><USER20> the actual bug is this,

if you play podcast while driving and meanwhile, the alarm is triggered. After you have dismissed the alarm, the audio won't come back. I suspect this is unrelated to my car, to be honest. As I disconnected my phone from the car, the issue was still there, no podcast audio.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I've got a 2016 15" MBP (touch bar) and have had zero problems with the hardware and software for a year and a half of heavy daily use. Well, maybe one weird hang.

YMMV, but it would seem like there's something wrong with your system that's not just run-of-the-mill.

<comment><USER23> Same here in terms of stability. I've been using a touch bar MBP 15 for several months and its been rock solid (still on Sierra though).

That being said, I HATE the keyboard and the touchbar is just dumb. The battery life is worse as well (although still way better than my Windows laptops). I wish I just had my old machine back to be honest.

That keyboard though.... ass

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> a few years ago, switching to android would have been unthinkable for me. preposterous.

now? I am so annoyed by my iphones persistent buggy problems performing normal phone-like operations (texting, typing) that I will probably switch. ugh.

few other anecdotal observations: their genius bar reservation web page literally redirects to an error page half the time! and not like a "planned" error page with a cute whale or something, but one with weird server logs that obviously are not meant for the end user

half the time i try to use the app store or sync apple ID I get an inscrutable error

i'm not sure if I gave up on apple, or they gave up on me! end rant

</comment><comment><USER25> Shipping iOS and macOS updates while simultaneously shipping new hardware every year is like never ending Cylon attacks in BSG.

It's relentless. It takes insane amounts of work. And you're on a fixed schedule.

</comment><comment><USER26> Aside from MacOS/iOS native software, IMHO Apple software for Windows has become unusable.

I tried using iCloud for Windows, but the sync behavior is unreliable, and I found myself without critical files on more than one occasion. This is not to mention the absurd background CPU usage.

iTunes on Windows is even worse. The built-in updater seems to fail on every major release, i.e. for 12.4,12.5,12.6 etc. Even under normal use, there are times when iTunes just refuses to launch. The background processes are running, but there's nothing on my screen.

I've resorted to delaying my iTunes software updates until absolutely necessary, and then doing a clean install of iTunes. This is not to mention the myriad issues with authorizing computers to download previously purchased content, or the fact that iTunes will quite literally prompt you for the same password multiple times, with no UI notification telling you that you've entered it correctly or incorrectly.

</comment><comment><USER27> Previous Thread: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16264329](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16264329)

My answer: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16265512](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16265512)

<comment><USER3> Previous thread only once mentions iOS 11 in nested comments which I'd find more interesting to hear about because I don't see many people complaining about it. Far more people are active on iOS 11 than High Sierra too. I personally have no issues with it beyond any other iOS.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I dealt with Apple Care recently for about 2 months of daily phone calls, store visits, and chats.

My MacBook had initially started restarting when it encountered any significant load. I got the logic board replaced and instead it started sometimes not waking from sleep correctly, producing "MCA data" kernel panics.

In the end, it got narrowed to the fact that I had an external monitor attached whilst closing the lid of the MacBook. This issue had been introduced earlier than my initial repair, but had only started happening for me post- repair because the repairer had taken the liberty of updating my software and exposed me to the bug that Apple had introduced.

</comment><comment><USER29> My first Mac was he Titanium PowerBook, loved it really, but eventually the hinges developed cracks and caused screen flickering.

Mostly now I'm happy with the hardware still using mbp for development, iPad Air, & iPhone; but have noticed the degrade in software stability on all devices.

OS updates make me nervous and don't address the issues I run into : general performance, responsiveness, Bluetooth device connectivity and hibernation.

I like tqkxzugoaupvwqr's theory - maybe Apple is more focused on a swift rewrite and unified OS. In general all software and os releases feel rushed and incomplete.

</comment><comment><USER30> I haven't experienced this with my macbook (Early 2015 also running high sierra), it's been stable. (but why isn't it possible to sort video's based on size in the photo app or icloud photo webapp?..)

With my iphone se it's a completely different story. Decided to contact Apple customer support because my iphone was frequently freezing up in the past weeks. Got told I need to replace the battery for 30euro (which to be fair is a decent price), but the battery still seems pretty good to me and the phone is less than 2 years old.

</comment><comment><USER31> I miss the simplicity of the old Music app. The "redesigned" music app is an eyesore and a clunky experience that managed to kill my love of listening to music using Apple devices since the iPod days. Now, I'm using Spotify and heck even Amazon's music player is way better. Sigh.

</comment><comment><USER32> On my side with the new Macbook and iPhone X no issues whatsoever so maybe this was just your system?

</comment><comment><USER33> Honestly my iPhone 7, iMac, and MacBook Pro have all held up great. I've had no issues.</comment>


All NYC Subway Stations to Receive Wi-Fi by End of 2016 - <AUTHOR> http://www.mta.info/news-technology-governor-wi-fi/2016/01/08/new-rapid-approach-station-redevelopment-will-expedite <comment><USER2> This might seem cool to people that aren't in NYC, but it's really not what we need. We need more tracks, more tunnels, and more trains. Second Avenue Sagas, the transit blog of record for NYC, is... more critical.

> wifi =/= building for the next 100 years. Massive subway expansion at > reasonable costs is what's needed.

[https://twitter.com/2AvSagas/status/685484086614437889](https://twitter.com/2AvSagas/status/685484086614437889)

[https://twitter.com/2AvSagas/status/685564984668123136](https://twitter.com/2AvSagas/status/685564984668123136)

> I want to walk into a train station and never have to wait more than 3 > minutes for a train.

[https://twitter.com/2AvSagas/status/685537323124133890](https://twitter.com/2AvSagas/status/685537323124133890)

The other thing is that Cuomo tends to just drop these announcements without any warning or planning. Sort of like the "throw it over the wall" model in open-source.

<comment><USER3> Sounds like 2nd Ave Sagas thinks a world class city should have a world class public transit system. That is my main thought, having been a user of Chicago and New York public transport: Why is this so much worse than e.g. Hong Kong? WiFi isn't the right scale of $ investment to get there.

<comment><USER4> I think it comes down to fares. You can travel between any two stations on the subway for $2.75. In contrast, the HK metro charges a fare between ~$0.50 to $7.00 depending on destination. Many other metro systems across the world use a zone-based fare scheme as well.

There's always a public outcry when MTA announces they're going to raise fares, and any attempt to introduce a distance/zone-based fare would be denounced as unduly burdensome on the poor, since they tend to live further out. In any case, I don't think the current MetroCard-based system could support such a scheme anyway.

The number one thing to improve straphangers' "quality of travel" would be to implement CBTC[1] so that we can get countdown clocks to remove the uncertainty that comes with waiting for a train. If I know the next train is coming in 15 minutes, I can hang out above ground or by the stairs and use my cell service rather than standing on the platform not knowing whether the next train is 2 minutes or 20 minutes away.

1: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications- based_train_con...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications- based_train_control)

<comment><USER5> Metrocard is going to be replaced in the not too distant future. I wouldn't be surprised if the next system has zones. They already have subsidized cards for low income travelers so a fare hike will have less impact. That's the only way they can begin to address their budget deficit issue.

<comment><USER6> Heavily disagreed - the budget deficit issue comes from a combination of state refusal to properly fund the MTA, and the MTA's own shittastic (and more than likely corrupt) processes for contracts that results in everything being vastly more expensive than it should be.

Not to mention vastly more expensive than every other first-world infrastructure project.

The problem with a zone system is that it effectively punishes the poor for being too poor live near work. The further out in NYC you go the _less able_ people are to afford higher fares, but yet that is exactly what a zone system does.

And like most other direct subsidies, the subsidized MetroCards are a terrifyingly bad solution to this - for one thing in a zone system, even with subsidies, the poor will still end up paying dramatically more than they do today to get to work. Not only that, only the poorest of the poor even qualify for these MetroCards, leaving out a vast income range for whom transit costs are still a burden and a substantial portion of income.

A zone system with subsidies will likely end up looking like:

\- The extreme poor pay slightly more than they do today because of the combination of living very far and subsidization.

\- The "merely" poor pay dramatically (possibly 2x+ multiples) more than they do today because they are "too rich" to qualify for subsidization but yet live at the outer reaches of the transit system.

\- Middle income individuals pay more than they do today, they don't qualify for subsidy but they live > 1 zone from work.

\- Upper/upper middle class individuals pay similar or slightly more than they do today, because they don't qualify for subsidy but are likely to live within the same zone as work (i.e., Manhattan below 110th).

A zone system, even with subsidies, will be insanely regressive to the point of comical absurdity.

Ignoring the fact that it's incredibly regressive, the zone system also won't do much against the budget issues the MTA faces - if you're going to squeeze someone for money you don't squeeze the residents of Brighton Beach or Bay Ridge or Hunts Point or Elmhurst - they don't got any money left to be squeezed out. Mid-low income families living in the far reaches of Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx, for whom transit is already a high percentage of their monthly budgets, have little left to give.

<comment><USER7> Very well reasoned! Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Meanwhile, San Francisco can't muster the courage to build a station on top of an existing tunnel boring site.

[http://www.socketsite.com/archives/2015/12/no-progress- for-a...](http://www.socketsite.com/archives/2015/12/no-progress-for-a-subway- extension-to-north-beach-and-a-setback.html)

</comment><comment><USER9> They just put 4G in the Chicago subways a couple weeks ago. That seems like a better solution than public WiFi, which you have to sign in to and is almost always overloaded or poor signal.

<comment><USER10> _> which you have to sign in to_

Why do you need to sign in into a public WiFi? Why can't it be open to everyone?

<comment><USER11> This is a free Hotspot wireless internet Service (the "Service") provided by Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) for use by customers of MTA. All users are required to log-in individually as an independent user.

1\. Our agreement

1.1 This agreement applies from when we accept your request for Service. Please read the terms carefully before activating Service with us.

1.2 By using and/or activating Service with us and/or clicking the accept button on the login/registration page you agree to be bound by this agreement. If you do not agree to the terms of the agreement, do not use the Service.

1.3 We may modify the agreement at any time. In accordance with clause 1.2, use of the Service constitutes acceptance of the agreement current at that point in time.

1.4 These Terms and Conditions do not alter in any way the terms or conditions of any other agreement you may have with MTA for products, services or otherwise. This agreement contains disclaimers and other provisions that limit our liability to you.

... blah blah blah blah blah and on and on.

<comment><USER10> In such case I'm not interested, thanks. It's enough that my mobile provider tracks me, why would I need MTA to track me in addition?

<comment><USER12> Because you're a foreign tourist who didn't get mobile internet access for their trip to NYC.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I wonder how many of the people in the system the MTA/NYPD can identify in real time and with what precision it can locate them. I presume they know the identities of a large proportion through entrance swipes from credit/debit- purchased metrocards, but that still leaves the problem of determining when someone has exited and where they in the meantime.

Between the travel data they're storing on the metrocards (exhibit number one, the Ebola doctor) and the ubiquitous cameras, I think the WiFi has more to do with tracking the public than improving service.

<comment><USER14> Don't forget the mics they setup all over the city [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3006019/Microphones-...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3006019/Microphones- used-New-York-City-s-effort-combat-gun-crime-picked-people-s-street- conversations-past.html)

<comment><USER13> Yeah, those, lamppost cameras, and mobile watchtowers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I seem to recall using wifi on the Moscow metro two years ago, and not just the stations, but the trains. Granted, some of the lines are still running cars that were made in "Leningrad" in the 70's, but...I mean you'd expect NYC trains to be made of castable diamond and levitating two inches above the rails by this point, so it's surprising they're still catching up electronically.

<comment><USER16> The oldest cars in the current NYC subway fleet are R32s built in 1964.

<comment><USER15> Even worse, huh?

<comment><USER17> Those old cars are tanks, for what its worth - they've been scheduled to be replaced several times over the years, and each time their replacement has been postponed to replace newer fleets of cars which have developed major problems. They don't have the fancy signage of some of the newer fleet, but they function very well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> London started to get wifi, but it is unencrypted and you have to watch an ad before using it, by which time the train has arrived, so it has zero value.

<comment><USER19> I don't get why they don't roll out LTE in the tube. Would be so much more useful.

<comment><USER20> Why would it be more useful? If they offered LTE you would need an account with a wireless provider to be able to use it, which is probably not an option for tourists who would pay insane roaming fees. On the other hand with WiFi most wireless carriers offer WiFi calling anyway nowadays, so you're able to do anything that you could also do on LTE.

<comment><USER19> No tourist uses the wifi in the tube. It's abysmal and too expensive for that. Unless you live in London there is no point to subscribe to the wifi there. Also pretty irrelevant as an argument given the fact that roaming charges are dropping and that you can get prepaid sims everywhere.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > The MTA will also accelerate delivering real-time arrival data for all 469 > subway stations, which will be available on the MTA's SubwayTime app and > will be streamed as an open data feed for any developer to use.

Neat.

<comment><USER22> I'm not sure _how_ they are going to do this, when most of the lines don't have this technology (it's literally turn the the century switching technology):

[http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/11/why- do...](http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/11/why-dont-we-know- where-all-the-trains-are/415152/)

<comment><USER23> Perhaps they same way they do it on buses?

<comment><USER24> No, you can't reliably receive GPS signals in a subway tunnel.

<comment><USER25> If you have wifi hotspots in every station you can track the trains that way, no GPS required.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Catching up to Moscow.

<comment><USER11> I started traveling to Moscow regularly before I moved to New York and when I did, I was shocked that not only was wifi not as ubiquitous as in Moscow but the subway in NYC didn't even have cell phone service. Felt very strange for Moscow to be so far ahead of New York.

<comment><USER27> it's normal - Moscow is 8 hours ahead of NYC

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Boggles my mind that union square station still has no service

</comment><comment><USER29> Not wifi, but in the much bigger metro network in Tokyo, You can use mobile connection (LTE) even in-between stations. They probably have underground relays.

<comment><USER16> Likewise almost everywhere on Boston's subway -- though it's worth noting that the Boston subway as a whole is smaller and carries less people than New York's Lexington Avenue line.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Are they going to be open WiFi, or will require some authentication?

<comment><USER30> I've used the one on 34th and it requires acceptance of their TOS but if I remember correctly, I didn't need to input any personal info.

<comment><USER10> 34th actually has usable T-Mobile connection.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> So, January 2018. Got it.

</comment><comment><USER32> This only applies to the stations, not the actual trains. The great majority of my commute time is spent on the train, not in the station (where you can often get LTE anyway).

<comment><USER33> > not in the station (where you can often get LTE anyway).

Often? Except for a few stations in Midtown, I rarely see any cell service once inside the turnstiles.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I have celluar data plan. I don't use the public wifi unless there is no coverage in the station. We need:

* more cellular coverage, for every station

* LED train schedule display in every train station

</comment><comment><USER35> Would be great if you could buy tickets with your cellphone</comment>


What is going on in tech industry today? - <AUTHOR> I just want to know, where is majority of the techies/tech companies are heading? What will be the future 5 or 10 years from now?
What things which exist today going to have the biggest impact in future? <comment><USER2> Cloud Computing, serverless applications.

It's unavoidable due to being extremely cost effective and point and click redundancy and security.</comment>