The Markup faces staff exodus and funder scrutiny following Julia Angwin ouster - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2019/04/25/the-markup-faces-staff-exodus-and-funder-scrutiny-following-ouster-of-julia-angwin/ <comment><USER2> FWIW, CJR's interview with Sue Gardner executive director -- i.e. the person who fired Julia Angwin -- has been the most revealing thing so far, because it's the first interview in which Gardner has spoken out in detail about her reasons (Jeff Larson, the managing editor, had written a Medium post but did not go into details about the reasons for firing Angwin [1]).

This is one of the biggest clusterfucks of media drama I have ever seen. Because Angwin was the first to take this fight public, and because she has obvious reasons to feel aggrieved, I had assumed her framing would be as uncharitable as possible to the co-founders who fired her. But accepting Gardner's claims at face value in _defense of her decision_ only makes Angwin's case seem even stronger:

> _Gardner felt that, as a senior executive, Angwin should be willing to take > part in team-building exercises by submitting to a Myers-Briggs personality > test, and should be more enthusiastic about attending meetings. She was > alarmed that Angwin did not agree to formal performance assessments for > herself and her team (Angwin says she never refused to do performance > reviews). Gardner says she found such behavior "unnerving coming from > someone in an executive position" and that she believes Angwin wanted an > adversarial relationship between editorial staff and management._

(disclosure: I used to work at ProPublica, but did not intersect with Angwin's time there, but do admire her journalism work)

[0] [https://www.cjr.org/analysis/the- markup.php](https://www.cjr.org/analysis/the-markup.php)

[1] [https://medium.com/@jeff_larson/about-the- markup-6adc6a77810...](https://medium.com/@jeff_larson/about-the- markup-6adc6a778100)

<comment><USER3> Well in her defense the Myers Briggs is tarot cards for people with LinkedIn profiles. There's not a bit of scientific validity behind it. It's an entertainment experience not a psychometrically valid diagnostic instrument.

<comment><USER4> A data driven exploration of Myers briggs might make a good article.

<comment><USER5> It would be a short article. There's really no reliable data.

<comment><USER6> Nah, there's quite a bit.

However, saying that the Myers-Briggs is the worst personality test available is a little bit like saying the Holocaust was the worst genocide ever. It's true, but that doesn't mean that the others were good.

In general, personality psychometrics is a pretty difficult field to work in. We don't have another source of data for personality, and as such, it's difficult to measure constructs appropriately.

Additionally, modern psychometric methods like IRT work best for tests where the answer is known, and so without another source of evidence, personality psychometrics is a very difficult field.

Finally, the "supported" model in psychology, the Five Factor Model is potentially not robust. The issue is that the authors refuse to use confirmatory factor analysis on their model, and invent new methods (procrustean rotation) to justify their particular choice of constructs.

When these analyses were done by others and suggested that their model was incorrect, they huffed and puffed their way through the ensuing academic catfight in the journals.

tl;dr myers briggs bad, nothing else is much better.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Too long to develop stories, eh? To be honest, that sounds like an encouraging sign, to me. Any news publication that can churn out stories in quantity, is probably not doing much that is data-driven. Collecting good data takes time, cleaning the data takes time (because even good sources have typos, format issues, etc.), analyzing it takes time, writing coherently about it takes time, making good graphics to illustrate it takes time. We may not, as a society, be currently equipped with a business model to support that, but we should.

<comment><USER8> Encouraging..? They have yet to launch.

<comment><USER9> Buzzfeed and Uproxx are the ones you're thinking of that started out with the "pithy clickbait gradually transitioning into legitimacy" business model, some with more success at that than others. From what I gather this is not what The Markup was built to do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> To me, the most salient and remarkable aspect of this story is the upheaval among the rest of the team. I've found, in leading my own company, that the right decisions are typically met with comprehension and sometimes even relief. If you understand that CEOs are the last to know about problems, especially problems of culture, this makes intuitive sense. You, the CEO, sees something going sideways, you react, and the rest of the company is like, it's about time you dealt with that!

But this sounds like the opposite problem, where the team doesn't know that the managers have an issue. Such an incident would alarm me greatly, since I generally consider my team to be something of a Greek chorus, mourning my decisions before I even make them.

<comment><USER4> I read somewhere that Steve Jobs would figure out if a person was good or not by talking to the person's coworkers and saying the person sucks. If they vehemently denied it and stood up for the person, that was a sign the person was good. If they didn't, the person might indeed suck.

sooo... if the rest of the team posted a statement and people resigned...

<comment><USER11> That's very interesting psychology, but it is horrible and psychopathic.

Nobody go out and trash people just to see if it sticks. Please.

<comment><USER4> Of course not. But hearing from the SJ story how people behave when this sort of thing happens aligns with the staff's determination at the markup.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Angwin said elsewhere that when she approached Gardner to be involved, Gardner said it would only work if she was CEO. To me, a statement like that is at least a yellow flag about collaboration and control issues.

In a normal publication, editorial has to do some things they might not like in order to meet business objectives—-like crank out stories about Game of Thrones or whatever is trending on Reddit so that they can maintain ad views.

The whole point of The Markup was that it was not supposed to be a normal publication. That's why Craig and those foundations funded it.

The whole point of the site was unique, high quality editorial content you could not get anywhere else. So to me at least, the reaction of the editorial team is a big indication this was a bad move.

</comment><comment><USER13> It's a sad state of affairs when someone like Angwin is ousted because she stood in the way of what appears to be the formation of another Vox/Gawker clone. Hopefully she and her editorial staff manage to pick up somewhere else with the original vision.

<comment><USER2> I definitely lean toward sympathizing with Angwin, but it's worth noting that this characterization is under dispute. The other two co-founders deny that they wanted to dilute the mission. And Angwin also says that while this bothered her, it was still something under discussion rather than decided upon:

> _Angwin told CJR she didn't know "where we were going to land on this > advocacy or neutrality question, maybe we could have reached a compromise. > But the fact is she was pushing really hard for stuff that I was feeling > uncomfortable with."_

[https://www.cjr.org/analysis/the- markup.php](https://www.cjr.org/analysis/the-markup.php)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> How can a founder and the entire editorial staff have a vision that differs from that of another founder? It seems like they were hired to accomplish opposite goals.

<comment><USER15> It could be one person was "we should have actual researched real news, not fake news", and the other was "we need real news, but still politically biased"

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm curious how Gardner is escaping coverage through this so far.

</comment><comment><USER16> Very different sides to this story.

Hopefully there will be some _data-driven_ way to find the truth of the matter.

<comment><USER17> Someone makes the data, someone collects the data, someone formats the data, and someone shares the data. Each step can be, and often is, corrupted. There is no path to 'truth' through only 'data'. Hence the news being the shitshow it is.</comment></comment>


Will You Lose Your Job to a Robot? Silicon Valley Is Split - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/07/upshot/will-you-lose-your-job-to-a-robot-silicon-valley-is-split.html <comment><USER2> Whenever I see the "positive" prognostications, I wonder if the author is intentionally spinning a tale for their own ultimate benefit, or if I'm just way too cynical. I don't see any way that the advance of automation can do anything but destroy any desirable concept of society. To me, the future inexorably looks like Detroit or Nairobi, not like Tokyo or Singapore.

Education is a red herring. Most people (and I'd include myself in this) are simply not mentally capable enough to be trained to outperform automation in any task automation can perform. More education will not rescue us.

The future I see is, like Asimov's "Solaria". In that world, what purpose does a laborer have? What strength could even rebels have? When the "top" of society controls machines that will produce, fix, and fight, then they are completely insulated and the majority of humanity is disposable.

<comment><USER3> I'm guessing that manual labor will be a thing of the past, and I struggle to see how this is a bad thing overall.

If the same work is being done without human intervention, why not just _give_ people who're unemployed the products of that labour?

<comment><USER4> Because the entities that control the machines and give their products away will be outcompeted by entities that keep the products to fuel their own growth. Over time, the former kind of entities will die out. This is a general argument, the "entities" could be rich people, companies, governments, AIs, etc.

<comment><USER5> Some of those general "entities" you speak of are composed of smaller entities. Trade (e.g. of labor) will occur between those smaller entities.

Where there exists scarcity and a differential in value, trade will occur. Now, of course, that says nothing about the people that have nothing of value to trade with. But I'd argue that everyone has something to trade, it just might be of very low relative value. Even in such a scenario they'll trade with their peers.

No matter what scenario of this dystopian future I play out in my head, I always find equilibrium. The key is not to attempt to fix it, but to have base rules that apply to all and will mean basic safety for all. You can't guarantee a peachy life for everyone. Most people just want to play meddling Deity with government money and violence, to suit their own personal ideals and prejudices. That is why I'm an anarcho-capitalist; because it makes everyone absolutely equal and everyone absolutely free to make their own way in life without intervention.

<comment><USER4> _Where there exists scarcity and a differential in value, trade will occur. Now, of course, that says nothing about the people that have nothing of value to trade with._

You can have something of value, but still be unable to find a trading partner, if that thing can be had for a cheaper price somewhere else. For example, if machines make labor cost less than a living wage, then you can't survive by selling labor.

<comment><USER5> Their labor has value to themselves. So they can always go farm/forage for food.

But to actually rebut your comment:

 _" if machines make labor cost less than a living wage, then you can't survive by selling labor."_ If machines reduce labor cost, then the cost of goods reduces as well, making goods more _affordable_ for poorer individuals. And consequently, reducing the amount of money required to be able to survive. You have to understand that none of these things function in isolation, but as a balanced equilibrium.

<comment><USER4> Powerful entities can extract more value from a piece of land than weak entities. That means powerful entities will outbid weak entities, and in the long run all land will belong to powerful entities. There will be no land for you to farm or forage.

Labor isn't the only thing needed for survival. You also need things like living space, air and water. If these resources can be more profitably used by someone else, they will outbid you.

<comment><USER5> Like I said, these things don't happen in isolation. Nor do they just manifest into existence out of thin air. It's a slow progression, and a slow co- evolution of different elements.

 _" If these resources can be more profitably used by someone else, they will outbid you."_ You use the word profit as a motive for "entities" consuming all resources. But you fail to elaborate on where this profit comes from? Well, other entities, and there you go, trade. But that's not really what you're getting at. You want to draw a false dichotomy between the two extremes of "powerful entities" and "weak entities".

Either way, all you need is the non-aggression principle and respect for property rights. And these "powerful entities" will never be able to coerce their way into the full market dominance that you describe. It's a self- correcting system, and it can only perpetuate itself if you don't respect property rights and the non-aggression principle.

<comment><USER6> I think cousin_it is not talking about just capitalism and markets, he's talking about optimization processes and game theory. The idea is, if you have two populations and one is better at using resources to grow than the other, then the first one will outgrow and displace the second. The "populations" and "resources" are free terms here; you can substitute for them "companies" and "profit", or "rat populations" and "food" \- the point is, this mechanism holds in abstract.

> _Either way, all you need is the non-aggression principle and respect for > property rights. And these "powerful entities" will never be able to coerce > their way into the full market dominance that you describe._

Non-aggression principles and respect for property are not laws of physics, they need to be actively enforced to have any meaning. For example, the reason patent trolling is profitable is that the victims stand to loose too much in a fight, even if they would ultimately win. We're having a hard time enforcing anything against rich people today, it's hard to see how this will change when the rich get orders of magnitude richer while the poor won't be able to provide any value to exchange for food.

The transition process will be hard and painful, but I do hope we'll emerge victorious on the other side, and that cousin_it's vision will be only temporary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> IMO it depends a lot on the timescale. Give it 100-200 years and all the positive scenario are the likely outcome.

In 200 years, people will only have hobby because that will be all they have to do and most of their needs have been automated.

The problem is the transition to there and that's the annoying thing in all those discussions, nobody ever talk about it.

For example, Industrial Revolution and the 2 World Wars were the fantastic drivers that pushed EU and US in an unprecedented golden age. I'm sure the majority of people would have been happy to get the golden a few years later rather than going through the mass loss of lives or the misery of those years.

> This is not a technological consequence; rather, it's a political choice.

Not quite sure how it is reassuring. Except China, there seem to be no move to even acknowledge that we may have something to do other than "the invisible hand of the market will solve everything"

<comment><USER8> > In 200 years, people will only have hobby because that will be all they have > to do and most of their needs have been automated.

This has not been the trend. Interconnectivity and ease of travel were supposed to relax the amount of work we do, but instead people put in more hours than ever. The efficiency gains have created winners and losers, but both are working at least as hard as before.

<comment><USER9> Depends on the country. In the Netherlands we are definitely working less :)

"In the mid-2000s, the Netherlands was the first country in the industrialized world where the overall average working week dropped to less than 30 hours."

Nice tables: [http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/ewco/studies/tn0803046s/nl080...](http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/ewco/studies/tn0803046s/nl0803049q.htm)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nah, it's not as bad as the article says. It's much worse.

1) If you don't lose your job to a robot, you'll lose it to an emulated human. An em requires only a tiny chip and a little electricity, and is every bit as capable of doing empathy and creativity as you are.

2) If you don't lose your job to an em, you'll lose it (and your life) to unfriendly self-improving AI that has a use for your atoms. If you think there's a law of nature against such awful things happening, think again.

3) Even if you learn about that bleak future with 99% certainty, you'll keep living life as usual and hoping for the 1%, instead of trying to change things.

4) And even if everyone on Earth sees that the bleak future is coming, we won't coordinate with each other to stop it! Look at poor people today, they are already suffering but don't coordinate to improve their lot.

<comment><USER10> The feasibility and cost of "emulated humans" is not settled; it may well be physically impossible.

<comment><USER4> Wouldn't it be nice if all the things that threaten us turned out to be physically impossible?

 _" At the same time, the parts we do understand, such as that human intelligence is almost certainly running on top of neurons firing, suggest very strongly that human intelligence is not the limit of the possible. Neurons fire at, say, 200 hertz top speed; transmit signals at 150 meters/second top speed; and even in the realm of heat dissipation (where neurons still have transistors beat cold) a synaptic firing still dissipates around a million times as much heat as the thermodynamic limit for a one-bit irreversible operation at 300 Kelvin. So without shrinking the brain, cooling the brain, or invoking things like reversible computing, it ought to be physically possible to build a mind that works at least a million times faster than a human one, at which rate a subjective year would pass for every 31 sidereal seconds, and all the time from Ancient Greece up until now would pass in less than a day. This is talking about hardware because the hardware of the brain is a lot easier to understand, but software is probably a lot more important; and in the area of software, we have no reason to believe that evolution came up with the optimal design for a general intelligence, starting from incremental modification of chimpanzees, on its first try."_

[http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/week311.html](http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/week311.html)

<comment><USER11> A very relevant short essay: [http://intelligenceexplosion.com/2011/plenty-of- room-above-u...](http://intelligenceexplosion.com/2011/plenty-of-room-above- us/)

Thinking human brains are the pinnacle of intelligence is ridiculous. We are just the very first intelligent thing to evolve. On top of which, biology is severely constrained in many ways and stuck in local optimas.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Often, the artist or novelist is a better judge of history than the professor or engineer, as they have the distance to see.

Neil Stephenson's 'Snow Crash' is a masterpiece of scene and action. His 'dystopian' novel set a bar to which we judge ourselves to this day. I use 'dystopian' in quotes as Stephenson himself describes his novel as an optimistic view of the future when he wrote it. Why? Because humanity survives the Cold War.

In 1980, that was not necessarily true. I would like to remind any readers that the facts have not changed in this manner. War has always been with us, and the robots, though shiny, will be tools of war just as every keyboard, scythe, and lump of granite has been. If there is one thing we can count on, it is war.

You may argue that the robot will eliminate the scarcity of resources that causes conflict. I hope so. However, history shows us again and again that war is a part of man. If you eliminate it, you rid us all of a part of humanity. I hope dearly for this.

But the consequences of that are not simple, there will be blowback to having the robot take our darker sides away. It is a bargain I hope we strike with the robot. But I have no doubt that my grandchildren will not be the same humans we are if that deal is signed.

</comment><comment><USER13> I see a darker future ahead: From a totally cynical but rational and economic perspective I think human labour is cheaper than any machine workforce for many tasks. We reproduce and maintain ourselves, we just need some water and food. We are very flexible and can adapt to any task very quickly. No need to order spare parts made from expensive raw materials. Human labour is only expensive because we have civil rights and we tend to riot if we are treated badly. Take away these two factors and you have a cheap labour army that's getting bigger by itself.

We are also limited by the capacity and architecture of our brains. A.I can rely on Moore's law, or quantum computers to benefit steadily from better hardware. Therefore I conclude that the most successful agents in our economy will be of A.I. The enterprises behind them might still have a human executer, smiling all charmingly, but A.I. will be in control.

<comment><USER14> But robots adapt (or their manufacturers do). Need a drill attachment for construction? Just snap it on. NO need to use a human who needs a portable drill with internal motor and cord.

<comment><USER6> You can adapt humans as well. Bolt in the drill and a battery pack to the human "frame" and you're good to go. We're not Borg already only because "we have civil rights and we tend to riot if we are treated badly".

<comment><USER14> But much more expensive to adapt to a biological unit. The robot's drill can share the robot's power unit. Mine has to be plugged in; has to have its own motor; has to be shielded and safe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Once again sethf hits the nail on the head. The response is entirely up to us.

I'm not personally optimistic: this country has a deeply held Puritanical work ethic, and even if we get past that we have a real nasty habit of not liking to give any government benefits to " _those people_ ".

But if we can get past that...

<comment><USER6> > _Once again sethf hits the nail on the head. The response is entirely up to > us._

I disagree. Short of halting the progress of robotics and software, there seems to be no way to avoid the continued automation of things, and economy, politicians and social habits will have to follow and adapt, like they always did. More and more I'm buying into the view that it's the technological progress that drives cultural change, not the other way around.

I recently found an interesting article touching this topic:

[http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/03/07/we-wrestle-not-with- fle...](http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/03/07/we-wrestle-not-with-flesh-and- blood-but-against-powers-and-principalities/)

<comment><USER15> >I disagree.

I'm not sure with what, we're both saying the same thing. ;-)

I haven't read too much of it yet but your link looks very interesting, thanks!

<comment><USER6> Well I understood that Seth was saying that politicians can decide to stop job automation or let it happen. I believe that they can't; they have far too little influence to stop a force this strong.

<comment><USER15> That's not how I understood it, and not at all how I think he intended it to be read.

His statement is that a question that sets "automation means less jobs which is bad!" against "automation means more and better jobs which is good!" is improper. Automation will _change_ the job landscape - that's an objective statement, and we've been living it so far.

Whether we make it a _positive_ change and end up with Russell's "idle utopia" or a _negative_ change and end up in some horrific dystopia is entirely up to our response.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The BLS has this documented fairly well over the past century: [http://i.imgur.com/BPNyjM8.png](http://i.imgur.com/BPNyjM8.png)

As advances in agricultural automation removed laborer jobs in the 1900s, workers switched to different, more-specialized industries.

In short, we will probably see jobs disappearing because of automation in the 2000s, but it won't necessarily be bad. Most likely we will also be seeing many new types of jobs appearing as well - some which may have never been conceived yet.

</comment><comment><USER17> This debate has been going on since the 1960s when jobs started becoming computerized. Yes, lots of bue collar manufacturing jobs were lost then. And workers were afraid of automation. In the 1990s workstations and the internet replace white collar clerical jobs. There are far fewer travel agents and bank clerks now. The newer robots may replace the more sophisticated manufacturing, delivery and service jobs.

</comment><comment><USER18> If we were having economic growth, it wouldn't matter. Robots would replace mundane labor, allowing people to be allocated to more economically beneficial occupations.

The problem is that there is no economic growth to speak of outside a few sectors.

IMHO the concern over automation and tech in general is shifting the blame from where it actually belongs: conservative fiscal policy.

</comment><comment><USER19> I think the safest thing to say is that integration of any technology takes time. Even if a technology exists, it won't be ubiquitous immediately.

If we accept that one day computers/robots will be able to outperform a plurality of the population, three questions arise. When will that be? Will enough of us see it coming? How should we respond?

</comment><comment><USER20> And then, in the next 100 or 200 years, a geomagnetic storm destroys all electrical systems and no one will know how to perform basic jobs because we delegated them to robots.. I know, a dystopian vision, but still possible :)

<comment><USER21> Not just possible. Likely. The Brunhes–Matuyama reversal was 780k years ago and the average gap is only 450k years [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal). Such reversal events can cause thousands of years of fluctuating protection from solar radiation.

I'd be fascinated to see a study of how we might protect ourselves during such an event.

Sadly I imagine nobody wants to be the guy that spent billions on EM shielding 50,000 years before anyone needed it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> 1\. Automate thing x.

2\. Wail and fret for 50 years.

3\. Take it for granted for next ∞ years.

</comment><comment><USER23> The question that always occurs to me is, if most people are to be jobless, then who can afford all the products and services provided by the robots?

<comment><USER15> I'm not sure a capitalist system makes sense in a techno-utopia. If the robots make themselves, mine the minerals, smelt the ores, assemble the smartphones, and deliver them to me, there is not a labor cost associated with assembling the smartphone, so why should there be a price?

Maybe the "cost" comes from the loss of the mineral in the ground, but if we're going full on techno-utopia the robots would reclaim the mineral through recycling, so does it become negligible?

Marx touched on the paradoxical nature of automation and advanced technology: "Though machinery be the most potent means for increasing the productivity of labour, that is to say for reducing the amount of labour time necessary for the production of a commodity, in the hands of capital it becomes the most powerful means... for lengthening the working day far beyond the bounds imposed by nature"

And damn, he hits the nail on the head there.

<comment><USER24> Companies don't automate to reduce potential profits, though, but to reduce the cost and inefficiency of human labor. Presumably, even with a fully automated infrastructure, there would still be a human-run corporation at the top, otherwise why would they bother creating the system at all?

But then I may simply not have gone far enough down the rabbithole in my conception of 'techno-utopia.' If the automation is truly self-sustaining and self-contained, in essence, a complete AI economy in and of itself, then perhaps the "cost" comes in the burden of including humans at all?

<comment><USER15> > Presumably, even with a fully automated infrastructure, there would still be > a human-run corporation at the top, otherwise why would they bother creating > the system at all?

IMO you're looking at the system before it reaches an endgame.

Investing in automation is a rational decision to reduce costs & increase profits, so companies are going to make that choice. As automations continue to improve more and more jobs will be eliminated in order to continue increasing profits.

But as jobs are eliminated the people that _used_ to do the jobs are still there - still wanting to earn money to feed and clothe their families. And as they don't have jobs, they don't have money, so corporate profits begin to suffer.

The system will eventually reach a tipping point. I just hope we end on the side of "we run the machines and distribute their output for the good of the people" rather than "we run the machines, keep their output, and give the people worthless scrip".

>If the automation is truly self-sustaining and self-contained, in essence, a complete AI economy in and of itself, then perhaps the "cost" comes in the burden of including humans at all?

Hopefully our robot overlords would see it as an opportunity, rather than a cost.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> people often hand-wave that "new technology creates new jobs". but it seems to me there's a simple economic proof that it's true, based on demand and supply. Is there one?

my favourite commentary on the singularity (comic) [http://partiallyclips.com/2003/09/25/dome- house/](http://partiallyclips.com/2003/09/25/dome-house/)

<comment><USER26> Well, there are practical experience of new jobs created despite automation since at least the luddites.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I think I'm going to have to stop clicking on these ones.

The future according to HN can be summed up as 30 years or so of Basic Income, after which we will be turned into paperclips by an unfriendly AI.

Maybe it's inevitable, but then there's not much point worrying about it. It's just another kind of death.</comment>


Releasing early with bugs: GrandCentral A Little Too Beta For Some - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/03/26/grandcentral-a-little-too-beta-for-some/ <comment><AUTHOR> It's interesting that this write up is not as negative as it could be. For a phone service some of the failures he mentions are pretty bad. Is Arrington pulling punches because he's already been positive?

Arrington claims people expecting Grand Central to do what is says are putting too much faith in a beta product. What you can get away with has a lot to do with your offering. I'm not going to stop watching justin.tv because it's down (like right now, completely dead). But I'm not sure if beta is a good enough excuse for me to miss calls from clients. Especially now that beta is ubiquitous and virtually meaningless. Gmail certainly would not be off the hook for losing my emails. Is it really just caveat emptor for beta products as he suggests?

<comment><USER2> I would say that the answer to your last question should be a resounding "yes". The whole point of the "beta" label is to alert potential users that the product is not completely stable, but is in some usable state. The problem is not so much that the service was not 100% reliable, but that the NYT readers expected it to be and relied critically upon it.

As most Linux and 'BSD users have come to learn, "beta" means just that: not ready for critical use. The user gains some privileges, like being able to use "bleeding-edge" software or to get a valuable service for free, and in return they sacrifice the stability and reliability that comes with time-tested software; all that as they actually are an integral piece to testing that software. Without such a beta stage, the whole rapid development movement would fail as projects get mired in extensive internal testing stages.

Your GMail comment especially strikes me, as I hadn't considered that before. Perhaps they grew much faster than anticipated and are still working on stability issues, and the "losing my emails" scenario may not be far off the mark. By attaching the "beta" label to their service, they can probably avoid any liability that may arise if such an event did occur.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Mobile App back-end CMS? - <AUTHOR>

I've got a project for a mobile app that needs to be able to provide custom assets to a Mobile app and allow the clients to update new content etc.
I'm debating on something like Node.js with KeystoneJS, but I'm not sure if that is the best approach here.
It would be nice if the mobile client had a native feel to it but loaded content from the server in a way that makes the various client experiences reasonably similar.  A custom client is fine even if we have to develop it but would be nice if something existed to speed that process up.
I'm not married to Node.js, heck I'd like to see something in Go but I worry about finding a team that can help me build it later if this gets from prototype to reality.
What would others suggest as the best way to approach this challenge? <comment><USER2> Kator - I'm able to build something like this for you. I typically build APIs and a CMS with Laravel, then build the front-end app using Angular JS and Ionic Framework. Would you like to chat about it sometime?

</comment><comment><USER3> Have you considered using Parse.com? Or some other back end as a service?

<comment><AUTHOR> Would rather have our own hosted environment as we expect to do a lot of customizations...</comment></comment>


Amazon Stock Climbs to $3000 - <AUTHOR> https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AMZN/ <comment><AUTHOR> AMZN annual stock growth:

      2020 (so far): 56.42%
      2019: 23.03%
      2018: 28.43%
      2017: 55.96%
      2016: 10.95%
      2015: 117.78%

Although Amazon doesn't give out top offers, it's stock growth often brings compensation in line with other top companies.</comment>


Ios, Android, WP7 - who cares? - <AUTHOR> http://jacquesmattheij.com/Ios+Android+WP7+who+cares

<comment><USER3> As a question of fact, has the mainstream switched from apps to webapps on the desktop? e.g. for spreadsheets, word processors, text editors, photoshop, compilers. If not, then the argument becomes "I think B will happen because I think A will happen".

One argument is that the main barrier to webapps is performance, and as soon as hardware gets fast enough, webapps will beat desktop apps. Firstly, there's a question of whether the hardware can ever be "fast enough" and this depends on the specific applications. An illustration is between Java and C. Java's JVM was slower but portable (similar benefits as webapps, for similar reasons). Today, Java is massively popular - but C is also still massively popular, and I would argue that one reason for this is that performance is still important for some applications. Perhaps there will be a similar proportion for webapps.

Secondly, as performance improves, user preferences may switch to some factor other than webapps first. Smart phones are a prime example: instead of people staying on their desktop and switching from apps to to webapps, they have switched from desktop apps to mobile apps. That excess performance is being spent on mobility rather than the web; people preferred the benefits of a small, portable form-factor over the benefits of the web. It may be that when smartphones become powerful enough (dual 1GHz cpus this year), an even smaller form factor will appear - making high performance software a premium once again.

Apart from performance, there are network barriers to webapps: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacies_of_Distributed_Comput...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacies_of_Distributed_Computing)

       1. The network is reliable.
       2. Latency is zero.
       3. Bandwidth is infinite.
       4. The network is secure.
       5. Topology doesn't change.
       6. There is one administrator.
       7. Transport cost is zero.
       8. The network is homogeneous.

All this will improve, but will it improve enough? Even if it does eventually, in the long run, we're all dead.

<comment><USER4> How many NEW desktop apps have you installed recently?

We obviously won't see Adobe, Autodesk and some other professional software developers moving their products to web anytime soon, but when we are talking about the new products - web is usually the winner. Look at Chrome and it's pace of innovation, check out the examples from Mozilla Demo Studio, could you imagine that working in all latest major browsers 3 years ago?

Same is true for mobile, I don't see another space for innovation except improving web performance, integration & so on. Maybe you see some other directions where iPhone & Android can go?

<comment><USER5> _How many NEW desktop apps have you installed recently?_

I don't install new desktop apps very often because my needs are already solved. I do nearly all my work in:

\- Mail.app

\- Xcode

\- Eclipse

\- TeXShop

\- Terminal

\- Chrome (JIRA, and browsing documents-not-webapps)

I'd _prefer_ a native application for JIRA, but I haven't found a decent one yet.

 _Same is true for mobile, I don't see another space for innovation except improving web performance, integration & so on. Maybe you see some other directions where iPhone & Android can go?_

I expect the iOS and Android platforms to continue to evolve their core libraries, providing significant additional functionality and features for use by mobile applications. Eventually that will slow as the mobile platforms mature.

I'd like to say that I expect the development of higher-level common platforms out of web browsers, but outside of (possibly) WebOS, this seems unlikely.

Compared to the web, iOS and Android have comprehensive platform APIs with consistent widgets and user experiences (iOS more than Android when it comes to consistency), support for multiple programming languages and runtimes, immediate access to platform vendor's APIs (playing video doesn't involve an browser vendors arguing over <video>, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> From where I sit, native applications still rule the day. Sure we spend more time in our browsers than anywhere else, but at least for me that was true back when Jacques still has the desktop war raging. IMO there is a good bit of web entrepreneur/HN hive mind selection bias here - I still go to Libre Office when I want to make documents, local dev tools for coding, local media players, local photo editors, etc. Sure, I can do a fair amount of that stuff "in the cloud" to varying degrees of effectiveness, but that doesn't come close to the last nail in the native application coffin. And I know a good number of people who even stick to desktop mail apps.

My point, I guess, is that I don't think the desktop war is dead - in fact there are a lot of decisions that go into how everyone picks their platform still today. So I don't really see that going away in mobile either - <USER2> nothing else on many platforms you can't even pick your browser. Also, much like on the desktop choosing one OS vs. another can really affect your security posture. In the coming years security is going to be a much bigger deal to a fast growing segment of the population.

<comment><USER7> I agree. I think this viewpoint is a little skewed. Web-based applications have definitely not killed the desktop differences.

However, I think there is a much better chance of them killing the mobile differences to a greater extent, since

1) we don't do as many processing-intense things on mobile platforms, like CAD, designing, etc., and

2) those processing-intense applications we actually do use on phones are also becoming available on the web for the large part.

<comment><USER8> I am actually happy that everyone considers desktop software old dated and dead - less competition for me :)

From a perspective of windows software ISV (yes, shareware which is supposed to be dead) I can say that there are lots of opportunities and companies making some serious money, unlike on the web where everyone expects to get things for free.

<comment><USER9> Just because everyone expects to get things for free on the web doesn't mean there aren't companies making serious money. They just make their money selling something other than software directly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I disagree entirely with his main point.

I will still buy a Mac over a Windows machine any day, and I still have friends who will say the same for Windows and Linux. I have a nice list of apps and features I cannot live without on my Mac, and my friends have similar lists for Linux and Windows.

The one thing we can learn from the desktop OS war is that it's far from over, and so I suspect the mobile OS war will rage on for years (decades?) to come as well.

I don't disagree that a web based model is ideal for certain applications, but there are still many applications that leverage client-side machine benefits like storage, computing power, and responsiveness. And that's where the OS makes all the difference.

</comment><comment><USER11> I'm seriously thinking of doing web work again, but I'm not kidding myself that my future Html5 apps will replace/kill the native ones, because html5 is nowhere near as fast or as well integrated with the platforms.

Instead, I just hope that I can be competitive with (mobile) native apps eventually and that I can deploy on multiple platforms with a reasonable effort.

</comment><comment><USER12> The article completely ignores the "appstore" distribution channel advantage. This isn't quite the windows/mac application versus web debate of the web 1.0 days. The appstore model significantly lowers the barrier of app consumption found in the old app distribution models, and brings the total distribution "cost" to be at least on-par with web apps, with a couple significant advantages.

Appstores provide near instant consumption, virtually eliminating the distribution inefficiencies of retail purchases. They also solve the payment (and collection) problem. Apple shares the same advantage that Amazon has in online shopping, as they already have my credit card, so purchases are just easier when going through Amazon, and Apple with the AppStore.

The appstore app model also provides an ongoing consumption advantage over web apps, as direct integration with the device provides unique to maintain engagement over the long term. Notification features will keep customers returning to your app. Also, presence on the home screen is like a built-in advertisement for your app. While you can add icons for web pages, its not typically used by most consumers.

I do recognize that developing to HTML5 instead of the specific mobile platforms can save the developer a lot of time, but it doesn't matter. Its all about the customer. Whichever model provides the superior overall consumption experience will win.

Who knows what the future brings, but the argument provided by the author is void of true analysis of the dynamics at play, and uses an imperfect historical comparison as a means to justify his view.

</comment><comment><USER13> People don't seem to really understand the difference: a web app sits on a server. A native app is on the device. A web app will ALWAYS have a round trip time - the web is not instantaneous. So it will ALWAYS be slower than a locally run app, by its very definition.

Furthermore, a browser imposes buttons and bars on the application that it does not need. In a mobile app, space is at an extreme premium, and the space used up by the browser elements are needed.

If we solve these two problems, by making all web based apps download their logic to the client, and by disappearing the browser entirely, then that's a native app. It's running locally and it's independent of the browser.

<comment><USER14> _If we solve these two problems, by making all web based apps download their logic to the client, and by disappearing the browser entirely, then that's a native app. It's running locally and it's independent of the browser._

I agree with you on this, although the one quibble I can see is that part of the appeal of web apps has been the idea that you (the user) don't have to update them, because that all happens on the server side. This can be solved trivially of course by just having the client side app check it's origin server for updates whenever the user accesses it, but there's a possibility of that that could end up rather messy unless update management was a centralized part of the OS, rather than a free-for-all (Java Updater and Acrobat Updater, I'm looking at you!).

<comment><USER13> Chrome auto-updates, you never realise it.

<comment><USER14> Right, Chrome is basically the only program that auto-updates correctly. But in the context of the myriad other programs that try to auto-update and fail miserably, or worse, I think my point stands.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I wish HN had a filtering system. I don't know why each of his blog posts makes it all they way to the top — I don't find them that insightful or interesting. I would much rather read about software & hacking.

Or is there a JavaScript solution? Has someone implemented a HN filter?

<comment><AUTHOR>
      > I would much rather read about software & hacking.

Cool - I'd like to read about those things too. Did you upvote the three things on software and hacking that I submitted in the past week or so? Have you submitted any that I could upvote?

      > Or is there a JavaScript solution?
      > Has someone implemented a HN filter?

If you're into software and hacking, perhaps you could provide one for us.

And to more-or-less answer your question, HN was originally "Startup News" and has always had a bent towards startups. It was widened to "Hacker News," but it still retains that bias. Strict hacking isn't hitting the majority audience, it's still heavily slanted towards the startup scene, and things that interest people who do, or want to do, startups.

That's why Jacques' posts are interesting to people - they are the musings and observations of someone who has started and runs several software and web based businesses. Hence they resonate with the majority audience.

But I'd be happy to see and promote anything you post about software and hacking.

Where's your blog?

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> My boss told me, you can not sell a web application on App Store, that's why we have to hire an iphone programmer to build a client app.

<comment><USER17> You could charge for web apps. And on the plus side, if you do, you don't have to pay anyone 30% off your price.

<comment><USER18> Don't underestimate the peer pressure to have an app on the AppStore or, to a lesser degree, the Marketplace.

Web apps are like the place the cool high school kids and poseurs avoid

<comment><USER17> _Web apps are like the place the cool high school kids and poseurs avoid_

IOW, webapps will (continue to) be making good money 5 years down the line while iOS apps are bagging groceries at the local supermarket? :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> People have been driving for web interface to rule them all for more than 10 years now. It will never happen in our life time. Those asking for web interface are mainly driving from tech management point of view, one development and interface for all devices and platforms. But consumers don't care and that's why the past few years we see the rise of native mobile interfaces. I see a future where native interface continues to rule, where the web is more the backend glues and data that network all together. Web interface might take a back seat when new generations user interface becomes standard. Touch has just become the standard, imagine a future with kinect like or advanced voice interface. Native interface on purpose build interface devices will have the opportunity to progress and advance the way we interface with the net and computer.

</comment><comment><USER20> While I certainly agree with Jacques that this war of mobile platforms will end with most applications being run off the internet, the reason I still care about iOS/Android/WP7 is that the days of webapp domination over native apps on smartphones is quite a long way off, and till then there is a very viable opportunity to make a decent amount of money off native apps for the various platforms.

</comment><comment><USER21> "Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent."

<comment><USER22> market irrationality is generally due to

1\. a large entity throwing money away to achieve some outcome. he will eventually be eaten by arbitrage unless he has arbitrary amounts of capital (state actors)

2\. the person stating this not understanding what a rational market means.

<comment><USER21> It's an analogy, not meant to be taken literally.

<comment><USER22> you may want to talk to all the people who take the idea quite seriously as a critique of market speed in reaching equilibrium.

<comment><USER23> It just means that you can have large numbers of participants being wrong and so, by their sheer weight become unmanageable to a smaller entity which however has the correct picture. This is why short-selling is not for the faint of heart. You need to know not just that the market is wrong, but when it will realize it is wrong.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The problem isn't with the Web, it's with current Web standards. The concept of a secure platform for rapid application development and world-wide distribution is great, but Web standards (HTML5 + CSS3 + JavaScript) are really failing to deliver on their promise.

There are apps written in HyperCard _20 years ago_ that are richer than anything that has been created on the Web that I know of. With iOS, Android, WP7, developers are developing better apps faster than is possible with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. The Web needs better standards to compete; HTML, CSS, and JavaScript are a dead-end.

</comment><comment><USER25> I think the 'war of mobile OS' as the author calls it will end just as the also still ongoing 'war for the desktop OS' will end: by the introduction of the web OS.

An OS is just a GUI for working with your files. As our devices, whether desktop or mobile, will continue to move towards an 'always on, always connected' phase it would be no more than logical to seperate the device from the OS and to launch whatever OS you feel like working with today on any device you want to launch it on.

Wherever you are in the world, whether it's on a crappy computer (with great internet connection) in a hostel in Thailand, in the train on your phone, you will always have your files and operating system of your choice available.

<comment><USER26> I think there will always be places without a network (that works). The web platform will need a much more functional cache to handle this, but the architecture is already there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I haven't seen Call of Duty or Final Cut Pro in the web yet. Native applications haven't given up the ghost yet and I really don't expect them to. They are more responsive to the user and easier to build.

Other than the link 6ren <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2371909> provided for the Fallacies of Distributed Computing, I believe the problem for apps on the web are the crappy state of web client development. Project Builder / Interface Builder or the 1st version of Visual Studio can build better apps than tool today in an easier manner.

</comment><comment><USER28> It's not a zero-sum game with native vs web apps. The web will not kill native apps, but for many applications the web offers a better platform than native development. For example, look at the rise of GMail's web client over MS Outlook - for many users a web client is easier, with mail accessible from any device with a browser.

New HTML5 features will extend these advantages to more types of apps beyond webmail. The same question came up over at Quora, with thoughful responses: <http://www.quora.com/Is-HTML5-the-mobile-app-killer>

</comment><comment><USER29> It does matter, especially when you have Microsoft crippling the web with their consistently outdated browsers. Just look at what WinPhone7 is running compared to everyone else's webkit-based solutions. Even when they get their ie9 on the phone it will still be behind the browsers in ios, android (including firefox and opera), and the newer blackberries.

We'll be writing if(ie) conditionals for a long time if people start buying winphone 7

</comment><comment><USER30> You should seriously consider joining the FAP store, which is for the Brother IntelliFax 2800.

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=120R2-phK0U>

After watching the above pitch; why you would want to do anything in the web or utilise web technologies, when there are powerful app stores like this launching on your fax machine, I have no idea ;)

</comment><comment><USER31> I don't see the desktop becoming obsolete. I can't think of another way to do my daily tasks without it. I can't think of another way for my clients too. A tablet and a smart phone are a great addition for my client X, but they don't replace his desktop computer. The iPad, iPhone and Xbox are enough for the kids to have fun, but when they want to browse the Internet and do a presentation, I doubt that the iPad is flexible and powerful enough. I doubt also that Google SpreadSheet is flexible and powerful as Microsoft Office Powerpoint.

A new trend has emerged (Internet + SmartPhones) because we have (the citizen of Planet Earth) become excessive technology users. We have become data holics. We like communication and Internet had just made it easier and more accessible. People got addicted to Information and the awesomeness of technology. That's why they buy the iPad. If they affrod it, they'll pay for it. People pay for the desktop because they need it. Different people have different usages. Some poeple don't use a PC everyday, but a one week usage justifies the purchase.

</comment><comment><USER32> Who cares? Developers do! For example Nokia's decision to ditch Qt4 means that we have to wait for "write once, run anywhere" even longer. And I am not so sure whether the browser will solve it all again. I think Microsoft and Apple are going to make sure that this won't happen again. In fact they already did so by removing the customers' freedom to install and run software of their choice.

</comment><comment><USER33> In what world have online office solutions or, even better, web-based photo editing software replaced their Desktop counterparts for even the simplest use cases? I see no widespread adoption at all, which renders the argument moot.

Whoever thinks web apps have already taken over lives in a very peculiar bubble.

</comment><comment><USER34> There are certainly plenty of native desktop applications which have not been supplanted by web applications. But the bigger problem is that desktop machines typically have high speed, almost unlimited data connections.

This is not necessarily true for mobile platforms, where there can be coverage issues, bandwidth limitations due to insufficient spectrum and/or cell power buildout, or worse yet, magic break points after which you pay $$$/kb uploaded or downloaded. This is one of the reasons why local storage and native applications may be much more important for mobile applications. No one expects to bring a desktop computer onboard an airplane or a subway and be able to read e-mail. But they do expect to be able to do this on a mobile device.

</comment><comment><USER35> If I'm Apple, Google, or Microsoft I'm going to care a lot because - native or web - users need a platform for applications, and those platforms represent a) revenue potential (see the iPad business) and b) a potential control point (see MSFT for the past two decades). As far as I'm concerned, the native vs web application question is secondary to the platform question. We're going to have both, and yes web clients will increase share. That doesn't change the fact that whoever is supplying the most popular platform for apps - web or native - will have control and profit potential in spades.

</comment><comment><USER36> The PC/Mac app market was fairly small for independent developers and very few people bought a large number of desktop apps. It is true that the web (mostly free sites and e-commerce sites) was able to deliver a lot of new "apps" to desktop users.

However, imo the post is mistaken in assuming that the mobile world will be exactly like the desktop world. The mobile app store economy is evolving in a very different way from the desktop world. That, in itself, is an indication that mobile app world may not _"fade away to be replaced with the www equivalent of mobile"_

<comment><USER37> Is mobile app store popularity a fad?

In some ways I think not. In many ways it looks like the latest GameBoy, Nintendo DS market, combined with the PDA market. These are not new markets, only their ease of use is new, and for PDA type apps, exposure.

But it seems most people install new apps, and only use a very small subset. As the novelty of a phone with an app store wears off, I suspect we will see a return to people only installing a few apps. Much in the way as the shareware scene - I used to try out lots of apps. Now I generally only install a small set of proven, good, open source/free tools, and try one or two others a year. Often prompted by personal recommendations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> It's not just the difference in app numbers, in app quality, in app language (you can probably do more with 1gb of memory in objc than java), but it's the integration, the user experience. On the computer, it's all well and good doing everything on your browser, but unless you're in full screen mode you're seeing something other than the page you're on. Apple does that bit best. (and others, but it's further ahead in the look of the out-of-app bits)

</comment><comment><USER39> More people would use desktop apps if they were easier to install. I tried to talk my mom through installing skype the other day, and we hit a snag. So she just used the video chat in gmail. Skype would have been better for her for various reasons, but she settled. If Skype were in an app store, she'd have bought it.

I install way more software when I'm in a linux environment, since it's just one simple command to do so.

</comment><comment><USER40> I don't think that the OS "war" will necessarily lead to an open, web based standard. It may well be that one of the contenders manages to make their "platform" so irresistible to users that they flock to that one OS, and we all will have another "MS" for a decade or two.

Its also the job of every developer to "guide" the users towards the best choice. More apps should have a browser version, for instance.

</comment><comment><USER41> interesting, I would say this is no different to any other inovation we have had in the past. Look at the car for instance it doesn't matter how fast it can go according to it's speedometer or what version of gas you buy, you are limited to the speed limit on the road you are travelling on at that time. So mobile Telco's will need to play a more direct role in delivering content more efficiently, for instance why have all the infrastructure laid out and bandwidth paid for for all the $$$ flying past which they can't get in on. Why not host something, apps, search, whatever and make mobile data, faster and more efficient. Hell how come no matter what TV you have you can get a decent picture without any download issues. Maybe we are too focused on hardware and not delivering stable, fast, realtime content.

</comment><comment><USER42> I completely agree. I'm curious how we would abstract the rest of the hardware though. cam/mic/sensors can't be accessed from javascript (yet?).

</comment><comment><USER43> > the web literally blew away the platform differences to something that is > comparable to a flavor rather than a huge technical difference or advantage.

yeah, web photoshop and web office are real alternatives ...

<comment><USER9> This isn't a particularly insightful comment, but I get your drift. The thing is, for the generation of teenagers and young adults, web-based software is actually relatively easier to use than native software because they grew up on the web. Even if you sacrifice some functionality using Google docs instead of Word, many people prefer the benefits of an instant-on, no-install, free, auto-syncing solution. So yeah, it is a viable alternative.

<comment><USER43> Yeah, but it doesn't mean the desktop war was lost/won.

Desktops are the niche of professional (or power) users. Tablets are where the web will point - because tablets (and phones) will be how the casual user will "compute" in the future.

So to me, web apps will never (well not in the near future) win the desktop war - just because they can't offer the speed and power a professional user needs.</comment></comment></comment>


Montgomery County parents say new curriculum is 'one-size-fits-all' math - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/montgomery-county-parents-say-new-curriculum-20-is-one-size-fits-all-math/2012/12/02/6828d390-3295-11e2-bfd5-e202b6d7b501_story.html

<comment><USER2> _But many students were accelerated before they were ready, said Erick Lang, an assistant superintendent. The pressure had families hiring private tutors for students who were falling behind and high school math instructors wasting time reteaching basic material._

I think a lot of ground could be made up with online education outside of the classroom. With the popularity of MOOCs and digital textbooks on tablets, students could learn the basics using self-directed online study, and cover the more advanced topics in class. The challenge with computer-based learning is largely the same one brought up by these parents - that the same material is being taught to each student, regardless of ability. I think once you figure out how to tailor the lesson to each student, online learning could be a worthwhile supplement to classroom learning.</comment>


List of Graphics Resources, Blogs, Publications - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/mattdesl/graphics-resources

<comment><USER2> Better title would be "Graphics /Programming/ Resources"...but nice collection!</comment>


Ask HN: How do you list your achievements without hard metrics? - <AUTHOR> I have skimmed through resumes, both real ones and examples, and frequently I come across achievements stated in numbers. "Accomplished XX% performance increase saving costs of $XXXX for the company in the quarter"<p>I'm sorry, but personally I find it hard to relate to this. I have worked for several companies as a software engineer, but there has been very little concern or motivation for management to track things meticulously by the numbers. The best I can do is ballpark estimates using words like "dozens" or "30-40%". Are these metrics still acceptable to use in your job history? <comment><USER2> You can think of the ideal resume entry as a little story: here's the settings, here's why I did what I did, here's what I did, here's the outcome.

The goal is to have that story resonate with the reader: "Oh djellybeans went and did this thing in a new product, and we're a new product and we have similar problems, maybe they can do that for us!"

Accomplishments are the last bit of the story, and ideally you have all of them.

Now, savings lots of money is great, and if someone measured it you can include it. Consider measuring this stuff yourself, even if management doesn't. But the real goal is to explain _why_ this matters, why it's useful, why the reader should care, in a way that will match their concerns.

Here's an example from my resume, where I wrote a new config format for ops team at an old employer. Here how's I might have all four of the elements of the story:

1\. Setting: The ops team managed hundreds of servers with similar but not identical configuration.

2\. Motivation: Noticing that this made configuring servers difficult,

3\. What I did: I implemented a prototype-based configuration system, where one system's configuration could inherit that of another.

4\. Accomplishment/outcome: This allowed them to significantly simplify their configuration, reducing opportunities for errors and unwanted divergence.

Notice that item #4, accomplishments, has no numbers. But it still explains why the reader should care, and the things I might be able to help them with.</comment>


Final thoughts on Windows 8: A design disaster - <AUTHOR> http://zdnet.com/blog/hardware/final-thoughts-on-windows-8-a-design-disaster/20706 <comment><USER2> > I'm going to avoid commenting on Metro on touch-based systems for now > because Windows 8 is too far off in the future to know what the hardware is > going to be like. Instead, I'm going to limit my discussion to using the > operating system on desktop and notebook systems.

I think he roundly missed the point.

Yes you scan over the screen and it might be hard to find the things you want on day one. That's how it was with our iPhone and Androids too on the first day we got them.

You all know what happens. People rearrange to their taste or memorize the locations of the less-than-five applications that they commonly use. It's not as if the "where's waldo" game goes on indefinitely.

I think he's being intentionally obtuse about this. Windows is trying to unify their UI among the XBox, Phones, Tablets and Desktops and he wants to focus on the one where it will be less useful than the others by complaining about a problem that literally every smartphone user has already solved by day three.

Typing the name of the app you want is clumsy, you say? More clumsy than eyeballing a list that gets rather large?

<http://i.imgur.com/Z0pCc.png>

If you know what you want, typing is _vastly_ easier than scanning a long startmenu list of items.

<comment> old-gregg But what stops you from re-arranging and placing the most often used application shortcuts on your desktop in Windows 95? And indeed, most users do just that. The reviewer correctly points out that this new UI doesn't really add anything, only takes things away. Shortcuts+search have been around for a while.

Actually I have no opinion on Windows 8 because I have not seen it myself, but this review fits both Gnome Shell and Unity very well: it's like they all suddenly joined the iphone-as-a-desktop cult.

Typing the application titles does not work for me. Because for frequently used apps I already have hotkeys or sidebar icons, but I never remember the names of rarely used apps: should I be typing "Monitor settings" or "Display" or "Desktop" or whatever, if I need to change the background or a screen resolution?

Lastly, is that really the biggest problem with the modern desktops: finding apps? Seriously, of all things that could possibly be made better, why are they all trying to re-invent how we're launching applications?

<comment><USER2> > but I never remember the names of rarely used apps: should I be typing > "Monitor settings" or "Display" or "Desktop" or whatever, if I need to > change the background or a screen resolution?

Windows Vista and up automatically help you with this. Even typing things like "DPI" or "wheel" into control panel come up with a list of all possible relevant _actions that could be taken_ , as opposed to just different panel screens. Here are a few examples of that in action:

<http://i.imgur.com/c9uN1.png>

<http://i.imgur.com/hZStY.png>

<http://i.imgur.com/dQR9U.png>

> why are they all trying to re-invent how we're launching applications?

My comment said why! It's not a re-invention, just a unification of the look and feel with the rest of Microsoft's ecosystem (xbox, phones, tablets, PCs will all have the same "start" screens).

<comment><USER3> I hate the wizardly control panel, incidentally. Just the other day, I was trying to remove a device. After maybe five minutes I decided it's not possible, until some time later accidentally finding the right button to press. It's very much not clear to me anymore what I can do, or how.

<comment><USER4> Not sure whether you're removing drivers or ejecting hardware, but Device Manager is still in the control panel and Eject Hardware is where it always was. I wasn't aware of any other way you could do it, past or present.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I've been using Windows since 3.11 and when I first booted up Windows 8 I clicked the Windows Explorer button in 'Metro' and was taken to the 'Classic' desktop. No Start menu. It took me a good fifteen minutes of clicking around to discover how to get back to Metro so I could launch any program.

In short it made a programmer feel like an idiot. I can't imagine how many grandads are going to be furious with it if they upgrade. I have no idea why removing the Start menu is a good idea.

I use OS X, Ubuntu (headless servers) and Windows 7 daily and I will definitely wait until Windows 9 before I upgrade my Windows VM. They are definitely sticking to the 'every second release sucks' cycle, like Star Trek.

<comment><USER6> "I have no idea why removing the Start menu is a good idea."

Because it wasn't removed, it was changed and given a new presentation. The alternative would have been to have two redundant start menus.

<comment><USER7> Even keeping the icon where the old one was which when clicked would take you to the new "start menu" would have helped...

<comment><USER6> That was the original design (seen in the first public preview).

<comment><USER8> I think that's probably an indication that the whole "It's not a replacement for the Start Menu, it _is_ the Start Menu" school of thought is a bit flawed.

<comment><USER9> They've removed all visual cues that let you know what things do. You'd have no way of knowing that clicking the bottom left takes you to metro if someone or something doesn't tell you. If you click on the bottom right corner, you minimize all windows -- There's a visual cue for this in windows 7. The button still exists, but they've removed this visual cue in Windows 8, and I have no idea why. I'm really baffled by it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It sounds like it's going to be the "Ribbon" debacle part deux.

The debut of the Ribbon UI in Office 2007 was the tipping point where I started to look at other platforms and other productivity suites. It made no sense at all to me to switch from literally decades of convention in the UI to something that to this day leaves me frustrated every time I use it (probably because it's not often).

The Ribbon is why I now use a Mac, and don't use Outlook or any Office products.

Windows 8/Metro is going to be another such pivotal moment. It's so different, I wonder how many people are going to say "wow, maybe I ought to look at a Mac / Linux if I have to relearn everything anyway."

<comment><USER11> I really like the Ribbon. Just like everyone else I found it a pain to begin with but it didnt take long to adjust and now I much prefer it to digging through menus. The customisation options are also really great.

Is there any research or evidence to suggest that the Ribbon is a UI failure? Office 2012 will use the Ribbon (restyled to look all metro-y).

<comment><USER12> The Ribbon is too big. It often looks stupidly redundant (section titles matching action button titles, like Find/Find and Exit/Exit). Icons are overused; it shouldn't be a sin to let "only" a word be the label for something. Mostly it looks like somebody emptied all the drawers onto the top of my desk, forcing me to stare at a pile of junk all day long even though 90% of the time all I need from the pile is my pen.

<comment><USER13> "Is there any research or evidence to suggest that the Ribbon is a UI failure?"

"The Ribbon is too big" is not research, and is anecdotal evidence at best. I, too, would love to see some actual research into the Ribbon. Programmers and the like hate it, but what about the "average Joe"?

<comment><USER14> Here's some info I've found:

[http://www.wseas.us/e-library/conferences/2010/Faro/DNCOCO/D...](http://www.wseas.us/e-library/conferences/2010/Faro/DNCOCO/DNCOCO-25.pdf) [http://www.exceluser.com/explore/surveys/ribbon/ribbon- surve...](http://www.exceluser.com/explore/surveys/ribbon/ribbon-survey- results.htm)

Personally, I'm a programmer and I have no problem with the ribbon interface.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'm probably not the norm here, but after installing Windows 8, getting the apps I care about pinned on the desktop taskbar I really, really like Windows 8.

It mostly feels like a cleaned up version of Windows 7, and it is much, much snappier. Whatever you do happens _now_. Even when you wake it up from cold hibernation it boots in less than 10 seconds. When it's only suspended it's ready just like that. Instantly.

It's as close to instant as my laptop has ever been. All the animations are silk smooth. Everything is fluid. This thing has been optimized to hell.

There can be no doubt that Windows 8 contains a multitude of technological improvements. Unfortunately for Microsoft, they seem to insist on literally taking the Windows out of Windows and forcing Metro on everyone. Even those who don't want it.

Every now and then (like when connecting to a new network) you have (Metro) infobars sliding in from the side and you can just tell that they come from a _different_ world somehow. They don't belong in your desktop. And that makes the entire experience feel a bit less coherent.

But all in all, I may be the exception, but I love Windows 8 so far. But to Microsoft's dismay, I love it not because of Metro, but despite it.

They've done this before though. Remember the Ribbon? I used to hate it and now I can't live without it. We'll see if Metro fares as good, although deep down inside, I doubt it.

<comment><USER16> I am with you. I am wondering when exactly these desktop power users will even see Metro. Nearly all the apps I use day-to-day are pinned to my task-bar.

<comment><USER17> I haven't run the Consumer Preview yet, but in the Developer Preview, I kept getting kicked out of Desktop and into Metro when requesting a lot tasks that were initiated from the Desktop. The fullscreen transition was very jarring when I expected to stay in Desktop.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> It sounds to me like he loves windows 8, but doesn't like the metro UI. Literally, despite how he repeatedly said "Windows 8 is a totally failure", his only complaint was with the ribbons. Everything else was about metro.

What does he even do in metro? Why does he keep returning to it? I've been working in windows 8 for months, and I'm only on the start screen after my computer boots up.

I can't help but wonder if he actually hates windows 8 as much as he sounds like he does, or if he's using link bait for page views.

The only noteworthy comment he made was this one:

> The biggest problem with Windows 8 is that it wasn't born out of a need or > demand.

Too bad that has little to do with what the rest of the article is actually about.

<comment><USER19> If you're not using the start screen / Metro then isn't Windows 8 basically just Windows 7? Is there any compelling reason to upgrade _at all_?

<comment><USER20> One thing that is pretty useful is the multi-monitor support. You get a taskbar for every monitor. Apart from that, though, Windows 8 has added absolutely nothing to my experience.

<comment><USER19> I already use DisplayFusion for multi-monitor taskbars in Windows 7.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I can't imagine how typing the name of the app you want to open is a design failure. I use Windows 7 and OS X Lion about equally and Alfred on OS X and the Start search box on Windows 7 are the _only_ way that I find apps that I want to open. It's largely the same way with finding files I want. It's my preferred way navigate the operating system.

<comment><USER22> I agree with you. In fact before I discovered that feature on a Mac I was absolutely baffled trying to figure out how people used Macs for real work.

On the other hand, I do a decent amount of desktop support in my job and I have yet to find a user who knew it was possible to hit the Windows key and start typing. There's a huge difference in usage patterns between the "power users" and "everyone else".

<comment><USER23> I too have used windows since v.3 and didn't know about this... One of the reason's I love OSX is using quicksilver.

<comment><USER24> try Launchy for Windows, it's no Quicksilver but it does a good job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I think more people would be fine with Windows 8 if people stopped telling them that they should hate it.

Same for Vista; personally, I never encountered problems with drivers/sluggishness that people told me were bound to happen. It wasn't a spectacular upgrade from XP but I think most people avoided it because people were very outspoken about how supposedly awful it was.

<comment><USER26> With Vista nobody told my wife she should hate it but the version that came pre-installed on her laptop never worked right and so she told me to return the laptop or put something on it that worked, so I installed Linux.

The problem with Windows 8 seems to be a general issue going on with UI design generally. If you look at Unity and GNOME-3 for example, these also break settled user expectations. It's like there is a rush to tell the users they are stupid and don't know what a usable UI is. I don't get that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I don't know if Windows 8 is good or bad, but I do know the perception of it is bad. Perception is reality. If Microsoft doesn't get control of Windows 8 image ASAP then it's going to bomb.

<comment><USER28> When was the last time Microsoft had control of the image of any of its products?

<comment><USER27> It's been a long time, but now there is more viable competition as well as less need to upgrade from older versions.

I think Microsoft would be far better off doing more frequent OS updates with smaller changes.

<comment><USER23> This is clearly a result of pressure from investors. Osx,iOS/android and chrome/*nix are all rapidly advancing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> In my (limited) experience, ZDNet has always been very friendly of Microsoft. The fact that even they are throwing around words like "disaster" doesn't bode well in my mind.

</comment><comment><USER30> It comes down to this: Microsoft doesn't care about the desktop market. They don't have to. People will keep buying Windows. It doesn't matter how bad the experience gets, the average consumer will still buy it, and the manufacturers will still ship it. Not to mention the desktop market isn't growing. The tablet market is a different story. This is a young market with lots of potential and people are still making decisions. Steve Ballmer is a businessman. He knows desktop windows can be as bad as he wants, and nothing will change. But if Windows 8 works well on tablets, Microsoft might have a new revenue stream. From a business perspective, the desktop Windows experience does not matter, and so it will be designed for the tablet.

<comment><USER31> > He knows desktop windows can be as bad as he wants, and nothing will change.

If that's the plan, he's in for a rude shock. Given the Vista experience, Microsoft has probably room for a mulligan. They'll bleed a few users, but it will be a flesh wound. Most people who really care won't have trouble skipping a release cycle like they did before (plenty of them haven't upgraded to Windows 7 after all). But if two versions in a row suck, if there's no light at the end of the tunnel... people will have plenty of places to go, and they will.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> I'm excited about Metro. I've hated every one of my Windows experiences to date. So I'm in a different boat from most people, who are probably upset about the changes, which will require learning something new with dubious benefits. But for me, I might actually find Windows useable for the first time (where the payoff of using it exceeds the effort to use it).

<comment><USER33> Interesting, you might be an outlier. What UI experience did you enjoy then?

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> It's hard for me to say much about how the UX feels without having used it. However, one thing sticks out to me as a concrete example of Microsoft's failings.

"Another annoyance with the Metro Start Screen is that all roads lead to it. Almost everything you do ends up throwing you into the Start Screen. I find it utterly crazy that I can go from clicking on a tile on the Start Screen and then be unceremoniously dumped into things like a Classic Control Panel applet or Windows Explorer. Then, to do the next thing, you're back to the Start Screen again."

Microsoft effectively has unlimited resources (cash and people). There is no excuse for not updating all of the applications to match the new UI toolkit.

This sounds exactly like happened with Vista. They updated the OS, but not the 1st party applications. Windows 7 updated many of them (Paint, Movie Maker, etc), but even then not 100%. I guess the issue was that the 'Ribbon UI' was an Office team invention, not a Windows team invention, but as a user I don't really care about the office politics behind it.

Now they're adding a Metro layer and they made the same mistake? It makes the OS so inconsistent. They can't do much about it for 3rd party apps, but the 1st party apps should be consistent. The cost of rewriting the presentation layer across all of those utilities has to be a small amount compared to the overall budget.

</comment><comment><USER35> I hope MS will up there release schedule just like Apple and Ubuntu. When OSX first landed most people didn't like it at all. But every year it was a bit better and at least since 10.4 one of the best if not the best desktop OS. Same thing go's for Ubuntu, the first incarnation of Unity was not good . But 12.04 is a really usable OS and for me (since I don't use OSX specific software) perfectly fine replacement for OSX. I'm really excited to see where they are going with it. So if MS is serious about there new desktop they should release a new version at least once a year. Perhaps they will need a LTS strategy for the Enterprise starting with windows 7. So by the time windows 8.4 comes a long Metro is matured and most workers will know how to use is.

</comment><comment><USER36> _I just can't shake the feeling that Windows 8 would be better off as two separate operating systems._

Bingo. Apple succeeded in mobile because they were forced to break entirely new ground. Frankensteining Metro and the old desktop UIs together makes about as much sense as WIMPing the XBox.

<comment><USER37> The desktop is a fallback. Same as 16-bit mode, low graphics mode, XP mode, or the Classic Mac emulator in early versions of OSX. It's not going to be in Windows RT, and it won't be in Windows 9.

Microsoft can't just up and cut all support for programs designed for the previous versions of their OS.

<comment><USER36> _Microsoft can't just up and cut all support for programs designed for the previous versions of their OS._

I'd go further: they should leave Windows pretty much as it is for the foreseeable future and treat mobile like the separate market that it is.

They shouldn't even _think_ about deprecating the Windows WIMP UI until they've got something inarguably better for the average desktop/laptop user. Not even Apple is that reckless.

<comment><USER37> The thing is, I'm not sure that mobile is a separate market anymore. How many corporations are doing a BYOD initiative? Personally at the company I work for, all the salesmen (a few thousand) are getting tablets instead of laptops for the next refresh. It just makes sense. Likewise, instead of handing out corporate laptops, they'll be giving employees a stipend to buy whatever device they want as long as it fits their needs.

When corporations (even IBM) start adopting bring-your-own-device and that includes mobile, mobile is no longer a separate market. It's time for mobile to evolve, something it hasn't done since 2007.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> OS X's yearly release cycle highlights a key problem that Windows 8 highlights. Making changes that are anything more than miniscule can happen over a long period of time that users can adapt to.

Microsoft is stuck trying to cater to two fundamentally different interaction paradigms in one gigantic release, which is very difficult.

I think if anything, the author's article highlights some common perceptions many consumers will hold with Windows 8. While I haven't used Win8, a lot of the authors complaints seem like he wasn't willing to embrace something new and wasn't willing to learn. They don't seem like design failures per se; but if 8 wasn't designed well enough to appease these types of criticism, then I guess it is a design failure

</comment><comment><USER39> Once the new form factors come out I think Windows 8 will do very, very well.

But we'll see!

</comment><comment><USER40> _Windows 8 wasn't born out of a need or demand; it was born out of a desire on Microsoft's part to exert its will on the PC industry and decide to shape it in a direction — touch and tablets — that allows it to compete against, and remain relevant in the face of Apple's iPad._

Early relational DB pioneer Michael Stonebraker once said: A company produces software architecture that resembles its org chart.

Maybe this is indicative on how well Microsoft can execute at this point. (Though, the overall trend seems positive for them.)

<comment><USER41> That's Conway's Law. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law>

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Who the hell reads these "professional" reviews? And why aren't people able to make their own opinion? It must be a dream-job (for some at least), get paid for playing prohpet and writing shit about other's (yet unfinished) products.

Personally, I bought my laptop a few years ago with XP preinstalled and Vista CDs alongside. I installed Vista out of curiosity, mostly _because_ people almost unanimously said it was crap, and, wouldn't you believe it, I _liked it_. I got a rock-solid, capable OS that was way ahead of the clunkiness that I remembered from the XP days and way better than crappines I was starting to experience with Linux.

So a message to all you schadenfreude-review writers: go to f*ing hell.

</comment><comment><USER43> I disagree completely. I tried the RC a few months ago, and it was abhorrent, but the image from just a few weeks ago was very usable.

I somewhat dislike the 'chrome' of the UI (I think it's hard to determine what is a button and what is just flair), but I've been running in 'Windows Classic' mode since XP so I may be an outlier.

They made that tile menu more transparent, to the point where you don't have to ever see it again if you don't want to, and many of the components that were Vista-y in the older RC have been polished for the newer image.

I'm not going to go out of my way to upgrade to Windows 8 like I did for Windows 7, but I also wont be downgrading to Windows 7 like I did with Vista (to XP).

</comment><comment><USER44> _There's a palpable fear that Windows 8 will stumble out of the door._

If push comes to shove, you'd think MS could easily make the Windows 7 desktop the "default" look and feel, and let you turn on the Win 8 look via a setting. But then again, isn't the whole Windows 7 desktop just one click away anyway? This whole article seems like its vastly exaggerating the issue.

There's a good article here comparing Win8 to Apple's first release of OS X (with its built in MacOS 9 classic mode) ... [http://www.osnews.com/story/25691/Windows_8_s_desktop_mode_M...](http://www.osnews.com/story/25691/Windows_8_s_desktop_mode_Microsoft_s_Classic_)

</comment><comment><USER45> Clearly the author is to old in body or mind or both. Yes I agree us old folk get stuck in our ways. But it's my kids that are going to love it, they already try and touch the monitor and TV like it was a smartphone, my 6 year old operates an iPhone perfectly.

Yes an article about old people worried about new ways isn't surprising at all heard the same tired tunes with regards unity which after a few release is starting to humm and now feels intuitive.

You can wait for windows9 all you like it will just be a more refined 8.

</comment><comment><USER46> I really hope they let users disable Metro UI - while it seemed pretty at first, having to switch to a full screen Start Menu 5-10 times to open all the programs I need is a bit tiring - the old Start Menu was much more inconspicuous. There are plenty of things to love about 8, but Metro just screws everything up, it seems.

</comment><comment><USER47> The thing I keep thinking when I hear about windows 8 is: how should a new windows application be developed? I think it's very confusing. If I were to start an application now, would I do it for desktop or windows RT? If I create for desktop then it will look bad with windows 8, with all the start screen swapping.

</comment><comment><USER48> >And if nothing else, I want to like Windows 8 because I know that I'll be spending a lot of time using it over the coming years.

That's a pretty stupid thing to say. If you don't like windows, there are plenty of alternatives, except maybe for very nichy work.

<comment><USER49> Not for those of us with conventional jobs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I kept reading this and going "wow, he's describing GNOME 3!"

</comment><comment><USER50> Well, this is just another Visa - hardly a huge problem while Windows 7 is still available. Just wait for Windows 9.

</comment><comment><USER51> Dammit, this is going to lead to a whole new set of questions from confused family members.

"How do I get to Start > Programs > [Some app which was made for usage on Windows XP]? I can't find the Start button, this new Windows is no good. _grumble_ "

<comment><USER52> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4boTbv9_nU>

<comment><USER53> This video is truly amazing

<comment><USER54> There's nothing particularly amazing about watching a man try to navigate a system he hasn't been taught how to navigate. Most of these kinds of experiments tend to end the same way, unless the system includes metaphors the users are already well accustomed to using.

I don't think there's any question Microsoft will include an extensive tutorial in Windows 8's final release. If they don't, we can safely laugh at them. As it is, though, this video is rubbish. I could make a similar video filming my Grandmother trying to use Windows 7(She only knows how to use a specific type of Web TV, sans mouse). I guarantee you we'll see similar results.

Windows has a massive install base. One of Microsoft's most important tasks will be to train their current users to make the transition to this new UI. It's not a small feat. But this video completely sidesteps the most important part in the process, and instead asks a man to use a novel, manufactured system with nothing but his natural inclinations. On those grounds, I think he does quite well. But the video is rubbish.

<comment><USER53> There's another video at <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XeeOkHjV7nM> where he is asked to use a mac for the first time in his life. The guy has apparently used XP for many years and is a die-hard windows fan. Watch how quickly he is able to pick it up (with zero instruction) in comparison to Win8.

The Win8 start screen isn't hard to get to - _if_ you know how. I'll have no trouble with it, you'll have no trouble with it, and anyone who is given a tutorial or basic training will have no trouble with it.

But I'll bet there's going to be millions of users who find themselves in the same situation as the guy in the video, and it's going to be a nightmare for any company who tries to deploy this to all their users.

For me the big take-away is this:

Important user interface elements should be visible on screen.

<comment><USER54> I'm troubled by the invisible UI stuff, including the hot corners. And I'm worried because knowledge of these features is required to operate the system at a basic level. That's kind of frightening. Not insurmountable, but frightening.

I think OSX's interface elements are more approachable than these hidden elements, given his(and most people's) prior experience. If you've used Windows, you're not going to be a stranger to drop down menus or desktop like icons (a la the dock).

And I agree that the invisible user interface elements will be a nightmare for IT people around the world. But to be frank, I don't want to restrict change to things that make IT folks happy ;) (Of course, I'm not a company worth a few hundred billion dollars whose livelihood depends on enterprise acceptance...)

I'm interested in seeing how long it will take for these 'new' UI concepts, where screen edges and corners are elements to be touched and modified, to sink into the general consciousness. It seems to have sunk into the OSX world rather quickly. Now it's time to see how the other 90% cope with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> agreed</comment>