Our software must get better - <AUTHOR> http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2016/04/our-software-must-get-better.html <comment><USER4> I dig Seth Godin a lot, but the real reason that software trends toward mediocrity over time is that the code base generally becomes an unmaintainable pile of crap. I find this this takes place over the course of years due to:

1\. Tight development timelines that encourage features getting slapped in quickly at the expense of proper refactoring or architecture.

2\. A shifting or unclear product spec - sometimes so dramatic that refactoring or rewriting is prohibitive (a hack is born)

3\. The fact that many developers will touch the code over time. Not only will developers have differing code styles, the preferred code styles and patterns of the language and framework change over time too. The attitudes and level of commitment changes over time as original developers leave and new ones come in. If the code finally gets shipped to an outsourcing firm, you can bet that any last traces of quality are going to disappear.

This doesn't just happen at lazy or cheap firms - I've seen projects with an incredibly strong development team devolve over time too. It can be prevented, but it happens more often than not.

PayPal? Imagine the twisted bunch of cgi they probably still have lying around in their core code base. I'd be willing to bet there are still traces of Peter Thiel and Elon Musk in there, and nobody wants to touch it

<comment><USER5> The problem of software quality is complicated and difficult to reduce to a single set of issues. I don't think anything you've said here contradicts what Seth wrote.

I think he's right, though, that economics is the fundamental problem. We bang out code quickly to meet deadlines measured in months despite the decades-long impact a poor decision can have (see JavaScript for example). When we find ourselves slowing down, we add more people to write more code; why are we surprised when our software becomes bloated?

But if we missed our deadlines too much, we'd lose the market to our competitor, who wrote their software more quickly. And if we didn't hire more programmers, we'd lose again to our competitor, who hired tons of people to add attractive features.

It seems impossible to write good software without losing in the free market. IMO we should be thinking about how to support software projects outside of market-based corporations.

<comment><USER6> JavaScript seems an odd choice for an example. Sure, you can look only at the oddities of the language, but you could also look at it as the choice to allow dynamic scripting in web pages. At that level, it has been a hugely enabling choice that I would not label as a poor decision.

That is, there is no real evidence that any other choice would have obviously gone better. Why assert it?

<comment><USER7> A few days by one person was spent on writing v1. Hundreds of years have been lost dealing with poor choices made over those days. That's not to say they did a poor job, just the timeline was crazy.

<comment><USER6> My point is you are focused on the losses, with no guarantee that other choices would have had the same gains.

Basically, this is an assertion without a valid comparison to back it up. I've become too much of an empiricist in my age.

<comment><USER7> At some point it would have been to late or to complex etc. But, an extra week would have more than doubled the time he had to work with. Pretending that's going to give anything close to an optimal solution is silly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think the problem stems from the customer not caring about the quality of software. That combined with wanting it for nothing. They may _say_ they care about it, but when you look at their behaviour, and not at what they say, they really don't care at all. It could literally delete all their files and most would shrug and go, oh well. What are you going to do?

When software users really start to care, and are willing to put their money where their mouth is, then you will see general software quality improve.

<comment><USER9> Also, people who pay for the software are not the same ones who use it / care about the quality. This may mean different things too:

\- when outlook sucks, you're likely not the one who bought it for the company and they in turn likely don't even have a choice - it's a requirement

\- when your company accounting package sucks, again you're unlikely to be the one who decided to buy it - it's a company / budget / b2b sales decision

\- when the printer driver is bloated and sucks for 10k reasons, you're not the one who paid for it - you bought the printer, the company producing the printer bought the driver (paid for creation to requirements) and you don't get a choice

\- etc. etc.

For a single person it's hard to bargain using money. I won't pay for Windows. My laptop came with it anyway and part of the price went back to MS. Even if I cared about the quality of Windows, there's nothing I can do at this point to influence it.

The big software packages are just completely detached from their users at this point. As long as they match requirements and don't break on global scale, they're not going to change.

<comment><USER10> You could influence Windows by buying a Mac instead. And arguably that has happened. Before OS X started taking off, Windows Longhorn was about trying to do object oriented filesystems and other stuff. It ended up as Vista, with semi-transparent window borders.

<comment><USER11> Really interesting perspective. In this example, external competition created a worse product than if they were left as a stagnating monopoly?

<comment><USER10> Before OS X the Windows team were hardly focused on the UI at all. OO filesystems weren't going anywhere. At least Vista shipped and had some new features.

<comment><USER12> > OO filesystems weren't going anywhere.

Really? Have we forgotten Smalltalk machines so quickly?

<comment><USER10> Smalltalk machines?

The question is not did we forget, but who had anything to remember about them in the first place?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> _1\. one piece of software can be used by a billion people, no extra cost per person. Unlike candy or anything physical, it doesn't cost more per user (not a penny more) to have more people use great software instead of settling for good software._

I strongly believe that you could spend all of the money on Earth on a software project for a billion users and you still wouldn't have something that all of the billion actually like and enjoy using. There's so much cultural variation between people globally that there simply isn't a pattern that fits everyone.

If you want your software to be universally accepted as something good you have to accept that you'll need lots of different versions of it.

To that end, Seth's assertion that "it doesn't cost more per user" is quite wrong.

<comment><USER14> Yes, it's argument from the classic "80/20 myth" post by Joel Spolsky ([http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000020.html](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000020.html)). The more people you want to reach with your software, the more bloated it has to become to be successful. The only choices are to accept and embrace that fact, or split the feature set and write variations on the software aimed at different niches.

<comment><USER15> I think it's possible to write opinionated software; often it turns out that those must-have features aren't actually must-have at all. Joel's own Trello is a good example of something that severely limits its functionality compared to its competitors, and ends up much better as a result.

<comment><USER14> It works because he is targeting a subset of all users. He is willing to give up on some potential customers who want some features that the product does not offer. He is also willing to lose actual customers who outgrow the product to competition.

I think it works because he hasn't yet reached the critical mass of users when it doesn't. It is probably a good strategy ("do things that don't scale").

GitHub did the same thing, by the way. Remember slide 56 of this slide deck from 2011: [https://speakerdeck.com/holman/how-github-uses-github-to- bui...](https://speakerdeck.com/holman/how-github-uses-github-to-build- github)? Since then a lot happened, including [https://github.com/dear- github/dear-github](https://github.com/dear-github/dear-github).

Regarding another of Joel's products, this was the top comment on the HN thread "Why Fogbugz lost to Jira": [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10314403](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10314403)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> He keeps using the word "better", but then the prime example he cites is "Roon" vis-a-vis iTunes. Go to their site[1], and check the comparison of their superior user experience (...) with a "meh" counter-example.

And you know what? I actually like the "meh" _a lot_ better. iTunes used to look that way in the beginning, before they went all color-crazy and web-like.

There are certain properties of software where you can clearly label a competitor or new version better: Fewer bugs, faster operation, no superfluous user interaction. But beyond that, we quickly enter the areas of taste, not quality. And, y'know, _de gustibus_...

[1]: [https://roonlabs.com/](https://roonlabs.com/)

<comment><USER17> > Fewer bugs, faster operation, no superfluous user interaction

The only music player which fulfills all of this and much more is foobar2000. There is nothing else which comes even close to it.

Looking at the Roon webpage:

> Forget everything you know about music players. Music is an experience, and > Roon reconnects you with it.

Experience? Why does everything has do be an experience? I just want to manage my library and listen to music and not fight against miles and miles of whitespace and padding and "beautiful graphics" to actually find my content.

> We have more convenience than ever, but no feeling of excitement or > engagement.

I don't want to be excited or enganged, I just want to listen to music...

> What you get is a searchable, surfable magazine about your music.

Searchable? I bet that foobar2000 is way more searchable than Roon will ever be.

> "It's light years beyond any current app."

lol

Perhaps I am just in the wrong target demography but there is not a single thing on that page which would convince me to switch to Roon. foobar2000 is the vim/emacs of the music player world and everything else is just a copy of notepad.exe with some fancy graphics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been quietly advocating the mutual model for a while now.

Free (Libre) Software is great where it works, but that seems to be areas where the users are also programmers. You can't really gain the benefits of software freedom if you're not a programmer, so your experience degenerates into using it because it's zero-cost and your best chance of getting a change you want is to complain on a hostile mailing list.

People say that non-developer users should be able to hire developers to sort out problems in Free or Open software, but in practice this very rarely happens.

In a software mutual, the source would be closed but with a guarantee of opening it up if the mutual could not continue. Possibly with an option of source licenses for mutual members. However, there would be two key differences from a Free project:

\- users who'd not paid wouldn't recieve the benefit of the software; no free- riders (modulo piracy, obviously)

\- development choices would be made by vote of paying members, not just developers.

<comment><USER10> That's pretty interesting as a model.

Is voting the right way to influence developer choices though, or is a more market based solution the right approach (like using subscription fees and thus loss of fees = feedback that the decisions are wrong).

<comment><USER18> I was thinking of both, really: pay for software, get a vote in its future. Possibly split into an upfront + ongoing membership payment, as software needs long-term maintenance. People who haven't paid wouldn't get a vote.

The intent is to fill precisely those areas where the current software market has failed, so we know that a pure market solution is not going to deliver what a particular set of users want.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> After reading a lot of Christopher Alexander I came to the conclusion that the key is to build for people.

This applies to buildings but also to software.

I think Seth is talking about this.

So don't build (sofware) for:

      - <USER2>
      - <USER3>
      - cars (urban planning)
      - the looks of it (using art is no fun)

<comment><USER20> Unless of course the people you're building for are actually interested in status, money, cars and aesthetics (ok I know you didn't mean their status and money but anyway).

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Also see a the discussion on HN: Why Shitty Products Survive (and Thrive!)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10994721](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10994721)

</comment><comment><USER22> tl;dr: The software market is still largely free and unregulated, and as a result, the tradeoffs made in producing software tend to reflect the preferences and priorities of many millions of different people from many diverse backgrounds. And these people don't share the preferences and priorities of Seth Godin, and that's why software sucks.

</comment><comment><USER23> After reading through the comments, there is one more thing to throw in the mix: software can only be as good as the tools you develop them with.

I'm building the same app for Android and iOS, and the latter is ways quicker. Even with last week's new Android Studio 2, it takes at least twice as long to build the changes and run a new update on Android. (Not to mention testing with multiple screens, emulators etc.)

Not surprisingly that shows in developer's salaries, and imho the quality of the products.

</comment><comment><USER24> Seth has written some great stuff in the past but this was not his finest.

        > 1. one piece of software... no extra cost...

There is a cost. Additional bandwidth for downloading. Additional language translations. Additional operating costs.

        > 2. fixing software today fixes it for everyone, in the world, going forward ...

This is terribly fallacious. In most cases it's impossible to make software always work because of external dependencies (for example government policy of time e.g. DST).

        > Alas, software tends to be mediocre. There are a few reasons for this:

Compared to what? I think Seth is myopic here and is not looking at the big picture. Most software is absolutely incredible in what it does. Ask and show anyone over a certain age that is not technologically biased and they are amazed what software is capable of.

Even gimmicky iPhone Apps are pretty impressive compared to where were 40 years ago.

Compare this to cars 40 years ago.

The rest of Seth's points basically apply to almost everything else in the world (from politics to food).

I just feel like I have heard this so many times (e.g. why does software suck).

</comment><comment><USER25> So, none of the reasons that software is mediocre is that developing, and maintaining, great software is actually hard?

Instead he claims it's all just due to market (lock-in, free) and management (more people) reasons.

That strikes me as being somewhat cynical, but perhaps I'm not reading it right.

Personally I think the bar is pretty high for software, since it's all mainstream now it's hard to get by with under-delivering in terms of features, which makes even "simple" things kind of complicated, which often necessitates at least a slightly larger team than before. Having a larger team I think makes quality harder to achieve due to the "committee-factor".

<comment><USER26> Of course building great software is hard. So is building great buildings, or designing great planes, or producing great, internationally sold cereal.

The commitee factor is a problem in anything provided internationally to millions of users, as well as in anything sold for hundreed thousands of dollars to single customers.

I don't think software is inherently more difficult than other products with comparable scope and scale. If anything, in software it's easier to develop and provide a product with big scope or big scale than in most other fields. In software you can often achieve quality and scale at the same time with a team smaller than the one of your local hardware shop.

But I agree with the author that in software, like in some other fields, a lot of the incentives are not aligned to create great software.

<comment><USER27> > The commitee factor is a problem in anything provided internationally to > millions of users, as well as in anything sold for hundreed thousands of > dollars to single customers.

As with anything in life, things are never black and white but filled with grays. For example, I'd much rather my banking software or the avionics of a plane that I am about to board be designed and built by committee rather than the local hotshot cowboy coder who wants to rebuild everything from scratch with whatever happens to be the tech stack-of-the-month. Great software is often boring and un-sexy and not everything can be built by two developers in a bedroom.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> awinter-py > fixing software today fixes it for everyone, in the world, going forward > (and for connected computers, going backward as well).

this would be true if reality didn't change underneath it. the people who are saying 'maintenance is where this breaks' are right.

Not sure I agree with the author that 'our software _can_ get better' but it would definitely be nice. Software exists in an ecosystem and there are 'resource and competition' reasons for bad software that aren't visible if you just look at the codebase.

</comment><comment><USER28> So can anyone else vouch for Endicia? We use Stamps.com for our shipping at work, and nobody really likes it. But I don't want to recommend something that is only marginally easier/faster/better. Is it truly a noticeably better piece of software like Seth says?

</comment><comment><USER29> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_Whys](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_Whys)

</comment><comment><USER30> "But let's not pay any more for it, or pay devs any more."

</comment><comment><USER31> I can not believe that he thinks software's biggest problem is that most of it is free. His description of users as "bait" whose habits will be tracked (which seldom occurs with free software, I can only think of fewer examples than the number of fingers on my one hand) seems to exclude the fact that paid software (hello! Windows 10?!) can do the same thing.

Anyone against free and/or open-source is an obvious shill or just plain greedy.

<comment><USER32> I don't think he means free as in freedom.</comment></comment>


Rocket Launch Seen from the International Space Station [video] - <AUTHOR> https://boingboing.net/2019/03/15/rocket-launch-seen-from-the-in.html <comment><USER2> Here is a NASA page with more details: [https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap181126.html](https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap181126.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> Wow, absolutely incredible footage. Feels like you are watching some sci-fi video. Thanks for posting this. I wonder how much work went into prepping the camera, adjusting the angles, etc. Talk about lots of prep work and being in the right place at the right time.</comment>


You Want A Gun? Then Do Something For Me - <AUTHOR> http://timkellogg.me/blog/2012/12/22/guns-and-responsibility/

<comment><USER2> The idea isn't bad per say, but while it may be a good solution for you, it may not be the best solution for everyone. I live in the south, and I know a lot of people would be outraged at the idea of this. When it comes down to it, most people are selfish. They think having a gun is to protect them and their loved ones, not me or you. They wouldn't like the fact that they have to spend extra time and money for their 'God given right' to bear arms. An 80 hours course isn't going to stop people from being violent, look at the hijackers of 9/11, they had to go through and get their pilot training which costs thousands and a lot of time, and that just shows where there is a will there is a way and a course might help these situations but nothing is going to totally alleviate them.

I don't think a lot of people who don't live in the south or a rural area understand how guns are used in normal culture in places like here. People go out and hunt. A lot. They go target shooting, they have competitions, etc. It's a big deal and it's an issue that sits very close to the heart of a southern person.

I personally am not sure what should happen, but these are just some things I have seen and grown up around. Almost everyone has a gun here, most of them never get shot, but they are still really prevalent.

</comment><comment><USER3> Taking the argument to its logical conclusion: if you aren't willing to kill on behalf of the unarmed, you aren't worthy of defending yourself. Kill for me, or you deserve to die. That logic seems flawed.

<comment><AUTHOR> That is in fact the logic of the the pro-gun party. Since politics is about compromise, might as well run with it...

<comment><USER3> In what way, in fact, is that the logic of the "pro-gun party?" I myself have not heard the NRA or others ever say that non-gun owners deserve to die. Please elaborate.

<comment><AUTHOR> They say that "guns protect us". How do they protect us? Is a bystander supposed to lift up their shirt, revealing a gun tucked into their waist, forcing the bank robbers to run away? I think the NRA and Republican party have already assumed that they're instructing the general public to kill, or at least wound, on behalf of public safety.

<comment><USER3> Having the ability and/or willingness to protect others is entirely different from mandating it. The NRA is asking for the ability to exercise the right to defend oneself (and others) if needed, without censure. You would require that civilians purposefully put themselves in that situation - to go looking for trouble - in order to have that right of defense.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> _All assault rifle owners are required to serve as volunteer police_

If someone wants to use a gun for criminal purposes, it's hard to imagine that giving them a badge first is going to solve anything.

It just means they could go on their power trip under the guise of police work in addition to doing it criminally.

</comment><comment><USER5> _"the constitution specifically highlights firearms as a method reserved for future use to revolt against the government, if it ever becomes evil."_

I keep reading this, but I don't believe the us constitution says any such thing. Am I (European) correct?

<comment><USER6> You are correct - the 2nd amendment prohibits the US government from infringing the right to "to keep and bear arms" - it does not specify what kind of arms, so knives and swords (and theoretically but not actually) nuclear weapons would all be equally covered - supposedly as a check against tyranny, but this is not spelled out in the constitution, and sedition was made illegal about 10 years after the constitution was ratified.

My personal view, therefore is that the arguments for the 2nd amendment are a ridiculous fiction - as I imply above, US citizens can not actually build up an arsenal of weapons that would enable them to successfully challenge the US Government successfully (see Waco, Move, etc. - build up a big enough armory, you will be taken out).

So in my view gun rights only exist at this point to enrich arms dealers and give the citizenry an illusion of control, at the low, low cost of 80-something of our citizens per day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The difficulty in defining what to regulate is probably the hardest part of the problem and he just throws out a completely unworkable definition.

A double-action revolver would fit his definition of an "assault rifle".

<comment><USER8> Even better depending on what you define as a reload a single action cap and ball could qualify. Restricting to rifles only, if you define a reload as taking bullets from outside the weapon and storing then in the weapon, which seems like a reasonable enough way to define it on the surface, a bolt action rifle with an internal box magazine (aka most rifles) would qualify. Also what would be the mission of the proposed volunteer police force? when would they be called in/up? who would govern and organize them?

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Do people who want food also have the responsibility to feed society?

<comment><USER10> Straw man fallacy. Besides, I don't think I've heard of too many people going on deadly feeding rampages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I will never support any sort of gun control that does not also include disarming law enforcement. Is this not something other people are concerned with?

</comment><comment><USER12> ..."but military service has a way of vouching for their sanity."

Sadly, there are too many who lose their sanity thanks to the military.

</comment><comment><USER13> I wish people would stop using the term "assault rifle" incorrectly. There is only one assault rifle ever, the Sturmgewehr 44.

<comment><USER14> To start making your wish a reality, go update this page and address any concerns various WP editors may have.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_rifle>

<comment><USER13> That page gets it right in the "Definition" section saying the term is basically slang derived from the StG44 and that to be considered an "assault rifle" it must be select-fire. Those are Class III weapons in the US and already very restricted, assuming you have enough disposable income to buy one and find a seller. The example given in the post has nothing to do with Class III weapons, so the term is used improperly, that is my point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This isn't how rights work.

</comment><comment><USER16> > _"No person can own or operate an assault rifle as a civilian except for > honorably discharged veterans, current military officers or enlisted > personnel at E3 level or higher, or persons who have passed an 80 hour > course. All assault rifle owners are required to serve as volunteer police > (or some other analogous public safety service)."_

Because nothing could go wrong with conferring special rights only to members of the military, right?

This proposed solution would have had limited impact on the recent killings that have stoked the current gun control argument. Adam Lanza would've have passed the 80-hour training requirement. Columbine and Virginia Tech was perpetrated by handguns and shotguns. Aurora did involve a rifle but VT still resulted in more fatalities with just handguns. The older perpetrator of the Beltway sniper attacks was an Army veteran.

This is not to say that gun control is bad. But the reasoning behind this solution is very specious.

<comment><USER17> He did mention an 80 hour course.

<comment><USER18> Expecting an 80-hour course to somehow deter a psychopath from shooting up a bunch of people strikes me as rather naive.

<comment><USER4> I agree with your claim, but it's also my understanding that the CT killer (and many murderers in general) stole the gun from a friend or relative.

So a killer wouldn't need to attend the 80 hour course if he had access to a gun purchased by someone who did attend the course.

<comment><USER16> The CT killer used his mother's legally owned rifle and it is said she took him shooting with her on many occasions.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Bubble to Bust to Recovery (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/dataview/2014-02-25/bubble-to-bust-to-recovery.html <comment><USER2> Holy cow, that graph interface. I've never seen something that slick and well- animated without flash. What's the trick behind this?

<comment><USER3> Looking at source it seems to be Raphael.js [0]. They also use _.js [1] and Handlebars for templating [2].

So a bit of javascript, vectors, and CSS animations. It does look rather nice - lot's of effort went into those graphs.

[0] [http://raphaeljs.com/](http://raphaeljs.com/)

[1] [http://underscorejs.org/](http://underscorejs.org/)

[2] [http://handlebarsjs.com/](http://handlebarsjs.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> strange, nothing is showing for me on either firefox or chrome :/

<comment><USER5> works fine for me on firefox (adblock on). you have to click the right arrow ">" for the presentation to begin.</comment></comment>


Impossible - <AUTHOR> http://www.randsinrepose.com/archives/2008/09/14/impossible.html <comment><USER2> I never did like that particular management strategy. If you use the word 'impossible' to motivate your employees to accomplish what is merely difficult to the point of improbable, what will you say when something comes along that really _is_ impossible?</comment>


Fuzzing TCP servers - <AUTHOR> http://blog.swiecki.net/2018/01/fuzzing-tcp-servers.html <comment><USER2> This is a big deal imo. There are many tutorials out there on fuzzing servers, but anything that abstracts away the source code changes necessary to fuzz servers is a great thing. Essentially this is taking what those tutorials do and making it so you don't have to adapt those tutorials to the particular software you are dealing with. If it is easier to fuzz software, more fuzzing will be done leading to more bugs being discovered and fixed.

At The Irssi Project, fuzzing has been very effective in helping to discover bugs. Fuzzing can turn up bugs that aren't otherwise found or that are unreproducible through typical use of the program. See [https://irssi.org/security/](https://irssi.org/security/).

Of course Irssi is a client, not a server. IRC servers often have protections against frequent connections and messages, which can result in fuzzers getting kicked. So this new development in TCP server fuzzing outlined in the article is a great improvement, but there are going to be cases where the code of the server will have to be modified moreso than just swapping out the main function (which I know the author never claims to not be the case).

<comment><USER3> Or, things like DNS servers, where request sent to it, can also induce another request from that server to an upstream DNS server - and it's be good to provide fuzzy data to both those cases (as client and as upstream server).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Very interesting, I didn't think of using AFL for a network level, and I have not heard of Honggfuzz until today.

I thought about doing this earlier and my thought was that this could have been done with something like Scapy or at a basic level hping3.</comment>


Larry Page posts about his voice - <AUTHOR> https://plus.google.com/106189723444098348646/posts/aqy6DvvLJY1

<comment><USER2> > Sergey says I'm probably a better CEO because I choose my words more > carefully.

This is almost the exact same thing members of the band Def Leppard said about their drummer when he lost his arm in a tour bus accident. They said the limitation caused him to become a better drummer.

Def Leppard subsequently became one of the most successful hard rock bands in history when their first album post-accident, "Hysteria," sold 20M copies. Several of the beats on that album became legendary, including the beat to "Pour Some Sugar On Me" [1]

I wonder how we could teach ourselves these lessons (without injury, of course).

[1] <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UIB9Y4OFPs>

<comment><USER3> Ask anyone who knows anything bout music - Rick Allen is a not a great drummer.

John Bonham, Dave Lombardo, Bill Ward, Peart, even Dave Grohl is better than Rick Allen.

<comment><USER4> Rick Allen is a great person for continuing with his drumming career with one (1) arm. Nobody's claiming he's a "great drummer" and your insensitivity doesn't contribute much here. The comment section is not a record store.

Many people have stronger voices than Page, but the point still stands that it's how you approach your adversity that counts.

<comment><USER5> In all fairness to Mel Gibson above "Several of the beats on that album became legendary" would seem to imply he was a great drummer. I agree it's rather odd to take issue with what was an unusual analogy to begin with but it was hardly an outlandish response/comment.

<comment><USER6> Mel Gibson? I don't get that but his response was fair and considered and correct. The OP trolled a highly subjective argument about who's the best drummer which completely missed the point of the original comment and the entire story.

<comment><USER7> "braveheart" is part of his handle

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Generally, I appreciate it when people with a condition or a risk factor speak out. I look forward to a day when diseases of all kinds are de-stigmatized, and each voice helps.

Curiously, I went to fill out the survey linked from Larry's post, and after I indicated that I don't have vocal cord paralysis, the survey was over for me. Somehow, I'm surprised they weren't interested in collecting denominator / negative information from those without the condition.

<comment><USER9> > _after I indicated that I don't have vocal cord paralysis, the survey was > over_

They're not collecting information from people without the condition.

This is simply their way of getting rid of people who shouldn't be filling in the survey.

I think it's actually a reasonable UI decision. They could have done it one of two ways:

1\. Have the page say, "Fill in the survey ONLY IF you have the condition".

2\. Anyone can fill in the survey. But the first question determines whether you are a candidate or not.

They chose #2.

<comment><USER8> Yes, it's a nice UI decision.

I'm surprised by the business decision. My feeling is that there is often value in collecting information on people without the condition (negative data), should those people somehow feel compelled to participate.

<comment><USER10> I think they realize that the survey prompt is self-selecting enough that they can't get a valid sample of non-sufferers through it, and will have to go elsewhere for a baseline.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> >But I was told that sequential paralysis of one vocal cord following another is extremely rare. "

Same thing happened to me.. I was told by my doctor that it was like winning the lottery twice

I was not amused

<comment><USER12> One of my friend contracted two different rare disease, and one of his doctor made a similar remark. Sometimes you're really lucky, and sometimes you are really, really unlucky ...

It really sucks that so much of those things will probably never be treated properly because there is no incentive to do so. That's why initiatives like this are so great.

<comment><USER13> Health has nothing to do with luck, take it into your own hands (instead of other's hand) and you will see why. Stop giving up on yourself.

<comment><USER14> Ah yes, all of those people with chromosomal diseases should just take their health into their own hands, because it clearly has nothing to do with chance.

</sarcasm>

<comment><USER13> So if your genes are bad, you give up on life? /sarcasm

<comment><USER14> Not what I said. I was specifically calling you out for this comment: "Health has _nothing_ to do with luck."

It was either naïve, ignorant, or a bit of both.

<comment><USER13> You have to work hard for health. If you don't.... you'll regret it by the time it is too late.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> For reference, here's a video of him talking: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=4Mzlp6mIaC4#t=23s)

<comment><USER16> And before the injury: <http://youtu.be/ajxYlACeb4w?t=37s>

<comment><USER17> This is after his first vocal cord was paralyzed, but before the second one was also damaged. You can hear what he called "a slightly weaker voice than normal which some people think sounded a little funny"--it quavers a bit. I was hoping to hear his voice before the first injury, but that was before Google was a phenomenon so there might not be any public recordings of him.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Scott Adams had blogged about it on Nov 8, 2012: <http://www.dilbert.com/blog/entry/larry_pages_voice_update/>

<comment><USER19> He doesn't have spasmodic dysphonia though...

<comment><USER18> Yes. I just thought I'd mention this because I remember reading about it first via Scott Adams blog.

<comment> k-mcgrady But it's completely speculative and wrong. It's not really relevant.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> While I think it's laudable that Larry Page would donate what I presume is a non-trivial amount of money to fund research and treatment into a condition he himself has, i.e. a voice disorder, at the same time I wonder whether he could get a bigger bang for his buck by funding the low hanging fruit. Maximum impact per dollar. Bill Gates foundation has taken this route and I think it's the right thing to do. There's a part of Larry's story that feels slightly egotistical.

<comment><USER21> It's not egotistical, but you could call it selfish. He wants to cure himself. Steve Jobs was on a similar quest to cure cancer - because he didn't want to die. Larry wants to speak normally again.

Behind many non-profits and causes there was a similar personal catalyst. People trying to get rid of the three strikes law or drunk driving were many times similarly motivated into action by a personal tragedy.

<comment><USER22> You don't know what he wants or doesn't want. It _could_ be selfish, but it could very well not be.

Maybe he just had the chance to learn a lot more about this particular disease and so it's more natural for him to invest there. It sure would feel more natural to me to contribute to research on a disease that I have experienced first-hand than to some other random one, even if the random one is more "important." No selfishness there. I would just identify better with the victims and have a more real urge to help them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Love the comment from Sergey : "Sergey says I'm probably a better CEO because I choose my words more carefully"

</comment><comment><USER24> > So I've arranged to fund a significant research program through the Voice > Health Institute, which he will lead.

I find this rather awkward. Here we have someone with a ton of money giving a tiny fraction of it away in a very public manner to a cause that seeks to remedy one of his own personal afflictions. He comes off looking like a good guy, and in the process generates excellent PR for his company and social network. What is the downside? It's as if there isn't one. I don't know why, but it gives me the squeamy jibbly icks. Same vibe as when he gave away flu shots at Target.

I guess I have the following questions. Why do the rich need to be our saviors? Do we really need to justify extreme wealth disparity with extreme condescension? Can't we just shuffle some defense money to healthcare and make democratic decisions about how to allocate healthcare funds? Or, god forbid, raise taxes on the wealthy?

Is the answer really, sorry, no, that's how it has to work in "free market" capitalism?

<comment> brown9-2 It's not a binary decision. Those with the means can still chose to donate some of their money to causes they like, and we as a society can (or should) still chose the way in which we want to allocate public funds towards more health spending or away from defense spending.

Choosing to donate to a cause that affects him personally is no different than when people create charities or foundations or donate money to fund research for diseases that affect their immediate family members - which happens quite often.

<comment><USER24> I agree, more or less, because certainly there's a long history of people creating charities to fill in the gaps left by government. It's the way he's doing it, on Google+ and as the CEO of Google that I don't like. Maybe it's just because of the mixing of personal and work life or something. I don't know why, it just gives me a creepy feeling like I wouldn't want to get involved with the guy. Maybe I'm just jealous because I don't have my own fuck you money.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> > I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's thyroiditis in 2003. This is a fairly > common benign inflammatory condition of the thyroid which causes me no > problems.

Larry is indeed very lucky.

One of my good friends was diagnosed with Hashimoto's thyroiditis after ten years of misdiagnosed and ignored symptoms. (It's a very rare disease, and many of the early signs - weight gain, mood swings, fatigue, etc. - can easily be mistaken for typical adolescence).

In Larry's case, it seems they caught the disease and began treatment before it completely destroyed the thyroid, which is a real danger - if the disease isn't diagnosed by this point, treatment becomes much more difficult, and patients develop heart problems.

Unfortunately, my friend has not been so lucky, and has been suffering with the complications for several years now.

<comment><USER26> > (It's a very rare disease, and many of the early signs - weight gain, mood > swings, fatigue, etc. - can easily be mistaken for typical adolescence)

Thyroid problems are routinely misdiagnosed as non-existent, not only for adolescents. Hypothyroidism in particular may be routinely under-diagnosed due to unspecific symptoms and far too stringent thresholds on thyroid levels.

<http://www.stopthethyroidmadness.com>

<comment><USER10> To the downvoter: if the above is wrong, it's non-obviously wrong enough that it deserves an explanation.

<comment><USER27> (Not the downvoter.)

I've read that site several times. Frankly, while I'm sure a lot of patients don't do well enough on levothyroxine or need more intensive tests than the TSH, I'm very skeptical of people who develop fanatical, rigid opinions about how to treat hypothyroidism without extremely careful and rigorous study, largely because I'm very skeptical about people who develop fanatical, rigid opinions about _anything_ without extremely careful and rigorous study.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> An interesting point was brought from a WSJ article [1] about Paige's situation: "Page's condition has worried the collective tech world and Google investors". Unfortunately, the article doesn't elaborate on this claim so it is tough to determine how true this is but like I said, it is an interesting point and thought-provoking.

[1] [http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2013/05/14/google-ceo-larry- page...](http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2013/05/14/google-ceo-larry-page-reveals- he-has-vocal-cord-paralysis/?mod=e2tw)

</comment><comment><USER29> My brain is screwed up. I initially read this as "Larry King posts about his voice".

Seriously though, I hope Larry Page will recover. It was sad to see Roger Ebert lose a bit of his zest when he could no longer speak and I wouldn't want any more people to be forever silent.

</comment><comment><USER30> I hope he gets better.

I also wonder what happened to selfless, anonymous donations. His affliction doesn't seem (medically or statistically) like something that would require rallying people to the cause, raising awareness, etc. There are conditions that matter, that affect millions (incl. children), that don't let people live normal lives (not kitesurfing - very basic everyday stuff).

The Target flu shot promo didn't seem genuine, neither does this.

<comment><USER31> Why does the donation need to be selfless? This one almost certainly isn't, but I don't see anyone claiming that it is, and I don't see any reason why it needs to be.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> On Bloomberg

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe4fpGUL_q4>

</comment><comment><USER33> It is interesting that he shared this. I like it.

I wonder how it will be perceived. Will stock traders buy or sell GOOG differently now that they found about it (or found out that the public found out) about this issue.

Did he have to get the approval of the PR or board of directors before disclosing it.

</comment><comment><USER34> Couldn't help to notice: <http://i41.tinypic.com/xbszk.png>

<comment><USER35> Thats hilarious!

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Probably not related but it reminded me of Scott Adams' voice disorder, which I only knew about because I knew a fan of his who had the same thing: [http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15446515/ns/health- health_care/t/d...](http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15446515/ns/health- health_care/t/dilbert-creator-recovers-rare-disorder/)

</comment><comment><USER37> I know he has the best voice therapists in the world and there's no chance he'll ever read this but: kazoo. That's my advice for anyone who has to give a speech or get their voice in shape for any reason. Ukulele & a kazoo 45 minutes every day.

<comment><USER26> I saw a study that claimed improvement in sufferers of sleep apnea who played the didgeridoo.

<comment><USER37> That makes perfect sense for breath training, I came upon the kazoo after reading that an early 1900s opera singer never did vocal exercises, she just hummed to warm up. The kazoo works the breath and the vocal cords which are tougher than other muscles, so you can and should work them everyday without fear of injury.

<comment><USER38> Humming _is_ a vocal exercise. It engages the vocal cords.

Not sure why you think humming/playing kazoo should be a good exercise for someone who has damage in the vocal cords. E.g. the common medical advice for someone who with a hoarse throat (due to a cold etc) is to let it rest, i.e., refrain from speaking. But I'd be happy to see studies proving that wrong.</comment></comment></comment></comment>