How to confuse a moral compass: Survey 'magic trick' causes attitude reversal - <AUTHOR> http://www.nature.com/news/how-to-confuse-a-moral-compass-1.11447

<comment><USER4> I am not sure the conclusions are particularly revelatory. The political system in the US appears to rely on using tribal association - Democrat/Republican, Conservative/Liberal - to get people to group themselves (by branding each tribe) then the political class just inserts whatever policies suit their goals and the masses fill in the blanks of justification. From the last decade alone there are countless examples of Bush policies opposed by D voters and supported by R voters yet when the same policies are enacted by the Obama administration people take the opposite positions. We all know it happens and see it every day.

<comment><USER5> > countless examples

name one.

> We all know

I think you see what you want to see, and not any reality.

<comment><USER6> Here's one example: some twenty years ago, "science" was a dirty word among liberals, Newton's Principia was a "rape manual", quarks were "constructed", and "scientism" was but another tool in our evil western civilization's arsenal for oppressing minorities and other cultures.

Nowadays, liberals are _all about_ science. Anyone who'd dare to question the scientific method is corrupt or crazy or both. All it took was the climate change and the controversy around teaching evolution in schools.

<comment><USER5> I was around 20 years ago and I have no idea what you're talking about. Mainstream liberals were anti-science?

<comment><USER4> The Republicans owned NASA and space science in the 80s. Yes there was definitely an anti-science bent in mainstream liberalism for quite some time.

<comment><USER5> I worked for NASA then, you are making stuff up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> 1\. How many people might notice, but think that the mistake was theirs, and even argue for the opposite of their position in order to save face?

2\. How many of these people hold staunch views on the questions asked? E.g. would this have the same effect on a extremist skinhead as it would on the average college student?

<comment><USER8> > 1\. How many people might notice, but think that the mistake was theirs, and > even argue for the opposite of their position in order to save face?

Probably most of them. This mechanism has been described by Cialdini as "Commitment and Consistency". Marketers abuse this in a clever way by ramping up commitment. If you answer a bunch of seemingly innocent questions to make you look good ("I often go see opera"), you have made a small commitment. Then it can be leveraged to sell you an expensive opera discount card ("For a person who visits opera so often, it would be irrational to turn the offer down".)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think this experiment does more to show the ineffectiveness of surveys than it does to imply that the subjects are fools.

<comment><USER10> In what way does it show ineffectiveness of surveys ? not challennging the assertion, trying to understand why you think so.

To me it seemed to be an indication of what was stated in the article, that people are less committed to their views than they imagine.

I would go one step further and conjecture that we have a tendency to defend a position, when confronted with "evidence" that we have endorsed that view before. I expect this to work on moral positions on which our convictions are not solid.

@pyre My confusion was not about whether surveys can be manipulated. I can well imagine that they can be. My question was more in the lines of: where in linked post is it demonstrated. Sometimes I dont read between the lines enough and thought I must have missed something. And yes, who in their right mind would want to leave any children behind ! Its mostly semantic gymanstics

<comment><USER11> >In what way does it show ineffectiveness of surveys ? not challennging the assertion, trying to understand why you think so. >To me it seemed to be an indication of what was stated in the article, that people are less committed to their views than they imagine.

The problem is that a survey result is a pretty meaningless number if it can be changed by anyone you put on television with a fancy suit and a pie chart. What you really want to know from a survey is a) what the people who feel strongly think about it, i.e. the people who can't be swayed by an ad buy or a newscast, and b) what portion of the population are those people and what portion are the ones who can be easily swayed. But if people are overestimating how strongly they're committed to their answers then they're contaminating both results: The second directly and the first indirectly by inserting the uninformed answers of the disinterested into the sample that ostensibly measures those with strong feelings.

<comment><USER12> I agree with everything you're saying, except for the fact that you've got the assumption in there that the purpose of a survey is to genuinely understand people's opinions on a subject rather than to claim support for your own position or even to influence the views of the people you are surveying.

This may be a semantics thing, but surveys are extremely effective - just not as a tool for understanding opinions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Slightly off topic, but when I scrolled to the bottom of the article, I was really excited to see they had _proper_ citations for the research the article was talking about.

I actually thought this was a BBC article, hadn't been paying much attention to the design and URL. Then I realized that this was on Nature, so I suppose it is to be expected here.

I really wish more science journalism did this, even on mainstream outlets.

</comment><comment><USER14> Did attitudes reverse, or did students that had no real opinion on some topics make up answers to them, and when they re-read the questions and they were different, accepted that because they didn't feel strongly either way?

Or, did students have some opinion on the topic, but when faced with a reworded question, be embarrassed that they must have misread it initially - which means they had not done what they were asked to do, which is answer the survey properly? There can be a lot of pressure to participate correctly in psychological experiments, I know that in my undergrad you had a requirement to do some amount of experiments to graduate (and non-psych students would be paid, which also puts pressure on you to do your role correctly). To say "sorry, I wasted your time - I misread these questions" would not be easy, much simpler to just make up new answers and leave.

I find it hard to accept their interpretation that attitudes actually reversed. Yes, some experiments - like Milgram's - show that people can do surprising things, that we would not expect in advance, and would even say "I would never do that", but likely we would. But this isn't the same - <USER2> Milgram's study, behavior was all that mattered. In this one, it is the interpretation of changing attitudes. I agree it is likely people will _voice_ different attitudes, but I doubt it is because they actually changed them, instead it is either social pressure to not admit you failed at your task to read the questions and answer them honestly, and/or that the student doesn't care either way about the topic.

</comment><comment><USER15> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0ZZJXw4MTA> Good take on surveys and leading questions

</comment><comment><USER16> Our minds are much less logical, consistent, or rational than we like to imagine. The concept of cognitive shortcuts is not new, analytical thinking requires effort and energy, so our minds tend to filter out majority of input and process it subconsciously instead of expending energy on consciously analyzing and processing every little decision. Unfortunately the filtering mechanisms are automatic and kick in even for things that _should_ be considered thoughtfully.

Some further reading on cognitive biases and shortcuts:

\- Motivated Tactician model tries to explain why people use stereotyping, biases, and categorization in some situations and more analytical thinking in others [<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivated_tactician>]

\- Framing of problem/question affects how we process it, and even the answer we arrive at. [<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_(social_sciences)>]

\- Affect heuristic is "going with your gut", or deciding based on emotion evoked by the question [<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affect_heuristic>]

\- Availability heuristic is the "if you can think of it, it must be important" heuristic, which leads people to fear flying more than driving and terrorism more than flying, even though their chances of dying from a car accident are far higher than ever being involved in a plane crash or a terrorist attack [<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Availability_heuristic>]

</comment><comment><USER17> Of cause it could be also the case, that survey participants just do not care that much about the responses they give, i.e. they are not very interested in arguing about their answers but instead want to get out of the survey situation.

</comment><comment><USER18> [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Cialdini#6_key_principle...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Cialdini#6_key_principles_of_persuasion_by_Robert_Cialdini)

See: "Commitment and Consistency"

<comment><USER19> Scott Adams (of Dilbert), also inspired by Cialdini, found an excellent use for the consistency principle. See [0] (text possibly nsfw)

[0] [http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/03/toda...](http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/03/today_i_will_im.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> These must have been questions on which the participants did not feel particularly strongly one way or the other. I'm pretty sure I would notice a 100% reversal in my stance on something I have a prior opinion on.

<comment><USER21> Having a prior opinion is about having some previous understanding of the subject being discussed. If more data were to be provided to you then you might reason differently. Not because you are changing your mind or flip- flopping (like politicians say), but because you are a thinker and coherent individual. You will analyse the new data with fresh eyes and challenge the old data with it. Its all part of the scientific approach. Don't you agree?

<comment><USER20> Being given new information on a subject I know about which contradicts my understanding might make me change my mind. Just showing me that I apparently answered the question differently wouldn't, for the obvious reason that I know about the subject.

If I don't have any previous understanding of the subject then I wouldn't be able to give an immediate opinion on it. If pressed, I might choose to answer a question on the spur of the moment, but my choice would be mainly random. If it was mainly random then the magic trick described here would probably work, but it wouldn't really mean anything as it was a mainly random choice in the first place.

<comment><USER21> :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is different from the classic phenomenon explored in _Yes, Prime Minister_ [1].

It's not that they manipulated the questions in advance -- it's that they _reversed the meaning of the questions after the respondent had answered them_. Even under these conditions, the majority of respondents were then prepared to support the position which they had, ostensibly, only a few minutes ago opposed and _vice versa_.

Remarkable.

[1] <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0ZZJXw4MTA>

<comment><USER23> nothing remarkable. if any one of us were presented in a fabriacted "forwarded" quote by us,

> in this format...

and we didn't really care, we would probably defend the misquotation (unless we explicitly remember what we actually said.)

when was the last time you said: "If I said that, I was completely wrong: I feel the opposite on this matter."

that would leave someone looking like someone completely unreliable whose opinion shouldn't matter in the slightest. no shit people don't want to be that person and will protect what they think people believe they have said.

you could show this with a second study, in which people are asked to defend a statement others heard them make, but where the defendend KNOWS that what the other HEARD is not what they SAID. It's easier and probably in many cases will happen, that you defend what you know the other person thought you had said.

THIS IS WHY "DISRUPTIVE LISTENING" (sorry, I don't remembe rthe correct word at the moment, the meaning is "actively pretending to hear something else") WORKS SO WELL.

In other words. If you are told, "There is no way we can ever be interested", and you repeat to the caller, "so if I understand you you are saying that there is no way you can put it in this month's budget"

then the person will quite likely agree with that statement. You just changed their meaning and yet they will not contradict you.

I wouldn't either.

<comment><USER24> I say "I was wrong" quite a lot in fact, and I think it's an important ability. Of course, it's easier when you've been called out on some trivia or an educated guess, but I'm not often confronted with something _I_ said that is _diametrically opposed_ to what I currently believe. Is anyone?

(Cue political jokes)

<comment><USER23> but we're talking about a few moments ago. it is a conversational thing - <USER3> doesn't make much sense to argue against what you've just been misquoted as saying a moment ago.

to justify the title, "how to confuse a moral compass" the methodology would have to remove the justification or public discourse aspect, and show that someone's internal or private belief actually changed due to the conversational obligation to defend what they are misquoted as saying. i.e. you would have to find out what they thought to themselves privately before and after.

maybe a way to do this would be to have an "outside friend" who is more trusted than any of the people involved in this fake context, and see if they would report a different opinion to this friend that they think has no connection or knowledge of the immediate social context, due to the misquotation in the immediate social context.

As it is,the methodolgy does not justify the conclusion. (as summarized for us, I didn't click through to the paper.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> In addition to "anecdotes are not data", everybody should learn that "self reported data is useless". Don't rely on it when making any kind of important decision. Surveys are just not a reliable way of learning anything about anything.

</comment><comment><USER26> _These findings suggest that if I'm fooled into thinking that I endorse a view, I'll do the work myself to come up with my own reasons [for endorsing it]._

Isn't this what cable news is all about?

</comment><comment><USER27> This doesn't show the ineffectiveness of surveys but rather the effectiveness of surveys as a brainwashing tool.

</comment><comment><USER28> In the last paragraph, is the critic asking me to believe that the ethics of meat consumption are somehow _more important to me_ than policy in Palestine? Really?

<comment><USER29> Why does that seem surprising? The vast majority of people will perceive that policy in Palestine neither directly affects them nor can be directly affected by them, while the ethics of meat consumption affects everyone who eats meat and everyone who chooses not to eat meat for ethical reasons.

<comment><USER28> So animal rights are honestly more important to you than human ones? Seriously?

<comment><USER29> I didn't say they were, or which side of either issue I come down on; those aren't really germane to the point of my comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I didn't really get the glue part, but the,results of this study point to some really interesting conclusions that,could be huge for copy in the future.

</comment><comment><USER31> _"I don't feel we have exposed people or fooled them," says Hall. "Rather this shows something otherwise very difficult to show, [which is] how open and flexible people can actually be."_

\--There is a "social" reversal stigma, likely at play here.[1] In isolation witout time constraint, check to confirm result.

_______________________

[1] _"Participants were then asked to [read aloud] three of the statements, including the two that had been altered, and discuss their responses."_</comment>


Amazon reviews now unreliable: negative reviews filtered (Anker example) - <AUTHOR> http://notes.kateva.org/2018/11/amazon-reviews-now-unreliable-negative.html <comment><USER2> I received my first fake from the UK site recently; a microSD card. I too was prevented from leaving a review due to "unusual review activity" for that product.

Checking the reviews I saw that many people had also received fakes and left one star reviews. Most reviews were five star, so I guess there's some commingling or similar.

They've sent a replacement but, rightly or wrongly, I feel not only was my time wasted but that I'm subject to a minor coverup.

<comment><USER3> Amazon's entire model is flawed in this respect.

Products on the platform are "deduped" by merging listings from multiple sellers of the same product under a single master listing, where the price for the item is the lowest price available from all sellers.

This leads to counterfeit sellers targeting high-quantity items, creating and selling fakes for just under MSRP and making out like bandits.

It's impossible for Amazon to police, and they can't avoid merging listings unless they want a million duplicate products in their search results.

<comment><USER4> I'd have thought that even when items are commingled there must be some way for Amazon to determine the origin and deal with it appropriately.

However, I would have also thought that it was in Amazon's interest to fix this before the items go the customer as it does have a detrimental impact on both Amazon and the counterfeited brand.

<comment><USER5> Apparently, Amazon has no idea which seller sent in the item amazon is selling you. I don't know how they can get away with it, or how this is even allowed. What if the item is so shitty that it causes injury or death? Wouldn't amazon like to know which of its sellers is responsible?

Anyway, one more reason to dump amazon, if their appalling treatment of people isn't enough maybe the time wasted in buying then returning fake items (if you can tell at all, if you're buying a product for the first time you can't always spot a fake) is.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> In my experience, whenever I want to find useful, unbiased reviews of a product and a discussion around this category of products, reddit is much better than amazon reviews. If you can find the right subreddit, you can extract a lot information out of reddit comments and buy the best product.

</comment><comment><USER7> Ebay is even worse. Now, if you contact the seller about an issue in any way, you lose your option to leave any type of feedback about that seller. I had switched to leaving feedback first, then opening a dispute, but I noticed in a handful of situations my negative feedback was deleted.

</comment><comment><USER8> "Censored Amazon Review of Sandisk Ultra 32GB Micro SDHC Card" discussed a month ago [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18017676](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18017676)

</comment><comment><USER9> What if the OP writes a 5-star review? Will Amazon accept it? It's not clear Amazon filtered the OP's review because it is negative.

</comment><comment><USER10> Even 'niche' markets of enthusiasts like reverb.com uses this dark pattern where you can't leave a non-positive review unless you first try to work out the issue with the other party directly.

</comment><comment><USER11> Fakespot.com</comment>


How Washington Can Support Entrepreneurs - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2009/0905.spc-sec.html <comment><USER2> Especially for techies, there are some good programs available for people who want to try a startup. Specifically SBIR (small business innovative research) and STTR (Small business Technology TRansfer) are really well suited to get money to get your feet off the ground. And they don't want any equity in return, they just want to be a customer!

<comment><USER3> You're kidding, right? No, seriously, you're kidding, right? They're predicated on "protectable IP" and only go to established companies - i.e. your side project doesn't qualify unless you've already incorporated. I could go on, but I already did:

[http://www.businessinsider.com/economic-advice-from-an- entre...](http://www.businessinsider.com/economic-advice-from-an-entrepreneur- thats-actually-doable-2009-3)

<comment><USER2> Odd, I worked for a small (3 people) company that lived off of these things. We didn't have any problems.

I'll note that these were all DoD.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Washington has one purpose today - feed the beast. Entrepreneurship and small business isn't on anyone's radar that matters. I can assure you that Pelosi, Frank, Obama and Maxine Waters - none of whom have ever been in business - couldn't care less about an Entrepreneurs dreams or ambitions. They're blinded by their own.

</comment><comment><USER5> There is a lot government can do to help, mainly by doing less:

1) Reverting bankruptcy laws to pre-2005

2) Health care availability for individuals (if I knew the perfect solution to US health care I'd be doing that as a startup, but some decoupling of employment and health care is key

</comment><comment><USER6> I think the "support" of DC is the kiss of death for any industry or field.

<comment><USER7> I don't think you deserve such down-voting ... Paul Graham's page has a link to T.J. Rodgers' congressional testimony to this very point.

However, there is "support" and there is throwing money. You're right about throwing money, but I think you're wrong about intelligent support.

DC can always, _always_ do a better job by:

1) Not subsidizing anyone, ever.

2) Increasing transparency of its laws

3) Taxing negative externalities rather than positive ones (so tax carbon instead of capital gains)

4) Removing market distortions like the immigration issue discussed in the article.

Notice that these measures are largely undoing rather than doing, and therefore don't sell well. DC is also, as you rightly point out, in a unique position to completely screw up any field it turns it eye to, by:

1) Subsidizing some part of the industry which therefore damages the innovation that would out-compete it.

2) Preventing failures and disallowing the knowledge acquired there to be applied to subsequent successful ventures

3) Making complicated, vaguely worded and frequently changing specific to an industry's particulars (like only allowing Cable providers to supply Television over their wires)

Sadly, the second set of policies sells a lot better politically than the first set. Which raises the question - why not? What's wrong with it?

Why does the US always feels the need to be "world-leading" at everything?

Is it really necessary to be world-leading? Is it so fundamental to the national ego that it is unthinkable to assume that like every other major power, our influence will wane and our leadership will become first co- operation and then acquiescence?

It seems silly, sometimes, to strive so vehemently for predominance, yet to have no use for it when obtained.

<comment><USER8> "Taxing negative externalities rather than positive ones (so tax carbon instead of capital gains)"

Problem: Negative externalities are supposed to go away. At which point you have no money. So you have to tax things (like income) that people just aren't going to do away with!

<comment><USER9> Taxing the negative externality behavior doesn't have the aim of eliminating it -- just causing it to be weighed properly in the firm's decisions.

But, you do have a point because 'proper' tax rates for negative externalities only pay for abatement/offset of the externalities' harm. You can't count exclusively on such taxes to pay for other unrelated public goods. (If you did, you'd be overtaxing the externality, causing underproduction of the related goods, which can be just as damaging to overall welfare as the original unabated negative externalities...)

<comment><USER8> "Taxing the negative externality behavior doesn't have the aim of eliminating it -- just causing it to be weighed properly in the firm's decisions."

But it does tend to reduce the externality, thus reducing tax base. Which interferes with revenue collection.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Is Quora the biggest blogging innovation in 10 years? - <AUTHOR> http://scobleizer.com/2010/12/26/is-quora-the-biggest-blogging-innovation-in-10-years/ <comment><USER2> Short answer: no.

Long answer: there is (IMHO) absolutely nothing innovative about Quora in terms of technology or concept. It's a Q&A site. No more, no less.

The only noteworthy thing about Quora is the marketing success in all the Valley insiders they've gotten to use it.

<comment><USER3> Completely disagree. Quora have done a whole bunch of very smart and innovative things that lead their Q&A site to be a very different beast from Yahoo! Answers / Mahalo / Stack Overflow etc.

* They are the first Q&A site I've seen that is completely personalised - you only see questions that are either followed by your social graph or apply to the topics you have selected.

* Questions are owned by the community, not the person who asked the question. It's actually pretty hard to figure out who asked a question in the first place, and other people can improve the wording, apply topics etc.

* They don't use a dumb points or badges based incentive system. Instead, their incentives are much more subtle - it's all about seeing how your peers respond to your interactions. The "thanks" button is a lovely example of this.

In 2002, would you have said "There's nothing innovative about Google in terms of technology or concept. It's a search engine. No more, no less." ?

But I don't think they're a "blogging" innovation. That's just a catchy headline.

<comment><USER4> Pagerank was a differentiator. None of your points are.

<comment><USER5> Pithy, but wrong.

They might not be themselves differentiators, but they are indicators of a differentiated understanding of how to design a good Q & A site that elicits high quality content from high quality contributers.

Technology is no longer the only differentiator. We've moved far enough "up the stack" that there are lots of ways to differentiate in consumer internet beyond better algorithms.

Do Craigslist, Facebook, or Twitter have anything that's, in your opinion, "differentiated"?

<comment><USER6> One could argue that those three sites just have the network effect going for them, but that's incorrect IMO.

<comment><USER7> I think Craiglist and Twitter had first mover advantage.

Facebook definitely started with the network effect. It was far technically inferior to Myspace and Friendster when I first signed up.

I only joined because of the exclusive feel which soon changed when they branched out. Many of my colleagues and I have said we never would have made a Facebook account if it was public like it is now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > _First, look at the Quora items I've been participating in. This is a lot > like a blog. But it's not Dave Winer's blog style. It's any question I've > followed, written in, voted up, etc_

No, it's like a forum.

</comment><comment><USER9> What a huge exaggeration of a headline.

Not that Quora isn't interesting/useful/cool, but need we have a meta discussion about how revolutionary every new product is?

It's like the Valley is turning into something like the more extreme parts of the fashion world: generating it's own excitement and obsolescence in a way wholly disconnected from the quality and utility of the actual products.

</comment><comment><USER10> Inside the bubble of Silicon Valley, maybe it is.

For the rest of the world, I don't think it is. I'm waiting for people outside the tech sector of the Bay Area to start using it.

<comment><USER11> The big question is whether teens using it to settle debates on the respective merits of Justin Bieber and Miley Cyrus will add to or destroy Quora's core value proposition...

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> It's not a blogging innovation - it's just a stream of activity that happens to be related to Q&A. It looks somewhat similar to someone's FriendFeed activity stream, or Twitter conversation stream.

Quora and StackOverflow might have improved the traditional Q&A site by making it more about conversations than just "HOW DO I GET BABBY" questions, but it's not blogging. Blogging is more about writing about what's on your mind. In some cases your blog entries are part of a conversation, but it's at the same level that a newspaper editorial is part of a conversation.

</comment><comment><USER13> No. But while we're here, they need to fix their search.

<comment><USER14> Totally agree, the usability of having a link that says "Add Question" to the right of the "Find" box, with no other button still makes me think I might accidentally be asking a question whenever I search. The only way to get search results is to actually select something out of the autocomplete list.

I rejected using Quora twice before I finally saw an explanation of how to search there.

I rarely want to ask questions, I often want to search. They've flipped the priority of those two things in the UI.

<comment><USER15> > the usability of having a link that says "Add Question" to the right of the > "Find" box, with no other button still makes me think I might accidentally > be asking a question

I thought the search field was the input field for the 'Add Question' button too. I finally found out when complaining in IRC that Quora didn't have a search.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I just created an account and logged in using my twitter. Pretty painless and I was soon presented with a stream of topics that interest me, highlighted by people I follow on twitter. Interesting and already relevant.

However, it was pretty much noise. The specific questions asked were fun, but not something I would like to spend any significant time dedicated to either answering or reading about.

That being said, with the rise fo Twitter, many people stopped blogging. I can see how this might get people to write something more meaningful and longer than 140 characters again...and since they are "hanging out" with an people they already have some interest in, it might work.

Interestingly, I think it almost fails as a Q&A site on first glance b/c the search seems so horrific.

Will I go back? Probably not. I would rather still use Google, which has better search, and see Quora in that feed.

Will other people create content for Quora, thereby creating value for Quora? Yes, undoubtedly. It happened with Mahalo, Stack Overflow and Digg/Reddit...it will happen here. To the scale Quora needs? Not sure. Depends if Google picks them up and if they open up to third party tools ala Twitter.

Is it the future of blogging? Probably not.

</comment><comment><USER17> I asked Quora: <http://www.quora.com/Is-Quora-the-future-of-blogging>

</comment><comment><USER18> Quora's relevance and absolute focus on completely revolutionizing the Q&A sector is fascinating. They've done so many innovations in that space.

Counting that as an innovation to _blogging_ seems too far-fetched...

</comment><comment><USER19> Short answer: No

Longer answer:

What exactly is a 'blogging innovation'? Something that helps you run a better blog? I don't think Quora qualifies as that. I know a few people who are attempting to use the posts feature as a sort of blog, it is not quite the same as an open blog. It is more like a Twitter follow on a access limited account.

As someone loves Quora and is very grateful for it (so far, at least), I can say that they have innovated mostly on the technical front.

Their differentiating factor is actually not technology. It is something that even the best of technology can find hard to solve - curation of content and the community.

One thing I can certainly think of that Quora has done right is to dis- incentivize the A-list. There is no reputation score in Quora, your follow count means nothing in your ability to participate anywhere. You contribute most often because you genuinely want to.

To conclude, I like Robert for his sincerity and passion, but his take on most technology and products are pretty poor.

</comment><comment><USER20> It remains to be seen if Quora would get traction on topics not related to Silicon Valley concerns.

</comment><comment><USER21> While Quora is my favorite web destination today, and the one that I enjoy spending time on more than others, I think Robert's getting way ahead of himself. It's useful to drive ideas to blog about, and have interesting discussions, but to call it a blog is doing Quora a disservice. It's a very well done Q&A and information site, which isn't a bad thing, but the future of blogging it's not.

</comment><comment><USER22> What differentiates Quora over Stack Overflow?

<comment><USER23> Initially when Quora was launched it seemed quite similar to Stack Overflow, but as the site has progressed it seems to me that it's actually quite divergent in terms of the core focus of the platform.

Stack Overflow is all about getting great answers to questions. Everything, from the reputation system, answer sorting, moderation, etc is designed so that the questions that are asked are on topic and objective, and that the best answers are situated right underneath. Not surprisingly, this focus was borne out of frustration with Experts Exchange playing tricks and hiding the answer to the question on the bottom of the page.

Quora, on the other hand, is all about social connection and discussion. It does have a ranking system, but kinds of questions and answers that are typically found on the site are much more subjective and are designed to encourage many people to weigh in and provide different points of view. Quora also places higher importance on the person's real name and employer than a Stack Overflow-like score for on-site contributions.

Overall, I think the title of Scoble's post ("Is Quora the biggest blogging innovation in 10 years?") sums up the difference quite clearly - Quora clearly has more in common with blogging than it does with straight-up Q&A like Stack Overflow.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> is scoble an investor in quora?

</comment><comment><USER25> No?</comment>


test.dole.com - <AUTHOR> I found: http://test.dole.com/ and: https://www.dole.com/en/Articles/TEST<p>The article is testing in prod I guess, and the test subdomain is probably staging. Interestingly, google indexed it and when I searched for whether to refrigerate pineapple juice that came up. <comment><USER2> I wonder if it is a staging / testing area for their site?

I've certainly done that before with a subdomain that I wanted on the actual internet.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's what I'm thinking, I just haven't seen anyone use a subdomain like "test" so blatantly

<comment><USER2> It does seem a bit on the more obvious side... I usually use something that seems more obscure / less likely for anyone to stumble upon.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Is anyone considering buying a Mac Pro tomorrow? - <AUTHOR> I'm considering switching from a Macbook Pro 16" to the new Mac Pro. I drive 4x$k monitors on my Macbook Pro 16", but it's unstable when disconnecting/reconnecting to the TB3 docks. I'm curious if anyone is considering buying one for dev purposes. (i.e., outside of video editors, photographers, modelers, etc.) <comment><USER2> Nope. Still getting by on my 2012 Macbook Pro. So far it's still doing everything I need it to do.</comment>


Remembering Martin Schaedel - <AUTHOR>

I still can't believe Martin Schaedel passed away.
A few years back, I went to a party in LA with Neil Strauss, during the time that he was writing the book "The Game," which is all about picking up women.  We were with the group of pickup artists detailed in the book, watching them work; one of the pickup artists went up to a girl and asked her, "do you want to go and get weird?"
My friend Sean Parker, who was with us, exclaimed with satisfaction, "I love that!  'Do you want to go and get weird' ... What a perfect way to describe the situation!"  And it was true -- it was an utterly honest, accurate description; and it took a certain type of utterly honest, semi-crazy person to say it.
I remember going  to a party in New York with Martin Schaedel a few months ago, wherein he went up to a girl, said hi to her by her first name, and then asked her why she wasn't wearing her engagement ring or accompanied by her fiancée.  When the red-faced, astonished girl asked how he had known all of this, Martin deadpanned and said, "well, I ran a background check on you last week."  Needless to say, I burst out laughing.  Here, my friends, was a guy who liked to get weird.
In our industry, as in most industries, we constantly celebrate the in-your-face, out-in-public superstars and pundits.  We fail to celebrate people such as Martin.  They aren't looking for massive fame or acceptance; rather, they just want to do interesting stuff and live an interesting life.  They are the true hackers -- hacking not only through code and business, but through the very way they lead their lives.
This is what I enjoyed the most about Martin, and what I hope this community should take away from his ever-too-short existence -- that you can do it all in an entirely different way.  In fact, you can live such an insanely global, social, real-time existence that even those who meet you in person question whether you are really the person who is standing before them (mainly because they are so caught up in the standard model that they can't imagine such an enormously successful deviation).  It really saddens me to know that he is gone; the full story of this amazing guy and his amazingly improbable life will forever be incomplete, told only in bits and pieces.
Hack your life. <comment><AUTHOR> Oh yeah, and this is the most priceless tweet to have ever been tweeted.

<http://twitter.com/martin/status/1113180806>

</comment><comment><USER2> That night with Martin was hilarious! What a way to meet!

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Morten Lund has more info, in case you're wondering: <http://lundxy.com/?p=3250></comment>


A Better JavaScript Ecosystem - <AUTHOR> http://gelatindesign.co.uk/coding/javascript-ecosystem <comment><USER2> These points are pretty naive, plus they solve very little other than _possibly_ saving some disk space.

It honestly reads more like a classic case of "My very narrow use case is the general case". A common mistake.

<comment><AUTHOR> (author here)

I'd disagree they are naive. These all stem from my team's experiences developing platforms at a large international bank.

We have dozens of packages that share many of the same dependencies, moving those to a single copy of each would reduce used disk space by equal dozens of times. But saving disk space is almost more of a nice side effect of the other solutions.

We've tried reducing this by using lerna but that can only go so far due to only supporting a single shared version or fully independent versioning. Hence the more customisable workspaces.

I'd also contend this is not a narrow use case, every bank in London is building similar platforms and could benefit from something like this. They just tend to not talk too publicly about what they are doing.

<comment><USER3> Have you tried pnpm? It seems like it would resolve some of the issues you brought up: [https://pnpm.js.org/](https://pnpm.js.org/)

<comment><AUTHOR> I haven't, but had a chat with Zoltan on twitter (a dev on it). It does seem to be pretty good, and definitely would be a less drastic solution since it builds on top npm.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


How to Build a Multiplayer (.io) Web Game - <AUTHOR> https://victorzhou.com/blog/build-an-io-game-part-2/ <comment><USER2> What's the connection with a .io domain name? Asking as someone who uses .io for my company's primary domain.

<comment><USER3> The intro to the previous article explains it: [https://victorzhou.com/blog/build-an-io-game- part-1/](https://victorzhou.com/blog/build-an-io-game-part-1/)</comment></comment>


Adversarial Autoencoders with Pytorch - <AUTHOR> https://blog.paperspace.com/adversarial-autoencoders-with-pytorch/ <comment><USER2> For some context here is a great intro to adversarial networks generally: [https://medium.com/@devnag/generative-adversarial- networks-g...](https://medium.com/@devnag/generative-adversarial-networks- gans-in-50-lines-of-code-pytorch-e81b79659e3f#.905b6ujiy)</comment>


Ask HN: How to get started with VR? - <AUTHOR> I'm really excited about VR and Oculus, and I'm wondering how to get into it.<p>I'm pretty good with computer graphics and programming, but I've never done anything with VR. Where should I start? <comment><USER2> As others have stated, there are several options.

Here's a general breakdown:

-hardware- cardboard, Oculus Rift Development Kit (DK2), GearVR (ionly compatible with Galaxy S6 or Note 4), mobile VR viewers (durovis, wearlity, DIY 3D printed headset, etc.)

-software- Unity, Unreal Engine, ThreeJS + WebVR

The most lightweight route is probably getting your hands on a google cardboard and using Unity to get your hands dirty. For basic things you can just use Unity's visual interface. The challenge is really just learning to navigate Unity, not so much understanding graphics. It's mainly C# or UnityScript, which is essentially Unity's javascript mutant child.

For me, one of the best ways to get assimilated with VR was actually using the webVR API ([http://webvr.info/](http://webvr.info/)). It's a JS based way to interface with the Oculus Rift or Cardboard. Using Three.JS to set up scenes and then using the webVR API to render stereo, get sensor data, etc. was a fast way for me to learn VR development.

Since you've mentioned you're adept with graphics and programming then maybe it's worth exploring Unreal as it's a bit more advanced, but can produce some awesome results.

Happy to answer any other questions!

<comment><USER3> I agree about WebVR, but the last time I tried developing for it Oculus drivers had changed and the browser plugins weren't working. I'd make sure it works before getting a DK2 with the intention of doing WebVR work.

<comment><USER4> Make sure you're using no later than Oculus Runtime v0.6 if you want the current versions of WebVR-enabled Firefox and Chromium to work. They're both currently built against Oculus SDK v0.5, and they only support one previous version at a time with the betas.

I don't think there is a link to it directly from the Oculus developer's site. But it is available if you Google it.

I believe the WebVR teams are looking into using OSVR to avoid having this issue in the future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> You should check out WebVR! JS might not be your preferred language, but WebGL is solid! The number of 3D JS/WebGL libraries also make it a bit easier to get started than learning a large but more powerful game engine like Unity or Unreal.

Check out: [0][1][2]

[0] [http://mozvr.com/downloads/](http://mozvr.com/downloads/) [1] [http://mozvr.github.io/webvr-spec/webvr.html](http://mozvr.github.io/webvr- spec/webvr.html) [2] [http://nickdesaulniers.github.io/joshVR/](http://nickdesaulniers.github.io/joshVR/)

<comment><USER6> I made "Internet Explorer": a tool for walking around subreddits [https://github.com/mrspeaker/InternetExplorer](https://github.com/mrspeaker/InternetExplorer). I had previous experience with three.js, but still - it was a lot easier than I imagined it would be!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'd look into Unity + Google Cardboard. You can be up in just a few mins at nearly zero cost and zero time (well you need a Google Cardboard which is < $20).

[https://developers.google.com/cardboard/unity/](https://developers.google.com/cardboard/unity/)

</comment><comment><USER8> Step 1: Don't make this too complicated: Get a DK2 and get Unreal Engine (it s free!). That's the basics you'll need to get started.

<comment><USER4> Skip the DK2. Get Google Cardboard to hold you over until the Vive or CV1 get released.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I personally use an Oculus DK1 (it was the only thing available at the time) and play around with three.js + WebVR. You'd be surprised the fun you can have with WebGL.

I can't show it off just yet unfortunately, but I made this web player for 360 photos and videos that has a VR mode. It came out better than expected.

Thinking about moving to Unreal next, not necessarily because it can do something that WebGL can't, but because I'm simply interested in that route.

While I'm sure Unity is a fine tool, I've had bad luck with them. I was interested in developing a mobile VR video player for 360 video, unfortunately Unity can't exactly map a video texture onto a 3D sphere, which is pretty much the standard way of making a 360 VR video. You can try taking the individual frames and mapping them onto the sphere as fast as possible, but the frame rate was a poor ~20fps, which I wasn't impressed by. It might be different for video, but last I recalled you should shoot for at least 60fps for VR experiences if you want to avoid the whole motion sickness issue.

I've also played around a bit with Google Cardboard, and I have to admit, it's alright, but at the end of the day it's still a cardboard shell for your phone with special lenses, so if you really want to play around with VR an Oculus DK1 or DK2 isn't that bad.

The Samsung Gear VR is a fine choice too, but only if you already have a Samsung smartphone, otherwise I'd still just recommend you go for the Oculus.

So, those are my thoughts.

<comment><USER4> There's framerate and then there's framerate (heh).

You want to be able to respond to the user's head movements as fast as possible--16ms max (which is 60FPS), but even at that point some rare people get sick. At 11ms, the number of people who get sick drops so dramatically that Valve claims they haven't met anyone yet who does get sick. But clearly, the lower, the better. Some people are claiming 8ms is "necessary"\--I think calling it necessary is ludicrous--but I'm sure it would be an incredible experience.

How often the scene actually updates is besides that. You could animate the video on the sphere at 15fps and it's not going to make the user sick, as long as you can react to their head movements faster than that. That's kind of the point of the TimeWarp feature that the Oculus Rift provides. You render the scene larger than the Rift is capable of displaying, and then the display driver shows different subsets of it based on the latest motion data, regardless of how old the frame actually is. It's not perfect, but it makes up for a lot of sins.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I made a video not too long ago about all the different methods for stereo view that I've played with over the years ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sxhMOOHuqc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sxhMOOHuqc))

The start for me was building my own cardboard smartphone viewer from lenses I already had in my house. It was fun, wasn't very hard, and didn't take a lot of time. If you want to try this yourself, you the typical lenses to get are spherical, 50mm diameter, 50mm focal length, glass lenses.

Or, just buy Unofficial Cardboard 2.0+ ([http://www.unofficialcardboard.com/](http://www.unofficialcardboard.com/)). They have a number of additional features over the stock Google Cardboard that definitely warrant the price.

I also have a Wearality Sky. They advertise a 150 degree field of view. I've gotten into arguments with their CEO over their exact definition of "150 deg FOV", but it's definitely the best smartphone-based viewer I've ever had. There are some issues with lens flare if you have any bright lights near you, but overall I think they are worth the effort.

Finally, I do have an Oculus Rift DK2, but you should skip it (unless you can get one donated by someone). Stick to the Google Cardboard-like solutions for now, while you're still learning and getting a feel for the _design_ of VR applications. In 6 to 8 months, the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift CV1 will be available. They will be very similar to each other, but completely outclass the DK2.

And then, when you're all setup, check out my project, [https://www.primroseeditor.com](https://www.primroseeditor.com) :D

As for writing code, if you want easy programming, go with WebVR (Three.JS + a WebVR build of Firefox or Chromium). I do suggest getting a physics library of some kind, though. I've been using Cannon.js. It's pretty easy to use, especially alongside Three.JS.

<comment><USER10> Does the Wearality Sky have any kind of input mechanism like the Google Cardboard magnet? I wish Wearality was taking preorders, I like so many aspects of the product (open-source, wide FOV, low price).

<comment><USER4> Only the lens holder is "open source". They don't provide design files for the lenses themselves.

Interactions with the company have been very disappointing. They don't pay attention to their own Twitter account or the common VR subreddits (/r/virtualreality or /r/oculus, though they post their own press releases to them, so they certainly know they exist) and they had the spam filter on their own support email line configured poorly. There were about two weeks between when the Sky first started going out and when Wearality started answering questions about what exactly they meant by "150 deg FOV". Their official replies were very derisive towards anyone who had done their own measurements and complained about people not signing up on their private forums to ask questions. Sorry, I personally think private vendor forums are a dead concept. I'm certainly not going to sign up to ask one question in a forum that has 0 posts. They've not updated any of their marketing material to even mention 7" displays, let alone that it's necessary to get the full 150 deg FOV. It's not even entirely clear from just their own information that 5" displays won't show as wide of a view as 6" displays, you're left to either figure that out on your own or hope that the separate set of clips change the focal distance (they do not).

In the end, they define 150 deg FOV as the visual angle between the eye and the rear lens aperture. You lose some view around the edge where the lenses only show the internals of the frame. Also, a 6" screen phone is not large enough to fill the view of the lenses, even though the max size of clips they provide is for 6" phones. My own measurements put the Sky with a 6" phone at about 110-120 deg FOV. That's certainly better than Google Cardboard. Wearality claims you have to use a 7" screen to fill the lenses. I suppose the holder will stretch to fit such a tablet, but it's very much not designed for it, and considering they provide separate holders for 5" and 6" phones, I would expect a 7" tablet to need a clip scaled for it.

Let me reiterate: it's the best smartphone-class viewer I've ever used, even if it doesn't live up to the claims. And I believe one could expect to get very close to 150 deg FOV out of a 7" phone. Of course, that extra inch will be so blurred you won't be able to make out any details, but the extra light is nice for the periphery. You'll have to modify the holder clip 3D models and print them yourself. Wearality does not provide a full package that is capable of 150 deg FOV out of the box.

It's also not so cheap. I Kickstarted at $130 to be able to get the very first shipment of the lenses, spacing frame (there are 4 lenses, two per eye, and they have to be spaced correctly), the 5" and 6" mounting clips, a carrying bag, a hat (with a flat brim to be able to clip on the device so it can be used hands-free), t-shirt, and a patch. They now are offering additional purchases to _some_ backers of the lenses and frames with one set of clips and no mention of hat for $99. I have no idea what the retail price will be, but I'm assuming it's going to be more than $100.

As for your other question, there is no integrated input mechanism. That's not a problem, though. The framing of the Wearality is completely open, so you're encouraged to touch the screen with your finger. That open frame design is great for portability. I recently showed it off to a bunch of friends and family at a party. Had it in my pocket right next to my phone, just pulled it out of the provided bag of holding and clipped it on while I waited for the Tuscany demo to load.

Also, Google Cardboard has gotten away from the magnet. Turns out magnets aren't nice to compasses, who knew? In the 2.0 version, it's now a strip of copper tape that connects the finger to the screen through an origami bumper button.

Finally, most people who use their smartphone viewers frequently end up buying a headstrap of some kind and a bluetooth gamepad or keyboard.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The Samsung Gear VR is worth it if you have already have the phone that it requires (or you need a new phone, in which case the Galaxy S6 is a totally decent choice).

The Gear VR's software ecosystem is an Android port of the Oculus SDK. It's a no-nonsense, rather '90s style C++ affair, mostly written by John Carmack.

I've enjoyed playing around with it, although if you're used to modern cutting-edge PC game engines, you may find it limited or old-fashioned. (Naturally the Android phone isn't a match for a modern PC, but it goes surprisingly far in VR, IMO.)

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd recommend the Zeiss VR One ([http://zeissvrone.tumblr.com/](http://zeissvrone.tumblr.com/)) and start doing development for mobile VR! Works for iPhone 6 and Galaxy S6 by default, or you can print your own tray for a specific smartphone. Zeiss also provides a great Unity "developer starter package" ([https://bitbucket.org/vrone/unity3d](https://bitbucket.org/vrone/unity3d)).

<comment><USER4> The Zeiss VR One is very overpriced.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> If you do any 3D work now (and have a computer capable of that sort of thing), it should be fairly easy to work on projects in Unity and Unreal with something like the Oculus dev kit.

I have next to no proper programming skills but I've done a bit of work in 3d graphics alongside my video work (stuff like Cinema 4D). At first I was focused on trying to build things in Cinema and translate that to VR but I've found it easier to just start learning and experimenting with Unreal Engine. You can immediately view what you've created inside the Rift for testing and learning purposes.

Still, I'm not sure what you're going after. For me it was yet another thing to play around with and learn a little about but while I could cobble together a neat little game or interactive environment, I don't have the skills to do something like this ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghgbycqb92c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghgbycqb92c)) which uses depth cameras to develop live, 3d video and telepresence.

Not sure what tools are available for simpler setups like Cardboard but I believe there is at least some level of support in Unity and Unreal.

</comment><comment><USER13> If you're good with computer graphics and programming, you're halfway done for doing your first demos / experiments :)

If you have an OculusRift, I think that's probably the easier start. Not because "mobile" is harder, but because you can focus more on doing stuff instead of optimizing / cutting stuff because mobile devies still do not have so much computational power.

Unity3D / Unreal engine are really easy to set up for VR. So easy to set-up that most people lose sight of VR.

I HIGHLY suggest you to give a read here [https://developer.oculus.com/documentation/intro- vr/latest/c...](https://developer.oculus.com/documentation/intro- vr/latest/concepts/bp_intro/)

and

[http://static.oculusvr.com/sdk- downloads/documents/OculusBes...](http://static.oculusvr.com/sdk- downloads/documents/OculusBestPractices.pdf)

You may think this is simple, everyone do it but... no. There are so many useful hints about how to reduce sickness and produce a better product, and so easy to find, that is mandatory to know.

This will get you started pretty well :)

</comment><comment><USER14> Build a hello world for Google Cardboard.

</comment><comment><USER15> You'll want to learn about traditional video game development. Programming wise it isn't much of a jump, it's a matter of rendering everything twice with slightly different positions each time. Which would involve using two different View matrices. Each render is then shown to its respective eye. This gives us depth perception the same way it works in real life, which combined with head tracking (using gyroscopes in the HMD), tricks our mind into accepting the images as 'reality'.

</comment><comment><USER16> I would highly recommend Cardboard. I haven't used WebVR, and I'm not certain how good its Cardboard support is. I'd suggest just starting with Three.js as it is, and then use StereoEffect to get the pseudo-stereoscopic view for Cardboard. There's sample code here, and it works on Chrome, Safari and even Edge. [https://vr.chromeexperiments.com/](https://vr.chromeexperiments.com/)

Unity with the Cardboard SDK is very easy to dive into as well.

</comment><comment><USER17> I've developed a couple games for the Rift (both DK1 & DK2) and I highly recommend starting with Unity. It's kind of ridiculous how fast you can get off the ground with your own FPS game using the Oculus SDK plugin. There's a lot of great video tutorials out there that can really speed up learning everything too. Note!: If you're developing on OSX, heads up as Oculus has stopped releasing new versions for it so you can only grab previous SDKs at the moment.

</comment><comment><USER18> I would recommend downloading Unity or Unreal as a starting point. They both give you an entire framework to develop on top of, and their VR support is getting better with each release.

We use Unity because it's way more popular with the local dev community here, but I actually prefer Unreal's licensing terms, as well as their documentation (I'm not a video person, and Unity relies on video tutorials a bit much).

<comment><USER18> Links to both:

[http://unity3d.com/](http://unity3d.com/)

[https://www.unrealengine.com/](https://www.unrealengine.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> You can also look at www.osvr.org

</comment><comment><USER20> Try WebVR. I gave a talk here: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oroAoCuCc74](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oroAoCuCc74)</comment>


Github is back - <AUTHOR> https://status.github.com?isback

<comment><USER2> Just curious, but why does Github only have ~84% availability? Do they not have the resources to get >95% (or 99% for that matter)? It seems once every couple weeks it goes down for an hour or more.

<comment><USER3> because the number you're looking at is for 24-hours cycle. Their availability is 99.4% at 30-days cycle.</comment></comment>


The Best Way to Solve a Problem: Give Up - <AUTHOR> http://www.illuminatedmind.net/2008/12/11/the-best-way-to-solve-a-problem-give-up/

<comment><USER3> Reminds me of this great story from Bucky Fuller:

You Do Not Belong to You. You Belong to the Universe.

In 1927 my wife and I were living in Chicago, in a one room apartment on Belmont Avenue. We were penniless. Five years earlier, our first daughter had died on her fourth birthday, having gone through infantile paralysis, flu, spinal meningitis and pneumonia. It was a long and terribly painful thing for us when she died. About that time my father-in-law, an architect, had invented a new building material. I liked this man very much - and I thought his invention would be useful. I finally organized four small factories around the country making this material.

I worked terribly hard, but the minute I got through work for the day - <USER2> guess I was in a lot of pain because our child had died - I'd go off and drink all night. I had enough health, somehow, to carry on. But the company failed and some very prominent people had bet money on me. So I was in disgrace and utterly broke. At that moment a new life, our daughter Allegra, came to us.

I appeared to myself, in retrospect, a horrendous mess. I found myself saying, "AM I an utter failure? If so, I had better get myself out of the way, so at least my wife and baby can be taken care of by my family." At that time Lincoln Park, right on Lake Michigan, was one of my favorite places. I would run through the park at night, and I knew every inch of the lake edge. So I knew just where to go when I decided to throw myself into the lake, fully intending to commit suicide.

I stood by the side of the lake, hesitating. All my life, at home and in school, I had been admonished: "Never mind what you think! Listen! We are trying to teach you!" But by that lake side I was forced to do some thinking on my own.

I asked myself what a little penniless human being with a remaining life expectancy of only 10 years - I was 32 and the life expectancy of those born, as I was in 1895 was 42 - could do for humanity that great corporations and great political states cannot do. Answering myself, I said: "The individual can take initiatives without anyone's permission."

I told myself: "You do not have the right to eliminate yourself, you do not belong to you. You belong to the universe. The significance of you will forever remain obscure to you, but you may assume that you are fulfilling your significance if you apply yourself to converting all your experience to the highest advantage of others." So I vowed to keep myself alive, but only if I would never use me again for just me - each one of us is born of two, and we really belong to each other. I vowed to do my own thinking instead of trying to accommodate everyone else's opinions, credos and theories. I vowed to apply my inventory of experiences to the solving of problems that affect everyone aboard planet earth.

I didn't want to waste a second, so I slept that way that certain animals sleep: lying down as soon as I was tired, sleeping a half hour every six hours. I also decided to hold a moratorium on speech. It was very tough on my wife, but for two years in that Chicago tenement I didn't allow myself to use words. I wanted to force myself back to the point where I could understand what I was thinking.

I decided to forget about earning a living. It seemed to me that humans are honey-money bees, doing the right things for the wrong reasons, just as the bee pollinates the flower.

Released from the idea of earning a living, I was able to address problems in the biggest way. I decided to commit myself to the invention and development of physical artifacts to reform the environment. I decided that a plurality of such artifacts had the potential to evoke humanity's most intelligent, interconsiderate qualities. It became obvious that if I worked always and only for all humanity, I would be optimally effective. I'd be doing what nature wanted me to do, and nature would literally support me.

Once I decided to do my own thinking, the first question I had to ask myself was: "Do you have any experiential evidence that forces you to assume greater intellect operating in the universe?" My answer was swift and positive. Experience demonstrated an orderliness of interactive, exceptionless principles. I was overwhelmed by this, and more convinced that my purpose was to abet the inclusion of human beings in the design of the universe.

I'm absolutely convinced that everything that has happened to me since that time has been through my commitment to this greater integrity.

Many times I've chickened, and everything inevitably goes wrong. But then, when I return to my commitment, my life suddenly works again. There's something of the miraculous in that.

<comment><USER4> Thanks for sharing this story. I've always admire Buckminster Fuller's work and this makes me respect him more.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> If you resonated with the article's points, the author's philosophy resonates with Stoicism.

<http://classics.mit.edu/Epictetus/epicench.html>

[http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/04/13/stoicism-101...](http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/04/13/stoicism-101-a-practical- guide-for-entrepreneurs/)

</comment><comment><USER5> Good points. People care too much about pointless things. People, too often, live in the short-term while ignoring the long-term. Instant gratification doesn't lead toward long-term satisfaction

</comment><comment><USER6> I just temporarily gave up on something I was trying to program. That's why I'm on Hacker News. Thanks for backing me up, random Internet blogger!</comment>


Blip – 1977 Mechanical Pong [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSvZbcwqlTw <comment><USER2> This toy with all its intricate, mechanical components cost $7.44 in 1977, equivalent to $32 today.

Electronic Pong games of the day cost 8X to 24X more. Crazy how that ratio has flipped, with electronics becoming cheaper and mechanics more expensive. I bet someone could recreate it with a 3D printer; a lot of it was plastic and the patent has some detailed diagrams of the gearing and cams: [https://patents.google.com/patent/US4147350](https://patents.google.com/patent/US4147350)

<comment><AUTHOR> That low cost was what stuck out in my mind. There used to be very complicated mechanisms in low end consumer electronics (VCR, Cassette Recorder, toys) that we don't see today in low-end items. In fact the only items I can think of that consumers see that have complicated mechanics are SLR cameras and lenses (and cars, of course).

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I watched this yesterday. Very fascinating. I vaguely remember this as a kid. I don't know that I ever played one though. I definitely didn't know that it was actually mechanical.

<comment><USER4> I had one as a kid. It was surprisingly fun, but every time I played it, all I could think of was the red LED eye of the Cylons. The original BSG was airing when this toy came out.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Cool, I have one of these I bought on a lark from a yard sale. I haven't tried it out yet, but looks neat if it works.</comment>


China blocks access to Bloomberg sites - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-18648050? <comment><USER2> I am in China right now. I just tried to Google Bloomberg and my connection was stopped.

I can not connect to bloomberg.com. I can not read this BBC article.

Reply here and I'll test whatever you want me to.

<comment><USER3> Append https to the BBC article to read it behind the GFW. The https hack sometimes works when the government is blocking content on individual cites vs. complete sites.

<comment><USER4> interesting.. It works with HTTPS, but the certificate is not the original BBC one.

<comment><USER2> Just notice that too. If I get some time next week I'll look into it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Princelings are a big problem; I'm glad Bloomberg followed the trail on Xi Jinping (China's apparent next president).

But really, the censors are way behind on this. All of the middle class knows this is how China works (political power = money) while the rural class doesn't care. So where do we go from here? Those in power hardly want to change a system that benefits themselves so greatly, and the system will continue to become more dynastic (certain families accumulating lots of power and wealth).

Bloomberg is going to be out for awhile I guess. But check out the Streisand effect going on, the visibility that the meta story is getting is much more than the original got!

</comment><comment><USER5> The block was first put into effect some time the night of the 27th-28th[1]. It was then lifted, so it may have been a test. The story was published at 3:32am EST / 7:32am UTC on Friday the 29th and the block was put into place soon afterwards.

[1]: [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230364950457749...](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303649504577493661140614048.html)

<comment><USER6> It'd be curious to know if they also blocked Bloomberg Professional. I'd venture they didn't, given that that would block important information from the financial (gov't) elites.

<comment><USER5> They did not. Their firewall blocks Internet access to the websites only.

<comment><USER2> The Great Firewall messes with more connections than just websites. They are definitely are doing something to SSH connections. Every time I ssh to my server it gets bombed with faulty requests. (This was discussed on hacker news before.) They actually seemed to have slowed down this practice recently.

The world is much more tolerant of China as they don't have a hidden agenda like Russia had. Their only agenda is the economic advancement of China and the stability of it's government.

<comment><USER7> "Their only agenda is the economic advancement of China and the stability of it's government."

I disagree: Their geopolitical agenda includes unification plus securing rights to natural resources under the South China Sea. Hillary and the US Navy have made it clear that the US will not be tolerant of a bully in the South China Sea. Also, stability of the government is not important, only stability of the party.

<comment><USER8> Their agenda is economic advancement, your point is indicative of that.

The party would serve no (meaningful) purpose if it lost it's ability to govern, so stability of government is equally important.

<comment><USER7> Economic Reformation completely transformed the government, causing it to be a shadow of its former self by killing millions of jobs at government owned companies. The party survived and subsequently thrived. Chinese unification is a centuries-old goal wholly unrelated to economic development.

I recommend reading Richard McGregor's The Party for a good introduction on the forces at play in modern China.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The BBC is dumbing down, that stock photo caption "Some Chinese web users try to find a way round the restrictions" is staggeringly inane.

<comment><USER10> Has some irony to it, they are playing a game on the picture.

<comment><USER11> Indeed, he's playing Starcraft. I don't think he's trying very hard to use dat proxy.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What would be your perfect work environment? - <AUTHOR>

We all know you want to work on startups...but if you had to go work for someone else, what would be your perfect work environment?
I'm not really looking for anything specific, pretty much anything that relates to a job.
Free lunches?
Good chairs?
A single boss?
4 day work week?
Free car?
Monthly talks by leaders in the industry?
Pretty much an open field. <comment><USER3> I think my job is perfect for me (right at this moment in my life). So I'll list that (hopefully not coming across as bragging or anything :) - and also ripping off your initial list for ideas).

\- Free Lunch (I swear this is the best thing, it's so easy)

\- Single Boss (so important to get things done) \- Relative freedom day-to- day

\- Relaxed work hours

\- Fair/Good pay (I can work on personal project without worrying about money)

\- Solid company revenue (so needed hardware/software is easy to come by)

\- A variety of work (in diverse fields) to keep me interested :)

</comment><comment><USER4> Fair pay and interesting work, but that's no surprise. One thing that makes or breaks a job for me is if my manager communicates well. It makes a huge difference when you know exactly what is expected of you, what you can expect from the company, and where you stand.

</comment><comment><USER5> Minimal meetings, distractions = office with door.

Fast computers, multiple hi-rez screens, comfy chair.

Flexible working hours.

Result oriented instead of time-sheet driven.

And most importantly ... manager who runs interference for us. Being shielded from executives from other areas. Realistic project plans. No fuss and quick acquisition of resources as required.

Concierge Service: have PA types to run errands, get in food, clean-up meeting rooms, organize stationery, get last minute gifts, tickets, flowers, whatever. NB: In the film and TV industries they're called 'assistant directors' - <USER2> title for general purpose gofers. Without them the pace and productivity would be a lot less. Just think about it, you pay them a heck of a lot less than great programmers and the programmers end up not wasting time on stuff they'd rather not do anyway.

</comment><comment><USER6> No distractions would be lovely. Currently, I'm "enjoying" the following in our open-plan offices:

\- Cellphones w/annoying ringtones going off every 10 mins (I don't care if you're the company's sales guy/gal who needs to be reachable every second of the day)

\- Impromptu meetings in the hallways

\- Obligatory foghorn-voiced American employee yacking on the landline

\- Resulting volume increase of person on the cellphone, person on the land line, persons in their impromptu meeting just outside the office door

The obvious answer is "get your own office", but that's not likely to happen.

Chip on my shoulder, what?

<comment><USER7> I agree with this. I'm perfectly fine interacting with people when that's the work at hand. I am frustrated when I'm forced to spend a significant amount of my energy trying to tune them out.

And it's not just a matter of "choice" or "adaptation". I've worked on this for over 20 years, and my "adaptability" has not significantly altered. I'm very aware of my environment; this seems to be hard wired. It offers some advantages: I notice things others miss, and I'm very quick to infer new information from the details at hand. But it also means that open space is a living hell.

I wish people in general were more willing to accept that different people thrive in different kinds of environments. But where there is a mix of personalities, often the loudest and most physically aggressive come to predominate the environment. I've also experienced this in my home environment, where the misfortune of a string of noisy neighbors -- even after moving -- have made being home an exercise. (The reasons I never transitioned to working from home.)

My second priority would be for interesting, meaningful work. Preferably where I am continually learning and creating. I've paid my "button pushing" dues; in fact, I've repeatedly taught the machines to push those buttons for me, before moving on.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> The top thing I want is a boss that lets me do my job. That means limit the team meetings to absolutely what is necessary. That means give me the tools that let me do my job most efficiently. For anyone that has ever worked in a bank, I'm sure you know what I am talking about.

</comment><comment><USER9> Interesting and meaningful work.

Everything else is just a detail.

I have sat in the worst conditions (too hot, too cold, too loud, hungry, tired, sore, lonely, etc.) working on something cool and meaningful and got into it so much that I completely lost track of time for hours.

OTOH, I have had employers or vendors give me the best Class A space you could imagine with ergonomic furniture, gourmet food and snacks, the latest technology with multiple large monitors, even a massage twice a week, but if the work wasn't interesting, I was looking for a window to escape from.

</comment><comment><USER10> I'd rather work a 6 day week working when I want to (say, starting at 10pm) than a 4 day week 9-5. Oh, and a do not disturb sign is probably mandatory. I'll let you know when I've got some processing power to deal with your problems. Otherwise, I'm dealing with mine.

</comment><comment><USER11> A sinecure.

</comment><comment><USER12> interesting work.

not terribly slow computers.

great chairs.</comment>


Blue-collar workers who become white-collar later in life - <AUTHOR> https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/blue-collar-to-white-collar-work-jobs <comment><USER2> Pharmaceutical supply company line worker, warehouse truck loader, dishwasher assembly line worker, gas station attendant. I had blue collar work from 16 until about 30. Under grad then grad school. Technical writer, jr developer, sr developer, architect. It's been an insane transition. And the biggest part that gets me is when people complain about workload. I try to temper myself because I know my lived experience is vastly different than nearly everyone I work with. But when Jrs complain about having too much to do or something being a lot of work I can't help but remember unloading hundred pound boxes from the back of a scalding hot truck in the North Carolina summer and chuckle to myself.

<comment><USER3> Undoubtedly there are really hard jobs. I'd put a mover on that list as well, along with oil field worker.

But it seems dismissive to say a dev can't claim burnout because they aren't doing something physical. When a junior dev, I once went into the office 23 days in a row and was usually there until 11 pm or midnight, sometimes later, sometimes earlier. I got burned out and left. It wasn't good for my health or relationships. I bet if you worked hours like that loading a truck you at least would have gotten overtime.

<comment><USER4> How many of those days and hours were spent inside an air conditioned room with a bathroom and, probably, a kitchen/cafeteria?

I work in engineering for construction - when we were building Bertha's rescue shaft in Seattle the crews worked 5 months straight drilling holes and placing concrete with two crews on 12 hour shifts with only July 4 and Memorial Day off. When we excavated the shaft and repaired the machine we switched to three 8s and ran for almost another year.

Rain or shine, hot or cold, day or night. We worked that job every day. Nobody left until we switched to 8s because guys wanted to work 10s on another job - that's just blue collar work. In fact, that's the type of blue collar work that guys want because the OT pays the bills so you're right about that. The management on the project? Worked 1.5x as many hours as the crew because they would normally cover a shift and a transition. Every one salaried. Nobody left.

What the tech industry complains about for working conditions makes me laugh.

<comment><USER5> _the OT pays the bills_

Another way to look at this is that people are underpaid just enough to get them to work longer, but the knock-on costs of that (impact on health etc.) won't manifest until later and will likely be borne by someone else rather than the current employer. This is equally true for bricklayers and coders.

For context I also did many years of construction and manual work, I'd guess my life has been about 50-50 physical and brain work (of course they're not mutually exclusive). The above is an observation from experience rather than theory.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> That bit about the assumption of positional authority really rings true.

I've worked with a number of people who used to be in blue collar jobs (former military non-commissioned officers, former trades men, etc). They often have a different kind of work ethic than people without that background and that often adds a lot. You'll rarely see analysis paralysis with them, or non-KISS solutions.

However, I once worked in an organization where all the management came from that background, and really still had one foot (at least) in that mindset. They did not understand what the engineers and developers did, so often made decisions based on fear of the unknown, or out of a sense that their authority was being questioned. Not a good scene.

<comment><USER7> 1 to 1 comparison.

Do you want your leadership figure at 30 to be someone who spent the last 11 years learning tech/design? Or someone who is new to the tech, but lived a 'tough' life for the last 14 years?

I don't see any advantages to the later, except they are lower cost.

<comment><USER8> Obviously both kinds of experience can bring different perspectives. There's not just one way to do things. You want someone who has faced some challenges, had some failures, had to recover, things sometimes worked out. That works for both sources of experience.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Part of the reason white-collar salaries are so high (along with demand) is that a lot of jobs actually aren't that interesting to do.

The stereotypical office job is "get on a train for 1-2 hours a day, then sit in front of a screen for 8 hours a day in a boring office with fluorescent lighting, five times a week, forever".

Not everyone works at a company that actually matters so they're ultimately just pushing bits around.

There are definitely other monotonous jobs (checkout staff is the obvious canonical example), but then there's interesting stuff like working for emergency services, mechanic, personal trainer, etc, all YMMV of course.

<comment><USER10> If I had to choose careers again I would probably think more about finding something that's more active and outside. My current job keeps me permanently at my desk or meeting rooms. No physical activity, no outside,no travel. This together with commuting being in a cube without daylight is really impacting my mental and physical wellbeing.

<comment><USER11> Find remote work. I've been working remotely for over a decade, because I felt an office confining and I missed being able to go outside.

With no commute, I also use that extra time to spend with my family.

I have my own office and many times work outside in the summer. I've even traveled to other states/countries and worked from there. You just need a good Internet connection.

It does take a lot of discipline. I basically have no manager now after proving that I can get my work done without being watched.

I've seen lots of remote developers come and go because they couldn't handle working remotely without someone sitting over their shoulder/telling them what to do.

<comment><USER12> > I also use that extra time to spend with my family

Remote can be nice _if_ you already have a family. Otherwise one could end up simply trading office desk and meeting rooms for their own desk and own room, still staying inside.

<comment><USER13> I think it is more that remote is nice when work is a part of your life and not the center of your life. Swap family with other major life pursuits. Family is often a forcing function for people to learn to balance work and the rest of their life. Remote affords more flexibility, but that means it requires more experience and discipline to balance your life.

If you already have the skill, remote gives you more flexibility to balance. But if you're not intentional about it being remote gives you more rope to hang yourself with, so to speak.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> > he wanted to be "someone my kids looked up to .."

> I wanted to provide a bright future for my kids

Both examples in this article had to do with being a parent. I wonder if this innate feeling was the true catalyst behind their move from blue to white collar jobs. The stress, or drive, to provide for their families and be a good role model. Good for them, their display of strength and pride will influence their children. I bet those kids will grow up to be strong-minded, hard- working adults.

</comment><comment><USER15> My husband was a machinist for about 6 years then went back to school to become a mechanical engineer. As you can imagine he is an extremely good mechanical engineer.

Nobody doubted his intelligence when he was a machinist because he was obviously smart. People in our generation experimented more with our life path more than kids these days. My husband was not unusual. He was a Berkeley dropout and his machinist best friend was a law school dropout. It makes me sad sometimes that kids these days don't experiment more. It is freeing to realize that you can make your way in life no matter what.

When my husband was a machinist he worked with a mechanical engineer on a project and realized he understood how to design better than the engineer. At the time I was still in school so we decided I would finish school first and then he would go back to school.

<comment> et-al > _It makes me sad sometimes that kids these days don 't experiment more. It > is freeing to realize that you can make your way in life no matter what._

Kids don't experiment more because a generation or two ago, all one needed was a high school diploma to be employable; now one needs a college degree. Saddled with student loan payments, who can be free to experiment? And wages haven't kept up with cost of living increases, either. So I would have been able to support myself as a server in a restaurant back then, but now I'd probably have to juggle two jobs to make ends meet.

<comment><USER15> Wow - so many negative reviews! This must be the most controversial thing I have posted!

In general you are right that blue collar wages have not kept pace with the cost of living. This is particularly true in the SF bay area. I have often thought that the poor livability in the bay area is not sustainable. I used to live in a neighborhood with only a few engineers. Now everyone seems to be an engineer. Having said that - there are far more livable places to live!

As for college education - I do support free college education but with caveats. I am shocked by the number of people who think college needs to be expensive. For instance, you can get a degree from Berkeley by going two years to a community college and the final two years at Berkeley even today. When you don't have much money, that is a great option.

I am also here to tell you that you can have a great career with a degree from a state college. My husband and I worked our way through school and the state colleges are very flexible with working students where universities are not. With my degree I was at some of the greatest companies in the world including Apple, IBM, Xerox in their heyday. I also worked at 4 successful startups.

Even in your generation this is possible. My son got a liberal arts degree in 2008 which was the worst possible year to get a liberal arts degree. He discovered that that the curriculum from Stanford and ITT India were on line. So he studied on his own to get a college-equivalent education and worked in tech for a couple of years. Then he decided he wanted a computer science masters degree. He took the prerequisites from community colleges and applied and was accepted to graduate school. His expenses ended up being small enough that he paid half through his savings and the other half he was able to pay back within a year of graduation.

I can understand that this route is not possible in all fields such as medicine. But an interesting life is still possible.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Worked as a printer at a newspaper for almost 15 years. For the last 10 years been working as a software engineer (mostly web, some mobile).

One of the biggest adjustments was trying to figure out how to not feel guilty when not "working". Even just taking a break, which I now know is important (at least for me) for solving knotty issues.

It does give one a perspective that those who've only done WC work often don't have. I'm not one to diminish other's hard work however for me personally even really long days have not compared to my days working as a press operator.

</comment><comment><USER17> So glad someone addressed this issue directly in an article, as it needs to be explicit:

""Blue-collar roles are usually in very authoritative structures. When men move from blue-collar to white-collar roles, they tend to assume that with their new role comes a lot of positional power. But in large organizations, that's not always true," she tells MEL. "Men in these situations need to learn to lead with influence, not power. They need to be more collaborative, and they need to understand that to get what they need they might have to leverage other departments or leaders.""

What is also notable is that the culture companies so desperately contort themselves to create is a naturally occurring phenomenon in blue collar environments. Tech is basically blue collar work for white collar money.

""The one shift I've noticed is most difficult [when men] go from blue-collar work like police officer or firefighter: there is a lot of time spent with colleagues in a 'brotherly' way," she tells MEL. "Eating together, spending long hours together and supporting one another in life and death or dangerous situations. This isn't the same schedule or interpersonal interaction in the white-collar environment and [it] can be difficult to transition to.""

White collar work is mainly political, and there is very little actual physical competence involved. The skills are social, and not really skills anyone (men or women) respects or admires. Perhaps that's why they are so well paid. From the outside, the emphasis on flexibility and collaboration, can be understood as being able suspend rules and principles for opportunity.

From the inside, you need a kind of self-superiorization that abstracts you from the work, people, and relationships. This is why an elite education is so valued, because no matter what happens "you still went to Harvard/have a PhD etc." and this is what facilitates your ability to be "dynamic," or deal with outwardly contemptible behaviour because it's not, "you," who is engaged in it, it's something a person of your position "does."

When competent people encounter uncertainty, we fall back on protecting the integrity of that competence, because it defines our self image of who we "are." But risking group survival (that is based on the external perceptions of stakeholders) to maintain the integrity of our competence based self image will get you isolated pretty quick. This is the essence of that blue collar alienation feeling technical people get.

This flexible superiorization can be affected in a number of ways without an elite education, but almost all of them are anathema to a traditional masculine identity, which is based on the very competence, principle, and structure that is the barrier to them in dynamic white collar environments. The thing about an education is it's something nobody can "take away," from you, and this is the key to being able to superiorize yourself to the work. Whereas "blue collar" things like competence and masculinity can be lost, and so the need to protect or maintain them becomes a kind of weakness or vulnerability in the political dynamics of white collar work.

If white collar jobs were just a matter of actualizing the most noble aspects of being good people, and the attributes that make us likeable, they wouldn't be work. White collar work itself is the ability to self superiorize, sustain the necessary cognitive dissonance to maintain and affect strategic perceptions, and to act on the instincts and techniques for identifying and aligning correctly to power.

Some people are naturals at it, and while they usually aren't particularly admirable or likeable, the compensation, status and power that comes with achieving it place those virtues as second prize. Until very recently, having the intellectual ability to criticize these dynamics was exclusive to people who were educated to work in them, and so there wasn't a reason to reflect on them critically. The internet is changing this as well.

Such an important article for people to read.

<comment><USER18> I need more of a definition of "superiorize". I kind of lost the meaning of every sentence where that word appeared.

<comment><USER17> It's similar to how you relate to a kid where you recognize yourself as an adult and them as a child, so you don't personalize or internalize their actions. Doctors and patients, even developers and users. You can be equitable about it by accepting things as they are, but internally, you can do that because you don't need for them to reflect your own self belief.

Among adults, it's recognizing people as true others, who are not a part of "your," tribe or experience, just neutral independent beings. In a professional context, their opinions are objective things that you don't register personally because your sense of self does not depend on your relationship to them. People will bend over backwards trying to explain it in a non-hierarchical neutral zen way, but the example makes it easier.

It comes from working with animals, where a trainer needs to emotionally separate themselves from the animals actions so you cease to relate to them an a reactive way.

<comment><USER18> Thank you for explaining!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This article talks a bit about the difficulties that come with making the transition (and the transition can be hard) but doesn't address the benefits. Working in blue collar positions can give one a unique perspective in WC positions: knowledge of how hard work _can_ be, a production driven mindset, a work hard play hard approach, limited tolerance for doddling and other B.S. and so on. This can be incredibly useful differentiation in the WC workplace.

</comment><comment><USER20> My route has been opposite, from white to blue collar. I was software developer and sysadmin for 16 years, straight out of school. For past 3 years I've been full time hand engraver and CNC machinist at my own company. I get to do very cool actual physical objects, starting from design with customer all the way to the finished product. Not a single regret so far, even though the office job was cozy and paid very well.

<comment><USER21> You are not a blue collar worker. You are a business owner. Being a business owner sometimes entails working blue collar like work but it doesn't mean you are a blue collar worker.

<comment><USER22> This is something I see a lot. When people say "my plumber makes $200k/year" what they mean is the guy who owns a plumbing business they use makes that much money. Very few blue collar workers that aren't also small business owners make over $100k/year and it can be pretty hard to get the gigs that do (usually require having many years of experience and being in the union in a particular area like NYC, or having a very rare specialty). The only "easy" way to break $100k/year as a blue collar worker is to work lots of overtime, which isn't exactly an apples-to-apples comparison with white collar jobs

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I think the biggest surprise for me was learning that white collar workers are neither more intelligent or wiser than blue collar ones, and that upper management is also made up of people with no particular oversupply of either attribute. They are just people who were born into the right social class and who are really good at playing the power game.

</comment><comment><USER24> Dishwasher, Linecook (Grad student), Construction worker, Construction Superintendent, PhD Student, Field Superintendent, Business Analyst, .NET developer, Java Dev & now Program Manager. I still love to be linecook, construction any day. The best job satisfaction I ever had. I see young kids these days just beaming with pride that are able to do a crud app or some react bs and they think they own the world. No respect sorry.

<comment><USER25> >> I still love to be linecook, construction any day. The best job satisfaction I ever had.

Why ?

<comment><USER24> Because there is no setting out to change the world "fakery". Let's face it, we are not changing the world by swiping right or left for hookups. Or, ordering delivery by tapping on the phone instead of calling the takeout place. When I am feeding a hungry person or building a shelter that's going to stand there for a hundred years I am literally changing the world.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I have a relative who was a blue-collar health worker for most of his life. He's in his mid-50s and started taking night classes a few years ago. Last week he graduated with his bachelor's degree and appears headed for a management job with his current employer.

I think it's awesome. He's so proud of that degree, and the rest of us are, too. It seems a little more special.

</comment><comment><USER27> I worked in a textiles factory in IT, one astonishing thing I found soon was, dealing with the blue-collar people was way easier. People did what you asked to, and were smarter.

</comment><comment><USER28> Surprised just how clean this article is.

Actual writing. Real groundwork. Relevant outlinks. No referral links (they totally could have sneak that in on the ONE amazon link).

Solid...anyone know what melmag is?

</comment><comment><USER7> >As a delivery driver, people wouldn't talk to me the same way or wouldn't ask for advice and stuff. I'm the same person with a different position but it seems like people respect me more because of what I do.

Because as a delivery driver, you follow instructions

As an engineer, you are paid to think critically, using logic and math as needed.

You should be more talented at making decisions after school + experience than before. Which is why people would ask you for advice.

Is there anything surprising/wrong about this? I don't ask high school kids for investing advice.

</comment><comment><USER29> I remind people at my company that I used to clean the shitters at a diesel garage.

</comment><comment><USER30> Strange that someone would get a degree in mechanical engineering, then go into IT.</comment>