Planning and Managing Layoffs - <AUTHOR> https://a16z.com/2020/03/31/planning-and-managing-layoffs/ <comment><USER4> These posts bring me to the realization that you should never go above and beyond for a company that you don't own. Just show up, do the bare minimum to meet expectations, finish your 8 hour shift and go home and enjoy quality time with your family. This way when you get laid-off there is nothing to cry for. You can always find an occupation, but you cannot get back the time that you dedicated to fulfill someone else's dreams.

<comment><USER5> That's true if you don't need recommendations from the people you're working with to get your next job, if you don't want to get promotions (which help you get better jobs down the road!), and if you are content to spend 40 hours a week from now until you retire just coasting through life.

I think a better way to look at it is -- don't be loyal to something that can't be loyal to you. But you can and should let yourself care about the work you're doing and the individuals you're working with. That way, if you do end up leaving when you don't want to, you have accomplishments and a network of people who know what you're capable of. And up until then, you can take pride in what you're doing and feel good about how you're treating the people you're doing it with.

<comment><USER6> > for a company that you don't own

I think you're missing the key part here. Most tech workers do have some ownership in the companies which muddies the calculus a little bit. But if you don't have a stake in the company you are literally trading time for money. Work more time for the same money and you're just under-pricing your labor by an equivalent amount.

Also, if you need to work overtime to get good recommendations and promotions that is not a company you want to spend your time at.

Also also, if you need to work overtime to care about the work you're doing then you should re-examine your value system.

<comment><USER7> > Most tech workers do have some ownership in the companies which muddies the > calculus a little bit.

Maybe nitpicking, but I don't think this is true at all. Lots of tech workers do, sure, but I doubt it's anywhere even close to half of them.

<comment><USER8> I wouldn't even consider common stock options as a form of ownership. You are basically last in line to get any sort of compensation after an exit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> As someone who was lucky enough to graduate right into the last recession, I highly empathize with the class of 2020, it is going to be rough for everyone, but especially them. Over a decade later, and only recently have I felt like I was finding my footing career-wise. And now we're all in for another ride.

I barely managed to land a job after graduating, made almost no money, got laid off, and the company collapsed shortly thereafter anyway. One thing missing from this article is that often times these layoffs don't happen in a vacuum — Even I, a fresh grad, knew my employer was in trouble — and that a layoff would be coming, which helped blunt the news when the actual layoff happened. This was only possible because my previous employer was transparent about the situation, and I was already pretty deep into my job search by the time the layoff happened. To this day I am appreciative about that, even if the end result was the same, and it took me a few months to land a great gig after that.

Graduating into a recession + getting laid off so early in my career has irreversibly changed my risk profile, and I refuse to work with a company that isn't transparent about its going concern.

<comment><USER10> Kids that Graduated in 2001-2003 feel the same.... those year sucked. I was a summer intern in 2002, and saw half of my group get laid off. As an intern I was cheap enough to keep around, until the economy improved in late 2003, when I got a full time offer....

2004-2007 were good, then bamn another recession... then this....

The way money interests/lobbyist are running the economy and country, It is almost given that every 10 years there will be a major recession. While this time it was a virus triggering it, the economy has been over-heated for a while, and the crazy thing is that the government was running crazy deficits in a hot economy, instead of saving for the long term. (i.e. the feds and the goverment, have been 'juicing up' the economy for short term re-election goals).

<comment><USER11> To the latter criticism, this has nothing to do with governments pumping up stocks.

It's a pandemic that could put a third of workers out of jobs because everything is shutting down and the economy is coming to a halt. It's not like 2008 when complex financial products f—ed it all up.

(Yes there are still bad policies, yes there is corruption, yes, yes etc etc etc but the point is that this isn't "part of the boom and bust cycle.")

<comment><USER12> We could have been like Taiwan and Japan. Seems like a mask mandate and diligent testing with quarantine of infected only is sufficient. Would have saved a lot of headache. And lives.

<comment><USER13> I heard the opposite about Japan. Are they really doing exhaustive testing?

<comment><USER12> It's hard to know which sources to believe these days.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Seems odd... To be honest I'm from Belgium and like how layoffs are handled in my country. There is a rulebook with actual legislation behind it. I like that because it is easy to know for both parties what the expectations are. Mostly you know exactly your severance pay as there are fixed rules for that in your contract. If there are mass layoffs it will trigger other rules.

Can't understand the American Freedom thing. So the freedon to chose to be an asshole employer is actually an option there :D

<comment><USER15> Expectations are handled when you sign employment contract. You are free to negotiate anything. I live in EU country with similar laws and still employees/employers negotiate additional things which are are not written in the contract (because law forbids it). American freedom - its hard to imagine somebody complaining because the person has more individual choices

<comment><USER16> While I agree in principle and wish more freedom in Europe, actually even more freedom in the US as well, it's in practice that it fails, especially in certain countries, and always in defavor of the workers.

When the capital holders manage to unbalance the relationship with the workers, after failing to rebalance it, politics come into play and rules get voted to protect the workers from certain abuse. I wouldn't say it works well but it limits certain practices that would put the workers in serious troubles.

In certain places, we've seen workers working over 60h per week, and not getting compensated enough to meet the ends. So you may say those workers should educate themselves and negociate better, but again it doesn't always work in practice.

<comment><USER17> > educate themselves and negociate better, but again it doesn't always work in > practice.

I can't believe this is even a debate topic. How do you expect an engineer to compete with a lawyer who has studied it for years and has been practicing it for a while.

<comment><USER18> You don't need to be a legal expert to negotiate with your boss if you're an undercompensated employee...

<comment><USER17> 1\. Lawyers are not just about legality, they are trained negotiators and thinking in contract laws.

2\. The manager potentially has/can get negotiation training, you have to pay out of your own pocket for yours.

3\. The power dynamic is usually not in your favor, as long as unemployment is above zero in your specific field, it can never be in your favor.

<comment><USER18> Where do you work where all of management consists of lawyers? Even HR usually only keeps lawyers on retainer.

The rest shouldn't really be that difficult if you're a competent person. I don't need training to show some combination of

1\. I've been productive based on X and Y projects

2\. I've saved/generated $X

3\. I'm undervalued based on these x salaries or this average value from $reputable_website

People treat negotiation like some kind of black magic. If your boss isn't a total asshole it isn't hard to make a case.

<comment><USER17> Only the first point was about lawyers. The points you mentioned are coming from a place of privilege. If it was this easy everyone would have done it. I can say all this and my employer can say "ok go work for them" and then I have to uproot all my life because my visa is tied to my work. This is just one example, and I am not going to give any more because I don't think your are writing in good faith. You are not paying any attention to what life situations are or potential power dynamics.

<comment><USER18> > The points you mentioned are coming from a place of privilege

The fact that I disagree with you is not evidence of "bad faith." But since you bring up privilege, I think you're just making poor excuses. Your Visa situation does not represent the majority and dismissing every successful negotiation as "privileged" just breeds learned helplessness.

If you have authorization to work in the country you live in and you can demonstrate that you're being underpaid, the onus is on you to approach your boss and make a case. You can always start looking for another job if they politely refuse. Or start looking first and come back with offers. This doesn't require any magical privilege.

I'm also mildly offended that you believe yourself familiar with my situation. "Privilege" is turning into a racist and/or sexist slur. It's a blanket term used to excuse failure and breeds complacency when people hide behind it. There was no need to make this argument personal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Most of this is good advice, but I'd disagree with declaring "Today is your last day."

I've been on both sides of the layoff conversation, and usually there are some loose ends relating to work-in-progress that can be tidied up with dignity if everyone has a couple days to do it. We're talking about reworking next week's client meeting, or sorting out some team/project responsibilities that ought to be handed off cleanly, or whatever.

Assuming that there's trust in both directions, too, it's decent to give laid- off employees a couple days to retrieve or delete personal information that's relevant to their life going forward. A work emailed picture of grandma's birthday party. That sort of thing.

The person you lay off today is likely to stay in the industry, and to mingle in the future with people that might be important to your future success. Take a moment to think how you want to manage that relationship. Tossing her/him out the door that day is one approach. But it carries a price.

A favorite example from finance. The guys who founded Kohlberg Kravis Roberts were thrown out of Bear Stearns quite summarily in 1976. They built quite a mighty firm in KKR and did not do a penny of business with Bear Stearns for many years.

KKR is still around and doing fine. Bear Stearns went bust in 2008. That single example isn't cause and effect. But it's a marker.

<comment><USER20> Yep. I'm not sure you read the whole thing, as I cover the grandma birthday example. Sentiment-wise we agree, tactically it's still not the best practice. I know it sounds like it is.

It really depends on the maturity of the workforce and leadership, as I mention. For a lot of startups, that's in short supply and just saying today is the last day of work is easiest. It shouldn't have the feeling tossing them out. It can be end of day, folks (not boss) can arrange a meet up at a bar nearby, etc. I've seen it go sideways on both sides before when it's too ambiguous for people or drawn way out, especially for junior folks in IC roles. The right thing really is just let them go, pay them as much as you can, and let them start figuring out what's next.

If it were me, chances are I would not make the day of notification their last day unless they wanted it to be (most would I bet) but I also know what I'm doing. :-)

<comment><USER19> Thanks for the very thoughtful reply. I like your option of semi-offering a couple days grace period but also letting the departing employee say: "Nope, I'm out of here."

From the employee side, there's a primal desire to control something about this unexpected and unwelcome process. Moving the last-day slider a day or two in either direction might hit the spot.

<comment><USER20> One of the hardest things about this process for a sensitive and compassionate leader is knowing when to not try and "make it better."

This is probably the greatest video clip on the subject of all time: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTjhHrcyiQI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTjhHrcyiQI)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> One more thing to consider as you _plan_ the layoffs: You may be eligible for one (or more) of the loans from the latest relief bill. The loans come with a near-zero interest rate and a big chunk of it may be forgiven.[1]

However, there are stipulations related to layoffs and reduced salaries, which is why you should evaluate this option _before_ making the irreversible decision to fire people.

[1] Here's a decent summary: [https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/30/heres- how...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/30/heres-how-get- small-business-loan-under-349-billion-coronavirus-aid-bill/)

<comment><USER22> We were considering laying off but quickly decided on pay cuts due to (what currently seems like!) the temporary nature of this and knowing that the relief bill will come. Our projection is that the loan funds should arrive by the pay cycle after our upcoming one.

Like the article and the parent comment mentions, laying off is a very significant and irreversible decision and at least in our case seemed too extreme.

<comment><USER23> This is exactly what the relief bill is aiming to accomplish: to bridge otherwise healthy businesses to the other side of the crisis without having to dismantle their teams now and painstakingly rebuild them afterwards. Hopefully many companies like yours can make this plan work out in reality.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Different point of view: I was a Founder and CEO during the dot com era. The company survived and became successful ($2B revenues today).

It may be unpopular, but I will give you a different view, the one from a Founder/CEO.

After the dot com crash no VC could figure out the good from the bad in their portfolio companies. I was starting to get conflicting opinions from my board (4 VC's and me, the Founder). "Become a BtoB company, a BtoBtoC company,etc,...".

Some VC's offered a bridge (and declined at the last minute), others claimed they were running of money, others did not know.

A white knight came in the form of a bottom feeder. Those kinds of sharks are circling around your company right now. Vc's are just happy to unload their portfolio companies to them, so they can save the face, some employees, and maybe the company.

Anyway, the deal came with a caveat: I had to fire 40% of the staff and I had to quit after that to make room for "professional management".As a Founder I had hired every single engineer, every single marketing rep. This was a very difficult one to swallow, but I had no choice.

The night before I did not sleep. I was up at 5 and drove early to the office. I stopped multiple times as I was sobbing and could not drive (I wear glasses).

Mid morning I called an all hands meeting. Got up the steps to talk to everybody. There was silence, as everybody sort of knew by then that something was brewing.

As I was reading to talk, I started crying. Everybody was watching me in silence.

As I was getting myself together I explained the situation, that we had a way out but that 40% of them had to go. One engineer raised his hand and said "I'll stay with no pay".

Then a second one.

I started crying again. Folks would come to me and say "we'll be all right" and I would reply "thank you". When asked what the structure would be, I said I did not know. I knew that after the layoffs I would be silently asked to leave.

A lot of people moved on, did well, got better jobs over the years.

So, be kind to your Founders, and all the early employees who worked for months and years with no pay because they believe so much in what they were working on.

In the past 5-10 years, we have seen a lot of excesses, super expensive office spaces, unbelievable perks and salaries, $30K conference room tables and unlimited money printed by VC's and later stage investors. Well, maybe this is it. If you get laid off don't be angry, don't blame others, and move on. Don't take that personally.

As for me, I never fully recovered from the worst day of my life, and that was 19 years ago. :-(

<comment><USER25> > The night before I did not sleep. I was up at 5 and drove early to the > office. I stopped multiple times as I was sobbing and could not drive (I > wear glasses).

> As I was reading to talk, I started crying. Everybody was watching me in > silence.

I know my comment is slightly off-topic to the article, but I just wanted to empathize with you and what was the worst day of your life. My company failed completely, but when I had to make the announcement I was sobbing uncontrollably to the point where I was having trouble breathing, in front of everyone (some were sympathetic, some were bitter, all went on to better things almost immediately - none had any interest in working for free). It's just fucking awful. I'm doing better now, but fuck just remembering how horrible that was made me feel compelled to write this comment.

> As for me, I never fully recovered from the worst day of my life, and that > was 19 years ago. :-(

I hope you're also doing better today.

<comment><USER24> So you understand...Thank you. I learned plenty of lessons: make money, don't over hire, be frugal, don't bend to pressure for fancy gigs and out of control travel expenses. Plenty of lessons for sure. I have sympathy for Founders who will find themselves in that kind of situation. That miserable sense of failure to your people. Good luck to all.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I remember laying people off during the GFC, and they all had a good laugh. Nobody was surprised. Nobody broke down, even though a couple of them had a pregnant wife to look after.

What's the secret? Communications. Don't say everything is fine if it isn't. Don't pretend that the potential saviour plans are more likely than they actually are.

Earlier in my career, I'd been through layoffs too. Management would say "this is the last round" several times. You could see teams vanishing from one day to the next. On a trading floor it's pretty obvious. But also in a major tech firm I'd worked at, it was the same, "this is the last time".

Fact is you don't know if it really is the last time, so don't say so. You can lay out the plan - staffers appreciate whatever detail management can give - and you can say why you think you're about to turn the corner. But don't act like it's a given.

</comment><comment><USER27> Just ruminating here, but I didn't fully understand the hesitance to do paycuts. Of course, I understand that in some cases the financial problem is severe enough that layoffs are the only option. But it's conceivable that in many cases a simple, say, 20% cut to salaries across the board could be enough to tip the balance.

Some employees will immediately start looking for another job, but that seems totally fine and reasonable to me, both for the employee and the employer. They get to retain most of their income and all their benefits while doing so, and if they do leave successfully that just saves you more money too.

With all of that said, it does occur to me that with small startups there just may not be enough employees for paycuts to help much. The above is really written with 100+ person companies in mind I suppose.

<comment><USER28> Like you point out in your second paragraph, some percentage of employees are automatically going to start looking for a new job and treat their 80% salary as a severance package. Being in a competitive job market, this is going to be pretty much every above-average employee at your company. With layoffs the company gets to choose who gets impacted, and the process is immediate rather than drawn-out.

The reality is that too many VC funded companies hire too eagerly and can operate perfectly fine (in some cases better) with a smaller, more focused workforce.

There is no coming back from a major across-the-board paycut, which is why no company chooses that option.

BTW your question is answered in the last paragraph of the article.

<comment><USER29> > Being in a competitive job market

Are we in a competitive job market still? For whom?

<comment><USER30> I thought the same thing. If I'm running one of the only companies making layoffs the advice about paycuts rings true, but what about the situation we find ourselves in now where almost every company in the whole UK economy, and many beyond that, are in the same boat?

Of course, this piece has been written to provide advice in the face of the current situation, so I'm not simply dismissing it: just asking the question.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> A big lesson I learned from people here that survived the dotcom bust: you don't want to be the last person laid off at any company. Don't feel great if the lower performers are out the door first while the economy starts the circle the drain.

The reason is because there are companies that are still hiring and that will make it, but they'll soak up their fill from all of the early lay-off talent and there will be very little left for you when you're the last person to turn off the lights.

I guess the moral of the story is to keep your resume fresh, and if a good opportunity comes by during this time it might not hurt to consider it.

</comment><comment><USER32> A bit of criticism - it "normalizes" an 8 week severance as a ceiling - <USER2> in the high flying startup world but any big company especially with long tenure 8 weeks is a pittance, especially to someone having been there for 5 years. May be worth a note.

> While it can sound jarring to say "and today is your last day," it's > generally better for people because it makes it clear that there is a new > normal and it starts right now

On what basis is this better? You're opting into socially traumatizing people this way. When you take someone's badge most people who remain immediately starts to shun the laid off worker. Your respect and trust of them as a person is immediately (rightly) seen as a lie. I'd really like more info on how this is better than allowing people to say their goodbyes.

<comment><USER33> Agreed that 8 weeks is not generous in any sense, especially for employees that have been at the organization for a year or more.

Layoffs are different from performance based firings. My rule of thumb for layoffs is mandatory 3 months + 1 month for each year of service. Someone at the organization for 6 years deserves 6 months of severance if laid off.

These are standards you have to build into your financial model. I'm afraid we've been in the crazy world of terribly run startups for too long. When I look at some of the standout startups from 2005-2010 and some from 2011-now, the startups coming out of this recent decade are far less efficient with their cash than their counterparts from the decade before.

<comment><USER34> 8 weeks sounds pretty awesome when a $100-millions company gives you 2 weeks (minimum legal here in Canada)...

<comment><USER35> It's probably a US thing. Canada has a stronger EI program so the hardship of unemployment is handled by society rather than falling solely on the hands of the employer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> This is a phenomenally good resource for the topic, as both someone who has had to perform layoffs and who has been let go myself.

Highly recommend reading in its entirety, and saving for the unpleasant day you need it (which, unfortunately, might be soon).

</comment><comment><USER37> This is a how-to article on a difficult administrative procedure --laying off employees. What stands out for me is the emphasis on employee dignity. As a manager, the layoff might feel like its about you, but it's really about them. Accommodate, but don't indulge their emotions.

What's missing is that a layoff conversation is also the beginning of a breakup. The economic truth may be transactional, but the lived experiences is emotional. Highly invested professional relationships are changing irrevocably. maybe it was great, maybe it wasn't. These employees have served the mission of your company. If they showed up to work, they were trying. As an employee, one can feel discarded. In this setting, the one emotion a manager should not suppress is gratitude: don't forget to say thank you.

</comment><comment><USER38> >You can say "I know this is a lot to take in, but you will get through this."

>Do not tell them they will be fine.

In general, a very good article, but these two lines really seem contradictory. It might intend to mean something else, but in practice it's pretty much doing what is outlined as a "do-not-do-this".

Edit: typos.

<comment><USER39> I hear what you're saying, but I think the difference is pretty important.

 _you will get through this_ acknowledges that a significant hardship is being imposed on them.

 _you will be fine_ trivializes the hardship; the subtext is "this is no big deal, you worry too much".

<comment><USER38> The point I'm making is that you might see that distinction, but the person hearing those words in that moment will not.

It's a moment in life where you just keep your mouth shut.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> > I say what roles, not who, because that's how you should be thinking about > this. It's not a person by person decision, it's a role by role decision.

Careful: If you've ever worked on a team where one person clearly needed to go, that person needs to go in the layoff. Otherwise, keeping the poor performer when you lay off other people who did their jobs well will severely hurt morale.

If you don't understand what I mean, well you should consider yourself lucky that you've always worked with excellent people who knew how to do their jobs and had great attitudes.

</comment><comment><USER41> Here's a don't: don't bring some BS document for the fired person to sign. They have no reason to do so and shouldn't feel pressured to execute something like a non-disparagement agreement, unless it comes with a big checks stapled to it.

<comment><USER20> I could have and maybe should have added that. Totally agree. They can take it home and review and you should send it digitally anyways so they have a copy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> This is extremely useful and well done, easily the best resource for layoffs I've ever seen. I really like that it doesn't hold back.

> _Maybe they will return to a home country with alternative healthcare > options_

Wow, that's calling it what it is.

<comment><USER20> Thanks and yep.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> Why pretend and cloud the idea, that the main reason a person has a "job" today is to accumulate capital for capital.

As long as this notion persists (which will be for many more decades I fear) power inequalities will just mean that some will suffer more (those who do not have resources in the first place).

Hey, you know, I am really sorry, but thanks for all the capital you helped us to accumulate - which we own and not you. Bye!

I imagine the most profound societal change will come from getting rid of this notion and the resulting reduction in power asymmetries.

<comment><USER44> In return for helping the company build capital you were paid a monetary value in return. A quick solution to the problem you are presenting is to invest the money you were paid into other companies or start your own company so you too can have 'capital'.

<comment><USER43> I understand that it's a very broad spectrum.

However, what I am observing is that 'capital' gets its hand in any aspect of life, the formerly family owned coffee machine maker, lingerie producer and the outdoor specialist went through couple of private equity hands - for what? For injecting capital to trim down ops, expand, then get out of a position?

After watching hundreds of hours of investing conference videos and interviews there is one thing, that really got me: why is this field so sad? I believe it's because all they ever talk about what they "own". The cannot make, invent, heal, fight, cook, write, harvest or any other human activity - <USER3> they do is "own" something that is valuable to others.

Imagine kids playing in the playground and all the talk about is what each of them owns. They cannot read, write, play an instrument, tell jokes, do tricks, etc. - no, but they control those who can and are productive.

I am not sure why, but I'd rather have a kid with talents than one with lots of "assets" (even though in this world talent does not matter, if you've got the assets).

\----

Warren Buffet was once asked by the audience, what you should do, if you have artistic talents and want to live them out, but you do not want to starve? He did not really care, understandably.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Excellent and humane in all aspects. Definitely a bookmark

</comment><comment><USER46> Sounds like compassionate and practical advice, but nothing particularly insightful.

Having seen the shit-storms of the early naughts, yes, I can say there are worse ways of doing layoffs. Hint: deactivating key cards at lunch time isn't a best practice, nor is dribbling out lay-offs in waves like a year-long "last man standing" game show particularly helpful. Nor is calling an all-hands meeting and having the CEO cry on a theater-sized video projection. But these things are fairly obvious to non-sociopath leaders and companies with a professional HR department.

This is the second essay from a VC concern that I've seen discussing this. It makes me wonder why are VC's giving out this advice in such open-letter forums?

<comment><USER47> Because the economy is tanking and layoffs will follow, even in Silicon Valley?

Also, this is intended as a practical manual from someone who's been there and done it repeatedly, not a random blogger attempting to dazzle with their "insight".

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> > Offering less than two weeks severance pay is outside the norm, as is > offering more than eight weeks.

Is this a norm for startups?

The norm for BigCorp is to have your tenure-based severance actually map directly to tenure, so if someone worked for you for 10 years she gets 5x what someone who worked for two years gets.

(Granted there might be a baseline, like $M + $N * $YEARS.)

And that's just talking about the US, but the article definitely implied they're talking about the US and in particular California. If your startup is domiciled in, say, France, you probably don't have a choice.

</comment><comment><USER49> Incorrectly states anything above 8 weeks isn't normal. 8 weeks is the min for Cal WARN. When i got laid off during the great recession, i received 11 weeks paid. 8 weeks for WARN and one week for every year employed. Then another one month of pay to give up my rights to sue the employer.

</comment><comment><USER50> shit. It seems that this recession will last for quite some time - so a good number of people will have to take up work as contractors. That sucks.

</comment><comment><USER51> Man that was very, very useful advice.

</comment><comment><USER52> Voluntary severance is another option. Give people six weeks pay if they take it, two weeks if they don't. Coach people in or out.</comment>


Who is your hero? - <AUTHOR> http://www.alexbowe.com/miscellaneous/hero-typing/

<comment><USER2> Richard Feynman: part hacker, part physicist, all work, and all fun.

</comment><comment><USER3> Elon Musk (Zip2, Paypal, SpaceX, Solarcity, Tesla Motors); engineer/entrepreneur, and inspiration for the film Iron Man's version of Tony Stark.

</comment><comment><USER4> At the risk of sounding childish I'd say Batman is my hero. One could even consider him a hacker based on his technological prowess.

</comment><comment><USER5> Thomas Jefferson would be pretty close to the ideal hacker. (if others disagree I'm interested in why as I have very little opposing data so far).

<comment><USER6> First major North American proponent of the tomato, inventor of the swivel chair, father of archeology--there's a lot of stuff there. He was about as prolific as Franklin.

<comment><USER7> Add to that architect, champion of liberty, states rights, and freedom of religion.

Also drafting the declaration of independence and being responsible for the Louisiana Purchase and the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

<comment><USER6> Yeah, but everyone knows about that stuff. (Maybe not the architecture.) He also founded the University of Virginia. But his more "hackerly" accomplishments are among the less historically noteworthy ones.

He was personally very disappointed in his presidency, despite all the accomplishments you note, plus winning the First Barbary War. He was in many ways a frustrated idealist, most dramatically in his moral disgust at slavery contrasted with his lifelong ownership of slaves.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> HN lurkers such as dlsspy, pquerna, and zedshaw are my hacker heroes.

They need not introductions but I suppose links won't hurt:

<http://hackerne.ws/user?id=dlsspy>

<http://hackerne.ws/user?id=pquerna>

<http://hackerne.ws/user?id=zedshaw>

<comment><AUTHOR> I like that. A lot of heroes go quietly about their business of making the world a little better, without having to wear their underpants on the outside to draw attention to themselves.

<comment><USER9> I'm not sure you can describe Zed Shaw as someone who doesn't draw attention to himself.

<comment><AUTHOR> Fair point, though I was speaking more generally about heroes :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Willie Crowther. Worked on ARPANet, wrote colossal cave, caver and climber.

</comment><comment><USER11> I think a good question on HN would be to whom here is pg not a hero in some way? Isn't that why people want to draft him for Congress / get his advice on everything / build statues of him out of old sim cards?

That being said, I did enjoy reading "I like the way Paul Graham quacks". And I do wonder if there are other people in the startup/investor community who have the same positive cred as pg.

<comment><USER12> Plenty of HN people are 'pg skeptics (it's getting harder to be skeptical about YC, though).

Here's a manifesto:

<http://www.idlewords.com/2005/04/dabblers_and_blowhards.htm>

<comment><USER13> Even Maciej concedes that pg knows a lot about certain topics.

I've noticed that pg hasn't been writing a lot of expansive, philosophical essays lately, like attempting to explain national characteristics of architecture. That kind of speculation is just asking for satire. Perhaps he's gotten the message.

I think pg is interesting for being a kind of working philosopher. He had various theories about business, programming languages, and youth, and actually tested them by experiment (betting his own money, too), and by most measures has won the argument.

<comment><USER6> I actually liked the expansive, philosophical essays. One of them was about the messages you get from cities and what kind of ambitions they arouse in you, and that probably explains the switch--when he lived in Cambridge (where being really smart was the ambition) he wrote wide ranging philosophical essays about what you can't say and how to predict presidential elections and how awesome dynamic languages are, and now that he lives in Silicon Valley, he only writes about startups.

At one time, PG was just an essayist and hacker who worked on interesting technical problems like writing a better Lisp and filtering spam, who occasionally wrote about startups. Now he's "just" the startup guru.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> i'd say _why and zedshaw. _why was a true hacker guy. he really dove into stuff. i liked the idea of writing a bytecode convertor to run ruby apps on google app engine, and tons of things besides that one. Zed writes nice posts. what's cool is that even though he gets annoyed easily and writes quite a bit of angry posts, he seems to care about people who start, and explains things to people. that's nice.

I like the way Ezra Zygmuntowicz explains stuff, and enjoy reading his posts and listening to records of his speeches.

Same thing about Michael Klishin, who used to be in Rails Core. Actually, that's the guy whom i learned from the most. I had a pleasure to meet him in person, and he did teach me tons of stuff. Not specifically-technical, more of vision-sharing things. Those things did influence me as a technical person a lot.

Same thing about Yehuda Katz. I like the way he thinks and ideas he comes up with (most of time).

So, I'd divide it in 2 parts: technical stuff | vision / point of view.

</comment><comment><USER7> Warren Buffett - Honest and successful, shares his wisdom, extremely independent thinker, wildly frugal, giving it all to the best run philanthropy to be spent entirely within a short period after he dies.

</comment><comment><USER15> Just a little side note, if you haven't already, you should really read "The Passionate Programmer" (the previous edition was titled "My job went to India: 52 ways to save your job").

</comment><comment><USER16> Thanks for reading the post, and Michael for posting it. I enjoyed all the comments. I only recognized Zed Shaw, Batman and a few others, so I've got some reading to do :)

<comment><USER17> Yeah baby!!! Batman's more famous than Jefferson, Feynman and Socrates put together!!!

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Socrates.

</comment><comment><USER19> Dean Kamen, Danny Hillis, and Adam Savage (not necessarily in that order).

</comment><comment><USER20> Norman Borlaug</comment>


FOSDEM 2019 – Call for participation - <AUTHOR> https://fosdem.org/2019/news/2018-08-10-call-for-participation/ <comment><USER2> Too bad FOSDEM always has horrible dates for students. Many students either go on holiday in Belgium because we only got 1 week or some people are still having exams. I wish FOSDEM was a bit later in the year.

<comment><USER3> I think no matter which date you pick there is going to be some group of people in some country when it's not going to be ideal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Looks nice, though [https://ksp.fosdem.org/files/](https://ksp.fosdem.org/files/) uses expired certificate.</comment>


Anonymous accusing a Silicon Valley startup of assisting ISIS - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/cloudflare-shoots-back-anonymous-claims-helping-isis-matthew-prince-paris-war-2015-11/?bypasscheck <comment><USER2> They really should stop trying to pretend that they know better than secret services and counter terrorism services.

If they really want to help, they should investigate and report to police, without making it public first. Much like what the french media are doing today. This way they would make sure they're helping investigation rather than try to get famous at all cost.</comment>


Insanely Undervalued Cryptocurrencies - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@creampuff/3-insanely-undervalued-cryptocurrencies-ae155958953e <comment><USER2> Telegram, that's where the pump and dumps are organized.</comment>


Satellites Confirm Sinking of San Francisco's Millennium Tower - <AUTHOR> http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Satellites_confirm_sinking_of_San_Francisco_tower <comment><USER2> I'm no civil engineer but I talked to one about this story and the concerns seem to be overblown. First, the foundation as I am aware is created by drilling to the point of refusal. Obviously bedrock is ideal, but in a place like SF where some of the land is based off old landfill, refusal is acceptable. From there a concrete foundation is laid and the building rests upon it. Concrete slabs are secure and in the event of an earthquake it will be allowed to shift and "float" if the ground underneath liquifies. Secondly, the sinking and leaning can be corrected. Engineers account for some level of sinkage as the building settles, and if it tilts, they can apply ties to the sides to straighten it. In the most severe of cases they can shore up the foundation and build more supports. I'm sure the builders are examining their options currently so it'll be interesting to see what course of action they take.

<comment><USER3> I'm in a similar line of work and don't fully agree with this. Yes everything he's said is true, but to an extent, and having these rates of settlement per year is very troubling for a structure designed to live 60-100+ years. If the issue is not groundwater related (which seems unlikely with surrounding structures largely OK) then expensive remedial work (underpinning / grouting / similar) is going to be required in the immediate future before this causes serious issues.

Admittedly I don't work in an seismically active region but I design for max settlements of ~50mm over a building's _lifetime_ , and the Millennium Tower is experiencing that every year.

<comment><USER4> > designed to live 60-100+ years

Really? That's what they design them for? That seems extremely short-sighted. What is supposed to happen in 60 years? Why were medieval structures able to last hundreds o f years but we can't do it now? Are new York's hundred year old sky scrapers due for being torn down now? I don't understand why anybody would think that's a good idea besides the fact that it'll be your grandchildren's problem and you won't have to deal with it.

<comment><USER5> Nobody lives in those 100's years old buildings; those that live in buildings say 200 years old do so at great cost, because they love the history. Functions change, tech changes, living patterns change, and retrofitting is much more expensive than rebuilding after some point. Especially for commercial buildings and downtown areas, it makes little sense to use buildings beyond 100 years, save for some of historical significance.

<comment><USER6> As a European this is just .. shocking. I was born in a city that has been settled for almost 2000 years, which has the oldest parts surrounded by walls that were constructed between the 12th and 14th century.

Even when I moved away from there to a new city the flat I bought was in a building almost 200 years old.

I know that America is "new", and that modern buildings are, by definition modern, but the idea that you don't plan for the long-term, and that buildings aren't old is very surprising.

<comment><USER5> I'm not sure what you're saying, but I'm very likely to live in a city older than yours. Buildings hundreds of years old are castles, churches or a limited number of inner city monuments. They are very hard to live in, let alone live comfortably in; they are very expensive to retrofit and in general nice to look at but a pain to live or work in.

Buildings 200 to 100 years old are more common, but still suffer from many defects; unless renovated in a way that is essentially 'build a new house inside the old one'. Which is more expensive than knocking the old one down.

Anything less than 100 years but older than say 20 can be made to 'modern' standards, for some values of 'modern'. It won't be nearly as comfortable as a new house though, again unless renovated the expensive way.

Housing needs change. If you think we Europeans build for 100+ year use, you obviously know nothing about real estate or construction, and the history thereof. If you think the fact that we have a bunch of old buildings is because they were designed that way, you are very mistaken.

<comment><USER6> I'm trying to say that while uses change that building is "effort" and if you're going to do it you should do it with the assumption that it will last.

Re-purposing old buildings is very common in the UK, and whilst sometimes that might mean essentially ripping it all out and rebuilding form the inside-out that's an extreme case. When it comes to "public buildings" and "houses" that people live in mostly the changes aren't so drastic.

I'm sure that people putting up buildings in the 1600s didn't imagine they would still be in use, but the fact that they are is a good thing. What I'm really trying to say is that planning to build something with the assumption it'll be dead/useless/retired in a hundred years seems wasteful and short- sighted. Europe is used as an example of how things have turned out otherwise. Though I appreciate there aren't any skyscrapers/tower-blocks of that age in the world. Unless you think of tenement buildings from the 17/18/1900s.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Interesting that the lead photo[0] also shows Salesforce East (formerly Salesforce Plaza, 350 Mission) also sinking at a similar rate. I'm wondering what all of this will end up meaning for Salesforce Tower (the large hole in the ground to the left of the Millennium Tower), since it's close to topping out and will be one of the two tallest buildings west of the Mississippi River.

[0]: [http://www.esa.int/spaceinimages/Images/2016/11/Millennium_T...](http://www.esa.int/spaceinimages/Images/2016/11/Millennium_Tower_sinking)

<comment><USER7> Also of note: you can actually see the buckling of the sidewalk and curbing immediately adjacent to the Millennium Tower. I'll see if I can get a photo to share today. There's certainly quite a bit of heavy construction equipment traveling on Fremont/Mission, but I can't see how it would cause buckling sidewalks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> "The Sentinel-1 satellites have shown that the Millennium Tower skyscraper in the centre of San Francisco is sinking by a few centimetres a year"

I'm no engineer - but to me "a few cm a year" seems very significant, and would be easily detectable by current surveying technology? You would probably even visually be able to see it at the entrance to the building after 1-2 years?

Why was a satellitie needed here to confirm it?

<comment><USER9> A cheap GPS device can give you millimeter-level measurements every few hours, so using an active satellite does seem like overkill.

<comment><USER10> I don't know what your exact definitions is of "cheap", "millimeter-level", and "every few hours", but your comment does sound a bit misinformed.

What you are possibly referring to is called dimensional control in geomatics and civil engineering, and there are various measurement techniques that can be applied, including GNSS-based.

In a way, the hardest part of it is the planning phase, where you have to decide which technique is most appropriate to meet precision, accuracy, timeliness, and cost constraints. All those factors kind of fight against each other. Finding the sweet spot is non-trivial.

<comment><USER9> Okay, tell me where I'm wrong: AFAIK you can buy a few hundred to few thousand dollar receiver that tracks the carrier phase, let it sit around for a few hours, and then with aggressive post-processing you should be able to figure out the right phase and know your location within a few mm.

Edit: And worst-case, you should be able to do an exact survey once, and then you can remember that and know which phase to use in the future. (Barring sudden multi-cm shifts, but in that case you have bigger problems.) You still have atmospheric fluctuations to deal with, but that's why you're measuring all day.

<comment><USER11> Vertical accuracy is usually lower than horiztonal accuracy. It is more difficult to calculate elevation than lat/long.

<comment><USER9> Not by a huge amount. Should be less than 2x, at least at some point during the day.

<comment><USER12> Much worse that 2x. Closer to an order of magnitude worse.

<comment><USER13> Indeed. Just to anchor this with current state-of-the-art numbers, I took a look at the CSV data file linked to by the page referenced in my above comment:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13040765](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13040765)

The quoted horizontal standard errors of the daily position measurements are ~1.5mm. The vertical standard errors are ~5-7mm. (Not as bad as a factor of 10, but certainly worse than 2x.)

The vertical position measurement responds well to averaging of daily errors to beat down the RF propagation effects that cause them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Somewhat unrelated, but for me this is another argument in favor of renting vs. buying. Sure, most people won't buy a super expensive condo in a super expensive city that happens to be sinking into the ground, but if you taken that $1.5m (they go for much more[0]) and put it into index funds instead, you could pay ~$5k/mo in rent forever and just leave when problems arise.

[http://sf.curbed.com/2016/8/5/12390756/on-sale-millennium- to...](http://sf.curbed.com/2016/8/5/12390756/on-sale-millennium-tower)

<comment><USER15> Someone buying a $1.5m condo only has to put up $300k for the mortgage, so it's not correct to say that the alternative is to just put $1.5m into the stock market: the buyer often doesn't have that much.

Also, it's more precise to use the S&P dividend yield (2%) or 10-year Treasury yield (2.4%) to gauge how much someone with $1.5m could spend in rent, assuming they put all their interest into rent. They'd be renting something at more like $3k/month.

Now take the fact that home prices are, at the higher end, about 25x the yearly rent of the same place. So this person with $1.5m is essentially renting a place worth $900k, whereas the buyer (who perhaps only has $500k) is living in a nicer place that cost $1.5m. And that's not considering the fact that rents could rise further.

There are taxes and maintenance to consider, the risk of putting a lot of money into a volatile asset, and being tied to one place. Financial leverage in general is risky. But it's not a clear-cut decision like most people try to make it.

<comment><USER16> That Treasury is vastly safer than a condo, which fluctuate significantly more than a standalone structure and often has dramatic increase in fees over time. Further renters can move to a new building every few years for minimal costs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> it boggles my mind that the developers were not required to sink the foundation piles all the way into bedrock. how unusual is this for tall buildings in the city by the bay? there is so much wealth in SF, this is a luxury tower, it's all a bit strange.

<comment><USER18> There are bedrock piles, and there are friction piles. The latter rely on friction of the material they're plunged into to stay put. They are effective and commonly used.

Despite how comforting the word bedrock is to our ears, neither one is "superior" to the other.

Obviously something is going wrong here, but it's not a case of "oh the developers cheaped out and decided to just build a giant skyscraper with no foundation!"

<comment><USER19> I'd say it's less about piles going to bedrock and more about the ground itself.

Building on sand, trash, and whatever other gunk comprises San Francisco ground...

<comment><USER20> You could say whatever you like, but none of the other tall buildings in SF are sinking noticeably, which suggests your theory may itself lack a solid foundation.

<comment><USER19> Are the pilings for those other tall buildings in the bedrock?

<comment><USER20> Depends. Some are but but in recent years it's been more common to use steel structures which (being lighter) don't require that.

Noise might have something to do with too. The last building that I recall having bedrock-depth pilings involved loud shuddering bangs through the financial district for nearly a month. Like you could feel it through the ground 3 blocks away every time they dropped the hammer..

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I find it amazing how _civil_ satellite can be kept in orbit, be it geostationary or not, and monitor "millions of points" spread to some great km and be able to detect (or provide image with enough resolution) so that a move of few cm can be detected.

<comment><USER22> Most countries launch EOS's that are either civilian grade or considerably lesser than that.

Only the US has really the ability to fund the crazy bus sized EOS platforms.

<comment><USER23> Himawari is a Japanese weather satellite that is 8m long and weighs 3.5 tons.

<comment><USER22> Block III and newer K-11 platforms are 20 meters in length and weight 20,000 KG.

Also the dry mass of Himawari is 1300 kg, it's based on the MELCO DS-2000 bus which is meant for communication satellites, it doesn't have an 8M telescope assembly.

<comment><USER23> Okay, that's really big. Thanks for the info!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I would be infuriated if I purchased a condo there. It seems like every month since last year, there are articles talking about the project. I haven't heard any solutions to the problem and I don't know anything about construction. Is this the type of problem that can be fixed, or will they have to destroy the building and rebuild it?

<comment><USER25> The main issue here is understanding what is the actual cause of the sinking:

1) extensive dewatering of the soil under the building and around it

2) some mistake in the calculations of the project and/or some foundation work made in difformity from the project

3) a combination of the two

IF it is only #1 (this is what the builders say) then stopping the water drainage or even (in certain case) re-watering appropriately the soil would stop the sinking (at a relatively low cost).

IF it is #2 or #3 it is certainly possible to "better" the soil underneath or "add" some (underground) supporting structures (at a much, much higher cost).

And of course someone will have to pay the bill.

Techically, IF the cause is #1, it is called "subsidence":

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

more specifically:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundwater- related_subsidence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundwater- related_subsidence)

Edit: P.S.: Seemingly the SF Millennium got just cited here also: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_leaning_towers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_leaning_towers)

(maybe exaggerating a little bit, look for Santos, Brazil, strangely not listed in the wikipedia page)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> It's not discussed in the article but I'm very curious about the brightest spot in the SF Bay Area in the survey image. It's not Millenium Tower (which I work next to so that's pretty interesting too). It's actually the land just west of Oakland airport, the part of Alameda built up in the 80s called Bay Farm. As I understand it the area was marsh up until then -- that and a garbage dump that has since been covered.

Does anyone know if the land there really is sinking so fast? It's not on a fault so I'm fairly sure it's not moving much laterally.

<comment><USER27> Maybe a garbage dump that has been covered would be expected to sink?

<comment><USER26> Sure, but it's the entire development.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> This is from memory, and I have not been able to confirm it with a cursory search, but FWIW: In most of central London, the bedrock is far below (which allows for deep Tube tunnels), so high-rises do not rest on bedrock, and are at least partially supported by the buoyancy of large rigid basements.

Of course, London does not have the seismic risk of San Francisco. I would guess that buoyancy might be an asset with regard to support, but possibly a liability with regard to stability, in the face of liquefaction.

</comment><comment><USER29> could there possibly be an enormous sinkhole beneath or nearby the pilons?</comment>


Show HN: My son's first GitHub repo - <AUTHOR> I have finally convinced my son to take a step forward to publish something in public domain. As he is learning Python these days, he made a scraper to download Cambridge past papers (GCSE / IGCSE).
If you like it, encourage the kid by pressing the Star button :)
https://github.com/UsamaKashif/CambridgePastPapersDownloader <comment><USER2> > If you like it, encourage the kid by pressing the Star button :)

I'd humbly suggest not teaching him to not use internet points as motivation.

</comment><comment><USER3> You should show him how how to use 'black' and maybe install pycodestyle. Function names with a starting capital letter shouldn't be done in python. And Camelcase is frowned upon as well.

And if you want to make his life easier show him how to use xpath with lxml. It's way easier to use than what he did. Just press ctrl-f in the 'elements' developer tools and you can test the path interactively

</comment><comment><USER4> You're an awesome dad. I hope to teach my (still unborn) son some programming one day!

</comment><comment><USER5> Hi! How old is your son?

<comment><USER6> 32..

Haha, kidding. Great question! I'm also curious.

It's great to have motivated parents who are in the industry. And resources these days are just incredible: [https://read.macmillan.com/mcpg/code-this- game/](https://read.macmillan.com/mcpg/code-this-game/)</comment></comment>


Folding Notebook - <AUTHOR> http://www.yankodesign.com/2011/04/12/folded-notebook/ <comment><USER2> Is it possible to cut the screen in half like that ? I mean, wouldn't there have to be a space between the two halves when in "full screen" mode ?

</comment><comment><USER3> Front-facing ports on a laptop/notebook are a showstopper for me.</comment>


Show HN: Send your photos as real postcards to anywhere in the world for $1 - <AUTHOR> https://make.dearpost.in/make?card=new <comment><USER2> Title send postcards 'to anywhere in the world' is misleading!

From FAQ:

Can I send postcards outside India?

Not at the moment. We're working on it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, the FAQs are not updated at the moment, we do ship internationally!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Lost me at "To continue, login using your Facebook account."

<comment><AUTHOR> Noted about this, we are making a login with email, this was just easy to get started.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> How do you differentiate from all the other companies that offer this service?

</comment><comment><USER5> postable.com is an option that works in the US and internationally.

</comment><comment><USER6> how do you monetize on this? I tried doing some basic research few years ago and found that monetization was impossible.</comment>


Path Only Works If You Reject Friend Requests - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/04/reject-path-friends/

<comment><USER2> I already figured that out, because when I try to accept a friend request, the Android app tells me I need to login again (goto 10).</comment>


Get Lifetime Access to Part of My Brain - <AUTHOR> https://www.nateliason.com/brain <comment><AUTHOR> I think that sharing your book notes/summaries is an interesting idea. Not sure if I'd pay the $25, and I am certain that I don't like using Evernote anymore.</comment>


Tracking an entire Windows sytem inside Git - <AUTHOR> http://alumnit.ca/~apenwarr/log/?m=200901#21

<comment><USER2> _Unfortunately, I can't advise you to try to duplicate my setup. I happened to have a valid Windows 98 license and a valid Win4lin license, neither of which you can buy anymore_

I don't know about win4lin, but acquiring a Windows98 license can be as easy as picking up an ancient, free PC from Craigslist with a registration sticker on it.

<comment><USER3> If you have the requisite large-company/educational institute Microsoft licensing, you get to download Microsoft programs from their Technet website - right back to DOS and Windows 3.

Win4Lin licensing might be more of a problem, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I always wonder if Linus might integrate his projects more. Note:

* Git - a filesystem based revision control system by Linux

* BtrFS - a filesystem with writable snapshots, integrated into a kernel controled by Linus

Might ever integrate themselves more. Ie, SVN commands actually using the underlying filesystem to store the data.

Git would therefore:

* Be compeletely transparent to applications and users, storing updates and comments in the filesystem as snapshots and extended attributes

* Be able to revision control binary objects without needless storage of duplicated data.

<comment><USER5> It doesn't sound like it would be that hard to combine the two. Both are open source projects ...

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> The more I use git the more impressed I am with it. We now use git to control access and distribution of distributed files. Previously we did that via NFS, but git was cleaner and simpler to manage access restrictions.

</comment><comment><USER7> That's a very unique but good application of version control.

It takes a special kind of person to think, "I'm going to take this thing meant for code and use it for what is basically an OS."

<comment><USER8> I think it's reasonably common to check your home directory into revision control...

<comment><USER9> And /etc is pretty standard, too.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Git is one of those cases where something that begins life as an incremental improvement turns out to be _such_ an incremental improvement that a qualitative leap occurs. New things become possible that you just wouldn't have thought of before - there wouldn't have been any point. Applications in completely unrelated areas spring up.

Sometimes I think that Torvalds may end up being remembered more for git than for Linux.

<comment><USER8> "Sometimes I think that Torvalds may end up being remembered more for git than for Linux."

Seriously??? I think even he would think that slightly laughable.

Git seems like an ok-ish version control system - there are a ton of them about now. Linux was a pretty big revolution and is pretty unique.

<comment><USER11> Linus has wrought three public miracles:

1) He had the chutzpah to just sit down and write a straightforward kernel for the 386, with no intentions of pedagogy (minix), research (mach), or circlejerkery (hurd).

2) He pioneered the distributed development model in the late 90s that made it possible for Linux to bloom.

3) He sat down and advanced the state of free version control a decade over the course of a weekend.

His initial writing of Linux is the least important of the three, if he hadn't done it someone else would have. The remarkable thing is _how_ he kept it going.

<comment><USER12> > 3) He sat down and advanced the state of free version control a decade over > the course of a weekend.

I'd say that's a bit of a stretch. Remember DARCS and Mecurial were both out when he wrote git. Though Mercurial wasn't that old:)

Read this: [http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/version-control/version- con...](http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/version-control/version-control.html)

Many people prefer Hg over Git, though I prefer Git, and it was written before Git.

I'd agree that Linus helped "advance the state of free version control", but certainly not by a decade when compared to other pre existing free version control systems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I guess the reason he can't do the same with vmware images is that git is slow with huge files. On the other hand, vmware snapshots should allow what he wants - to keep several closely related versions of the system and the ability to start any of them. Am I missing something?

<comment><USER14> I've tried this before with a VirtualBox image of XP. Even the base install of XP, without any updates or added software, is too large for Git to handle, or at least too large on my machine with 2GB of RAM.

<comment><USER13> According to this thread:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=374416>

Git is particularly bad for large files, while good old SVN handles them Ok.

<comment><USER11> And CVS handles them far better than SVN.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why Do Americans Refrigerate Their Eggs? - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/13/insider/why-do-americans-refrigerate-their-eggs.html?_r=0 <comment><USER3> I think part of the article that's getting glossed over is:

" _A refrigerated egg, no matter the source, will be good for four or five weeks. Unrefrigerated eggs are best used within a week, though they may be fine for two._ "

So, one would want to refrigerate eggs (washed or unwashed) anyway if they're not all going to be used immediately.

<comment><USER4> I live in UK and never keep eggs the fridge. They easily keep for a couple of weeks or more. So I think the "use within a week" advice is over-cautious.

Handy tip, if you want to know if an egg's good* or not, without breaking it: pop it in a tall glass of cold water. If it sinks, it's fine. If it floats it's gone off.

[*'good' as in 'still fresh'. Unfortunately it won't tell you if it's full of salmonella, or not!]

<comment><USER5> Isn't this covered in the article?

>In Europe and Britain, the opposite is true. European Union regulations prohibit the washing of eggs. The idea is that preserving the protective cuticle is more important than washing the gunk off.

UK eggs are unwashed, thus still have their protective cuticles and thus can last much longer unrefrigerated. GP's quote only applies to American eggs, which are washed.

<comment><USER6> I live in Ireland, in the EU, and I'm fairly sure all the eggs in supermarkets here are washed. There's never a spot of dirt on them. And we always refrigerate, as does everyone I know

<comment><USER7> I live in Romania, another EU country, and the eggs from the super-market are definitely not washed. They're also always refrigerated.

<comment><USER8> Interesting. I don't think I've ever seen a UK supermarket put eggs in a refrigerated section. They're always sold from a standard shelf.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> martin-adams Not explicitly mentioned, but is linked from the article:

 _In Europe, the understanding is that this mandate actually encourages good husbandry on farms. It's in the farmers' best interests then to produce to cleanest eggs possible, as no one is going to buy their eggs if they're dirty_ [1]

So in Europe, you need a clean environment as you're not allowed to wash the eggs. I find this equally compelling than not wanting to wash the protective cuticle off that protects against bacteria.

[1] [http://www.forbes.com/sites/nadiaarumugam/2012/10/25/why- ame...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/nadiaarumugam/2012/10/25/why-american- eggs-would-be-illegal-in-a-british-supermarket-and-vice-versa/#58478d01a53e)

<comment><USER9> It doesn't seem to be working in the UK. Over half of all the fresh chicken sold is contaminated with campylobacter.

<comment><USER10> Presumably chickens that are bred for meat live a different existence to those reared for eggs?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm a swede and I had no idea, I've refrigerated eggs as long as I can remember. My parents are from Croatia though so it's kind of weird that I picked up this habit. My relatives in Croatia do not refrigerate eggs.

Most swedes that I can think of refrigerate their eggs straight from the store. The recommendation is printed on the box to refrigerate.

Now that I've read this article it suddenly makes sense why I've sometimes seen dirt (maybe poo?) and feathers on store bought eggs.

<comment><USER12> Hmm..weird. I'm from Croatia and I would be surprised to see people not refrigerate eggs. We (me and my family) always refrigerated them. Every fridge I've seen has egg holders that we would fill up.

Pretty sure that most people I know refrigerate eggs, but then again, I never really paid attention to that.

<comment><USER11> Well my relatives are from the country, they have their own chickens. But yeah, like you say, even in Croatia most refrigerators are sold with egg holders.

<comment><USER13> Im a us expat living in Russia; eggs are sold nkn refrigerated but virtually everyone's home I've been to stores eggs in the refrigerator. The only time I haven't seen it was rural houses. I've known about this factoid for some time after reading an article om NPR about it, and I guess I always just assumed it was cultural assimilation happening. That is, we see people in US tv and movies do it, so we do it. I didn't know there was a difference in preparation prior to the article and most don't seem to either. So instead we just do what everyone else does.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> My wife bought our chickens mainly on how pretty the basket of eggs would be on the counter. This is this weeks haul that we didn't eat - [https://imgur.com/a/T9x4K](https://imgur.com/a/T9x4K).

If you have the room, I highly recommend them as pets. They're quite cool and very low maintenance, and they make the best eggs you've ever had.

<comment><USER15> My parents considered it, but heard that they attract snakes.

Also, what do you do with the eggs you don't eat?

<comment><USER16> We have about 25 chickens right now and we just picked up another 18 chicks today. Our's free range on our land and they're fantastic at keeping bugs down.

We've had some problems with snakes, but we're in the country outside Austin, TX and snakes are just a way of life out here. We even had to remove a rattlesnake from inside the house a few weeks back. Skunks are a big problem this year -- lots of them out and about.

We give and sell fresh eggs to everyone we know. I routinely take them into work and sell them for $5 a dozen. We've had to explain the whole not washing or refrigerating them to most people but after they've had fresh eggs they always want more.

<comment><USER17> You can buy free range organic eggs at Whole Foods for less than $5 a dozen.

<comment><USER18> You can't buy pastured eggs for less than $7 a dozen generally. The eggs you are referring to are still from chickens who are stuck more or less indoors at all times, and don't get to engage in "chicken-y" behaviors. "Free range" in this case often means there is access to an outdoor patch, but there's no real reason for the chickens to go there, and the are so depressed that they hardly want to move anyway.

As such their yolks will tend to be yellow instead of orange or nearly red, as true pastured chicken eggs yolks will be.

<comment><USER17> No the eggs I am referring to are from "pastured" chickens. I have seen them go for $5 at a Whole Foods in Northern Virginia as well as the local coop around the corner from me in Syracuse, NY.

<comment><USER18> Right. I'm just saying "free range" doesn't mean much. You can get pastured eggs for $5 if you buy direct yes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The thing is, salmonella _is_ most prevalent on the outside of the shell, and that cleaning does save some lives (and misery). Meanwhile you can let your egg come to room temp if you prefer, before use. Finally, if you really want fresh eggs, you can raise them or hook up with a local farmer. Even in a big city, you can raise chickens for eggs.

<comment><USER20> >that cleaning does save some lives (and misery).

Does it? I'd imagine if it really did the Europeans would switch to the refrigerated approach asap.

<comment><USER19> Europe has traditionally (as a whole) been a lot laxer with regulations. The upside is that they avoid a lot of red tape. The downside is... Thalidomide.

<comment><USER20> >Europe has traditionally (as a whole) been a lot laxer with regulations.

Quite the opposite. I mean they even tried to regulate how bent bananas could be. Commission Regulation (EC) No. 2257/94

<comment><USER19> Bullshit.

 _Bananas have always been classified by quality and size for international trade. Because the standards, set by individual governments and the industry, were confusing, the European Commission was asked to draw up new rules._

 _Commission regulation 2257 /94 decreed that bananas in general should be "free from malformation or abnormal curvature". Those sold as "extra class" must be perfect, "class 1" can have "slight defects of shape" and "class 2" can have full-scale "defects of shape"._

 _Nothing is banned under the regulation, which sets grading rules requested by industry to make sure importers – including UK wholesalers and supermarkets – know exactly what they will be getting when they order a box of bananas._

Leave that Brexiteer crap at the door please.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> A friend with chickens sent me this article a long time ago: [http://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/how-to-store- fresh-...](http://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/how-to-store-fresh-eggs- zmaz77ndzgoe)

Summary: unwashed eggs are edible for up to eight weeks on the counter, and can go much longer than that if refrigerated. Washed eggs go bad more quickly, but should still be ok for a couple of months. The hard part is, you really have no way to know how long it's been since a store-bought egg was laid.

</comment><comment><USER22> I (Europe/Germany) put them in the fridge because the fridge came with an egg tray. Simple as that, never thought about leaving them outside. Maybe that's a simple answer to why many people put them in the fridge, independent of 'how long they will stay good'.

<comment><USER23> Everyone I know in Germany puts them in the fridge. Though I just realized, that the supermarkets/stores sell the eggs uncooled.

<comment><USER24> Same in Norway, except the supermarkets sell the eggs cooled as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> In Swedish egg farms, if salmonella is discovered (in a mandatory screening), the entire flock must be killed off. This provides a good incentive to avoid salmonella outbreaks. The state reimburses up to 50% of the costs incurred (up to 70% if the farm is part of the additional voluntary salmonella screening program).

</comment><comment><USER26> As someone who raises chickens for eggs on our hobby farm and have done much research surrounding this, having been raised in the U.K. and now living in Canada I have the following info:

In North America, I cannot speak to the quality of the conditions in which the eggs are laid, but they are washed. The Health Department requires that washed eggs be refrigerated due to the removal of the cuticle or "bloom". In the supermarket, eggs are refrigerated accordingly and they should be refrigerated at home too.

In the U.K. the eggs don't undergo any process that removes the cuticle and thus they're not refrigerated in the supermarket and thus don't need to be refrigerated at home.

When I pick the eggs from our free as in "can come and go as they please" chickens in the morning, some of the eggs I have been stepped all over by careless chickens with dirty feet and thus I like to wash those eggs and they can either then be dipped in mineral oil to mitigate the need for immediate refrigeration or as I frequently do, I put them in the fridge after I wash them. If the eggs are clean, I don't wash them and leave them on the counter where I treat them as good for 2-3 weeks without a second thought. Of course, if I were selling these eggs, which sometimes I do, it's usually less of a ball ache my explaining why they don't need refrigeration than it is just to wash them and tell people just to keep them in the fridge as normal - <USER2> they want the whole "farm fresh organic treated like wild chickens" experience, in which case I tell them to keep them on the counter in a little wicker hay lined basket for that farmhouse vibe... and eat them up within a week... because that way they'll buy more.

</comment><comment><USER27> Please excuse me if my question is dumb, I've never been to the US so I might just be uninformed...

I've noticed in movies and shows that eggs in the US usually have a white shell, whereas in other countries (at least the ones I have lived in, i.e. Europe, SE Asia and Australia) they are usually of a colour that I would describe as beige/light-brown. is that because of the washing process described in the article, or is it just because of the hen's breed?

<comment><USER28> Egg color is actually a genetic characteristic. The most common layer of white eggs is the Leghorn Chicken, which is pretty common in American factory farming. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leghorn_chicken](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leghorn_chicken) I think a big aspect is just that there is a cultural expectation of eggs being white in the US. 'Free range' and Organic brands often choose chickens that lay brown eggs though, as a way to distinguish their product and appear more 'natural'.

 _edit:_ auto correct.

<comment><USER29> It's opposite in Europe, eggs are typically brown, while the white ones are considered more 'natural'.

<comment><USER30> If I, being from the UK, see white eggs I assume they're duck eggs. I certainly wouldn't consider white eggs, of any kind, to be more natural though.

<comment><USER31> When I was a kid in the UK eggs were generally white, but brown became more fashionable at some point (more wholesome like brown bread?).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> If this interested you, then you might also be interested in water glass, or sodium silicate [1]. It is still used today by some sailboat crews to keep fresh eggs on board without refrigeration for up to five months, without resorting to powdered eggs.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_silicate#Food_preservat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_silicate#Food_preservation)

</comment><comment><USER33> Ah ha! I had always wondered why we'd buy a crate of 24 eggs at Carrefour in France when I lived there for two years, just off the grocery floor. I didn't feel bad not refrigerating them there, but of course must do so again now. Satisfying answer.

<comment><USER34> I live in Italy and most supermarkets only have refrigerated eggs with Carrefour being the notable exception and I found it weird when I first saw eggs outside the refrigerator

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Whenever I buy eggs from the store I refrigerate them. My chickens and ducks however I don't bother with. Eggs don't last long around my house, have a few labradors who I feed a home cooked diet in which eggs are a daily item.

I think the washing/not washing discussion is interesting. It really highlights a difference in food approaches between the US and EU. One of the things that really annoys me about the US is the raw milk stuff. I live in PA so I can get raw milk pretty easily; live a mile from a raw milk farm that's been in business since 1840 or something. This farm has a good track record, some others don't. I remember in Mike Pollan's Netflix's documentary series the part about the cheese nun and the FDA. The FDA individual simply stated that in France the practices are much more rigorous than the US. Why can't we develop a system that allows raw milk from farmers who follow similar procedures? Why can I still not buy raw milk cheese under so many days old directly from France? The ban probably angers me more than anything since I'm really big into cheese and raw milk cheese from France tastes better than pasteurized stuff. Raw milk itself I'm content with since I get it from the farm nearby. It's what I grew up on, whenever I have milk from other sources the differences are night and day. The differences in food approaches is interesting.. and really shows how far the US has gone off track. Not to mention the damn ban on tonka beans.

</comment><comment><USER36> Wait, this is seen as an American thing?

Because I'm from the UK, and most people I know here store boxes of eggs in the fridge. That's how we've done it for decades, and that seems to be the 'norm' where I live. Certainly never seen any eggs laid out in a bowl on a table or worktop.

Maybe it's a regional thing here?

Edit: Just checked online a bit. Seems like it's a matter of individual opinion here, based on this Guardian thread:

[https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-26...](https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-26086,00.html)

The Daily Mail run a 'study' about it:

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2421530/So-eggs- frid...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2421530/So-eggs-fridge- Scientists-crack-age-old-argument-chilled-room-temperature-best.html)

And there's a Yahoo News UK article saying not to:

[https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/never-put-eggs-in-the- frid...](https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/never-put-eggs-in-the-fridge-- a-dozen-food-myths-that-could-cost-you.html)

Certainly doesn't seem like a unanimous difference between countries.

<comment><USER37> They may be kept in the fridge at home, but I don't recall ever seeing them refrigerated in a shop

<comment><USER38> What an individual does in their own home is their own business, no matter how depraved.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> While the rules on eggs are the same the culture is not. In Austria most stores sell eggs refrigerated where as in the UK they so not.

<comment><USER40> mhm, only Hofer doesn't chill them. And sometimes Spar with eggs from local farmers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Italy here and I've always refrigerated eggs. I didn't even think about it: fresh food goes into the fridge bu default.

<comment><USER42> But they are not sold refrigerated, right? In the US they would.

<comment><USER43> They are usually sold refrigerated in Italy

<comment><USER41> Not where I buy them (COOP).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> I live in Sweden and we've kept our eggs unrefrigerated in our home. However, we recently sponsored a chicken and now get to buy more ethically obtained (in my opinion) eggs from a small local farm in batches that might last a month or so. The farm owner recommended that we refrigerate the eggs, I suspect because we are not using them as quickly as you would otherwise go through a carton of eggs from the supermarket. I'm also not sure what period of time the eggs are collected over, so they could very well already be a week old by the time we receive them. So now we refrigerate to be safe.

</comment><comment><USER9> There's a similar thread (for a different article) with 78 comments here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8029882](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8029882)

</comment><comment><USER45> Raised chickens for some time. Noticed my eggs would "sweat" when I'd take them out of the refrigerator vs store bought which do nothing at all; after a time at room temperature they'd reabsorb. I'd imagine that's pretty dangerous if you're running a cesspool operation - pulling in liquid contaminated by whatever is on the shell.

<comment><USER46> Are you sure you're not describing condensation and evaporation, rather than sweating and absorption?

<comment><USER45> Would take much longer for condensation to evaporate at room temperature

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> French here : eggs are usually sold refrigerated (Leclerc, Auchan - but not my SuperU for instance) and I keep them in the fridge, like everyone I know (and have seen manipulating eggs)

</comment><comment><USER48> Interesting; explains why my Chinese friend has a habit of leaving the eggs out on the counter after taking them out of the fridge. Thought she was just absent-minded.

Seems like it would be fine for them to blow them off with air, and irradiate them. Then if there's some crap stuck to them you at least won't be getting salmonella.

<comment><USER49> Chicken feces can be infected with salmonella. So if that gets in to your food...

<comment><USER48> That's why I said _irradiate them_ , please read comments before getting so up in arms.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> A related question is: how do you optimally store _boiled_ eggs? (And how long can you keep them?)

</comment><comment><USER40> In Austria (AUSTRIA -> EUROPE, NOT AUSTRALIA ;-] ) most of the eggs are chilled and people chill them also. I see very rarely some eggs not in the supermarket fridge and asked myself at this moment: how they prevent the eggs from decay

<comment><USER51> I have never seen anyone NOT put them in the fridge. The same goes for my time in France and England. This article is "America vs the rest of the world" clickbait. At least the headline is clickbait. The part about washing and the "protective cuticle" was interesting.

<comment><USER52> Living in the UK here. Never heard of such a crazy idea as putting bread/eggs in the fridge. I don't entirely think this discussion is without merit

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> I live in China. Shouldn't keep the eggs in the refrigerator a common sense?......

<comment><USER54> In my city eggs are sold unrefrigerated in a bag or in a huge pile for you to pick from. This is in a grocery store. The wet markets sell them similarly, though I have been to them a lot less.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> I refrigerate my eggs because I keep them for months sometimes before eating.

</comment><comment><USER56> I refrigerate everything. Cold makes everything last longer

</comment><comment><USER57> SciShow did a great little video on this.

[https://youtu.be/LJwO5SdGcLk](https://youtu.be/LJwO5SdGcLk)

</comment><comment><USER58> This differs between Europe countries, in ex-Yugoslavia (Serbia, Croatia, etc.) eggs are not washed, but we also usually keep them refrigerated.

</comment><comment><USER59> america here, we used to own chickens -- the rule my wife told me is if it's fresh--it can sit for 1-2 months without putting in fridge, if it's store bought it must be refrigerated because of the cuticle. -- Though not sure on store-bought but un-washed eggs, since there's obviously handling and processing between farm and home it could obviously shorten the life span.

</comment><comment><USER60> Would it be possible to sterilize the eggs without destroying the cuticle? Like with heat, radiation, or ultraviolet light?

<comment><USER61> Unless after sterilization you would also seal them in plastic or something, they will become "non-sterile" again.

Pasteurized milk is sealed.

<comment><USER62> you might just want to kill one strain of bacterium that live in the soil and around hens, not actual complete sterilization.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER63> Same reason as the peanut butter jar because far easier to find. But did have to explain to wife when we married.

<comment><USER64> If you have "natural" peanut butter (ground peanuts and a bit of salt), refrigerating after stirring the separated oil back in helps to keep it from separating out, again.

It also makes it a bit less "oozy" when spreading it on bread. For those of use who like a thicker helping of PB with our J, another plus. :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> in Israel every egg carton has a stamp stating an expiry date if refrigerated and an expiry date if not.

</comment><comment><USER66> Probably because rats, racoons, opposums, dogs, skunks, snakes, etc love to trace and steal eggs.

</comment><comment><USER67> We get our eggs from local farmers who raise chickens in old fashioned coops. In addition to tasting much richer without having to pay for "organic" eggs (because they get to run around and eat bugs), they keep longer as well. We don't bother refrigerating them either.

</comment><comment><USER68> The article should be titled "Why Do Americans Wash Their Eggs?"

<comment><USER69> Other countries that wash their eggs include Australia, Sweden and Japan

<comment><USER70> ... but up until recently, Australia did _not_ refrigerate the eggs in grocery stores! (yuk!)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> Scishow already covered it

</comment><comment><USER72> Why are so many headlines needlessly in the form of a question?

</comment><comment><USER73> Because it gets 100+ degrees in the summer?

<comment><USER74> Ironically, not in the US because we also love air conditioning.

<comment><USER75> Nice generalization. I've never had AC and almost nobody I know has AC. It's not unusual to reach 90F (32C) in the kitchen and other rooms in summer.

<comment><USER74> About 90% of US homes have AC, you're very much outside of the norm.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER76> Food goes in the fridge.

A place for everything, and everything in its place.

Keeps your life uncluttered and tidy.

</comment><comment><USER77> I love how, once again, the states are clueless, forcing companies to wash the eggs on one continent, and forcing them not to on the other continent. Another useless law, hampering the production of vital goods.

<comment><USER78> What do you base that observation on? The article doesn't address whether washing + refrigeration is safer than leaving the membrane in-tact and not refrigerating. In fact, it hints at the exact opposite, saying Japan adopted the US method after a major salmonella outbreak. Who's right, or more importantly, does this even matter?

<comment><USER79> I did not read the article as I got fed up with playing the "chase the close box in this overlay" game. However, most egg vendors in Japan neither wash, nor refrigerate eggs. The main exception I can think of are the eggs at the convenience store. In my town, they even have vending machines for eggs that the local farmer fills up every 2 or 3 days. They are unrefrigerated and the eggs sit happily there are 35 degrees C in the summer.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Unstatus: Free hosting for dynamic, server-side (PHP) status pages - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/turbo/unstatus <comment><USER2> Seems odd to me. Why would I use this as opposed to a normal PHP host, or some kind of Status SaaS that already exists?

And if I want to save money I could create a github page which polls my service via AJAX.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, a "normal" PHP host usually has at least some cost attached. This doesn't.

> And if I want to save money I could create a github page which polls my > service via AJAX.

I covered that in the first paragraph of the README.

<comment><USER2> > I covered that in the first paragraph of the README

Not really. Because you can host a static page on a different infrastructure to your main service.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, really. I specifically talked about GitHub pages:

> Static pages can be hosted for free with GitHub pages, but these can only > contain client-side code.

And your other point:

> you can host a static page on a different infrastructure to your main > service

Well, yes. That the point. That's also why the title here says dynamic and server-side.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> It is quite ironic that GitHub has a "Major service outage." exactly the day unstatus goes public :)

</comment><comment><USER3> I can't see any code in the repository. An example would be helpful.

<comment><AUTHOR> Example for what? The repository holds the source code for hosted status pages. It's empty because no one submitted any pages yet. There's nothing you have to install, build or use.

unstatus.site simple hosts whatever this repository contains. Basically it's a (peer)-reviewed PHP hosting. You make a PR to include your page and that's it :-)

<comment><USER3> Already understood. Nevertheless an example would be helpful. E.g. with [https://unstatus.site/foobar](https://unstatus.site/foobar)</comment></comment></comment>