Ask HN: Disrupting online dating - valid thoughts? - <AUTHOR> http://nullrisiko.biz/daniel/2009/06/10/its-neither-the-chicken-nor-the-egg-thoughts-on-disrupting-online-dating-business-models/

<comment><USER3> I don't think "online dating" will ever work. Sexual attraction isn't about the kind of rational things you can communicate over our current, low- bandwidth digital connections. It is well and good to describe your personality with words and pictures, but in most cases it isn't enough. It might even be counterproductive for people who are unable to look good in a photograph.

The things described in the linked post (commonalities) _are_ important parts of dating and attraction, but initial attraction is much more about the subtle things: Body language, subtle personality cues like clothing and hair style, all sorts of instant non-verbal communication, social proof etc. So either you have to remove these factors from the equation entirely (I can't really see how to do this) or you have to make an arena where they can be properly expressed.

This would mean, essentially, arranging real-life encounters where everybody has a decent chance at relaxing and being themselves. The thing is, nightclubs do a pretty good job at this already. The biggest solvable problem of nightclubs is differentiation; if you go to a nightclub you invariably meet the outgoing, confident, secure club crowd. It's always a high-pressure arena. But actually, relaxing and being yourself around strangers is pretty damn difficult as it is.

This is just the basic human part of the problem. But there are much deeper issues to think about. Sexuality and relationships are a very sore and difficult part of human nature, and it is never rational. There are chaotic, unmapped social issues here as well; for example a lot of women are interested in sex just for the physical thrill but have a huge social barrier against casual relationships. On the casual dating scene, this manifests itself as a series of games of playing hard-to-get, blaming alcohol for a successful one- night-stand, etc. I don't think _anyone_ has the vaguest idea of all the other similar, irrational cultural norms that will bite you in the ass if you try to tame this problem.

Online dating is difficult because

+It is hard to convey your personality over an internet connection

+No one is able to tell you what you're doing wrong, since the rational and quantifiable part of dating is so small

+There are a lot of unmapped social and human behaviors that will fuck things up

Basically, I'd just try to tackle some difficult technical field instead. Human sexuality is too chaotic and hard to quantify.

However, I _do_ like your idea of using an existing social network to bootstrap the thing. It is the best solution of the chicken/egg-problem I have heard.

<comment><USER4> _arranging real-life encounters where everybody has a decent chance at relaxing and being themselves. The thing is, nightclubs do a pretty good job at this already_

I don't know where you live but I've never been to a relaxing nightclub where everyone was encouraged to be themselves. In fact, it's almost the opposite: a loud stressful environment where everyone is dressed up and trying to be someone they aren't.

To meet women at a nightclub you are pretty much taking a shotgun approach. You need to have no shame and be the guy with the most cocaine. Online, you just need a decent photograph and a funny profile and the women will come to you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Your idea is pretty good. I signed up for OK Cupid a while back and repurposed the photos and certain other information from my FB profile. It would have been nice to just auto-import.

I would take a look at OK Cupid, if you haven't. The other dating sites like Match or eHarmony seem very "find your future husband or wife" oriented. The other end of the scale, AdultFriendFinder or even the Onion / Nerve personals are very ghetto/spammy and seem to be best suited for ugly people into weird sex stuff, or actual prostitutes.

OK Cupid has worked out very well for me in finding people who just want to go out on a few dates and have fun without the pretense of sizing me up for marriage or whether or not I'll fit into a harness in the dungeon.

If there was an iPhone app for OkCupid it would be nearly perfect. (for actual "dating.")

<comment><USER5> The tech-savvy ex-hipster geek-trash I know in Houston all love Ok Cupid. But they use it heavily for the sort of social networking that Facebook is suppoed to be for. (It's apparently better than Facebook for finding people with similar esoteric interests.)

On the flip side, Facebook & Friendster started out as surreptitious dating sites. People went on there to figure out who among their friend's friends were cute enough to date.

<comment><AUTHOR> Your last point raises an interesting question - when the current business model of social networking sites is "keeping in touch with people you know", might a future business model be: "Helping you find people you don't know but will find useful - for work, dating or sports"?

<comment><USER6> For the dating piece, wonder if a "bounty" model might make sense. i.e. I will pay a matchmaker $1 to introduce me to a potential match (if I agree it is a good match based on some preliminary info about the person).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I am not sure if this is ok to post - I checked the guidelines but found nothing against this. If there is some kind of policy against for feedback like this, I will delete my post. This is definitely not meant to be some kind of ad, just an honest wish for feedback on my conceptual idea. I hope that's ok?

I am new to HN, but Paul Graham had dating on his "ideas" list for startups he would like to fund, so I thought HN might be a good place to discuss it.

<comment><USER7> Yeah, seems like a good submission.

A couple thoughts:

People do pay to get into a certain building to meet other single people (I'm thinking about nightclubs and bars that have cover charges here).

Also, your point about people mostly meeting partners through friends is valid but the REAL question is does it happen this way becasue that's the 'best' way to meet somebody or becasue it's currently one of the biggest ways humans meet new people? In other words, does it work this way becasue this way works best, or does it work this way because it just happens to provide the most chances?

That being said, your assessment of the problem is solid. It's an idea worth honing in on. The one thing you'd want to be able to hang onto from the "walled garden" sites is the fact that everyone there has expressed interest and availability for a dating relationship. This lowers the risk for those who do the asking since you are less likely to get rebuffed in the "EW, I'm dating already, thank you very much creepo!" sort of way.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your feedback!

Great point about the most efficient way to meet a partner! This is indeed a great question one should ask oneself. I see a problem with that approach though: I guess many people don't want to mix 'efficiency' with dating and human interactions and emotions too much. It's probably socially accepted to use dating sites, but are we already on our way to rethink our entire approach to dating?

The expression of interest is indeed a good concept to hang on to. Which is why social networks are especially suitable for adding dating - you can add a simple "are you open to dating approaches?"-setting.

<comment><USER7> Agreed. In fact, I think getting 6 pages of profile to look through to try to find somebody you may want to contact on a dating site is counterproductive and probably frustrates people a lot.

At first I thought that maybe your idea subverts the role of the intermediate players in our lives. (The people who go "Hey, I know this person you should me, let me introduce you.") But what if you actually allowed that to happen in the social 'net? Do you think it would be handy if you could anonymously suggest to friend A and Friend B that they connect if they don't know each other?

<comment><AUTHOR> Good questions. What value do intermediate players provide?

Is it in them playing cupid or is it in them being a trustee? Why do people who are introduced to each other go along and talk to the other one - is it because they are interested in a stranger or because they trust the intermediate player?

I tend to think it's the latter which is why anonymous suggestions may not work. What do you think?

<comment><USER7> Hmm, good question. If you knew it was through a mutual friend it could still work, but maybe it should not be anonymous.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> So I don't mean to spam this thread (I already posted as a response to another comment), but I do want to encourage people to check out our disruptive online dating startup: <http://flowmingle.com>

No profiles, no matchmaking tests. We built the site to be inherently social and group oriented. We make no claims about 'finding love' or 'finding a soulmate', our site is optimized to make introductions between like people, help them set up a meeting, and then get out of the way.

Basically, we create small local groups of similar people an d then lead them through a guided introduction process that lasts a week. At the end of the week we help people connect and plan a meeting. Check us out.

</comment><comment><USER9> ... The big thing the article seems to skip over is the fact that people on an online dating site are actually LOOKING to date someone. While people on your friends of friends social network may or may not be. And approaching someone online without that context established is considered creepy, and especially so considering you're putting your 1st degree friend in the middle of it.

Someone may argue that the search should be restricted to facebook ppl with "looking for guys/girls" checked in their profile, but in my experience almost noone checks those for fear of looking desperate to their other friends.

<comment><AUTHOR> Very good point - dating has so much to do with social perceptions. For a stand-alone dating site, there is a serious problem here: people might not want to contact suggested 'matches' out of fear of appearing creepy (this may be subject to local customs though, at least to a certain extent?).

Tthis is why social networks are especially suitable for adding dating - <USER2> can add a simple "are you open to dating approaches?"-setting, which is hidden from view; a private setting used only for the dating functionality of the social network. Do you think that would help?

<comment><USER9> Could be wrong here, but I doubt most people would enable that setting even if they might actually be open to such a thing. In the same way people don't check the "Can we contact you for feedback on our site" checkboxes etc.

Dating is a really really touchy subject when there are friends in the mix as well. That's the great thing about dating sites, they are completely removed from the rest of your social life.

I work for <insert really large internet company here>, and our dating site's user namespace is completely removed from the rest of the social sphere we've developed over our other properties, because in almost all cases, users don't want anything they do regarding online dating to be mixed with what they do elsewhere (This also applies to our online job site).

<comment><USER10> True, people won't check that, but there's another indicator: the relationship status. Nearly everyone keeps those up to date, especially if they actually use the site.

<comment><USER11> On Facebook I leave my status blank and don't change it when I enter a relationship. You're right though, most people keep it up to date.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I always thought a good online dating site should have you _do_ stuff with somebody else. Like playing a game and chatting at the same time, or talking on a certain topic - stuff that would make initial interaction easier. I think this is more important then selecting your best partner, and then just giving you his/hers email address.

<comment><AUTHOR> What's your rationale behind your proposal to force users to do stuff? Is it to make initial conversation easier? Well, could be an icebreaker, that's true. Do you think it comes across as sincere intermediation or as some kind of forced thing both parties will rebel against?

<comment><USER10> It's a way to find out what kind of person your 'opponent' is and to get to know them, as well as to have fun, thus creating an emotional bond with them - a reason to 'see' them again. A short, goofy game, akin to a Mario Party or Wario Ware video game, would be perfect for this, I think.

<comment><USER13> Check out <http://images.google.com/imagelabeler/>

The creator (or so) once told in an interview that people feel connected when playing this game successfully together.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Well, there are plenty of social dating apps on Facebook at the moment. :) so I guess the model works.

Making one cross network might not work so well: I wouldnt really see it working for, say, linkedin (too business oriented), Twitter (lack of info), Myspace (too young a crowd). Facebook would probably tend to be the target for this model.

</comment><comment><USER15> "How it certainly doesn't work is by going into a predefined building - sometimes even with an access fee - and only finding potential partners in there."

Actually, certain kinds of dating work exactly like this, and translate well to the online model. It's just that most people don't want to live that way.

</comment><comment><USER16> Yeah, funny, I was thinking of a similar principle. However, mine is slightly different. You match people using collaborative filtering techniques based on your social network profile (bayesian filtering, for example. . .). Then you via gps on your cell phone. IE, if two likely matches happen to be geographically close to each other, the cell phone tells both of you "hey, you guys would be a good match . . . would you like to hook up at a nearby coffee place?". If both say yes, the cell phone will allow you to meet at a local coffee place (or whatever).

The point is is to have a weird excuse to interact briefly. Just by a brief encounter one can know if that person is his/her type.

</comment><comment><USER17> Take a look at Zoosk for an example of your idea in action. It may not be a one for one to what you envisioned but they are using social networking applications to add users to a central dating site and seems to work fairly well.

</comment><comment><USER18> fta:

"How it[real life] certainly doesn't work is by going into a predefined building - sometimes even with an access fee - and only finding potential partners in there."

Sounds like the writer has never gone clubbing before ...

In other news, the writer has never used MySpace either (before it got hijacked by spammers)

</comment><comment><USER19> Don't people do this already? Search through Facebook or Myspace pages for compatible mates?

<comment><AUTHOR> Might very well be. But there might as well be a business model in simplyfying the process for them and making it a lot more efficient. What do you think?

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Online dating is a way to scam gullible lonely people. It works perfectly. No need for improvement.</comment>


The iPad Is Unbeatable - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2012/03/new_ipad_how_apple_s_tablet_strategy_parallels_its_unbeatable_ipod_success_.single.html

<comment><USER3> Sometimes the way I see Apple promoting iPad makes me see it as a fad, but sometimes it feels like there are spots it can secure for good.

For example, the new TV ad shows a clip of someone making a fake oil painting with their finger. That's a fad - people who use that will be people who want to see what it's like to paint once or twice, not serious painters. A fat finger on a glass pane will never be a substitute for a brush on canvas.

The other promotional video on their homepage right now shows a yuppie mom using it as a visual grocery list, a mechanic doing oily-fingered conversions on it on some gruddy garage floor while handling heavy metal equipment, old men playing backgammon, and a bunch of young adults around a table "jamming and recording" music together.

All of this is gimmickry.

The ads also show people browsing photos and videos and reading iBooks. These are things I can see people using iPad for more than few times, and the key to having tablets not fizzle out as a fad is letting the money pour in from gimmickry while focusing on these functions that can make tablets last - <USER2> a photo album and a book. People will never use iPads for half the stuff they're being marketed for. People will certainly try it (and make Apple a ton of money in the process), but they'll end up preferring the former methods because a pane of glass can only emulate them and not outdo them.

<comment><USER4> The vast majority don't make art and music with their computers, either, but we don't consider it "gimmickry" when some do. Most computer users use their computers for a narrow and mostly similar range of things, just like most iPad users do. Both computer ads and iPad ads mix a few of the niche apps with a few more commonly used apps because it makes a good ad. I think it's really clear that tablets are not a fad or in danger of fizzling out.

<comment><USER3> The difference I'm pointing out is between these niche apps - sure they exist on both platforms. Plenty of professionals produce music and art with computers, I don't think I need to prove that. But nobody will do this stuff on tablets.

It's because personal computers will always be more sophisticated than tablets, both in terms of hardware and input. On an iPad you can play with a fake 6-inch guitar with your fingers in Garageband. That's limited gimmickry, and will only be fun/interesting the first few times. On a Macbook you can directly record an actual guitar and produce an album in Pro Tools. Nobody will ever produce an album on an iPad.

The same goes for visual and physical art, nobody will ever use iPads for Photoshop or AutoCAD. These are just things that require complex UI that you can't use without a precise, physical form of input like a mouse and keyboard. Touch input is too bulky for things like that.

There are good fields to go into with tablet apps - we're already seeing this with the watered-down photo editing Apple is selling. <http://i.imgur.com/HUBeu.jpg> Some apps, like this and iBooks, can still be useful to typical consumers when they're this simple. But a lot of the other stuff is just gimmickry that sells on shallow novelty.

<comment><USER5> >Nobody will ever produce an album on an iPad.

That seems like an extraordinary claim. I'm positive somebody will eventually produce an album on an iPad if that hasn't already been done. Whether it'll be a _good_ album is another question of course, as is whether that'll become a highly popular way to do things...

<comment><USER4> [http://www.engadget.com/2010/12/27/gorillaz-ipad-album- now-a...](http://www.engadget.com/2010/12/27/gorillaz-ipad-album-now- available-as-are-the-apps-used-to-make/)

Over a year ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is a bit-o-nonsense;

\- unbeatable tech...people said this about the iPhone. But 4 years on there were a pretty good set of alternatives.

\- Price being unbeatable... low prices are just not Apple with their 40% markup goal. I'm sure we will see Samsung, Huawei and others pushing the price point down on tablets. Price matters, remember those dumped HP tablets!

\- "they would still lack all of the tablet-optimized apps that are now clogging Apple's App Store"... really? Android is doing a pretty good job at this on the smartphone market. It can be done.

Apple have an awesome head start but there is no unbeatable in this market.

</comment><comment><USER7> When the hell am I gonna be able to buy an 8.5x11" e-paper device for reading conference papers and other full-sized PDFs? I know this isn't as sexy and glossy as the likes of tablets, but I can't be the only on who's been impatiently waiting for such as series of devices to crop up.

Tablets seem nice and all (I haven't been compelled to get one), but I want a really awesome good-sized _reading_ device. The Kindle DX is _so_ tempting, but it's too expensive (relative to tablets) and it's still just a _wee_ bit too small.

<comment><USER8> The Kindle DX is really nice. I have one and prefer it to the regular size one quite a bit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Whatever, I just got a Transformer Prime and wouldn't exchange it (or any other comparable Android tablet) for ten iPads.

Well, I would, and then I would sell them and get another Android tablet. I haven't liked a piece of equipment so much in ages.

<comment><USER10> When'd you get your Prime? I attempted to purchase one for my girlfriend for Christmas and it was a big mess of a problem that I don't ever want to deal with again containing canceled after canceled preorders and finally after getting the device having it force reboot and lose WiFi every time it went to sleep until ASUS pushed an update weeks later.

<comment><USER9> I went to Best Buy two days ago, when I came in the US, bought one in a few minutes and left. I have zero issues with it (maybe a little bit of graphical flickering for a few ms in the recently used programs list).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Every person in history who has ever said "X is unbeatable" has been eventually proven wrong.

<comment><USER4> Well, sure, in the long-term everybody's dead. But the point of the article is that perhaps Apple's success with the iPad will be more like their success with the iPod (market-share domination, 2nd place is only a minor player) than their success with the iPhone (lots of profit but lots of other players are making lots of revenue, at least).

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> 1979: The IBM 370 is unbeatable.

1982: The IBM PC is unbeatable.

1985: SONY is unbeatable.

1988: Microsoft DOS is unbeatable.

1990: Kodak is unbeatable.

1993: Windows is unbeatable.

1994: AOL is unbeatable

1996: Netscape is unbeatable.

1998: Internet Exlorer is unbeatable.

2002: Krispy Kream is unbeatable.

2004: MySpace is unbeatable.

2006: Real estate is unbeatable.

2008: Toyota is unbeatable.

2012: The Ipad is unbeatable.

<comment><USER13> Tense matters. In 1979 the IBM 370 was unbeatable. "The iPad is unbeatable" is true. "The iPad will always be unbeatable" is a different statement.

<comment><USER14> This is a weird bit of equivocation, and it's kind of clever and fun to think about. But they aren't really different statements plainly spoken.

To say that something is unable to be beaten is intrinsically a claim about the future.

<comment><USER13> I think you're taking it too literally. In the movie "Pumping Iron," Serge Nubret says to Arnold Schwarzenneger at the 1975 Mr. Universe competition, "You are unbeatable!"

Did he really mean forever? Just that competition? Until Arnold retired? I think the expression "unbeatable" always means "Under the current circumstances, roughly now-ish, for the foreseeable future, &c." If you take it literally, there would be no use for the word.

Saying "Arnold is Unbeatable" in 1975 meant that the current crop of body builders couldn't beat him, that either he would grow old, or retire (which he did, and then un-retire to win again), or some new young phenom would come out of nowhere.

Saying "IBM 370 is unbeatable" in 1979 meant simply that nothing at that time would beat it, that only time or the unforeseeable would unseat it, which is what happened.

<comment><USER14> The word is always used with an implied context, yes, but that context is never just 'the present' with all circumstances staying as they are.

To call something 'unbeatable' means that there are still variables that can come into play in the contest, but they don't even matter. The victor is already decided even allowing for the most extreme probabilities.

For many or most of the items in the list you were replying to, the contest was not over when the crown was lost.

The OPs list was intended to show that many companies lost their tremendous advantages in a variety of ways, that the variables are such that the iPad shouldn't be labeled as unbeatable.

And of course, no one really believes the iPad is unbeatable in any meaningful sense. It's just hyperbole for being in a dominant position.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The title is link-baitey of course, but the general thesis is this:

      * control over essential components.
      * market leadership in applications.
      * continual innovation.

The first one is the way in which Apple dominates and controls the supply chain. It's not monopolistic since they are paying real money for goods from third parties, but one has to wonder if there is restrictions on starting up new production lines. This becomes a huge barrier to entry to anyone else. I'm really curious to know where ASUS is getting their 1920x1200 glass for the new Transformer Prime. Like nuclear proliferation, there are a few key components that can prevent others effectively from building tablets. These are currently displays and radios.

The application one has been discussed a lot on HN, but basically what it boils down to is Apple's policies with regards to applications acceptable for publication creates a more homogenous user experience. There is anecdotal evidence that this translates into a user perception of 'quality' to those applications.

And finally they don't stop, like Intel's tick-tock sort of model they move incrementally forward each release. You can argue that the 'new iPad' is what the iPad 2 should have been but missed out, or you can argue its the same old same old with just a higher res screen and 4G, but the release after release means that if you're an Asus or a Samsung or a Dell, Etc and your development cycle is 2 years you have to guess where they will be in 2 years if you want to compete head to head. That is harder than you might think until you've tried it a few times. And of course the risk is that the 'new' thing might have come out of left field so its high risk.

A strategy which has more understood risk is to create your own product in the space which has your own vision of what it will be, but folks like RIM who have tried that have been challenged to think outside the space that they were successful in. Apple's advantage here was that the iPad is in many ways just a big iPod touch. And they had a lot of information about the touch which could help them vet various ideas.

</comment><comment><USER16> "Unbeatable" is hyperbole but it's not that far off the mark. IMHO the iPad will dominate the tablet market for _at least the next 3 years_.

People like analogies. Two regular comparisons on HN and elsewhere are Windows vs Mac and iPhone vs Android (interestingly the second is also used as an analogy for the first).

All of these analogies are wrong.

A smartphone has very high (what I call) _built-in utility_. You can use it to make and receive calls, send and receive SMSs/emails, take photos, get directions and browse the Web. At a guess, this accounts for probably 70% of smartphone usage. A large portion of the rest would be (again, I'm guessing here) games.

Android is a commoditizing product. With the standard Google apps, you get 70% of the utility (based on my earlier assumptions) of an iPhone. The point here is the ecosystem doesn't matter as much.

The iPad is a different beast entirely and (as I've been saying for 1.5+ years now) IMHO much more important and will be a much bigger market than the phone market. It will (and already is) cannibalizing a lot of PC usage and sales.

The thing to note about the iPad is that 70% figure is (at least anecodtally) vastly different. The ecosystem matters. Apps and content matter much more than on phones. And this is where the iPad competitors really suffer and will continue to suffer.

It's why I have the most hope for Amazon in the iPad competitor space because they have the closest thing to what the iTunes ecosystem can provide. Without this, despite the relatively low price, I don't think the Kindle Fire would've sold anywhere near the number of units than it did.

A better analogy for the iPad than the iPhone is actually the iPod. 10+ years after the iPod's release it still accounts for the majority of MP3 player sales. Yes you can rip your own CDs and buy your MP3s from Amazon and elsewhere but the convenience of the ecosystem trumps pretty much everything else. Last year it was rumoured that Apple would kill the Classic until it was pointed out that the Classic is the fifth biggest selling MP3 player (the top 4 are all Apple too).

Apple's supply chain management, innovative financing and unprecedented warchest certainly have given it a massive advantage, no question. No one else can (yet) create a product at similar specs for a similar price. But it's the ecosystem that has driven and will continue to drive the iPad's dominance.

<comment><USER17> > The iPad is a different beast entirely and (as I've been saying for 1.5+ > years now) IMHO much more important and will be a much bigger market than > the phone market. It will (and already is) cannibalizing a lot of PC usage > and sales.

Three questions/comments:

1) Why do you feel it is bigger than the phone market? I'm skeptical of this, at least until the day tablets and laptops merge (imagine a tablet that docks into a keyboard/touchpad). Almost everyone needs a phone these days. And if you could only have one, I imagine most would take the laptop/desktop over the tablet.

2) How much evidence is there for large-scale cannibalization? I always figured the iPad is growing so much faster than PCs, because the PC market is saturated and frequent upgrades are no longer necessary. Everyone has a computer already and a 4+ year old one works fine. Tablets are new and desirable - but is there that much evidence yet that a tablet is actually more desirable than a computer?

3) Strongly disagree that apps are more important on a tablet than a phone. Phones are lower power typically and screen space is at a premium, so I'd argue that native apps are more important on a phone. Tablets should be able to handle webapps fine.

<comment><USER16> > 1) Why do you feel it is bigger than the phone market?

I only use my phone for calls, messages (SMS/email), maps and _occasionally_ for Web usage. That's 95% of my phone usage at least. I don't believe my experience is atypical. The phone is ultimately a communication device (and, these days, a camera).

IMHO it's reasonably likely we're heading for a point where the phone will be replaced by a (largely if not completely) nonvisual communication device. Maybe the whole glasses thing will happen (although I'm skeptical that any electronic display can match the latency required to interpose imagery over what you're looking at, which is a problem for augmented reality in general).

Look at it another way: how much do you use your phone versus a tablet (assuming you have one)? For me, it's a factor of 10-20x in favour of the tablet. I know other people vary on this. Some spend all day sending and reading messages. A few even spend all their time on Facebook (or even Twitter) on their phones.

Basically, I just believe tablets will be bigger because rather than being hybrid communication devices like phones they'll encroach on general computing.

I use a tablet for Web browsing, email, books, games, Netflix and photos. I have a Macbook Air. I use it a lot too but if I'm just reading/browsing/consuming, I'll use the iPad in preference to any other device. And that covers a lot of my technology use.

> 2) How much evidence is there for large-scale cannibalization?

There is some evidence [1] but the trend (if it is that) is, at best, emergent.

> 3) Strongly disagree that apps are more important on a tablet than a phone.

Native apps are vastly superior on the iPad to Web apps too. Low power is an issue for tablets too. People use them on sofas, on buses/trains/planes, etc. Battery life matters. The battery life of an iPad dwarfs that of pretty much any other laptop.

Compare native apps to the ghastly hybrid native/Web apps that some put out there (that are essentially a UIWebView with HTML/JS/CSS). They have all been in my experience terrible.

[1]: [http://betanews.com/2011/01/12/it-s-official-ipad-sapped- win...](http://betanews.com/2011/01/12/it-s-official-ipad-sapped-windows-pc- shipments-during-q4-2010-but-macs-more/)

<comment><USER17> > Look at it another way: how much do you use your phone versus a tablet > (assuming you have one)?

> If I'm just reading/browsing/consuming, I'll use the iPad in preference to > any other device.

To each their own. I don't own a tablet, but used my roommates iPad for a few weeks to see what all the fuss was about. I constantly longed for my laptop, which was far more comfortable to use, faster (in terms of web navigation), larger screen space, etc.

Sure I use a phone less than a laptop, but I absolutely need both.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Wordstar, Netscape, Myspace, Palm OS. These and many more were once considered "unbeatable".

Apple has great momentum right now. But if history teaches us anything, it's that nothing lasts for very long in tech, even if it feels like it will.

</comment><comment> jack-r-abbit I guess this is how we are different. I am an avid Android user (phone & tablet). I like my devices. They work for me. I think both the iPhone and the iPad are nice pieces of hardware. They are slick. They function well. They do about the same things that my devices do. Some things are better... somethings are not (they do lack a couple things I really enjoy about my devices). Unfortunately for Apple, they are the very reason I probably will never own one of those devices. But if the iPad is what works for you... awesome. Use it. Love it. I don't think we need an "iPad killer" or an "iPhone killer". It would be a very sad world if there truly was only one option for a phone or tablet (even if it was an Android based device). There is plenty of space for multiple players. It is just plain arrogant douche-baggery to go around with this "the iPad is all you will ever need so stop looking" attitude. The best tool is the one that works best for you. Funny thing is, that is not be the same tool for everybody. Do I care that the iPad may have 99.9999% of the market share of tablets today? Nope. Just because all those people decided the iPad was the best tool for them it is irrelevant to which tool is best for me. Perhaps down the road more people will start choosing something else. Maybe not. I still like my choice. I'm not going to tell you what device to use... so don't start telling me which one I should (unless you're just trying to be an arrogant douche wagon for the heck of it).

But hey... what do I know. I'm just some idiot that doesn't own an iPhad. _rolls eyes_

</comment><comment><USER19> Its funny. Apple sells 15M iPads per quarter, more than any PC manufacturer sells PCs. For comparision, they sell around 2M Macs in that timeframe. I know some people who own an iPad, i do so myself. But whenever i talk to them about it or look at myself i realize: almost noone really uses them.

Maybe thats a thing with techies, so we dont really have use for such a casual device but i use my iphone alot daily, like 10x more than my iPad.

<comment><USER20> I think it's the convenience of always having the iPhone on you.

The only time I reach for my iPad or Samsung Tab is when I want to read comics (thanks Comixology) or want to play a game.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Well the title is a bit of hyperbole, but Apple is in an unbelievably strong position right now.

I think key on the Android side is going to be value. They really need at $99-$250 price points.

On the Windows side, I think Microsoft is playing their cards right. They have virtually no apps but with Windows 8 they will have a storefront that will be installed on tens of millions of devices, which should solve the app problem over time.

</comment><comment><USER22> I'm not sure that the iPad is unbeatable (and in the long run what is, really), but in my opinion it is and will continue to be extremely successful for one main reason.

(Most) people don't want a computer.

They want something to give them access to shop online or to keep in touch with friends, to watch videos or to play games and at the moment the iPad provides the easiest, most hassle free way to achieve that.

No A-V, easy updates, no worries about drivers or compatibility and it's relatively cheap. It's also very easy to use.

As an anecdotal point I've recently introduced my mother who's in her sixties and father-in-law who's in his eighties to iPads and they've both been able to use them easily and without a lot of the questions and problems that technologists learn to dread when they're providing family IT support.

The iPad isn't likely to replace laptops or desktops for IT professionals any time soon, but I think that for a lot of people it does what they want in an easier more intuitive way.

</comment><comment><USER23> In the pure tablet space, iPad probably _is_ unbeatable for the foreseeable future, but I think a lot of people are underestimating Microsoft's potential to change the game with Windows 8.

As an early Asus Transformer TF101 adopter I'm totally sold on the idea of a tablet/laptop combo but as much as I like Android as a phone and basic tablet OS, I find myself wishing I could use the Transformer as a full-blown no- excuses laptop for development, etc (there are some sort-of-options there involving installing Ubuntu for ARM, but too much hassle to deal at this point and not well supported).

Enter Windows 8 and the eventual laptops that are either ARM tablets with Metro-only or full blown x86 laptops when the tablet/screen is docked. That is the device I want. To some degree I don't care if it is running Windows 8 or Android + Linux, or OS X + iOS, but I suspect Microsoft will have their solution polished up before anyone else since nobody else is making strong moves into this space right now.

</comment><comment><USER20> I'm not a fan of tablets at all but at least I can use my iPad with minimal frustration. I recently acquired a Samsung Tab 10.1 and its been a frustrating experience.

If I had to sum up my experiences with tablets: iPads: reliable, albeit boring Samsung Tab: kill it with fire.

The Samsung Tab just killed any enthusiasm I ever had for Android.

<comment><USER24> I'm curious to know what was so frustrating. I've had my tab for a few months and love it to death.

<comment><USER20> Yes, I'm puzzled by how many folks gave it a good review. The tab is slow, jerky slow when it comes to animation, sometimes freezing mid-transition. Most of my touch actions either don't register or are delayed. A lot of the time I can't open the camera because: 'media scanner is running'. I've given it a factory reset, removed all widgets and while performance improved slightly, it was short term.

I want to like it. I want to give it a chance but any extended use causes me to scream obscenities.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> The "post-PC" era will eliminate PCs like McDonalds eliminated kitchens.

</comment><comment><USER26> The iPod (5gb) started at $399, had an added model the following year (10gb) at $499, then started a slow downward price with adding new model types at the low end.

The iPad just did its first $100 drop by using the previous model (per iPhone strategy). I would expect that next year we will see another $100 drop either through the old model approach or introduction of a new member of the line.

It is really going to be hard for companies without Apple's supply change to keep up.

</comment><comment><USER27> Microsoft is the only company that can compete with Apple in the consumer software space. The difference between the iPad and the iPod is that a consumer tablet platform really plays into Microsoft's strengths as a platform company in a way the iPod and iTunes absolutely did not.

The traditional cell phone manufacturers will continue to use Android (or whatever) to sell mountains of cell phones like they have been doing for over a decade, but a tablet is a consumer software platform and after using Windows 8 it's painfully clear that only Microsoft and Apple really understand how to deliver such a platform.

It will be a two horse race.

The problem for Microsoft is that it will be Windows 8 v2 or v3 before is starts to match iOS feature for feature, and that's at least 2 years away. I may be on my 3rd iPad by then.

<comment><USER28> Why do you think it will be 2 years away? I would not be suprised if by the end of this year, just few weeks after of W8 release there will be tons of apps that will match what 90% of consumers need. There are already lots of developers building W8 apps and they will all be tablet ready if MS plays it right - and they would be completely dumb if it would not be ready when they already did such a huge leap with their W8 UI revamp for laptops/desktops.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> "Meanwhile Google, which makes all its money through ads, will find itself reaching its customers through a device made by a hostile rival."

So no change there, at least.

</comment><comment><USER30> The iPad is not quite a computer replacement. Most people are going to have an iPad and a desktop or laptop as their main computer.

The windows tablets will be a computer replacement because you'll be able to jump into desktop mode and keyboard and mouse around.

The problem microsoft is going to have is getting their tablets into a form factor/price point that is competitive with the iPad. It has to be just as fast, just as cheap, and just as small. Unless Microsoft starts selling their own tablets, I think the only company really capable of building an Apple quality product is Apple.

</comment><comment><USER31> I found the article right on the spot. It is unbeatable. For how long is the important question without an answer, so far.

</comment><comment><USER32> and the Titanic was unsinkable...

</comment><comment><USER33> Android on the tablet will be doomed to the Zune fate.

</comment><comment><USER34> This:

"Because Apple has used its plentiful cash to corner the market on key tablet components—like touch-screen displays—many competitors will find that the only way to make a tablet with comparable features but a lower price is to sell it at a loss. You can't do that unless you have some other way to make money, like a big digital media store."

That argument was used in regards to the iPhone as well. Apple's supposedly insurmountable component purchases would make it impossible for competitors to ... compete.

And there's Android, out activating the iPhone three to one. Apparently those Android phones are either made out of cardboard, or the manufacturers found components.

In reality, 2012 will be the year the iPad loses its market dominance in tablets. By the end of 2013, Apple will hold 1/4 to 1/3 of the market, which is exactly what their entire business model is designed around: lower market share, much higher margins.

<comment><USER35> But isn't it the case that the iPad is being manufactured much more cheaply than the competitors can (eg. the Xoom) because of Apple's manufacturing processes? Phones are a slightly different beast.

FWIW, I think it's Apple's game to lose. The iOS 5 today uses the exact same interface as the iOS we saw 5 years ago. _Eventually_ someone is going to iterate their software past Apple, and then we'll see whether Apple has the software vision to keep up (I'm thinking they don't).

<comment><USER34> You mean China's manufacturing processes.

Foxconn isn't going to hand Apple a permanent monopoly over efficient processes to the detriment of their domestic buddies. That's not how China works.

Every day that goes by, Apple's lead will erode in both quality of product and manufacturing advantage. It's not due to anything Apple will do wrong, it's due to how markets work, particularly in technology.

<comment><USER36> _You mean China's manufacturing processes. Foxconn isn't going to hand Apple a permanent monopoly over efficient processes to the detriment of their domestic buddies. That's not how China works._

For one, Foxconn is Taiwanese, not Chinese, it's just that it has factories in China.

Second, money is how China works. Where does the delusion comes that China will ...sabotage Apple in chinese factories in order for Chinese device makers to win?

As a matter of fact, China is opening to be Apple's largest market, with raving reception this past year.

<comment><USER37> Sabotage, no. Copy wholesale, sure.

<comment><USER38> > Sabotage, no. Copy wholesale, sure.

Tell me... how is "China" going to copy Apple's well-curated ecosystem of apps, content and accessories?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Well there's a pile of hubris a mile high.

</comment><comment><USER39> I think this is a suitable explanation for this 'article'.

From the authors profile page:

"Farhad Manjoo is Slate's technology columnist and the author of True Enough: Learning To Live in a Post-Fact Society."

Edit: I really feel that any person saying X is unbeatable, is really underestimating competition and the drive to improve what they make.

The iPad at this moment is the best tablet overall, but it won't be long before someone is able to match the quality, and surpass in features. I think what really will clinch this is that once Android tablets come out in force, there will be so many options the iPad will be lost in the noise. This isn't to say the iPad will be the only right choice in that situation, just that when there are options, especially cheaper options, people tend to shop for what suits their needs at a price they can stomach.

The iPad is still too much for most consumers. I myself cannot justify the cost for a consumption device, not to mention how I dislike Apple's handling of their app ecosystem.

<comment><USER40> Don't just dismiss it outright. If you have some insight and think the article is wrong then refute it with a meaningful, substantial argument.

<comment><USER41> A couple easy points:

They claim it can't be beat on price, but, due to the varying size and features of other tablets, that's simply not true (see Asus' MeMo 370T [http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-57393947-64/google-asus- to...](http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-57393947-64/google-asus-to-hook-up- on-7-inch-android-tablet-says-report/)).

They claim it can't be beat on battery life, but reviews have shown that the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Transformer Prime both come within a few percentage points of usable time. Certainly close enough for practical use.

<comment><USER8> Since when did "come within a few percentage points of it" and "beating it" become the same thing?

If the other tablets want to win, they have to be _better_. Either cheaper or more functional or more novel or better styled.

<comment><USER41> You're right, I stated the claim wrong. The correct claim is "None of Apple's rivals has managed to even match the iPad's battery life." On that count, they are, for practical purposes, incorrect. Additionally, Engadget's test have shown The Galaxy Tab 7.7 significantly besting the iPad 2 in battery life ([http://www.engadget.com/2012/02/07/samsung-galaxy- tab-7-7-re...](http://www.engadget.com/2012/02/07/samsung-galaxy- tab-7-7-review-international-edition/)).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Emergence of IP Norms and the Transformation of Stand-Up Comedy (2008) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.law.virginia.edu/pdf/faculty/hein/sprigman/94va_l_rev1787_2008.pdf

<comment><USER2> [https://www.boston.com/entertainment/2015/07/28/man- claims-c...](https://www.boston.com/entertainment/2015/07/28/man-claims-conan- brien-stole-tom-brady-caitlyn-jenner-jokes-off- twitter/8Vzbkk8rdDrH5Xs8igSIrJ/story.html)

So much for no lawsuits.</comment>


How to assign partial credit on an exam of true-false questions? - one-more-minute https://terrytao.wordpress.com/2016/06/01/how-to-assign-partial-credit-on-an-exam-of-true-false-questions/ <comment><AUTHOR> As one of the commenters points out, Tao has rediscovered the notion of a _proper scoring rule_ \-- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoring_rule#Proper_scoring_ru...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoring_rule#Proper_scoring_rules) \-- and the specific (rather nice, if you don't mind all the scores being negative and the infinite penalty when something happens that you said definitely wouldn't) _logarithmic scoring rule_ \-- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoring_rule#Logarithmic_scori...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoring_rule#Logarithmic_scoring_rule).

The Brier score -- you score minus the average squared error between your prediction and [1 for the right outcome, 0 for the others] -- is also a proper scoring rule (i.e., incentivizes you to report your probabilities accurately) and doesn't penalize maximally-wrong answers infinitely. For some purposes it's a better choice than the logarithmic score.

<comment><USER2> In the traditional formulation, the Brier score is 0 for correct guesses with p=1, 1 for incorrect guesses with p=1 and 0.25 for guesses with p=0.5: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brier_score#Example](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brier_score#Example)

When translated into a grading rule, this gives us a score range from -3 to +1, with 0 for uncertain guesses. So it's not as harsh as logarithmic scoring, but still penalizes confident wrong guesses more harshly than it rewards confident correct guesses.

<comment><USER3> Sounds interesting. The problem with logarithmic scoring is your penalized for picking actual percentages vs gaming the system.

EX: If your 99% sure of each question and there are 100 questions then getting 1 wrong gives the best points at 99%. But, randomly you can only add +1 point from 100 correct but randomly there is a long tail of missing several. Further, scores are not linearly valuable trading a lower max score but higher chance of getting an A is a positive result.

Ideally you should set things up so accurate estimates give the best results.

<comment><USER2> > Ideally you should set things up so accurate estimates give the best > results.

This is true for both the logarithmic score and the Brier score. These are both "strictly proper scoring rules", which is a formal way of stating your requirement that it should not be possible to game the system. In both cases, you get the highest score (on average) if you guess is true distribution.

<comment><USER3> The problem is if your X% sure on each of a set of questions and you want to get an A, you want to minimize your chances of getting a bad grade more than you want to maximizes your score. Alternatively, there is no point in setting your odds for every question below the point that takes the minimum number of correct answers to pass. EX: If you need to get X% correct to pass, then don't set your odds below X%.

For a similar example consider what you bet on the final question in Jeopardy does not just depend on your estimate of your odds, but other factors.

Of course even thinking about this stuff is distracting, you may be better off picking a very small number of odds. Say 99%, 90%, 70%, and 50%.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> There used to be a Decision Science class at Stanford, where this exact scheme was used. Students were warned all the time to never indicate 100% certainty on any question, because if you ever did that and turned out to be wrong, you would fail the entire course because of that one question: even if it happened to be a minor homework assignment. I always thought this was a great way to teach people the lesson that you should (almost) never claim 100% certainty in anything, and that you should view knowledge through a probabilistic perspective.

<comment><USER5> Unless you're arguing with someone that will take any missing confidence as sign that you're completely wrong.

<comment><USER6> >> "Unless you're arguing with someone that will take any missing confidence as sign that you're completely wrong."

This is 90% of people.

<comment><USER7> No. You have to stick to your guns that uncertainty is a valid disposition (maybe).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm working on something like this right now. We asked 8 trivia questions on a survey of users of our website, and had people assign probability estimates to the probability they got the answer right.

First of all it seems like everyone had exactly the same probability of getting any random question right. Some people got every question right, and some got none right. But in exactly the proportion you would expect by random chance - that some were just particularly lucky or unlucky.

The second is that probability estimates did not vary much based on questions gotten right. Everyone expected to get about 44% of questions right, regardless how many questions they actually got right. People who only got 1 right assigned the same probability as people who got 5 right.

Likewise people who estimated higher probabilities of getting more questions right, got the same amount of questions right. And a decent percent of people were underconfident too, and assigned probabilities too low (but got the same amount of questions right.)

Lastly, people are really uncalibrated. Some people are just bad at estimating probability. When they say "80% chance of something" they mean that thing will only happen 58% of the time. You can be trained, in a relatively short time, to become calibrated. By estimating probabilities and seeing how many you actually got right. But most people aren't trained, so it would be a bit unfair to put this on a real test.

</comment><comment><USER9> Could this be simplified by asking students what they think their score on the test will be and adjusting their final score based on how accurate that estimate was?

Overall it seems like the biggest flaws in this system are that

1: Scores still get mapped to discrete letter grades.

2: A student's goal is not to get the highest score possible, rather it is to ensure that he or she is most likely to get an "A".

For example:

Given a 10 question quiz, a student who knows (in truth) she is 80% likely to answer each question correctly, and who needs to achieve a score of 0.2 to pass. The student is led to believe that by accurately estimating her confidence for each question at 80% she is giving herself the biggest advantage. If she does this and she gets 4 of the questions wrong her final score will be -1.219 and she will fail. However, if she had instead underestimated her confidence and given each question a confidence of 0.6 her final score would instead have been 0.290 and she would have passed. She could of course go even further and determine the likelihood of her getting N questions wrong and use that to determine the optimal confidence level to select which will maximize her expected score while ensuring that she is most likely to pass the class.

<comment><USER9> [http://pastebin.com/zahgmVnk](http://pastebin.com/zahgmVnk)

[http://octave-online.net/](http://octave-online.net/)

I put sample code in a pastebin and a link to octave-online if you want to verify how I'm thinking about this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I suppose if you combine this approach with the theory that nothing is 100% certain you end up with a test that is impossible to get 100% on (which I guess makes perfect sense as nothing is 100% certain). But back to reality, if you set students tests where a 100% confident answer being wrong instantly meant they fail, it feels like you are no longer testing the student on the subject matter in question and instead are testing their ability to play the probability meta-test game.

The task itself of working out how 'confident' you feel about an answer also feels like an impossible task (almost like a non-technical project manager asking a developer how long a task will take). I guess it would be fun to see the results of tests taken using this approach and then compare the scores with the new system, the old system and ultimately what they get as their final grade in the subject.

</comment><comment><USER11> Fantastic and frankly hilarious scheme he has developed here. My favorite part is that if you state your absolute certainty in true or false and turn out to be wrong, your score is negative infinity. Only in a math class would I expect a score of negative infinity I suppose.

<comment><USER12> That weirdness is kinda just a consequence of wanting the scores for different questions to be added together. A simpler (to me) but equivalent way to frame it is to use scores that you multiply together. These scores are "the probability of the true answer occur, assuming the students odds."

That is, if the student gave a probability of 1 and were correct, their score for that question is 1. If they were wrong, they get a score of zero.

The interpretation of their final score his interpreted simillarly as a joint probability, assuming independent trials.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The SAT used to have a wrong answer penalty to discourage random guessing. This seems to me a simple, effective way to reflect a student's certainty in an answer.

<comment><USER14> Funny thing is the weights they assigned didn't discourage random guessing at all; they merely made your expected gain from guessing equal with the expected gain from not answering (i.e. zero).

So even if you had the very slightest idea, you should absolutely guess. If you took the test multiple times, then probabilistically you'd be _better_ off if you always guessed even when you had no clue: some of your scores would be higher and some would be lower than if you hadn't guessed, and usually only your highest score is considered. Most guides overemphasized the penalty.

That said, it can screw you of course too if you happen to be unlucky in your guessing. This is what Terry's scheme overcomes.

<comment><USER15> Terry's scheme punishes well educated people who are conservative in their claims of confidence

<comment><USER16> Why should being conservative in your confidence be rewarded above having an accurate assessment of your confidence?

<comment><USER17> In the case of an exam, students are under stress and pressure that will often lead them to underestimate themselves, especially knowing that if they're wrong that 100% probability will net them a -infinity score for the exam, even if they get everything else right.

This also means questions have to be _very_ carefully worded. I recall a number of exam questions (over many years of school, not one class in particular) where the "wrong" answers were arguably right depending on how the sentence was parsed just based on poor use of punctuation or other ambiguous wording.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Here's a totally different idea: lets assume that the true-false questions are on a related topic. We can give partial credit if wrong answers are _consistent_ with each other: that is, if there is some (simple) model of the topic we're asking about that is close to the correct model and produces those particular wrong results.

Intuitively, if there are a bunch of questions about the same "feature" and you get them _all_ wrong, all those mistakes stem from the same misunderstanding. I guess in a well-written test where questions are conceptually spaced out this is not as much of an issue...

So to give partial credit, we try to find a simple model consistent with the T/F answers and award credit based on how wrong the model is.

In particular, this would catch the problem where you have a single misunderstanding that cascades into a whole bunch of wrong answers even if you actually understood the rest of the system fine. That's one of the main uses for partial credit in longhand answers, isn't it?

How would we do this systematically? Well, we can't, really. But there are places where we could. I worked with a professor who did research in program synthesis, and I remember he had an interesting idea for education: when a student submits an incorrect program in, say, Scheme, we could try to synthesize an interpreter _that would make the program correct_ and then extract what the students misunderstanding was. (For example: they used dynamic scoping instead of static scoping.) If you seeded your synthesis system with the various kinds of things students actually get wrong, this could be both useful and practical.

You can apply the same idea to grading a test about Scheme. Award partial credit if somebody has a consistent mental model that just happens to be wrong. If they got a whole bunch of questions wrong just because they mixed up scoping rules—but understood everything else—partial credit seems fair.

I guess this is pretty explicitly rewarding _consistency_ with partial credit, but that also seems fair in a lot of classes like CS.

To be clear, I don't actually think this approach is really practical: it's more of a thought experiment on what could be _interesting_. Even if it was possible, doing it on T/F questions would likely require _a lot_ of questions since each one only provides one bit of input. If you had questions along the lines of "what does this Scheme program produce", you could get away with significantly fewer if you were clever about choosing them—but you'd still want some redundancy to be at least a bit robust to the student making typos _as well_ as conceptual mistakes.

</comment><comment><USER19> Interesting derivation, but why not Receiver Operator Characteristics(ROC)? In recognition memory research we often collect confidence ratings on a 6-point scale for yes/no decisions, for example, and plot ROC curves, and calculate d' discrimination scores.

<comment><USER19> [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Receiver_operating_character...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Receiver_operating_characteristic)

Or am I missing something.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Nitpick: His name is Terence not Terrance.

<comment><USER7> Both spellings are equivalent modulo permutation.

<comment><USER21> I understand the attempt at humor but can not help but point out that the two names are not permutations of eachother.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> There is nothing in that method that accounts for the possibility that the test may be flawed in some way. I suppose that the assumption here is that the test is 'perfect' in that each question is worded in such a way that there is one and only one 'right' answer. But, as a taker of this kind of true/false test, if I am only allowed to provide my assessment of my own confidence in my answer without an explanation of "why" I assigned that value, then there's no way to answer in a way that I will not be penalized for a question that I don't feel that I can answer as asked.

Consider assigning an additional value of '1' to each question initially as a representation of the author's confidence that the question is not flawed in any way. Then, if a significant segment of the test taking population indicates that they believe that the question is flawed in some way, then, the "author's confidence" for that question would be reduced by an amount that wouldn't penalize me for identifying that flaw while still allowing for less 'partial credit' to those who answer incorrectly without being aware of the flaw, or more specifically, not giving as much credit to those who answered 'correctly' in spite of the flaw.

It's also possible that the question I think is a 'flaw' is really a 'trick' question and that in order to answer 'correctly' you must discover the trick -- this would still allow for a better result in that it more accurately assesses whether I really understand the question or not.

It also occurs to me that if the test administrator wants to give a test where they can assign some manner of partial credit to an answer, then they shouldn't give a true/false test in the first place.

</comment><comment><USER23> I don't think his scheme buys anything. Any pointing system in which a wrong answer has more weigh than a right answer will siply incensitive student to aim for the fair confidence level, the one that gives -1 for a bad answer. You need so few 'bad confidence' result to completely wreck your overall score that it is not worth it.

The main flaw of the scheme is that it is a purely mathematical analysis. Answers are not based solely on confidence but often relies of reading comprehension skills. (Even at the pure mathematical level. For example missing a square factor and a minus sign.) So you can have 100% confident incorrect answer just because you mis-read or mis-interpreted the question. Then you get punished hard. Given one's incapcity of self introspection and detection of such mis-reading, and the harsh punishment for such undetectable failure on the part of the student, his scheme is wrong headed.

<comment><USER24> I imagine the first test or two would be a period of the students learning to understand the system, but after that it's perfectly fair. It's a good lesson in "You aren't 100% sure of anything, so don't claim you are".

<comment><USER15> Why fail a student for making one specific mistake once?

<comment><USER25> Because that will make him more focused on correctly approaching problems instead of rushing for solution without checking immediate work.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> The authors calls out: [Important note: here we are not using the term "confidence" in the technical sense used in statistics, but rather as an informal term for "subjective probability".]

But then goes on to use a very technical, statistical version of confidence where 0% confidence is somehow equal to 100% confidence you picked the wrong answer.

All of this leads me to assert that despite the math being internally consistent, it does not apply well to the situation. A rational outside observer without reading such an article would assume that 0% confidence in your answer is equal to a 50% chance of being right.

The phrase "confidence that the answer is 'true'" can easily be interpreted as "confidence that the answer I marked is correct".

<comment><USER27> It is confidence that the answer is true. 100% being fully sure the answer is true. 0% being fully sure the answer is false. 50% should be used for both true and false have the same probability.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> This moves the problem to a quiz of introspection, not a quiz of the material

<comment><USER28> There's a pretty solid case to be made that introspection is missing from a lot of pedagogy anyway, so this isn't necessarily bad. I can see this being useful in many places - when testing on bits of interrelated knowledge, having a confidence score on the test may help people learn to puzzle out information and synthesize conclusions. Both of those skills are more valuable to the student than the ability to dump random facts - we have google for that these days.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> That was beautiful. It's been a long time since I've read anything derived as elegantly and clearly described as that. Got any more?

</comment><comment><USER14> But a possibility of negative infinity begs the question: how certain is the _professor_ of the answer?

</comment><comment><USER30> A comment on the reddit discussion of this said that a similar scheme was used at CMU for midterm and final exams in the "Decision Systems and Decision Support Analysis" class offered by the decision theory department. The exams were multiple choice with four choices per question. The commentator linked to this handout describing the grading for the midterm: [http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/%7Esbaugh/midterm_grading_...](http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/%7Esbaugh/midterm_grading_function.pdf)

If you assigned probability p to the correct choice, your score for that question was 1 + ln(p)/ln(4). You were not allowed to assign a probability of 0 or 1 to a choice.

The handout points out the importance of thinking about how to approach these tests ahead of time, and also explains the benefits of using this scoring system:

\---- begin quote ----

I cannot stress strongly enough the need for each of you to sit down and think about different strategies for answering the questions. This grading technique completely removes any benefit of random guessing. Such a guess could be disastrous. You're much better off admitting that you don't know the answer to a question. (Placing a 0.25 probability by every option indicates that you have no idea which answer is correct, and your score will be 0 for that question). Assessments of probability 0 (0%) or 1 (100%) are not allowed. These answers will be interpreted as probability 0.001 (0.1%) and 0.997 (99.7%) respectively. Your probability assessments must sum to 1 (100%). A probability of 0.001 by the correct answer will result in a score of -4. In contrast, a probability of 0.997 on the correct answer only earns a score of 1. Think about the implications of this before the day of the test.

I strongly recommend that you analyze the grading problem from a decision analysis perspective. Calculate expected values (or expected utilities) for various levels of personal uncertainty. Notice what happens if you are overconfident or underconfident.

This grading scheme makes the midterm harder then a standard multiple choice test, but this is the point. It has many benefits from a teaching/learning perspective.

1) It teaches you to apply the techniques that have been discussed in class. You have to assess your own personal probabilities and apply them to problems that have very real (and potentially) important payoffs. It is impossible to get these points across with the few simple lotteries demonstrated during class.

2) It helps to removes the element of chance from the test. Because of the severe penalty for guessing, the test will more accurately measure your knowledge.

3) The test will also measure what you know about your knowledge.

4) By analyzing how you answer the questions, I will be able to determine which questions are hard and which questions you believe are hard. (A "flatter" distribution for a question indicates a lower confidence in the question, and therefore, a belief that it is hard.)

5) It will allow you to appreciate how hard it is to assess probabilities.

\---- end quote ----

</comment><comment><USER31> Interestingly, another way of looking at this result is that the score is a measure of the total information content of the respondent's answers.

</comment><comment><USER32> Sorry to be negative, but this sounds like a solution to make something which is horribly broken a teeny bit less horribly broken.

<comment><USER33> I think it's a little extreme to say that the current popular way of quickly assessing large numbers students is "horribly broken", but I think the most interesting part of this has nothing to do with student assessment and more to do with forcing the student to think about how well they know things.

A quiz can be a teaching tool as well as an assessment tool. It's often poorly designed for the first function, but that doesn't mean it has to be.</comment></comment>


Beautiful Finnish Web Magazine - <AUTHOR> http://www.raymond.fi/

<comment><USER2> Great visual effect, great typesetting, very inspiring layout.. but is that guy really smoking a cigarette _at_ the gas pump? I can't believe that's legal there..</comment>


20n (YC W15) Uses Software To Engineer Microbes For Chemical-Making - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2015/02/26/20n/ <comment><AUTHOR> Founder here; working on software that exploits the full potential of engineered microbes; we're using them to make therapeutics, plastics, materials, etc. happy to answer any questions.

<comment><USER2> this sounds amazing! aside from the organics-only requirement (which makes sense to me), what other limitations are there on what you can make? or is everything basically open given a long enough search?

<comment><AUTHOR> Many limitations! Constructing the designs (i.e., going from data->dna->cells) takes time and is expensive: we pay vendors for the construction. So we have to restrict our software to output designs that yield the most novel products, with the least change to the biology of the microbe.

Most of the time changes do nothing! But if our models are accurate enough, the engineering can be predictable. We are continuously improving our models -- from more data mining, and from feedback from experiments.

That said, what our algorithm predicts right now is still a huge space (5000-10000 products). That is the tree image in the article. For context, the chemical industry centers around 70,000 products.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Really cool. Question: Assuming that your algorithms will become known or can be replicated, how do you think about your defensibility? What is proprietary here that improves via network effects? How does the licensing model work and what are some comparable (old school/current) companies?

<comment><AUTHOR> Defensibility for us: microbes we build, and the platform they form. Our software-driven engineering is significantly faster than the state-of-the-art: human's looking at metabolic maps. People will start building on top of our initial microbes and improving them. These initial microbes form the "platform" from which to enable more bioproduction apps.

<comment><USER4> > Defensibility: .... People will start building on top of our initial > microbes and improving them. These initial microbes form the "platform" from > which to enable more bioproduction apps.

That's not a very fair answer. I have often said pretty much that and was laughed out of the room. Granted, maybe it's all in the delivery.

Microbes can be easy to culture and store, so that doesn't really count as defensibility... and the software can't either, because nobody these days is really struggling to run algorithms over regulatory networks or KEGG or whatever...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There is already a lot of competition here (which is not necessarily a bad thing)...will be interested to see how 20n can differentiate and or add value upon what already exists.

[http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v10/n3/fig_tab/nrmicro...](http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v10/n3/fig_tab/nrmicro2717_T1.html) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25080239](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25080239) [http://www.biomedcentral.com/1752-0509/5/122](http://www.biomedcentral.com/1752-0509/5/122) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24642060](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24642060)

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed! We love this community [1]. We started 20n with DARPA's help, in part to gather more steam around the accuracy of software predictions tools within synthetic biology. You seem to have worked on these tools, and so must know the pain of convincing wet-lab scientists to follow up on the sw predictions.

Paracetamol, both for academics and to pharma, was a non-biosynthesizable molecule. But once we had the prediction, we were able to go to the lab to construct the microbe pretty easily.

In the end, the tool is the start of the process. We are investing significant resources in constructing the microbes. Over the coarse of the next two year, hopefully you will find some novel molecules in the ones we move to bioproduction.

[1] Have to! We are part of it. :) We know most of them, and they probably know us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Cool! I almost went into a lab studying polyketide synthase enzymes. How heavily do they feature in your pathways? Is their modularity overstated/understated?

(I fully intend to stalk you on google scholar after I get back to the things I really ought to be working on right now...)

<comment><AUTHOR> Hah! Oh PKS-es! Megasynthases (PKS, NRPS, FAS) do not currently feature very heavily in our algorithms, but their modeling is certainly within our intended algorithmic expansion plans. As for whether they are understated/overstated, my cofounder can sit you down for hours and speak about them, but you have probably moved on!

ps: Googling me will lead you to program synthesis: programs that program programs :) which is another curiosity that you may or may not want to dive into. You will find a lot more biology from my cofounder. google scholar: chris anderson synthetic biology.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Question: could these be tailored for end-users? So instead a prescription a patient could be sent home with a jar of pickles that synthesized their medication as they fermented? I could see that disrupting the pharmaceutical industry (if dosage could be controlled).

</comment><comment><USER8> This is really interesting - this field is new to me, but is there existing research available that shows that this works for large scale chemical production or will this be something that you'll be working on inventing?

<comment><AUTHOR> Optimizing for large scale production is indeed what most of the field works on. There have been many success stories: an anti-malarial drug through yeast (Artemisinin by Amyris+Sanofi), a plastic precursor through bacteria (1,4-BDO by Genomatica+DuPont), and more.

What they are missing is the whole spectrum of what could be made biologically. We will create microbes for the most valuable chemicals and then partner with existing optimization companies that have industrial fermenters running. Think beer fermentation, just instead of the alcohol yeast, you use our yeast.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Really interesting, but the article doesn't explain why someone would want to grow chemicals using microbes instead of synthesizing them through chemistry. Is it cheaper?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes. When going after non-trivial chemicals the economics work out, and is cheaper when scaled up. The process essentially repurposes beer fermentation. The usual benefits of biological production: carbon-negative, and not using any toxic catalysts or producing waste products hold as well. Consider the molecule, paracetamol/acetaminophen/Tylenol [1], that we created a microbe for: The US alone produces 35000+ tonnes of it, all currently coming from petro-routes. It would be nicer to get it the same way we get beer, if we could.

There might be additional market forces that make a microbial fermentation attractive: e.g., in the case of the anti-malarial drug artemisinin, fluctuation in supply of the plant Artemisia annua, the price of the drug varied between $120-$1200/kg, and Amyris and Sanofi moved it to yeast based production for creating a steady supply [2]. That route was critical for the supply of the drug to African countries.

For many of the requests we get, chemical synthesis is not economically feasible to take the chemical to market, and bioproduction might be the only route. The fact that we suggest routes that work well for the planet is a good side-effect. :)

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracetamol#Synthesis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracetamol#Synthesis)

[2] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemisinin#Synthesis_in_engine...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemisinin#Synthesis_in_engineered_organisms)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> are you hiring? and what for?

<comment><AUTHOR> Tech people. Ideally, somebody with algorithms chops, but one who doesn't get scared by biology or chemistry.

<comment><USER10> How do we apply?

<comment><AUTHOR> email me: firstname.lastname@example.com</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Provenance whitepaper – 7 mins read version - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@provenancehq/building-brands-to-trust-with-the-blockchain-227436fbe40#.a2aegf4ty <comment><AUTHOR> Discover how Provenance are using the Ethereum blockchain to track products and their key attributes, e.g. organic, through global supply chains.</comment>


Where's The Octopus? (2011) [video] - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencefriday.com/video/08/05/2011/where-s-the-octopus.html

<comment><USER2> Growing up in a remote Australia desert beach, I spent a lot of time playing with creatures like this (among many others) and I have come to love them with a great deal of passion.

If you're ever in a situation where you want to play with an octopus, but are having a hard time getting its attention, remember this trick: take a gold coin out of your pocket, shine it in the sun, and use it to the lure the octopus into your domain. I've yet to meet an octopus I can't convince to play with me for a while, for the cost of an Australian gold coin or two.

Another thing that I love about these creatures is that they are intensely playful. I once watched an octopus playing with the sandfish around his hole .. he dangled an old crayfish head, long since hollowed out, at the end of a long string-like tentacle, luring the stupid little fish into his lair .. I watched him for hours, just lazily casting it out, bringing it back .. it didn't seem like he was fishing (although he'd have been quite capable of it) but more like just entertaining himself by watching the stupid little fish fall for the trick, over and over again ..

Lovely creatures. Be nice to them, you might make a reef friend. (Watch out for the blue-rings, though, you don't want to play with them too much, heh heh..)

</comment><comment><USER3> While the video is amazing, the fact that statistical computer vision techniques aren't fooled in the least is astounding. It's not a purely visual trick, so much as a psychovisual one. Kind of like lossy compression of the surroundings.

<comment><USER4> The evolutionary pressure of "avoid being eaten" is enforced via the visual circuits of their predators, so it makes a certain amount of sense.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> The narrator says that octopuses are colorblind and also says they use sight alone to camouflage based on their surroundings. How is one to reconcile these claims with the fact that the octopuses clearly take on the color of their surroundings when they camouflage?

<comment><USER5> There's a 3-video lecture on camouflage by Roger Hanlon (who took that video). The part about color-blindness is in part 2, here[1].

[1] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtIiSXRv5no&t=33m23s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtIiSXRv5no&t=33m23s)

<comment><USER6> Thanks, that is a super interesting talk! He posits one mechanism for how the octopus might be able to colour-match while being colour-blind, which is the presence of distributed light sensing pigments in the skin - a molecule for this, "opsin", can be found in the skin of cuttlefish and squid (and maybe octopi too, he didn't say).

He says that although the pigment they have found for light-sensing is the same one they have found in the eye, and thus only indicates that the skin may be able to "see" a single colour (i.e. is also colour-blind), the research suggests that other pigments may exist, or that some other mechanism like refraction of nearby chromatophores (pigmented and/or light-reflecting cells) may allow those pigments to detect more than just a single colour.

When I was first trying to imagine how a colour-blind octopus could colour- match itself to its surroundings, one thought I had was how a deaf person can sense sound via felt vibrations. Based on the frequency of the vibration, pitch can be inferred. In a way, that is sort of similar to what he suggests is happening with the light-sensing pigments in the skin - the information the organism requires is fed to it via its skin rather than the organs typically used for this task, the eyes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wow, that old clip. I seem to recall that floating around the Internet even before the time of YouTube. Nice to finally see it in a decent resolution, though! ☺

<comment><USER8> Yes, but why on HN?

<comment><USER9> > On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes > more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the > answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.

<comment><USER10> I'm a hacker and rage comics gratify my intellectual curiosity. Now what? Pyrocat is right, deal with it. This kind of stuff has no place on HN.

<comment><USER9> Just out of interest, what stuff does have a place on HN? And why, specifically, should this not be on HN?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The way the skin works is fascinating. I wonder if there's any potential for designing a display that works in a similar fashion :)

</comment><comment><USER12> This is the video that put TED talks on the map

<comment><USER13> That talk [http://www.ted.com/talks/david_gallo_shows_underwater_astoni...](http://www.ted.com/talks/david_gallo_shows_underwater_astonishments.html)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Moving from Senior Manager to Remote IC - <AUTHOR> Due to some health issues of my spouse, we have decided to move from the Bay Area back to the Chicago suburbs to be closer to extended family. I work at a FANG company which occasionally allows IC equivalent of manager and above to work remotely if there extenutating circumstances. I am considering talking with my director or VP about transitioning back to an individual contributor role, as it would be great to keep a high salary in a lower cost of living area, and not have to start my domain knowledge and relationships over again at another company. I'm assuming this would more or less kill my upward progression within this company which I'm not overly worried about, I am just not sure if the logistics makes sense, or if this is something typically tried and done successfully. I would be interested to know if anyone else has tried this and whether or not they've been successful <comment><USER2> With regards to negotiation, I know a friend who did this at a normal (not FANG) company and not transitioning from manager to IC. However, I tell this anecdote since you seem wary of your negotiating power. He was moving cross- country for family reasons. He said that the key to getting full remote approved was approaching his boss like "I'm moving out of state. I'd like to continue working here." However, the important thing to note is he stated that the move was a done deal _and_ implied that he was willing to walk away from this company and find a new job if he had to. You have to go all-in. Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER3> Are there no management jobs in the new area? I'm not sure what the IC version of senior manager is, but remote management almost never works out.

</comment><comment><USER4> "IC equivalent of manager and above"

Managers are not IC's.

"keep a high salary in a lower cost of living area"

Most companies will offer you a lower salary, especially if you tell them that it's a lower cost area.

Sounds like you need to find out the specifics of your company. I can't see how general advice will help you.

It is generally accepted on HN that the easiest tactic to get remote work is to start on-premise and move later though. So your plan makes sense, generally speaking.

<comment><USER5> Honestly, even if you're a mediocre negotiator one should be quite capable of maintaining at least an IC's Bay Area salary while going remote.

The possibility of quitting if you already have extensive relations with the company is unlikely to be appealing.

Good talent is global nowadays and the arguments about cost of living are pretty much worthless if you've demonstrated sufficient value.

In the very worst of cases, OP should negotiate increased vacation time if you're going to accept a lower salary, given that it may align with OPs personal interests in this case.</comment></comment>


TSA responds to blogger who rendered $1B of nude body scanners useless - <AUTHOR> http://www.bgr.com/2012/03/08/blogger-shows-the-world-how-to-sneak-anything-past-tsas-nude-body-scanners-video/

<comment><USER2> I'd hardly call that a response... What's that quote about if your job depends on not understanding something, there's no way in a million years you are going to understand it?

<comment><USER3> It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it. \-- Upton Sinclair <http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/23510.Upton_Sinclair>

</comment></comment><comment> jack-r-abbit Making the title in HN different than the actual article title is misleading. One could argue that it is link baiting. I've watch that dudes video. If the article's real title had been presented on HN, I would not have clicked it since I didn't need to see it again. I don't think the TSA's "response" in the article is even a response and certainly not worthy of a headline... I imagine if it was headline worthy, BGR would have used THAT in their title. Shame.

</comment><comment><USER4> _While speaking with Digital Trends, a TSA spokeswoman called the video "a crude attempt to allegedly show how to circumvent TSA screening procedures." She continued, "TSA conducts extensive testing of all screening technologies in the laboratory and at airports prior to rolling them out the field. Imaging technology has caught many items large and small, and is one of the most effective tools available to detect metallic and non-metallic items, such as the greatest threat to aviation, explosives."_

...so, they respond by saying nothing of substance.

</comment><comment><USER5> Yeah, that's not a TSA response; just a canned one liner from a PR droid. The only real content there is the video which has already been discussed to death here on HN[1].

1: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3673462>

</comment><comment><USER6> They didn't respond to anything and it was a single sentence of fluff.</comment>