Joel Spolsky's resume tip for startup applicants - <AUTHOR> http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/01/02b.html

<comment><USER2> Steve Yegge says something similar about applying for a position at Google.

[http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2007/09/ten-tips-for- slightl...](http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2007/09/ten-tips-for-slightly- less-awful-resume.html)

'Resume screeners keep an eye out for non-weasel words, aka Productivity Words. These are words that you can't weasel out of when someone asks you about them. The best are synonyms of "got real stuff done", including "coded", "implemented", "developed", "delivered", and "launched".

It's perfectly OK to use "designed", as long as you follow it up with a Productivity Word. If you design something without implementing it, then it's just a synonym for "Proposed". If you prefer to design things that other people ultimately implement, then you're quite possibly outstanding material for a company full of kneebiters. But a real tech company like Amazon or eBay or Microsoft or whoever isn't going to hire you, because they can find plenty of people who can both design things and implement them.'

</comment><comment><USER3> When I left the military--I interviewed, outside my network, looking for a tech lead position. During the interviews I emphasized my leadership skills and experiences. I had come from a research background: won funding on my own, executed my own projects (i.e. wrote code), led development teams, and contributed in many places. I got things done.

Every interview led to an offer+. Yet I was frustrated during the whole process. I asserted tech lead and they pushed back with straight coder.

\+ [Note--there was one company where I declined before they could make an offer.]

After reading this post, I can see there was a difference of values causing a misunderstanding. In the military, my technical skills were completely ignored (except at the research lab--I found my way there despite my career field). Leadership ability is what matters (esp for officers). In the civilian world, it seems leadership skills are perceived as fluff.

I won't say one is better than the other. A lot of time what people pass off as leadership accomplishments are just fluff. Its harder to fake a solid technical background.

Eventually I declined every offer and am continuing to work on my startup idea. At the time, the process gave me a bad taste of private sector "jobs". This led to a second wind and more determination to make it.

My failure tolerance moved from "almost out of money--get a job" to "sell everything I own, move in with my parents, try startup again--get a job if accumulating debt".

I haven't hit these extremes yet but find myself willing to go there if necessary.

<comment><USER4> I'm curious - why the bad taste of private sector jobs? Because of the emphasis on technical skills, or something else?

I can sympathize with the "declined all offers and continued to work on startup idea". I did that once and was very tempted to do it a second time. Eventually I figured that since I had a good offer in hand and my ideas didn't seem all that hot, I was better off taking it _before_ I got into dire straits.

<comment><USER3> This didn't really have anything to do with idea and opportunity cost vs. job. It was about cultural differences. I interviewed outside my network (to avoid burning bridges for saying no). At the time--I found the process distasteful as they ignored what I had been conditioned to value most about myself.

I'm thankful I did get offers and was welcomed into these organizations. But I did feel devalued and this is no way to walk into an organization. This further motivated me to keep rocking it on my own.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think this depends on if you're hiring someone new primarily to take the coding pressure of the current team / founders or if you're hiring someone that will grow into leading a group later on and have to wear a lot of hats along the way.

But I don't think Joel is really talking about startups, he's talking about Fog Creek. Fog Creek isn't a startup, it's an established, profitable, small business, and for small businesses, he's right.

</comment><comment><USER6> Back in the last century, I was the CTO at small company and I had to hire marketing and sales vice presidents. I learned pretty quickly to avoid people from large companies like IBM. They never got their hands dirty and wanted a large support staff. I never really interview programmers from large companies, but I suspect the same may be true for them, e.g. they have never configured a server.

</comment><comment><USER7> "Those VP jobs just don't exist at startups, and the few VPs they have are the founders and a key early hire or two. Not you."

That's probably not fair. Successful startups are looking for talent, not pedigree - it's a question of whether the candidate can add significant value as a VP.

I think this blog post get's distracted from it's original point - if you're a software developer looking for a software developer position then emphasize software development skills. This applies to small companies and even big companies (like Google). The skill set to be a good developer is consistent no matter what the size of your company.

This doesn't mean that startups don't need business, product, or technical leadership because all the best ones have shown they attracted all these very early.

<comment><AUTHOR> So, even though I think Spolsky's posts have gone further and further off the rails, this is one that resonated with me:

* first, management jobs in startups _do_ go to the founders and "key hires" (definition: if you have to ask if you are one, you aren't) --- _and_

* _the_ key predictor for whether someone does well in a startup has, in my experience, been how willing they are to write lots of code, as opposed to just talking about code.

Every bad hiring decision I have ever contributed to has involved allowing myself to be impressed with someone's design/architecture/methodology/"engineering". Conversely, everyone I've ever neg'd because they didn't seem grounded or professional enough has gone on to depants me in the commit logs.

<comment><USER8> Even though I recognize you meant this, I'd edit your key predictor to read, 'the key predictor for whether someone does well in a startup has, in my experience, been how willing they are to write lots of _good_ code"

I've been at several startups where the developers who made the most difference where those who wrote concise, correct, and elegant code that did the job, and nothing more. They didn't get distracted into writing "architectures" when all that was needed was a "tool." Their code was a pleasure to build upon, and people instantly respected their ability to bang it out.

Sometimes less is more.

<comment><AUTHOR> I actually didn't mean that. I meant: write lots of code.

The bad decisions I made?

(a) thinking that people who could talk and talk and talk about code ( _shut up I'm not interviewing with you_ ) would write _good_ code

(b) thinking that people who couldn't explain why they'd ever use a red-black tree instead of a hash table would write _bad_ code.

I'm making a case for more-is-more. People who write code (really write, sure, not cut-paste) have work ethics, are really _into_ actually writing code, can easily be trained to bring them up to a median "engineery" standard of code, and get stuff done.

<comment><USER9> I'm not sure where in the tree to place this, so I'll put it at the bottom.

The absolute best indicator I've found for separating quality developers from the 9 to 5 set is finding out what they read.

80% read nothing and admit to it.

15% will make up something like "I read lots of things" or "I read blogs". This is the dangerous group, they're the astronauts.

The last 5% will tell you books they're reading, and more often than not will recommend books to you because they are passionate about what they read.

This simple test has yet to fail me. I'm sure there are great programmers in the 9 to 5 crew, but they aren't the people I want to trust in a pinch. I'll always prefer the guy who is doing this because he loves it over the guy who does it because it's a paycheck.

<comment><AUTHOR> I've met a lot of people who can talk very intelligently about code and design, and who have read the canon, and can't put a function in a text editor to save their lives. Obviously, I'm not the only person to notice this: it's the reason for the "fizzbuzz" test.

<comment><USER9> Well, there are two parts to this. First of all, here (Phoenix) the market is very full of the "I program because it pays the bills" sort, and when we do a posting we review hundreds of candidates (either who directly contact us or are sent to us). Of those hundreds, I'll talk to probably 30 to 50. Of that 30 to 50, maybe 5 or 6 will come in for a face to face. The conversation around software is a great start and it saves me a TON of time when screening candidates by phone. Once there here we can talk code samples or details.

The second part is that it is inevitable that someone will eventually talk a good talk but be unable to actually walk the walk. That's when it's nice that we're in a right to work state. There's no point keeping someone on if they can't do the job you've hired them to do.

Of course, all that being said, this only works _because_ we are a small shop, and the person doing the hiring is the same person who will work with "the new guy" from day one. This makes it loads easier than having to deal with hiring for someone else's department or even company.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "Contributes to OpenBSD file system in spare time"

i'm curious about a windows shop using openbsd as an example for startup cto recruiting

<comment><USER11> I'm not sure if they're a 100% Windows shop.

In any case, if you think of it as a sort of modified version of the "Python paradox" for sysadmin, then it makes sense. You can probably get better Windows admins if you look for people who can do both Windows and OpenBSD (though I suspect not many OpenBSD gurus would be eager to work with Windows).

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> _Single-handedly developed robust 100,000 LOC threadsafe C++ service_

I don't know if I love this or hate it.

Does "Single-handedly" mean "jack of all trades" or "doesn't work well with others"?

"Robust" according to whom? Save the commercials for your webpage. Just the facts, ma'am.

"threadsafe C++ service" that did what? for whom? Did anyone even want it? Does anyone even use it? The outcome is as important as the process.

"100,000 LOC" My favorite. I still don't know how I feel about this. Does this mean lots and lots of valuable experience or a newbie who can't write a function but is a whiz at cut and paste? Hell, my javascript generator just cranked out 100,000 LOC while I slept. Onto the resume it goes!

<comment><USER13> > "Robust" according to whom? Save the commercials for your webpage. Just the > facts, ma'am.

I would argue that a resume is a personal, (hopefully) factual commercial. The interview is there to put any claims you've made into perspective.</comment></comment>


Google's 47 Best 2018 Ranking Signals - <AUTHOR> http://magxiblog.blogspot.com/2017/08/blogspot-seo.html <comment><USER2> Point 2 "Spell check posts and always use correct grammar."

Point 4 "Create a new post at least twise per week."

(Let me guess - 'But "twise" is a super easy search term to rank for!!! We _own_ the SERPs for it!!!')</comment>


Thinking too much: self-generated thought as the engine of neuroticism - <AUTHOR> http://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/fulltext/S1364-6613(15)00154-0 <comment><USER2> Very interesting article. One thing that it makes me wonder about is if there's a mischaracterization of the concept of "immediate environment" with regards to the human mind in a modern society. Things like future job loss, reduced earnings, being forced to leave one's home, lifestyle and societal status downgrades, etc. may not be in the immediate _physical_ environment, but they are ever-present in our _social_ and _economic_ environments. For example, thinking about how you badly need to get rich sooner than later because ageism is likely to be a factor in the not-too-distant future isn't equivalent to thinking a lion may be in the room, but it doesn't mean the threat isn't just as - or in this case more - real. It's just that the scope of "immediate" and "environment" is shifted for those with high neuroticism. Something that could happen in just a few years is "immediate" enough to worry about.

</comment><comment><USER3> As a practitioner of meditation and other things...

... could have told you that one.

Before I started serious practice, if I were to liken my mind to a computer running Linux: out-of-control processes exceeding available memory; processes that call each other and recurse in loops, getting into dead-locks and race conditions; hard storage filled with junk -- files, logs, random crap all over the place; layers and layers of different package management and manually compiled/hacked programs; worms and security exploits hidden all over the place.

And the ironic part: I thought I was doing good.

That's one of the big things I learned, that many of the mental thought streams and habits of the mind I thought were necessary turns out to be ... not. I had attached them to my identity, but they really were not serving me, my friends and family, and my community well.

And here's the kicker -- having spent a lot of time cleaning out my mind, I can tell when other people have their own dysfunctional processes. In even people you might consider well-adjusted, there lurks all sorts of unexamined things in the subconscious, yet leaks out if you pay attention and have the clarity of mind to see it.

</comment><comment><USER4> Direct link: [http://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive- sciences/fulltext/S1364...](http://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive- sciences/fulltext/S1364-6613%2815%2900154-0)

</comment><comment><USER5> This seems to agree with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.

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

</comment><comment><USER6> > For example, experimentally induced worry increased creativity in high > scorers on neuroticism.

Jesus.

<comment><USER7> I am quite neurotic. But if this is indeed true (and there are some indications that I am more creative than other people), then I think I would rationally prefer to stay more creative even if neurotic.

Some people think high intelligence is a burden (together with the above, it may also be the realism of skeptical thinking that makes people a little depressed). But I believe, even assuming it carries this burden, it is still a wonderful gift worth accepting.

<comment><USER3> You can be intelligent without being neurotic.

There are some key insights that open up that path. The biggest one is that any thought that you experience in your mind is it's own thing (thought, distinct from concepts, which are much more subtle and ephemeral).

The reason is that for the mind to experience and process thoughts, the thought itself is carried by emotional streams. There is a wide-spread tendency in people with high intelligence to fool themselves into thinking they have high emotional intelligence, or don't need it.

These emotional carrier waves on which thought rides on have an affect on your ability to think on things, or decide on an action. One common neuroticism is when the thoughts start looping on each other. On the surface, those loops appear to chain rationally and logically, one to the next, but if you were to pull your awareness from the thought and go deeper into the emotion, you'll see it is actually the emotions in control.

Suppressing the emotions and awareness of the emotions will actually backfire on you. You get more stupid when you do. You cannot separate thought from emotions. (As I mentioned before: concepts and abstractions are more subtle, so it's possible to flash through them without a thought-stream).

You can't separate thoughts from the emotions on which thoughts rides upon. A lot of intelligent people with poor emotional intelligence will trick themselves into thinking they can. It does not help that accusing someone of being emotional has been weaponized.

Example: Most programming language / OS / design flame-wars are really people being moved by powerful emotions rather than a rational discussion, though the participants often trick themselves into thinking they are being rational.

tl;dr emotional intelligence will supercharge your existing intellectual prowess.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Imagine this article recurses on itself. Thinking too much: self generated thought as the engine of thoughts about neuroticism.

<comment><USER3> There's a reason I used to be enamored by 'meta', and now I don't anymore.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I just get redirected to cookieAbsent</comment>


The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan - <AUTHOR> http://www.theleadsports.com/the-surreal-story-of-stubhub-screwing-over-a-kobe-fan/ <comment><USER2> The better question is why SH allows sellers to cancel complete orders where payment has already been taken. Frankly, it's ridiculous that the seller had any input a month after the order was marked as confirmed, and I can only assume that payment was taken if SH was willing to issue a nearly $1,000 credit.

<comment><USER3> SH has no mechanism to ensure delivery of the ticket. The seller holds the ticket, so how can SH compel them to hand it over - short of not releasing the buyer's payment to the seller. Short being the operative word. SH is running a speculative marketplace against n% insurance fee on unfulfilled sales.

<comment><USER4> Why are they set up this way? The purchase should confer ownership at the time of purchase, or within a reasonable time afterwards, in such a way that it is physically impossible for the seller to take back ownership without the cooperation of the buyer.

<comment><USER5> Sometimes Ticketmaster takes a long while to print the tickets. So even if the seller has to send in the tickets as soon as possible (which is in fact the case), there's going to be some period where the transaction has occurred and the seller can't possibly send the tickets to the buyer.

I think Stubhub has non-delivery penalties, but probably not enough to cancel out this windfall.

<comment><USER4> Sure, "some period" is fine. When you buy stuff on eBay, for example, your product might not even ship for a couple of days.

In this case, though, it was a month later and they still hadn't been delivered. That's no longer reasonable.

It's possible the ticket issuers won't issue tickets even in that timeframe. StubHub's web site has warnings that the tickets might not be available until 72 hours before the event. In which case they either need to forbid reselling such tickets, or have _massive_ penalties for breaking the contract.

<comment><USER6> For Lakers games and season ticket holders, TicketMaster doesn't 'e-print' the ticket until 96 hours before tip off, to try to minimize ticket resale (which it doesn't, or only marginally, because they're counting on people not being able to keep track of that - which StubHub helpfully does).

<comment><USER7> The 49ers did that this season (72 hours)... one of many ways they pissed off the season ticket base.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> To be fair, the very first section of the StubHub user agreement warns about this scenario:

 _" 1\. Using StubHub

Ticket Marketplace.

StubHub is a marketplace that allows users to buy ("Buyers") and sell ("Sellers") tickets, related passes and merchandise or other goods (collectively, the "tickets") for events. As a marketplace, StubHub does not own the tickets on the Site nor does it set prices for tickets. Because sellers set ticket prices, they may be higher than face value.

While StubHub may provide pricing, shipping, listing and other guidance in our Services, such guidance is solely informational and you may decide to follow it or not. Also, while we may help facilitate the resolution of disputes and provide the FanProtect Guarantee, StubHub has no control over and does not guarantee the existence, quality, safety or legality of the items advertised; the truth or accuracy of the user's content or listings; the ability of Sellers to sell tickets or Buyers to pay for them; or that a Buyer or Seller will complete a transaction."_

The takeaway from this seems to be that:

1\. StubHub should be more transparent about the seller-side risks involved when "selling tickets" to customers.

2\. Buyers should be more aware of the fact that Stubhub is only a marketplace, and they are really at the mercy of the seller.

3\. Given StubHub's policy above, anyone who wants a guaranteed ticket should never ever use StubHub.

<comment><USER4> That's just ridiculous. Nobody reads user agreements, everybody knows nobody reads user agreements, and pretty much everybody expects that if you purchase something through a company, that company is responsible for delivering.

You can't reasonably set up a marketplace, be the middleman for buying and selling, then throw up your hands and say "sucks to be you" when the product you advertise doesn't get delivered to buyers.

This might be legal, but it is completely nuts, and the existence of a "we're completely nuts" clause in the user agreement doesn't mitigate that.

<comment><USER9> The buyer made the mistake of thinking he was dealing with StubHub rather than the seller. If he had been smart, he would have asked asked StubHub for the seller's details with the comment that he would be filing suit against either StubHub or the seller.

StubHub is a marketplace and sellers frequently sell tickets they don't own. This works out because tickets frequently drop in price shortly before the game and, for the times that they don't, sellers usually eat the loss. But this seller decided not to deliver and, for that, they should be sued. The equivalent in the stock market would be to short a stock and then not pay up when the stock quadrupled. Given that the value of the loss suffered by the buyer is roughly $5k ($6k tickets less ~$k credit at StubHub), it's a good candidate for small claims court.

<comment><USER10> Based on the customer service emails it looks like StubHub knew full well what was going on and aided the seller in pulling out of the agreement.

<comment><USER11> Of course they knew what was going on. A seller "made a mistake" in listing the tickets, thus the tickets didn't actually exist in StubHub's eyes and they were forced to cancel the transaction.

It is impossible to know if the seller is telling the truth in this situation or not. Everybody makes mistakes, this seller just claims to have made a more costly one than usual.

StubHub is a marketplace, they can't investigate every time somebody claims to have made a mistake in listing their tickets.

IF the seller re-listed the exact same seats for a higher price once the original order was cancelled, I could see how StubHub could easily call out the fraudster and ban them from using their site... but even then the seller could just sign up using another credit card and a friend's address.

<comment><USER12> >It is impossible to know if the seller is telling the truth in this situation or not. Everybody makes mistakes

When the reason given for the 'mistake' is obviously false, it's not impossible.

>they can't investigate every time somebody claims to have made a mistake in listing their tickets

They certainly can investigate every case of purchases in the $900+ range. You know, as part of their multiple hundreds of dollars in fees.

<comment><USER11> >When the reason given for the 'mistake' is obviously false, it's not impossible.

The problem is that you could not concretely determine that to be the case. Thousands if not millions of ticket sales are canceled for a variety of reasons on StubHub every single day.

They would be going broke trying to investigate all of them for fraud, not to mention open themselves up to potential lawsuits by the alleged perpetrators they wrongly defamed if they made a mistake.

<comment><USER12> The article says that stubhub charges a 20% fee when the seller cancels. So again, they absolutely are able to investigate every such situation while making a profit. Every ticket? No. Cases where they're making over a hundred dollars? Yes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Looks like "ticketsforless.com" got some great free PR (if they manage to spin the media on this) - from the FB comments:

      Jason Durbin · VP of Ticket Operations at Tickets For Less

      Jesse Sandler – I'm the VP of Ticket Operations at Tickets For Less. We've    reached out to TheLeadSports.com and are trying to contact you. We have four seats for you in section 106 for Kobe's last home game. Please contact me or our President Dan Rouen at 913-685-3322.

<comment><USER14> Stubhub also said they'll get him to the game. No mention of changing policy so that it doesn't happen again. Next time it wont go viral and they wont have to fix it.

[https://twitter.com/StubHub/status/684906796813697024](https://twitter.com/StubHub/status/684906796813697024)?

<comment><USER13> Well, they're only writing about Jesse and not his 3 friends though. ... bad reaction IMHO, given that he bought 4 tickets initially and not 4.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The is normal for stubhub. Here's an article from last where the same thing happened to a friend of mine: [http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british- columbia/super-bowl-ti...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british- columbia/super-bowl-tickets-stubhub-ebay-sellers-leave-diehard-b-c-seahawks- fan-ticketless-1.2938040)

tldr, bought tickets for Superbowl, prices went up, order was cancelled, was refunded and given credit which would not cover the cost of the increased cost of tickets. Then repeated the same thing with another reseller.

</comment><comment><USER16> This reminds me of the Hawks v. Pats SuperBowl fiasco last year. Flippers selling tix they didn't have, people buying their flights and then not getting tixs: [http://www.seattletimes.com/sports/seahawks/super-bowl- dream...](http://www.seattletimes.com/sports/seahawks/super-bowl-dream- becomes-nightmare-for-seahawks-fans-after-shortage-of-tickets/)

Though in that case StubHub guaranteed the tixs:

"Instead, StubHub as of Saturday had spent $5 million on tickets to avoid defaulting on orders. StubHub policy guarantees that fans will get a ticket to the game if a seller can't provide a ticket."

<comment><USER17> I have experienced this myself with Lakers playoff tickets a few years ago ... we showed up at the game with the tickets we were sent, and they were tickets to the _previous_ playoff series, a week or so prior.

We ran a few blocks from Staples to the stubhub office and they just handed us comparable tickets. It was amazing. One of the nicest and best customer service interactions I have ever had.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> He's getting 4 free ticket from Budweiser in section 112 and 4 free tickets in section 106 personally delivered by the CEO of Tickets For Less. Now, Stubhub has apologized and promised to get him to the game.

If I were him I'd deny the Stubhub tickets regardless of how good they are. Budweiser tickets are middle bottom level section (great view) while Tickets for Less are offering behind the backboard seats. Both are better than the original location he purchased.

<comment><USER19> I've found this one in the comments:

      > Jason Durbin · VP of Ticket Operations at Tickets For Less
      > Jesse Sandler – I'm the VP of Ticket Operations at
      > Tickets For Less. We've reached out to
      > TheLeadSports.com and are trying to contact you.
      > We have four seats for you in section 106 for Kobe's
      > last home game. Please contact me or our President Dan
      > Rouen at 913-685-3322.
      > Like · Reply · 1228 · 23 hrs

But where is the Budweiser comment?

<comment><USER18> [https://twitter.com/Budweiser/status/684878816959856640](https://twitter.com/Budweiser/status/684878816959856640)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> tl;dr it was the seller who screwed him over, not StubHub, but StubHub responded poorly and has policies that incentivize this behaviour when ticket prices go up by more than 20%.

<comment><USER21> Why be a market facilitator if you aren't going to make sure that buyers and sellers are being honest and fair with each other? That is what irritates me about this.

<comment><USER22> Because money. HN will likely play devils advocate but I agree with you. If you enter an arena, I believe you are partly responsible for what happens in that arena.

<comment><USER23> Morally, yes, they should be responsible. But StubHub only has an obligation to act legally, not morally. There should be laws in place to deal with this situation. Maybe there already are?

<comment><USER24> Why laws? How about just contracts binding those in the market?

<comment><USER25> Agreed; this is probably already fraud between the seller and the buyer, ignoring StubHub's involvement already. It's unlikely we need any laws to "fix" this because the ones that have been around for centuries are probably already sufficient. Small-claims court may already be an available avenue of relief as in many states this would fit under the limit, though the internet can as always make jurisdiction a tricky issue: [http://www.nolo.com/legal- encyclopedia/small-claims-suits-ho...](http://www.nolo.com/legal- encyclopedia/small-claims-suits-how-much-30031.html)

<comment><USER4> Would a small claims court in this case do anything besides ensure the buyer got a refund, which they already got anyway?

<comment><USER25> I would claim I had legal possession of the tickets due to the fact the seller had accepted my money, and that when the value appreciated, that was therefore my value, not theirs, and that ~$5000 was stolen from me.

I won't guarantee victory because of course I can't, but this strikes me as a fairly basic argument about possession suitable for a small-claims court, not a bizarre legal theory.

By contrast, had I merely "reserved" the tickets _but no money transfer had occurred_ , in a transaction clearly labeled as a "reservation subject to cancellation", I'd expect the court to tell me to go pound sand and that I was lucky to get coupons in that value. But buying a ticket on StubHub looks and feels like a purchase, not a reservation subject to arbitrary cancellation. StubHub's terminology is all about "Buy" and "Sell" on their website, not "Reserve". (Just checked to be sure.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Simple way to solve this is to make SH an escrow service that requires the tickets up front.

Of course that would increase costs and their responsibility, so it will never happen.

<comment><USER27> They actually do this for some very high profile events - they require you to send in your tickets before they are placed for sale on the site. The Super Bowl is one, the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight was another. But regardless of whether or not it is a high profile event, the seller should only be given a few days to deliver the tickets after the sale. That way this kind of thing won't happen. If this seller only had 5 days to deliver the tickets, for example, this buyer would have had his tickets long before the announcement.

<comment><USER28> More severe penalties for reneging would seem to make sense too. This could potentially be problematic in cases of scalping (e.g., the seller scalps a ticket right before someone else makes a purchase on SH), but this is simply another case where digital transfer of ownership would make way more sense. If SH could see a ticket had changed hands, they could immediately pull it from their site.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> If the seller changed their mind and pulled their tickets then StubHub should own up and say so. The tickets weren't listed "incorrectly". They were sold correctly but then the seller refused to forward the tickets when the price changed.

StubHub and similar services should also guarantee ticket possession within 7 days. If you buy the tickets you get the tickets immediately. It's bullshit that you buy the tickets but don't receive them for weeks or months. That's too big of a window to let sellers change their mind.

I bought tickets through SeatGeek via BigTicket for on November, 19th for a January 7th show (tonight!). I wasn't told at time of purchase that my tickets would not be delivered until after January 1st. In fact I wasn't told until I e-mailed customer support and asked where the hell my e-mail delivery tickets were. I expect e-mail delivery to be instantaneous. Not 7 weeks later and 6 days before showtime.

What if the Lakers ticket seller had until the final week to deliver tickets? If they're expensive today they'll be even more expensive then!

This is inexcusable and StubHub is fully responsible for the situation. They do not get to shift blame to the seller.

<comment><USER10> StubHub could easily look at the historic pricing data and the normal cancellation rates for tickets. If the cancellation rate is normally low, except for instances where the ticket price suddenly jumped, then any cancellations in that time frame would likely have a high probability of being fraudulent, especially if the same tickets were later relisted through the same sellers account.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I'm a season ticket holder for an NBA team that runs its own secondary market for tickets. I have mixed feelings on this. On one hand, I can't use services like StubHub to list my tickets for sale because the tickets are locked down into the secondary market account. On the other hand, I've never seen crap like this happen on there.

I was lucky/smart enough to list all the games I couldn't attend at multiples of face value and adjust the price as the game dates come closer. This worked out well with my tickets to the game against the Lakers because they sold pretty quickly after Kobe's announcement. I definitely didn't get full market value for them, but people were getting their tickets poached at far less because they set them for a pre-retirement announcement value. Since the Lakers stink and it was a weekday game, that value was probably below face value.

But with the market we're forced to use, you can't take your tickets back, which is clearly a good thing.

</comment><comment><USER31> Update: StubHub, via their Twitter account, has promised to get this guy to the Kobe game.

[https://twitter.com/StubHub/status/684906796813697024](https://twitter.com/StubHub/status/684906796813697024)

<comment><USER32> Did the promise not to cancel orders that they received the payment for in the future?

<comment><USER31> How could they possibly make that promise? They don't own the tickets, and they're not really selling them. They're facilitating a transaction between two parties.

<comment><USER33> Well, in this case the order was "confirmed" then later StubHub claimed the tickets were "listed in error" which is an obvious lie. So for a start, they could start not obviously lying to their customers.

They could also add automatic sanity checking on listings, so sellers cannot accidentally list tickets at too low a price; and a manual offer acceptance stage in case the seller has chosen to list on multiple marketplaces.

They could also require that when a seller is selling a ticket, that the seller proves they actually have the ticket. If stubhub want to facilitate sellers engaging in speculation by selling tickets they don't own, they could clearly mark such listings, with the seller placing a security deposit so their obligations can be met even if the market moves substantially against them.

In the event a seller works around these protections (such as by submitting fake proof they have the ticket, or refusing to meet their obligations if the market price of a ticket they shorted exceeds their deposit) stubhub could take care of forcing the seller to meet their obligations.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Really this just shows how corrupt and broken the entire entertainment ticketing stack is.

TicketMaster, StubHub, etc., all prey on fans, and the fans ALLOW it by paying ridiculous fucking prices to attend events.

We're long past the days of needing an entity like Ticketmaster to be in the middle of ticket transactions. And we're long past the days of needing to worry about ticket scalping if we actually have an efficient ticketing system.

<comment><USER35> > _fans ALLOW it by paying ridiculous fucking prices to attend events_

No, fans have no choice. Entertainers allow it by using Ticketmaster.

> _We 're long past the days of needing an entity like Ticketmaster to be in > the middle of ticket transactions_

The greatest fear an event planner has is that they'll plan the event and no one will show up. Ticketmaster aggressively markets the events they're selling tickets for, which is why event planners continue to use them.

Sure, you could use a homegrown solution or a smaller company, but Ticketmaster unethically adds all purchasers to a bunch of mailing lists and makes it really difficult to unsubscribe, and then they can claim "X million mailing list subscribers" to the event marketers.

<comment><USER36> So, to avoid having to do marketing themselves, or to hire a firm, the event planner goes with a possibly corrupt system that by all appearances the fans of the event despise?

I'm more of the mind that these things are so entrenched that neither fans or event planners have a choice.

<comment><USER37> The role Ticketmaster plays in the live event business is much bigger than simple middlemen. They provide the previously mentioned marketing, promotion, and discovery. They provide box office management. They provide customer service. They manage the secondary market. They provide business intelligence. They represent artists. They even own their own venues for a complete vertical monopoly.

They are the Amazon Web Services of the live event business. Sure, you will probably have a better experience if you use Backblaze for your storage, but AWS provides so many other services you might need that it makes sense to consolidate your business with them. That is why Ticketmaster is so entrenched. It isn't corruption. There is just a huge barrier to entry when your biggest competitor has such a complete product offering.

<comment><USER36> I wouldn't say the business tactics that businesses like Ticketmaster use to get so entrenched in their markets is necessarily corruption. But, once entrenched they often start conducting corrupt, or at least unethical, practices.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> The seller probably never had tickets in the first place, which is why they had to cancel the order, since they would have taken a huge loss trying to flip tickets.

It happens all the time with big events: tickets will appear on StubHub before they even go on sale to the general public. Speculators will gauge interests using StubHub for tickets they do not even own. If they make a StubHub purchase, they have time to find a cheaper ticker to cover the transaction.

<comment><USER14> How can they do this for events that have specific seats. Its not a general admission event. They sold this guy certain seats.

<comment><USER38> Great point, my mistake. Ultimately, StubHub policies that condone speculative selling (not releasing tickets at purchase time), allowed the seller to renege on the agreement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Most of these comments ask how this is legal, when the guy owns the tickets, etc.

The "when the guy owns the ticket" part is a question of title.

Let's take a gander at yon UCC, which covers these questions in most cases in most of the US.

[https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/2/2-401](https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/2/2-401)

Blah blah blah blah. I'm too lazy to read all the stubhub fine print again, but last time i did, it said nothing. That means, in circumstances like these, title passes to buyer when physical delivery of goods occurs.

That's when the buyer _owns_ the tickets.

The rest of the questions are pretty standard breach of contract and damages questions, which others seem to have covered.

Here, the buyer would definitely have recourse against the seller (but probably not against stubhub).

Of course, stubhub is being stupid in this case too, there are a variety of mechanisms it could use to prevent this from happening (escrow, charging sellers difference in current price vs old price if they reneg on tickets that have gone up more than, say, 100% in price, etc). Sadly, it looks like Stubhub _also_ has a financial incentive to let this happen, since they make 20% of the price.

</comment><comment><USER40> The article might be more compelling if half of it weren't in all caps.

Though as is, I probably won't ever use StubHub if this is the case.

<comment><USER41> The problem I see is: show me a good alternative

I don't see that there is any ticket-service that isn't shady in some way. I've only used a few, but they are usually pretty exclusive to the event, and they are all terrible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> People need to realize that buying from Stubhub guarantees you only this: if your order isn't filled (or is filled with bogus tickets) and we can't find you tickets we consider equivalent or better at some point (even during the game, then you'll get a refund). The only thing "guaranteed" is your payment. (You might also get additional credit toward a future purchase.) People need to be aware of this when buying major-event tickets: they are happy to "walk" you (give you no ticket alternatives at all) if it's at all costly to cover a bogus sale. I've seen it a number of times at their pickup sites.

So, for example, if this happens at a Super Bowl, you are still out all of your transportation, lodging, and other expenses.

</comment><comment><USER42> I have to admit that I always assumed Stubhub took some kind of ownership interest in the tickets either (1) once posted; or (2) once sold through Stubhub.

Situations like this make it clear why it's in their interest not to do so.

<comment><USER43> For sports teams/venues that partner with them, they do.

When I sell my hockey tickets on stubhub, they place my tickets on hold with Tickets.com, and once sold, my physical tickets can no longer be used to gain entry to the event. The tickets that the buyer receives has a new barcode on them, so they can rest assured they won't have an issue at the gate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> It would be interesting to find out who's sitting in these seats at game time and how they got their tickets.

</comment><comment><USER45> Does anyone know how this compares with Bait & Switch laws? It seems like the merchant's behavior fit the definition perfectly (but im not a lawyer)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bait-and- switch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bait-and-switch)

<comment><USER46> No, B&S (of which only the seller would be guilty not the marketplace) would be advertising tickets for $900 _now_ but saying "oh they don't exist anymore but here are some for $6,000.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> That's clearly a breach of contract. The buyer could sue the seller for damages.

<comment><USER48> The buyer already got their money back, so what is the damage?

Sure if the buyer booked a nonrefundable plane ticket in anticipation of going to the game, that would be something. Absent something like that, I'm not sure there's a case.

<comment><USER6> The damage is that "getting money back after the transaction wasn't finalized" wasn't a consensual part of the contract.

You buy a car from me. A -month- later I show up and say, "Yeah, sorry, I sold this car by accident, here's your money." and I take off with the car regardless of what you want to do, you have a case against me for theft.

Whether the buyer got his money back is irrelevant - that doesn't give the seller the retroactive ability to void the sale.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Enjoyed the guy in the comments from Tickets for Less offering him four complimentary, better seats to the game.

</comment><comment><USER50> The real winner here is Tickets For Less.

</comment><comment><USER51> I bought tickets to the New Year's Game, and I couldn't list it for sale on stubhub the day of. I had to use their Last Minute Services, but the office was closed.

<comment><USER7> They got rid of LMS for all but the largest metro areas (not even Bay Area events have LMS coverage for Sharks, Warriors, or baseball anymore)... not even for the NBA playoffs.</comment></comment>


These are the real Stack Overflow trends: Use the pageviews - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@hoffa/these-are-the-real-stack-overflow-trends-use-the-pageviews-c439903cd1a <comment><AUTHOR> Previous discussion: When Stack Overflow introduced the trends tool (May 2017).

\- [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14299731](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14299731)

What's new: # of questions is only half of the story - now you can also look at pageviews %!</comment>


Do you deserve to get rich funding a Kickstarter project that sells for $2 bi? - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2014/3/28/5557120/what-if-oculus-rift-kickstarter-backers-had-gotten-equity

<comment><USER2> In all honesty I'm not surprised that a 'hedgefund' meets 'kickstarter' hasn't started up for projects, where individual contributors get stock as opposed say a tee shirt. As a result of Occulus Rift. If your target fails the amount raised goes to "hedge-starter". In the event you do succeed ownership of non- voting shares are given to donators, so companies using the server can claim to still maintain ethical integrity.

Obviously there would be legal problems that would need to be worked though.

<comment><USER3> Until Title III of the JOBS act goes into effect, it's not possible to do so in the US. However, as the article mentions, there are a number of groups that are getting ready to offer this sort of crowdfunding for equity service once Title III does go into effect.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> No.

The concept "Deserve" does not apply here. When I buy into a Kick-starter project, I do it to bring a product that I want to exist into reality: for that reason and that reason alone.

If the people doing the work are able to bootstrap that interest into a successful business, then good on them. At best, it is a validation of the original project. At worst, irrelevant. To call it a detraction, or (worse) to try to lay claim to the spoils is merely greed of the basest sort.

</comment><comment><USER5> "Deserve's got nothing to do with it."

William Munny</comment>


Ask HN: What is the meaning of life? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> To ponder about the meaning of life.

</comment><comment><USER3> To experience, learn, love and To pass on that information to the next person. You can also ask Siri if you have an iphone.

</comment><comment><USER4> by biological/objective perspective = sex subjective is Up to you Religion(God/illusion) is To fulfill his wishes in moral aspect

</comment><comment><USER5> 42</comment>


Zerch – hyper local deal discovery app goes Live in Bengaluru (India) - <AUTHOR>

Discovering deals and around from nearby stores around have become a lot easy now, with Zerch.
Zerch is LIVE in Bengaluru (India) for about a month-and-half. Currently, around 1000 offers covering 2500+ stores in Bengaluru are listed. In addition, there are 250+ exclusive merchant tie-ups where Zerch users gets special discounts. The app is available for free to download and is available both in play store and app store.
The next city that would get Zerch would be Delhi (NCR) region by July-end. <comment><AUTHOR> App is available for download at www.zerch.in/download</comment>


Work-Life Balance for Startup Founders - <AUTHOR> http://foundercode.com/work-life-balance-for-startup-founders/

<comment><USER2> One thing that's commonly not discussed is the fact that for those of us who are naturally introverted, putting on the socially outgoing facade requires a lot of energy ... and to a lesser extent, even being sociable with those we love can be hard when your brain is completely focused on achieving something.

It's funny (to me at least), that my brain can be perfectly happy being alone for eight to ten hours a day. When the work is interesting, time is compressed and my surroundings "blur". My kids have figured out that if I don't answer them, it's generally because I really never heard them.

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree with you. Being sociable for its sake can be its own stressor. Better to hang with people where you can be authentic, be yourself. How one finds balance and happiness in their work-life make up will be different for each person. There is no one-size-fits all lifestyle :-)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do you promote your side projects? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> \- reddit

\- content gathering websites (such as hackaday, if electronics)

\- applying to conferences

\- IRC

\- related topic forums

</comment><comment><USER3> TL;DR:

\- Identify your target users / audience

\- Identify sites and forums where they hang out online

\- Get involved in those communities, and subtly promote your app / site, answer questions that your app or product or site might really help them with

\- Google Adwords, FB Ads etc require a huge budget to be effective, so it usually doesn't give ROI for side projects that are just launched.

LONG ANSWER:

It really depends on what your app or site is about, who it's targeted towards, and what problem it solves.

1 size does not fit all. You should look at your traffic, analytics demographics (and referral sites if you are getting referral traffic) and other data to identify avenues for promotion.

Let me give you an example.

My most recent project is [http://www.visaok.in](http://www.visaok.in) \- It's a niche job board for tech jobs where the employer will sponsor your work visa / permit to come and live and work in their country.

My target audience is young, smart techies who want to leave their home country (ex: India, China, Russia, Pakistan, Eastern Europe and Middle eastern countries) and live and work in a progressive nation like Germany, Australia, Netherlands etc.

So I started hanging out at immigration forums and answered visa questions and noticed a steady stream of traffic

I also noticed a lot of traffic from India and China and many were asking me questions about how to apply for work permits etc, so I identified the top visa sponsoring countries on my site, and started to make visa guides 1 by 1 for each of the countries. Examples: [http://www.visaok.in/work- permit/blog/](http://www.visaok.in/work-permit/blog/)

Now, I am getting requests to translate the guides into chinese, so I am looking for a bi-lingual english-chinese speaking person to help me.

Should you get paid advertizing?

For side-projects that are just launched, I do not recommend this. I tried this with my other fun side project (didn't expect it to make money, just did it cos I love cats). [http://www.pawpurrazi.com](http://www.pawpurrazi.com)

I tried FB Ads for 50 $ and Google ad-words for 100 $. Facebook was total waste. I got about 800 likes on 20 posts over 20 months, less than 5% was actual visits. Most people seem to just click the Like button for some reason.

Google ad-words was effective but expensive.

Also, if you are going the ad route, make sure you get your money's worth by either having a newsletter signup form, or if it's an app, user signups. You can setup ads on FB where you only pay if the click-er performs a certain CTA (call to action).

Hope this helps

Feel free to ping me. Email in user bio link.</comment>


How Chekhov invented the modern short story - <AUTHOR> https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/books/2020/08/how-chekhov-invented-modern-short-story <comment><USER2> I've been reading some Chekov via [https://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/ac/jr/](https://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/ac/jr/) recently. I also enjoyed George Saunders commentary on Gooseberries to be a good intro if you haven't read much Chekov before: [https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/02/ge...](https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/02/george- saunders-on-chekhovs-different-visions-of-happiness/516798/)

I've been thinking a lot about that man with the hammer from Gooseberries lately given the state of the world and my privileged position to ignore much of it when I choose to.

</comment><comment><USER3> > Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky's new translation of 52 Chekhov > stories

Oh no, oh no, oh no. Their "method" absolutely disagrees with any author with a tight writing style, and Chekhov's tired narration with a tiny drop of irony is tight.

[https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the- pevearsion-o...](https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-pevearsion- of-russian-literature/)

[http://www.thinkaloud.ru/feature/berdy-lan- PandV-e.html](http://www.thinkaloud.ru/feature/berdy-lan-PandV-e.html)

[https://www.librarything.com/topic/260074](https://www.librarything.com/topic/260074)

[https://readingroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/the-art- of-...](https://readingroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/the-art-of- translation/#comment-206)

[http://languagehat.com/the-translation-wars/](http://languagehat.com/the- translation-wars/)

[http://languagehat.com/more-translation-wars/](http://languagehat.com/more- translation-wars/)

[http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/06/23/socks- translating...](http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/06/23/socks-translating- anna-karenina/)

[http://languagehat.com/janet-malcolm-vs-pv/](http://languagehat.com/janet- malcolm-vs-pv/)

[https://kaggsysbookishramblings.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/why...](https://kaggsysbookishramblings.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/why- i-dont-read-pevear-and-volokhonsky-vtranslations/)

[https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/the-...](https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/the- pevearvolokhonsky-hype-machine-and-how-it-could-have-been-stopped-or-at-least- slowed-down/)

</comment><comment><USER4> You can download a free high quality ebook of his entire short story corpus at Standard Ebooks: [https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/anton-chekhov/short- fictio...](https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/anton-chekhov/short- fiction/constance-garnett)

Warning, it's very long! But, many of the stories are incredible. Constance Garnett is a very capable Chekhov translator, and her Chekhov translations were praised by writers including Hemingway.

<comment><USER5> +1 for Constance Garnett, she was by far my favorite translator for Crime and Punishment.

<comment><USER6> I put together Garnett's Crime and Punishment translation for SE at [https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/fyodor-dostoevsky/crime- an...](https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/fyodor-dostoevsky/crime-and- punishment/constance-garnett) if anyone wants to read it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I do love Chekhov's stories, but many years of humanities education has left me pretty jaded about "X invented the modern Y" claims. It's a lazy formula and relies on the complete slipperiness of the term "modern" (oh and "invented" is kinda vague too).

Examples, based on ones I've heard: "Shakespeare invented the modern self" "Napoleon invented the modern state" "Newton invented modern science" (Or was it Galileo?) "Picasso invented modern painting"

Note that these examples span about 1600-1900. Perhaps we should just engage with the work on its own terms.

<comment><USER8> _" Bastard asked me to understudy Konstantin in The Seagull. I'm not going to understudy anybody. Especially that pimp! Anyway, I loathe those Russian plays. Always full of women staring out of windows, whining about ducks going to Moscow"_

― Withnail & I (1987)

<comment><USER9> Plays in general are probably the easiest form of writing to distill into stereotypes since they rely heavily on dialogue and that's bound to get repetitive when thousands of works are written. I can think of a dozen plays right now where there were similar moments of young adults arguing with relatives (usually not parents but aunts or grandmas) or someone monologuing about a death that happened offscreen but in a vague way. All of these moments can be deconstructed and I do find them repetitive if I read a few plays in a row... but I still feel like it's wholly a matter of preference. If you like those elements - sad women staring out of windows, for example - you'll like the plays.

<comment><USER10> The great thing about plays is that they can be interpreted and reinterpreted again and again by different directors, set designers, composers, and actors. It's possible to bring the play into our own time or to subvert its ostensible message or to add new layers and nuances. It's wonderful that the text of the play is only the skeleton which to hang the body of the performance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> And Gordon Lish invented Raymond Carver.

<comment><USER12> And don't forget that Jef Raskin invented Burrell: [https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&stor...](https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=I_Invented_Burrell.txt&sortOrder=Sort+by+Date&characters=Burrell+Smith)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Wasn't Edgar Allen Poe earlier?

<comment><USER14> Aesop beats both readily, and even then he wasn't probably the inventor

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky are fucking terrible. Read any other translation

<comment><USER16> That's surprising to hear. I've found P&V's Dostoevsky translations very readable, and my understanding from reading reviews online was that P&V's translations are well regarded in general.

Which translation did you read/would you recommend?

Edit: I did some reading online and found some criticism of P&V, such as:

[https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/gary- morson/the-...](https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/gary-morson/the- pevearsion-of-russian-literature/)

[https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/the-...](https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/the- pevearvolokhonsky-hype-machine-and-how-it-could-have-been-stopped-or-at-least- slowed-down)

Interesting to see the comparisons!

<comment><USER17> They are not without their detractors - part of it is they take on difficult work, some of which hasn't seen serious translator attention for a while. Personally, I find the results poor but obviously lots of people like them.

Chekhov's short stories are an English translator's nightmare though - there's a reason he's much more famous as a playwright in the English-speaking world.

<comment><USER18> I've always liked his plays more than the short stories and I haven't read them in English. Maybe his plays are just better?

<comment><USER17> I don't mean the reason is one aspect of his work is 'better' than the other, just that the difficulty translating his short stories makes them much less accessible to English readers than the plays.

I think the reverse is the case for Russian - Жалобная книга (The Complaints Book) is part of Russian idiom, the famous play Чайка (The Seagull) is not. Chekhov just occupies a different part of the English-speaking cultural taxonomy.

A (maybe more than a little over the top) way to put it is, it's like if in Russia, Newton was primarily known as a great theologian and alchemist.

<comment><USER19> May be like Victor Hugo is known to English readers as a novelist, while I have heard that French regard him more for his poetry.

<comment><USER20> Somewhat off topic, but interestingly Victor Hugo is regarded as a saint in the Cao Dai religion of Vietnam.

[https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cao- Dai](https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cao-Dai)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Modern short story? Russian inwention!

</comment><comment><USER22> If you invent the modern short story, I sure as heck expect you to use it.</comment>


All Systems Are Go: An Interview with Rob Pike - <AUTHOR> http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1623555

<comment><AUTHOR> Pertinent quotes:

"The trick is to control the urge to put in every feature that comes to mind. It's also important to worry more about semantics than syntax."

"Consensus drove the design. Nothing went into the language until all three of us agreed that it was right. This meant that some features didn't get resolved until after a year or more of discussion."

<comment><USER2> The first one is very important.

The second can be a death sentence for a language, but when the consensus is between Rob Pike, Ken Thompson, and Robert Griesemer, it's a good thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I want to like Go but recent discussions such as the one about exception/error/panic conditions and handling (and those versus flow control) make me concerned that they have learned the wrong lessons from predecessors. Perhaps still worth learning.</comment>


Spree 1.0.0 Released - <AUTHOR> http://spreecommerce.com/blog/2012/02/09/spree-1-0-0-released/

<comment><USER2> Its great that this project has finally hit 1.0 so that there is a Rails based ecommerce engine available - I installed it recently to try it out. Two caveats :

1) Works with Rails 3.1 , not 3.2 as yet, although this is on its way I believe

2) More importantly, by default you need to set your online store to use ( and presumably send your store data to ) Jirafe.com for analytics ( [http://guides.spreecommerce.com/release_notes_1_0_0.html#spr...](http://guides.spreecommerce.com/release_notes_1_0_0.html#spree- analytics) ). This made me somewhat uneasy and it seems a bit pointless to set this up as the default. I had a bit of a problem trying to replace the Jirafe.com dashboard with the old dashboard ( <https://github.com/spree/spree_simple_dash> ) which I didn't manage to make work immediately, probably due to some name changes in the gems .

</comment><comment><USER3> Please remove the Jirafe default and make it a plugin.</comment>


More than 120 hedge funds focused solely on Bitcoin, digital currencies - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/27/there-are-now-more-than-120-hedge-funds-focused-solely-on-bitcoin.html <comment><AUTHOR> NB: Title edited for space.</comment>


Detroit Is Going Bankrupt, But Its Tech Community Is Going Strong - <AUTHOR> http://m.fastcompany.com/3014543/detroit-is-going-bankrupt-but-its-tech-community-is-going-strong <comment><USER2> Anyone who lives or works there is a fool.

I grew up there, and lived downtown for years before wising up.

Have a medical emergency and call 911? You're lucky if an ambulance shows up within an hour, if at all.

I've been robbed at gunpoint enough times for one lifetime. I'm tired of having to pick up my .45 as the first thing I do after landing at the airport and getting my rental car.

Tell me how cheap rent has to be to make it worth it?

No thanks. My family is there, I know tons and tons of people there, and know the city itself as well as the rest of the metro area like the back of my hand.

You couldn't pay me to live there.

There's a very good reason people run away from that place as if their lives depended on it. It's because they do.

<comment><USER3> FUD. This is total nonsense. I've lived in and around Detroit for the greater part of my life. I've even lived in the Bay Area for a couple years. There have been tremendous strides to turn this city around even in the last 5 years. I don't live in the city now, but I do work downtown every day in the Ren Cen. Even in the last year alone, I've noticed things pick up in the downtown area. I'm glad you took your cranky hatred elsewhere.

<comment><USER2> The five square blocks around the rencen and the casino don't count, though you can't get emergency services there either.

It's not nonsense, you just don't use emergency services like police, EMS, or fire every day. That doesn't make it any less stupid to live somewhere they aren't available, though.

Enjoy unplowed streets and no street lights while things "pick up", though. Oh, wait, the rencen has a parking garage. Nevermind.

PS: obviously this "pick[ing] up" hasn't been reflected in tax revenues, eh?

<comment><USER3> Listen, I'm really just fucking tired of people slagging Detroit. The people that are doing it always seem to fit the profile of this guy here, "I used to live there...I have relatives there...I visited there once..." \-- quite frankly, fuck all y'all. We're doing fine in Detroit, we're making it better...slowly but surely.

<comment><USER4> _we 're making it better...slowly but surely_

That's a feeling not a measurement. Clearly economically it's getting worse. And emergency services seem to be getting worse. What exactly is getting better?

All I'm saying is that, especially in crisis, the truth and measurement are far better than emotion. What exactly is getting better?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There's not a lot of substance in the OP to back the claim "its Tech Community Is Going Strong"...and a lot of the individual assumptions/assertions made by the OP are kind of strange...

> _By some estimates, the city owes as much as $20 billion. But the news is > unlikely to halt the growth of Detroit 's burgeoning tech scene, according > to some of its entrepreneurs._

"according to some of its entrepreneurs"....if this is in the lede, I think it's safe to assume that the reporter isn't going to look at the big picture (i.e. the relative size of the tech startup boom compared to Detroit's job sector in general)...

> _" We are the Facebook or the Twitter of the area," Gierak says. "We can get > unbelievably good people who are extremely talented and think we're the > coolest job in town, as opposed to being the 550th coolest job in town back > in San Francisco."_

I haven't been in the SF job market...but is the allure of being "Employee #single-digit" enough to outweigh a higher-paying job in a more amenable city?

> _Neverthless, the tech scene in Detroit does face challenges. The most > recent Census data shows Detroit has just 11,000 young professionals between > 25 and 34 who hold at least a bachelor 's degree, compared to Chicago's > 250,000. Michigan is one of four states that had fewer young professionals > in 2011 than it did in 2006._

"...does face challenges"...that's quite the buried understatement. Detroit has a relatively tiny pool of young professionals...at the same time, tech jobs seem to still be in hot demand in nearby Chicago. It's definitely possible that Midwest professionals would like the choice of staying in the Midwest, but how likely is it they'll pick Detroit over Chicago?

This is not to counter the actual achievements of the Stik team, but it's unlikely the tech scene -- especially with startups focused on online remote services -- will have much factor at all in reversing Detroit's deterioration. Not through any fault of their own, but because of the sheer size of local revitalization needed.

<comment><USER6> I think the biggest appeal of Detroit right now is that the people going there are trying to be a part of something bigger. They're trying to revitalize and reinvent a once great city. And it's working. Detroit is a hell of a lot nicer now than it was 5 years ago.

You might think that the tech sector can't do enough to turn the city around, but I disagree. This isn't just a collection of random startups. There are tech giants like Microsoft, Twitter, Google, and Amazon who are already in the area or looking to be. Quicken Loans (Intuit) is the biggest tech employer downtown and Dan Gilbert is doing everything he can to make the city more amenable to other tech companies.

And the auto industry? That's still there. It'll never be the blue collar manufacturing boomtown it was, but all the auto companies will continue hiring engineers. Both auto and software.

<comment><USER7> Quicken Loans is nothing to do with Intuit beyond using the name 'Quicken'. They're not an Intuit company. They're certainly pretty strong on their own, but the name is the only relationship.

<comment><USER6> Ahh you're right. I had read that Intuit bought Quicken Loans, but I guess I never read that Dan Gilbert bought Quicken Loans back from them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> NYC almost went bankrupt back in the 70's. It took a long time and a strong leadership to bring it back to where it stands now.

Granted Detroit does not have the population size of NYC but with strong leadership they can rebound. Well see if it happens. My bro in law lives near there and sells RE for a living. Said he feels optimistic that if Detroit cuts down on the city boundaries and focuses on areas of growth and potential they'll pull through.

<comment><USER9> NYC always had the finance industry, which conveniently happened to boom like crazy from the 1980's-2000's.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's hard to square these quotes:

> SILICON VALLEY IS A GREAT PLACE TO BE IF YOU'RE IN THE 1% OF TECH STARTUPS. > BUT IF YOU'RE IN THE OTHER 99%, YOU SPEND ALL YOUR TIME TRYING TO FIND > TALENT, AND NOT ENOUGH BUILDING A BUSINESS

> Detroit has just 11,000 young professionals between 25 and 34 who hold at > least a bachelor's degree

Or is it "once we convince people to move here and work with us, they're trapped"?

<comment><USER11> You're making a common mistake. Detroit has 700,000 people. Metro Detroit has an additional 3.5 million.

I don't have the stats but there's a much larger number of young professionals within easy commuting distance of downtown Detroit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'd like to say the good people of Manchester (UK) got through something very similar in the XX century, and have been on the up ever since 1992, when the IRA demolished half the rotting city centre and unwittingly kickstarted a ground-zero regeneration campaign that's been wildly successful.

Maybe Detroit needs a similar "let's get our shit together" turning point; maybe it's already happened and we just don't know yet. It's clear that local geeks have produced positive media coverage for quite some time now (I'm sure I've seen quite a few features on this "Detroit rebirth" in the last 24 months).

<comment><USER13> Manchester has improved dramatically since the Thatcher years but they still have a ton of cash issues.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Some of the comments are grossly exaggerated and don't really apply to the epicenter of Detroit where alot of the innovation/change is occurring. I grew up and lived around the Detroit area for 20+ years and I wholeheartedly agree with the article discussing the growing tech community in downtown Detroit. I now live in the Bay Area and the two definitely can't compare, but to make widely exaggerated statements about the living situation there just goes to show how different perception is from reality.

Over the past few years, private investors have begun trying to make big changes in Detroit. These are big name guys like Dan Gilbert (Detroit Venture Partners) and Bill Ford (Fontinalis). Each have started VCs that have made heavy investments to help Detroit's tech community grow. The Madison building as discussed in the article only popped up in the recent years, supported by DVP.

To be clear, I'm not talking about the entire Detroit metro/city area. The area that is on the up and coming is the area from Grand Circus Park up through Woodward right up to the Quicken Loans building. In the recent few years, Dan Gilbert along with other private investors has been buying up properties and renovating buildings. Practically every building in this 1 mile stretch is now owned by Dan Gilbert and is in the processed of being renovated and used by companies. For example, right next to the Madison Building, Detroit Labs has moved in.

You can see some of the vision for the future of Detroit right here:

[http://blog.thedetroithub.com/2013/03/28/look-dan-gilbert- la...](http://blog.thedetroithub.com/2013/03/28/look-dan-gilbert-lays-out- vision-for-downtown-detroit/)

Not only that but there is a stronger young professional population in this area. In the past 2 years, huge buildings like the Broderick Tower ([http://brodericktower.com/](http://brodericktower.com/)) have been completely redone and turned into apartment buildings. These buildings are FULLY booked and are filled with young professionals.

From a security and safety perspective, Detroit isn't the safest city but isn't as bad as some people may suggest. The stretch down Woodward is actually VERY safe. In the past two years, there has been outdoor security cameras installed EVERY single block all the way up to Quicken Loans building. Dan Gilbert has hired private security contractors who monitor these cameras 24/7\. In fact, I'd argue that strip of downtown is safer then MANY cities. As a whole, the outskirts and further away from Downtown is a different story (near Wayne State, etc.). This article is focused on the change happening downtown, not the entire city. It's going to be a many years coming to but for someone having grown up close to Detroit, it's crazy to see the level of change happening in the past 2-3 years compared to the previous 10 years...and it's all starting in this 4-6 block section in Downtown.

While Detroit isn't going to be the next SV or even NYC tech scene, to deny that there's change happening would just be ignorant. Even though Detroit as a city is going bankrupt, I cheer on the people who are there and working hard to make it a city they would be proud to call home. I encourage you guys just to check it out if you have the time. If you go to that section between Woodward and Grand Circus Park, you'll see that that lunch hours are PACKED with people and over the weekends when events are happening the city is bustling with life and energy.

Don't like the FUD get to you and get out to see the real picture!</comment>


Unlock or Bypass Android Pattern Without Loosing Data (Easy Way) - <AUTHOR> https://youprogrammer.com/unlock-bypass-android-pattern-without-loosing-data-easy-way/ <comment><USER2> >Things You Will Need To Do This Method: –

>USB Debugging Enabled.

It rather involved being on the other side of this airtight hatchway indeed.

</comment><comment><USER3> Another "easy" method is to use a tool like Shuame[0]. It's in Chinese but plenty of guides exist.

[0]shuame.com</comment>


On Keyboards - <AUTHOR> http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2008/07/22/On-Keyboards <comment><USER2> the comment thread in Bray's blog is a perfect replica of:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=185743></comment>


Ask HN: What's the best way to make the switch from web-designer to programmer? - <AUTHOR>

What's the best way to make the switch from web-designer to programmer? Obviously it would be to learn to program, but how would you transition and learn to work in a programming environment after being a web-designer?
I know HTML/CSS, Javascript, some PHP, some python, some C. I have very basic programming skills.
I'm wondering how I can leave the web designer/developer field and move in to a programming community. What steps should I take to emerse myself in the programming world. Knowing to program is obvious but what kind of work is out there for an entry level programmer? It seems like all the jobs out there want pros. <comment><USER2> You might want to take a look at some of the available online computer science courses (iTunes U, MIT OpenCourseware, Khan Academy, Udemy). Tons of really, really good introductory courses are available that can help with picking up the basics (Stanford's "Programming Methodology" [<http://goo.gl/Tbejg>] and "Programming Abstractions" [<http://goo.gl/RdwLt>] come to mind).

As others have pointed out, Meetups are a great way to learn, particularly specialized and cutting-edge stuff, not to mention the networking-with-others potential. Same for joining an open source project and contributing as you learn.

Finally, if there's the equivalent of a Hacker Dojo (<http://goo.gl/B2ats>) local to you, drop in. People love to help and mentor others.

Good luck to you!

</comment><comment><USER3> buy a book. write code.

If you're serious about it, I recommend The Art of Computer Programming by Donald Knuth. You should start with volume 1.

<comment><USER4> Are you trying to turn them away from programming? That book is a little heavy for a designer to learn.

If you're already a web-designer I'd suggest learning HTML and CSS which are used to turn your designs into marked up and styled pages. Then a easy transition is learning JavaScript which is a programming language and will nail down the basics of programming and how they apply to what you are already familiar with.

Then you move on to Knuth books when you want to branch out from JavaScript.

<comment><USER5> PHP is also a fairly easy leap from HTML/CSS.

With JS or PHP, learn what they're actually for, and then come up with something useful you can create with it. Doing is learning. Reading alone is useless.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Craigslist: all those shitty no pay jobs in the gigs section. That is for you.

They want an expert kernel programmer willing to work for $10 an hour? Great! You're an expert and you know the kernel inside out.

Those idea guys where you get 50% and no pay? Perfect, talk to those guys, they will give you all the experience you need.

Once you have a few of those under your belt and some sample code, go show the guys looking for pros.

Alternatively, you can go to the LKML or Google Chrome or Firefox dev sites. Download the source, work on documentation, find some simple bugs to fix, etc. Pretty much any open source project would love contributors, go contribute., worst comes to worst they reject your patch, but keep submitting til the quality is up to par.

Basically, just go do it. Whatever you want to learn, just start doing it. It sounds like you're trying to give yourself a list of reasons why you can't do it.

If your looking to transition from a field where you have years of experience to a field where you have little and expecting to bump your salary all in one go I have to say it's pretty unlikely that's going to happen. However, if you're willing to put in time and effort you will have no problem transitioning over a period of time.

The simple facts are that it takes 10 years of programming to have 10 years of experience programming. I spent 5 years doing PHP / C#. Another 5 years writing C# / Perl.

When I wanted to transition to iOS coding I bought a dev license installed XCode and started coding an app for myself and put it in the app store (it took about 1 to 2 months). I've made $30 bux on that app, but the point was not to retire from the app store but to learn iOS. Whatever you want to do, just start doing it, and see it through to the fruition that people are looking for. (eg. on iOS store all anybody cares about is that you've gotten it into the store).

If you're getting paid anything to learn to code you're 10,000 times further ahead of everyone else who are paying lots of money to learn theory, rather than practice. (eg. How many iOS courses actually result in people putting an app in the store?)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks that puts everything into perspective now, very helpful.

<comment><USER6> Also wanted to add: Meetups, go to all the meetups and get involved with the community. Springboard from the meetups to the conferences.

If you're in the decent programmer category who your friends are matters far more than what you can do. (I'm pretty sure this is true at any level in any industry). Plus, who doesn't want more friends?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Javascript</comment>


Alertify.js - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/fabien-d/alertify.js/ <comment><USER2> Very cool library! The one thing all of these type of things lack (e.g. this, dojo.dialog()) is that they are non-blocking to the execution thread, unlike alert()/confirm()/prompt(). I know it's not their fault, javascript doesn't allow this natively, but i feel like that would be immensely useful for general user input, form validation and the like. Yes, I am aware that it can be done currently through workarounds, I'm just saying that allowing certain native objects to be blocking upon further user input, would be immensely useful and save code readability

EDIT: Care to explain why I'm getting downvoted? Said nothing offensive, and I'm clearly on-topic.

<comment><USER3> Are you saying it would be good for them to block? Why?

When they execute, they run a callback with the input provided. Inside that callback, do whatever you need to do that requires some input.

<comment><USER4> Sometimes it's just easier to have linear code with some blocking than to create an entire state machine. Yes there are libraries that get close to this. No, it's still not the same.

<comment><USER3> You can have linear code without blocking - it's exceptionally common in the node world.

async.waterfall([ function getInput(){...}, function checkInput(){...}, function submitInput(){...}, ], function finally(){})

Each of the functions takes a callback, and returns err (if any) and output. If a callback returns err, it jumps to finally where you say what failed.

This is odd when you first get started with async, but it's really easy to visualize.

Think of a production line, with a number of different workers doing different stuff. If one of them gets a dud part, it throws it away.

<comment><USER4> I get it. I do plenty of async programming. But, at the end of the day, no matter how nice you think the async.waterfall mess is, sometimes you just want to block. Sometimes it turns out that that is the right pattern. I've written dozens of async apps, much to the chagrin of co-workers who hate anything resembling async. I think I'm qualified to know that sometimes I get to a bit of code that sure would be nice with a simple blocking call.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Since nobody seems to have noticed yet: bonus points for using native methods and not using JQuery.

<comment><USER5> Indeed, I like the fact that it doesn't have dependencies. And is using html5 tags which is useful too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Pretty slick, animation-wise. If I could make one design-layman suggestion...the thick, black border belies the unobtrusiveness of the plugin. Maybe a lighter, thinner border would be a better fit for the use-case of this plugin?

<comment><USER7> looks like it's using _class="alertify alertify-show alertify-prompt"_

you should be able to override any of these to your liking

<comment><USER6> Yeah, I meant for demo, first-impression purposes. I know it's just a easily- changed visual tic once a developer decides to implement it...but might as well entice as many people as people as possible.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's rather annoying it's modal but leaves most of the page visible and unresponsive to clicks. Maybe dim the background slightly?

</comment><comment><USER9> Here's the examples link: <http://fabien-d.github.com/alertify.js/>

I love that someone already made a pull request to update the readme with it.

</comment><comment><USER10> One concern is the ordering of buttons. Windows users will be used to OK/Cancel whereas on OS X, etc Cancel/OK is the norm. I wonder if this is something this library should handle?

</comment><comment><USER11> This looks beautiful. But I'm curious, do users no longer expect/like their platform's native dialogs for these things?

<comment><USER12> The native alert is very hard to customize and extremely bare boned.

<comment><USER13> Not to mention that the second I see a native alert my heart rate increases 10 fold.

<comment><USER14> Only thing worse are those "Are you sure you want to leave this page?" modals. Those cause me to go into fits of ctrl+w- smashing rage!!!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Really nice smooth animation.

It would be nice if the alerts appeared in the centre of the screen though... I find that jerking my eyes up to the top of the screen and then back down to what I was looking at quite intrusive.

<comment><USER16> Ideally you could specify an HTML element to place the notification near, and then pass whatever element the user activated to trigger the notification. Or you could specify target coordinates, and compute the desired location yourself. Both of those ought to use optional parameters, though; defaulting to center seems reasonable.

<comment><USER17> If you look on the demo page (<http://fabien-d.github.com/alertify.js/>), all of the alerts get injected into #alertifylogs.alertify-logs which is positioned by css and therefore should be easy to overwrite:

        .alertify-logs {
            position: fixed;
            z-index: 5000;
            bottom: 10px;
            right: 10px;
            width: 300px;
        }

</comment></comment></comment><comment> X-Istence In the "prompt dialog" the buttons don't get highlighted when I tab over to them ... so instead my browsers buttons get highlighted, and I end up hitting back instead of Ok or Cancel...

</comment><comment><USER18> Degrades perfectly down to IE7, great example on how to do this - the design and functionality become less and less polished yet it still does the core tasks accurately.

</comment><comment><USER19> I was literally talking to someone yesterday about how I couldn't believe a plugin like this didn't exist yet. Long overdue. Well done!

</comment><comment><USER20> Looks great on my iPhone. Thanks for the nice lib!

</comment><comment><USER21> I love it but I actually don't understand why you decided to put two completely separated features in a single library: the alert/confirm/prompt dialogs and the log/success/error messages.

I think that if you'd split this two things into two different libraries it would be better (e.g.: if i want only dialogs i'd prefer to include just them)

</comment><comment><USER22> Great work!

I've been using apprise ([http://thrivingkings.com/read/Apprise-The- attractive-alert-a...](http://thrivingkings.com/read/Apprise-The-attractive- alert-alternative-for-jQuery)), which is pretty good, but going to switch to this. I really like how Alertify has the growl-like log alerts along with it.

</comment><comment><USER23> Great work, but one suggestion:

Make the alert notification go away when ESC is pressed, like the Confirmation and Prompt notifications.

<comment><USER24> I'd also suggest that clicking anywhere on the body should dismiss it, and behave like cancelling.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Very slick. The only thing I'd add would be Chrome desktop notifications (optional) for plain alerts.

</comment><comment><USER26> HALP! Does anyone know of a jQuery plugin that has notifications like they do on OSX. For example, when you raise the volume or mute you see that rounded transparent square? Is there something like that for the web?

<comment><USER27> It's a DIV with a border-radius and a semi-transparent black background. It's just CSS, why use a jQuery plugin? Why not just quickly build it yourself?

<comment><USER26> Because it is an alert. I need it to fade in and then disappear. I mean I guess I could build it but was wondering if there is a complete library out there to handle the alerting and all the options a modern notification library has.

<comment><USER17> I found this project that would fit the bill: <http://fabien-d.github.com/alertify.js/>

See "Customizable Log Messages".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Very nice. Thanks for sharing. I think that I'd like to see the ability to <tab> off the dialog onto the underlying document restricted. The concept of 'semi-modal' is pervasive but undefined :)

</comment><comment><USER29> Great stuff, I think this will take over from jQuery.noty for me.

</comment><comment><USER14> Very nice! I've used jGrowl for this in the past, but this seems much improved, more feature-rich and with sensible default styles. Alertify FTW!

</comment><comment><USER30> Stacking up of multiple alerts being triggered is not handled properly. I think it should show latest posted alert on the top. Overall, good job!

<comment><USER31> Unless it's been updated since you posted, it is. The newest alerts appear at the top of the stack for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Sweet, thanks for Sharing. Another lib to add to the list. Not sure how it compares to noty, which has many options.

</comment><comment><USER33> I like that it doesn't require any JS frameworks and still being lightweight.

</comment><comment><USER34> Very useful! Thanks! ;)

</comment><comment><USER35> Very nice work, I will look deep into it today :D

</comment><comment><USER7> great stuff! i wish prompt dialog auto focused on the textbox. currently i have to click it first to type in. (on windows chrome)

<comment><USER36> Agreed. Looks like someone reported an issue already: <https://github.com/fabien-d/alertify.js/issues/3>

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> works surprisingly great on mobile \----- on a galaxy nexus (cm10) (animations are bit laggy, but thats fine)

</comment><comment><USER38> Looks awesome! Smooth transitions!

</comment><comment><USER39> i like it, thanks for making!

</comment><comment><USER40> This is pretty bad ass.

</comment><comment><USER41> No examples?

<comment><USER42> "No examples on a github repo page?" Classic. Good one.

<comment><USER43> <http://fabien-d.github.com/alertify.js/>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Cool library, i'll deep into it today :)</comment>


Google finally realized that racist search results are a problem - <AUTHOR> https://theoutline.com/post/1430/google-finally-realized-that-racist-search-results-are-a-problem <comment><USER2> Only a problem to them. This is the same company that redesigned their code to be 'inclusive' of all 72 genders that were created in the last year.

Any censorship, especially in this day and age, is too much censorship. Google has a huge say in what content is made readily available to people whether you like them or not.

</comment><comment><USER3> On the one hand all the "HILARIOUS WACKY" alt right idiots are getting really, really old, but I really can't imagine any company I want deciding which information is appropriate for the public less than Google. Of all the 21st century American corporate oligarchies Google should scare you the most.

</comment><comment><USER4> Hopefully they'll fix the offensive "european people history" output as well.</comment>


Bletchley – A Collection of Practical Cryptanalysis Tools - <AUTHOR> https://code.google.com/p/bletchley/ <comment><USER2> When I approached this[1] I googled for Python tools for playing with cryptanalysis and found this to be completely irrelevant to what I was trying to do. A small library of NumPy-based functions, on the other hand, did an excellent job.

I don't know how this fares when it comes to blackbox crypto pen-testing, but I must admit I shudder at the thought of blackbox crypto pen-testing.

[1] [http://blog.ram.rachum.com/post/56061414423/the- interactive-...](http://blog.ram.rachum.com/post/56061414423/the-interactive- homebrew-encryption-challenge)

</comment><comment><USER3> Where do I learn about cryptography?

<comment><USER4> I can recommend "Applied Cryptography" by Bruce Schneier

<comment><USER5> Not even Bruce Schneier recommends Applied Cryptography. [http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/09/the_cult_of_sc...](http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/09/the_cult_of_sch.html)

<comment><USER6> TLDR; Get "Cryptography Engineering"[0] instead.

0: [http://www.amazon.com/Cryptography-Engineering-Principles- Pr...](http://www.amazon.com/Cryptography-Engineering-Principles-Practical- Applications/dp/0470474246)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Are encryption based solutions a viable business? - <AUTHOR>

In other words, can I start a company that provides encrypted communication mechanisms that cannot be deciphered by the company (not storing the keys on the servers). Is it illegal or not a viable business considering governmental interference concerns? I know there are open source tools or solution from large companies (like Apple encrypting data in iOS8 by default etc) which do this out there but as a startup with this as a main business idea? <comment><USER2> I'm going to be making some assumptions here, with assumption #1 being that you would be based in the US.

It wouldn't be illegal, but I think you'll have serious issues with viability. Concern #1 would be when / where / why you would distribute my encryption keys. For example, I am a SaaS, perhaps small, perhaps big. You are a one-or- two person startup holding my encryption keys, and the FBI comes knocking with an NSL. You will not have the money / resources to fight it, so you'll turn over those keys without telling me (as you are required to by law). However maybe it was a BS request, and maybe had I known about it I could have fought it with my A+ legal team.

The other issue is one of data mutability. If you are just storing files, there is some merit in separate key storage. However, if your SaaS does something with that data (converts it, processes it, moves it), then those encryption keys will be right back in the hands of the company doing the data holding.

Finally, there are very few companies that care enough about encryption to actually do it, and those who care that much about it probably won't be willing to ship that functionality out of the company.

(A bit about me: I am a webapp security / crypto guy at a mid-sized SaaS company)

<comment><AUTHOR> Does not being based in US help? Say in europe where there more likely options to fight against government interference? Or is it a myth and all governments are concerned with encryption enough that no law can protect for small businesses?</comment></comment>


We published our research & case studies to help you succeed on Kickstarter - <AUTHOR> http://maximizeyourcrowd.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey, HN. We've been working on this book for months. It contains the result of dozens of hours of research, case studies, examples, and surprises we ran in to in getting funded on Kickstarter. We spent a lot of time on the book to make it a high quality product.

We wanted to publish all of this information to help others learn the ropes of a successful Kickstarter project before they make the same mistakes we or others did.

Also, we'd love to hear what you think!</comment>


Detecting an asymmetric Curve25519 backdoor in RSA key generation algorithms - <AUTHOR> http://samvartaka.github.io/backdoors/2015/09/03/rsa-curve25519-backdoor/

<comment><USER2> It seems trivial to avoid detection: Just generate a random number, and if it's a valid x-coordinate, only then backdoor it. Sure, you'll only backdoor half the keys, but then you have to weigh whether the probability of being detected and severity of it is worth the cost.

</comment><comment> ryan-c If anyone's particularly bored, the password, from which the master key used in my original backdoor is derived, should be fairly easy to crack. It is eight nonrandom characters.

<comment><USER3> Actually, you don't need the master password to recover. Reusing master hash (MASTER_PUB_HEX) works just fine.

[https://gist.github.com/aexaey/3646bb438f8712cbadf5/revision...](https://gist.github.com/aexaey/3646bb438f8712cbadf5/revisions)

Scroll to the third change from the top - stupid github doesn't allow (an obvious) way to make a direct link to a particular gist's revision.

<comment> ryan-c That only works in your changed version because it incorrectly uses MASTER_PUB_HEX as a private key.

<comment><USER3> Well, that's the version that samvartaka linked to. ;-)

<comment> ryan-c Well it isn't my code, which does not have that bug. Apparently it is possible to update other peoples gists? WTF? I've emailed the author to fix the link. I've also fixed the gist. No idea how that got there.

Mine is here: [https://gist.github.com/ryancdotorg/18235723e926be0afbdd](https://gist.github.com/ryancdotorg/18235723e926be0afbdd)

Edit: Looks like you forked my code, replaced the curve25519 lib and broke the NOBUS and forward secrecy properties, then Nightling forked your fork (making no changes), and I accidentally hit fork on his fork.

<comment><USER4> what a cluster fork

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Of course, the Elligator and related mappings allow for (a subset of) valid curve points to be mapped to indistinguishable bit strings, which is very handy in some protocols. A backdoor merchant using Elligator 2, or Elligator Squared, in this particular setup wouldn't be detectable.

<comment><USER6> I don't think you even need anything that fancy - pretty sure just encrypting the leak again with a fixed AES key would do the job well enough. If someone manages to get hold of the AES key they could use it distinguish backdoored keys from random, but at that point you've been caught anyway.

<comment><USER7> There are a number of properties that a carefully designed asymmetric backdoor is expected to have. NOBUS (Nobody But Us) and forward-secrecy are among them. With a forward-secret backdoor, if a reverse-engineer breaches the key- generator, then the previously stolen information remains confidential.

If the key-generator embeds a secret key (for seed exfiltration), the backdoor design will never be robust against reverse engineering. In fact, exposure of the embedded key gives to the attacker the ability to retroactively factor with ease the moduli of public-keys generated in the past, and recover the private-keys.

The designs of Curve25519 and illusoryTLS embed only an elliptic-curve public- key. Therefore, the exploitation requires access to the associated private-key /i.e., NOBUS property).

For the longer story about the sorrow state of the Web PKI and the nitty gritty details on this cryptographic backdoor, you may want to review the illusoryTLS whitepaper [http://conference.hitb.org/hitbsecconf2015ams/wp- content/upl...](http://conference.hitb.org/hitbsecconf2015ams/wp- content/uploads/2014/12/WHITEPAPER-The-illusoryTLS-Asymmetric-Backdoor.pdf)</comment></comment></comment>