Meditation study shows changes associated with awareness, stress (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2011/01/eight-weeks-to-a-better-brain/ <comment><USER4> Meditation seems to sound really weird to lot of people but the zen breathing exercises I've done are mechanical and completely devoid of mystical culturally relative concepts.

Simple introductory exercise in meditation for those unfamiliar with it. No mystical chanting required. The only caveat is that it can be as boring as hell. I'm not an expert but this should contain the essentials of a simple zen practice:

Equipment: timer and a comfortable place to sit without interruptions

Time: 10 minutes (or 5, whatever you feel like but try to commit to the timespan you choose). Put the time on the timer.

1\. Sit down. The position should be stable so you don't fidget around.

2\. Get a good posture: keep you back straight

3\. Concentrate on your breathing. Keep breathing slow and deep breaths

4\. Count your breaths, mentally, from one to ten, starting from one on exhale, two on inhale etc until you reach ten and go back to one.

5.Start the timer

Proceed until timer runs out.

Try to maintain this: sit still, back straight, rythmic breathing, count each breath.

You may observe thoughts arising. Observe the thoughts but do not get lost in them. You will notice you have been lost in your thoughts because you loose count of your breaths, at which point you just start counting from one. Do not try to block the thoughts.

If you can keep complete count throughout the entire span on first try then that's great!

Any weird sensations you might get are just pointless disruptions created by your mind.

<comment><USER5> I think this comment was important to me. I've never understood what the fuzz is about, but after reading this I decided "fuck it, why not try?".

I just did a 5 minute one. Genius idea about the timer, wouldn't be possible otherwise. Afterwards I felt 5kg lighter. I will put this in my life toolbox. Thank you.

<comment><USER4> I'm glad you found it usefull!

The relationship between this sort of meditation and the various schools that use meditation as part of their doctrine seems to me be like the difference between engaging in an exercise and exercising as part of a particular club/school.

Personally I've had a few moment in my life where there introspective skills I've gained from this have probably been for the better.

Not sure if it's from the practice, or just some anxiety relieving placebo effect caused by the practice, though. Seems to be good for me, whichever the underlying effect.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have been practicing mindfulness meditation for the last 14 months - <USER2> minutes, everyday and I have to say that it has been virtually the most important skill that I have picked up. Because it's essentailly that - <USER3> skill. I was very stressed and the anxiety started to affect virtually every aspect of my life. My family wanted me to seek professional help (take pills), but I decided to try to take care of it myself so I started reading books... a lot of books about the brain, how it works, etc. and this is how I was introduced to mindfulness. Now, 14 months later the effects are so profound that I have hard time imagining what my mind looked like before. The biggest change I have noticed is the ability to not act on thoughts and easily let them go by accepting them. Things that used to trigger me before are just thoughts now: the thought comes, I notice it and it passes. The best word that comes to mind when trying to describe the feeling is ... grounded. I feel grounded, calm.

I know it sounds cliche, but now I realize that it's true that the moment you stop fighing your thoughts and urges, they lose their power. I remember reading things again and aain and could not wrap my head about this concept before.

\- Does the anxiety go away? No, but my relationship with the anxiety and stress changed.

IMHO Self-reflection and emotional intelligence are the most important skills one can develop. Because if you develop them, you stop being in your own way and sabotaging yourself and it leads to generally happier life.

This is what I did i nthe last 14 months: \- Lay down, close my eyes and observe the sensetion of breathing in my belly. \- In the beginning my mind was immediately distracted with thoughts. It took me sometimes a few minutes until I was able to realize that I have been distracted all along. Then I had to force myself to ignore the distrating thought and pay attention to my breathing. It was really hard in the beginning and my sessions lasted usually 15 minutes max. \- But as I got better it became easier...now I have no problems to let go of a thought ... even a very emotiaonally charged one. It's like I have a switch in my head.

I have recommended mindfulness to all my friends and relatives and virtually none of them have made more than a few sessions. That makes me sad, because I can see what effects it can have, but there's nothing more than recommending that I can do - it's really a personal commitment.

<comment><USER7> Thanks for the comment. Are there any books or resources about mindfulness that you found particularly helpful?

<comment><USER8> Check out Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind for a good book on practicing meditation. It's not religious, but basically a transcript of a Zen Master's talks on zen and the practice of meditation to his group of students. It's what I recommend to people who want to 'get' meditation.

[http://www.amazon.com/Zen-Mind-Beginners-Shunryu- Suzuki/dp/1...](http://www.amazon.com/Zen-Mind-Beginners-Shunryu- Suzuki/dp/1590308492)

Not specifically related to meditation, but The Tao of Pooh is still the best book I know of that deals with the concepts behind this stuff. I re-read these books whenever I lose my way, which happens more often than I'd like to admit ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I surfed through the links quite rapidly, but I haven't seen any description on what exactly exercises they used. "Meditation" is a term so easily abused, you know. There's quite a few schools calling "meditation" something completely different, some techniques almost opposites (quite literally) of each other. Hell, why to talk about different schools when even Zen has both very different zazen and other meditation practices, which all could be commonly referred to as "meditation" by western people!

So I would hope to see some more detailed explanation of what participants were told to do, which I couldn't see somehow. In other case it sounds only a little more meaningful than "Participating in an eight-week doing something program appears to make measurable changes in brain regions associated with memory".

<comment><USER10> [http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0925492710...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S092549271000288X)

Looks like Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), a specific practice developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn.

<comment><USER11> I can't recommend his "Mindfulness for Beginners" book enough. Although I've been "meditating" for years, this book is packed with subtleties that are easily missed. In other teachings, it can be very difficult to separate religious dogma ("all you need is love, man") to the things that actually make a difference, scientifically, to your practice ("bring gentleness and kindness to the process").

One line especially made me realise I'd missed something important for years: Be aware "as if your life depended on it". That's about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The goal of meditation is not to get a better brain. As the goal of yoga is not to get a sexy body. These articles and even more the countless yoga ads with young beautiful ladies are really counterproductive from the viewpoint of yoga. They might be helpful from another perspective.

I can't summarize the real goal of yoga properly (meditation is one of the important exercise beside contemplation; the asanas are for preparation only), but it's more to be able to let go of the selfish desires like becoming smarter, getting a sexier body, getting more money, fame, admiring ("Oh, you look so good lately" ... "Yes, you know, I'm doing yoga."). The goal is more to be able to coordinate (not suppress) the desires to avoid doing harm and at the end creating harm for yourself. Meditation gives us insight to where the desires are coming from. Are they essential? Do I need to fullfil them? Or do I need to eat another snickers just because the last one has made my blood sugar go like a rollercoaster?

<comment><USER13> "The goal of meditation for me."

"The goal of yoga for me."

You clearly take the spirituality focused route in your yoga and meditation and thats great for you but you can't proclaim that the only right way to do it is your way and everyone doing it for different reasons is wrong.

<comment><USER14> I think he's criticizing the cultural caricature that accompanies any activity becoming mainstream... but perhaps misdirected as the context in which one finds value isn't really important in contrast to value itself. Perhaps the elegance is in how deeply individual a practice it can be (turning the locus of one's awareness inward).

And to the OP, isn't it great that yoga can hold so much value through _both_ a spiritual and physical lens? I think the mental and spiritual component has a lot to offer, but it's hard to claim that someone pursuing a positive activity, regardless of motivation is a bad thing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's always funny watching peoples' reaction to meditation as a means to an end. People want to meditate for cognitive benefits, but meditation purportedly teaches that meditation should not be done for any particular benefit.

I think the real source of this dissonance is Zen, which tends to center around elimination the ego, or the sense of self. Doing this type of meditation for any sort of benefit seem incongruous, since you're practicing elimination of self with the intention of improving the self.

There are a lot of kinds of meditation though. The weird paradoxical component is kinda unique to Zen, AFAIK. A lot of styles are quite comfortable with the idea of meditating for cognitive benefit.

Even with Zen, I don't think it's incongruous to practice selflessness via Zen in the moment with the intention of applying that skill in other moments to benefit you in various ways.

</comment><comment><USER16> I think if you are looking for mental self improvement this Havard article may be more appropriate ([http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/regular-exercise- changes-...](http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/regular-exercise-changes- brain-improve-memory-thinking-skills-201404097110)). The short summary is _exercise_. Not only do you get your "better brain", but the rest of your body benefits as well.

<comment><USER10> Why the implied either/or? Why not do both meditation and exercise?

<comment><USER16> It's a personal choice. For me there is definitely an implied or because I struggle to make time for exercise as it is. I also prefer almost any form of exercise over meditation. :)

<comment><USER17> I think many people (including Siddhartha or Buddha) used to walk for meditation. If that's the case, and you practiced mindfulness while exercising it might be possible to do both at once.

Often when you hear of great athletes, especially great endurance athletes like Michael Phelps, they talk about how they don't think about the whole X meters or Y miles at once. They focus on performing the next stroke or next step or next pump of the pedal perfectly. This to me, as a layman, sounds similar to the idea of focusing on the next breath as is a common practice during some types of meditation.

When I used to meditate I used to like to let my mind wander, then focus on breathing. Or vice versa. And many people prefer guided meditations.

As there are so many types of meditation I do not see any reason to believe that some types might overlap with exercise quite comfortably. Guided meditations might be more difficult because it would presumably be harder to both focus on the next stroke and focus on the meditation, and I guess that goes as well for the wandering mind meditation (you really don't want to run absentmindedly in NYC where I live, maybe in the country or even suburbia it would be more feasible).

Anyways, I guess to me it doesn't seem like it has to be an either or but could be one activity. If Siddhartha can do it, so can we :-).

I should start running again though, that's great exercise!

<comment><USER10> Walking meditation e.g. as described in 'Mindfulness in Plain English' is slow and deliberate, and I don't think one can get much physical benefit out of it.

I'm no expert but I think concentration is only part of the picture. This can be concentration on the breath, or concentration on a physical activity as you describe it. The other part is using the highly developed concentration state for the actual (mindfulness) meditation, which is pretty hard if you're moving around, at least for a beginner.

I'm talking about Vipassana practice, which is all I know about. As you say there are many forms of meditation.

edit: I used the word 'deliberate'. I should say seemingly deliberate. To be exact, it's not about deliberation or thinking at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been using the Headspace app ([https://www.headspace.com/](https://www.headspace.com/)) for a few months now and LOVE it. I highly recommend giving it a try. They have a free introductory course you can try too.

<comment><USER19> What does it do, and how does that help you?

<comment><USER20> For one, it gives you 10, 10-minute meditations for free, so you get a sense of what the whole enterprise is about without laying down any cash. For some (many?), that's all you need to get going.

Second, having listened to quite a few guided meditations, I find the Headspace guy (I think his name is Andy) to be one of the best. The meditations strike a near-perfect balance of helping direct my energy and attention in a way that doesn't draw attention to himself or his voice/delivery. i.e. he gives excellent guidance and gets out of the way.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> There are different types of meditation styles. I had experience with a type of meditation mentioned in the article. It is known as mindfulness meditation. Even in mindfulness meditation there are different approaches. Mine is mindfulness through the awareness of bodily sensations.

[http://www.dhamma.org/](http://www.dhamma.org/)

This is the 10 day course I underwent. It is pretty brutal and intense. You meditate for 8 hrs a day in total silence for 10 days.

 _Description_

The mindfulness meditation consists of two parts. Part 1 is concentration or Anapana. Part 2. is Vipassana which is awareness through bodily sensations.

The first 3 - 4 days are spent in Anapana. You simply observe the incoming breath and outgoing breath. That's it. The problem is that your mind gets hijacked into the past or future frequently. All you have to do is observe the incoming breath and outgoing breath. After a few seconds this new habit pattern of the mind gets disrupted. You don't get frustrated or despondent because this is the way the mind works. You keep bringing your mind back into the present by focusing back on your breath.

You do this for 8 hours a day for 3 to 4 days with breaks in-between. What you realize is that with persistent effort you can actually stay in the present for quite a while. Your mind becomes very concentrated.

Now, this concentrated mind is a tool. With your powerful concentrated mind you start observing the area under the nostrils and above the upper lip. You become aware of an interesting phenomenon. There is an interplay of a multitude of sensations spontaneously occurring in that region. The sensations feel like tiny extremely weak electric currents zapping through on the surface and disappearing. Or it could be a weak throbbing and itching sensation. Sometimes you get the feeling of the area under investigation being in a state of tension. It doesn't matter what the sensation is like. What matters is that you are aware of these sensations.

The remaining days you try to stay in the present via bodily sensations.

Now, instead of just focusing on the area under the nostrils and above the upper lip, you start scanning the whole body from the top of the head to the tips of your feet and then you realize that these sensations are present throughout your whole body. Again, the same thing happens. You start scanning the body beginning from the top but your mind tries to hijack awareness from the present into either the past or future. Again, you just smile to your self without getting frustrated and patiently and persistently you bring the mind back into the present moment.

You do this for the remaining days. Now there are two important things you will experience via mindfulness meditation.

1\. The mind and body are very deeply connected. The sensations you feel through out your body react to the contents of the thoughts present in your mind. Some traumatic event from your distant past surfaces up while you are meditating. Your natural reaction is to get caught up in it. Your bodily sensations change in response to that. Now, instead of getting caught up in it you just try to observe the sensations and try to be equanimous. This leads to point#2.

2\. All the sensations you experience are impermanent. Your entire body is in a state of flux and so is your mind. Any sensation no matter how pleasant or unpleasant is only transitory. There is no need to crave pleasant sensations or flee from unpleasant sensations because they are all going to change anyways.

This is how you rewire your brain by persistent mindfulness meditation. You teach your mind not to fall into old patterns and to try and be equanimous.

<comment><USER22> I went to one of these and got freaked out because it's an unmistakable cult.

The teachers on the podiums up at the front is a creepy psychological hack, the recorded chanting they play while you meditate is hypnotic programming, the 2 hour video lectures of the great leader convincing you of his religion being your only stimulation, the bowing and mindless chanting from the regulars being passed off as "optional for first timers."

Many of the people there mentioned they go several times a year, with that glassy eyed obsessed stare. At least one person mentioned they had moved their home to be near the group.

I tried to skip a session because I didn't get enough sleep and the management came and got me out of my room. That's when I knew it was time to leave.

Also, if you leave early, you get excommunicated and blacklisted.

The point of all this is to make you unquestionably loyal to the group and to become an evangelist, which is how these things become so popular.

The danger of cults is that if you go for long enough you can permanently lose your identity and self respect. It's probably not actually possible to 100% master the skill of meditating painlessly, which undermines your confidence and makes you more determined to achieve the enlightenment they promise, which exposes you to more brainwashing and makes you more submissive to the great leader, etc.

They do at least provide a source of protein and the food was pretty good.

The technique itself is pretty useful, and after the 4 days of silent nonstop meditation reality felt really weird and everyone in the outside world looked like an impulsive idiot being emasculated by their smartphones. This feeling lasted a few days and then wore off.

I'm sure the effect lasts much longer if you do the full 10 days. I'm pretty sure you would get that same effect going through any very intensive and stressful course and avoiding anything fun or distracting, and the culty brainwashing stuff is totally unnecessary.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4-Hms7bHqY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4-Hms7bHqY)

<comment><USER23> > I went to one of these and got freaked out

That's the problem, you freaked out and left, even though they ask everyone multiple times at the beginning whether you are ready to stay for the full 10 days.

As someone who took more than one of these courses I can say that the single most important thing you should do during your first course is not quit. Strange things start happening to people when they are put into an environment where they can't do anything but eat, sleep and meditate. Your mind starts playing tricks on you and you start reacting to your thoughts. Wave after wave of anger, joy, confusion, happiness, sexual fantasies, tranquility, fear, etc, come and go. It's like your mind switches to different modes. You don't notice this during normal life, and that's the real beauty of these courses and centers. To give you an opportunity to observe all that is happening in your mind.

Although I experience this before, it still happens to me when I take a course and start wondering what am I doing here, this is a waste of time, this is all a cult, a scam, etc. Nope, it's just my mind reacting :) That's how you learn, I don't think there's another way to silence the mind.

>I tried to skip a session because I didn't get enough sleep and the management came and got me out of my room.

That's their job. It's not a holiday and you are there to work hard. In fact I can easily say that my first course was the hardest thing I've done in my life, it was just brutal. But my mind felt much clearer, I had way less anxiety and just felt kind of happy.

<comment><USER24> You have two comments on HN, one linking to one of these ten day courses, and now this one defending it, nothing else. You may want to be a bit more active, and on other topics, if you want to be seen as credible.

<comment><USER25> Here is a write-up of my experience doing that particular 10 day meditation course, which I'm surprised to discover wrapped up almost 10 years to the day: [http://weblog.squareapple.net/archives/2004/11/26/art_of_liv...](http://weblog.squareapple.net/archives/2004/11/26/art_of_living.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I'm not well versed with reading research papers etc but I have one question. Could it be possible that by simply practicing mindfulness meditation the brain restructured itself via a placebo style effect rather that because of the meditation itself?

For anybody who has access to the paper what did the control group do during the eight weeks?

<comment><USER27> Not clear what distinction you are trying to make. They practiced mindfulness meditation according to a specific, published plan, and brain anatomy changes were noted. It doesn't seem they are making any claim other than, this series of exercises produce this effect.

The paper doesn't seem to be available, but the abstract at the author's page[0] says "Healthy but stressed individuals are randomized to either a meditation-based stress reduction intervention or health education control intervention."

[0][https://connects.catalyst.harvard.edu/Profiles/display/Perso...](https://connects.catalyst.harvard.edu/Profiles/display/Person/12961)

<comment><USER28> If the control group were doing nothing for eight weeks, they would expect no change. An expectation of change can illicit substantial differences. That's the placebo effect.

When administering medication and checking for results, the control group is given a sugar pill rather than nothing. If they were given nothing it would not eliminate the placebo effect.

<comment><USER29> (You mean elicit, not illicit)

Placebo might be a fair critique if we were talking about people's self- reported stress or well-being. Here we're talking about _physical changes in the amygdala_.

<comment><USER28> The brain and nervous system changes based on it's use and function. Look up neoroplasticity. This is nothing new. A placebo could certainly elicit a change within 8 weeks if participants thought it was helping them cope with stress. If you think dancing clockwise in a circle for ten minutes a day will help you, it probably will. That doesn't mean there is anything useful in the practice.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> The thing i don't like about the term "meditation" is that its too closely intertwined with spirituality. Where meditation should actually be associated with relaxation.

This article only mentions the control group twice, once to say "None of these changes were seen in the control group, indicating that they had not resulted merely from the passage of time". This is just bad reporting - How about telling us what the control group were actually doing?

If they (control group) were not taking part in any type of consistent relaxation for 8 weeks then how would you expect to see any changes in the control group?

[http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/yoga- woo/](http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/yoga-woo/)

<comment><USER10> They weren't expecting to see changes in the control group. Control groups represent the baseline, untreated state.

Also, meditation and relaxation are not the same thing.

<comment><USER30> You're right, meditation is relaxation with a sprinkle of woo.

<comment><USER31> You think meditation is relaxation, you do not realise how much effort it takes. I'd suggest finding a tutorial and trying even 5 minutes.

As for the "sprinkle of woo", some meditation practices comes with buckets of foo, while some are entirely woo free.

<comment><USER32> I've done this for an hour or so on occasion. I don't find it a particular strain. I may be doing something different than what you are doing, though.

<comment><USER31> The point is not that it's a particular strain. The point is that most people can't just sit back and let their mind go - to maintain focus requires concentration, and concentration is not "free" \- it takes energy. It may feel energising - especially after you're done -, the same way exercise does, but people who think that meditation is "just relaxation" usually have no idea what is involved.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I see a lot of anekdotes here on HN about meditation. But anekdotes are not science. I dislike the very close relation between meditation and spirituality that turns into fluffy bullshit.

I distrust peoples self-reporting because it is extremely unreliable.

The 'eight weeks to a better brain' sounds like any link-bait you see on the internet (' 6-pack in 12 days!').

Also, the results may be merely from the fact that these people spent ~30 minutes a day deliberately relaxing. What would happen if the control group would just lie on a couch for 30 minutes, doing nothing? None of that in the article.

<comment><USER34> Or that the group learnt a new skill, which involves both new physical and mental agility. For example would learning to dance for an introverted person produce the same changes in the brain?

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> What is the best way to learn how to meditate? Any good resources?

<comment><USER36> Either join a course or pick up a good book. I found this book immensely useful and simple to follow: "Mindfulness in Plain English" [1]

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Mindfulness-Plain-English- Anniversary-...](http://www.amazon.com/Mindfulness-Plain-English-Anniversary- Edition/dp/0861719069)

<comment><USER37> Is that book the same as this free one? [http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html](http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html)

Does your book contain exercises?

<comment><USER31> It's the same book.

I strongly recommend it.

You don't need exercises: The book is a step by step "instruction manual".

There is only one exercise (in this context; there are many other forms of meditation) Sit comfortably. Breath in. Breath out. Repeat. Now gently try to let go of your thoughts, and gently focus your attention on your breath. When your mind slips, bring it back to the breath. Repeat for as long as you want to sit.

The reason you want to read the book is because it deals systematically with the practicalities, such as how to deal with pains and aches and distractions, or how to deal with sudden intense nonsensical urges (for example, when I started I went through a period where I'd get one minute or so in and then be _convinced_ that I'd failed to set my timer, and that I had been sitting for way too long, and that I'd be late for _something, anything_ ; it took weeks to push past that barrier).

I'd also strongly recommend this series [1] of recordings of a course by Gil Fronsdal. It covers the same practice, and fits very well with the book. And like the book, the course recording is very much kept secular.

[1] [http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma12/GilMed07.html](http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma12/GilMed07.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Does anyone have any experience with meditation and RSI? I've been having RSI(like) problems for almost 3 years now. Recently I've read the Mindbody Prescription book[0] after finding this HN thread[1]. I must say it did help somewhat but I think I'm still in the process of healing myself. The bit I'm struggling is uncovering suppressed feelings and emotions. So I'm wondering wether meditation would help here. Any thoughts?

[0] [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mindbody-Prescription-Healing- Body-P...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mindbody-Prescription-Healing-Body-Pain- ebook/dp/B00FOTRPJQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1417164485&sr=8-1&keywords=Mindbody+Prescription)

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1269951](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1269951)

<comment><USER39> I've also been treating RSI in the framework of Mindbody Prescription. I'm still just starting with meditation, but it seems like the main skill it teaches (this post describes it well: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8670184](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8670184)) is precisely what's good for getting over the RSI(like) problem: the main thing is to understand the 'sensations' aren't something that you need to deal with when they arise, it's okay if they arise—just let them pass. I'd gotten into a way of thinking that if the sensations were there it meant things were going poorly, if not they were going well; while what seems better is, things are okay either way. You don't want to stop the sensations, you want to understand they aren't harmful. I've done a decent survey of meditation literature, and I think a good overview from a number of perspectives would be this one: [http://www.amazon.com/Beginners-Guide-Meditation- Inspiration...](http://www.amazon.com/Beginners-Guide-Meditation-Inspiration- Contemporary-ebook/dp/B00ISAN12I/)

Also, I thought this book was better than any of Sarno's for TMS stuff [http://www.amazon.com/Rapid-Recovery-Back-Neck-Pain- ebook/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Rapid-Recovery-Back-Neck-Pain- ebook/dp/B0056VBF4I/)

Lemme know if you have other questions or anything.

<comment><USER38> Nice, I'll go trough this things. I'll be in touch if I have any questions. Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> 16 participants in the study! Neuro-imaging bolloxology. Meditation might be pleasant, but this is a pretty poor piece of science reporting.

<comment><USER41> That's actually a pretty common study size in neuro-imaging/fMRI studies. You may still disagree with the statistical validity of the findings, but there's nothing unusual about this specific study in that regard.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Ought to wonder if today's XKCD is related...

[http://xkcd.com/1453/](http://xkcd.com/1453/)

</comment><comment><USER43> This is my old lab! I'm turning these neuroscience findings into consumer products now-- using biosensors for meditation tracking and biofeedback. [http://www.brainbot.me](http://www.brainbot.me) Check it out if you're interested, but full disclosure- this is my company

</comment><comment><USER44> In case you wonder if this s yet another study about this matter, note that the article is from 2011/01.

</comment><comment><USER45> I'd like this to be compared to an equal amount of non-stimulated time that is not necessarily meditation.

I feel that the main issue here could be that a lot of people, in western culture at least, are constantly stimulated.

</comment><comment><USER46> I read Dan Harris' book 10% happier and started meditating for just 5 minutes a day.

I can highly recommend it. I am much more aware and present when doing it than those days I do not.

<comment><USER47> I made a similar experience. When I force myself to sit still and focus on breathing for just 7 minutes in the morning, it seems to make me more aware of what I'm doing for the rest of the day. Sometimes I continue to 40 minutes. Too often I skip it entirely and e.g. surf the net instead, which makes me feel like a work-addicted wreck who won't grant himself just 7 minutes of peace.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Are there any other training programs for better memory?

<comment><USER17> Domonic O'Brians methods work like magic with relatively little practice. They're also a form of meditation in some sense because of the concentration required to use the imagination so vividly. He has a six cd course I've never gotten all the way through but the techniques I employed helped me remember french vocabularly, art history (dates, names, etc), people and their names, and phone numbers with relative ease (especially compared to rote memorization). The best thing is, the more you do it, the better you get and the easier and faster it is.

Looks like he has many books [0] here on Amazon. He won the World Memory Championships a number of times.

[0] - [http://www.amazon.com/Dominic- OBrien/e/B001KHNR2K](http://www.amazon.com/Dominic-OBrien/e/B001KHNR2K)

<comment><USER49> Thanks for this. I'd never heard of him, but after a bit of googling, reading and mentally going through my house, I can see that this stuff works. Cheers codyb.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Another suggestion for anyone who would prefer a guide that is unbiased/free of religion and mysticism: How to Meditate by Lawrence LeShan.

</comment><comment><USER51> [http://xkcd.com/1453/](http://xkcd.com/1453/)

Timely this.

</comment><comment><USER52> A few lowballs of Jameson on ice combined with a heavy 3D shooter on the XBox is my meditation.</comment>


Wag's new TOS charges users $1000 for going off Wag - <AUTHOR> https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladviceofftopic/comments/cwe79d/does_this_seem_like_wag_is_trying_to_get_around/ <comment><USER2> This points to a basic issue with Wag's business model. If 'contractors' have an incentive to take on clients directly and cut out Wag, then they will do so. You can't stop that with an unenforcable TOS, because they're contractors. What a normal business would do at that point is admit Uber for dog walking was a bad idea, implement a reasonable finders fee system and pivot to connecting/reviewing/vetting/handling contracts/payments for owners and walkers. The business would be worth X to XX million dollars and everyone would be happy.

Wag, however, has over 300 million dollars in funding. So they're probably @#$%ed.

<s> Here's an idea for a startup, 'Uber for Uber for X'.

How many times have you acquired 300 million dollars in funding only to realize you missed a silly detail that will bankrupt your overvalued Uber for X startup? Never again!

Now anyone can easily build their own Uber for X in days! Use our centralized customer network for immediate network effects! As the network was the only real value your sheisty middleman-ware provided anyway, you're obviously now a contractor. If it turns out we don't add value to your Uber for X experience, taking on customers directly will of course result in a hefty fine. It's buried in the TOS because it's legally unenforceable, but we'll still try to bill you anyway!

Uber for Uber for X. Overvalued since 2019. </s>

<comment><USER3> I thought you were joking about the $300 million, but nope:

[https://news.crunchbase.com/news/wag-need-300m-softbank- walk...](https://news.crunchbase.com/news/wag-need-300m-softbank-walk-dogs/)

<comment><USER4> Jeffrey Housenbold, of Vision fund and Hilary Schneider, CEO of Wag both went to HBS.

Maybe they knew each other from before. Connections do work...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Here is the clause in Section 11:

As a Pet Owner, you acknowledge that Wag! is in the business of connecting Pet Owners and Pet Care Providers, and that said business is how Wag! earns its income. As a result, Pet Owner agrees that if Pet Owner solicits a Pet Care Provider to provide off-platform pet care services to Pet Owner whom Pet Owner first met and/or learned about through the Wag! platform, Wag! is entitled to charge both the Pet Owner and the Pet Care Provider a referral fee. This referral fee will be charged once per specific Pet Owner/Pet Care Provider services relationship utilized outside of the process provided for within the Wag! platform. Pet Owner's referral fee will be $1,000. Pet Owner will first be notified in writing of Pet Owner's obligation to pay the referral fee. Thereafter, Pet Owner hereby authorizes Wag! to charge any of your payment methods for the referral fee.

<comment><USER6> I've been waiting for this sort of thing. Naturally, since a TOS represents informed consent and is somehow a legally binding contract, then the next innovation is to add financial terms to them.

Hopefully, such a company will push the boundary so far that the entire world of TOS will be overturned by some court decision.

Imagine walking into a mall and ending up consenting by accident to the tos nonsense we have now.

<comment><USER7> > a TOS represents informed consent and is somehow a legally binding contract

Not necessarily. If you bury surprising stuff like this in the TOS, it's likely not enforceable. The court knows that nobody reads these endless TOS anyway and would likely rule the clause "unreasonable".

However, it can still work as a means of intimidation. Also, let's imagine Wag actually tried to collect those 1000$, some people may not even fight it.

I think this is a case of "there is no such thing as bad publicity". I don't use Wag, but like most "gig economy" platforms, I would expect it's already thoroughly despised.

<comment><USER8> My understanding is that TOS clauses are only binding when they're things users generally know when they sign up, such as "don't hack our systems", "you dont own our stuff by using it" and other CYA clauses. The only thing I don't think this would work for is binding arbitration, but those are joined by a "this agreement contains a binding arbitration agreement you must read" line at the top of the TOS and is valid under case law.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> For reference, Wag is the same scummy company which can't even handle accidents in a professional way and required an NDA to be signed before they'd compensate the victims[1] so this new twist is no surprise.

[1]: [https://nypost.com/2019/01/22/wag-killed-our-dog-and- tried-t...](https://nypost.com/2019/01/22/wag-killed-our-dog-and-tried-to-buy- our-silence/)

</comment><comment><USER10> I'm just imagining one of the wag investors asking "What's to stop your walker who lives nearby the dog's owner, just doing the walk independently with the person they've built trust with?"

And the answer is "you have a shitty business model and this should have killed it years ago"

<comment><USER11> I don't know. Both Wag and Rover have fund-raised $300M from investors. I would think they'd have responded to that line of questioning at least once.

<comment><USER12> the answer would have to be that doing so would benefit the walker short term but over the long term would lead to them losing business because Wag would track the lost business and as such disqualify the walker from any more Wag business, thus walkers would not cheat on wag because wag would catch them doing it - probably by using something that they would call "machine learning" and "suspicious behavior tracking" that will also be "patent-able, someday"

<comment><USER10> There's limited demand on both sides of this though.

To take the Uber model - you are going to take n trips, in m cities, for y duration. Uber and their users want unlimited drivers, riders, cities piled into their app.

Wag is completely different. Your dog is in your home. It needs walking say once a day. I'd have thought the user would want the same reliable person doing it each day - and the walker would ideally want to build a stable of local dogs that need walking each day. Once both sides are happy and stable, you don't need the app.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> It's really interesting to watch how much of HN armchair lawyers this and assumes it will not hold up for, well, no apparent legal reason that i can see.

With my actual lawyer hat on, I'll place my bet on the other side -

This is not a non-compete, and these clauses are quite commonplace in almost all placement agencies (IE nannies, employees, etc). Charging a fee to facilitate two people meeting and making a transaction is perfectly normal, and I'm not aware of any court striking them down. In fact, the opposite - i'm aware of plenty of court cases of employers recovering placement fees, etc, from employees, for example.

The only prohibition i'm aware of in california is payment of fees to unlicensed real estate agents for things licensed real estate agents would normally do.

The only interesting restriction you will find on recovery is whether the agency (wag here) was compliant with relveant licensing/etc statutes, and whether the two people actually met using wag.

If they did, ...

Folks are welcome to meet through other means, and it does not restrict anyone working for anyone.

<comment><USER14> I think it won't hold up. Not for legal reasons, but for economic reasons.

Say they don't pay the $1,000. What is Wag going to do? Sue the customer? Wags has no collateral that they can repossess. Taking the customer to court will almost certainly cost more than $1,000. If the cost of collecting this fee is greater than the fee itself then it's not in the company's interest to enforce it when customers refuse to pay. The result is that the fee effectively becomes optional.

<comment><USER13> Err, plenty of these agencies have enforced against their customers.

They won't end up in court, but binding arbitration. They will make an example of a few people and the rest will fall in line or run away, as per usual.

They are more likely to enforce against the dog walkers than random customers.

The customers will not care about that enforcement, it will be relatively effective in achieving their goal, etc.

In practice, they will most likely use this clause to prevent organized abuse, etc.

Remember also that you agree upfront to let them charge you. So it is going to be _you_ who has to try to get the money back. (You will not likely win a CC dispute here)

<comment><USER14> A customer blocks all charges to their credit card from Wags and cancels their service. Wags issues a fine to a customer. The customer doesn't pay. Wags tries to bring the customer to arbitration. The customer gives no response. What happens then?

Wags could use a collections agency, but they'll only get a fraction of that money back. Not to mention arbitration usually costs hundreds of dollars per hour, with usually one hour (or longer) minimum, so I'm dubious they'll even bother going to arbitration.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> If I recall correctly, when an employer signs up with a headhunter service to bring resumes, you're also agreeing to a 1 year term of exclusivity. Often resumes are shared without a name or other basic identifying information until you agree to meet with them. If you end up hiring them anytime from then to 1 year out, you pay the headhunter their fee. Seems fair, only because the headhunter needs to make a buck.

Based on neighborhood traffic on Nextdoor and Facebook, dog walking is still a "hire your neighbor's kid" market, and Wag seems to be trying to elevate it to the gig economy where dogs are walked by those that need to put food on their own table.

Headhunters don't profit forever from every job they connect their clients with, and it seems Wag is trying to get away with changing those rules.

<comment><USER16> > Seems fair, only because the headhunter needs to make a buck.

Seems like a relationship built on deep mutual mistrust!

I spoke to a recruiter once who wouldn't tell me the company she was hiring for, presumably to stop me going directly. But it was a ludicrous situation because of course I'm not going to agree to spend my time interviewing with an unknown company!

<comment><USER17> I'm wondering how that would even work. Do they blindfold you and take you to a mystery location!?

<comment><USER18> I'm a recruiter. The contract is with the hiring company. Once I've submitted your resume to a company, with your permission, the company can't hire you without paying me. So as long as I have your permission to put you forward for a role, and submit you to the client, you can cut me out of the process as much as you wish ... I'm still getting paid if you take the role.

<comment><USER16> Why can't everyone operate with a bit more trust? Am I too hopeful and in reality people would try to screw you over if you were more open?

<comment><USER18> I've found generally I can operate with almost complete trust, but there are always some bad actors AND people fuck up. Of the latter: programmer contacts me about a job I'm advertising. I tell them about the role. They want me to represent them but decide the best course of action is to apply directly to the client on their website (?!). When I find out, I contact the client and try and explain the situation.

First time I've worked with the client, and after some emails, they grudgingly accept that I have the emails to prove the situation, but the candidate fucked it all up ... however, this has engendered enough shitty feeling that they decide they don't want to continue working together.

I don't get paid for most of the candidates I put forward for roles (employers want 4-5 applicants per person they hire, at least), as they don't get the roles, and can't afford to just forgive a $20,000 commission because the candidate managed to gum up the workings.

<comment><USER19> TBH, the few times Ive worked with a few recruiters, they misrepresented the position they were recruiting for. Now, I'm not sure if it was a recruiter packaging the job to be 'ideal' or if it was HR having absolutely no clue what they were doing.

Never the less, when I walked in and sat down, it was nowhere near what I was expecting and what was conveyed to me.

Of course that's the worst situation. The recruiter doesn't get paid and spent time, the company wasted time, and the potential employee wasted time. But I have no issue in leaving money on the table for you if you do a good job about recruiting. And once you're paid after a year, I'll ask for a raise equal to what you got :) That tells me what they're _really_ willing to pay for me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Sigh.

Did it take this long to realize that "gig economy" was all about employee arbitrage and the destruction of the bottom 1/5 of employees to 'day laborer with requirements of employees'?

Uber steals tips by 'lowering pay' of a ride. Same with Lyft. Same with that food delivery service. They're all alike: 'abuse the worker cause they're here - they don't have other choices'.

And all the while people "agree" to these abortions of contracts. Contracts usually have to be agreed to by someone of sound mind. So why isn't the threat of being hungry, homeless, medical care-less, and such not considered a invalidation of contracts? It's akin to a gun pointed at your head; it instead leads to poverty and homelessness.That has longer and just as severe ramifications.

<comment><USER20> The more direct solution to helping those in tough situations like you describe is enforcing stricter employee labor laws. Messing with contract law is another can of worms. There are plenty of situations between corporations or wealthy people where parties have no other reasonable choice (e.g. a fire sale of a company). That shouldn't make contracts void.

<comment><USER19> Why "Messing with contract law", especially when it concerns a corporation to an individual, so terrible?

A company has piles of money and piles of lawyers. What do you, an individual have? You likely have a few thousand in the bank, more money locked away for old age, and can google a list of lawyers.

Point being; there is a significant power imbalance between an individual and a corporation. So absolutely yes, we as a society should be legally preventing and stopping many contracts, ToS, and other legal and quazi-legal instruments for abuses of all sorts.

That should apply from shitty Valley upstarts all the way to banking and old businesses.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I'm certainly not defending it, but these clauses can also be found in UK rental contracts made by estate agents. The clause will usually state that if you continue in the house after the term of the contract without renewing through the agency (and paying their exorbitant annual fees again) they will charge you a "finders fee" on the basis that you found the landlord through them originally.

No idea on the legality of it, but I guess it's likely legal since rental contracts are things that you read through and can even negotiate and amend, quite unlike the "contracts" that you click through when you sign up to a dog walking service.

<comment><USER21> _I 'm certainly not defending it, but these clauses can also be found in UK rental contracts made by estate agents._

Probably not any more. Letting agents, at least here in England, got so abusive with their terms and associated fees that it resulted in the Tenant Fees Act 2019, which came into effect in June this year. It isn't quite a professional death sentence for any agency that even thinks about charging a tenant for anything ever, but it isn't far off.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Homejoy the house cleaning startup has a very similar business model to Wag. and as Homejoy failed because clients would directly hire the cleaners vs going through Homejoy; Wag will be destined to the same failure unless they use scare tactics to block clients from hiring contractors directly

<comment><USER20> A platform isn't destined to fail just because there's a high rate of disintermediation.

Generally, the root cause for these sorts of businesses failing is when their customer acquisition cost exceeds their customer ltv.

Disintermediation causes customer churn which results in lower customer lifetime value. But, it's only one of many important levers that determine the health of a platform business.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Do people really let strangers walk their dogs?

It's crazy, my dog is my best friend, there's no way I'm trusting a random person with his life. If I can't find someone to take care of him, I change my plans. If you can't prioritise your dog you shouldn't have one.

<comment><USER24> When we both worked, we had a dog walking service. It was the same walkers over and over (changing rarely), vetted by the agency, but essentially strangers to us.

I think it's extremely common.

<comment><USER25> I don't understand? Walking a dog is not a fulltime job. Not sure how you could work, and still not have time to walk a dog?

<comment><USER24> I'm not sure what's not to understand.

We would leave for work in mornings and return in the evening and didn't feel it was appropriate to leave our dog home alone for 8-9 hours without a walk (social contact and the bathroom as well).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> We board our dog with somebody we used through DogVacay before it merged with Rover.

To me, there's definitely some value was added by the service by doing some screening. I didn't ever pick somebody who had no reviews. But that's valuable for the first time, worth much less afterwards. We've used 6 or 7 different "sitters" because the first, first 2, first 3, etc. were booked or not available.

Our primary sitter went private. He's got magnetic signs advertising dog sitting on his truck. He charges the same rate as when we booked through DogVacay but we pay him in cash, not via credit card on the website. I text him to see if he's available and so far he has been. I think he's less busy than he was using the website but the flip side is that he's not paying a fee so I bet he nets out better or the same. Plus he's dealing primarily with repeat customers - dogs that he's familiar with, dogs that are familiar with him.

The matching has some value. It's too bad there isn't a fair way that he could have us as a repeat customer - which is due to him being somebody we think is trustworthy - but pay less to Rover. Something like 25% (or whatever they charge) for a first-time stay, 10% for repeats.

<comment><USER27> Not trying to be rude, but have a real question. Why do you feel that it's ok for you to cut Rover out of the deal? Disintermediation is always mentioned in these sorts of conversations. I'm interested to understand how people justify it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Brought to you by the morons whose employee killed someone's dog and offered to pay for the dogs final expenses only if they agreed on pain of lawsuit not to talk about it.

Can they go bankrupt already?

</comment><comment><USER29> The title should be fixed, it's for using a provider you met through Wag.

</comment><comment><USER30> This falls back to the classic thing - if your market is commoditised, then your product needs to be an experience to drive your revenue. And in all likely-hood, dog walking is not an industry "ripe for disruption" with enhanced experiences. Ride sharing took off because the experience of cabs was (in my experience) pretty much universally abysmal across the globe, and Uber/Lyft etc. actually provided a service that gave you a better experience.

The reality, as the commenters said in the linked reddit discussion, is that Wag has no real way to enforce this. Unsure on laws in the USA, but that provision would be highly illegal under Australian competition laws as exclusive sourcing is a finable offence, so have to assume similar provisions exist over there too in one way or another.

</comment><comment><USER31> Pff. I don't know what lawyers they have but they are shitty as fuck. Of course, this is 100% unenforceable. If I was hit with one of these I would immediately sue in a small claims court. Those walkers are contractors. If they want to do this type of shit and have at least a small chance to earn those fees, start by hiring them as W-2 workers with benefits. This is just hypocritical.

<comment><USER20> Why sue them? Seems like a waste of time when you can dispute the charge with your credit card company.

<comment><USER31> That's not the issue. Even if my credit card company reverses the charge, Wag could still seek for payment and send the charge to a collections agency, possibly affecting my credit score.

If you sue and win they have to annul the charge. You also create precedence which is crucial in American Law jurisprudence. $1000 USD is a significant amount of money for many people.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Wag is sitting in the exact same space as Homejoy which has the same fundamental problem - there is a natural relationship between both sides.

Beyond discovery there is no reason to keep the relationship on the platform.

Comparisons to Uber or AirBnB don't really work here as there is no natural relationship with your Uber driver and the lack of repeat visit to the same destination keeps repeats/relationships down.

Wag is fighting a capitalistic force. Beyond the initial discovery/relationship build - once the end user and dog walker has found someone they really like, what value is being added by staying on platform?

They're just taking money...

<comment><USER27> Lots of mention of disintermediation here. What about the relationship between the customer and the company? There are many ways a company with many employees provides value over the initial "discovery". What if schedules need to be adjusted? What if the service provider is sick? What if the service provider breaks something or worse? The business is offering a service not service provider. Take this another way. What about a smaller version of this business? "Bobs dog walking" grows to more customers than Bob can walk in a day. Bob adds employees. Is Bob just a match maker now?

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I actually don't think this is all that bad. (I'm not sure if it would be _enforceable_ \---the classic common law rule is that liquidated damages clauses have to actually be a genuine estimate of the party's damages, not punitive... but it's also been a while since I've done contract law.)

It seems like the defense of this is fairly simple.

(1) People ought not to be able to use their matchmaking services without giving them a cut, that's shitty, and why not use contracts to enforce it--- just the same as other kinds of matchmaking services, like job placement agencies, do.

(2) Also, it's probably safer for consumers to use their platform to have things like built-in verification of transactions, maybe(?) insurance(?) etc. anyway. Same reason it's a bad idea to take the AirBnB or Ebay or whomever transaction off-platform, because that's how crooks siphon away recourse for their frauds.

So why not use a little bit of coercion for everyone's good?

</comment><comment><USER34> I mean, if I hire a contractor that I got through a staff augmentation agency, I have to pay a fee. That is part of the agreement with the agency. This seems the same?

</comment><comment><USER35> I'd never let strangers walk my dog anyway. Heard too many bad stories. Put out pads if they really need to go during the day.

</comment><comment><USER36> IANAL, but this sounds like tortious interference to me.

</comment><comment><USER37> It's like if Tinder tried to charge for every time I fucked my girlfriend.

</comment><comment><USER38> It's time to stop viewing contracts as an inherent good that must be obeyed, and instead as merely useful tools to help society. Until (more) limits are placed on them to protect individuals, we will continue descending deeper into a "well you agreed to it when you clicked OK" dystopia.

<comment><USER39> This certainly wouldn't be legally binding in Germany, is that actually different in the US?</comment></comment>


Emailing End User, Not Purchasing Dept - <AUTHOR> Suppose you sell a B2B software, and you want to send emails to help the end user understand how to get the most of out it - how to ensure the right person is getting the emails?
Many companies will be using a purchasing dept or at least someone higher up will be paying. Does that mean they, instead of the end user, will be getting detailed instructions that they're not interested in?
I presume this issue is tackled in an existing neat and elegant manner? If so, could someone tell me what it is, as this is bugging me... :) <comment><USER2> You're making the assumption that email is the right medium for this kind of information. But people are busy, their in-boxes are already too full, and they have too much important email to read without being interrupted by unimportant stuff.

As one of those busy people (I'm a senior developer), I would not want to receive those kinds of emails from a vendor of a product I'm using. Receiving that information as emails means that I have to do the work of saving the emails that I find useful, and also that I get interrupted by the emails that I don't find useful. I'd much prefer for the vendor set up a well-organized web site that has FAQs, tutorials, etc. that I could search or bookmark. Make it easy to find that information from the main "help" page of your product. Also, create a blog on your web site for product news. If it's useful, I'll subscribe to it in my RSS reader and read it when I have some spare time. (Make it a real blog. Don't assume that I want to follow your company on Twitter or Facebook, where there are all kinds of ads and other junk competing for my attention.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Great reply, thanks! :)</comment></comment>


SurveyMonkey to buy Wufoo (YC W06) for $35m - <AUTHOR> http://kara.allthingsd.com/20110425/surveymonkey-buys-online-forms-start-up-wufoo-for-35-million/ <comment><USER4> That's awesome news. Congratulations to the Wufoo team -- it is well deserved. (Their product is awesome.)

It is also great news for SaaS startup generally, since Wufoo is a little of column A and a little of column B on the typical grow via revenues VS get investment and grow massively dichotomy. That's a data point in the favor of at least some investors making investments in companies which have a projected trajectory where massive success results in a company on the scale of 37Signals/FogCreek/Wufoo rather than resulting in a company on the scale of Zynga/Groupon. $35 million won't exactly have VCs salivating but, oh well, if they don't invest they don't get a vote -- the angels and employees of Wufoo have to be happy like clams at this outcome.

<comment><USER5> As far as I know, Wufoo didn't raise VC. They only raised a small angel round.

<comment><USER6> The total amount raised, according to Crunchbase, was $118,000 (18000 YC + 100000 Angel). This was in 2006, so assuming there has been no other investments made, looks like their revenues must have been pretty decent to be able to support their operations.

<comment><USER7> If you consider a 10x multiple, revenues would have been in $3-4 MM range. Wufoo sets a great example for exits where VCs are not involved but are awesome for founders + employees.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> SO happy for these guys! Well earned outcome.

The dollar-figure makes me wonder if there is a "valley multiplier" on startup valuations. These guys built a great business with epic growth outside of the valley with very little funding. Aside from their SaaS offering, they're doing $200k of commerce transactions PER DAY.

If they were in the Valley and had taken a few million in funding, would the price tag be different (i.e. much higher)? When I compare this exit to other 30-40M exits, Wufoo seems head-and-shoulders above the rest in terms of revenue/profit, proven growth, proven team, etc.

<comment><USER9> Yea, that's a great point/question. Unfortunately, one which I don't have an answer too.

<comment><USER8> The other related question is: Is the multiplier "efficient"? In other words, if they took funding and HQ'ed in the Valley, say they would've had to dilute the founders from 33% to 23%. They'd also have a much bigger expense line around real estate and salaries. Would the Valley premium more than make up for all of that? I suspect that it would.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Hopefully this is one of those acquisitions where the acquired company ends up taking over and reinventing the acquiring company.

</comment><comment><USER11> "Wufoo has helped people collect over $100,000,000 worth of revenue for the users and about $200,000 in payments per day."

I really hope you guys continue to kill it in the form space.

<comment><USER12> Not a snarky question, I am just confused.

Where do these numbers come from? How is Wufoo helping it's customers collect revenue?

<comment><USER11> I pulled this from Startups Open Sourced. Here's the context:

Q: Did you ever do any other big changes or pivots? A: Payment forms is a big feature that we have at Wufoo and that's something we even didn't think about when we launched the service. It's one of those things that our users ask us about, constantly. People are asking for payment integration like crazy; let's just see what we can do to make it happen, and our payment integration is something that we're really proud of—it's this really easy way of assigning prices to different choices in the form fields, and a significant driver of revenue for us. Interesting fact: Wufoo has helped people collect over $100,000,000 worth of revenue for the users and we process probably about $200,000 in payments—in transactions—every single day. So Wufoo helps generate a lot of significant revenue for our users.

full interview: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2481804>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I don't get it; where did surveymonkey found $35m? is there so much money to make in online surveys?

<comment><USER14> I can believe there's the money, what I can't believe is why SurveyMonkey appears to be so entrenched, it's not a product that's hard to replicate (at least that's how it appears from the outside).

It also has a URL that really looks scammy. Whenever I see a mailing list mailout from Big Corporation X, and it has a SurveyMonkey URL, I think "this is pretty much the opposite of the professional image that they're trying to pitch." I don't know how they do it. I guess that's why I'm not making the mega-bucks ;)

However, it's a great exit for Wufoo, and congratulations to all of them.

<comment><USER13> Based on their site, surveymonkey seems to be very good in corporate sales, having that big customer base is hard to replicate.

<comment><USER15> This is exactly it. The product _is_ easy to replicate, corporate account acquisition is not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Wufoo is 5 years old?

Time sure does fly...if you asked me how old Wufoo was, I'd probably say a year...two tops.

</comment><comment><USER17> Link to original article, without blogspam: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2481610>

<comment><USER18> Posting news on your own, professional blog is "spam" now?

<comment><USER17> If your blog post adds literally no value whatsoever and is on a blog that is almost 100% repost spam, yes.

<comment><USER19> This article added one fact of interest: a price.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> PG must be very pleased. I think he invested in Wufoo (in addition to the original YC investment).

</comment><comment><USER21> fun FAQ <http://wufoo.com/surveymonkey-wufoo-faq/>

</comment><comment><USER22> Congratulations guys. I'd normally never want to see this happen, but survey monkey is a great home and it's a great fit. I'm proud that we pay for your service.

</comment><comment><USER23> What's interesting is Wufoo didn't take a lot of funding at the start, and they grew over time.

It's great product that I've been happy to evangelize over the years. It does what it says, and it does it well. Congrats Wufoo!

</comment><comment><USER24> Interesting that they are (soon to be were) in Tampa, FL - not exactly a hotbed of tech startups. Definitely cheaper to be there, but is it easier or harder to draw talent?

</comment><comment><USER25> So I am going to go out on a limb and take the Wufoo guys at their word.

I used Survey Monkey a bit on some grad projects, but wasn't too impressed by what I saw. I mean, it was ok...but wasn't Wufoo-esque.

I love Wufoo and the founders have tremendous credibility in my eyes. It is clear that they are VERY passionate and extremely intelligent. The thought and effort they put into everything they do - from Particle Tree to Treehouse to Wufoo - is awe-inspiring.

Given that they have not raised a ton of money, I can only assume that they decided to do this deal on their own initiative and not based on pressure from both PG & PB (both of their angels).

So it would seem that they know what they are doing.

I hope that this works out for the best. Although I am just a free user of their product, I have a lot of respect for the team and have learnt a lot from them.

I truly wish them all the best - even if it means they needed to sell.

</comment><comment><USER26> Wufoo is YC W06.

<comment><AUTHOR> Updated the title - <USER2>

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> A strangely perfect fit.

I use both Survey Monkey & Wufoo daily at work, and consider both of them to be fantastic tools, which both could both use some love on the visual customization end.

Survey Monkey's visual customization is limited to changing colors and uploading a logo. With Wufoo - it's possible to generate custom CSS (or do completely custom forms with their API) - but much more difficult than (I feel) it should be.

So - congrats to both companies, and hopefully they'll now move in the direction of more & easier visual customization.

</comment><comment><USER28> > customers frequently use Wufoo's forms to process online transactions.

> a process that previously required hours of work by web developers can now > be done by anyone with web access in a matter of minutes.

Can I ask a question of the Wufoo team? Do you attribute your success primarily to: allowing anyone to do what only web developers could do (targeting non-consumption); reducing the work from hours to times; or processing online transactions?

<comment><USER29> If I had to pick one of those, it would be reducing work. People will pay for something that makes their job easier / efficient. Knowing what people want is hard though. I personally attribute it to day after day of paying attention to the details in support, design and all other areas of a business, which slowly builds trust and paying users.

<comment><USER28> Of the three, my guess would be making web-form creation accessible to people who could not do it before. While it's great to save time, that's a percentage improvement; whereas making the impossible possible is of a different order altogether. It's also to get people to adopt if they haven't already invested in a way of doing it that is already working for them (even if it is inefficient etc) - change is hard when you have bigger problems to worry about. But that's just my guess - I'd love to hear from the wufoo team...

But I agree with you about the support, design etc. There are a few companies providing online forms. Technically, it's not that hard to do; and I had a quick play with a competitor, that seemed pretty good. So I guess the "what people want" above just defines the mini "industry" of online forms - <USER3> Wufoo's is within an industry, its success must be based on additional factors, like the ones you mention.

<comment><USER29> "I'd love to hear from the wufoo team..."

That would be me :) I'm one of the co-founders.

<comment><USER28> whoops! Sorry, I am chagrined :/ But, bonus, I got an answer from a co- founder. Thanks!

I thought you were speaking hypothetically (I checked your profile too).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Any idea how many employees Wufoo has? And how many are engineers/designers?

<comment><USER31> 12 based on the photo on this page:

<http://wufoo.com/2011/04/25/wufoo-surveymonkey-acquisition/>

My guess is 4-6 do customer support, and the rest do engineering / design.

<comment><USER32> 10 employees. 3 full time support people, but everyone actually does support.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Congrats Wufoo!

</comment><comment><USER34> Snarky 37signals post in t-minus...

<comment><USER35> I don't think so.

Wufoo and SurveyMonkey are both profitable and they both charge for a product that solves a real problem.

<comment><USER36> Perhaps he's referencing to their post in response to Mint's acquisition [1]. I had the same response, although I don't use either service enough to have much validity behind my opinion: Wufoo seems to have been better executed than SurveyMonkey, at least from an UI perspective. That said, there's obviously more to this business than simply executing well.

1\. [http://37signals.com/svn/posts/1927-the-next-generation- bend...](http://37signals.com/svn/posts/1927-the-next-generation-bends-over)

<comment><USER37> Jason Fried's comments on the Mint acquisition could be summarized as dissapointment over Mint "selling out". That is, they were on a good trajectory to take out an incumbent institution, and instead of carrying that through, they took a payday and let the incumbent off the hook.

The situation with SurveyMonkey and Wufoo couldn't be more different. Neither is analogous to Intuit. Not by any stretch. Both companies are closer to start-up than they are institution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Wuhoo for Wufoo!

</comment><comment><USER39> Wonder if SurveyMonkey is interested in buying us for only USD 500K :)

<http://sourceforge.net/projects/xtcc>

Man is this going to get me downvoted or what?!!</comment>


Ask HN: What are your favorite paid online services for non-programming use? - <AUTHOR> I guess many people have monthly/annual subscriptions to certain online services, and most such services offer conveniences, provide access to content, improve productivity, etc. I wonder what paid non-programming-related services (e.g. Github, AWS, DigitalOcean, etc are excluded) are popular with the community here?
My current subscriptions include: pinboard, tarsnap, expressvpn, the economist, and the information
P.S. I'm mainly interested in digital services here, so things like food/grocery/domestic/personal care subscriptions do not apply.
P.P.S. To avoid the obvious, the usual suspects such as Skype, Netflix, Evernote, Spotify, etc may be safely omitted. <comment><USER2> Pinboard [[https://pinboard.in/](https://pinboard.in/)], Moo.do [[https://www.moo.do/](https://www.moo.do/)], Instapaper [[https://www.instapaper.com/](https://www.instapaper.com/)].</comment>


Goal Hacks: How to Achieve Anything - <AUTHOR> http://www.spring.org.uk/2011/03/11-goal-hacks-how-to-achieve-anything.php <comment><USER2> The great paradox of this article is that the ultimate way to achieve things is to evolve to a point where you stop reading these kinds of posts. When your media diet is greatly composed of easily digestible lists that instead of instructing effectively end up only distracting you from achieving, you begin a reductive process towards not actually achieving at all.

I'd go as far as to say this article will not help a single person as far as it comes to "achieving" anything. Will it create a momentary dopamine pulse for those that read it? That enjoy clicking? That enjoy distraction? Yes.

But thats not how doing anything worth a shit gets done - other than temporary brain relaxation - and that could have been spent more effectively driveling around I Can Has Cheezburger instead of this article.

<comment><USER3> I think that's a bit extreme. If you have some fundamental issue with getting things done, articles like these are clearly not going to help you. If you're already productive, and looking for tips to optimize your execution, it makes for interesting reading. There were several ideas I hadn't seen mentioned on other lists, and some cited journal publications. Not too shabby.

I had a problem with procrastination when I was younger. I wasted a significant amount of time reading a bunch of very poor-quality linkbait blog articles, trying to find something that helped. When I finally bought The Now Habit (print edition and audiobook for my car), I was able to apply a coherent system rather than piecemeal techniques, and this helped to correct what was a fairly big problem for me. Now that I have a system that works for me, small tips are useful. Prior, not so much.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have a different way of thinking about goals. My goal is always a specific action, and not a result. The outcome I consider it a byproduct in which I have not 100% control.

For example your goal would not be to get a raise, instead it would be to have a meeting with your boss and explain to him/her why you are confident the company should increase you salary.

<comment><USER5> i find "visualize process not outcome" extremely effective, both in sports and in doing things i don't want to do.

<comment><USER6> One of my greatest procrastination sources was doing my books at the end of each month. So I turned it into kind of a game, I wrote down all the steps I need to do for my bookkeeping. Then every month I challenged myself to eliminate a step or make it easier. Since then I've been on time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Everything on this earth began with someone visualizing something and then executing on it. What separates the successful ones from others is "execution" of this vision.

This is nothing new and has been repeated many times by life coaches (think Tony Robbins et al) all based on concepts Napoleon Hill taught over 100 years ago.

There has been many blogs and books which talk about goal setting etc but in the end it all comes down to execution. This obviously means starting someplace even if it's not the right place and following through with the vision and adjusting along the way.

</comment><comment><USER8> "Visualize process" is a very good mantra.</comment>


Drupal 8 – PSA-2016-002 – Pre-Announcement of Security Update - <AUTHOR> https://www.drupal.org/PSA-2016-002 <comment><AUTHOR> Is this a common practice in the wider security community?

Since Drupageddon i kind of see the necessity of such an Pre-Announcement, but this seems like a horribly broken process if the only way to ensure an critical security update to a submodule gets installed is to tell everyone to get their mousecursor over the update button so you can be quick enough...</comment>


Lucid Meets Prolog - <AUTHOR> https://billwadge.wordpress.com/2015/11/20/lucid-meets-prolog/ <comment><USER2> This is a Big Deal.

Remember though that in the old A.I. there were two approaches. One was Prolog, based on backwards chaining, the other one was the expert system shells based on production rules.

The production rules are still around in systems like Drools, IBM ILOG, FairIssac, etc. 50% of the time you find "enterprise" customers are happy with "business rules" and the other 50% of the time the people think it is the spawn of Cthulhu.

It's time for something new that gets consistently good results.</comment>


Delphi 10.4 released with big updates - <AUTHOR> https://www.embarcadero.com/products/rad-studio/whats-new-in-10-4-sydney <comment><AUTHOR> finally : major Delphi Code Insight improvements using an separate LSP service.

HighDPI should work also better now (hopefully, they promised that already)

some new language features - custom managed records

and a breaking change (for the mobile editions) - unified memory mangement (aka no more ARC)

and lots of cross-platform and mobile updates which i dont use ..

[http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Sydney/en/What's_Ne...](http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Sydney/en/What's_New)</comment>


Ask HN: Why are Windows security updates larger than the ENTIRETY of Windows? - <AUTHOR>

A vanilla install of Windows XP uses 1.2GB of disk space.
But 83 critical security patches need to be downloaded and installed right away. These add 5.3GB to the system. That's 4 times as big as all of Windows XP!
(This is all according to a recent RISKS article.)
I'm reminded of the story of how a statically-linked "Hello, World" program was over a megabyte. It turned out that all the Unicode characters were thrown into libc.
I'm thinking that there has got to be a similarly interesting reason as to how security patches can be massively bigger than the OS itself. <comment><USER2> There's probably multiple updates affecting the same code, with the effect that bits are downloaded which get replaced without ever being used.

<comment><AUTHOR> So you're saying that (eg.) security patches 1 to 83 download eighty-three slightly different versions of file X, only the last of which is used. Presumably versions 1 to 82 shouldn't be saved -- and I don't see evidence in XP that they are for security updates.

The original article -- here, by the way, <http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/26.47.html#subj8> says that the final result is 6.5GB of hard drive space for a patched XP install.

<comment><USER2> I believe that Windows keeps patch downloads stored somewhere even after they have been extracted and installed.</comment></comment></comment>