My offer numbers from big companies - <AUTHOR> https://us.teamblind.com/article/sharing-my-offer-numbers-from-big-companies-for-your-reference-yNgqUPQR <comment><USER2> It seems standard way to get a great compensation is to sit down and exercise all the run-of-the-mill algorithmic questions because that will matter the most in the end. Further optimisation could be made by being less fearful about negotiating the offer. Asking for 10% more would never hurt [1].

I am not a fierce critic of BigCo. interviewing practises but it seems a little disappointing that coding side-projects, contributing to open source, and writing mean so little in getting hired.

[1]: [https://medium.com/we-are-yammer/how-i-negotiated-for-an- add...](https://medium.com/we-are-yammer/how-i-negotiated-for-an- additional-15-000-at-yammer-2d3c137623ec)

<comment><USER3> It's because the vast majority of candidates, including a lot of very good ones, will do none of those things.

<comment><USER4> Work will have much more in common with said open source efforts than with all those algorithmic challenges though.

<comment><USER3> A good chunk of these people will be good engineers that cannot talk about or show the stuff they worked on at their previous job. And those places specifically ban them from making apps or working on open source and they will be hard workers that work 40-50+ hours a week. Maybe they have kids too.

How do you interview these people?

I agree, algo interviews are annoying and I wish it wasn't there. If it wasn't it would make switching jobs a lot faster. But thats what it is. The suggested alternative of portfolio work has it's own problems, the same with homework problems.

Unfortunately, even places that have you write code with the internet still have an algo inteview or two.

<comment><USER5> I had an interviewer ask my for some code samples. Conveniently it was the day after I accepted another offer, but that was a definite no bueno for me, I don't contribute to open source, and I was hardly going to send them some code samples from my previous job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I guess I need to move to Silicon Valley. These numbers are insane for two years and an undergrad degree. I have 32 years experience and I don't get these kinds of offers. This is either complete BS or the guy is a savant. Something smells fishy here.

<comment><USER7> They seem a bit higher than what I would normally expect for 2 year experience; sometimes a successful startup and some salary negotiations can give you a boost.

But recall: $1 USD (SFO) != $1 USD (Almost anywhere else).

And there are some other downsides, you work very long hours in a company of 70%+ men. I think quality of life in South Bay for most isn't as nice as much less affluent places. It depends on your cup of tea, I guess.

[https://www.nerdwallet.com/cost-of-living- calculator/compare...](https://www.nerdwallet.com/cost-of-living- calculator/compare/san-francisco-vs-chicago)

<comment><USER6> According to that site, I'd need to make over $200k to meet my same standard of living, but I still think someone with two years experience can't come close to my knowledge of software development. There are inherent limitations. Of course if the job is to write code without any comment about the big picture and without complaint about hours, then maybe it is competitive. And that signing bonus? That just doesn't translate to the Midwest at all.

<comment><USER8> We just bought a 5 bedroom, 3-1/2 bathroom house with a nice size separate office in the northern suburbs of Atlanta with about 2800 square feet. Brand new build for $335,000 with all of the niceties. I've looked on Zillow, the same square footage, much older home, would be around 2-4 million at least in San Francisco.

<comment><USER9> Yup, _this_ is the major difference. The COL numbers can be explained away, but if you want space now and a retirement later then you can get by with much less work outside SF.

<comment><USER6> In Chicago, it's fairly common to take a regional 50 to 75 minute train ride into the city from a distant suburb. Is there anything like that for Silicon Valley? Can you get an hour away by train and lower housing costs?

<comment><USER10> Sure. Live in the Eaat Bay and BART in.

<comment><USER6> How about that. Clean 1br for around $1500/month and 10 minutes from BART station. That's pricey, but workable.

<comment><USER10> That's actually cheap, depending on the BART station (not all are created equal), the size of the place, whether it's gated, and whether you mean 10 minutes walking or driving.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> 403 Error.

TLDR the author had 2 years experience

1) Google - 140k base, 107.5k RSUs, 50k sign on, 15% bonus

2) Facebook - 160k base, 75k RSUs, 70k sign on, 10% bonus

3) Lyft - 170k base, 180k RSUs, 20k sign on

4) Dropbox - 162k base, 114k RSUs, 10k sign on

5) Airbnb - 152k base, 75k RSUs, 13.5k sign on

6) Palantir - 150k base, 51k stock options, 25k sign on, 25k bonus

<comment><USER12> I cringe every time I see Palantir still on options when their 409a valuation must be very close to their preferred price at this point.

<comment><USER13> From what I have read about the potential Palantir IPO in 2019, they might be valued less than current 20 billion valuation if they IPO, potentially much less. It will depend on how well they do in 2018, that will be key year if they are going for 2019 IPO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> > 2\. What's your background?

> Male. Two years of professional experience. Bachelors. Non-ivy league > school. _Previously from a unicorn startup_. I'm mentioning these because > people ask, not that I think they matter.

Being an alumni from unicorn startup is my guess on why he got these offers.

People are obsessed with salaries and positions which I think is unhealthy. But what I find ironic is that I have always heard the rich talk about how money can't buy happiness or how you should take risks from people who have some kind of backing - monetary/family or like here how background doesn't matter, even with evidence like unicorn or referrals.

Edited for some clarity.

<comment><USER12> Money can absolutely buy a lot of contributing factors to Happiness. However it can't solve your unhappiness.

Also not having money will often cause unhappiness.

<comment><USER15> You're as wise as your username.

To add to your points, money used to invest in experiences with loved ones will certainly add to happiness.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It always strikes me as odd at how much HN complanies about hiring practices in tech. Spend a few weeks with Leetcode and CTCI and you have a decent shot at salaries in this range at the BigCo's (depends on location of course).

What other industry has it's interview process so transparent with such high rewards?

<comment><USER17> If you have a job and any kind of social life, going through 200~300 questions like OP is going to take you more than a few weeks.

A lot of people complain because this is the very example of cargo culting, you hire people who went through the same questions and reject those who haven't, even though it has no bearing on their ability to do the job.

<comment><USER13> Sure but you are forgetting a key factor. Once you get Google/FB/Amazon (or to a lesser extent even a unicorn like Netflix/Airbnb/Dropbox etc) on your CV, that will help you tremendously in your career.

You will get shortlisted for top jobs and bombarded by opportunities by recruiters forever and you will be able to skip any screenings and phone interviews and just go for final onsite interview mostly.

Investing several weeks or couple of months once might be worth it as you will reap benefits for a long time, perhaps until retirement.

You need to consider this before you decide not to spend the time to go through CTCI etc.

<comment><USER17> I've had interviews with most companies you mention. Getting in touch with a recruiter and passing the phone screenings hasn't really been a problem.

Maybe I'm not smart enough, but on-site rounds are a different story. I've practiced CTCI and solved my fair share of questions on Leetcode. Yet I find pretty hard to get back into it on a short notice. It's not a one-time investment. I assume I'm not the only one since

\- The on-site to offer conversion ratio is typically between 6:1 and 8:1 at such companies.

\- Most people do better with practice. It implies that a standardized process is biased towards people who have the opportunity and time to interview a lot for fun. (Some companies let teams do their own hiring though, where this is less of an issue).

Not everyone lives in the valley or in a place with a high concentration of tech companies. At least the Microsoft-era questions such as "how much would you charge to clean all the windows in Seattle" were more equally silly and unfair to everyone, including outsiders.

<comment><USER13> Well I applied for a job at both Netflix & Twitch and never heard back from them. I think if I had Google/Apple/Facebook/Amazon on my CV I might have gotten more recognition. Just my personal opinion, I could be wrong.

Funny thing is, I have been called by Google, Amazon and FB recruiters in London couple of times. But I never went for onsite interview. I figured they can't really match contractor pay and they only outsource "shitty" jobs to London (I told recruiters my contractor rate and asked them if they can match/beat it and answer was no).

<comment><USER17> FB London has many teams doing interesting stuff. I'm not sure about Google (Zürich is bigger and pays more anyway) or Amazon.

Netflix got back to me within a couple hours after a one-click application on their careers page! Unfortunately I had to prioritize other companies at that time, we put things on hold due to the visa situation in the US and I never got the chance to have a technical interview.

Before I left Berlin, Twitch seemed to be hiring engineers there.

<comment><USER13> Yeah, but pay in London is mediocre compared to contracting (for FB and GOOG).

I applied to US. I was never interested in moving to Berlin.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'm in the southeast. 24, self-taught, no degree (I was able to make it through Triplebyte, though I'm not persuaded that actually means anything). 2009-2015 IT/helpdesk/sysadmin, and 2015-2017 more dev/devops, all with a local medium (~350 employee) retail-ish business that grosses about $30m annually if I had to guess. I quit this year for a number of reasons (depression), but I mainly worked on automation. A collection of scripts I wrote (and documented!) saves about 30 days' worth of the team's time annually. I made $22.50/hour. The numbers in this post are unfathomable to me.

<comment><USER19> Switch companies more frequently. Each time you do, you'll make more.

The trick is, you're worth whatever the market is willing to pay. But the only way to find out is to go out on the market. Most people stick with the same job for years, meaning they only check their worth a few times. Hence low salaries.

<comment><USER20> IMO, the key to this is to also increase your responsibilities and skill level - which sounds like the OP has, but some people ignore. It's the difference between a 10% bump and 2x-3x moves early in your career. I also think it's worthwhile to find a good company - growth and culture - and then negotiate well as tech and domain knowledge will make you less replaceable.

One thing that gets ignored on the west coast is how to specialize without hurting your career. In the southeast, we don't have endless tech companies, if you specialize poorly, you could get stuck with relocation being the only answer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I live in the UK, to me these numbers are insane. How are these salaries at that work experience possible? Is the pay increase from then on slow? Are these salaries sustainable for the industry long term? I know experienced professionals who would be considered successful in the UK who finish their careers nowhere near this level of salary (not programmers but certainly engineers). I'm astounded.

<comment> King-Aaron This is what I wonder also. It's like here in Australia, where blue-collar truck drivers can get paid $200k/year. It doesn't seem sustainable... because it isn't.

Edit: This has resulted in what people are calling a "two-speed" economy - [http://archive.treasury.gov.au/documents/1421/HTML/docshell....](http://archive.treasury.gov.au/documents/1421/HTML/docshell.asp?URL=02+The+resources+boom+and+the+two+speed+economy.htm)

<comment><USER22> I knew a 19 year old girl who was driving trucks in a mine in Western Australia. She was on $180K/year. She gave it up after a year though apparently, and I don't know where she is these days so cannot ask her why she left a job that was paying that much only a couple of years out of high school.

<comment> King-Aaron I can give you some direct insight on that.

First of all, she would have experienced _severe_ gender bias. I don't think it needs an explanation when you consider a demographic of mostly low-to- moderately-educated men in the workforce and everyone living in fairly close quarters.

Secondly, the conditions are harsh. You work around 14-hour days in 35-45 degree C heat. This wears out people very quickly. It can get so hot that rubbish bins catch on fire themselves, and you can cook an egg on your car's roof.

And third, people get homesick due to the rosters - usually 2 weeks on, one week off (or similar). It disrupts relationships and takes a big personal toll on people.

There are a lot of people that do it for years - but the majority pull a year or two and then leave.

<comment><USER22> I figured it would have been something like this. She was a fairly attractive young lady. Very capable, but I am thinking she would have copped a fair amount of harrassment just due to her gender.

I am several male friends in the mining and offshore oil rig game too, and those jobs appear to suit young people without a family and little social life. Once relationships and kids come into the equation, that shift regime just doesn't seem to be compatible.

<comment><USER23> I know someone in Brisbane who did the mining thing who went to General Assembly and accepted the first job he could get his hands on - he knew mining wasn't sustainable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> > _Thankfully I had FB and Google referrals else I doubt I would have gotten a > reply at all._

<comment><USER25> This is one of the things that really sucks about the industry. It is a new "boy's club", and if you know people in the club then the barrier to entry is easier (if you can code at a reasonable capacity).

<comment><USER26> The entry fee for a referral is striking up a single conversation at a conference. If someone from a big tech company is speaking at a conference, the fact that they are speaking isn't the primary reason for being present. They are there to recruit.

<comment><USER13> Just having a chat with someone at a conference is often not enough to get a referral tbh. I'd assume for a referral you need to know a person at least reasonably well, i.e. you know each other on first name basis and have been out for a beer or worked together on some open source project or something like that. I don't believe you can just walk to a person at a conference, talk to them to 15 minutes and then ask for their referral.

<comment><USER26> I was a bit brief on tactics. Yes. Don't just ask for a referral.

Tactics:

Understand that they are there to recruit. This should give you confidence. This isn't some weird game, you're not manipulating or tricking them. They are here for these conversations. Some soft-skill tactics don't work for everyone. If some/none of the below materializes or isn't your thing, it's alway okay to ask. "Are you doing any recruiting while in town? I'm interested in talking to someone at NeatCo."

If you can speak at the conference, that is preferable. If not, walking up and saying hi will work but it should involve you asking a well-informed question about the thing they are speaking about. Spend an hour before the conference researching their topic and come with something in mind: What lead company X to create Y? If someone were motivated, could they create ${interesting but not crazy new feature/thing} using Y?

If you don't have a question, just talk about the content of the talk. Tell them what you thought.

The person speaking on behalf of NeatCo will often bring another person with them. The speaker is the domain expert, the other person will often be someone capable of hiring. If they bring a +1, talk to that person as well.

The goal of your chat is to get any of: dinner invite, next-day coffee, straight up ad-hoc interview.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> True, if big.

Anyone could write up such a Blind post. And when it comes to anonymously bragging via lies on the internet, there is no shortage of prior art.

To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if the growth rate of engineering applications to these bigcos has declined over the past few years. A decline in the supply of candidates relative to demand, among other factors, could lead to an increase in compensation per offer.

That being said, I'm still leaning towards this post being BS.

<comment><USER13> But you get these posts on HN quite often with similar numbers. I'd assume all of them are not lying or using fake data to brag. If only some of them are telling the truth then the numbers are real which is why I tend to believe them.

<comment><USER28> The only thing about the post that seems off, is the experience level that's generating that income. It could happen though, it's not implausible. The income figures stand-alone are not abnormal for someone with several more years of experience.

We're looking at maybe 3.7% type U3 unemployment in 2018. The Fed's GDP Nowcast figure is projecting nearly 4% growth for the fourth quarter. Throw on corp tax cuts and possibly infrastructure spending in 2018, and the US economy might expand at something like 3.5% for all of 2018. There's a massive hiring rush going on around things like artificial intelligence, that is vacuuming up immense amounts of engineering talent (depleting the total pool for everything else). These salaries might get crazier yet.

<comment><USER13> Which is good for us (software engineers). I have noticed the same thing in Europe. Even though it's nowhere near Silicon Valley, I have noticed salaries in London rising faster than they used before. So there's definitely shortage of talent and market (supply / demand) seems to be reacting to this and driving salaries up.

<comment><USER28> Definitely. Incomes and growth are starting to pick-up in Europe and Japan (finally) as well. Much of the globe is in sync on this expansion. I'm not sure if that means we're getting close to the next recession pull-back, or if the global economy is finally fully pulling out of the great recession era. There are some indicators aggressively pointing both ways right now. I'd like to see it continue for a while yet just so workers can see a meaningful net wage gain vs 10-15 years ago. At least in the US, corporations can afford to give up some margin due to a tight labor market, given the profit boom over the last decade (plus the inbound corp tax cuts).

<comment><USER13> I hope Japan finally gets a break. They have been in a stagnation for such a long time and it had to be really tough for young people. There is already a sizable lost generation, Japan really needs to get some growth going so the new generation gets some economic boost (and is able to afford to raise a family) and doesn't become second lost generation in a row. That would be really bad.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> If you are making $100K in Albany, GA then to have same standard of living in SFO you need to make $201K: [http://money.cnn.com/calculator/pf/cost-of- living/index.html](http://money.cnn.com/calculator/pf/cost-of- living/index.html)

So SFO/Bay area is _that_ expensive. Most people don't think of that and assume that SFO requires modest 20% increase in cost of living. Absolutely not true. So before you get floored with these numbers you need to divide them by almost a factor of 2 for the corresponding standard of living.

</comment><comment><USER30> 10 years ago I was working for VMware in Palo Alto as an intern and my salary was $5.5k per month. They offered me a permanent position for $75k per year, but I decided to move back to Finland. I would say that those numbers in the article sound believable. Housing costs in the bay area are crazy.

<comment><USER31> Housing costs shouldn't really factor into what the company is willing to pay staff though. It costs the company the same amount regardless of how much it costs the employee to live.

<comment><USER32> Housing costs come in to play when trying to recruit and maintain talent. All cities do not have enough tech talent. Migrant tech workers consider housing costs when deciding which city to move too.

In addition, if salary does not increase with cost of living workers will leave.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> These numbers should be taken with a grain of salt. I live in Zurich, Switzerland and I have a similar salary (~200K) but the high cost of living (which, I assume, is similar if not lower than the Bay Area) make my salary comparable to an "ok" salary in other European countries. Just to give you an idea: the overall cost of school + a nanny for 2 kids under 6 is around 70K year in Zurich.

As other have mentioned, the sign up bonus is quite awesome, but I assume is not the standard in the US either.

edited: nannies -> nanny

<comment><USER34> Also living in Switzerland. I have to comment that ~200K is not "normal" salary here either. To be fair, most people also don't have a nanny for their kids (or more than 1 as you do), and do not pay for private school. Average salary for a Software Dev with >10 years experience in Zurich is somewhere around 130k - 150k.

<comment><USER33> There are no public Kinderkrippe in Zurich. If your kids are under 5, the only option is a private kita - and if live in Zurich you should know how pricey they are.

In any case, my point wasn't about "me". I was trying to highlight the fact that in certain places, a high salary is driven by other factors, such as higher-than-average cost of life, low security (Saudi Arabia), etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> [https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?dataset=&i=$140k+salary+...](https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?dataset=&i=$140k+salary+san+francisco+vs+dallas)

For anyone else that was confused

</comment><comment><USER22> There was a question on gender and race in the article comments. I am wondering how much _does_ this play in the numbers game? Do tech companies ask this in their application process (in SF, USA anyway)? Are they even allowed to? Can they find out? Do they have recruitment teams sniffing out applicant's social media to find out?

Sidenote: One of my favourite replies on the article comments:

> Can you share your gender and race?

>> OP is a female dwarf paladin

<comment><USER36> I'm somewhat confused by your question, but generally it's not a secret what gender someone is based on their resume/application. You may also be able to glean race from this. This information is rarely anonymized.

That said, the "numbers game" doesn't really start until after you pass the on-site, and any inherent bias likely occurs more frequently there since there are more opportunities (likely a single phone screener/resume screener, then 4-6 on-site participants).

From what I've seen in management in SV, bias tends to rear it's head more in the phase of considering on-site feedback in the topic "does this candidate fit in here?" before anything gets to the offer stage.

At the offer stage, the actual financial details are usually left to a different set of individuals, depending on the size of the company (hiring manager, HR, CTO, CEO, etc.). There's a different opportunity for bias here, but I think generally, it's smaller.

<comment><USER22> Well, with Western names, I guess a recruiter can guess at the gender, but with some Sub-continental or Asian names - that can be hard to do.

Which leads me to another question - Do people use pseudonyms to increase their chances of getting through initial screening of their applications?

(Anecdote: I had a (female) business mentor many years ago who said that she had trouble getting businesses to meet with her. Until she stopped using her full name on letters to company executives. She changed her signature from 'Anna Smith' to just 'A. Smith'. She said she then started getting lots of replies addressed to 'Dear Mr. Smith'.)

<comment><USER13> Depends. With Chinese people applying for jobs, for example, Chinese people have English first name as well as their Chinese first name. And they would use their English first name when applying for a job at US or other large international company. So you could definitely guess gender there.

Sub continental names I would agree, if you are European or American it might be difficult to guess the gender from name. But from the resume you might be able to guess it based on other information (lots of people put their photo on their CV which makes this a moot point obviously).

<comment><USER22> > Chinese people have English first name as well as their Chinese first name

I've always been intrigued by this. I assume they do this when they decide to travel to the West for work or study (in order to make it easier to communicate with locals), as opposed to being given dual names at birth?

<comment><USER13> I think it might depend on country. Mainland China I'm not sure about but in Taiwan/HK/SG I think parents choose a second "unofficial" English first name for their children. This is useful exactly for reasons of traveling, studying or working abroad or for multinational corps.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> These seem in line with what I've seen from friends and acquaintances. I've also heard 100K signing bonuses to new grads at FB. [https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-rationale-behind- Facebooks-1...](https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-rationale-behind- Facebooks-100K-signing-bonuses-for-engineers-and-why-havent-other-top- software-companies-followed-suit)

<comment><USER38> It can go up to $125k if you negotiate. I've heard even higher but I'm skeptical of those claims.

I'm just sad I can't get even a fraction of that at my Big4.

Source - multiple friends at FB.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Well this makes me feel terrible... Your sign on was probably for more than I've made in my professional career.

My first job after graduating 10 years ago was for 45k per year.

I have had an awful lot of bad luck since graduating and have yet to be paid more than that since.

Every job I've had paid progressively less, always took them cause I needed the job.

My last programming job paid $14 an hour.

Can anyone offer advice on breaking out of the cycle of terribleness?

I'm a US citizen, bachelors in CS, live in Tx.

<comment><USER40> Regionally: The wealthiest companies pay the highest salaries. In the tech world, those live on the west coast or the east coast. Texas probably isn't going to give you much room to grow in the tech world.

Some of it is regional, and some of it will depend on what you do. The best salaries will go to the most valuable roles, so you may need to find out how to develop a specialty to make your work more valuable.

$14/hour is really low. I don't know what exactly you do, but for most programming that's below the market rate. If you can give me more info I'd be happy to help with advise where I can.

<comment><USER39> I understand that Texas isn't going to pay well, I'm anchored to a wife who has a PhD with extremely limited opportunities that pay decent. So here I am.

The $14 was way below market, some web work, some IT, and some updating a program that I had built for them a year earlier. I needed the cash and it beat flipping burgers or working retail. The place was interesting, people did Bio-Research. I was trying to get my foot in the door and get a better job with them. About that time my wife took a job that brought us back to Texas, outside of San Antonio.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I just get a 403 page instead of an article, probably because I browse via a DigitalOcean IP address.

If this is enough to get me blocked, that's hilarious given that this company's product is supposed to be "anonymous work talk" \- if they like anonymity so much why am I not allowed to browse from whatever IP address I like?

EDIT: And furthermore, all it takes to find out if a company uses Blind is to type in the company name and see what it says. That's a pretty blatant privacy leak right on the company's home page.

<comment><USER41> I get the same thing. It also breaks out of a google cache view.

Here's archive.is: [https://archive.fo/FF094](https://archive.fo/FF094)

<comment><USER14> This is interesting.

Archive:

> 5\. Did you get rejected anywhere?

> Yes, I got rejected by Asana and Instacart at the onsite stage.

Web Link:

> 5\. Did you get rejected anywhere?

> Yes, I got rejected by some smaller startups at the onsite stage.

<comment><USER41> Guess he edited the post _shrug_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Damn... I guess anyone smart should just stop complaining and find a way into the big co.s... Living in midwest this is insane... :) ...congrats....

<comment><USER43> You also need to think about what you'd lose if you were to work for a big company. I do not know your current company, so maybe there is nothing to lose.

<comment><USER42> I just recently quit a Big 8 co and moved to a smaller co (was working remote for a few yrs, wanted to do something local); its just different styles of working; the quality of work isnt much different between each other.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> I just left a company that got aquired by a big US security company, I was offered a 140k bonus (50/50 cash/stock, under the condition of staying min. 2 y) if I stay (because they knew I was probably leaving). The Bonus was several times more than my annual salary (Eastern Europe). Despite all the day dreaming about the numbers I declined and left. Why? Because after 2 years there I was already burned out, had no time, was getting calls at 5am, had to be available 24/7\. I was miserable and had no life and for what? "The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run." - Thoreau. Now I only work 10h a week and am so happy and relaxed, I earn enough to cover my living costs and can use the rest of my LIFE to do whatever I want. Just wanted to share that because I often see people here obsessing about money, but what's the point of it if you can't live?

<comment><USER34> Couldn't you have negotiated that in your offer e.g. I'll take the 140k bonus but my phone is off from 6pm to 8am, only covering night shift on certain days etc. If they say no that's OK, but if they say yes, great.

<comment><USER44> There were other issues which the new company didn't agree on. But I wanted to leave anyway. In the end I followed this: "You can always earn more money but you can never make more time"

<comment><USER45> I think you made the right decision! Enjoy your life friend :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Recruiters who was interviewing this guy must have been all believing he is worth it. Well done.

Have been interviewing people, many with 5+ years of experience and in my opinion it is not too difficult to spot somebody who is not fit for the job.

So well done again.

</comment><comment><USER47> These are insane compared to the UK.

17 years ago I started out on £21k, which was considered pretty reasonable. Two years later I switched job and got £35k and over the next few years until I hit the 10 year mark I pushed it up to almost £50k. At that point AFAICT I was actually doing better than average.

I'm now contracting in the financial world, earning well over twice that figure, but while I can match the salary the various otions, bonuses etc put a guy two years out of college in SV well ahead of the game.

I like the bay area, too...

<comment><USER13> Yes, it's the bonuses and stock options that make the compensation in SV ridiculous. If we compared just base salaries then SV would be ahead but comparisons wouldn't be so silly. But all these sweet RSUs and cash bonuses that are standard in SV make their overall yearly compensation really insane (plus things like 50k sign up bonus... I got no sign up bonus when I moved to London from EU). I wonder why software engineers don't get those kind of bonuses / extra cash on top of base salary in London.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Given with multiple offers, he didn't drive hard negotiation like this guy. [http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part- ii...](http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii/) HN discussion [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11552780](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11552780)

</comment><comment> King-Aaron Jesus christ, $50k as a sign on bonus.

I haven't seen anything like that in Aus for that sort of experience.

<comment><USER26> If you have the flexibility, most of the companies on this list recruit regularly in Australia for roles in the US. You may need to fly state-side of an on-site but the initial round can be done in Melbourne or Sydney.

Tech companies love E3 visas.

<comment> King-Aaron I may look into this, I'm in need of a change of scenery

<comment><USER49> I'll be in Melbourne renewing my E3 visa in late Dec/early Jan. And maybe doing some recruiting for my almost-unicorn company too. Message me if you'd like to get coffee or something. My email's in my profile.

<comment> King-Aaron I'm actually Perth-based, but I do end up in the Eastern States from time to time, I'll see how I go :)

<comment><USER50> My chance to try and swipe a referral bonus, then. I'll be in Perth for Christmas and my lot were sponsoring E3s before it was cool. My work email is firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> Wow. These are high. Anyone know what the numbers are for data scientists nowadays? Also, how hard would it be for a senior data scientist working at a large (non-tech) company on the east coast to get an interview at one of these places?

</comment><comment><USER52> Top notch devs earn less than the quarter of that money around here (I know about the cost of living, but still). No wonder the US is outsourcing all its dreams here, from faceplus to instasnap, from payeasy to dollarpal.

</comment><comment><USER53> How do these numbers carry over to non bay area places like Austin? I've got an offer for 86k base, 4000 RSU, no sign on here in Austin for an L2 at one of those companies in the top 5 and it seems like a joke.

</comment><comment><USER54> Dude is advertising for LeetCode. He's not too clever, easily figured out.

</comment><comment><USER55> Getting a 403 when trying to access the link? Anyone else having problems?

<comment><USER56> Same here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> Anyone have a copy/cache of the content? It's down already.

</comment><comment><USER58> Can someone explain what RSU's are? I'm assuming its something specific to being American and since i'm not i'm afraid i'm not familiar with the term.

Thanks

<comment><USER58> Thank you to those that replied.

<comment><USER59> So that $100k RSU you see in the list should not be considered yearly, but instead something like 25% of it per year?

<comment><USER60> The author claims

> figures above are ANNUAL.

But if he is mistaken on the RSU part, then people might find these offers easier to understand. (-e- but the only thing typically not annual in these numbers is the RSU, so I don't think that mistake is likely)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> These numbers seem high in absolute value but one must compare Cost of Living (insane in the Bay Area I guess) and insurance costs and other living expenses as well

</comment><comment><USER62> I'm guessing he was working at Uber before. Would explain why Lyft wanted him so badly and why Uber is missing from the list of companies he talked to.

<comment><USER13> Could be. Also Uber pays top end salaries so it would make sense with these very high offers as they probably had to at least match but preferably beat his current Uber package (and potential counter offer).

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> SF must have some insane margins to afford this.

</comment><comment><USER60> For those who are incredulous or doubtful, what experience do you think should command $150K Salary and $100K liquid stock in SV?

</comment><comment><USER64> Nah, actually it's totally not any meaning to me. Because the numbers are too impractical to me. Whuu...

</comment><comment><USER26> In every single thread where someone publicly discloses rates like this the comments are flooded with people who use all kinds of FUD to explain why what they've just read must be untrue.

It's strange.

> Are these numbers real?

Yes. I'm not the author, but they don't appear at all unusual to me. SF's developer market is nearly as screwed up as it's housing market (except not really, the housing market is truly something else).

> Is this "normal"?

No. Well… yes and no. These numbers are real and you can get offers like that too. But this type of pay isn't "normal" in the sense of historical norms. Tech isn't normal right now. We have a shortage on one side of the market. It will be relatively short lived. That doesn't mean you should ignore you're ability to make unreasonably amounts of money for the next 10 years. If you're qualified to fill the positions that people are over-paying for, you should totally take that money.

> But this person had "special" access because of ${referral/previous > company/magic}!

Yes. This person did have "special" access. But being granted that access is literally as easy as talking to someone who works for the company that you'd like to work for. Are they attending a conference? Walk up to them. It's really that easy. I know. I've done it.

> No really, this person got lucky because they worked for a unicorn before > applying to these companies. They got lucky by picking a place that happened > to turn into a rocket ship.

Little secret, you don't have to work at a unicorn _before_ applying to a unicorn. There's a phase after everyone knows it's a rocket ship where the company is still hiring like a madhouse. You can join during that phase and still get credit for "picking" a unicorn. You'll likely get a very small piece of an over-saturated employee pool so the equity won't make you rich, but it does allow you the pick of the litter amongst other top tier firms, App/Goo/Ama/book/Soft, which all pay along the lines of what the author posted.

> I have no desire to live in SF.

Yeah, SF is awful, don't move there. You can get close to these numbers in some cities that have a much better standard of living. NY, LA, Austin (the numbers are close but come down in that order).

Feel free to ask any questions about getting a job in a company like this if you'd like. I find it mystifying that people consider it some kind of secret so I'm down for sharing w/e people want to know (within some personal boundaries). I wouldn't say that it's easy to get a job like this, but the information isn't hidden. In my experience it's right in front of people and they either ignore it or choose different paths because they prefer the lifestyle that they have outside of these major US hubs.

<comment><USER65> >We have a shortage on one side of the market. It will be relatively short lived.

Can you support the latter claim?

<comment><USER26> Good call. I can't.

I feel unreasonably lucky and make this claim to myself in an effort to engender urgency and grace — I have what many want and few have and it is fleeting.

The other two shortage that I was aware of during my primary education seem to have been filled at this point. I was told regularly that the best paths toward success was to study law or accounting. At the time law firms were experiencing a lack of supply similar to the current state of software that has since been filled. You can still make great money but you're going to need crazy hours + prestigious education or unreasonable amounts of proof-of- awesome. Similarly, after SOX there was an immense need for accountants but that demand was filled rapidly when higher ed was successful in pushing huge numbers of degrees out the door.

Education in practical skills for software development has been slower to fill demand. I see three reasons, I'm sure there are many more: Software doesn't have the same social prestige as law or accounting — the first dot-com crash scared people — demand has grown more quickly than any other field.

<comment><USER65> Thanks for elaborating, was genuinely curious.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> I'm getting a 403 for this site. Any one else experiencing this?

</comment><comment><USER67> I am curious what would 10 years of experience would translate to.

</comment><comment><USER38> These seem pretty standard for 2 years experience?

<comment><USER68> Really? Anywhere else in the world they'd be classified as "insane".

<comment><USER69> Exactly. Even the lowest offer is more than twice my pay, after 10+ years of experience in Sweden.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER70> I think the numbers are ok considering you have almost not experience.

</comment><comment><USER71> Link broken

</comment><comment><USER72> [https://imgur.com/a/VpCJT](https://imgur.com/a/VpCJT)

Is this for real? This is Ministry of Truth levels of double-speak.

<comment><USER73> They make you validate your work email, which is then linked to every post you make on the platform :)

This will blow up one day.

<comment><USER72> I really don't get it. How is it "anonymous" in any way?

<comment><USER74> Other people on blind don't know who you are when you post.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER75> Here in Australia there is no point even being a software engineer. 2 years experience will be 90k base, I don't even know what a sign on or bonus is because we don't even have them, and your wage will rise with inflation. Inflation seems to be a fairly garbage number so I would say your wage goes down each year.

There are plenty of other jobs that are much easier that pay the same. Australia is not an innovative or technology-oriented or entrepreneurial country. Some multinationals mine our land, that is it. It is a bit of a joke country compared to China or the USA.

<comment><USER76> Silicon Valley is an anomaly when it comes to salary. $90k would be considered an excellent salary for most of the world's software developers. Even in most parts of the US a salary like that is considered quite good for 2 years experience.

<comment><USER75> Yes, although I should say, 2 years experience and top 1%.

The thing about the US though is that in places where you get offered 90k, house prices are about half what they are here. The amount of tech companies you have in Tennessee is more than all the tech companies in Australia. So you don't really get those types of jobs here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER77> Why are people so surprised ? US and especially US's tech sector is known for trowing money at people. They are doing it in a hope to get those sweet Rob Pikes of our time by sheer brute force.

</comment><comment><USER78> Does this motivate anyone else to move to Silicon Valley?

</comment><comment><USER79> This is nuts unless it's AI/ML.

<comment><USER80> No, I work at one of the companies mentioned in the post. These are typical salaries for devs without exotic specializations.

<comment><USER60> Yeah, same impression here. Though it seems slightly aggressive for two years non-ivy.

<comment><USER38> Why would the school matter?

I thought this industry keeps crowing about how "school doesn't matter"?

<comment><USER28> Because Berkeley, Stanford, MIT and Harvard produce radically superior computer science students vs the average community college.

That doesn't mean _no_ talent comes out of community colleges. It means the average ability level is far lower and the elite students are far more rare.

The school doesn't matter much if you have the ability and can demonstrate it. The kind of grads coming out of elite schools that Google & Co are recruiting, tend to have both the ability and the school. The schools, and the professors there, help more often than not with filtering.

<comment><USER38> As someone that didn't work at Google/FB and goes to a state school, Well, thanks for the vote of confidence!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Is there a site providing example files for "all" media types? - <AUTHOR> Hej HN.<p>I would love to know if there is a good site/source for files of different media types. <comment><USER2> What exactly do you want to do? A lot of the other answers assume that you want examples of different h.264 encodings, JPEG image varieties, etc.

In my own side projects, I'm often dealing with old, badly-documented formats with limited examples (like data files for games). I usually start with the "file" command to try to identify the filetype, then look on Wikipedia and filext.com to find links to format specifications. Usually, I can also find the name of any programs that create/edit/view that file type, and that's a jumping-off point to find examples (given the domain, it'll be anything from another game that uses the format to a 90s-era fan page with modified or fan- created data files).

I've used this site before too: [https://wiki.multimedia.cx/index.php?title=Main_Page](https://wiki.multimedia.cx/index.php?title=Main_Page)

It provides links to a lot of format specifications, codec information, sometimes the mplayer samples that other comments here have linked to, etc.

</comment><comment><USER3> I started a project in this vein a while ago:

[https://github.com/nbeaver/mimetype- menagerie](https://github.com/nbeaver/mimetype-menagerie)

It organizes files by mimetype. It's not complete, but it might be a good starting point.

You can also look at the testcase folder for afl-fuzz, which includes archives, images, and even an H264 compressed video:

[https://github.com/arisada/afl- fuzz/tree/master/testcases](https://github.com/arisada/afl- fuzz/tree/master/testcases)

</comment><comment><USER4> You may want to look at [http://fileformats.archiveteam.org/wiki/Category:Graphics](http://fileformats.archiveteam.org/wiki/Category:Graphics). Collecting sample files from there is a bit of a hassle, but there's quite some obscure formats.

On the same site, [http://fileformats.archiveteam.org/wiki/Encyclopedia_of_Grap...](http://fileformats.archiveteam.org/wiki/Encyclopedia_of_Graphics_File_Formats) points to an archive.org copy of a CD ROM with sample images.

Via its BMP page, I found [http://entropymine.com/jason/bmpsuite/](http://entropymine.com/jason/bmpsuite/), which looks like the definite resource on that format.

</comment><comment><USER5> I've used the ffmpeg samples before:

[https://samples.ffmpeg.org/](https://samples.ffmpeg.org/)

Not nearly complete, of course. I can't find a set of test images from the imagemagick project.

This would be a awesome github project; it wouldn't even need an associated web page. You'd be amazed at all the different varieties of "legal" JPEG images, for example.

<comment><USER6> Incidentally, [https://samples.ffmpeg.org/](https://samples.ffmpeg.org/) and [https://samples.mplayerhq.hu/](https://samples.mplayerhq.hu/) are actually mirrors of the same collection, it seems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Define "all" media types. Do you mean something like an example of each and every one of these ? [https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/httpd/httpd/trunk/docs/conf...](https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/httpd/httpd/trunk/docs/conf/mime.types)

<comment><AUTHOR> yes, kinda.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Apache Tika is a text extraction toolkit. They store a wide selection of file types for their parser tests: [https://github.com/apache/tika/tree/master/tika- parsers/src/...](https://github.com/apache/tika/tree/master/tika- parsers/src/test/resources/test-documents)

For large sets of some common media types take a look at the govdocs1 corpus: [http://digitalcorpora.org/corp/files/govdocs1/by_type/](http://digitalcorpora.org/corp/files/govdocs1/by_type/)

For an odd example, sometimes a google search will turn something up.: [https://www.google.com/?q=filetype:xlsx](https://www.google.com/?q=filetype:xlsx)

<comment><USER9> The test files for the parser are available at: [https://github.com/apache/tika/tree/master/tika- parsers/src/...](https://github.com/apache/tika/tree/master/tika- parsers/src/test/resources/test-documents)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> [https://github.com/alexschiller/file-format- commons](https://github.com/alexschiller/file-format-commons)

Here was my stab at that problem. Somewhere near 70 files, many are variants on text files/code files iirc but a lot of data centric files as well. There is a small neglected WordPress site linked to it.

</comment><comment><USER11> Would like to find something like this as well.

I've used this site for videos of different sizes/filetypes before: [http://www.sample-videos.com/](http://www.sample-videos.com/)

</comment><comment><USER12> I've used this site in the past to test various video formats and sizes: [http://www.sample-videos.com/](http://www.sample-videos.com/)

It is basically the "Big Buck Bunny" video in many sizes, durations and formats.

</comment><comment> a-priori I don't know if there's any source with a wide variety of formats, but there are various sites with some samples. Here's one for H.264 videos, mostly movie trailers, encoded using various parameters:

[http://www.h264info.com/clips.html](http://www.h264info.com/clips.html)

I've used it before when I built a system that processed video files.

</comment><comment><USER13> [http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media- types.xhtm...](http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml) is the canonical list of types. They do not have examples though.

</comment><comment><USER6> Is this about Cascading Style Sheet media types? Or MIME types for video, audio, etc.?

<comment><AUTHOR> video, documents, whatever.

<comment><USER6> For video and audio, the best place is by far [https://samples.mplayerhq.hu/](https://samples.mplayerhq.hu/), from the devs of MPlayer

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> dunno. if not, go please make it. sounds like a useful public resource. it's one of those classic cross-cutting concerns. it would fit in nicely with a web where any piece of info you'd want, or service, is sitting at a URL, just a tab or curl away.</comment>


Ask HN: What is your significant other like?  - <AUTHOR> Obviously this question is very unrelated to a lot of the usual tech information that fills Hacker News, but this question has been piquing my interest lately.
As an engineer, I seem to differ significantly from my friends in what I look for and enjoy in terms of the opposite sex. Many of the qualities that I seek in a relationship aren't important or even mentionable to those in different professions.
Did you marry another engineer? A CS major? A PR major? How is your SO similar to you? How are they significantly different? Have these differences helped/hurt your relationship? <comment><USER2> My SO is of the same sex so in that context we're rather similar.

He's in tech, so am I but he's in media, I'm a devop. It allows us to both be nerdy, around each other, but not have our lives revolve around that. We can talk nerdy but since we already live in that we tend to do other things when we're together. It balances things out in a nice way. We can also both understand that sometimes you need to pull crazy hours and that things like that are just expected of us. Being in the same domain helps in our case but I wouldn't bet on that being something you should look for in a good relationship.

I'm more routine bound, I have things that I need to do a certain way, my way. He's far less obsessive in that except for when it comes to planning events, like a holiday, where I'm totally relaxt and last-minute and he's stressed out just by thinking about all that needs to be done.

I never look for specific qualities in people I gather around me nor did I build up a profile about my partner. Most people I meet and stick with I just click with. It's not something professional, we don't necessarily share the same hobbies, it's just a feeling of recognising something in that person and simply knowing it's all good.

As far as my experience goes, it's better to let certain things in life just happen to you than go look for something specific. I'm not saying it's not good to have a plan for your future, things you wish to achieve. But my friends and partner all just happend to me, sometimes at the most crazy moments in my life, but I'm very glad they all did.

</comment><comment><USER3> Completely unlike me; a liberal arts major and works on Broadway. Much more creative than I am - she prefers to talk about more down to earth, entertaining things (T.V. we're watching, her day working with actors/actresses, etc.) than computer architecture, and she loves being artistic (painting, drawing, singing).

That said, she's very intelligent, but not technically so. I'm the kind of person who sucks up knowledge like a sponge - she doesn't get the same kind of joy out of reading Wikipedia :).

To be clear, I love this setup. It's really wonderful being with someone completely non-technical for a host of reasons. The worst thing that comes up is that she asks me to debug her computer once in a while.

EDIT: Read the other comments. I do find she has the same sense of humor as me (I think that's really important), and I think that's really important. In situations like this I think it's really important that we're both open to different lifestyles for it to be compatible. She's very open to listening to the intricate details of a programming language, and I get pleasure out of learning how professional theatre operates (to give one example).

</comment><comment><USER4> We're a lot alike in a many ways. My husband is also a developer (though more as a hobbyist the past few years - he also owns a local computer repair shop).

We both share a love of strategy gaming, we're both introverts, atheists, liberal. Neither of us are particularly outdoorsy or sporty. He's much better at math, and I'm much more expressive, artistically.

He plays more video games than I do and I watch more documentaries than he does. He's a bit of a dreamer. I'm a bit more pragmatic.

We both have a very similar sense of humor.

We both have our own particular hobbies/interests that the other doesn't share, though. Sometimes I think it would be nice if we did, but I think the differences are also probably very important and healthy, too.

</comment><comment><USER5> My SO is of the same sex. We are both in tech, he is more of a ux designer (though he started as a rails engineer), and I am more backend. We hack together often, and constantly inspire each other to be disruptive in what we put together.

For me, I look for people in tech. My ex was also an engineer, give it up for the bay area and having so many chill, cute, stoner-engineer types. I love having a boyfriend that understands "You.kind_of? Cute == true". Having somebody to come home to that understands what I did today, and understanding his challenges and being able to communicate about it is awesome. There is no "translation" layer, I feel like this helps communication.

We have plenty of differences, he is into home-improvement, I am into lots of music production. In general, we are more similar than other couples I've met. We have enough differences to keep it interesting, and enough in common that we never run out of things to talk about!

</comment><comment><USER6> Completely different in regards to tech. She got her first email address just 4 years ago and doesn't really understand what I do for work. Most importantly though we share the same values and sense of humor. So it doesn't hurt in the least. She's a nurse.

</comment><comment><USER7> She's a writer and has a masters in social-sciences. Her interests are mostly helping people; making a fortune or even a living are uninteresting to her. We make a wonderful combination.

</comment><comment><USER8> Quite like me, also nerdy. She's better at math than I am, I am a bit more risk-tolerant than she is. I'm very good friends with my wife and we also share a similar sense of humor, two things that I think are very important.</comment>


Facebook Timeline - <AUTHOR> http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?timeline

<comment><USER2> There is something I've pointed out before, but it is interesting and, I think, worth repeating:

If they lost half of all of their users overnight, it would only set them back about two years in terms of growth.</comment>


Hacker News Reader for iPad - <AUTHOR> http://markfayngersh.com/post/554409071/hacker-news-reader

<comment><USER2> HN for the iPad is a great idea. Its certainly one that has crossed my mind (only to be put aside due to the lack of time - maybe in a few weeks, after the semester ends...). This app leaves a bit to be desired, however. At least, judging by a quick look at the screenshots.. to name a few things that jumped out at me:

\- Is that _Marker Felt_ for the Y in the icon?!

\- The use of modal views bothers me; it doesn't completely hide the splitview column, but, you can't select anything in it anymore as a result.

\- The large emphasis on Instapaper makes it feel like the app is a glorified RSS reader meant to funnel you away from the app itself and consume the content elsewhere.

\- When you _do_ view a story in-app, its just a UIWebView that opens the HN page; nothing different than using Safari.

\- Using a single line on the UILabel that has to be scrolled (instead of sizing it to fit, or just having multiple lines) seems like a hassle to find out the title of the story.

\- Why does the full URL of the story matter? Regular HN does fine without it.

As an aside: Why aren't any of the HN iPhone/iPad/* platform apps open source? Seems like a no brainer to let anyone else submit patches. And from first hand experience, open source in the App Store _does_ sell.

<comment><AUTHOR> -That is actually American Typewriter -Fair enough -Perhaps, though it is one of the app's more productive functionality -What would you suggest it do? -Doesn't seem like too much of a hassle. Some titles are really long and scaling the size would create very small fonts. -Does it hurt?

Fair enough, removed pricing and will post source code up on github. You made a substantial argument Zev. I was just hoping to make a bit as a fund-raiser for this event in school, but perhaps I'll leave that to some future game :)

<comment><USER2> _What would you suggest it do?_

Reformat the text to fit the iPad's screen completely.

 _Doesn't seem like too much of a hassle. Some titles are really long and scaling the size would create very small fonts._

Its not _much_ of a hassle. But, its _still_ a hassle. And an unnecessary one. UILabel has a numberOfLines property. Please use it; the iPad has a nice, big screen.

 _Does it hurt?_

Does it help? Many of the best iPhone and iPad UI's are about _removing_ extraneous content. Just because you _can_ have something on screen doesn't mean that it _needs_ to be on there.

 _Fair enough, removed pricing and will post source code up on github._

No, no, no! Open source doesn't mean it has to be free! You can be open source and still charge for the application. I work on Mobile Colloquy; our source is available under a BSD license, yet on the App Store for $2.

FWIW, I bought a copy of the app. And I'll be taking a look at the source and have a few (probably small as I'm slightly busy with finals) patches in a fork at some point this weekend, at latest! :)

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll keep it free for now, until several patches later and the app becomes more or less worth the money. I appreciate your active participation :)

<comment><USER3> Can we get a link to the GitHub source. I'd love to contribute to this app and make some useful improvements.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I for one welcome a dedicated app for the iPad espe ially considering the memory limitations with mobile safari on the iPad restricting the number of open tabs.

The sidebar back button is a nice touch. One suggestion I would make though is to do something else with the page curl when clicking the "view" button. It's a nice effect but having the page curl remain visible makes it seem like you can just click the exposed page curl to go back and bring the native app back into view. Sine this doesn't actually do anything it's a bit awkward to keep hitting it instead of remembering to hit the sidebar back button.

<comment><USER4> Wow, this looks ugly. It just goes to show it is a lot harder to design for the ipad, with its much larger screen than for the iPhone.

For example, it seems silly to have the headlines (the most important info), crammed into the small bar on the left, with the huge space on the right used for displaying one headline and a menu. This is a waste of space.

<comment><AUTHOR> You bring up a good point megablast, designing for the iPad does bring new challenges of its own. Though I agree with your design criticism, the iPad Human Interface Guideline paper published by Apple is demanded to be followed upon submission of an App to the AppStore. The larger window on the right, the Detail View, is meant to handle a single unit of content at a time, in this case an HN article. This "Side View" perspective may seem awkward considering a large screen, but keep in mind that just because there is more space, not all of it should necessarily be used up :) You don't want to cramp up too much data or display too little. Maintaining a good balance between the two will come with time and experience.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I don't get it. I go to HN using the web browser, and it is bookmarked. What's wrong with that? Easy and simple.

<comment><AUTHOR> Nothing. See response to nanijoe's comment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Several MUST have updates for the next version.

First, stop sorting the articles list by alphabetical order of title. this sort makes absolutely no sense and makes in next to impossible to find new articles.

Second, have some way of showing which articles have already been read. in iPhone apps vie written in the past I've typically changed the font style in the sidebar article listing. for example, once an article has been "read" change the font color in the sidebar to a "grayed out" style vs the regular black font color.

With the way the current app sorts by alphabetical order plus no way of visually knowing which articles have already been read, it's nearly impossible to use the app well to keep up on new submissions on Hacker News

</comment><comment><USER6> what's wrong with reading HN in a web browser?

<comment><USER7> The HN user interface leaves a bit to be desired on mobile devices. Ever notice to "sorry I downvoted you" comments? That is people with touch screens.

Another example, to reply to you I had to find your comment in the mysteriously small text, double tap zoom, pinch zoom, reposition, and then I could finally hit the microscopic "reply" link.

It is a persistent itch that the site itself does not address. Some people do things with style sheets or HTML rewriters, some do it with an app. I'd do width sensitive CSS with the media type selectors if it were my site.

<comment><USER8> And the iPad isn't really a mobile device. It has a very large screen so large that it is the same resolution as one of my laptops.

<comment><USER7> On my iPad my finger is many times the size of the voting arrows. Your pointing device on your netbook is pixel accurate with pre-click position feedback.

But beyond the clicking, I think the reason I like the native HN app on my phone is because it makes better use of the pixels. On the web page there are great swathes of pixels that are not contributing. I'm not as sensitive on the ipad, but paid my $3 because the author promised an iPad upgrade, and HN on a small screen could be $3 better.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Is this more than just a wrapper around WebKit that can also display the article headlines to the left? Or is there more to it than the screenshots show?

<comment><AUTHOR> The cells on the left represent actual entries in a locally stored db using CoreData, meaning that they will always be there until you explicitly delete them. Each cell represents an Article object that has a title, url, author, and comment link. So, after the article are long gone off the homepage (or even off of the hn database), they will remain in your iPad with substantial information. There is also an Instapaper integrator button that will instantly send any article to your Instapaper account for offline viewing on a variety of devices, include the iPad. Hope that cleared any concerns.

<comment><USER8> Sounds like rss to me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> An app for every single websites out there is an awesome idea. At this rate App store will have millions of apps (there are ~100 million domains).

</comment><comment><USER11> I honestly think most of the apps in the app store would have been better off as highly optimized web apps. When you look at the quality of gmail.com on the iPad, for instance, it makes you wonder why anyone bothers with apps. Not to mention, there is no approval process for websites. Someone just needs to make an iPad optimized version of HN

</comment><comment><USER12> I would love a good HN app for my iPad.

This one is nit very good though (I am using it right now).

It doesn't feel very well thought out. Instead of having articles always stay in the list I would rather them disappear after I read them unless I mark it as a favorite or comment on it.

Also, what is this weird back button?

<comment><USER2> _Also, what is this weird back button?_

Likely an attempt at copying Instapaper's pagination; see "Pagination tap zones" on <http://blog.instapaper.com/post/545408126></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Bootstrap Alternatives? - <AUTHOR>

Twitter Bootstrap is an amazing resource for free baseline styles, interface components and interactions. Are there other companies out there who have released their own version of similar resource? <comment><USER2> Foundation by Zurb - <http://foundation.zurb.com/> (which I think preceded Bootstrap's existence in time) is very polished, and really is a serious contender.

I recall someone earlier describing it as the preferred choice for those who want to go a few extra steps to retrofitting the framework to their own liking.

<comment><USER3> Looked at this last week. Seems great and get's points for not being Bootstrappy. In the end, I ended up using Bootstrap and dealing with the hassle of digging through the CSS to get a less bootstrappy look so I could use the handy Javascript plugins that are included, namely scrollspy.

Looking back, I actually can't think of another reason why I chose Bootstrap over Foundation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> HTML Kickstart - <http://www.99lime.com/>

<comment><USER5> This is pretty nice. Thanks! Has a ton of features I've been looking for.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> If I'm a non-technical person with minimal coding skills (C++, editing HTML/CSS, rudimentary knowledge of Ruby), should I invest time and effort to learn Bootstrap/Foundation? My goal is to develop a functional MVP that I can take to potential customers; I've validated the need for my product through individual sales but feel like I need to test a semi-functioning site to see if my idea can scale.

Would appreciate suggestions, alternatives.

<comment><USER7> You don't really "learn Bootstrap". If you can do web development, you just use whatever parts of Bootstrap you want by mirroring the homepage's code.

If not, it's HTML/CSS that you have to learn and then you'll find Bootstrap an good resource.

<comment><USER6> That makes sense, thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> <http://html5boilerplate.com/> is a great choice not yet mentioned. More of a blank slate though so you will need to do some design work. It is responsive in nature which makes formatting for mobile devices easier too.

</comment><comment><USER9> I'm working on one, hope to release it officially soon.

<http://bedrocktheme.com>

Download it here: <https://github.com/dylanized/bedrock>

<comment><AUTHOR> Would love to see updates when it's done -- firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> zurb <http://foundation.zurb.com/>

</comment><comment><USER11> <http://getskeleton.com/>

It's not nearly as complex as Bootstrap which is great when you want create some pages quickly and use your own styles.

<comment><AUTHOR> I like the responsive grid. Would like to see some more UI elements but that doesn't really seem like that's it's goal in the first place.</comment></comment>


Would you pay $30/m to move your resume to top of applicant list? - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2013/09/03/has-linkedin-crossed-an-ethical-line/

<comment><USER2> > Would you pay $30/m to move your resume to top of applicant list?

Maybe, but if I was hiring, why would I use a service that allowed an applicant to do that (unless I can easily identify and disregard the applicants that are placed by payment rather than qualification)? I mean, if it was a fee to move their application to the top of the list for a particular opening, it might be vaguely useful as a screen for motivation or interest level, but paying $30/month to make themselves a "featured applicant" for all applications means that, as a hiring party, the system just became less useful for me. And if hiring parties stop using it (or continue to use it because they can easily disregard the out-of-order listings), the paid premium service isn't useful for job seekers.

</comment><comment><USER3> "your application will move to the top of the pile...regardless of your qualifications."

I've not used the LinkedIn job boards, but the rest of the article implies that the rest of the list is sorted with the "most qualified" at the top. If the second part of the above quote is true, I'd be skipping straight past the "featured applicants" to the ones who are there because they have the best qualifications.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I have paid for express postage, line-bypass at a club, 'rush' passport service, expressway tolls and many similar services, so why wouldn't I as a serious job-seeker, pay to have my application move to the top of the pile?

<comment><USER4> Yep, I like the idea, but as the article points out it can potentially cause an employer to look at you differently because you paid to be placed there. At the same time it's not different from paying for advertising so I guess it's all about how you look at it.</comment></comment>


A Survey of Behind-the-Scenes Personal Data Sharing to Third Parties on Mobile - <AUTHOR> http://techscience.org/a/2015103001/ <comment><USER2> Very interesting write up. It looks like most of the apps are sharing with Google on Android and Apple on iOS. I would be interested in seeing the graphic without them.

Also would be interested in knowing if all of the connections to Facebook are using Facebook to log in, or sharing in secret. Or pinterest connections to twitter, which are likely for sharing purposes.

I am far more interested in which ones are sharing with the unknown 3rd parties.</comment>


Why I'm quitting my job to make apps - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/p/9ba301edf37a

<comment><USER2> I quit my job, too. But "to make apps" is probably a bad idea.

When I studied, everyone was about "oh I be a game dev" or "I'm going in the web-dev bis!!"

At the end all those people where about how they start app-development.

It's trendy and cool and also overrund by people.

<comment><AUTHOR> Fair play, "to make apps". Terrible title. Agreed ;)

..having said that, the idea is less important than committing to make something happen. Which is why I have not yet decided on which idea to pursue!

<comment><USER2> I like your attitude :)

I hated to do the same boring stuff, so I will quit at the end of the year and start something

But I probably don't know if I'm crazy enough tojump in a shark-tank like the game-industry or the app-industry. Even if I think it would be funny to do such stuff.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Decentralizing Uber? - <AUTHOR> Seems to me Uber is ripe for a decentralized solution. Why? Unlike Google or a SaaS provider, there is no data-bank or centralized algorithm that requires a lot of compute resources.
Why decentralize Uber? - Contractors get 20% increase - No single point of failure - Consumers could pay less - Automatic global scale - Airports or any can not deny access - Who drove who can be publicly accessible - Technical feasibility is there via a block-chain solution
Is anyone working on a decentralized Uber solution out there? <comment><USER2> It could be difficult to implement that since the efficiency brought by uber's algorithm might be good in allocating drivers to demands. Since they also predict and direct drivers to locations. Without there being a research group who is ready to do that, it can be difficult to achieve. Though not impossible.

<comment><AUTHOR> well, with [https://www.getsync.com/](https://www.getsync.com/) you can have decentralized files of lat longs for each region and the app receives the files and presents the user where supply and demand is.

Each driver and user can make their own decisions based on that.</comment></comment>


Alternatives to Google services? - <AUTHOR> Inspired by this article "PSA: Don't Mess With The Google!"
Link: http://www.dansdeals.com/archives/98444
Many of us started casually using gmail back in the days, and - with time - we have married google for email, contact, calendar, photos, files (drive) and much more.  And it's a scary proposition that everything can be GONE with no or little notice or recourse.
While backing up can mitigate some of the risk, a better strategy would be to duplicate the functionality with paid services?
So, what are the best, affordable, alternative to:
- gmail/contact/calendar - Photos? I am assuming box and dropbox are good candidates - drive? I am assuming box and dropbox are good candidates <comment><USER2> I use NextCloud for personal cloud backup solution. Although it doesn't have mail server in it.

</comment><comment><USER3> Try fastmail.com</comment>


Near-miss math provides exact representations of almost-right answers - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/49/the-absurd/the-impossible-mathematics-of-the-real-world <comment><USER2> It's always fascinating to think about how few people realize the near miss (better called lucky approximation) of 2^7/12 ~ 3/2, which is the basis of the equal-temperament musical system, i.e. music as we know it.

<comment><USER3> A great further read:

"The saddest thing I know about the integers"

[https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/the- sadd...](https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/the-saddest- thing-i-know-about-the-integers/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Is there a body of literature that one can use to bootstrap yourself into these ideas? I've seen it written up in the popular scientific press a couple of times over the last few months, but I've never found a tutorial or textbook or body of papers accessible to AI researchers or engineers. Pure math papers are often not written to be understandable to dabblers.

</comment><comment><USER5> This page is referenced in the article, but I didn't see a link provided: [http://www.orchidpalms.com/polyhedra/acrohedra/nearmiss/near...](http://www.orchidpalms.com/polyhedra/acrohedra/nearmiss/nearmiss.htm)

</comment><comment> GuB-42 Interesting,

Does it makes sense to do statistical analysis on near-misses like it is done in experimental science in order to find if it is just a coincidence or if it warrants more attention?

For example: estimate the entropy of a formula and compare it to the error margin.

<comment><USER6> I'd say it doesn't, and that's precisely why it might be a fertile ground for new mathematics. Like it was with e.g. complex numbers, aka. "let's assume that this thing, which clearly doesn't make sense, exists, and let's consider how it behaves".

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The two triangles and blocks are kind of mind bleep, before it's explained to you.

Check it out here, without the spoiler:

[http://static.nautil.us/12472_4c78f7b58f4de12ed2cab9bcb9ec0b...](http://static.nautil.us/12472_4c78f7b58f4de12ed2cab9bcb9ec0ba0.png)

</comment><comment><USER8> How can any irrational number x be close to a rational number y? as long as x is irrational it seems to me it would still be infinitely far away from y. What notion of proximity are they talking about?

<comment><USER9> There is a rigorous notion about how well an irrational can be approximated by a rational, related to its continued fraction representation ( [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continued_fraction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continued_fraction) ). I'm having trouble finding a better description than the note in that WP page, but the idea is if the cf representation has a "surprisingly large" value, then the rational number you get by truncating the sequence there will be a very good approximation, like 355/133 is for pi (see the comment in [https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/435668/finding- the-...](https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/435668/finding-the-value-of- a-continued-fraction)).

<comment><USER10> Continued fraction approximations p/q have |x-p/q| < 1/q²

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Uhhhhh I'm pretty sure near miss is the wrong term.

Near hit sounds about right.

<comment><USER12> Close call?</comment></comment>


Data Visualizations: London Rent By Geography - <AUTHOR> http://blog.rentonomy.com/posts/Rentonometrics/category

<comment><USER2> dead link?

<comment><AUTHOR> Almost all of the links are specific analyses, but these two caught my eye of interest: Both are rent-price dimensionalized for geography by tube-stop.

<http://blog.rentonomy.com/posts/75>

<http://blog.rentonomy.com/posts/74></comment></comment>


Erlang alterline - <AUTHOR> http://wiki.github.com/yrashk/erlang

<comment><USER2> This project is possibly a better choice to base private patches on: <http://github.com/mfoemmel/erlang-otp/tree/master>

<comment><AUTHOR> may be yes, may be no — I didn't know about this repo existence when I created my repo, anyway. thanks for pointing it out!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Have you sent this to the erlang list? I just checked for both yrashk and alterline, and I'm not getting any threads for those queries. The OTP team is generally really good about merging bugfixes, from what I've seen on the list.

<comment><AUTHOR> I've sent one of the patches so far, yes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > However, since most probably it will not be easy to push some of these > patches through Erlang/OTP,

Why's that?

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, it is what I heard from people who tried that before.

<comment><USER4> So, you have patches, and you haven't even _attempted_ to get them committed?

<comment><USER5> The problem is solved for him. He is really under no obligation to do anything else; if upstream is interested, they can just pull from his repo.

<comment><USER4> If anyone has bothered mentioning it to them.

I sent some Erlang patches in years ago, and in due time, they showed up in the main release.

Obligation? No, but it's a nice thing to do. He's demonstrated he's interested in helping out by publishing them in the first place.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't understand you. Wiki page I linked to explicitly states "The intention of alterline is not to fork Erlang, though — the best outcome for it is to be merged into official source tree". And I already started pushing some of the patches out: [http://www.erlang.org/cgi-bin/ezmlm- cgi?3:mss:451:200908:oal...](http://www.erlang.org/cgi-bin/ezmlm- cgi?3:mss:451:200908:oalelhbknmalgbgnoehf)

<comment><USER4> > And I already started pushing some of the patches out

Cool, that's all I wanted to know. Good work!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Unconventional and Hidden Treasures (Good movies that we somehow miss) - <AUTHOR> If you are bored with top 100 IMDB list of movies, then head over to www.nextshow.co . Me and my friend worked on a project to recommend movies based on your liking. If you think something can be changed, I will be happy to receive your feedback. <comment><AUTHOR> www.nextshow.co

<comment><USER2> Requires Facebook Login before you can see anything. I would never use a social login (or any non-throwaway) to check out a new site.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi, Thanks for your feedback man!! We have rolled out Guest login, so try it out!!</comment></comment></comment>


Pharmacy Startup PillPack Could Change the Way America Takes Its Medicine - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhedgecock/2015/04/15/this-pharmacy-startup-wants-to-change-the-way-you-take-your-medicine/ <comment><USER2> This start-up is a great example as to why it's important to understand who the players are that deliver healthcare in the US.

You have the insurance companies that pay the costs (drug and non-drug). However, many insurance companies partner with PBMs (pharmacy benefit managers) and let them handle all of the processing (for a fee).

Guess who one of the biggest PBMs are? CVS Caremark. Yes, the same CVS as the retail pharmacies.

If this product is going to work, it needs to figure out how to create an incentive for the existing players to get involved.

If you look at your drug benefit card, it likely has a list of "preferred pharmacies". Go there and you pay less, go somewhere else and pay more. The PBMs control where you get the best deal. And yes, it's typically at their own pharmacies (e.g. CVS).

If this company were to approach a retail pharmacy with their idea, I'll bet the pharmacy says "no". Retail pharmacies already have contracts with PBMs/insurance companies that pays them a certain fee for dispensing. A retail pharmacy would likely _lose_ money if they had this company repackage a prescription. The only way to make this attractive to the retail pharmacy is to make sure they either make the same or more money. That's up to the PBMs/insurers.

So if you take a step back and think about what drivers insurance companies, it's all about cost. Not just dollars, but improved outcomes for patients since that lowers costs as well.

Compliance (taking the right drug at the right time) is a huge issue in terms of drug costs. An insurance company might plop down $5K for a prescription. The patient may only take 3/4 of the doses and end up no better. That $5K was a waste. Asthma is a great example. Insurers are more than happy to pay $300/month for a drug that reduces ER visits. One ER visit can cost $1000K.

Now prove to an insurer/PBM that this type of packaging saves more than it costs (e.g. improved compliance) and they will come knocking on _your_ door.

This of course entirely ignores the issue of drug distribution. There are some _huge_ players out there and this company needs to figure out how to insert itself between the company that sends the drugs to the pharmacy and the pharmacy itself. I'll leave that for another time.

<comment><USER3> _If this product is going to work, it needs to figure out how to create an incentive for the existing players to get involved._

I agree with your writeup, but I'd like to call this out in particular:

 _What if all the existing players are the source of the problem?_

That's the real trouble facing startups in healthcare: everyone wants to partner with the existing players, but they're all basically profiteering bastards.

<comment><USER4> > everyone wants to partner with the existing players, but they're all > basically profiteering bastards.

I was thinking this while reading refurb's comment and pleasantly surprised to get down to yours where its explicitly called out.

<comment><USER2> I guess it depends on how you define "profiteering". The drug distribution business has many competitors and margins are razor thin (think <2%).

PBMs are also pretty competitive and I don't think they make a ton of money either.

As for insurance companies, the ACA put limits on profit.

<comment><USER3> And yet Aetna does pretty well for itself:

[http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AAET&ei=yIswVam_LOuJsg...](http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AAET&ei=yIswVam_LOuJsge4_YHQBw)

So does Humana:

[http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AHUM&ei=44swVcjiAcSGsg...](http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AHUM&ei=44swVcjiAcSGsgfL5oCgCg)

And Anthem:

[http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AANTM&ei=OIwwVYr5OIWDs...](http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AANTM&ei=OIwwVYr5OIWDsQfltYGoAQ)

And Pfizer:

[http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3APFE&ei=uYwwVeG2DezwsQ...](http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3APFE&ei=uYwwVeG2DezwsQfMhoCAAw)

And Bayer:

[http://www.google.com/finance?q=ETR%3ABAYN&ei=Fo0wVcmsE6qysQ...](http://www.google.com/finance?q=ETR%3ABAYN&ei=Fo0wVcmsE6qysQfk84DoCg)

And that's without even getting started on the corruption of equipment purchasing:

[http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2010/1007.blake.ht...](http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2010/1007.blake.html)

Or the FDA:

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidmaris/2012/10/10/fda- recall...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidmaris/2012/10/10/fda-recall- points-to-serious-problems-at-the-fda/)

Or even the physician trade union itself:

[http://seattlepostglobe.org/2011/03/07/warnings-of-doctor- sh...](http://seattlepostglobe.org/2011/03/07/warnings-of-doctor-shortage-go- unheeded/)

(note that the govt. measure causing the shortage of residency slots was supported by the physicians themselves--only to later recant after the damage had been done)

There are some players who have a hard time making an obnoxious profit, sure, but let's not pretend that's the general case.

Those shiny new hospitals going up in your local medical center? That money isn't there because healthcare is so affordable and easy to get.

<comment><USER2> I'm not sure what stock prices have to do with "profiteering".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is quite common here in The Netherlands; if you have trouble taking your medication on time (especially elderly people do), your pharmacy will pack the pills in plastic bags on a roll, labelled with a description of its contents and date+time it should be taken. See e.g. [https://www.efarma.nl/PAGES/sectieinfo.asp?SC=VP](https://www.efarma.nl/PAGES/sectieinfo.asp?SC=VP) (in Dutch, but has photos).

<comment><USER6> Standard practice in Sweden, too. Pills are packaged in regional locations (called "dosage pharmacies"), shipped out, and then collected by customers in their local pharmacies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Many hospitals use such a system internally. Sometimes it doesn't work. See "How technology led a hospital to give a patient 38 times his dosage"[1]. This new mail-order system has far fewer crosschecks than that hospital system.

[1] [https://medium.com/backchannel/how-technology-led-a- hospital...](https://medium.com/backchannel/how-technology-led-a-hospital-to- give-a-patient-38-times-his-dosage-ded7b3688558)

<comment><USER8> that was a good read, but it was about failure of poorly designed systems, rather than blister pack efficacy.

<comment><USER7> That hospital used robotic packaging of pills, labeled for each patient. That's very similar to the consumer-grade system discussed here, but with fewer crosschecks.

A similar service for horse feed supplements has been available for years.[1]

[1] [https://www.smartpakequine.com/WhySmartPak.aspx](https://www.smartpakequine.com/WhySmartPak.aspx)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I take care of my elderly parents, who each have over a dozen different pills to take each day, and this kind of repackaging is really helpful; although I would have thought it's the kind of thing that drugstores already do.

(At least two of the (non-chain, family owned) local drugstores where I live already do this. For example,

[http://findleyspharmacy.com/rxmap.html](http://findleyspharmacy.com/rxmap.html) )

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</comment><comment><USER11> Regardless of the company's ambition, the firm still has to compete with all of the other small businesses marketing the same packaging services in every city. Many actually have very similar machines manufactured by AmerisourceBergen.

The role of a PBM is to create value for the payer; this typically occurs by the company using the collective power of its membership to negotiate down drug prices, specialty or otherwise. If creating value for the payer means increasing adherence then why not. At least that's what many PBM executives have said that I have spoken with.

The largest customer is the pbm/ payer/ private insurer market where the benefits of adherence can be marketed to those who pay for the cost of patient noncompliance.

I had a project very similar to this. However, my focus was the backend data system as my perspective was each patient may need a different compliance solution.

</comment><comment><USER12> We've had these in Australia for years. It's called the Webster Pak and is a method of packaging done by pharmacies. It was invaluable for my grandparents when they were too old to see/sort their own pills.

I think the webster pak looks more functional than lots of baggies. It's a less ambitious company though, it's not trying to be the whole pharmacy, just a method of packaging.

[http://www.webstercare.com.au/shop/item/community-webster- pa...](http://www.webstercare.com.au/shop/item/community-webster-pak)

<comment><USER13> There's a big advantage in the bags, in that you can grab one when you're heading out for the day or a handful when you're gonna be gone for the weekend. It's hard to do that with a giant week-sized card.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> So simple, but such an improvement over the current system. Excellent idea.

I just looked up how many people are taking prescription drugs and was shocked; almost 50% during the last 30 days ([http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/drug-use- therapeutic.htm](http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/drug-use-therapeutic.htm)). A big chunk of that is probably birth control and blood measure meds, but still that seems like a really high fraction of people (and an excellent market size for this business).

</comment><comment><USER15> This is definitely not a novel idea, but it's well-executed. Anyway, my personal issue with this is the excessive packaging and possibly non-compact storage if you have to, for example, go abroad for a month.

</comment><comment><USER16> In Australia this is standard for the elderly already and every pharmacy does it. That said, the US and Canada could stand to make it standard practice there as well.</comment>