When the State gets it wrong, innocent people die – I was almost one of them - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@damienechols/when-the-state-gets-it-wrong-innocent-people-die-i-was-almost-one-of-them-670c57d79796 <comment><USER2> It is a very human trait to stick with a choice once made, even if the information that led to that decision turns out to be faulty and the decision itself no longer makes sense. Loss of face, stubbornness, a refusal (subconscious or not) to admit our own fallibility, for any one person there can be plenty of reasons to stick with a faulty decision.

But what always puzzles me in these horrific accounts of abuse by a _system_ is how all the people that are part of it somehow allow for this human trait to seep into the system itself. What goes on in their minds? Is it something to do with a fear of unjustly triggering a series of (costly) events that might exonerate an innocent man? A fear of personal consequences in case they proved guilty after all? Or is it simply always someone else's problem — even if you were the governor himself?

<comment><USER3> politics and media play huge roles.

in this particular case though, the author provides zero evidence that the crime wasnt committee. he hints that the guy was mentally not all there or "insane".

<comment><USER2> The author himself (not the other guy who was executed in a rush) was offered the Alford Plea, which if I understand correctly means that the justice system does in fact believe he is innocent and doesn't want an innocent death on their hands, but also doesn't want to be held accountable for eighteen years of unjust incarceration — i.e., admit that a grave mistake was made.

(Please capitalize your sentences, it makes your contributions easer to read.)

<comment><USER4> Though that is kind of how it was used in Echol's case, in general the prosecutors think the person is guilty but don't want to spend money on the proof. Avoiding huge lawsuits was probably why it was used in this situation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > "An Alford Plea is a paradox — it means you get to maintain your innocence, > even as you accept a guilty plea. It makes no sense to anyone capable of > logical thinking, and the only reason it exists is so the state can't be > held accountable for sentencing an innocent person to death. Part of this > plea deal was that I could never sue the state of Arkansas for what they had > done to me. Why would I take such a deal? Because I knew that if I didn't, > I'd ... [be killed], despite having evidence that would have gained us > exoneration in a less corrupt forum."

As a European I never stop being amazed how crazy corrupt the US legal system is and how ignorant the US citizens are.

<comment><USER3> please don't equate Arkansas to the whole country

<comment><USER4> 47 states allow Alford pleas, as does the Department of Justice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is a horrifying story and, I fear, part of a trend in the USA towards devaluing human rights.

<comment><USER7> Since '99, executions have declined by 3x [https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions- year](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions-year)

<comment><USER6> Maybe so, but the devaluation of rights goes far beyond executions. There are ways to oppress people that are almost as bad as wrongful execution, such as wrongful and malicious prosecution, wrongful imprisonment, profit-based prison systems, and predatory plea-bargaining, and that's just the justice system.

In a broader sense, the willful dismantling of laws and programs meant to prevent human suffering, and reduce vulnerability to robber barons is also part of the trend: the denial of climate science, the attacks on net neutrality, the attempts to dismantle healthcare assistance, the defunding of scientific programs - the list goes on and on, and it is to the detriment of all but the mega-wealthy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > A judge ruled that the DNA, which could exonerate him, should never be > tested.

This resonates will with the other HN submission today about the climate denialist whose mind was changed by data.</comment>


Bizarre pornography raid underscores Wi-Fi privacy risks - <AUTHOR> http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42740201/ns/technology_and_science-wireless/

<comment><USER2> "Law enforcement officials say the case is a cautionary tale."

I think it's also a cautionary tale for law enforcement officers. It seems when it comes to pornography, all their rational thought processes drop down (they do have those, don't they) and they go into a "let's go get that bastard" mode. Sadly, although such stories are quite common, i.e. there's nothing bizarre about them in that sense, there's little you can do if it happens to you: They just say "OK, you weren't it" and go away.

I think the war against child pornography is being fought as mindlessly as the one on drugs, with quite similar results.

<comment><USER3> All they had to do is simply check if the guy had an unprotected wifi signal or not, but it was much easier breaking down the poor man's door and harrasing him.

<comment><USER4> So basically under your proposed rule, someone could download as much child porn as he wanted in complete safety as long as he made sure to keep his wifi unprotected? Your rule needs some refinement! :-)

<comment><USER3> I implied that they could be more civil if there is a chance that the owner of the internet connection is not the criminal. They could knock on the door, politely ask the owner to answer some questions and do the rough stuff after they are absolutely sure that that guy is the one they are looking for.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Tim O'Reilly: Web 2.0 Is About Controlling Data - - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/news/2007/04/timoreilly_0413 <comment><USER2> Thats awesome that he mentions Amazon & ebay as giants of Web 1.0 :-) <http://revvu.com> is gearing up for that scene.

</comment><comment><USER3> <http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2006/12/web_20_compact.html></comment>


Facebook's High Pressure Tactics: Opt-in or Else - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebooks_high_pressure_tactics_opt-in_or_else.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+readwriteweb+%28ReadWriteWeb%29

<comment><USER2> So, stop using Facebook if that bothers you. Same comment, re: privacy, goes for GMail, Google documents, Twitter, Yahoo, etc.

The sci-fi author David Brin (a cool guy, BTW, I once went to his house and had a long talk with him) has a good take on privacy (pardon my paraphrasing, but could not find a direct quote): lack of privacy can be tolerated if it is an even playing field. That is, if politician, corporations, etc. all have the same lack of privacy as people.</comment>


Ask HN: How to hire freelance developer for an MVP? - <AUTHOR> For those non technical founders who got their product developed by contractors, any tips to share? <comment><USER2> I do consulting for non-technical founders of software companies. This is an incredibly common question. A lot of ink has been spilled over it, including my own ( [https://jeremyphelps.com/blog/how-to-interview-a- freelance-d...](https://jeremyphelps.com/blog/how-to-interview-a-freelance- developer.html) )

Generally speaking you want to focus on more than raw technical skill. It's far more important that you align on expectations, values, etc. than it is to hire the world's greatest developer.

Most importantly: pay them to work on a small project before tackling your MVP. You don't want to get involved with someone on a big project only to find out the person is difficult to work with.

</comment><comment><USER3> As a software consultant with decade worth of experience, I've seen non- technical founders getting ripped off and getting substandard product. It's generally because, while they do have a clear vision of what they want, they do not have the ability to gauge the skill set of the agency/freelancer they are dealing with. In one case, despite paying full, my client didn't have access to the code and the agency became hostile when they started to feel the client slipping away. We had to send legal notice to get access to the code.

Here are some tips:

1\. Check for their LinkedIn profile and actually do attempt to talk with their clients. Do your research well, cold email should work.

2\. See how old their clients are and if they are still in business. Substandard product reduces the probability of the project to succeed.

3\. Involving external consultants to help you evaluate the Agency/Freelancer suited for your business. They would provide unbiased opinion which would help a lot.

4\. Always go slow, it might even make sense to comission 5-10% of the project and see how they perform. It reduces your overall ridk.

5\. Check their GitHub account for open source projects to gauge on technical competency.

6\. If you can't afford an architect, I'd still recommend getting few hour worth of their time to sense how the project is progressing technically. They would assist like a consulting CTO.

There are scammers everywhere, the onus is on us to be diligent.

Shameless plug: I run an agency, email in my profile. Do send me an email if you need any help.

</comment><comment><USER4> There's 5 stages: Define, design, develop, testing, deploy

There are different kinds of people suited to these stages. First step, get someone to write out what you want to do, ideally a developer. Commission a scope of work document, or write one yourself, with things like what pages are on your application, what relation they take to each other, UI, and so on. It's better for someone in programming or design to do this. Get a rough estimate for each.

You'll probably have to pay a good amount to get that done, but it's not wasted time. It's wasted if they misunderstand and build something you don't want. It's wasted if you misunderstand how expensive a component in (Social media logins are an example of something more effort than people realize). It's wasted effort and money if you thought you wanted something, but then scrap it later because that wasn't a good idea after all. And defining the problem is a big part of development as well, one that gets glanced over even by professionals. You should do wireframes to define UI - basically little sketches for buttons and where they go to, etc, and not with fonts, color, and the like.

Once you get the definition down, you should have a good feel for how good the person you're hiring is. If they're dumb it will clearly show, and make you frustrated. If they're great, they'll add input of their own and improve your plans.

Then you get to work on the following stages - hire a designer, a tester, find a way to deploy it to the users, though some freelancers can probably do all of this solo. Once deployed and you get your feedback, you cycle back to the definition phase for the next features.

</comment><comment><USER5> Focus on finding freelancers with the expertise you're looking for, and you'll be able to get a product much faster. I've done consulting for 2 YC companies and helped launch several products, if you want to chat just send me a message: [https://www.linkedin.com/in/deejax](https://www.linkedin.com/in/deejax) Probably looking through the HN freelancer thread would be a good start too.

Be attentive to the long term cost when you hire someone else to build an MVP --there's often a lot of changes, updates and natural iteration especially for early stage companies--just make sure you set aside a budget for that if you anticipate iterating.

</comment><comment><USER6> I would suggest to hire no-code developers. Most of them are people who are non-technical, but are well versed in creating online technical tools via no- code tools, which can be handed over to you in a way that you can manage and scale it by yourself in future, without the need to have any technical knowledge, except what's the workflow of your product.

</comment><comment><USER7> There is a monthly "Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer?" thread first working day of the month [https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=whoishiring](https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=whoishiring)

<comment><USER8> In my experience the quality of developers posting on that thread is worse than upwork, on average. This shouldn't be surprising, since hn is an open forum where literally anyone can post. On upwork there's at least some work history you can look at.

<comment><USER9> How many experiences have you had?

<comment><USER8> I've kind of lost count, but about 5 on hn, and 10 or so on upwork. I'm still working with 1 from hn, who is posting to the thread despite having very limited availability.

There were 3 people from upwork whose work quality was great, but are also severely overbooked (great work on the first project, then no reply for weeks)

The biggest problem for me is that qualified devs all seem to be overbooked.

<comment><USER10> > qualified devs all seem to be overbooked.

did you try giving them more money?

<comment><USER8> yes, I did.

to add to this - I pay exactly what the freelancer asks, and not a single person I've worked with has ever asked me for an increase in rates, even when I would have gladly accepted. When I offer more money proactively, it's usually when they're dropping the project and I really want them to continue. Unfortunately money doesn't seem to be the issue in these cases - the two instances were "got a job" and "personal issue".

apart from that:

\- hourly rates don't correlate with total cost, lower hourly rates = they'll bill you more hours

\- higher hourly rates isn't necessarily better. The best, most reliable person I've worked with charged $60/hr. The worst was well over 100.

<comment><USER11> I am curious to know how in the world someone with $100/hr could not provide a professional service?

Doesn't lower hourly rate means less experienced professional?

I should probably increase my rate from $45/hr to at least $60/hr considering that I don't annoy my clients like you in Upwork.

On the contrary, getting clients to actually pay over $100/hr is a holy grail. How many clients did these guys had in their history?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> What language/stack are you using? If you know, let me know, might be able to help.

If you don't, you don't know enough to be a technical hirer/boss in this situation.

<comment><USER4> As a freelancer, this is a terrible way to filter it IMO. A lot of people come to me expecting a website to be built in, say, Ruby. I ask them why not JavaScript, and they'll tell me that JavaScript has some licensing issues with Oracle. Or some pick Cordova because it's easier to maintain one code base (it's not).

It's hard enough for someone who does it professionally for years to know why they should pick Flutter over Native, or Vue over React. Most people probably can't afford the best stack anyway. Let the freelancer decide what's best to build the product in.

<comment><USER9> If you can't find another contractor to maintain things later on because you locked into an unpopular language, it'll feel pretty silly.

<comment><USER4> That would be part of the interview process - figuring whether their language of choice is replaceable. Most languages are learnable; every project I've joined was built in a language I had 0 experience in, but it's not hard to just hack in fixes or even rebuild modules completely.

Outsourced work tends to be hacky and unmaintainable for the most part. Sometimes it's built cheap, with no architecture whatsoever or designed for a very specific situation. Even worse, it could be overengineered.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? is a good place to start. I've got projects on multiple slack channels as well (Larachat, Launch etc.)

<comment><USER13> Can you share those slack channels?

<comment><USER12> VueSlack, Larachat and Launch

<comment><USER11> There is no way to join VueSlack. Invitation link no longer works.

Can you share an invitation link so I could join myself?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'd ask for recommendations/referrals from friends and your local startup/tech community.</comment>


Startup America, Startup Britain - why no Startup Australia? - <AUTHOR> http://www.startupsmart.com.au/growth/2011-04-01/10-reasons-why-we-need-a-startup-australia.html

<comment><USER2> I would have upvoted this story, if it hadn't been for the annoying "darken screen and ask for your email address" trick.

Perhaps part of the answer to the question posed by the title is "because the Australian startup community is too dominated by scammy-looking weirdoes trying to sell you "101 tips on somethingorother""

<comment><USER3> > because the Australian startup community is too dominated by scammy-looking > weirdoes trying to sell you "101 tips on somethingorother"

Correct!

Including this "Finntastic" guy, who sits around submitting links to these inane stories.

One of our engineers was just bitching about the ridiculous number of people in Australia who are 'trying to help' the startup community from the outside.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Because massively successful Australian startups can be counted on one hand.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the positivity guys! Just a few points - we report on and work closely with the start-up community in Australia. To us, there is no 'outside', only collaboration and support.

Secondly, nothing is being sold on our site. All the information is free and doesn't require any sign-up. If you don't want to read it, fine, but many people find the info we publish very helpful. I'm sorry you don't, but I'm not going to force you to read or buy anything.

Thirdly, Andrewstuart, constructive point, but if you've ever been on Freelancer.com, watched TV or a movie on Fox or read a newspaper any time recently, there's a good chance you would've seen the work of 'massively successful' Australian entrepreneurs.

Fourthly, how about discussing the point and the issue in hand, rather than pointless backbiting, eh?

I know a lot of Australians look at this site and I'm sure they'd love to get the perspective of a country with a more switched-on start-up culture.

<comment><USER5> Freelancer? You mean the Swedish site (GetAFreelancer) that was bought by some Australians?

Sure, it has been cleaned up a bunch, but doesn't seem like a massive entrepreneurial success (other than as a vehicle for self-promotion).

<comment><AUTHOR> Suppose that depends on your definition of entrepreneurialism.

Raising $40m in funding, adding 2 million customers in a year and dominating a niche is pretty entrepreneurial behaviour to me.

But then you could define that strictly by who founded the company, came up with the original idea etc.

It's an interesting debate. Going by the second, stricter, definition of entrepreneur, how would you class Trump Organization heir Donald Trump? Or, if you believe a couple of Olympic rowers, Mark Zuckerberg for that matter?

They are still both entrepreneurs to me. So is Matt Barrie. Good on 'em all, I say.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Which of the 635000 NPM modules do I choose? - <AUTHOR> https://www.coreycleary.me/which-of-the-635000-npm-modules-do-i-choose/ <comment><USER2> FIRST QUESTIONS 1\. DOES IT DO WHAT I NEED TO DO, AS ELEGANTLY AS I DO IT? 2\. IS IT WELL DOCUMENTED? 3\. IS IT SIMPLE ENOUGH THAT I CAN PERFORM A SECURITY AUDIT ON IT?

SECOND QUESTIONS 1\. IS IT SUPPORTED, AND IF NOT IS IT SIMPLE ENOUGH FOR ME TO SUPPORT? 2\. IS IT PRESENTED AS PRODUCTION/GA CODE?

You won't need to bother about answering the second set affirmatively if you can't do so with the first. To make a good clean decision, the answers to all the forgoing should be in the affirmative.

If you ignore the attractive module names and apply this simple hueristic faithfully, you'll find that the pool of potential production modules is not only reduced dramatically but that in some application areas the selection will actually become quite sparse.

You might say that my hueristic is incomplete, and you might be right, so feel free to add a few conditions of your own.

Note that while we're all different and have different requirements, you should still direct your efforts toward keeping the hueristic as simple and concise as possible.

<comment><AUTHOR> This is definitely a very useful heuristic and one I follow. I might put "Is it supported?" in the first questions group though, especially if the project is for work and you need to be able to get support/troubleshooting questions answered quickly, as opposed to a "just for fun" side project where deadlines are less prevalent.

"Keeping the heuristic as simple and concise as possible" -> this is really the crux of it. In this post I listed out pre-researched modules and use cases for them, but still basically a heuristic nonetheless.</comment></comment>


Doctors raise alarm about health effects of continued coronavirus shutdown - <AUTHOR> https://www.foxnews.com/politics/doctors-raise-alarm-about-health-effects-of-continued-coronavirus-shutdown <comment><USER2> [https://www.scribd.com/document/462319362/A-Doctor-a-Day- Let...](https://www.scribd.com/document/462319362/A-Doctor-a-Day-Letter- Signed)</comment>


Instacube Out of Cash, Needs to Raise 1+ Million - <AUTHOR> http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1084349160/instacube-a-living-canvas-for-your-instagram-photo/posts/528245 <comment><USER2> You mean they need a B round ;)

Edit: People asking for their money back in the forums! Priceless! I'm sure they'll start issuing refunds immediately with all that cash they have on hand.</comment>


Synth repairman accidentally gets high after touching old LSD on'60s synthesizer - <AUTHOR> https://consequenceofsound.net/2019/05/synth-repairman-lsd/ <comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23535373](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23535373)

<comment><AUTHOR> Dang.</comment></comment>


It's time to act. Help prevent upload filters by calling EU parliament members - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/achtungtechnik/status/1008971079606513664?s=21 <comment><AUTHOR> Kudos to haywirez

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17339543](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17339543)</comment>


Steve Blank's Guide to the Real Silicon Valley - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/startup-grind/steve-blanks-guide-to-the-real-silicon-valley-37278610026c#.c2mz8mr15 <comment><USER2> Summary: there's nothing to see in Silicon Valley, folks. Move along. This article reminds me of a Movietone newsreel, slick propaganda pieces shown in movie theaters and classrooms during the baby boom years.</comment>


Last Resort Font - Unicode placeholder to identify unsupported characters - <AUTHOR> http://www.unicode.org/policies/lastresortfont_eula.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Another great tool I use on Firefox is the extension Character Identifier by L. David Baron

[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/character- ide...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/character-identifier/)

You just highlight any characters on the page, right click and it gives you a breakdown.</comment>


Life of a Tech-nomad. - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/this-happened-to-me/e8b4d21888a4

<comment><USER2> Sorry if I come of a bit harsh (personal bias, I'm aware), but here's my input:

As someone who grew up in two different places (granted, they were strong opposites), and as someone who knew many children whose parents moved a lot, I'm warning you; It has a very negative effect on most children, loosing your friends/peers and not being allowed to "invest" in them. As an adult you might think, oh, well he can use Skype or e-mail then, and what's so bad about making new friends. No. Eventually most of them stop making friends, or make them very superficially. Your kids most likely won't have childhood friends, friends they trust, nor close friends. And no, family (or you) is not a substitute either.

> sacrificing the safety & comfort of a 'normal life' and just doing what it > takes to make something happen

That's great as long as it's only your stuff you're sacrificing.

I do commend the bravery and spirit, but I'm strongly against including kids in it.

<comment><USER3> "That's great as long as it's only your stuff you're sacrificing."

My parents moved again and again then divorced and moved again and again. I attended four different high schools and have no life-long childhood friends nor a "hometown" nor many great memories of family. My siblings and I were the casualties of their lifestyle and half of us are dead before 30. Our education and many other advantages of a more stable life suffered.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry to hear that...

We moved at least every 5yrs - my dad was in the military... I also don't have a hometown and went to plenty of different schools around the world. I don't have any of the negative feelings about moving or not having a real hometown... nor did I have any issues keeping friends long distance or otherwise. Just to give you some perspective... not everyone has the same experiences.

<comment><USER4> I feel like moving with the military, or going to an American school in a foreign country is less problematic than other situations. Starting at a new High School in Norfolk VA is different from starting at a new High School in St Louis. Going to college where you don't know anyone is not a problem because everyone else is in the same boat. Military brats and expat kids are much more receptive to new friends than their typical peers. If the new school has plenty of them, the experience is likely not so bad.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think military kids are just taught to get over it - and not be whiners...thats really my take. I went to plenty of 'offbase' public schools where I was not only one of the 'few' military brats... but also completely foreign ( I'm half-Asian - try doing that in the deep south? ). ;) Being receptive is about learning to accept that shits changed and you either adapt or turn into a hermit... its also about knowing that people are not that different from each other - they just have different experiences of the world... I accept people for who they are - not where they live or what they do - or even for what the may not have experienced...and I usually find it easy to make new friends.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _My "office" is a small corner of one of the bedrooms and consists of a 5yr old MacbookPro with a broken fan._

I don't get this piece. If you're a developer, you should have the best development gears you can afford. Why have it so miserable to make it more of a punishment than a happy environment to work in.

<comment><USER6> Hmm, besides the broken fan the machine is good enough for development work under OS X. I have a 2009 MBP and only switched the hard drive for an SSD. It runs XCode like a charm.

> If you're a developer, you should have the best development gears you can > afford.

There's also the school of thought that you should be using the hardware configuration you expect most users will be running and make sure your product runs acceptable on it.

Giving the devs highly powered machines just removes them from what the majority of users will experience. While most people still surf the web with Core 2 Duo machines many webdevs have overpowered i7 rigs with gigabytes of RAM. And that's why so many JavaScript loaded websites are unusable on anything but the latest quadcore i7 systems nowdays.

<comment><USER5> _There 's also the school of thought that you should be using the hardware configuration you expect most users will be running and make sure your product runs acceptable on it._

This might have been true for desktop software development, but not in this case. In the context of mobile apps, it's the testing devices might as well be low-end ones, not the development machines.

<comment><USER6> Are we talking about iOS now? I just replied to your

> If you're a developer, you should have the best development gears you can > afford.

generalization.

<comment><AUTHOR> we do it all... mostly iOS / Android and Cloud based stuff though... its interesting how people are worried about my set up... haha... I added those details for drama...I guess it worked. My machine is old... but I can get plenty of work done - and really its fine for Xcode and developing mobile apps or doing cloud based development as well... its actually amazing how far these machines can take you now a days....

<comment><USER7> I spent 2 years programming on a 13" Macbook Air while traveling...it was doable, but I'm definitely a lot more productive now with a pair of 27" monitors! (Still plugged into the MBA though.)

<comment><AUTHOR> :) yes big monitors are good! and more comfortable for sure... but I can't really lug them with me thru the airports in Moscow...and I don't want to buy one here and leave it to rot while Im gone... already have too much stuff in storages.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Does it have to be like this? Is it not possible to lead a startup and work normal hours (≤8) and spend time with your kids?

I'm torn between thinking I'm putting too little time in my software business (solo developer), and thinking that I'm spending too little time with my family.

I don't want to believe I need to sacrifice my family life to be successful.

<comment><USER9> > Is it not possible to lead a startup and work normal hours (≤8) and spend > time with your kids?

Absolutely. The problem is that if you go head-to-head with people that _will_ go all out there is a chance that they'll be able to outgun you with a similar sized team.

In practice there are ways to offset for that depending on the situation, for instance, you could have more experience, better quality people you're working with, an established track record and/or a better launchpad.

So it's not just a one-dimensional (time put in) problem.

<comment><AUTHOR> It also depends on the talents of the team and individual in question... I don't want people to think I'm advocating they dump as many hours as I do into things... I'm just saying thats been my personal way of attacking things. Everyone is different - Im sure there are people out there who can put in way less time and get better results for their needs... this is just what I happen to be doing to make things work. I'm a bit extreme normally anyhow.

<comment><USER9> Be aware that this can be a trade-off too. It may be that you can burn fast but burn short or that you could burn a lot longer if you pace yourself. If you take off before you reach the end of that runway then good but if you run out of energy before you've reached a plateau of some stability then you could easily lose it all.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes - Im aware of that... thanks for the reply...Im getting to the stage where some balance is returning to my life...I plan to take advantage of that and reduce the overload by building a bigger team to help me. ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> While I admire the guys's perseverance, I can't help but have the reaction of "wow that is selfish". If you're working that much (for that long) it sounds like you have very little family life.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ouch...I actually spend more time with my family than I would if I was working a regular 9-5. We are together since I work at my laptop near them. But yes I am busy a lot... thats the point of the writing I guess.

<comment><USER10> "Spending time" doesn't actually mean you're really present though does it? Not trying to sound harsh, but it's something I've examined a lot in my family relations as well. It reminds me of the dads at the playground who are having conversations on their cell phones while their kids are trying to interact with them. They're spending time with their kids, but are they "there"?

Thanks for writing though. I think too many people think success will happen within the first year or so and don't realize there are often pivots and things don't often go ... as planned.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes you are right.. I am partially absent during my time with the kids.. there but not all there. I wish I could tell you I was the picture perfect version of a dad... but Im not - and to me being a dad is an everyday struggle to get it right...but that being said - my version of whats right and yours are probably very different...My dad was busy all the time too - he flew choppers in the Army... he went on TDY ( long term duty ) / he worked over weekends ( MEDIVAC )... he was busy as hell and yea sometimes he was grouchy.... but dammit he was a great dad..and I love the hell out of him...he was real with me...always... he let me know that the world is not all pretty smelling roses and sometimes you get your ass handed to you... maybe thats why I am the way I am now? dunno.. I hope to teach my kids the same kind of survival skills my parents taught me... do what you must do to survive and succeed on your own terms... be a real person... strive to stay honest and seek what is good in your heart. Thats all I'm doing here... if I've sacrificed being a 'great dad' \- well... hopefully my wonderful kids and wife will forgive me for trying... my goal is to get to a place where I do have much more freedom and time with them...and I'd never trade the time Ive had with them thusfar... being an at home dad... even if it meant laptop glued to my fingers... has not been all that terrible in my pov. cheers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I left my hometown in East Borneo when I was 13. I now live in Cairo, Egypt, which is my 7th country. I started my company in 2003 back in Chicago. I just got married to an Italian woman three months ago.

Bottom line: What's normal is not the same for everybody.

<comment><AUTHOR> :) exactly... thats part of what I was trying to convey as well by saying we are "nomads" \-- a wandering family.. but that doesn't mean its all bad. cheers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Interesting. I'm married to a Russian devushka and work with a Russian developer similar to the author. Also considering moving to Russia part-time (black sea area) if my startup gains enough traction.

<comment><AUTHOR> If its just you and your wife - then I'd say take a chance! :) I actually enjoy my time in Russia...We even have a guy working with us from Ukraine so its a lot of cultural fun for me anyhow. ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This article is riddled with misspellings, typos, and grammar errors. :(

<comment><AUTHOR> thanks...do you want to edit it for me? I suck at grammar and writing.</comment></comment>


Detroit Is America's Emerging Market - <AUTHOR> http://time.com/3204249/detroit-americas-emerging-market/ <comment><USER2> This is certainly what Dan Gilbert would like you to think so he can resell his cheaply purchased real estate at a profit.

Detroit has poor infrastructure (responsible for recent flooding,) high taxes, no public rail transport, poor roads, rush-hour traffic congestion, poor parking, some of the worst schools in the country, corrupt local government, is full of blighted neighborhoods, and I am sure many other terrible things. I am trying to see the reason why anyone would think it was a good idea to live or work there in its current condition.

<comment><USER3> Is this not the case for all "emerging markets"? This wouldn't be a story if Detroit had low crime, great infrastructure, low taxes, superb public transport, immaculate roads, and prestigious schools. All of the aforementioned would translate to increased costs of living. Is Dan Gilbert making money from this? Absolutely, but he's also the one that took on the initial risk.

The cost for cheap, spacious housing and office space in Detroit is having to tolerate a phoenix city in the midst of an identity crisis; expecting something which resembles NYC or SF is silly. I grew up in Michigan and have been to Detroit numerous times, and what I've witnessed lately (in concentrated locations, of course) is exciting -- see [http://techtowndetroit.org/](http://techtowndetroit.org/). Granted, there are certainly depressing and desolate areas of the city, but again that should be expected for a city that has seen massive emigration and decreased revenue. I am optimistic about the future of Detroit.

<comment><USER4> There are a lot of differences between Detroit and a real emerging market. For one, higher minimum wages. For another, additional environmental and labor regulations (and while some of this may benefit society and some of it may not, _much_ of it probably results in increased compliance costs.) For a third, a 41% corporate income tax rate (35% US + 6% Michigan, according to casual internet search).

If you're going to pay the very high price of doing business in the US, it might be a better plan to locate yourself somewhere a little less wrecked where it actually buys you something.

<comment><USER5> That's why the title say " _America 's_ emerging market", not "the best emerging market ever". You're commenting on an article called America's emerging market and complaining about the fact that America's emerging market is in America.

Think about it.

<comment><USER6> Emerging suggests positive change currently and into the future. The only positive I can see from the story is cheap real-estate?

There's no indicator, in the article at least, that anything is happening in Detroit to turn around job prospects since the car industry keeled over. So you wouldn't go there for work. Also, according to protonfish, Detroit has terrible infrastructure and sounds like a shitty place to live. So you wouldn't go there for the lifestyle.

All of which leaves me wondering: what's so great about Detroit that it should be considered an emerging market?

<comment><USER7> Aside from the Detroit car industry doing quite well, I have to comment on -

"Also, according to protonfish, Detroit has terrible infrastructure and sounds like a shitty place to live."

Just to contrast here, protonfish questions the motives of a billionaire who has moved thousands of his own employees, and made significant investments, in downtown Detroit. A man who, despite the financial capacity to live anywhere in the world, lives in Detroit. Invests in Detroit. Believes in Detroit.

Isn't that an incredible contrast? On the one hand you have someone taking strong actions, and on the other you have someone posting a comment on a message board. And you believe the guy posting on a message board?

I doubt protonfish knows anything about Detroit beyond some ruin porn they saw on a Reddit post.

<comment><USER5> Hell, I bought my car because it was made in Detroit (I was born and raised in Michigan). 'Imported from Detroit' is a hell of a marketing message for Fiat/Chrysler to make.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The Madison Block[1] has a lot to do with the growth startup-wise in Downtown Detroit. Also, there are more and more meetups going on. For example, Detroit Soup[2] is a growing event and calls people to join, pay $5 for soup, and vote on a project that will benefit the city (people present their projects). Even MHacks, the premier college hackathon run by students from the University of Michigan, was held in the Quicken Loans headquarters this spring. I have also been to a few meetups such as one from the Detroit NodeJS group, and the Detroit Drones group- the meetup groups are active and growing.

The city has had its ups and downs, but things are on the rise. Take it from someone who has lived near the city for 17 years. I think there are a lot of assumptions about Detroit, but there are a few things that are true: We have a 14.5% unemployment rate, a post industrial culture (culture of employees expecting to work for the Big Three immediately, instead of a culture of entrepreneurs), a financial problem, and poor Detroit schools (however the schools in suburbs are much better).

I think that the combination of a lot of opportunity, and recent support from people like Dan Gilbert gave Detroit a huge start with the Madison Block, and that is the reason that people look at Detroit and what is happening in the city now.

1\. [http://www.madisonblock.com/](http://www.madisonblock.com/)

2\. [http://detroitsoup.com/](http://detroitsoup.com/)

</comment><comment><USER9> Is there a PR firm behind the effort to make stories about Detroit appear here from time to time, or is it actually that compelling of a city-story?

I have to think that there are many US cities equal to or superior to Detroit in just about any balance of livability metrics one could produce, including cost.

Very abstractly speaking, I can't even see it being a local maxima for any particular basket of criteria...help?

<comment><USER10> People find Detroit interesting because it was once a leading city, and then feel into a deep decline.

People like stories of rise, fall and rise again. A city that is merely "better than Detroit" is not particularly interesting.

The anchoring bias is certainly at play here. I imagine others contribute as well.

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

People also are interesting in the potential of Detroit. Detroit was founded where it was because it is on a river and the Great Lakes. It has good farmland (I'm guessing on that point). It is amidst other major cities. It has history.

So if Detroit recovers, there is a natural support structure around it that will make it an interesting city.

<comment><USER11> When was the last time Detriot was a leading city? Early 90s to late 80s? I'm surprised most people on here are old enough to remember that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I visited Detroit for the first time this past weekend, I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it- beautiful, clean downtown area (much cleaner than SF), a very lively art scene (many artists ARE moving there for the cheap rent), many new bars and restaurants, a growing community of people that care and want to see the city improve.

<comment><USER13> If you just visited the downtown area, some would argue that you didn't see the "real" Detroit. I might be one to make that argument had I been to Detroit in the last 15 years. Tell you what, could you do me a favor and catch a bus up to around 6 Mile Road and Woodward Ave. and let me know how things are looking? :-)

(Seriously, though, unless Detroit has undergone some hard-core gentrification in the last decade, please don't do that.)

<comment><USER12> I visited the abandoned neighborhoods as well and saw some terrible blight and impoverished areas- my point is that as an outsider, that's all you expect from Detroit, which is only part of the picture.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Article cites cheap rent as a reason businesses are flocking there, but I don't buy it.

Houston's downtown, which has excellent office stock and is in the center of an _exponentially_ stronger economy, has median rents at about $25 per square foot. Detroit's CBD median is $23 per square foot.

Plenty of cheap office space all around this country so I reject that this is the reason.

<comment><USER15> Heh...

Visit Downtown Houston... then compare it to Downtown Detroit... I think you would rather be in Downtown Detroit.

I live behind the gates on Sunset... and I'm sitting in the Museum District as I type this. So don't misunderstand me... there are a lot of nice places inside the 610 in Houston. Downtown is not one of them however.

I'm a Houston guy... but I have to say... if you ever actually visit Downtown Detroit, you will find it is MUCH more clean and attractive than Downtown Houston. It was a visit to Detroit that made a lot of people around here kick in to redo or demolish a lot of the eyesore abandoned towers in Downtown Houston. There are just too many of these abandoned buildings in Houston's Downtown right now... so it's slow going.

<comment><USER14> Well fair enough. Houston's downtown is pretty boring but not too much blight although that abandoned Days Inn needs to go. My point was just that downtown Houston is the center of a much stronger and larger economic area.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> One of the big problems with Detroit is that it's missing people to pay taxes into the system. That means the remaining people have to pay higher share of taxes for infrastructure that's supposed to support far more people.

A solution could be asking immigrants to live there and giving them an accelerated citizenship schedule. If they live in Detroit for X years, they qualify to become citizens. That'll bring an influx of new people who will pay taxes, start new businesses and work at all levels of the economy.

<comment><USER15> I think this is the same as the idea of the Governor and the President. There are a lot of issues with it, but the main one I see is the jobs issue.

Typically, immigrants move to places where jobs are plentiful. With a program like this, you are moving immigrants to a place, and then ASSUMING that jobs will follow. I'm not sure it works like this. I think places like San Fran, Chicago and Boston for instance, all draw a lot of immigrants because there are a large number of open jobs in these places. Historically speaking... setting up immigrant neighborhoods in the absence of jobs has proven to be a bad idea.

If you have to use governmental incentives, and I'm not saying you do, but if you are going to use governmental incentives... I think a BETTER approach would be to give the incentives to companies and startups. If companies and startups come to Detroit, then people will follow to fill any jobs these enterprises create. I don't think you need to put forth more governmental incentives to INDIVIDUALS to live in Detroit. (In fact, I think that's been a big problem in Detroit in recent history).

If you want healthy growth... it really does need to be predicated on a diverse and vibrant private sector.

Now if you are absolutely bent on providing incentives to individuals, then Detroit should provide the incentives to recent college grads, or other young people to come to Detroit to try to make a go of a startup. Everything from free healthcare to nearly-free office space in some of the many available buildings just outside the development zones, (or even inside of the zones???), could be offered to them on a first come first served basis. Such an offer would, I think, be well received by today's young people given the troubles they are experiencing in the job market.

<comment><USER16> Great reply, thanks.

With regards to _" setting up immigrant neighborhoods in the absence of jobs has proven to be a bad idea."_ what's an example of this? I'm curious about what's been tried in the past.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> >Many emerging-market cities, from Istanbul to Lagos to Mumbai, share similar characteristics, good and bad.

hmm... Istanbul, Lagos and Mumbai are each the largest city and main commercial centres for large developing countries. Detroit less so.

</comment><comment><USER18> I'm just not sure how Detroit ever comes back as any type of manufacturing / industrial center in the NAFTA era.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada%E2%80%93United_States_Au...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada%E2%80%93United_States_Automotive_Products_Agreement)

There is no longer any real benefit to dealing with the additional expense of the weather issues with current trade agreements. Add to that the continuing expansion of contract manufacturing in Mexico. It just doesn't make sense for companies compared to Texas, Alabama, Mississippi etc.

It's a great story, but I just don't see how it is possible beyond a small boutique city center for special cases.

</comment><comment><USER19> So is it a good time to start investing in property in Detroit?

<comment><USER20> doubtful, even if they rename it Delta City.

This piece came across as a feel good piece, if anything its a familiar story. Town goes down the tubes, yuppies move in and renovate old housing and such pushing what few remaining stragglers there are left out and help recreate a few revitalized islands amongst the rest. Usually led by a few strong business interest who promote the idea to get further concessions and good will all the while the decaying neighborhoods on the perimeter of these areas just stagnate

<comment><USER21> That sounds...great? You just described urban renewal. It's got to start somewhere, it's not going to happen all at once all over the city.

<comment><USER20> urban renewal does sound great until you realize the only people who suffer are those who are already suffering. So you have depressed prices which means large swaths of property can be bought out on the cheap. Then those areas get developed and local property values increase. However, instead of buying out the dieing islands of poor they are driven out either through increased taxes, zoning, or imminent domain seizures, which turn the property over to the very same people who would not buy it when they know government will take it for them</comment></comment></comment></comment>


The difference between 'broke' and 'poor' - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/mar/12/poor-broke-difference-poverty-inequality-society <comment><USER2> Poverty especially sucks when you're all alone like it seems this person was. Where I grew up, most of the people were poor, but we had rich lives for the most part. Lots of family dinners and outings. The people with more would let you take the leftovers home. You can't really train this and we all definitely need a social safety net, but I do think our closed off society prevents us from helping each other too.

<comment><USER3> I think the recent decades turned us away from ~natural gathering/solidarity mindset. Consumerism drugs you thinking the best thing is to satisfy envy with things, and without a context of cultural sharing habits, many people end up alone struggling thinking people are selfish because today's mainstream is selfish and so it's hard to connect.

<comment><USER4> Not that simple.

Social connections require work, they also are slow and unreliable.

Before the information age, to get to know something, talking was the main way.

But now with books, panels, displays, packaging, signs, internet, GPS, etc., we have access to a huge quantity of information without having to talk to each others.

And we choose to do so because on average it's faster, more accurate, and avoid to deal with annoying people. After all, human relations also include a part of risk.

I lived 2 years in Africa, and there, you don't have that much information immediately available. You are back to talking, creating a social network and playing the game. People are way more friendly there, there is greater solidarity. But things are also way slower, unreliable, and you are a lot more at the mercy of popularity games even in the most simple activities.

This century we have been mutating our lives in deep ways, very fast. And it's not all bad. But we will need some time to reconcile the efficiency of our new life styles with the social needs we have at the primitive level. A few decades is way too short for that to have happened already, especially since we are not done with technical progress.

<comment><USER3> I think you're pushing it too far, even my parent's generation is confused how culture changed from a lot of social interactions to barely nothing. They had radio/phone/tv (a lot lot less of course) but the social quality was still present.

I agree with your conclusion though.

<comment><USER5> Radio and tv are worthless for information on demand. The phone is still talking to other people.

I can now travel into a city I've never been to, find directions to and make reservations at a popular restaurant, follow it up with directions to a nice scenic spot, and finally find a last minute nice hotel to stay in all without ever interacting with another person.

None of that was possible with radio/tv.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've been where this author has: selling off stuff and wondering how to pay rent, waiting in line for free food, donating blood plasma for $15, walking everywhere because it's cheaper than the bus, getting arrested for not paying child support. Nonetheless apparently I had it ass-backwards in my head: rather than "poor" I mostly still considered myself what this author would call "broke" the whole time. Maybe it was denial, maybe I was just another "temporarily embarrassed millionaire." But I adhered to the thought that I didn't belong in that situation, that it was temporary.

Regardless, poor and rich are relative terms; it's a continuum. You can never be "poor" and you can never be "rich." You can only be poorER, or richER, than somebody else. But there will still always be someone else poorER or richER than you. Ask Steve McQueen if he's rich, and he'll say well I'm not as rich as Paul Newman. Both dead now of course, but they once squabbled over who would get top billing in The Towering Inferno.

I think what I'm saying is that in some way, "poor" is in your mind, and as soon as you consider yourself poor, you are poor. I still wouldn't fault the author's friends for saying they're "too poor" to afford something; it is literally true. They're "rich" enough to afford food, sure, and I guess that offends the writer's sense of victimhood. The whole drama of this piece takes place in the writer's mind. It's a story of falling tragically from a place of privilege. People are "poor" every day and don't feel the need to write an article about it and nobody asks them to.

<comment><USER7> Your last paragraph is spot on. I definitely had a "I'm too poor" mentality for most of my 20s (I did some similar things to the author of the piece, but without the kids), and that mindset was definitely a limiting factor in my life. I was always too poor to do anything I wanted to do. I even considered myself too poor to date anyone, so I just didn't. Now that I'm in my 30s looking back, and even though I'm more financially secure now it seems like I had a lot more freedom then and could have done a lot more then, possibly more than I can afford to do now (because now what I'm poor in is time and energy, not so much cash).

I still managed to do a few interesting things in my 20s, but not as much as I would have if I could reverse time but with the knowledge I have now.

<comment><USER8> Tip if I may: don't get too comfy.

Life can come crashing down on you sometimes, and it can do so very fast. My own life lesson has been that you're poor and broke (whether aware of it or not) until you're financially retired.

<comment><USER7> I definitely don't consider myself financially secure, not by a long shot. I'm still a lot closer to the poor end of things than I feel comfortable with, especially since I know bad things could be right around the corner.

It's easy to not have it at the forefront of your mind though, and be a little too easy with money. My girlfriend is pretty bad about it also, and I've been a lot more loose with my money since dating her than I was when I was single. But I'm also to blame, we just enable each other to have bad behavior.

I do save a decent amount and don't touch that, though, we just could be doing better. I'm not saving quite as much as recommended, and nowhere near the almost 50% of wages that some people here claim to do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I thought that the article was going to make the more relevant distinction between "transient low income/wealth" and "reasonable expectation of permanently low income/wealth". If we're going to specify a useful word, I think that's more interesting than what she's saying about "so little income it impacts your life stability" vs "low disposable income". I don't think it's useful for this woman to call herself poor, she had an explicitly transient state of unusually high outgoings and low income. She never looked down the barrel of 20 years of the same situation.

</comment><comment><USER10> In my early 20's I had a girlfriend who was raised in Colombia and immigrated to the US in her teens. I remember one day recounting some bullshit middle- class slogan about how "it's better to be poor and happy, than rich and sad". She slapped me across the face and yelled at me. Passionate as she was she'd never done anything like that before. She told me what it was like growing up so poor you can't afford toothpaste. She basically gave me the whole "you know nothing John Snow". She described what a hard life it was. She'd take anything over that life.

She also wasn't poor in a 1st world country with community pools and libraries. Being poor in a 3rd world country is a whole other level.

<comment><USER11> You're both right. Research shows that more money doesn't make you happier - _after_ around 80k a year in family income. Before 80k a year (depending on location, etc, I think that was the average for the USA), every dollar absolutely makes you happier with a linear line graph.

This is also a great argument for more marginal taxation.

<comment><USER12> If 80k/yr is considered poor, then sure, but that's absurd. She was right. He was wrong.

<comment><USER11> Totally agree, I should have phrased it better.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> > I often hear my friends say, "I'm too poor" when they're frustrated about > what they can't have. Maybe it's a trip they can't afford, a renovation they > want to start right now or a pretty pair of shoes they spotted in a shop > window.

I'm pretty sure I've literally never heard someone describe that as being "poor". Maybe this is some regional language thing?

<comment><USER14> I think this article (and I've seen another before just like it about the poor/broke distinction that had a really powerful piece about mental math while buying groceries) do a disservice to themselves by focusing on the usage of two very common, widely used words. It's fine for words to have multiple meanings in different contexts and those meanings are defined by usage. If people say "I'm too poor to get a pool membership" then that's what poor means, at least in some contexts. Prescriptivism of common, mundane words is a terrible way to make a point. The author is hiding their real point, which would be still more powerful without this unnecessary baggage. See what we're discussing instead of what the author probably wanted us to discuss? If she wants a distinction, then there are other words or phrases (chronically poor, perhaps?) with more specific meanings. But it is fruitless to get "heartbroken" that people don't understand a distinction that isn't common use.

<comment><USER15> Seems like these kinds of articles always need to have a scold or a guilt trip associated, though I'm not sure it's irrational of the author. We are discussing it, aren't we?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I have noticed there's been some progress on reducing the stigma when you're poor and are surrounded by those that aren't.

When I was young, free and/or reduced school lunch paper punch cards were a different color than normal paid ones. Similar for food stamps, WIC, etc. Now they are all plastic cards that don't look obviously different from the cards the people with money use.

<comment><USER17> EBT moved to discreet debit cards more for ease of accounting and disbursement than recipient dignity, but WIC still uses stacks of paper checks that have to be run as a series of discrete transactions. They're embarrassing to use, almost more trouble than they're worth.

It's obvious when people are paying with it-- the conveyor belt is lined with bunched groceries and paper slips while the line behind the customer backs up into the aisles.

<comment><USER16> As with many things in the US, varies by state. Many states do have WIC cards that work like a debit card and many grocers have support for a single checkout process with two swipes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> My impression from the author's description of her friends is that they aren't broke either.

>I often hear my friends say, "I'm too poor" when they're frustrated about what they can't have. Maybe it's a trip they can't afford, a renovation they want to start right now or a pretty pair of shoes they spotted in a shop window.

</comment><comment><USER19> The author didn't talk about the difference between wealth and income. That, to me is a key distinction in understanding people's choices and possibilities. I'd call someone who lacks income, broke, and one who lacks access to resources, poor. The article merely talked about different degrees of lack of income.

</comment><comment><USER20> And this is in Canada, where the author's surgery and other medical care was covered in full by universal health care. Without that, her situation likely would have been far worse, and yet we can still do so much better.

<comment><USER21> If you are poor in the US your healthcare costs will mostly or entirely be covered. This includes major surgery.

<comment><USER22> Which I never understood. USA provides free healthcare for people who are poor because they don't work and healthcare for people who are retired and don't work.

But the USA does not provide healthcare for people who work and keep machine turning.

Hmm... I wonder if it's a political lobbying by healthcare industry to get more money for people who wouldn't provide it on their own by extracting it from the tax payers who do work and can (barely) afford insurance, etc.

<comment><USER21> This is why the ACA (Obamacare) was extra bad (for me and others in my situation). Not only do I have to subsidize the poor through taxes but now I have to subsidize higher risk individuals through my own increased premiums. I also make enough money to get zero tax breaks on any of it and the "marketplace" has removed all competition and downward price pressure.

EDIT:

People seem to think I'm being flippant or cruel but here's more background. I _am not_ rich. I struggle to stay in the middle class. It doesn't take much to stop getting tax breaks but it takes a ton of money to survive. Paying $1,000 a month for health insurance on top of my already high taxes is a meaningful amount of money that greatly impacts where I can live, if I can retire and many other major life properties.

<comment><USER23> You're so well paid that you don't get tax breaks, and you are forced to help poor people through taxes and insurance premiums?

Sounds like a good situation to be in...

<comment><USER24> It's not helping the poor per se that makes many people uncomfortable: no sane person will share the "poor must die of hunger" attitude.

It's that we help _only_ the poor. Look, I pay taxes. Poor people don't. Fine. I get it. But they do get free medical insurance, I don't. They get free college, I don't. All I get back are reminders about "straight white men privilege". That's not fair.

Nobody likes paying taxes. But if it's "guys, let's all cough up what we can and build a greater society for all of us", I'm for it. If it's "let's build a greater society for the poor" \- that's a much more bitter pill to swallow.

<comment><USER25> _It 's that we help only the poor. Look, I pay taxes. Poor people don't._

Poor people pay just as much as everyone else in sales tax, excise tax, tolls, meal tax, etc. And because they are poor, they pay disproportionately more of their income in taxes than the wealthy.

I live in the Boston area—even though there are 70 colleges and universities here, none of them are free for poor people.

<comment><USER21> _> And because they are poor, they pay disproportionately more of their income in taxes than the wealthy._

That's incorrect. The tax rate is lower for lower income thus they pay less proportionally.

 _> I live in the Boston area—even though there are 70 colleges and universities here, none of them are free for poor people._

Every ivy league school has income adjustment and will offer free ride based on need:

[https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/how-aid- works/harv...](https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/how-aid- works/harvard-financial-aid-initiative)

<comment><USER25> _That 's incorrect. The tax rate is lower for lower income thus they pay less proportionally._

If you look at what I listed—sales tax, excise tax, meal taxes—those are the same whether you're rich or poor, except they have a disproportionate impact on the poor.

Poor people do get most of what they pay in income tax back once they file but that's not the case for these other taxes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I agree words matter. I'm working as a bookkeeper and broke is when you're spending more than you make wether you're making < 22k$/year or > 500k/year. Poverty is a completely different animal.

"Sometimes I splurge and make homemade hot cocoa. [...] every week we give to the food bank..."

?? Land-o-Lakes hot cocoa mix is $1 at my local grocery store. What kind of hot cocoa are you making lady?

<comment><USER27> It says "homemade hot cocoa", so it might mean from chocolate or something? Not really sure

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Leaving aside the politics of a universal basic income, would a UBI have helped or hindered this person? Do most UBI schemes assume that healthcare subsidies would stop for instance, and the money be redirected to the UBI? Or would the income be on top of whatever healthcare subsidies already exist?

<comment><USER20> I think the article is a good example of why universal healthcare would have to remain in place when UBI is implemented. UBI is unlikely to be enough to afford quality healthcare.

<comment><USER29> Agreed. There are two types of healthcare expenses that insurance is important for:

1) massive, unexpected ones, which $1000 a month would be useless towards, and where the word "insurance" actually makes sense

2) recurring costs like doctor appointments, prescriptions, and teeth cleaning, which could arguably (but still probably shouldn't) be lumped in with UBI

#2 can still wreck someone who's truly poor, to be clear, but the author's case sounded more like #1

<comment><USER30> #2 should not be lumped in with UBI since the costs wildly fluctuate between people. A 25-year-old person will have fewer preventive checkups than a retiree or a small child. And people with chronic diseases have way higher recurring medical expenses than people without. My bookkeeping shows that I spend two weeks' worth of salary per year on medications, most of which is for keeping my chronic ailments in check.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> As tragic as this story is, let's not pretend that it's commonplace. A disabled single mother of a disabled child? She won the reverse lottery.

</comment><comment><USER32> This is an important distinction. CBS reports [1] that a $500 emergency expense would put most Americans in debt. Our consumer-focused economy with easy credit lures people into purchases that they cannot afford. Many spend without careful thought and purchase homes, electronic devices, automobiles, and college educations that they cannot afford to repay.

My wife and I had little savings when I got out of graduate school. Neither of our parents had taught us about budgeting. I found books that taught us how to make a monthly budget. The authors stressed the importance of working together to plan a budget and setting a goal of saving for an emergency fund that would eventually cover six months expenses. We drove our old car until it was too expensive to repair. Eating out was a rare treat. I carried a bag lunch to work. We bought a used tent and camping supplies for a vacation. We had a used B&W TV for years. We were able to purchase a modest house. We never upgraded to a bigger one. A careful lifestyle helped us get our kids though state universities with no debt.

In time we could add more "fun" items because we had a buffer. We were still careful. My employer had perennial layoffs. We knew I could be laid off at any time. Happily, I was ready to retire when my time came (My company went from 65,000 employees in our city to less than 1,700 when I was laid off).

I have a friend who ran his own computer business and counseled (free of charge)many families with money problems. His conclusion was that lack of money was not the biggest problem these families had. He concluded that poor management of what they had was a bigger problem.

[1] [https://www.cbsnews.com/news/most-americans-cant- afford-a-50...](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/most-americans-cant- afford-a-500-emergency-expense/)

<comment><USER33> Any unexpected expense can knock you down when you're on the edge. Unexpected expenses are how people become homeless.

I am friends with a camgirl who is a prime example of this. In her case, she made a go of full-time camming, and thought she was doing well. What she didn't understand is that the site she worked for paid her as a contractor and withheld nothing. She never thought much about taxes, and all her previous jobs had withheld taxes, so she didn't pay quarterly estimated taxes. Last month, when she went to file her taxes, she realized she owed thousands. She has been struggling to pay this while other unexpected expenses mount (car repairs). She's struggling with the decision on whether to pay her taxes or her rent, and is about to become homeless.

The super irritating thing to me is that she had a gofundme setup for her friends and family to donate to help with her tax issue. The campaign was going well (close to 50% complete) but gofundme took it down and refunded all the donations. This was likely because they don't want to be associated with sex workers, and she apparently had a link to it from her cam-site page.

<comment><USER33> That reminds me: Does anybody know of any US crowdfunding sites that are not hostile to sex workers? That seems unlikely after FOSTA, but it does not hurt to ask, and I figure this would be the place to do it.

<comment><USER34> Probably best to talk to a tax advisor-- and I am not one. I think the first time you owe a lot in taxes you are not assessed a penalty (if you keep owing every year, you are). This filing season is also exceptional due to tax bracket changes last year.

She can pay in installments vs the entire sum at once: [https://www.irs.gov/payments/payment-plans-installment- agree...](https://www.irs.gov/payments/payment-plans-installment-agreements)

<comment><USER33> I've been trying to encourage her to do just this, but she does not always take my advice. She had her mind set on putting this behind her. She does not always make the best decisions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I grew up poor. I don't know how my dad managed it. I'm thankful every day that I don't have to worry like my parents did.

<comment><USER36> Likewise. My parents raised myself and my siblings well, and somehow managed to give us all a good education and life despite both being on minimum wage.

As an adult, I'm angry at my younger self for being annoyed at the things I used to be annoyed at, now I realise I couldn't have done it any better (probably a lot worse).

Luckily, we are all doing well now, and we have a good relationship with them, and get to pay it back via buying them gadgets, sending them on holidays etc, and just being there for them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Seems increasingly the marginalised , feel it necessary to take it out on the not so marginalised, to police their language, to compel them to appreciate their lot, even to make them feel shitty, for wanting a pair of shoes, as if this would make their lot in life better, to make the world "more equitable".

How about the old fashioned approach of targeting the rich and powerful? Or is that considered too difficult now.

I couldn't give a damn about the difference between broke and poor. Changing their use isn't going to change a damn thing, just as changing how words are used has never changed a damn thing in the whole of history.

</comment><comment><USER38> This article would have been stronger if it simply addressed the issue of poverty directly and dispensed with the nit picking over the words broke and poor. I also disagree with the assertion that her middle class friends were using the word wrong or that broke was an apt description of their financial situation.

Broke is a a synonym for bankrupt or being in bad debt. If someone says they can't afford something which is what was being expressed when someone says "I'm too poor" that doesn't mean they are broke.

</comment><comment><USER39> I came up from poverty and its a trap. I grew up in a trailer park with parents that didn't care how well I did in school, who I hung out with, what I did away from home, where I was most of the time or when I came back. They treated me like a burden not a part of the family. At least not the TV families I saw growing up. Started smoking with the neighbor kids when I was 15, started drinking shortly after. There were no examples to me of life outside of that, I couldn't comprehend what life was outside of being a fuck up. Until I met my uncle. He was a former cop turned SysAdmin @ TCI he introduced me to a side of computers I didn't know existed. I envied what he had, I daresay I coveted his gear and his lab and his stuff. I had been a run- away about 4 or 5 times from the time I was 10 well when I saw that life could be different I decided to run away one last time. I moved in to his house and he taught me a lot of what I learned, not about computers specifically but about learning how to learn. How to teach myself.

I eventually got fed up with him being a bit of a strict hardass about everything. I mean, dude was a cop. Everything I did had to be by the book in terms of life outside the house. I ended up just kind of traveling around the country with my gypsy blooded estranged mother, started a pretty serious drug habit for a bit. But all the time I kept thinking about computer stuff. I kept learning, and eventually I got fed up with my situation. I took a look at my mom's boyfriend and at the time I thought he was pretty cool but one day I was smoking pot with him and I looked at him, like really for the first time. I saw a dude that paid child support to 3 different women, who, if he wasn't dating my mom, basically lived on other peoples couches. He worked at a winery and made less than I made @ McD's. I looked at him and then I asked myself, do want to be this dude when I'm 45? I stopped all drug use except the occasional drink, spent all my free time learning the stuff that my uncle had been trying to teach me and moved back to my old home town. These days I'm actually a Developer which I never thought I could be. I'm content that I made it out, but I know that my case is unusual.

I've driven through that trailer park occasionally and I still see familiar faces more than 20 years out. The truth is we're all poor. If your not making $300k a year you are no better than a generation away from trailer trash. I mean look, here they were, two brothers, grew up in the same house with the same opportunities and I was born to the crappy one. I made it out basically on accident. The difference between being rich and being poor these days is generational, not situational. I disagree with this article, its not that you are broke, it is that you are poor, unless you're filthy stinking rich, you are still one generation away from trailer trash.

<comment><USER40> Easier to go down than up, and the people on your level will often try to make you feel bad for trying to move up and out. Good on you for escaping the trap. Props to your uncle for giving you tools to do it, hardass though he was.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> I lost interest after she states that she donated to charity.

<comment> ali-tny Why? If you disagree with giving to charity, does that invalidate the rest of the article? Or are you suggesting that it was financially irresponsible to give to charity?

If the second, I think that this is wrong. She had a 6 month emergency fund - the (presumably) relatively little she gave to charity is unlikely to extend that runway very much. I think (some of) the point of the article is that true poverty is living a life in which your _needs_ are greater than your means. A little extra runway isn't going to help you in the long run there. Once you're in this position, often through no fault of your own, you become stuck in a cycle of poverty.

Rhetoric about poverty that implies that the poor are financially irresponsible I think is very damaging. No amount of fiscal responsibility could have shielded her from not being able to earn once she became sick, and having her costs drastically increased due to having a disabled child. I don't think it should be possible to find yourself in a situation where you cannot provide for your families needs (ie, food, rent etc) and we should be working towards creating a society where this is the case, rather than labelling poor people as financially irresponsible.

<comment><USER41> Nothing to do with charity, poverty, socioeconomics, etc. I simply lost interest in her article after it began to read as a self-serving 'look at me, I donated to charity!' post.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> The way this guy lives sounds extremely stressful.

</comment><comment><USER43> The prevalence of charity is evidence of the failure of society to provide equity of opportunity.

That's okay. I prefer proportionality to equity, personally. But the ideas that everyone must be given a chance to make it are incompatible with the absence of the welfare state.

</comment><comment><USER22> With all the hands out on that web page, I think it's The Guardian that's broke.

<comment><USER44> The Guardian isn't run like most newspapers

<comment><USER22> Clearly. A full page piece on a semantic argument. Most newspapers don't waste our time like that. There's nothing of value in that article.

<comment><USER44> Ignoring that (in the UK) the Guardian is probably influential newspaper of the last few years (Breaking large stories), most do.

Newspapers can't just sell news anymore, it's not profitable.

Besides, do you not try and expose yourself to opposing views? Maybe not applicable here, but opinion pieces are important.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: I built a stats page using bootstrap and app engine for the ipl - <AUTHOR> http://quickiplstats.appengine.com

<comment><USER2> Looks like its down?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for letting me know. Submitted another link</comment>


Ask HN: Marketer? Seeking Marketer? (April 2014) - <AUTHOR>

Tired of building potentially viable, potentially revenue-generating hackathon projects only to abandon them because of other priorities?
I am!
I have a couple of projects I'd like to hand off a skilled marketer so that I can watch my projects turn into something real without putting in the time that normally requires.
So let's see if we can start a new tradition where all HN's "non-technical co-founders" in waiting can get a chance to prove themselves and make some scratch.
If you've got a project you need a marketer for, post a description here. If you're a marketer looking for a project, post a brief summary of your qualifications and what type of project you'd be interested in.
I'll start.
Seeking marketer for:
1. Turning my hackathon project ExtraExtra into a business. ExtraExtra does split testing for blog headlines, tweets, status updates, or any other short piece of text. System already is built and working. Just needs someone to launch and promote it.
2. My podcast series (the A* interviews) where I interview some of the world's best programmers to find what makes them tick and what everyone else can learn from them. Needs someone more channels to reach potential listeners.
Note: Not an April fools joke. <comment><USER2> Just a suggestion: Cross post this on growthhackers.com The entire community is focused on marketing & a boatload of really good marketers hang out there.

I suspect you may get more (additional) traction there.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good idea! Just crossposted...let's see how it works.

<comment><USER2> Super!

I have seen that there is more activity during regular works hours (pacific time) - so I wouldn't necessarily be surprised if you posted it around now and it didn't get any play. It may mean a re-post at a "better" time.

Cheers!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Great idea.

SEEKING for gems in the jungle: [http://gemsinthejungle.com/](http://gemsinthejungle.com/)

To be honest, I'm not sure if there's actually a path forward here. But I'd love to team up with a marketer if there's any that sees potential in the idea.

</comment><comment><USER4> www.doorhangermarketplace.com/jobs.html</comment>


Why Use a Laptop When a Tablet Will Do? - <AUTHOR> http://www.thechromesource.com/why-use-a-laptop-when-a-tablet-will-do/ <comment><USER2> I like the iPad, however it is a seriously passive device for anything that doesn't actually _benefit_ from fingers (like drawing). You can only realistically interact with it for things that require touch interaction.

If I want to _read_ my E-mail, it's ideal. Same for reading news sites, etc. such as HN.

If I begin _typing_ an E-mail of any length, it's only a matter of time before I screw something up on the iPad. While some of this could be addressed by fixing Apple's asinine methods for text selection and cursor movement, a lot of it is just the (lack of) keyboard.

Similarly, if I want to _log in_ to any web site, or otherwise do lots of typing, it is a real pain. So I rarely do, except from a full-fledged computer.

If you have to do any significant amount of typing remotely, you NEED a laptop. Though, I do agree that Windows is overkill, especially on batteries; something like Linux with VNC would be plenty to reach any session you have running and do real work (or a Mac).

On the other hand, if you're _drawing_ , or doing things that would require lots of mouse movements, the iPad is _ideal_ , and a laptop would _suck_.

So Steve Jobs is basically right...there is a market in between the computer and the laptop.

<comment><USER3> Regarding the logins, have you tried 1Password? If you're using 1Password on a computer and sync with 1Password with your iPad, it will save you a -ton- of headaches trying to log into sites on an iPad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> He complains about Windows 7 not being instant-on. My laptop resumes from sleep in less than 2 seconds. Which isn't quite as fast as my phone, but it's not what you might call "slow".

He refuses Android on the grounds that it's "For Phones". It's not for phones any more than iOs is - it's an operating system with a simplified UX, I'm looking forward to the first pads that use it.

</comment><comment><USER5> If you can do everything you need with a tablet, great. But many people need more capabilities than a tablet provides, at least some of the time, then it is either use a laptop when you could be using a tablet, or you have to buy and maintain and transport _both_.</comment>


Sneak Reddit into work by making it look like Wikipedia - <AUTHOR> http://subdood.com/?tester <comment><USER2> I'm pretty sure your IT department can still see the packets.</comment>


Toronto-based Wattpad raises $17.3M Series B funding led by Khosla Ventures - <AUTHOR> http://blog.wattpad.com/post/24538462109/wattpad-funding-17m

<comment><USER2> What is the draw of the site for authors? I couldn't find anything about that - is it just the readership? Is there an ad platform with profit sharing?</comment>


Programming as a medium for poorly understood, sloppily-formulated ideas (1967) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/devinmcgloin/theory/blob/master/worrydream/Minsky%20-%20Why%20programming%20is%20a%20good%20medium%20for%20expressing%20poorly%20understood%20and%20sloppily-formulated%20ideas.pdf <comment><USER2> Engineers and scientists usually don't understand that mathematics (and programming by extension) is ultimately a language, with all that that implies.

Formalism and rationality provide checks that whatever you are saying is coherent, but in the end what is being expressed are the ideas of a human mind, and the ideas expressed will be only as rigorous and thorough as the understanding you have about the problem you're describing.

There will also be a lot of assumptions that are not included in the formal object (the code) but which are essential to the full meaning of the concepts, and are either expressed as axioms or entirely omitted. A computer will blindly execute exactly what is being written in a program, but for the system to be used and evolved in a coherent way, it depends on the users knowing those untold assumptions that separate correct from incorrect interpretations.

There is an unexplored area for a platform to support this kind of exploratory, poorly understood and probably incomplete of wrong programs, with tooling to help the user refine a program iteratively from the first insights to a complete working state. "Live programming" and online notebooks a la Jupyter work in that direction, and spreadsheets directly support it (but are limited to a specific programming model).

<comment><USER3> Not disagreeing, but just to add on the other side of the coin: language can be a driver for thought and ideas. This might feel wishywashy without an example, but I usually feel that I need to reinterpret algebraic manipulation that I have done to understand what significance they have.

So in a way, I allowed myself to be a mechanical executer through the rules of algebra/calculus I've used, and then I re-engaged my intuition to understand what is happening.

It might even be my unwillingness to accept the mechanical approach purely that poses a big hindrance to fast tracking a lot of learning in this domain I have to do. Maybe I should just shut up and calculate as they say, but it's hard.

This just makes it all the more true that learning "languages" is the best way to become smarter. "Smarter" is a weird personal word here, but I'm at a loss for a better way to put it. What am going for is: languages can be an abstract lever that allows our limited cognitive potential to build culturally, which is distinct and will definitely interact with the knowledge ladder, but in a distinct way. "Languages" here are more general than just the textual/oral/syntactic, and am not talking about Russian/Arabic/French either.

<comment><USER2> > I usually feel that I need to reinterpret algebraic manipulation that I have > done to understand what significance they have. So in a way, I allowed > myself to be a mechanical executer through the rules of algebra/calculus > I've used, and then I re-engaged my intuition to understand what is > happening.

That's a sensible approach, but it works because you're executing mechanical in a well-defined problem domain, so there's an intuition attached to each term used, and you can build an overall intuition. You might as well use random mechanical transformations over an algebra and they wouldn't make any sense, just like if you attached random dictionary words forming grammatically correct sentences.

I see usage of formal languages as mathematicians and philosophers making "very precise sentences", i.e. being extremely precise with the meaning attached to each term so that it remains consistent among all the transformations of discourse (in fact, there's a formal theory of meaning which does exactly that).

But the main value of such exercise is in knowing what you want to express, not in the fact that you're being extremely precise while doing it; the latter can help you convince others of what you're saying, but they need to agree to the original axioms of your theory, otherwise they'll just be able to point very precisely where they think you are wrong.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I think the title here should be changed to the original: "why programming is a good medium for..." It changes the thesis quite a bit.

<comment><USER5> I have to agree. The current title implies that it's a negative thing. I'm not sure why it was changed when posting here, since it completely changes the meaning as well.

<comment><USER6> >implying implications

I see no need to assign a value judgement to it, and somewhat resent doing so.

Might be good for juicing clicks by confirmation bias, but the idea is nevertheless that programming is a medium through which incomplete understanding can be refined, and eventually expressed.

Good or bad should be left to the reader to judge.

I like the idea, if only because I've philosophically approached software in terms of chewing what a program is from what it isn't.

<comment><USER5> > programming is a medium through which incomplete understanding can be > refined, and eventually expressed.

Which, by all forms of understanding I possess, is a benefit or beneficial to the users of programming. Ergo, a good medium.

If the title were "Programming as a potential medium for expressing/refining not yet well-formed ideas", then there'd be no value judgment at all (and we probably wouldn't be having this conversation). But as it is, the title uses "poorly understood, sloppily-formulated ideas" which automatically puts a negative spin, which is in a way counter-acted in the original paper by "good medium", implying that the paper isn't actually about bad ideas and how they're propagated through code.

<comment><USER4> This was my thought as well. I don't understand the objection to value judgements above.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Working with Haskell has made me realize how much undefined behavior I'm implicitly including in my programs.

<comment><USER8> Interesting. Which kinds of things in particular?

I think of undefined behaviour as a matter of knowing the many dark corners of C and C++. How did Haskell help?

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This paper is from Marvin Minsky at MIT. He was an expert on AI, and co- founded the MIT AI lab, among many other things. He also invented the first heads-up display (HUD) in 1963 [0].

Such an interesting character.

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

</comment><comment><USER10> This is what first order logic is for</comment>


Samsung reveals pre iPhone concepts - <AUTHOR> http://www.osnews.com/story/26230/Samsung_reveals_its_pre-iPhone_concepts_10_touchscreen_devices

<comment><USER2> Since when does providing pre-iPhone iPhone-like designs mean this is an open and close case? Does that mean that someone from Samsung didn't "steal" the iPhone designs while they were being prototyped? The iPhone was being developed for almost ten years, according to multiple sources. So, how is this open and close again? Am I missing something?

<comment><USER3> Yes, you're missing something. Both the iPhone and Samsung's phones of the time derived stylistically from the phones which came before them, just as every other new product in the world is inspired by earlier products.

In this case, Samsung based its designs on its own earlier designs. Apple based its designs on earlier designs by Sony and Samsung. No-one should be suing anyone here, but Apple's definitely on shakier ground when suing Samsung.</comment></comment>


New paper by Robin Dunbar exploring social media vs. real world networks - <AUTHOR> http://rsos.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/3/1/150292 <comment><USER2> It's great that the author decided to do this work. TL;DR: The Dunbar numbers are significant for online social networks too.

People working in TCS on "social networks" often work with TCS tools, which are inherently asymptotic. Thus they conclude some stuff on social networks, while assuming that the number of "friends" per person tends to infinity, without seeing much of a problem concluding that it's what happens in "the real world". To be fair, one excuse is that more realistic models are often not mathematically tractable (yet), but it doesn't excuse making wild conclusions.</comment>


Let the White House know about Paul Graham's idea for a Founder Visa - <AUTHOR>

It'll take you two minutes. Copy the contents of http://paulgraham.com/foundervisa.html and paste them on http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/.<p>Provide your our comment, attribution, message, etc if you want. Maybe if enough of us do it, someone will read it. <comment><USER2> The one issue I have with the essay is how startup investors are chosen. "We know who one another are" is an unsatisfactory way for the government to decide who startup investors are, mainly because it could become a closed club very easily.

</comment><comment><USER3> I agree with Paul Graham completely. I wish there was some kind of founder VISA. I am graduating from penn state with a PhD. I have started my own startup which is developing educational apps for iPhone, android, desktop and web, but I am going to have a hard time staying back in US. I dont need to be present in US to run the business but I would prefer and wish there was something like a founder VISA for legitimate companies making more than $200k an year.

<comment><USER4> I agree, a visa for what you are doing should be available. From what I have read about pg's founder visa, I don't see how that includes your situation.

It does seem reasonable that the U.S. should be tripping over themselves to provide a visa to anyone that can create jobs or be an overwhelming contributor to taxes.

From the government's view, how would they make such a decision? In your case, your already here and already have a going concern which seems an easy thing to write regulations for. What about for those just starting with no employees and no revenue? What about for those that just show up at the airport and say "I'm gonna give it my best shot, where's my visa?". Is it ok to show up and say, "Hey Paul Graham gave me and my friend $15k, let me in."

I like the idea, but I don't see how the rules get written and managed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nothing against folks outside the U.S. that want to work here. But, I have not seen any real evidence that supports a skill set shortage. Can someone provide real numbers?

<comment><USER5> You missed the point. We are talking about founders who could potentially create a great company and jobs for Americans. Did you read Paul's essay? I suggest you take a look and think about how many founders/developers are foreign born.

<comment><USER4> I have read the essay. I agree with the points. However, they do not take into account the number of Americans that have the skills and desire to create a startup but for other reasons can not afford to be founders. Shouldn't we address those reasons first?

<comment><USER6> Does it matter if a company that was founded in the U.S. and that does employ mostly Americans was founded by an American or by a non-American??

I can understand the argument against visas for foreign engineers... but I don't see any trouble with a founder visa.

<comment><USER4> Your point is well taken. However, we do have lots of talent already here (many are ones already here on various student and work visas). YC is limited to a narrow set of people that can "afford" the process. I do not buy the argument that this implies we need to increase the pool of eligible applicants with a special visa. Perhaps YC will simply reach its limits. Thats ok, there is no reason that something has to keep growing in size to continue to be a success; it could just reach a natural equilibrium.

Is there any evidence that the U.S. does not already have the talent? Or is it only that there is not enough talent that can afford to work at such low entry rates? Please keep in mind that our visa programs that already exist are to fill positions where there is proven lack of skills. They do not exist so the investor or business owners can find cheaper labor.

<comment><USER6> I think the U.S. should try to keep the best and brightest at all costs. HN is too focused on programming, but I am thinking of electronics, photonics, semiconductor, nanotech, biotech people, etc. It takes so long to train experts on these fields, and since many of them were funded via NSF as graduate students, it would be wise to create incentives for them to stay in the U.S. and be productive.

Does that mean that a founder visa is necessary? Unfortunately I don't have the data to be able to offer any insightful comment on that...

<comment><USER4> Your right, we do need to figure this out. I never have understood why we make it so hard for someone to stay after they've completed an education here.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>