Ask HN: What was your first programming book? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> A Guide to FORTRAN Programming by Daniel McCracken

</comment><comment><USER3> Complete Turbo Pascal, First Edition

</comment><comment><USER4> K&R

</comment><comment><USER5> Camel book 2nd edition

</comment><comment><USER6> QBASIC for Dummies

</comment><comment><USER7> php3 reference book</comment>


Show HN: NEXT Browser – A Lisp-based browser - <AUTHOR> Now with GTK Linux support, still very alpha, but much faster than before:
website: https://next-browser.github.io source: https://github.com/nEXT-Browser/nEXT
thanks for your time! <comment><USER2> Nice! Your gif would be better if they were twice as slow as they currently are, so that people can understand what you're showing without reading the descriptions.

The problem (as in "the reason why it's not worth it for me to try") with any new browser is the lack of ad-blocking at the uBlock Origin level. Without a proper ad-blocker, the web is just unbrowsable these days. The exceptions are browsers that lack JS support, but this brings its own set of issues.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, I really need an adblocker, I'm working on that. Thank you for the nice words!

<comment><USER2> Great, good luck!</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: PHP Version Audit – Audit Your PHP Version for Known CVEs and Patches - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/lightswitch05/php-version-audit <comment><AUTHOR> I wrote PHP Version Audit to automatically keep track of PHP patches, particularly for releases that fix CVEs. This morning it automatically updated to include new CVE patches and releases: 7.4.1, 7.3.13, 7.2.26. This was the test to determine if it was ready for a 1.0.0 release, so its official now. I would love to hear any thoughts on this new tool. Thanks!</comment>


PostgreSQL Android App Contest - <AUTHOR> http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/AndroidAppContest

<comment><USER2> I would love to find out about programming contests earlier. I missed a few other contests that I found out about only when the time period was almost over or completely finished. Anybody know a good way to stay on top of these?

I'm a big fan of programming contests. They force me to stop dallying and get something done.

</comment><comment><USER3> Ooh! Free Postgres shirt, here I come!</comment>


This Is How I Read TechCrunch: Without Comments - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/12/techcrunch-comments/ <comment><AUTHOR> Seeing this made me think that TC should go with the approach of charging a one time fee of a couple dollars to create an account to comment (thus forcing them to use their real name) as discussed on <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1518925>.</comment>


China's Central Bank Visits US for Blockchain Research Trip - <AUTHOR> https://www.coindesk.com/chinas-central-bank-visits-us-blockchain-research-trip/ <comment><USER2> Considering the mining power of blockchain resides in China, they should have paid a visit to Bitmain facility to learn more about it. Methinks it is just a spin given by coindesk website.</comment>


What a Dead Man Named FM-2030 can tell us about the future of user names - <AUTHOR> http://mcdowall.info//posts/what-a-dead-man-named-fm-2030-can-tell-us-about-the-future-of-user-names <comment><USER2> Of course, the obligatory article about programmers and names must be linked to here: [http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods- programmers-b...](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers- believe-about-names/)

<comment><USER3> That article seems like a bunch of useless pedantry to me.

"...refer people to this post the next time they suggest a genius idea like a database table with a first_name and last_name column."

So what's his suggestion then? Take this list of "bad" assumptions and try to build around them? Hogwash. Questioning whether you should design around someone not having a name is like asking if you exist.

I know companies that have been making millions for 15-20 years with this genius idea. You know what's so genius about it? It's simple, the developers understand it and it works for a great, great majority of cases.

<comment><USER4> It's not pedantry when a significant proportion of people on Earth are affected by at least one of these falsehoods.

Obviously it's very difficult to design a system that doesn't fall foul of any of these, but we could at least strive for better. Just having "first name" and "last name" fields is really quite culturally insensitive. It pretty much worked when only Americans and Western Europeans were using computers, but the online world is a lot bigger now.

A comment by the author gives examples of humans who don't have names, but certainly exist: "Someone born into slavery in the Sudan, a woman born in rural China, an American baby recovered after being born into a toilet, a feral child, an amnesiac, etc, etc."

It's not quite so important for a social network to deal with this, but a government system, for example, should be more rigorous. Whatever the system, if we can be more global in our attitude, so much the better.

<comment><USER5> > A comment by the author gives examples of humans who don't have names, but > certainly exist: "Someone born into slavery in the Sudan, a woman born in > rural China, an American baby recovered after being born into a toilet, a > feral child, an amnesiac, etc, etc."

I don't know if this is a peculiar idea, but in those circumstances perhaps a "Generate Name" button is the useful feature.

<comment><USER2> Only if that name is intended to become official. If not, rather make sure that the field accepts a null value. ;-)

<comment><USER6> I'm not going to communicate with you by pointing. Stop being a special snowflake and come up with a name, even if it's local to the service. No null values. Your name can be 'null value' though if you like, win yourself some geek points.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > _"Future generations are going to find it impossible to register themselves > on social networks with their actual birth names, because older generations > have used them all."_

Only if we presume:

1\. Registering people with the same name is difficult-to-impossible. \-- And/Or -- 2\. Systems that future generations care about will have been invented at some problematic chunk of time before they attempt to register for them.

As to 1) I believe even Facebook can handle the multitude of "John Smith"s fairly painlessly. And 2) is borderline laughable.

<comment><AUTHOR> In regard to your first point, yes of course they can handle multiple equivalent names for display, but if you want to use Facebook as your Identity, then there can be only one.

The person at <http://www.facebook.com/john.mcdowall> is not me, nor is john.mcdowall1 and so on.

<comment><USER2> So? Why don't you simply use your phone number, nobody else has the same one as you. Why would identity be restricted to names?

<comment><USER8> _Why don't you simply use your phone number, nobody else has the same one as you._

You do know that multiple people can share a phone number, right?

<comment><USER2> Yes, and one person can have multiple phone numbers. That was just an example of another data which can be used for identity which is far less ambiguous than the proper name. The point with identities is that, if you need to be able to identify someone with a single piece of information, it can't be defined by the person being identified; instead it has to be appointed by a globally central authority, since it's the only way to ensure uniqueness. So in any case, names are completely irrelevant when it comes to identity.

<comment><USER8> _if you need to be able to identify someone with a single piece of information, it can't be defined by the person being identified; instead it has to be appointed by a globally central authority_

Not necessarily; for example, people could generate their own UUIDs as identity tokens.

<comment><USER2> That's a fair point. However, identification is not only about uniqueness, it's also about proving that you are who you say you are, which still requires a central authority -- or maybe another un-fakeable certificate, although I'm not sure how it would be implemented without depending on another type of identity (such as email).

<comment><USER8> _it's also about proving that you are who you say you are, which still requires a central authority_

I disagree with this too, because "who you say you are" is not a single thing; it depends on the context, and you ought to be able to control what connections people can make between different contexts.

For example: I might want to give one ID to my doctor, to connect it with my medical records, and another to the DMV to identify me for a driver's license. There is no reason why these two IDs need to be the same: in other words, there is no reason why the DMV needs to verify that "who I say I am" to them is the _same_ as "who I say I am" to my doctor. Or again, if I have to prove "who I say I am" to Social Security in order to receive benefits, that doesn't necessarily mean I have to use the same ID as I use for other purposes.

Of course, some of the reasons I would need an ID are to prove that I have a certain set of rights, as in the Social Security and DMV examples, so whoever I give the ID to has to be able to connect that ID with the appropriate evidence that I have those rights. So my "Social Security ID" would have to be connected to my employment history, or at least to my history of paying into the system, and my "DMV ID" would have to be connected to my passing of a driver's test. But that still doesn't require any single central authority to dispense or verify IDs; I could still generate my own UUIDs for each of these entities and then allow them to link those IDs to the appropriate information. The fact that we _allow_ the government to create one central "ID" for us does not mean that's the only way to meet those needs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > "How would you process a credit card payment for someone who has only one > name?" The Sripe API doesn't require a name at all, so they're clearly ahead > of the curve here!

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, Stripe doing it like a Boss :)

That said, you know there's programmers out there not using the Stripe Button and coding forms by hand that will have validations on them for the First and Last name because they think it's the right thing to do. I've seen it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I worked with a guy called "Comet." That was his full legal name. He logged a bug against the HR system, because it insisted on both a first name and a last name.

</comment><comment><USER11> I actually find that interesting. Why can't we change our names at will? Is it because government needs them as a unique ID (combined with birth date and what not)? If governments had other IDs (and they do have social security numbers), why bother keeping track of names?

<comment><USER12> IANAL, but I believe that in the United States you're free to use whatever name you like so long as it's not done for fraudulent purposes.

<comment><USER13> Essentially true.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> How's that new? What about Seal, Madonna and Louis C.K.? Programmers should already handle that. Handling 1 name instead of 2 is a lot easier than let say change your system because instead 2 now you need 5 because people decided to have 3 middle names. Running out of IPs and upgrading Internet to 2.0 version sounds more complex than shrinking names from 2 to 1 IMHO. is it enough for a specific situation (security, verification, banking, etc.)? Probably not. But I am sure there will be plenty fo ways to do so. Every other man in China is Li or Lee and they somehow managed to deal with it :)

<comment><USER13> "Programmers should already handle that."

Except they don't. I have a one-word legal name and I have _rarely_ found any online from that allowed me to have less than two names. I realize I'm an edge case, so I just make up something for the other field.

Ironically, I practically _begged_ Google+ to allow me to use my _real_ name, which they require for their "fine dining experience" (<cough>advertisers<cough>), but they refused because it was less than two names and looked fake. They may have finally worked that out by now, I left the building long ago.

<comment><USER15> I bet you have fun with the TSA.

<comment><USER13> I don't fly much. When I have, it's a brief conversation with the TSA supervisor, followed by the miracle of flight.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Just a note for the author of this piece - FM-2030 played in the Olympics in 1948, not 1984.

<comment><AUTHOR> Whoops! Thanks :) That really would have been Transhuman...

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> My name is "Robert'); DROP TABLE Students;--"

<https://xkcd.com/327/></comment>


Chapter 6 of the Rails Tutorial, 2nd Edition is out ("Modeling users") - <AUTHOR> http://news.railstutorial.org/chapter-6-of-the-rails-tutorial-2nd-edition-i

<comment><USER2> I know i'm harping here, Michael, but:

 _Another step that isn't strictly necessary at this stage—but is a really good idea nevertheless—is to tell Rails which attributes of the model are accessible, i.e., which attributes can be modified by outside users (such as users submitting requests with web browsers)._

That's not what attr_accessible means --- the real meaning of attr_accessible is subtly different in a way that leads people to make mistakes. attr_accessible means attributes can be modified _automatically_ based on user input. End-user web browser requests _can_ modify things that aren't in attr_accessible --- you just have to write the code to let them.

The error this leads to is overly-permissive attr_accessible statements, because people fall into a trap of believing anything that might be changed as a direct result of a user request must be in the attr_accessible statement.

<comment><USER3> `attr_accessible` and friends are a nightmare anyway. They push a controller- layer concern into the model-layer. It breaks the hash-initialization syntax that is so useful in irb, in unit tests, in background jobs, etc.

Instead, I've been using ActiveSupport's Hash#slice method in my controllers.

<comment><USER2> Declarative syntax for which attributes the model designer is comfortable exposing to mass assignment seems like a perfectly legitimate model concern. In what sense is attr_accessible different from, say, "validate"?

<comment><USER3> It mascarades and is documented as a security feature, but it's a superficial restriction. You could simply loop and send("#{key}=", value) instead of calling attributes=(hash).

In practice, all it does it prevent you from writing `MyModel.new(:foo => bar)` and force you to write `m = MyModel.new; m.foo = bar` This is simply annoying at the repl.

Validation applies always the same (or when some predicates are satisfied), but restriction on changing fields can vary by view or via permissions (ie. only admins can flip that bit!)

The security concern comes up when you bring "params" into the picture. You don't want to ever do: MyModel.new(params) for fear of params[:is_admin] == true.

A better solution would be to automatically mark the values in `params` as tainted and throw an error on mass-assignment of tainted values. This way you can still use mass assignment for non-user-input (like in tests or at the repl). You could have an `safe_attrs` to disable tainted value filtering for some known-safe attributes.

<comment><USER2> I see where you're coming from. In the past 10 years, I've learned to appreciate things that, while not solving fundamentally a specific security problem, act as a circuit breaker to keep people from mindlessly making the exact same mistake over and over again.

AR::Base#update_attributes is a bad interface, from a security perspective. But it's vital to the programmer experience of Rails development. There's no good fix for the problem; AR models don't even _list_ their attributes, let alone express a coherent strategy for defending them. I'll take the little wins I can get.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Michael, your rails tutorial continues to be the best source for those who want to learn the basics of rails. I used it as an introduction, and I recommend it to anyone who wants to begin creating web apps. I am glad to see that it was enough of a success to warrant a second edition, and wish you continued success.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> See also the original announcement of the 2nd Edition, which includes a FAQ and a list of new features:

[http://news.railstutorial.org/ruby-on-rails-tutorial- second-...](http://news.railstutorial.org/ruby-on-rails-tutorial-second- edition-updated)

The biggest changes are:

        * A full update to Rails 3.2, including coverage of the
          asset pipeline

        * A complete rewrite of the authentication & authorization
          system, taking advantage of the new has_secure_password method

        * A revised test suite using the latest techniques in
          RSpec programming

</comment><comment><USER5> Thanks Michael, I was having a hard time understanding TDD and git until I went through your tutorial. Also, although I had been programming in Rails for a couple years, it really helped me understand some of the basics of Rails that I had somehow missed.

</comment><comment><USER6> Thank you so much Michael, Rails Tutorial has helped me go from zero Rails knowledge to deploying apps. Please keep it up!

</comment><comment><USER7> Michael, this is great and incredible stuff. I think your work goes unmatched and that there is no introduction (paid or free) that is as comprehensive or welcoming. I have passed on (even forced) this onto all my friends. Even those who know Rails so that if someone may ask them in the future, they will point them in your direction.

Putting that behind us, I hope you're not planning to post on HN every week or two when a new chapter is released. I think your last post and perhaps one when the book is completed would be sufficient.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback and suggestion. I can understand not wanting to have an announcement hit the HN front page every time a new chapter is released. But even if I don't submit the story, the chances are good that someone else will. By submitting it myself, I can control the timing; in particular, I can make sure to be available to respond to comments. In any case, if people don't vote it up, the story will soon disappear.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Michael, this is fantastic once again. Thanks a bunch. Really looking forward to those screencasts whenever they come out also.

<comment><AUTHOR> You're welcome! And I didn't realize The Fonz was a fan. :-)

</comment></comment><comment> james-fend Great stuff Michael!

</comment><comment><USER9> many thanks michael, your tutorial is really the best to get started with web development, from bdd to hosting. Hats off!

</comment><comment><USER10> Thank you very much, I hope to be slow enought to wait the following chapters :P</comment>


Second Circuit negates first sale right for foreign-made works of authorship - <AUTHOR> http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110817/18162715566/legally-bought-some-books-abroad-sell-them-us-you-could-owe-150k-per-book-infringement.shtml

<comment><USER2> I thought _Omega v. Costco_ was correctly decided and that Mike Masnick is full of it, but I got into a week-long argument with someone in the wake of that case and don't want to repeat the experience. I think it's telling that Masnick left out the data point that the defendant had earned somewhere between $900,000 and $1.2 million from his book import & resale business, but that's not germane to the decision.

Murtha's dissent is error, in that first sale only applies where the United States is the country of first publication, notwithstanding that the foreign publisher may be a subsidiary of a US entity which is the ultimate rightsholder.

The argument that this will hurt libraries is completely bogus. 17 U.S.C. § 602(a)(3)(C) specifically authorizes libraries to import copies of foreign copyrighted works for both archival and lending purposes, thus providing them with a statutory 'safe haven'.</comment>


Ask HN: Does LinkedIn have a very strong network effect? - <AUTHOR> Is barrier to exit really high for users? <comment><USER2> I personally get zero value out of LinkedIn except as a place to control the info about my resume that people see. I don't want a "better" replacement because those exist already and just lack the user base.

</comment><comment><USER3> With all the life coaches, "content marketing" and "SEO" specialists, "business development" people, I find the barrier to staying on LinkedIn is really bad.

When it comes to B2B marketing I spent a lot of time on LinkedIn which was a big waste; I switched to another channel and things turned around immediately.

</comment><comment><USER4> Similar to FB - it's good to stay connected to old friends, former colleagues, random nice people you meet at conferences. Useful should you need to ping these individuals for info.

</comment><comment><USER5> Yes</comment>


Why Are Some Programming Languages Faster Than Others? - <AUTHOR> http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/programming-languages-faster-than-others/ <comment><USER2> > "These differences are not really a problem for most people, especially with > computers becoming faster and faster every year. 2 While some programming > languages are certainly faster than others, what really matters is it gets > something done."

The difference in execution speed between, for example, the same task implemented in C versus Ruby can be 100 to 200x. This is not a trivial difference at all. In other words you can get a 100x execution speed with the same hardware.

NOTE: Programming languages per se can't be measured in speed; what one can measure is programming language implementations. But the features and idoosyncracies of a PL will inherently affect how much speed an implementation could strike.</comment>


An Encoded Tree Traversal - <AUTHOR> https://research.swtch.com/treenum <comment><USER4> > There must be existing uses of this encoding, but I've been unable to find > any or even determine what its name is.

not a tree guru.. but isn't this somewhat related to 'fractal tree indexing':

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

        Each internal node of a B-tree will contain a number of keys that is
        one less than its branching factor. The keys act as separation values
        which divide its subtrees. Keys in subtrees are stored in search tree order,
        that is, all keys in a subtree are between the two bracketing values.
        In this regard, they are just like B-trees.

also, thanks for the plan9 stuff :D

</comment><comment><USER5> I like using a level-order traversal because it makes your indexing very simple. For a binary tree you start with 1 and each node has children 2 * i and 2 * i + 1, and parent i / 2\. You can do a inorder/preorder/postorder traversal using the typical methods, but for a level-order traversal all you need to do is walk through the backing array.

This also generalizes to k-trees. Start at node k-1. your children are ((i - <USER2> + 2) * k) through ((i - k + 2) * k) + (k - 1), and your parent is ((i / k) - <USER3> + k) with integer division. Once again this all fits nicely into a flat backing array and requires no extra memory to store children or parents.

<comment><USER6> I agree, this is a great representation - I think of it as the heap ordering - but it assumes a fixed-height tree. For my use case, I want to overlay increasingly large trees (with leaves appended to the right side) to a linear array, so heap order is a non-starter.

</comment></comment><comment> bra-ket great interview question

<comment><USER6> It's a terrible interview question, not least because I spent however long writing 4 pages about it and still don't know what it is. :-)

But it's not made up: this comes up in a real system and I would like to know more about the answer.</comment></comment>


Sega Dreamcast at 20: the futuristic games console that came too soon - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/games/2018/nov/28/sega-dreamcast-at-20-futuristic-console <comment><USER2> Dreamcast had a native web browser; you could buy a full-size keyboard as well as a mouse for it; you could run NetBSD on it.

</comment><comment><USER3> I still love my Dreamcast despite the fact that it's almost old enough to drink. Phantasy Star Online is still one of my most favorite games ever made, and the amount of oddball games such as Toy Commander are second to none. Sadly, the disc reader seems to be going, as it makes distressing noises when loading.

</comment><comment> http-teapot I miss Power Stone :(

</comment><comment><USER4> Still have my dreamcast. Its become my favorite throwback console to play due to being able to easily burn any game to a cdr and play it

<comment><USER5> Yeah, self booting cdi images helped to contribute to the piracy issue, which helped kill it faster.

<comment><USER6> Really? I was under the impression that the Dreamcast was cracked well after its fate had been sealed by the marketplace.

<comment><USER7> I was too. The reason it lost was PSX had way way more games than DC.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It had the best version of MVC2. One of the best/crazy fighting games ever made.

<comment><USER9> and NFL Blitz, at least in my opinion. The Dreamcast was very close to Sega's arcade hardware at the time, providing many "arcade perfect" ports.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> The US release date was 9.9.99</comment>


DoNotPay app waits on hold for you - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2019/10/16/avoid-waiting-on-hold/ <comment><USER2> I downloaded the do not pay app a week ago because I wanted to use their temporary card number feature to sign up for a free trial.

This feature automatically declines the charge when the trial finishes.

The app was free to download and I was immediately asked to enter my credit card on the onboarding flow. I was a bit annoyed but reluctantly entered it and figured I could cancel this before the trial.

Then I went to create one of these fake cards and got a notification that my actual credit card was charged $3. What? Turns out activating one of these fake cards automatically activated my free trial. I had no idea and was annoyed by this dark pattern, and even more annoyed I fell for it.

Then I tried to cancel and the only thing I could find is a chat bot that kept presenting the same options. Ironic that the article talks about bypassing a bot when they use one themselves to handle customer service.

After going through the chat of flow a few times I was able to cancel my subscription, but the chat it didn't know how to handle my refund request. I ended up finally finding a form I could send an email to someone asking for a refund.

This app has dark patterns all over the place to trick you into paying for their products that save you money. I would not recommend it.

<comment><USER3> Since I closed my BoA account I've been using privacy.com for temporary credit card numbers. It "just works" \- for me at least - and I haven't been charged a dime. They make their money from interchange fees.

<comment><USER4> Citibank still offers the disposable card number thing. I am forgetting the official name they have for it.

<comment><USER5> Except last time I tried using that feature it required something crazy... I think like either a Java applet or a Flash something or a Windows download... so I didn't get far with that.

<comment><USER6> BoA just sunsetted their "ShopSafe" virtual CCN tool last month, which had a UI that required Flash. They didn't offer any explanation (or more than about 20 days' notice...), but I had to wonder if they just didn't want to port it to something modern...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm excited that they got investment to build an Android version - I plan to be an early customer. A couple of things, though:

>> write legal letters to scare businesses out of overcharging you

This one actually concerns me a little. A lot of businesses use legalese to scare and overwhelm you, so it's great to have something to fight back. But there are also a lot of people out there who just game the system as consumers too - I'm a little concerned for Mom & Pop shops who will just end up being the victims here instead. Ultimately I don't think there's a perfect solution to the fact that dishonest, selfish people exist.

>> they'll think 'this could be made public and go viral and hurt our business

This might play out in a more complicated way. I have an app that records all my calls. I stop the recording immediately if it's a personal call. If it's a business I inform them I'm recording the phone call. Much of the time, that ends the call. The business was going to record it too, but now that they know I'm going to record it, they tell me they'll have to end the call and schedule a time to call back when neither of us records it, which I refuse to do, so I take care of business in writing, often in-person instead. Instead of making my over-the-phone business more confident, it just eliminates the phone as an option.

<comment><USER8> Curious, what call recording app do you use now please, and does it properly record full duplex audio from the line (so not using speaker/headset/other workarounds)?

The last time I had this working perfectly was with a Nexus 4 and I find that call recording apps do not work on newer phones I've bought since. Any suggestions? Android or iOS, I don't care which platform as long as it works well.

I used to set the app to only record incoming calls from callers not in my address book, and on several occasions it was a huge benefit to have these to refer to later.

Companies really do not like it when you email them recordings of their employee lying to you, and will go out of their way to make things right immediately when that happens.

<comment><USER9> I did this once with Chase and didn't get anywhere. Had a CFPB case opened and they refused to budge.

I had called multiple times and was told that their QuickPay was irreversible and that it was fine to use it for commercial transactions. I accepted it for a transaction, the transaction got reversed and money taken out of my account and I was charged overdraft fees. Submitting the audio recording did not make a difference.

<comment><USER8> That's a shame, what was their explanation? Did they say it's OK for Chase employees to lie to customers, or did they dispute the authenticity of your recording?

There's probably something in the fine print of your contract with them that lets them get away with whatever happened, but always escalate matters as it's pretty effective. Press them on social media, if there's arbitration try it or small claims court, and involve any local media or politicians that you can get on your side.

Basically, just be a huge pain in the ass and do not give up or go away until they back down. This can take a while and you must document everything, every interaction.

<comment><USER9> They supposedly couldn't play the audio file.

Looking back I probably should have transcribed it and highlighted the relevant parts to show the issue more clearly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think it's Do NOT Pay

This company has consistently come out with some amazing products, really refreshing to see a tech company that seems to just purely be fighting to solve annoying problems that haven't been touched before. Also founded by a solid entrepreneur who is the son of Bill Browder who has done incredible work throughout the world advocating for legislation that will help eliminate corruption and who wrote a fascinating book (Red Notice) on his time as an investor in Russia. I won't spoil it but it reads like a thriller despite being nonfiction and is well worth a read.

</comment><comment><USER11> Isn't this basically same service as GetHuman which has been around for years?

[https://gethuman.com/call-back](https://gethuman.com/call-back)

<comment><USER12> I used GetHuman once a couple months ago, and they spammed me for weeks after without any ability to unsubscribe.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I use a Chase Liquid card that's associated with my Chase checking account [0]. The balance I keep on it is always 0.01 (it used to be 0.00, but Chase closed my last Liquid account because it was not used, so I'm hoping keeping one cent on it keeps it active). The Chase Liquid card is a prepaid Visa debit card, so the merchant cannot pull more than what is on the card (they are denied), and the card is accepted wherever Visa is accepted. Some merchants can detect whether or not the card is a debit card, but this occurrence has been very rare in my personal experience (definitely once, maybe twice, I can't remember the specific merchants).

I use my Chase Liquid card as the default card for _any_ merchant that wants a card to automatically charge per month, or for _any_ merchant that offers a discount for having autopay setup (one example of the latter case is T-Mobile where I get $5.00 off my bill Per month for just having a card on file for autopay). Merchants have gotten better at notifying me when my payment is due before actually charging me, so I actually perform one-time payments in these cases using my normal credit card that offers cash back.

Yes, this approach does not provide any additional privacy beyond keeping my intended payment method to myself. For anything more, I only know of privacy.com . However, this approach is sufficient for practically all of my needs.

[0] [https://www.chase.com/personal/debit-reloadable- cards/starbu...](https://www.chase.com/personal/debit-reloadable- cards/starbucks?jp_cmp=rb/liquid_redirect/off/redirect/na)

</comment><comment><USER14> Doesn't this defeat the purpose of the entire automated phone system? An agent time is precious the automation is there for simple tasks that doesn't require any intervention. If everyone starts requesting an agent it'll clog up the system for everyone.

<comment><USER15> Automated phone systems are completely useless after the advent of the internet and the smartphone. Anything on any company's IVR is more accessible on the app or the website. There's no way I'd call my bank from the bank's app to have my damn statement and balance read out to while I'm looking at it. If we call someone these days, it's to talk to a human.

<comment><USER16> They became useless when they became, for the caller (or at least for me), an exercise in double-and sometimes-triple entry of "validating" information as you move across queues because I guess no one has figured out how to store the 29 buttons I have to press for an account number from one queue to the next and and refusing to take DTMF tones (looking at you ComEd Energy) as inputs and in general, being as user hostile as possible to callers before getting even placed into queue.

USAA gets this right, to your point.

I can't tell you how many times I've opened the App, started doing something in their "support menu" and been told "You need to call support for this, press this button", the phone starts ringing and even if I have to wait a few minutes, the person who picks up the phone already knows who I am, why I'm calling based on inputs from the Mobile App. They authenticate by sending a security code _to the app_. Hands down my favorite experience calling support is whenever I need to call USAA for something.

(Plus, despite being retired from the services for 12 years now, it is nice sometimes hearing "Good Morning Sergeant Torres". Takes me back to my days on the flight line in a strange way, heh)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The recording is the better feature IMHO. My iPhone was jailbroken before I updated to the 11 Pro and the audio recording tweak was one of my favorite tweaks. I thought of spinning up a service that did this just using Twilio but wasn't sure if people would be willing to pay (I think $1-3/mo would cover costs).

I just used a recording the other day when Spectrum (shitty internet provider, formally Time Warner) tried to lie to me and I was able to re-listen to my previous conversation with them to catch them in the lie.

inb4: I live in a 1 party state and even so I rarely talk to a "real" person on my phone, it's only businesses and if they are going to have a recording then so will I.

<comment><USER18> There are a bunch of android call recording apps and on most phones they work without a jailbreak etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> How do they get you to the right department? If you call the wrong dept at Comcast, for example, they transfer you into the queue for the proper department, which would take just as long as calling in on your own.

<comment><USER20> Same for AT&T.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> The web site for DoNotPay looks completely different: "The World's First Robot Lawyer". (A bad claim to make.) It's mostly about parking tickets.

<comment><USER22> I think DoNotPay's first use case was disputing parking tickets. Basically the founder made it as a teen after getting a ton of his own parking tickets and the app helped dispute and overturn something like 160,000+ parking tickets for users in the US and UK.

[http://money.com/money/4387657/donotpay-chat-bot-traffic- tic...](http://money.com/money/4387657/donotpay-chat-bot-traffic-ticket-new- york-london/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I have tried this a few times and always been spooked by being asked up front to enter too much information including passwords(!!!????) for some products

</comment><comment><USER24> Typo in the title, DoNotPay is the correct name.

[https://donotpay.com/](https://donotpay.com/)

</comment><comment><USER25> I always use Google Hangout's free phone call when calling customer service.

</comment><comment><USER26> "Surprisingly, the startup has never been sued."

Ok, why should it be sued?

<comment><USER27> Translation : "Some exec should have spooked by now"</comment></comment>


European Court Says CIA Ran Secret Jail in a Polish Forest - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2014/07/24/world/24reuters-cia-jails-poland.html <comment><USER2> And we'll continue to absolve any American president of war crimes, even though it's become patently obvious that there were war crimes.

We'll hand out punishments to enlisted personnel operating under the aegis of their superior officers, while superior officers avoid serious punishment.

We forgive and forget the lawyers who authored the decisions that allowed this horror in the first place.

And they call us the good guys. More like "the didn't-get-found-out-by-decent- people" guys.

I'll admit to my own days of wanting glass parking lots in war zones or delivering godlike wrath on foreign opposition, but I don't actually have the power to make that happen. I also generally keep it to myself, because hey, coffee solves a lot of problems.

But nobody's even trying to prosecute our officials for their involvement in war crimes.

<comment><USER3> Prosecution for "war crimes" is something that only happens if you lose a war. That's not a cynical statement; it falls out of trying to reconcile the concept of "war crimes" with our concept of a world of sovereign nations. Sovereign nations aren't bound by any higher sovereignty that can set rules and subject violators to legal process. The only context in which a nation, or its leaders, can be punished for "war crimes" is when it loses a war and is temporarily inferior to the victors, who can impose prosecution as punishment for conduct during the war.

<comment><USER4> This is simply not true. Prosecutions for war crimes have happened both for winners and losers of wars. The truth, to be more exact, is that the losers are overwhelmingly more prosecuted than the winners (by the winners), but the winners now have the option to be brought before the ICC in the Hague.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Criminal_Court](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Criminal_Court)

Of course the chances of countries being signatory to (and having ratified) that particular treaty are roughly proportional to the inverse of their activities regarding such crimes in the recent past.

<comment><USER5> You ever heard of the "Hague Invasion Act"?

 _" U.S. President George Bush today signed into law the American Servicemembers Protection Act of 2002, which is intended to intimidate countries that ratify the treaty for the International Criminal Court (ICC). The new law authorizes the use of military force to liberate any American or citizen of a U.S.-allied country being held by the court, which is located in The Hague. This provision, dubbed the "Hague invasion clause," has caused a strong reaction from U.S. allies around the world, particularly in the Netherlands._

 _In addition, the law provides for the withdrawal of U.S. military assistance from countries ratifying the ICC treaty, and restricts U.S. participation in United Nations peacekeeping unless the United States obtains immunity from prosecution._ "

[http://www.hrw.org/news/2002/08/03/us-hague-invasion-act- bec...](http://www.hrw.org/news/2002/08/03/us-hague-invasion-act-becomes-law)

<comment><USER6> I think that sounds like a good thing.

If anybody doesn't, have you ever actually looked at the laws enforced by the ICC and how the judges and prosecutors are appointed? And who has the authority to change those laws? Just because you call something the International Criminal Court doesn't mean that it isn't a ridiculous Kangaroo court.

Without going into a detailed review, the laws all look so vague that any participant in any kind of conflict could be changed with a huge pile of crimes, depending on the whim of the judges and prosecutors. Most sane legal systems require that any law be defined strictly enough that an individual can always be sure whether an act he is planning to commit does or does not violate the law, and I think this body of laws is far, far away from that point.

As for the governing bodies, it seems the primary authority is a body in which every member nation has a single representative and a single vote (the Assembly of States Parties). Uh yeah, I bet about 10 seconds after this court was given any real power, the dictatorships of the world would horse-trade enough votes to change anybody who was politically unpopular with them with a huge pile of crimes whose definition is so vague that it's impossible to know whether you've committed them or to defend against the accusation of them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> As a Polish person - I feel really bad that my country has in any way or form participated in this and helped CIA. Our country is known to bend over to America's requests, getting absolutely nothing back, and it upsets me deeply.

<comment><USER8> First, I'm not american and I don't make excuses for the US here but my feeling is that if what Poland gave to US was secret, then it's very likely that what Poland received from US in return is secret too. Apart from that, what we see here is that governments aren't really bounded by laws, treaties nor conventions(not even constitutions). The only thing that bounds a "willing" government is another government with a bigger army or some nukes.

<comment><USER4> The atmosphere in Poland has been rather gung-ho pro American no matter what, this is likely related to the proximity of America's (former?) arch enemy Russia with whom the Poles have an extremely uneasy relationship, mostly due to having been repeatedly run over from the East (as well as the West) in living memory.

See the statements of Polish politicians regarding the missile shield for some good examples of this.

<comment><USER9> What annoys a lot of central European countries (ex eastern block countries) is the fact that their enthusiasm for the US is greeted with complete indifference.

Czechs, Poles and others _still_ need an US visa, despite the fact that they are fully fledged EU members and part of the Schengen treaty.

So the general attitude is no more quite as gung-ho as it was in the beginning of the millenium.

<comment><USER10> Fwiw, Czechs no longer do. Six ex-eastern-bloc countries were added to the visa-waiver program in 2008: Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia.

<comment><USER9> I stand corrected.

Thanks

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This story has no more connection to HN than any other political, human rights, or current events story. There's a whole Internet full of venues to have discussions about these kinds of stories. They don't need to be on the HN front page. Which is why the guidelines say they shouldn't be.

<comment><USER12> I thought it was interesting. I imagine that the people who voted it to the front page thought so too.

<comment><USER11> The bar is higher than "interesting enough to garner upvotes".

Here's what moderator 'dang said about this issue a few weeks back:

 _Some of you feel that such stories are so important that the flamewars around them should just be allowed to burn. Our experience and observation suggest the contrary: they are bad—existentially bad—for the site. Like fire in general, they lead to more of the same. So the alternative to the current policy is conflagration. The best aspects of HN, in our view, would not survive this._

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8012898](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8012898)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> WHAT?!??! Illegal kidnapping, torture and demonstrated government complicity: and all I got was this lousy 100,000EUR? They obviously need some decent lawyers.

</comment><comment><USER14> As a person born in Poland and living in the US, I'm proud that these two countries cooperate to advance common goals, and I can only wish that we work closer together (both openly or secretly).

As to what happened in those secret locations, the European Court is free to investigate (and potentially prosecute) CIA, which is the organization directly responsible. But then, wouldn't it make more sense to go after Guantanamo (or eastern Ukraine these days) first?

</comment><comment><USER15> I don't get it how a court can rule that a <natural fact> can be either true or false.

<comment><USER4> If you don't get that then you probably don't get how _any_ court decision is ever possible. The correct interpretation of the headline is that the court found that the evidence documenting this particular fact is strong enough to support the decision to collapse the true/false options to just 'true'.

Courts are messy, they deal with uncertainties all the time, so we ask them to clarify what their view is on the veracity of certain facts and the courts then rule based upon the evidence and their interpretation thereof and then we proceed from that new base of certainty. Of course courts err (miscarriages of justice) but this is a low enough incidence that we continue to believe that when a court rules something is 'true' that it did in fact happen.

Tricky concept, courts! In the end it's still people and people make mistakes but these people are experts trained to sift fact from fiction.

<comment><USER15> I understand how _most_ court decisions are made, e.g. those involving legality (or morality) of some action. E.g. it's clear to me why a court could find it legal/illegal that the CIA had a jail in Poland.

In this case, however, the court is deciding on _facts_. I guess what happened here, as _vidarh_ 's comment implies, is that the court had some indirect evidence presented, and based on that evidence, ruled that it is more likely than not that the CIA had a jail in Poland (and is concealing the real, definite evidence).

<comment><USER16> Well, courts have to decide who killed someone. That's a fact that needs to be decided upon.

<comment><USER15> But no one pretends that courts decide in the "fact" \- they just determine who is "guilty" of murder. In the US, for example, you have to be certain up to the standard of "beyond reasonable doubt", but even that standard, albeit high, means that the court don't establish facts, but only what the fact is most likely to be.

<comment><USER16> How can you be guilty of murder if you did not, in fact, kill the victim? Absolute certainty is an illusion. The word "fact" is never meant literally by people who've thought about the subject for a while.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN : What print magazines do you still subscribe to? - <AUTHOR>

Given the demise of Dr. Dobbs, just curious what print magazines people here still subscribe to?<p>I subscribe to Circuit Cellar and Make Magazine. <comment><USER2> I still love magasines- no iTablet to read on the toilet yet...

Wired Billboard Urb The Beat Vibe Fader

when I'm in the US or UK I also usually grab a few things at the bookstore:

Wallpaper Mix UK Future Music

</comment><comment><USER3> The Week Evo Fast Company (I regret renewing last year)

Pick up occasionally: The Economist Monocle

</comment><comment><USER4> * Black and White Photography * Runner's World * England Rugby * Sport Diver

</comment><comment><USER5> 1) New York Magazine

2) Details

</comment><comment><USER6> The Economist

</comment><comment><USER7> The Economist

</comment><comment><USER8> Make Magazine

</comment><comment><USER9> None

</comment><comment><USER10> reason</comment>


GoDaddy Conveniently Deletes My Fiance's New Domain Purchase - <AUTHOR> http://chrisbrogan.com/godaddy-bad/ <comment><USER2> The domain industry is corrupt and backwards. I just had a domain locked for 60 days while trying to transfer it out of another registrar. They only have the right to do that if the ownership has changed, but the ownership obviously did not change, since it has been in my account with my billing information for the entire time.

</comment><comment><USER3> Why would you reward GoDaddy's shenanigans by buying it from them at the inflated price? It seems like they get exactly what they wanted: $650

[https://get.health/registrars](https://get.health/registrars)

</comment><comment><USER4> Reach out to them through every support network. Twitter being the main target. Go through support agent after support agent looking for the difference in money back. Eventually it'll be easier for them to just pay you rather than losing customers from you making this public.

Prolly your best bet besides getting a lawyer.

</comment><comment><USER5> I can recommend gandi.net from Paris. Not as sleazy as your typical domain registrar.</comment>


"I never agreed to that. Here's what I signed." - <AUTHOR> http://www.reddit.com/r/YouShouldKnow/comments/ev9k8/10_tips_before_you_sign_a_housing_rental/c1b9973

<comment><USER2> [Since reddit is under severe load, here's the actual text...]

ZorbaTHut 319 points 1 day ago

> A contract is a two-way agreement, so if you see terms in there that you're > uncomfortable about, you can black them out.

This isn't even a housing thing, this is just a global thing. I don't think I've ever signed an employment contract without modifying it. I've never had my employer mention it afterwards.

Excessive non-compete clause? Bam, gone. Clause that conflicts with a verbal agreement I had with the producer? Bam, gone. Cross out some bits, write notes in the margin, make little arrows pointing at what you crossed out with your initials, sign it, photocopy it, turn it in with your employment paperwork, keep the photocopy.

"Your Honor, our ex-employee should go to ultrajail for breaching our horrifying non-compete clause, and also owes us a billion dollars for Section 7 of his employment paperwork."

"I never agreed to that. Here's what I signed."

"Well, fuck."

[And then this reply seems very helpful...]

OriginalStomper 157 points 6 hours ago

I am a lawyer familiar with contract law, though not an employment lawyer. You and sporkus are both correct (at least under Texas law and most other US jurisdictions): it is not a binding contract until both parties agree to all the changes.

Until the original agrees (by initialing the changes or at least signing the agreement after your changes are made), the marked-up document is merely a counter-offer. However, that means the employer has nothing to enforce against you. Texas is an "employment at will" state, and here 99% of the time an employment contract was the employer's idea, for the employer's purposes, with little or no actual benefit to the employee. The employee usually comes out ahead if the entire contract is unenforceable, or even if just the harshest clauses are deleted.

Protip: while you are at it, also delete arbitration clauses. Completely and whenever possible. The individual/employee will almost never win in arbitration, unless the arbitration is conducted under a collective bargaining agreement negotiated by a union. If there's even the hint of an arbitration clause in your contract (ANY kind of contract, not just employment contracts), then it does not matter how well you edited the rest of the agreement, because arbitrators are free to be arbitrary. They are not legally required to follow the contract -- they can do whatever they think is "fair." Strangely enough, "fair" will almost always favor the employer or other repeat customer for the arbitrator. Because, see, the arbitrators are in the business of arbitrating disputes. If no one chooses them to arbitrate, then they have to find a real job.

<comment><USER3> Them paying you after your modifications is sufficient (in most cases) to constitute agreement. "Meeting of the minds" is not really a legal practice today. The employer was objectively given notification of the modifications and objectively paid the employee, constituting acceptance of the agreement. Obviously no such case is open-and-close, but the modifications are probably on fairly solid ground.

<comment><USER4> my Tort tutor (admittedly not a contract tutor, but...) boasted to the class about signing up for a blockbuster video rental card, handing in a signed T&Cs slip instore with the late fees clause blacked out. The acceptance of the slip (putting it in a drawer) made that the contract; then commencement of trade between the parties evidenced it. How he laughed, he says, when they pulled out his file to wave it at him, trying to get him to pay a fine.

<comment><USER5> This doesn't sound credible. It's based on the idea that a clerk at Blockbuster can accept changes to contract language. A similar story could go, "my Tort tutor added language to the rental contract that demanded Blockbuster pay me $100 every time I didn't like a movie; how he laughed, he said, when he demanded his payment after renting Marmaduke".

I'm obviously not a lawyer but this seems to have more to do with there being _no valid contract to enforce_ than about him secretly modifying the language of the contract.

<comment><USER3> I explain the difference below: "You couldn't sneak in a clause saying 'I get a 100% pay increase annually' -- in this case, they're the party being bound so would need some indication of assent beyond just a paycheck." Similarly, the clause you identify means that Blockbuster is now the party that is bound. Renting you a movie with that clause isn't sufficient proof of acceptance, especially because there's no consideration that Blockbuster receives in return.

<comment><USER5> That makes sense, and it's kind of a moot point, right; either way, Blockbuster isn't in a strong position to enforce a fine, and can simply refuse to rent to you again.

<comment><USER6> Right, but then they'll hit your credit report, and you'll have to spend far more time than it's worth (at the least) to fix it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've done this with just about every employment agreement I've ever signed, and never had a problem. One time, the company I worked for was acquired by IBM and I refused to sign their intellectual property agreement. The HR guy said if I didn't sign it, I wouldn't get paid. I told him that if they didn't pay me, I wouldn't do any work. The next day they came back with a more reasonable agreement, but it was too late. I had already found another job.

<comment><USER8> Admittedly I have only signed one "real" employment contract, but it was sent to me in two signed copies of which one was to be sent back. So making the changes and then having them accept the changes by signing afterwards isn't really possible.

Did you make your employer aware of the changes openly?

Edit: I mean, I could sign their copy, take a photocopy of my own and send it back to them, but at no point would they be accepting my changes.

<comment><USER7> Oh, I was definitely open about it. Usually I'd be signing in person, so I'd just say, "hey, I can't agree to this, and here's why," and then we'd mark up the contract together. I think I once sent an email with my objections, then edited the contract before I printed and signed it.

The actual mechanics aren't that important, though. The point is to actively negotiate the agreement. Usually, employment agreements are cooked up by lawyers that do everything they can think of to protect the interests of their clients. That doesn't mean that they're sacrosanct.

If the company is putting a contract in front of you, they've already decided to hire you. They've already put a lot of effort into the hiring process and they won't want to throw that away over a few clauses that they may not be able to enforce anyway.

So read the contract, and if there's something you don't like, say so. Get it removed. It's usually that easy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Most non-compete contracts are about as valid as the paper they're written on. I've signed a lot in my time and have only been brought into court once. The judge laughed at the company and asked them if they were going to pay my salary for the next 12 months I would be out of work if they wanted to enforce the non-compete contract. Needless to say, The company dropped their case and I still got a hefty severance check.

Companies can't keep you from being gainfully employed, even if it's with a competitor in your same industry. This means most employment/non-compete contracts are essentially non-binding agreements. I've never heard of someone getting sued and losing trying to break an employment contract, it just doesn't happen.

<comment><USER5> It happens for customer-facing people; what you're really observing is that it's hard to construct an enforceable noncompete for an engineer.

More relevant to HN founders is the question of whether a noncompete would enable your company to kill any overlapping company you might find in its cradle. That's not as clear cut as employment law.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Another good anecdote along those lines: <http://www.metafilter.com/47719/unite-and-take-over#1147083>

</comment><comment><USER11> Cached version: [http://www.reddit.com.nyud.net/r/YouShouldKnow/comments/ev9k...](http://www.reddit.com.nyud.net/r/YouShouldKnow/comments/ev9k8/10_tips_before_you_sign_a_housing_rental/c1b9973)

</comment><comment><USER12> It seems the traffic Hacker News is sending Reddit is causing it to topple!

<comment><USER13> This is very standard for this time of day on Reddit unfortunately.

<comment><USER12> And as a developer I understand that with the dynamic nature of Reddit that eventually throwing hardware at the problem won't fix it.

It still saddens me, and as a Reddit Gold member I hope that soon they are able to hire more people to more carefully look over the code and optimise it.

<comment><USER13> I wonder what the bottleneck is? Is it Cassandra?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Most underrated comment: "I laughed at your Perry Mason moment before the judge." That fantasy never gets old.

</comment><comment><USER15> Are these contracts really valid? I thought that a contract needs to be ultra squeaky clean without any typos, crossed out words and so on.

<comment><USER16> Anything is technically a contract when signed by both parties... right?

<comment><USER4> even if you didn't read it, in the UK at least (L'estrange v Graucob, IIRC).

Mind you, EU law (and hence, UK law) might strike out some terms as unfair. And public policy is also grounds for certain (extreme) contracts to be outlawed - for slavery, for example.

<comment><USER17> In some areas "public good" can override things aswell

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Wouldn't a company need to explicitly confirm such changes (say by initialing) for them to become effective?

The way I read it is that he's basically hoping that his scratch-outs will go unnoticed when the company brings him on board. That's simply because no reasonable company will accept an employment contract with NDA clause stricken out by a prospective employee. The only way this can happen is by an oversight, and that's what he appears to be exploiting.

On the other hand, I did have my own contract amended at my request to list and acknowledge by participation in a number of my past projects, open source and not. They did not require a code escrow, nor the detailed description, so something like "p2p communication system" gave me a carte blanche for doing anything with p2p in it and keeping it all to myself.

<comment><USER19> No he's expecting the signing party to read the blacked out parts and either agree to them (by signing) or not agree to them, by countering back.

I black line and edit contracts regularly. Usually not on printed contracts with notes in the margins but with Word Docs with "Track Changes" turned on. I then return it (unsigned) with an email explaining my changes. They then either accept the new contract and sign or return it with their revisions and we go back and forth until we're happy.

I'm always surprised by the number of people who don't negotiate language. I was told once that a company only pays invoices in 60 days. I changed that to 30 on my contract and they didn't even blink.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> It's too bad this doesn't work on a cell phone contract.</comment>


Wisconsin's $4.1B Foxconn factory boondoggle - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/29/18027032/foxconn-wisconsin-plant-jobs-deal-subsidy-governor-scott-walker <comment><USER2> > The LCD screens being made by Foxconn require benzene, chromium, cadmium, > mercury, zinc, and copper ... The Walker administration had also exempted > Foxconn from the state's usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge > materials into wetlands...

WTF? Wisconsin is a beautiful state with rich wetlands and farmland. Letting a Taiwanese* company fuck that up for 13,000 jobs that will never pay back the incentives makes no sense, other than a small tick on Walker's re-election campaign resume which he is now shying away from anyway. This project needs to be cleaned up or killed before it starts to literally kill people in Wisconsin.

<comment><USER3> The article is painting a pretty misleading characterization of the wetlands issue. Foxconn isn't being permitted to "discharge" heavy metals into wetlands. Foxconn is being permitted to fill certain isolated wetlands ( _i.e._ wetlands that are not connected to rivers or lakes that would put them under federal jurisdiction) with the requirement that they create 2 acres of additional wetlands elsewhere for every acre they fill in: [https://journaltimes.com/business/local/dnr-foxconn-to- creat...](https://journaltimes.com/business/local/dnr-foxconn-to-create-more- wetlands-than-it-fills/article_8c9d9440-350a-5042-bd10-3ac18920c02c.html). That's more than the usual state law requirement of 1.2 acres created per acre of wetland filled in.

There's no indication, moreover, that Foxconn has received waivers from ordinary state and federal rules that regulate dumping heavy metals into the soil. The article misleadingly tries to suggest that by juxtaposing the fact that the LCD panels "require benzene, chromium, etc." with the fact that Foxconn has been authorized to fill in certain wetlands.

<comment><USER4> Regardless of whether or not they're going to discharge heavy metals, they're planning on drawing up to 7 million gallons of water _per day_ from Lake Michigan outside of its basin on what amounts to a technicality in the Great Lakes Compact. Also the factory itself is going to be so large and built on a flood plain that it could cause flooding just over the border in Illinois because rainwater won't have anywhere to go.

<comment><USER5> FWIW, the allowance of 7 million gallons/day from Lake Michigan is apparently a "0.07 percent increase in the total surface water withdrawals from Lake Michigan", according to the state's Dept. of Natural Resources:

[https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2018/04/25/dnr-...](https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2018/04/25/dnr- approves-diverting-lake-michigan-water-wisconsins-foxconn-plant/551542002/)

<comment><USER4> Sure, but it violates the compact. The compact only allows use of the water inside the basin. What's going on here is the factory is going to use water from Racine (which is on the lake) and therefore allowed to draw the water even though the factory itself is outside the basin.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > In both cities, the company said it wanted to attract top talent from area > universities. But Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Eau Claire are homes to some of > the state's lesser universities, and it was unclear why these graduates > couldn't simply drive down to the Racine plant to apply for jobs.

What? Eau Claire is 260 miles away from Racine. Green Bay is 150 miles. An Eau Clare location can attract people who want to stay near Minneapolis. And the Downtown Milwaukee location is a more desirable place to work to Milwaukee metro residents than out in Sturtevant, home of that one Amtrak stop.

You can't put a 4 square mile factory downtown, but I'm not sure why all your engineers have to work at the factory.

Also, lesser universities? They mean not Madison. But if you're ruling out Madison (maybe they figure a Madison to Milwaukee commute is reasonable), they seem like good choices. Maybe La Crosse lost out to Eau Claire because of proximity to Minneapolis?

<comment><USER7> OTOH, wouldn't FoxConn just hire any qualified person who applied from anywhere? they're not limited to UW grads or even Wisconsin residents.

<comment><USER8> Any qualified person who's willing to move to the Milwaukee area. If you're not from Wisconsin and you're willing to move out of state after graduating, of all the places you could move to, why on earth would you choose Milwaukee? I like Milwaukee, I went to UWM for undergrad, and I might have stuck around after graduating if the job market were better. But if I weren't from Wisconsin (and especially if I were from somewhere with a warmer climate), I don't think I'd even consider it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The "AI 8K+5G" buzzword bonanza is marvelous. I'm surprised they haven't thrown cryptocurrencies and IoT in there for good measure. I'm also surprised to read that:

>The Walker administration had also exempted Foxconn from the state's usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge materials into wetlands and reroute streams during construction and operation. The state also exempted the company from doing an Environmental Impact Statement.

How is that even a legal possibility? The state's administration can just decide to suspend these rules on a case-by-case basis without any kind of supervision or accountability?

<comment><USER10> >How is that even a legal possibility?

Walker didn't do it unilaterally; the legislature passed a law to exempt Foxconn specifically. They are considering giving Kimberly-Clark a similar deal:

[https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop- law...](https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-lawmakers- call-extraordinary-session-on-foxconn-style-aid- package/article_9b94b4bc-0972-553d-8c6b-379cebbd1269.html)

Wisconsin is under one-party control, which makes many things legally possible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> What I find funny is that Wisconsin already makes a large number of the components needed for LCD monitors, TVs etc. 3M in Menomene makes the difusers that spred the light in back of the screen. There is TTM in Chippewa Falls that makes pcb boards that are needed for the electronics. There are IC design houses and computer makers (Cray Computer and HP) that can design the electronics. Foxconn buys the equipment to make the LCDs from the Japanese (Nikon) and they hire the workers to run them. Why not just eliminate the middle man (Foxconn) and make our own? I'm not sure the cost would have been much more.

<comment><USER12> Newer LCD displays will forgo the diffuser for mini-LED FALD backlights.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> What a sucker of a governor. "But all the other subsidies, worth more than $1 billion, will be paid regardless of money invested or jobs created."

(See also: most stadium deals.)

<comment><USER14> I'll just say that while I realize that Wisconsin is extremely corrupt, in looking around the nation I've started to get the feeling that most of the other states are likely as corrupt as ourselves. The difference is that in Wisconsin we, at least, still have people that get mad about it, and occasionally we even have mass protests.

The main problem here, (and it's frustrating), but the main problem is that due to the way the system is structured, we can do nothing about all the corruption. I don't like always being on the national news because of the latest governmental thuggery, neither does anyone among my family and friends. (And I was born and raised in small town Wisconsin.) There's just so little the average person can do, so you just sit in Markesan, or Racine, or Independence, or LaCrosse or wherever and you just stew in your anger.

Then it even gets thrown in your face on Hacker News.

<comment><USER15> > I'll just say that while I realize that Wisconsin is extremely corrupt

Can you be more specific about what you mean by "corruption" in this instance? Repeatedly pointing to a faceless "corruption" de-focuses the conversation from the specific issues with this deal, including the magnitude of the subsidy, and what might be the lack of recourse for WI residents against Foxconn.

Is it to suggest that Gov. Walker had expected, or at least decided it was acceptable if Foxconn significantly altered their plan in a way that undermined the deal, in return for a short term political "win".

If not, then what is the "corruption" you are referring to in this situation? Weren't the terms of the deal, including the latitude it offered the parties, fully public?

> The difference is that in Wisconsin we ... have mass protests.

Wisconsin is not the only place that has protests over corruption and mismanagement. It's a common occurrence, especially at the local level, in many places.

<comment><USER13> Fight back by calling the governor a sucker as frequently as possible. Republicans are supposed to be good at business. When a governor gets taken to the cleaners like that, it means they're too gullible for the job.

<comment><USER15> If he was a sucker in this deal, then can he have been corrupt?

Or if he is corrupt (as in he knew that it was a raw deal for WI but carries forward for personal benefit), can he be a sucker?

In this instance, is it possible he was both corrupt and a sucker? Maybe so if he was playing WI residents while getting played by Foxconn? Not drawing conclusions here but trying to play out the implications of what others have stated here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Money to corporations for lies about the jobs in order to win an election. I've seen this template too many times, this just might be the biggest one ever, however.

<comment><USER17> This approach is fundamentally one of doctrine and ignoring what actually attracts companies and it isn't even what companies say it is - those are usually bonuses they want on top of what they actually need. It isn't taxes but resources that can be used successfully which itself varies by businesses. If low tax environments were really what they lusted for above all else they would start buying up vast swathes of unincorporated land. Basically nobody except maybe corporate farmers and real estate developers are doing that.

The good news is that desired resources vary. It could be mineral resources. It could be location. It could be the labor pool. Infrastructure is a large part of it along with the local labor pool or ability to host one satisfactorily.

<comment><USER18> It totally makes sense to provide more direct incentives to the other end of the spectrum. What if Wisconsin could tell Foxconn that it's offering to forgive a portion of all student debt for engineering degrees in the colleges around the area? Or that it would reimburse citizens for technical learning courses or training programs for likely positions in the area? Or if Wisconsin was willing to forgive state income tax for Foxconn employees for a certain number of years (which seems to amount to between 5-6% of income)?

All strategies that increase the attractiveness of the area by actually making the area a better resource pool over time, and in a way that helps citizens.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> It seems like the state could have expected a much higher ROI by just picking 12,000 random Wisconsinites and writing each of them a check for $230,000.

<comment><USER20> Or just reduce/remove tuition and student debt for uw colleges. That would be a very interesting experiment

<comment><USER21> Sorry Comrade, that would be socialism.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The subsidy ratio here is incredible. Alabama has used subsidies to lure automakers and other factories, but our incentives are peanuts compared to this.

For example, we are getting a $1.7 billion Toyota-Mazda plant for $350 million in incentives, creating about 4k jobs. The state has a 4-5% income tax and 9-10% sales taxes, so I'd bet that, even if the 4k number is exaggerated, then the state and local govts will earn much of that money back within a few years (provided it doesn't create some pollution disaster).

</comment><comment><USER23> So frustrating to see politicians on the "conservative" side of things in the US who should be opposed to this on a fundamental level, jump into handing over taxpayer money, the environment, and such for what appears to be less and less.

Also what is with Foxcon's constantly changing plans with all this? It doesn't seem like they have a coherent plan on what they wanted to do / want other than gather up taxpayer dollars...

If Foxcon has no coherent plan, the deal should be off.

<comment><USER24> Why would you be surprised or expect them to be opposed?

I'll be honest, I think you misread what "conservatism" is really about... and I say this as someone that thought he knew it and considered himself to be a "conservative" for a long time.

Their pitch is smaller government, but you shouldn't construe that to mean a non-interventionist government. They see a very active role for government in 1) foreign affairs; 2) economic activity; 3) social policy... in other words, quite a lot of intervention. The only real difference between the conservatives and the progressives are the goals of those interventions (somewhat) and the how up-front they are about their positions.

Once realized that the pitch and the actual goals were saying contradictory things... I can tell you that I'm no conservative.

<comment><USER25> It's really hard to have legitimate political debate when you can't even find out what people's real political positions are. My gut feeling is that the blue team is more honest about telling you what they actually believe and want, but I might just be naive.

<comment><USER24> [edited: I didn't like pretty much my entire text; updated to be more clear about the same ideas]

Team Red lies about what principles they hold; there are exceptions, like abortion, but on the whole they say they're for one thing when in fact they are largely about another.

Team Blue is pretty up-front about their principles. For Team Blue rules much more by the ends justifying means. So they'll tell you what they're after generally, but will lie about/hide the details of what it takes to achieve the ends or the broader consequences of their goals that might not be readily apparent.

Both of them want you to have an emotional response to their proposals or opposition than to try to have you respond rationally to facts. Lying or not, an emotional response is stronger, harder to dislodge, and avoids pesky details that complicate an otherwise perfectly painted, if not fully real, picture.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> No matter what the content, I now find it hard to read articles where it feels like the author has a personal point to make. This is somewhere between news and opinion. Perhaps the author's explanation of the facts is correct-- or perhaps he is interpreting facts for his own personal views. It's hard to tell so I just end up not really putting much weight into the article.

<comment><USER27> That seems ill-advised to me. Yeah, he has a bias. So does _literally everyone else_. The notion of unbiased news is 1) fiction, and 2) fiction that exists to support a status quo that may or may not be to the readers' liking or their best interests.

An honest accounting of where one stands allows you to calibrate for it. Dishonest impartiality--and, for reals, _it 's all dishonest_\--robs you of that ability.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> In an article this long and $4.1 Billion in the title, it would be nice to see a simple listing of the subsidies. It is hard to know what is really being given to Foxconn. Seems like a combination of tax breaks and public infrastructure projects. Spending $300 million to expand an interstate near the factory a bit quicker that was slated for expansion anyway, should maybe not really be considered a public subsidy to Foxconn.

<comment> p-squared My recollection from earlier stories covering this deal is that "subsidy" actually means "tax break". If that's correct, then the tone of this story is very misleading.

<comment><USER29> How so?

<comment> p-squared The term "subsidy" implies that the state is actively paying out cash to Foxconn. If I'm correct that these are actually tax breaks, then the state is merely claiming less tax revenue from Foxconn than state law would otherwise dictate. That's tax revenue that the state wouldn't see _at all_ in the absence of Foxconn. And if Foxconn's locally-generated revenue ends up being smaller than originally anticipated, then it would stand to reason that the effective reduction in tax revenue is reduced as well.

The article goes on and on about wasted subsidy funds (there are other valid criticisms of the deal, but this is the big one). The Foxconn deal may not be working out, but if everything is structured in terms of tax then the state finances are not really getting impacted.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> It's also pretty evident, by this article's caption picture, that none of these men had ever used a shovel before in their lives.

<comment><USER31> Not to mention the shovels are golden and they are all wearing suits. It could just as well be a political cartoon about a new Gilded Age if it wasn't real life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Is there any way for Wisconsin to walk back the deal? If Foxconn isn't building the plant they said they would, and aren't creating as many jobs as they said they would, surely there's some way to prevent the disbursement of the subsidy?

On another note, I wonder what it will take for middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs. I understand the hope and allure, but it's plain that this ship has sailed long ago. Watching these snakeoil salesmen literally and financially strip-mine the country is just sad. I don't know that there is a good solution to the problem, as these states aren't really set up to sustain knowledge-based industries. How will they pivot into the 21st century? I can't help but think that 20 years from now, we will still just see more of the same.

<comment><USER33> >On another note, I wonder what it will take for middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs. I understand the hope and allure, but it's plain that this ship has sailed long ago.

Liberalization of global markets has not had that long of a time to run its course. You speak so confidently that the status quo will run eternal. What is happening in middle America should be seen as pragmatism, the people of Wisconsin are beginning to accept their current predicament. They are accepting a leveling of environmental standards to foster competition with East Asia rather than choosing to go the way of the Dodo. Is this not what classical liberals dream of, a leveling of competition across boarders? So quickly the west is ready to externalize the cost of environmental pollution in the name of liberalization of markets but hypocritically don't appreciate the same leveling of standards domestically out of necessity. Perhaps the coasts should subsidize the cost of living in the mid-west to maintain the cost of keeping environmental standards well above those in developing countries.

Please don't turn your nose up at people that are desperate to make a living and are willing to sacrifice a lot in order to do so.

<comment><USER34> I don't think you understand what the environmental concessions actually were. The article tries to make it sound like they were related to the dumping of heavy metals, but in reality they are just for the construction of the site and water usage, (e.g. For every of acre they fill to build, they have to create 1.2 acres of new wetlands). The company will still be held to the same pollution standards as every other company in the state.

<comment><USER33> >The Walker administration had also exempted Foxconn from the state's usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge materials into wetlands and reroute streams during construction and operation. The state also exempted the company from doing an Environmental Impact Statement. At stake was a huge swath of land: the plan calls for Foxconn to eventually own 4.5 square miles of what had been mostly farmland. Adriaens says these exemptions and the fact that Wisconsin is allowing Foxconn to operate unusually close to Lake Michigan are "red flags."

I am only going off what the article purports as truth.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Do huge taxpayer giveaways to attract business ever actually work out? It seems like we see these kinds of stories over and over again.

<comment><USER19> No. Extremely consistently no.

But all the studies finding that they're a stupid idea never make it onto the evening news, and sound bites from politicians do.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> With comments like "There's a whole lot of people out there scrambling to try and come up with a reason not to like this, They can go suck lemons. The rest of us are going to cheer and figure out how we are going to get this thing going forward." It's pretty clear what happened. Walker isn't a fan of thing like 'reason' and 'numbers' and 'facts' and instead likes to commit billions of others peoples money based on his faith that things will work out if he just wants it enough.

But what confuses me is Foxconn changing what they said they would do. When they announced that instead of building the 10.5 plant they had committed to building, they were going to build a Gen 6 plant, why didn't the state of Wisconsin say "OK, that's great, give back every last penny of money you have ever received from us immediately, and then we will begin discussions on a different deal since you have broken the contract on the first one?" Instead they just keep giving money to Foxconn no matter what they do? Just how many shares of Foxconn did Walker and his family and friends get for this?

<comment><USER34> If you read the article it explains that Foxconn changed their plans after Wisconsin refused to subsidize a necessary Corning factory.

I think that people are forgetting that this a subsidy to build. The state is not "giving" Foxconn money, it's just choosing not to collect taxes/permit fees/construction costs, for them to put in the factory. Once the factory is built, there is nothing stopping the state from modifying their corporate tax laws to recoup this investment much faster.

Also your last statement is just preposterous notion. Governor Walker is not personally gaining anything financial from this deal. It was a desperate bid to push his re-election campaign. Personally I think that the deal has soured so much that it should be cancelled, but the original $3 billion for jobs sounded very sound. Especially for a very economically repressed location like Racine.

<comment><USER36> At ~200k/job, why not just have the state give universal basic income to everybody in Racine? Don't like handouts? Have them dig a giant hole and fill it in afterwards.

<comment><USER37> At this rate of return, they could make college free, and still get a faster return of investment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Wow. I wish there were some type of criminal negligence law that can be applied to something like this.

</comment><comment><USER39> I really wish the Rust belt would give up their dream of recapturing a large manufacturing base and focus on educating their populace for the 21st century. Imagine if that subsidy money was used in education. It's pretty clear that mass manufacturing is a race to the bottom (China is now facing competition from Vietnam), and high tech manufacturing (Germany) will not provide the amount of jobs needed to offset the ones lost over the past 40 years. While manufacturing should always be a component of any mixed economy, many of those jobs are not coming back and we need to retool our workforce.

A highly educated workforce is the best way out.

<comment><USER40> For that matter most of the rust belt states have very fertile soils and plenty of fresh water and historically were great temperate agriculture power houses before much of that agriculture moved to the year-round-climate cheap- labor zone of California.

Now picture the world 20 years from now when drought and depleted aquifers make California not as viable for intense food production as it is now.

Suddenly the east/northeast/midwest around the great lakes look pretty damn attractive.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Reminds me of GreenTech Automotive which used a similarly subsidized factory in Mississippi to build street legal electric golf carts nobody would ever buy.

</comment><comment> rigged-system Serious WTF. Is this okay with people in Wisconsin?

<comment><USER14> OK, what is it that you suggest we do?

Wisconsin is corrupt. Very corrupt. What might work for you in squeaky clean Vermont, or wherever, is not going to work here in Wisconsin.

It's just not.

<comment><USER42> Wisconsin had an extraordinarily well-functioning state government in the very recent past.

<comment><USER14> (sigh)

I've tried to explain this to people from outside Wisconsin before. Why don't I just repost a sort of run down of just a _few_ of the kinds of things you can expect to see from our "extraordinarily well run" government here in Wisconsin:

> _" We've had our share of bent DA's here in Wisconsin. Probably the best > story I can tell you about is a DA that would allow drug dealers and other > criminals to "contribute to charity" in lieu of going to jail for their > crimes. Of course, all of the "charities" they could contribute to were > controlled by he and his buddies. (This way they could make sure all the > "contributions" went for the benefit of the local community you see.) It got > so bad that drug dealers were routing their shipments through that > municipality because if you get caught, you just paid the bribe. I mean, > "charity". You didn't have to go to jail.

I won't go into too much detail on this one, because it's disgusting. That said, we have a juvenile detention facility where the guards were discovered to have using the boys for... Well, I think you can figure it out. If not just Google "Lincoln Hills". (but I'd recommend just ... yeah... just not googling it.)

Moving on, we have something called the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. Basically everyone chips in to a fund, via taxes, and that fund gives money to entrepreneurs and businesses to stimulate economic growth. That's the idea. In practice, whatever politician is in power funnels the money to his/her cronies. They're pretty open about it too. So small businesses in the state end up having to make do with whatever they get out of the federal SBA. Because the big political guys take all the money from WEDC.

And that's just scratching the surface with the criminal related stuff. There's all kinds of political and public spending related stuff that happens here all the time. There's the typical police corruption that you need to look out for. Man don't even get me started on Wisconsin's part in the VA nursing home scandal. Wisconsin is so bad that at one point there were 100's of thousands of protesters outside our Capitol building in Madison. We're just a really bent state, and there's not much that can be done about it because of how we're set up. There's a lot going on up here. Despite what you may have heard on Netflix, the corruption up here is not ALL about Steven Avery.

Illustrative factoid, there is a restaurant in Madison right on the Capitol Square. It's pretty conveniently located for the state senators and assemblypeople. Kind of a nice place too.

What's it's name?

"Graft", I kid you not.

Located on the ground floor of a building full of lobbyists. I mean, "lawyers". Right across from the Capitol.

I know that sounds just WAY too brazen, but it's a true story..."_

PS - People generally _REALLY_ find the part about the Graft restaurant difficult to believe. I understand. So I encourage you, don't take my word for it. Go ahead, Google it.

<comment><USER34> Fellow Wisconsinite here. I went to UW Madison when the protests you mentioned were happening. The 100's of thousands of protestors you mentioned were bussed in from all over the country. Many of which were bought and paid for by all sorts of Political motivators. I literally would ask people why they were here and they would say "because I'm getting paid $10/hr to hold this sign".

If you are going to site examples of a states corruption, at least use concrete evidence rather than vague allusions. The only real corruption you listed was an on individual/(small group) basis. This is not an indicator of a corrupt system, but rather anecdotal evidence of a the most noteworthy bad apples.

Overall in my very humble opinion I have found that the Wisconsin government is fairly well run.

Finally I don't see how the name of a restaurant has anything to do with government corruption. The name is purely based on its location, (within 400 ft from the capitol), and has nothing to do with politics. Also they have great food, I would highly recommend trying it out!

<comment><USER42> Also, those protests weren't about corruption. They were mostly about labor policy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> > With other small costs added, the total Foxconn subsidy hit $4.1 billion — a > stunning $1,774 per household in Wisconsin.

Wow. You sometimes hear of things like roadworks project taxes costing a household $100 per year. But this kind of sum to create a handful of new jobs and a pittance of additional tax revenue?

</comment><comment><USER44> Why not just hand every single on of them $315k, let the market work it out.

This is such a blatantly bad deal that I don't know if this says more about the governor or the rest of the state.

</comment><comment><USER45> I feel bad for Democrats sometimes. It seems they always inherit the worst mess.

</comment><comment><USER46> Too long to read is there actual breakdown of tax incentives vs actual $ state has to spend?</comment>


Monologue: a simple blogging (Rails) engine | Jean-Philippe Boily / jipiboily - <AUTHOR> http://jipiboily.com/2012/monologue-a-simple-blogging-rails-engine

<comment><AUTHOR> Is this something you need to have in some of your Rails project? Maybe you'll need a blog + a e-commerce framework like Spree? If yes, what are the features you are looking at?</comment>