A Visual, Intuitive Guide to Imaginary Numbers (2007) - <AUTHOR> https://betterexplained.com/articles/a-visual-intuitive-guide-to-imaginary-numbers/ <comment><USER2> Once I renamed imaginary numbers to 2D numbers internally it made more sense.

Do you know any other examples in math where fixing terrible naming makes the concept easier to digest?

<comment><USER3> I think there's definitely something to your suggestion here. For instance, there is no result to sqrt(-1) on the real line, but it becomes possible in the complex plane because you have an additional degree of freedom.

One qualifier I'd add though is that they're 'asymmetric' 2D numbers. The real vs imaginary axes have different behaviors. If I multiply by the positive unitary value on the imaginary axis (i.e. 'i'), I get CCW rotation by 90 degrees; with the negative imaginary unit I get CW rotation; positive _real_ unit, no change occurs; negative real unit, rotation by 180 degrees.

Actually that's something I wonder about—could there be a 'symmetric' version of that? Maybe something where the real axis behaves more like the imaginary axis, but maybe some signs are flipped or something.

I guess an important aspect of how using the complex plane is beneficial is the fact that it combines these disparate elements though—we can start with something real, do certain transformations to it in our more broadly capable complex plane, then bring it back into the real line.

<comment><USER4> You want geometric algebra. In 2D GA, you would have two unitary vectors, i and j, such that i * i = 1 and j * j = 1. The (non-commutative) product of between them (or their division) would be a bivector: i * j = ij = - j * i. You rotate 90 degrees the i and j vectors using the bivector.

The good thing about GA is that the same concept can be easily extended to 3D (quaternions), and in fact to 4D and nD.

<comment><USER3> That does sound pretty close to what I had in mind. Are i and j from your example associated with orthogonal axes in a plane?

<comment><USER4> Yes, they are. i would be the unitary vector in the horizontal direction, x, and j in the vertical one, y.

In fact, geometric algebras are very general, and the one I briefly sketched is not the only possible interpretation. If you are interested, you can find many good introductions online, directed at different audiences. You can also search for the term "Clifford algebras" if you are interested in a more formal approach.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Discussed in 2011: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2712575](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2712575)

And all the way back in 2007, long enough ago that nickb posted it: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=91811](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=91811).

<comment><USER6> Who was nickb?

<comment><USER7> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=152428](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=152428)

<comment><USER8> They're arguing about whether it's Paul Graham but I need to read a lot of comments to determine whether that's the consensus or it's a joke.

<comment><USER5> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=152477](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=152477)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I really enjoyed this video series on imaginary numbers. Went through the history as well as the math:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T647CGsuOVU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T647CGsuOVU)

</comment><comment><USER10> > Focusing on relationships, not mechanical formulas.

The focus on formula memorization in schools is tragic. Once upon a time, I too have learned everything about imaginary numbers ... everything, other than why the heck they are actually useful. Can do all the calculations, don't know why I am doing them.

Are there other great math textbooks/websites (Calculus level and higher, Stats, Linear Algebra, etc.) that try to do this better? For someone older than school level who wants to learn again.

<comment><USER11> They are only really useful in the science and engineering fields that need them. That is why they remain opaque to most people. High school level pedagogy doesn't deal effectively with the useful applications of these concepts (matrices are also poorly introduced).

Most of our modern technology would not be achievable without the use of complex numbers as a tool.

<comment><USER12> I always liked how Feynman dealt with complex numbers in 'QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter'.

He focuses on the intuitive concept of a particle having a spinny arrow attached, the arrow rotates as the particle flies through space. He only casually mentions that this is in fact a complex number, whereas the bulk of the text focuses on developing intuition around arrows.

I read that book in high school, and it certainly influenced the direction I took in university. It helped to understand that the physical universe often appears to behave in extremely non-intuitive ways, but using mathematics we can develop a model that transforms the phenomenon into something that actually does make intuitive sense.

I think some of the harder concepts in math are difficult because they act like stepping stones into aspects of our world that just don't make sense based on day-to-day experiences. But modern technology depends on this! Pedagogy is improving, but it still lags advances in technology.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I always find the "algebraic closure" approach to be the best bet for explaining complex numbers. Much like how having negative numbers means that you can subtract any two numbers (closure under addition), having complex numbers means you can find the roots of any polynomial. If you don't have complex numbers, something like `x^2 + 1` has no real roots, and you have a problem.

The really nice part of this explanation is that it tells you why complex numbers show up everywhere. It turns out that it's rather straightforward to find physical real-world problems with input parameters that are coefficients to polynomials and behavior that depends on the roots of those polynomials. Take a slinky or another other harmonic oscillator - when you model it with a differential equation, the polynomial coefficients are how heavy the slinky is, how much speed-dependent resistance there is, and how springy it is. Factoring the polynomial gives you the behavior over time, and it pretty much always has some sort of behavior, so the roots should be _some_ kind of number.

<comment><USER14> From the POV of this explanation, it's then quite fortuitous that the complexes are just two-dimensional over the reals, and can thus be easily visualized. That is, as soon as you adjoin the roots of x^2 + 1, and close under field operations, you actually get the roots of _all_ polynomials.

<comment><USER15> There is a deep result stating that for a field F there are only three possibilities for what the dimension of its algebraic closure can be as an F-vector space: it can be 1, if F is algebraically closed, it can be 2, as happens for R and other real closed fields, or it can be infinite, as it happens for Q, but there is no other option!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I wonder if these wonderful resources we have nowadays will result in more kids getting into science and maths. It would have been fantastic to have had this when I was in school (I kept an interest in maths in spite of my teachers' efforts).

<comment><USER12> Many people have recognized the need for improvement in mathematics education, and I think it really is evolving in positive directions. I worked at DreamBox Learning for a few years, they produce an adaptive math learning program for elementary schools (and gradually reaching higher levels) which as been very popular with children.

The kind of math that was traditionally taught in schools is still relevant and important, but I think we can leverage modern visual and interactive media to help children develop a broader class of mathematical reasoning skills, which includes much, much more than a bunch of rules, symbols, and rote procedures.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I think I first learned imaginary numbers in algebra 2 which was like 6th or 7th grade. I know they use x^2=1 as an example, but I don't know how useful that is. I think they really need to teach trig before they teach imaginary number. They also need to teach polar coordinates with imaginary numbers. Most all of its uses are for solving trig problems. You use it in EE and ME to solve sinusoidal problems, but I don't know how i=sqrt(-1) helps you understand what its used for. I think euler formula is most elegant formula in math. How did the guy even come up with it.

<comment><USER18> I don't know how Euler came up with it, but here's a fairly intuitive way: think about circular motion. If something moves around a circle at constant speed, then its velocity vector is perpendicular to the vector from 0 to the moving thing. Once you have the idea (which _isn 't_ terribly difficult) that complex numbers live on a plane and multiplication by _i_ is rotation through a right angle, this gives you the differential equation d _x_ /d _t_ = _ix_. Solving that is easy: _x_ = exp( _it_ ). Since it's also easy (by definition of the trig functions) to see that _x_ = cos _t_ \+ i sin _t_ , we're done.

Given the sort of thing Euler was good at, though, it seems just as likely that he looked at the power series for sin, cos, and exp, and said "aha!".

<comment><USER11> The 2D analogy and use of rotating vectors was alien to Euler and contemporaries. They really did think of it as an "imaginary" abstraction to make the math work.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I came here expecting to see Steven Wittens' excellent writeup [0] mentioned in the comments. Since it is not, I feel obligated to mention it.

[0] [https://acko.net/blog/how-to-fold-a-julia- fractal/](https://acko.net/blog/how-to-fold-a-julia-fractal/)

<comment><USER20> Yes, I think this makes things very intuitive, and I use it (well, the first slideshow in it) to introduce the idea when I teach complex numbers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This has also a great intuitive explanation of why sqrt(-1) is a rotation.

HTTP://greatscottgadgets.com/sdr/6/

</comment><comment><USER22> If thinking like I'm 5, it doesn't add up. At first, "b times i" means rotation, but then 'a+bi' is a vector of two orthogonal components. I expected 'bi' to be an angle in polar coordinates and 'a' to be length.

Besides that, why did mathematicians choose this exact representation? Why not polar, spherical, hyperbolic, Hilbert-like, Minkowski-like? Did anyone explore on how that could change known problems, like e.g. Riemann-zeta?

<comment><USER23> It still means rotation in "a + bi". If you take "a + b" you get another real number, but if you take "a + bi", the _b_ component has been rotated by 90 degrees (i), and now it's orthogonal to _a_. Even if we drop complex numbers, it's not like we write out points in polar coordinates as "5 + 30 degrees" \- how are you adding a length and an angle together?

<comment><USER22> Yeah, I see now. "times i" is discrete 90 degree rotation itself, not just 'i', nor 'b'. Thanks everyone for making that clear.

This though shows that explanations via analogies or non-strict wording may confuse one rather than enlighten. I'm not good at math, but once understood to not search analogies or geometry in things. Instead it is better to "shut up and calculate". Not sure if imagining something is required to manage it. It's only our brain's faulty quirk.

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zwAD6dRSVyI](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zwAD6dRSVyI)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The punchline for complex numbers is in Geometric Algebra...

<comment><USER25> I disagree. It suffices to include a rotation operator (or bivectors in general, if you want to do it in N>2). The 'full' framework of GA is, imo, foolish, because the geometric product doesn't really have a geometric interpretation.

<comment><USER24> What? :-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> "Does any of this really have to do with the square root of -1? Or do mathematicians just think they're too cool for regular vectors?" [https://xkcd.com/2028/](https://xkcd.com/2028/)

<comment><USER27> This is obviously not a completely serious question but it is definitely looks like a question someone might ask when learning about complex numbers for the first time.

The answer is completely historical in nature. Imaginary numbers began as being interpreted as the square root of -1 for the purposes of solving polynomial equations (hence the name.) Later, their field structure and their interpretation as vectors-with-multiplication became their primary use but the name remained.

Mathematicians don't really use "vectors" in the traditional sense like in physics but deal with abstract vector spaces where a "vector" is simply a member of a "vector space" which is "a set of things with addition and scalar multiplication and a few other nice properties".

However, if something needs to be done with vectors in a plane, complex numbers are extremely useful because scaling and rotation can be represented as multiplication. Therefore natural operations in the complex numbers often correspond to natural operations in whatever you are trying to study with complex numbers.

<comment><USER20> > Mathematicians don't really use "vectors" in the traditional sense like in > physics but deal with abstract vector spaces

This is not at all true in general: many mathematicians use non-abstract vectors too. My (maths) PhD, for example, uses vectors throughout but doesn't mention vector spaces once.</comment></comment></comment>


Joe Hewitt, renowned Facebook and Firefox developer, slams the 'open web'  - <AUTHOR> http://www.netmagazine.com/news/firefox-veteran-downbeat-open-web-111432

<comment><USER2> I agree with Hewitt. I've kept myself employed since I started web development in the mid 90's. I've progressed through the various approaches/languages - cgi/perl, asp, servlets/jsp, php, rails, etc... They've all been good learning experiences. But I've never felt that it was always just HTML or nothing.

In fact, many times I wished for something better and when I would play around with a fat client I would think 'oh, it's not cross platform, never mind' and that was that. In my mind, mobile, specifically the iPhone, changed everything. And on top of that it was JSON.

Nowadays, after feeling like I've done it all, when I approach a project I look for the best user experience. I look for the best design. _Then_ I figure out if it's just web based or a mobile client or both.

Having gone thought HTML on mobile, I don't believe it's as good of an experience as a native mobile app. We had this discussion at my last job - mobile web vs. mobile apps. I the customers voted app hands down.

Anyway, HTML is still great, but like I said, I completely agree with Hewitt on this topic, 100%.</comment>


Making an MSX font - <AUTHOR> http://www.ateijelo.com/blog/2016/09/13/making-an-msx-font <comment><USER2> > I'm not sure either what's the character between INFINITY (∞) and ELEMENT OF > (∈). I checked an old MSX Technical Data Book and it seems to be lowercase > phi (φ), but it certainly doesn't look like it.

The last three letters in the Danish and Norwegian alphabets are Æ, Ø, and Å. Given that both the lower and upper case version of 'æ' and 'å' are included in the MSX font, it would make sense that they would also include the 'ø' symbol which the resulting font is currently missing. Given the limited number of pixels it would also make sense that the same graphic is used for both the lower and upper case version of this symbol.

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

Size does matter: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f488uJAQgmw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f488uJAQgmw)

<comment><USER3> I am perhaps about to make an ass of myself, but i have the impression that ö and ø can be interchanged in a pinch.

<comment><USER4> In a pinch, _maybe_ (see bottom paragraph for a better alternative), but ö is Swedish and German. It's "the same letter" but at the same time it is not.

In Sweden, the modern alphabet ends with "å, ä, ö". In Norway and Denmark the modern alphabet ends with "æ, ø, å".

Although the order is different, å is the same in both Swedish and Norwegian and Danish, and ä is "equal to" æ, and ö is "equal to" ø.

I've seen some people aged 60+ use ö in their handwriting in Norway.

I was born in Sweden and am a Swedish citizen but have been living in Norway since I was four years old. (Swedish father, Norwegian mother.) My last name contains and ö in it, but to the Norwegian authorities and everyone else here, my name is written with an ø. I always write my name with an ø, because that's what I'm used to and that what everybody else is used to, except when I'm in Sweden, then I use ö.

Aside from my last name, I would never interchange ä with æ or ö with ø, because doing so either for a Norwegian word using Swedish letters or for a Swedish word using Norwegian letters would simply look absurd to me. In fact I think even some people might find it offensive to do so. The "å, ä, ö" and the "æ, ø, å" are part of the Swedish and Norwegian peoples identities.

If you need to type words that have these letters in them but you don't have the letters accessible on the computer you are using, it's much better to perform Anglicization IMO. Type å as aa, ä/æ as ae and ö/ø as oe".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There are two great blog-posts covering the typography in 8- and 16-bit systems (Commodore, Apple, Atari, Amiga, IBM, etc.):

[https://damieng.com/blog/2011/02/20/typography-in-8-bits- sys...](https://damieng.com/blog/2011/02/20/typography-in-8-bits-system-fonts) [https://damieng.com/blog/2011/03/27/typography-in-16-bits- sy...](https://damieng.com/blog/2011/03/27/typography-in-16-bits-system-fonts)

</comment><comment><USER6> (aww... the old days when you had keys to move the cursor diagonally... [https://www.msx.org/wiki/images/1/18/Frael- Bruc100.JPG](https://www.msx.org/wiki/images/1/18/Frael-Bruc100.JPG) )

I remember playing with fonts to generate sprites and psychedelic screen savers, IIRC fonts were stored around the 16k byte of RAM

<comment><USER7> Wow I've never felt so appalled by a keyboard before! Why are the the left and right keys below and not above the down-left and down-right keys?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> It looks like the MSX font is very closely based on the original IBM PC font (these days known as CP437), so for the characters that are ambiguous in 8x8 I recommend checking out the 8x14 versions from the PC.

> _I wasn 't sure whether some letters are upper or lower case, like pi (π), > or theta (θ)_

Wikipedia says "227 (E3hex) is the Greek lowercase pi (U+03C0, π), but early fonts such as Terminal use a variant of pi that is ambiguous in case, and therefore can be used for the Greek capital pi (U+03A0, Π) or the n-ary product sign (U+220F, ∏)."

> _I 'm not sure either what's the character between INFINITY (∞) and ELEMENT > OF (∈). I checked an old MSX Technical Data Book and it seems to be > lowercase phi (φ), but it certainly doesn't look like it._

Wikipedia says: "237 (EDhex) is supposed to be used as Greek lowercase phi, but is mainly used as the empty set sign (U+2205, ∅) and was also used as the Greek phi symbol in italics (U+03D5, ϕ) to name angles, diameter sign (U+2300, ⌀), and as a surrogate for the Latin lowercase O with stroke (U+00F8, ø)."

The joys of low-res, approximate typefaces - glyphs so weird and obscure you can use them for just about anything.

<comment><USER9> They're really not - the IBM PC set is double-pixel wide and with quite different choices for many of the letters because the MSX is 5x7 while IBM PC used 8x14 (EGA) or 8x16 (VGA).

It is far more likely they took inspiration from the Apple ][ font and tried to add serifs in the limited space.

CP437 is the codepage - chars outside the ASCII range of 0-127. The font you are thinking of is probably the BIOS font from either the IBM EGA or VGA adapter.

<comment><USER8> By "based on" I meant the character set, not the actual glyph designs, I absolutely agree the MSX characters don't look much like the PC ones.

...but the character sets match surprisingly well; outside the basic ASCII range they have mostly the same accented and Greek characters in the same places, many of the same glyphs for control codes, and some of the symbols right at the end. The box-drawing characters are very different, and the MSX has more accented characters in total, but nothing that would raise eyebrows in a European MS-DOS code-page.

(off-topic: thank you very much for Envy Code R, it's one of my favourite monospaced typefaces ever!)

<comment><USER9> Oops, now your comment makes total sense including the CP437 remark, sorry!

Glad you enjoy Envy Code R :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Finally a font I like ;) MSX is my first computer love; good to see people make time to do this. Nice work!

<comment><USER11> Mine too! Philips VG8020 - [https://www.msx.org/wiki/Philips_VG-8020](https://www.msx.org/wiki/Philips_VG-8020)

<comment><USER10> I had that one first :) But my real love is the NMS-8250[0] ; I really liked that, to the extend that I have over 25 of them now for my museum.

I'm pretty sure it was on the market in '86 instead of '87 though.

[0] [https://www.msx.org/wiki/Philips_NMS_8250](https://www.msx.org/wiki/Philips_NMS_8250)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> related: UNSCII[1] is a font set attempting to combine characteristics for all the 8-bit microcomputers. this person has found a whole pile of various box drawing characters and oddities that don't map to anything in unicode. I should think there would be an argument here for a Unicode Consortium submission, to make it possible to represent "texts" from this machines in unicode proper.

[1]:([http://pelulamu.net/unscii/](http://pelulamu.net/unscii/))

</comment><comment><USER13> I started this with "oh but why wasn't he reading it from the graphic memory!" But I see the objective was different

Very cool

(You could also manipulate the fonts in the original MSX to allow things like inverted text, for example)

</comment><comment><USER14> The MSX font layout actually looks a heck of a lot like CP437 to me. I wonder why iconv couldn't recognize it.

<comment><USER15> If I understood correctly, the characters corresponding to the first row of CP437 are actually 2-byte sequences (01 xx) on MSX, and the prefixed values as individual bytes are shifted down a row to correspond to the uppercase alphabet rather than being values 0-31, so iconv would have to know about the prefix to not mix those up. The resemblance to CP437 probably isn't a coincidence, though. Microsoft was heavily involved in MSX, so it was undoubtedly indirectly influenced by IBM PC.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Sweet!</comment>


Ask HN: What do you do with mismatching braces in c style languages? - <AUTHOR> I'm kind of ashamed by asking this. But it has been on my mind for a long time. While writing code in c-style languages, many times I find myself lost among mismatching braces! For example look at this:
(function(){ // from JavaScript the good parts
  var add_the_handlers = function (notes) {
    var i;
    for ( i = 0; i < nodes.length; i += 1) {
      nodes[i].onclick = function (e) {
        alert(i);
      };
    };
  };<p>}());<p>My editor is complaining about a mismatch in braces or prans. How do you find your way out of these situations?  :) <comment><USER2> I use vim showmatch. [http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Moving_to_matching_braces](http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Moving_to_matching_braces)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you, that seems to be helpful

<comment><USER2> You are welcome! I teach vim for pleasure. :) You can visit my vi resources page at [http://www.verticalsysadmin.com/vi.htm](http://www.verticalsysadmin.com/vi.htm)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> The Sublime text editor underlines the opening and matching closing bracket that's currently under the cursor. Easy to miss, I noticed it only after months of using the editor.

</comment><comment><USER4> To a first approximation, all IDE's and programmer friendly text editors have 'parenthesis' matching modes/features. Certainly any IDE/editor that complains about mismatched 'parenthesis' does.

I found turning on parenthesis matching a was a bit disorienting at first because deleting parenthesis worked differently from deleting other characters. Eventually I got used to it.

Good luck.</comment>


After so many years, still no .NET Native nor proper UWP support for F# - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Microsoft/visualfsharp/issues/1096 <comment><AUTHOR> See also comments here [https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2017/07/24/get- start...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2017/07/24/get-started-with- f-as-a-c-developer/)

> There is no timeline for F# support on UWP. If you must use UWP for your > workplace, then F# is not an option for you. We make no such claim that you > can do this, though. If there is such a statement somewhere, please do let > me know. I do not wish to mislead anyone.

>This is an interesting point:

>> Full tooling support, every single feature as VB.NET and C# have on Visual Studio.

> Is it your expectation that every programming language be supported across > everything you can use in Visual Studio?

>> As for .NET Core, most of us on the enterprise hardly care about .NET Core beyond UWP, until it gets feature parity with .NET Framework.

> I will challenge this position. Perhaps you've not seen .NET Core in your > organization, but we've seen strong adoption and significant interest in the > enterprise for .NET Core. And this also goes beyond Visual Studio tooling. > Many enterprises have developer who wish to program on macOS and deploy to > Linux machines. We've made that a priority for .NET Core, and F# is every > bit as capable as C# on that front. This has also been a significant area of > growth for C#, F#, and .NET as a whole.

And here

[https://github.com/Microsoft/visualfsharp/issues/1096#issuec...](https://github.com/Microsoft/visualfsharp/issues/1096#issuecomment-320984143)

> No further news or updates on F# Support for .NET Native. There is no > affinity between .NET Native, .NET Core, or VS 2017. It's an orthogonal > area.

> There are three options:

> Use UWP Bridge

> Deploy elsewhere than the Windows Store

> Use Fable + React Native

Come on Microsoft, this is unacceptable, you're driving valuable programmers away from your platform.

F# is a mature fully .NET compliant Microsoft language, it should be expected and a high priority to get the .NET Native UWP (your main platform) to accept F# code.

Most people I know invested in F# with the expectation to target Windows without fuss and workarounds. And no, UWP Bridge and Fable + React Native are not acceptable solutions.</comment>


Google Fiber Is Moving Ahead Again in a New City - <AUTHOR> http://fortune.com/2017/04/28/google-fiber-louisville/ <comment><USER2> This is great news. I have Google Fiber at home, and I've never had a speed test yield less than 940 Mbps up and down. Compared to Comcast, which was giving us "250" (read: "25") Mbps and had connectivity and uptime problems, Google Fiber is consistently fast and available. There was one afternoon early on where it was down for a couple hours (construction related), but we've had no problems since.

I hope they continue expanding to new cities so the other player(s) there are forced to compete.

</comment><comment><USER3> I still remember how Time Warner miraculously discovered another 100 Mbps practically the day after Google Fiber announced that it was moving in. And TWC had the audacity to pitch it like some kind of gift, like they were making this great investment in their customers and upgrading them "for the same monthly rate". Oh what crap they unleashed: the happy commercials, all the great things they were doing for customers, as if it wasn't _completely obvious_ that the _only_ reason any of it existed was the threat from a real competitor.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, we saw doubling of speeds. 50/100/150 all got automatically upgraded to 100, 150, and 300mb/s.

Then when Spectrum bought them out the mid tier disappeared; oh, and prices went up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I really wish it was easier to roll your own. I'd be more interested in a local co-op that forced competitive pricing and services, forced speed upgrades and allowed more choices.

Across the US, even in major cities, most residences don't actually have a "choice" in their provider.

Something I recently learned when one of our renters tried to get Satellite services in a heavily-wooded area.

</comment><comment><USER5> Hmmm. Good luck to Google, for the current ISP's are absolutely ridiculous. I think that maybe telephone poles should be owned by the state/city/county and ISP's should just pay a fee to the city to use them. The govt can raise money to pay for the poles through taxes or municipal bonds. This way competition can't be blocked out of using basic infrastructure.

<comment><USER6> Ah title II for the Internet. Too bad the FCC will take it away with this administration

<comment><USER7> But hey, at least ISPs won't be stifled from innovating anymore! Can't wait to see all of the marvelous innovations which wouldn't be possible for them to bring us if they were just a dumb pipe. Just think of all the jobs they'll create too!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I hope they come to my neighborhood in San Francisco. I recently tried the wireless internet provider that was just set up in my building. It is so janky, I can't sign up for recurring billing. I literally have to sign up again every month. When I called the guy who runs it, he said his payment gateway doesn't support recurring payments. Sigh.

<comment><USER9> Maybe sonic.net fiber is available in your neighborhood.

[https://www.sonic.com/gigabit](https://www.sonic.com/gigabit)

<comment><USER8> Thanks for the suggestion. Just checked. It's not.</comment></comment></comment>


Cowboys Stadium has Control Room & 5 Staff to Monitor Wifi Stations - <AUTHOR> http://news.cnet.com/2300-11386_3-10006499-3.html?tag=mncol

<comment><AUTHOR> They probably use Wifi for in-seat concessions, but beyond that it seems a bit over-engineered.</comment>


Ask HN: What's your favorite Latex resume template? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> The one linked here:

[https://quip.com/MFS9AXtq5fk8](https://quip.com/MFS9AXtq5fk8)

> The best resume templates are here:

> > [http://www.rpi.edu/dept/arc/training/latex/resumes/](http://www.rpi.edu/dept/arc/training/latex/resumes/)

> LaTeX can be edited easily online with the following tool:

> [https://www.sharelatex.com/](https://www.sharelatex.com/)

> Example resume on ShareLaTeX:

> > [https://www.sharelatex.com/project/55db6ac384d1be370a7d4b9a](https://www.sharelatex.com/project/55db6ac384d1be370a7d4b9a)

</comment><comment><USER3> I think this one is one of the better ones I've seen (source). You can see some of the tweaks I've made in adapting it to mine as well (source).

[deedy]: [https://raw.githubusercontent.com/deedydas/Deedy- Resume/mast...](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/deedydas/Deedy- Resume/master/OpenFonts/sample-image.png)

[deedy-source]: [https://github.com/deedy/Deedy- Resume](https://github.com/deedy/Deedy-Resume)

[jez]: [https://jez.io/resume](https://jez.io/resume)

[jez-source]: [https://github.com/jez/resume](https://github.com/jez/resume)

</comment><comment><USER4> I've been using this one for several years and have been very happy with it. It is a descendant of several other templates: [http://www.sudo.ws/todd/resume.html](http://www.sudo.ws/todd/resume.html)

</comment><comment><USER5> [http://debarghyadas.com/resume/debarghya-das- resume.pdf](http://debarghyadas.com/resume/debarghya-das-resume.pdf) Double column. You can fit in a lot of info in 1 page.

</comment><comment><USER6> My own custom one. :) They're not very hard to write and once written make updates a breeze. It's the ideal tool for resumes, I think.

<comment><USER7> Agreed. If you're too lazy to start from scratch you can start with any old template and vandalize away to your hearts content.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Here:

[https://www.sharelatex.com/templates/cv-or- resume](https://www.sharelatex.com/templates/cv-or-resume)

I like the ones with a picture, although I'm not sure if pictures are appropriate in CVs.

</comment><comment><USER9> Is there a "simple" way to draw rectangles and fill them with colors and overlay text?

I have a nice home-made Word resume and the only thing stopping me from moving it to LaTeX is the fear that the design would be too much work.

<comment><USER10> Check out [http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/38354/make-an- example...](http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/38354/make-an-example-and- shaded-box-like-in-the-book)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> If someone prefers a more WYSIWYG approach, they might try the open source Scribus ( [http://www.scribus.net/](http://www.scribus.net/) )

</comment><comment><USER12> I used moderncv with slight modifications for my last cv.

</comment><comment><USER13> How to learn LaTex quickly (good enough to create an awesome looking resume)?</comment>


Hiring, firing and more - <AUTHOR> https://minnenratta.wordpress.com/2018/01/18/hiring-firing-and-more/ <comment><USER3> > #9 Hire only for good reasons. Being overworked is not a good reason to > hire. Instead, hire to be ready to catch opportunities, not to survive the > current battles.

Being overworked is an _excellent_ reason to hire. It shows that you are about to lose your team due to burn-out or extended sick leave. Good managers know that the work load has to be such that there is some built in 'down time' in the schedule and no amount of pressure cooking or death marching is a substitute for bad planning. Overworked employees are a _management failure_ and if you are reading this to get actionable advice that means _you_.

> #32 Delivery dates…

The lesson learned should be to release incrementally, rather than in one go.

> #8 Fire people whenever you can. There's often someone to fire, but not many > opportunities to do so. When you are given a lot of opportunities to fire > people, it is often due to a crisis situation and you'll likely fire or > otherwise lose the wrong people. People appreciate when you fire the right > people, so don't worry about morale.

No, fire people when you _have to_ , and for the right reasons, definitely not 'because you can'. If you fire without having a good reason it will affect morale and in the worst possible way.

> #2 Don't be prudish. If you fear that people will lose faith in you because > of the foggy goals and dire situation statement you are painting yourself in > a heroic corner.

I can't even parse that in the current context.

<comment><USER4> > Being overworked is an excellent reason to hire. It shows that you are about > to lose your team due to burn-out or extended sick leave.

I took the original comment to imply that when employees are overworked, it is due to a failure in planning to assure a project is adaquately staffed from the beginning. _That_ is when you should hire, not because you just began to notice you failed to plan appropriately.

Sure, if someone is being overworked, hire to spread the load (if new person can ramp-up fast enough). But don't put your employees in that position to begin with, because some of them won't return to full productivity, even after you resolve the problem. Overwork for any duration comes at a cost.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> "Hire only for good reasons." Well, yeah, that's good if painfully obvious advice.

"Fire people whenever you can." Don't do this. "There's often someone to fire, but not many opportunities to do so." I thought you were hiring for good reasons, why the bloat?

"it is good to at least apply a low-frequency filter when passing along the "news", so that good and productive people can carry on without too much hassle."

Only if you're their only connection to the real world, otherwise you'll be quickly spotted for the bullshitter you are.

This is a weird article.

<comment><USER6> Firing is not because of bloat, but because that person needs replacing - <USER2> takes time to detect bad hires; and also people change, even if they were a good hire a few years ago, now they may not any longer be good at that position in that company.

Looking back with hindsight at the firings I've participated over the years, in all cases it would've been better if they would have been done much sooner; and most of the doubtful decisions that didn't result in a firing actually should have.

In essence, firing/not-firing usually turns out into a tradeoff between avoiding some short-term pain ("it's hard to get a replacement right now, it will affect schedules") and a significant long-term productivity cost. And people tend to prioritize the short term problems, while almost always it's actually better to take the short term hit to build better results in the long run - so, as a rule of thumb, it should be expected that right now you're firing a bit too carefully and should be firing a bit more (but not too much, naturally).

<comment><USER7> > people change, even if they were a good hire a few years ago, now they may > not any longer be good at that position in that company.

When a manager takes a very skilled person and demotivates them, that is what that looks like. It happens allllll the time. Fire the manager -- or you'll just be turning skilled workers into ex-workers.

<comment><USER8> This may be anecdotal, but at many of the places I've worked, the employer doesn't even bother to ask the employee why their underperforming before firing them. That conversation often times starts with, "We've decided to let you go because..."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This being on the front page makes me question the standards that the HN community has for managerial advice...

Anyway, bad hiring/firing advice is a lot like a bad hire/fire... Really bad. And this is almost entirely bad hiring/firing advice.

This is with the caveat that there are a lot of other good learnings in the original post.

</comment><comment><USER10> I think I understand what the author is trying to get at - people are sometimes clearly incompetent to do the role they're in - but firing them is a necessity, not an opportunity.

In fact, taking every available opportunity to fire people is biased by the metrics you use. No metric of developer productivity is ever as good as actually working in the same team, and so you'll probably lose:

\- anyone who writes tests and refactors code, for being slow

\- anyone who maintains the profitable parts of your software, for not having a list of impressive new features they worked on

\- anyone who takes time to help their co-workers, because they'll look less productive on paper

\- your most senior, most multidisciplinary, and most intelligent employees, because they'll appreciate the first three groups the most, because they can get another job faster, and because firing competent employees sends the message that the business is struggling

<comment><USER3> This holds even at the largest companies. For instance it is reasonably well documented that when working for Microsoft the only way to get promoted is to work on new stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> As an experienced software engineer, I did not find this to be particularly insightful. Some decent suggestions mingled into a whole bunch of bad ones. I also could not find info about who wrote this.

<comment><USER12> I for one found the bad suggestions to outnumber the good ones by a large margin, to be honest.

<comment><USER13> I'm taking their advice and firing this article. :-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I didn't read the original, but the clarification evokes a reaction in me.

I'm very much in agreement with the idea that you shouldn't hire _just because_ you are overworked. However, I would rephrase it in the positive: Hire when you are in a position to incorporate more people. Avoid hiring when you are not, even if you are over worked. Hiring someone because you are doggedly trying to hit a deadline and you think that bringing on more people will help you is one of the classic ways of torpedoing your team. Integrating new people takes time, attention and resources. You will have _less_ capability for a surprisingly long time immediately after you hire someone. Make sure that you hire when you have the capability of dealing with that. If you don't have the capability, then focus your activities until you do.

With respect to time synchronisations, logic would have me agreeing, but experience compels me to disagree. I've never had "ship when it's ready" work. That sounds horrible, but it's true. The main problem is that "ready" usually has a very loose definition and without anything to constrain it, it often expands over time. I'm sure there are ways to get it to work (by imposing other constraints), but I have not personally experienced that. Instead, I have had great success with using time to constrain what we deliver. The trick to this is to have _very_ good tracking and to be flexible in _reducing_ scope as you arrive at your arbitrary release date. By having very short releases, you can kind of approximate the "release when ready" approach (to an extreme, you can have "internal only" releases and then have an "external release" when you think it is "good enough" \-- but you have to be very careful of the "creeping good enough" even still).

The other stuff is hard for me to comment on because I have yet to form firm opinions (after 30 or so years on the job!) I've definitely changed my mind a _lot_ and I suspect most other people will too, given enough time in the industry. Possibly it's hard to make a general statement because it is to sensitive to the context.

</comment><comment><USER15> People do appreciate when you fire the right people, but if you do the firing under the cover of a downturn or crisis or something, then ostensibly you're not firing them for underperforming, you're firing them due to the crisis. Which makes good people fear for their jobs and consider moving on. After all, as they see it, they may be needing to move on soon regardless.</comment>


Node Knockout 2013 Winners - <AUTHOR> http://nodeknockout.com

<comment><USER2> Personally, I think the most interesting one one is Tidbit, which lets you mine bitcoin via an iframe installed on your website. [http://nodeknockout.com/teams/shoop- team](http://nodeknockout.com/teams/shoop-team)

</comment><comment><USER3> Oops! Google Chrome could not connect to nodeknockout.com

<comment><AUTHOR> fixed, sorry about that!</comment></comment>


Teixobactin: A New Antibiotic from a New Platform? - <AUTHOR> http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2015/01/08/teixobactin_a_new_antibiotic_from_a_new_platform.php

<comment><USER2> Previous very extensive discussion of this interesting news from a different source, on HN front page two days ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8852487](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8852487)

<comment><USER3> I missed that discussion, thanks, although this link is a better read than the bloomberg article.

To add to this post though, there is an interview with one of the researchers (Lewis) on the BBC World Service Science in Action. Podcast is here:

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/scia](http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/scia)</comment></comment>


Elon Musk calls US shelter-in-place orders fascist, un-American - <AUTHOR> https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-rant-coronavirus-shelter-place-orders-fascist-unamerican-imprisoning-2020-4 <comment><USER2> It would be more accurate to call it authoritarian as opposed to fascist (I just learned about the distinction the other day).

Not sure if it's faux pas to drop a link in a different thread than the original submission, but my thoughts on the "shelter-in-place" orders are captured here:

[https://www.ryankemper.io/post/2020-04-29-the_case_for_endin...](https://www.ryankemper.io/post/2020-04-29-the_case_for_ending_lockdown/)

A few select pieces:

> There is an ironic parallel to the concept of cytokine storm. Just as our > immune systems sometimes get overzealous and destroy the body, so too has > our response to COVID-19 ironically ended up damaging the stability of our > economic and socioemotional systems and made us less resilient in the face > of future crises.

And

> We as American citizens need to fight against this worrying trend of > censorship and mass surveillance. Other countries do not even have the > concept of freedom of speech/assembly embedded into their founding > documents. Thus we are in a unique position where we are fighting not just > to save lives, but perhaps more importantly, to save the soul of our > country.

\--

Focusing on what Elon said:

> "Frankly, I would call it forcible imprisoning of people in their homes > against all of, their constitutional rights, in my opinion," he said. "It's > breaking people's freedoms in ways that are horrible and wrong and not why > they came to America or built this country.

I agree with this, although I would probably soften the language around forcible imprisonment slightly.

Along that same vein:

> "If somebody wants to stay in their house, that's great and they should be > able to," he said. "But to say they cannot leave their house and that they > will be arrested if they do: that's fascist. That is not democratic; this is > not freedom. Give people back their goddamn freedom."

Yup, no argument here.

<comment><USER3> >Other countries do not even have the concept of freedom of speech/assembly embedded into their founding documents.

Many countries recognize such rights as part of their constitution or primary legal framework, and those rights are recognized by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The First Amendment itself was inspired by the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and the English Bill of Rights.

The premise that the United States, alone, recognizes freedom of speech as a legal right is simply absurd.

>I agree with this, although I would probably soften the language around forcible imprisonment slightly.

I'd soften it a lot, because as far as I know, no one is being forcibly imprisoned in their homes under shelter-in-place orders in the US. At least in my case, the orders for my city don't prevent me from moving freely. I have to wear a mask in public, and my local supermarket opens later and closes earlier and has item limits to stop panic buying, and there is an 11pm curfew, but those are hardly what I would consider to be the signs of a totalitarian police state.

<comment><USER4>
      The First Amendment itself was inspired by the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

From Wikipedia: "The Declaration was drafted by the Abbé Sieyès and the Marquis de Lafayette, _in consultation with Thomas Jefferson._ "</comment></comment></comment>


Subscriptions and the new In-App Purchase requirement - <AUTHOR> http://www.marco.org/3437484678 <comment><USER2> Marco really nailed it. He was also exceptionally level-headed considering that his application, Instapaper, is likely to find itself in exactly the situation he outlines. Marco's plans for Instapaper are based around paid accounts for API access, which would enable third-party apps for paid users. It would be an absolute shame if Marco's app weren't allowed on iOS. Quite honestly, if Instapaper, Dropbox, and Evernote are under threat to be removed from the App Store, I won't even consider a new iPhone until Apple revises its policy.

<comment><USER3> I wonder if you'll see under the table deals where 3rd parties write apps for these services FOR the company to bypass the restriction, assuming 3rd party apps are still allowed by Apple's new policy.

<comment><USER4> I hadn't thought about it, but this is what they should do.

<comment><USER2> That would be a horrible business decision, in my opinion. "Under the table" deal is just another way of saying "violating the agreement I signed". Two wrongs don't make a right, etc, etc. But more importantly, operating in the background would just enable Apple. Cutting Apple out of the revenue won't really hurt them, but it will increase dependence on their platform, which gives them more leverage.

Under the table deals would be extremely short sighted and dishonest.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, I think you are right.. I was commenting on the third party part more than the under the table part.

I was thinking more along the lines of Amazon creating an open or liscensed API for it's ebooks, so that someone can make an app for me to log into and read books that I own. Users could still read their kindle books on their iphones, and amazon could keep it's position as the best book store for iOS users, expand to other devices, etc..

I don't think it is worth it for someone like Amazon or Pandora to stay off of Apple's platform just to give them less leverage, but I agree that they would have to be upfront about it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I agree with all the points except for the one that believes it's within Apple right to do whatever they want because it's their hardware and platform. Let's forget that the hardware really belongs to the iPhone/iPad owners for a moment, but if it's defensible because it's their platform then it's more reasonable for Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast to take a cut from all sales and profits happened via their network. It's their platforms, which took them decades to build. And surely there's value added when they offer preferentially faster speed and more secured transaction to whichever companies agree to pay them. It would be hilarious if an ISP starts demanding 30% cut from every sale Apple makes that originates from their network.

<comment><USER6> Ah,

And _then_ every ISP will demand a cut of every sale that happens on the Internet part of their network. Finally, the telecos implement some good natural language processing and demand a cut of every sale you negotiate over their _voice_ network...

...Their network, their rules...

... that will work well till the Oxygen cartel starts making demands....

<comment><USER7> Indeed. Whatever happened to "With the internet, we can cut out the middlemen"? Suddenly, every corporation wants to set up tollboothes along the way and starts demanding their cut.

If this continues, in small steps, we'll be back at the old way, in which the content creator gets only a minimal share of the pie, and it's the distributors that get rich.

I'm all for an open, "flat", neutral infrastructure, so there is no way I'll be buying any Apple products.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I really like how he moves the argument from "Does Apple have the right to do this?" to "Should Apple do this?" I'm really surprised: this is what I've always been taught to call bad revenue. I could understand a bit better if they were a struggling startup looking for any possible profitable business model, but they are printing money already. I'm left shaking my head here. Even the folks who often rush to Apple's defense seem to agree this is a mistake. For me, this is the first time that I've looked around Apple's walled garden and wanted out.

<comment><USER6> _I'm really surprised: this is what I've always been taught to call bad revenue._

Interesting. Do you mean it is more like a move to squeeze the last available dollar out of an existing business rather than a move to grow a business?

<comment><USER9> I am interpreting it more as revenue that actually ends up indirectly costing you more to obtain than it's worth in the long run, so that you come out net behind. For instance, this App Store policy will bring in revenue but if enough developers and customers leave the ecosystem because of it Apple will end up a net loser.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Marco's analysis is sane & pursuasive. It's a much better response than the Readability team's rant.

Clear heads will win this fight.

<comment><USER11> Will they? Many App Store absurdities have been resolved through the squeaky wheels getting the grease.

<comment><USER12> Maybe it's a planned double-whammy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I think one very interesting case is services like directv, dish networks, comcast, tivo etc. They all offer services but their apps are ancillary to the subscription service that they provide. Does Apple want Directv to offer subscriptions within the app?

<comment><USER14> Only if the content being paid for is delivered through the app. If the app is just something like a remote control or a channel guide then I'm guessing Apple would let it slide.

<comment><USER15> It's exactly this issue though. Where's the line on what Apple will "let slide"? When is something part of the core service of a product?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Just so I've got this clear..

If I develop an enterprise ipad application and track down the customers myself, it is possible to sell to them and take 100% of the revenue still?

I can do this by offering the app for free on the app store and requiring activation through my own external signup system. However, I must also offer the option to sign up using Apple's API and Apple taking 30%?

I just need to be on the phone to the customer when they download the app and ask them politely to not use the Apple method?

<comment><USER17> Why ask them? Just price the Apple-payment-system version 30% higher than your own and let customers see the difference.

<comment><USER18> You can't do this. Apple states you must price it the same.

<comment><USER19> Or lower.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> What's going to be interesting to me, now, is whether or not this will cause developers (more specifically, service and not game developers) to start to look more seriously at web-only apps, as opposed to native.

You're thinking, "the performance of web apps doesn't at all compare to native apps," and you're (mostly) right. Web apps tend to feel a bit slower and less responsive. _But_ if we can get one "hero" (i.e., popular web-only app) then people will learn to accept/ignore that the performance isn't quite the same as what they get when they download an app — and that would be good for the whole mobile web ecosystem.

And, of course, as mobile browsers (fairly quickly) advance, the performance will increase significantly and the difference will be less noticeable.

<comment><USER21> The problem isn't the performance of mobile apps. We're about to release an ipad app that could've easily been a webapp—it is 90% implemented via javascript+HTML, animated with CSS transitions, all in a UIWebView controller. We do a lot of app-side caching, but I think a sufficiently-motivated javascript dev could do something similar.

The problem is that by not making it a native app, you're cutting yourself off from "the way people get apps" for their devices. The app store is a distribution mechanism that just _can't_ be ignored by a serious mobile developer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Is it interesting timing that in-app subscription rollout is happening as Steve Jobs is taking a step back? I wonder if this says anything about the potential PR fallout to happen that Steve would handle better than most others just as he did when the iPhone prices were lowered.

<comment><USER21> Considering the main press release quotes Jobs[1], this is unlikely.

[1] "Our philosophy is simple—when Apple brings a new subscriber to the app, Apple earns a 30 percent share; when the publisher brings an existing or new subscriber to the app, the publisher keeps 100 percent and Apple earns nothing."

<comment><USER23> Except that Steve's quote is a good argument for the conservative interpretation, which says that if you don't use an iOS app as advertisement for non-App Store payment, nothing changes. Because to me it seems like there's no necessary IAP option implied and if the publisher isn't using Apple's means (including the iOS platform itself), it keeps its 100%.

That battle of interpretations rages on, unless I've heard different. It looks like Marco is taking the liberal interpretation (apps must accept IAP as a form of payment for any services they offer).

It seems to me this is the underlying debate.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Marco didn't mention the possibility that more people would begin to jailbreak their phones and use Cydia or another site, where Apple can't control the applications on offer. Am I underestimating the difficulty of jailbreaking an iPhone and setting that up?

<comment><USER25> You're overestimating peoples inclination to fuck around with cruddy hacks. The vast, vast number of iPhone users aren't nerds, and have no desire to become nerds.</comment></comment>


Apply HN: FundChan.com – funded channel messaging - <AUTHOR> FundChan is a messaging auction platform where senders place bids to get their message to the front of the recipient's message queue.
This addresses the problem of communication in asymmetric relationships -- I know you, but you don't know me, so how do we open a channel of communication that works for both of us?
Enter FundChan.com, which is live and fully functioning at https://fundchan.com. (note: I have zero traction/users, which is why I am applying to YC).
Here are examples of asymmetric relationships/use-cases we may address:
In Hollywood: -- fan/celebrity or C-list actor/A-list director
In Silicon Valley: -- salesperson/CEO or CEO/investor
In World: -- advertiser/consumer
FundChan features person-to-person direct messaging as well as targeted public messaging.
I have been working on this project for over 10 years now, so, yes, I am obsessed. The project has also evolved and iterated over the years as my understanding and approach to the problem has changed, as well as my programming skills (php/mysql).
I am ready with answers to your questions! Feel free to post hardball comments -- I can take it. <comment><AUTHOR> Here are a couple of videos that describe the conceptual underpinnings of FundChan. Please forgive the low production values -- I fully own that I am a dork. These videos were posted many years ago, so you can get a sense of how the project has evolved.

Charting the mindshare market [https://youtu.be/5EJGF7hddc8](https://youtu.be/5EJGF7hddc8)

I Hate Advertising [https://youtu.be/TyuVeIIRb8o](https://youtu.be/TyuVeIIRb8o)

</comment><comment><USER2> Seems like you have a pretty hard chicken-and-egg problem, since you've been working on this for so long without traction. How are you going to attract users? What have you tried and why have those things failed?

If I was a celebrity or someone important, why would I sign up to receive unsolicited messages for a pittance? I feel like you have a value mismatch -- people worth contacting want a strong filter (high $ value), and the people that want to contact them won't want to spend that much. The only people who will be reachable will have a low value and probably aren't worth contacting.

How do you know people want this?

<comment><AUTHOR> Excellent questions - thank you!

I'm going to answer your questions in reverse order.

 _How do you know people want this?_ First off, I want it, and others will want it if it is designed and presented properly -- that is what is taking me 10 years to figure out.

Regarding the second question, there is a problem with the way you frame the question. "Unsolicited messages for a pittance" \-- of course nobody wants that, but there is some amount for which anyone would welcome an unsolicited message. Me, I would welcome receiving a 25 cent message. There are advertisers who are paying a lot more than that to send me unsolicited commercial messages, and it comes to me as junk that I resent.

For the celebrity, the situation is the same. There is some amount that any celebrity would accept. There are fans who are willing to pay some amount. I would be willing to pay a few bucks to send a message of admiration and support to Edward Snowden. In the FundChan system, my bid would be competing with other admirers to get to the front of the line. If I bid enough, he gets my message. If I am outbid, he doesn't get my message, I keep my money.

 _How are you going to attract users?_ YC Startup School (great videos!) taught me that I have to do things that don't scale to get early traction. Right now my plan is to campaign to get what I call high value targets into FundChan -- people other people want to reach. This could be celebrities (I'm in Los Angeles, so Hollywood is a natural) or, if I get into YC, I will campaign to get sought-after members of the YC community.

So, how much would Sam Altman be willing to accept to read a message? Who would be the highest bidder to send him a message? This is simple supply and demand. If the supply (Sam's attention for a moment at a given price) meets demand (the amount the highest bidder is willing to pay) then we have a market.

In the FundChan system there are two data points for every user: Notice Price and High Bid. The Notice Price is the bid amount set by the user that will trigger a text or email notification. This is a price signal from the recipient to the sender. High Bid is the currently highest bid in the recipient's message queue. This is an indication of the demand for the recipients attention. As a sender, I decide if I want to bid high enough to get to the front of the message queue, or if I want to bid high enough to trigger a notification.

What do you imagine would be Sam Altman's Notice Price and High Bid?

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Here is the video I submitted for my YC application (hyperlinked): [https://youtu.be/OIdjmDEQrEw](https://youtu.be/OIdjmDEQrEw)</comment>


Product Review: Siemens' SIMpad SL4 (2003) - <AUTHOR> http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6733 <comment><USER2> I don't understand why this article is on the front page given the headline. This was as much an iPad as a Commodore 64 is a zBox 4 supercomputer.

The SIMpad 4 (referenced in the article) was invented by Keith and Koep of Siemens AG, not Microsoft and ran WinCE 3.0 and WinCE 4.0, but could run Linux. It was designed as a portable Internet browser, not as a media consumption device (the StrongARM processor used was the same as that used in the early iPaqs that I used to work on with Familiar Linux and wasn't anywhere near powerful enough to do things like hardcore media playing beyond MP3s and low-res Mpegs).

Incidentally, as someone that used OPIE I can tell you it was a sack of the proverbial and nowhere near the experience of the iPad. It was very much experimental in terms of user paradigms that didn't always work and certainly weren't suitable for normal non-techie users. To be fair, much of the same charges could've been made against the appropriately named WinCE at the time.

<comment><USER3> I agree, an 11 year old device with 32 MB RAM is nowhere near the experience of the iPad, IMHO

<comment><AUTHOR> You have to remember the constraints of the time - just like an early mac offered a windows (as in WIMP) experience compared to the prevalent DOS

<comment><USER4> The saying goes that the iPad was on the map since a long time but serious work on it kept being pushed back specifically because of hardware limitations. Some go as far as considering the iPhone as a byproduct of the R&D put into the future iPad.

I think that it makes quite some sense.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There seems to be a misunderstanding. When you say iPad you mean a device that looks like a portable EKG from 1996. When I say iPad I mean that device that looks like the tablet "Data" is holding in Star Trek.

<comment><USER6> I daresay the power/space ratio of computers increased dramatically from 2000 to 2010 (ipad release), allowing much more elegant designs, not to mention the absolute transformation of computers from a moderately expensive specialty tool with side uses to most definitely being a common household appliance worthy of design.

For comparison, here's apple's powerbook g3 from the same era:

[https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=powerbook+g3&hl=en...](https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=powerbook+g3&hl=en&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=K5yWUO7eNIrKrAf444GQCg&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAQ&biw=1094&bih=685)

(herp derp I R dell computer!)

Or how about the disgusting early powerbook g4s?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:15-inch-titanium- powerbook...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:15-inch-titanium- powerbook.jpg)

Looks just as tacky as apple imitators today.

I'm always surprised by the lack of humbleness that apple fanatics display, forgetting apple's own history.

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed, the technical progress allowed a finer device, but besides the thinness (and therefore the weight) it was as similar as possible to an iPad with the constraints of the day.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Microsoft and Apple and many other companies were designing "iPad like" products even in the 90's.

The iPad didn't just fall out of the sky as a totally new product. But it did have a bunch of subtle improvements that make it easy to use.

<comment><USER8> Correct. Tablet computers were nothing new when the iPad was released just as smart phones were nothing new when the iPhone was released. Apple just has the knack of getting them right for consumer adoption.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> _Siemens is known to the public mostly for the cellular phones it builds_

Siemens is known to the public for (once upon a time) powering everything from consumer hardware, marine current turbines, to Irans nuclear program. The company is massive.

They probably built this more for themselves than anyone else.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I see many comments wondering how this can be compared to an iPad.

Given the technology of the time - yes it was as close as possible to an iPad.

Microsoft made the OS (a windows CE with minor tweaks) and Siemens made the hardware.

A ARM powered tablet, with wireless (DECT), oriented toward consumption of internet content, without any user replaceable part besides a PCMCIA port.

It was impressive in 2001 - and still good enough in 2003 to get many followers when it was EOL'ed.

</comment><comment><USER10> There were windows slates available in the same time period, like the Compaq TC1100. iPad -like in the overall form factor but very far off in terms of price, weight and simplicity.

</comment><comment><USER11> An iPad - seriously?</comment>


I Was an Amazon Chew Toy - <AUTHOR> http://www.theawl.com/2015/01/i-was-an-amazon-chew-toy?src=longreads

<comment><USER2> Being a European, I find this very... surreal.

It is often considered that our labor regulations and unions encumbers businesses, but when I read stories like this I can't help thinking that it's actually the other way around.</comment>