Microsoft looking to buy Yahoo again - <AUTHOR> http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/microsoft-signs-a-nondisclosure-agreement-with-yahoo/?smid=tw-nytimesbusiness&seid=auto <comment><USER2> I just hope that however any of this falls out, Flickr survives and starts to see some attention. I really, really like Flickr (pay for it even) and don't want to see it die. I actively dislike the competitors in the social photo uploading space (cannot stand Picassa's UI, and Facebook is, well Facebook. Photos are not the primary function there). Flickr suits my needs just perfectly.

<comment><USER3> Have you tried 500px.com?

<comment><USER2> No, this is the first I've heard of it. I'll take a look over the weekend. First glance it actually looks a little more...artist-geared? than what I use Flickr for. I'm not even close to a professional or advanced amateur photographer. My Flickr feed is a mishmash of things taken with my phone, my point 'n shoot, some photos I've put effort into and some that I've not.

I like the community on Flickr (there are a lot of other people in the asian ball-jointed doll hobby there, and probably a good 75%+ of my photos are of my dolls), and the ease of just uploading handfuls of photos at a time and grabbing the BBCode to post them on forums without having to host the images myself.

I like that I can feel like I can throw anything up on my Flickr stream, and then selectively share the ones I think are good with related groups, and not have to overly curate what I upload to only my "best" shots.

The only thing I really feel I'm missing from Flickr is more advanced permissions. The 'guest pass' thing never seems to quite work for me when I want to share a photo only with specific people. I usually wind up marking the photo private and sending the person a direct image link.

<comment><USER4> Off-topic but can you post your Flickr link. I'm curious to know what a "Asian ball-jointed doll" actually is.

<comment><USER2> ABJDs are highly customizable dolls, generally made from hand-cast polyurethane resin, and, as their name implies, usually from companies based in Japan, S Korea, or China, and poseable thanks to their ball-joint and elastic construction.

<http://www.flickr.com/photos/cowpewter/> It's basically all dolls, cats, occasional garden photos and random sketches.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Anyone trying to meaningfully compete with Google will need to both buy and build their way into contention. MS has the money to do both but so far the build side of the equation has been a bit lacking.

Don't get me wrong-MS has some very (technically) cool products and projects out there (WP7, win8, Xbox to name a few) , but none of them are giving them the halo that Google (or Apple) has. It will take years of marketing and [m/b]illions of dollars to move them out of the funk that they've built up for themselves over the years. American car makers faced similar marketing challenges in the late 90's-00's and are only recently turning heads again.

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure it's really possible to meaningfully compete with Google, at least in the US search market. They're synonymous with search, as evidenced by the neologism "just google it". As much as Microsoft wishes it, no one actually says "just Bing it" if they aren't being paid to do so. The amount of mindshare Google has at this point seems insurmountable, no matter how many technically impressive tricks Microsoft can cook up.

<comment><USER7> As long as there continues to be very little cost for switching from Google, they will always be vulnerable to a competitor who does search significantly better, mindshare or not.

The good thing for Google is that no one is providing a compelling case for switching. Bing and Google look like the same product and return similar results. So why should anyone switch?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I really hope (for Yahoo's sake) this happens. About half a year before I left, Yahoo turned down the offer from Microsoft that was in the $30/share range. I couldn't believe it.

[http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/feb08/02-01cor...](http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/feb08/02-01corpnewspr.mspx)

Yahoo was bleeding then and has been bleeding ever since, still trying to be too many things to too many people--none of them well.

Hopefully MSFT can clean house, invest where it's needed, and put things on track.

<comment><USER7> _"[Yahoo is] still trying to be too many things to too many people--none of them well."_

And the things they did do well (Flickr, Delicious) have been abandoned or left to rot.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The fall of the iconic SF Yahoo billboard seems to have done some major foreshadowing-- it really does look like it's an end of an era for Yahoo.

</comment><comment><USER10> Everyone is missing the point. If Microsoft buys Yahoo they now control three very large IM networks: Windows Live (MSN), Yahoo, and Skype.

<comment><USER11> Agreed with this comments. but I am not sure what is that worth. is not like people spend a lot of time on any of those networks, ie not monetizable, and amount of utility they provide vs. FB is diminishing

<comment><USER10> Remember that Microsoft has part ownership of Facebook and Skype video chat is integrated into Facebook.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> At this point I wish it'd go through so somebody could put Yahoo out of its misery.

<comment><USER13> I hope the YUI team can find a new home (and some other good teams like them) at least before that happens. Maybe google could buy the whole team ?

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Yahoo really needs to enlist Shpigler the Shark this time: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=650U4-9CPew>

</comment><comment><USER15> Since 2009, Microsoft has lost $5.5 billion on Bing and is losing $1 billion every quarter.

How is this even possible and how is buying Yahoo going to plug the holes? Bing search is horrible and their adcenter product is even worse.

<comment><USER4> I'll agree with the adcenter, but Bing itself is a perfectly fine search engine. I consider it a drop in replacement for Google these days.

Yes i'm sure someone is now scrambling to find some edge case where Google is better, but you can do the same thing with Bing, and frankly all search engines have issues somewhere. I use a few search engines which have their own index such as DDG, Gigablast and Blekko.

I really find it amazing that people aren't cheering on some competition in the space. If Bing folded we would only have 3 players with their own index (that im aware of).

Purely subjective but I find Bings results page much clearer then Googles these days.

<comment><USER15> Agree with you on the results pages. I've found that Google's become much more cluttered since the "instant results" redesign and add in of the Google+ and preview buttons. I feel like the page even seems clunkier.

Regarding quality of results though, wasn't Google accusing Bing of directly copying search results somehow?

<comment><USER4> That was a red herring. It was the Bing toolbar watching what users were clicking on. So it picked up Google's results, but also everything else people were clicking on. I wouldn't be surprised to find that Chrome does the same thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Microsoft doesn't have enough money to buy a better reputation. I'm not sure how buying Yahoo helps at all.

</comment><comment><USER17> So, they want to buy Yahoo just because they can't hire sales people?

yeah, makes a lot of sense.

<comment><USER18> Last I checked their adCenter required Windows and threw up a complaint about nonstandards compliant browsers (like Chrome). They are completely lost.

<comment><USER19> adCenter blocks non-IE browsers, but ludicrously doesn't actually use any proprietary MSIE code - a simple user-agent spoof gets it working 100% in Firefox.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What are some interesting open APIs out there? - <AUTHOR> Inspired by the recent Show HN on satellites (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21037167) it got me wondering what other interesting APIs are out there that are free to use (mostly, or not) and provide interesting data that could either be used as part of an application or feed an application by itself.<p>So, what do y'all know?  Thanks! <comment><USER2> FRED

It's an economics and financial data service from the Federal Reserve that has heaps of indicators. They aggregate data from many other sources (IMF, World Bank, etc.) so it's the closest thing to a one-stop service for economic data. It's biased toward macro / government data though, so you won't have high- frequency private market data there.

[https://research.stlouisfed.org/docs/api/fred/](https://research.stlouisfed.org/docs/api/fred/)

<comment><AUTHOR> That looks great though, so much info! Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> [https://carbonintensity.org.uk/](https://carbonintensity.org.uk/)

> The Carbon Intensity API uses state-of-the-art Machine Learning and > sophisticated power system modelling to forecast the carbon intensity and > generation mix 96+ hours ahead for each region in Great Britain.

</comment><comment><USER4> The 2FB API feeds the Shareable Tweets application: [https://2fb.me/https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21039982](https://2fb.me/https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21039982)

</comment><comment><USER5> [https://apilist.fun/api/blockfacts](https://apilist.fun/api/blockfacts) BlockFacts Crypto Asset Market Data Unified APIs For Professionals API.</comment>


Forget Your GPA - <AUTHOR> http://refer.ly/forget-your-gpa/c/faf268f6885011e2bfbf22000a1db8fa

<comment><USER2> It depends on what you want to do with yourself. You also need to be able to be brutally honest with yourself.

If your goal is to be a doctor, attorney, MBA, you need to sell your soul to get the best grades possible. A JD/MBA from a top tier school translates into a high paying gig when you leave. The same degree from a state school means you get to review contracts for some County or work at Starbucks.

I had a 2.2 GPA in CS -- mostly because I had to work full time through school, was lazy, and didn't have enough time. I love computers and IT, but didn't have passion for what I was doing. I was passionate about history and writing, and ended up with a dual major that was fun for me (I had a great in history), even with hardly any time investment. I stuck with CS because I had no interest in academia/teaching/law or other things that a History degree helps with.

I adopted a system like what this guy did... I was actually detained by campus security in the final for one of my "E1" classes because the professor had never seen me and thought I was taking the test for someone.

That meant that I wasn't going to be working for a top tier technology company. So I got a job with a tiny company, built a network, and ended up with a pretty awesome role.

If you're really struggling with the material and can't get an A after giving it 110%, you're just not at the top of the curve. It's not the end of the world, accept it or move on to something you are passionate about.

<comment><USER3> _If you're really struggling with the material and can't get an A after giving it 110%, you're just not at the top of the curve._

This was me in my first collegiate art elective. I put in enormous effort, but there was no _there_ there. It was a valuable and humbling experience.

I'd used the author's "technique" in high school by making sure to get As in math and science, and simply not trying in the humanities classes. This plan backfired terribly, and in multiple ways.

Backfire #1: I was accepted by my top choice (CS @ CMU), but I wasn't offered any scholarships, and finances pushed me towards a less expensive option.

Backfire #2: it delayed recognition of the gaps in my abilities. I thought I was getting 'B's because I wasn't trying, when I actually had (sometimes serious) unaddressed gaps in my skill set.

Backfire #3: it delayed the realization that I really enjoy some of the subjects I'd blown off.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> As a teacher in a top grad school, the grades matter somewhat, but if you show yourself to be smart as fuck in class (by asking good questions/making good comments), and get B's, I'm still recommending you.

Yes, teachers do get asked who their top students are by employers.

<comment><USER5> Having just served on the admissions committee for a top CS school, a student's recommendation letters and publication record are weighted far more heavily than his or her GPA. That said, the GPA is not entirely discounted--- especially for those applying from unknown or lesser known schools. It can act as a red flag if the rest of the application is not stellar.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I had a professor in college who set the A at 93%. We didn't have pluses and minuses. Going into the final, I was very close to an A, at 92 point something. The final had, like, 200 questions. I did really well, but was _one_ question away from 93%.

The professor suggested that I review the test to see if I can find an error in the questions that I got wrong. I couldn't.

He said: "I'm giving you a B. I know it sucks, but guess what: if I give you an A right now, tomorrow you'll forget about it. This B, you'll remember it for the rest of your life. It's gonna suck right now, but you'll see that out of everything I've taught you, this B is going to be the thing that matters."

That B, it made me a wiser man.

</comment><comment><USER7> As a grad student, this is especially relevant since I have three courses that are mandatory to getting the degree. One subject on "Enterprise Systems" was more of a history lesson in software, and another subject comprised largely of unpublished material by the professor. I kinda feel foolish looking at the effort I put in to study those two subjects, when I could have spent the same energy in something else. Like learning lisp maybe, which I have been wanting to for quite a bit. I also resonate with putting extra effort into obtaining an A+ for a relevant subject that goes a long way, which I am now doing for a course on Virtualization and another on TCP/IP Architecture.

<comment><USER8> You can learn Lisp on your own, outside of the curriculum. But you would not learn that unpublished material from the professor outside of school. Unless the professor's material was rubbish, maybe everything worked out for the best. Once you get a job you'll have 25-45 years to learn about more practical topics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This depends on which field of study you're in. If you want to go to grad school for astrophysics, getting that high GPA score is important. But, I do agree that halving your time to get a B+ versus an A is good. This type of decision making shows that you're good at managing your time and setting your priorities right.

</comment><comment><USER10> FWIW, don't opt for the E1/B1 part of the curve in that graph. I graduated with a GPA around 2.2 and it made it very hard to find a job.</comment>


Show HN: Whenever – a sticky notes app with date countdown - <AUTHOR> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/whenever-sticky-notes-wit/nfbcejefjldiddbganfjdlmgiafffhpd

<comment><USER2> Nice app! Love the idea. The time could be more precise though.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, glad you like it. Currently it is only for date but I can add optional view for hours as well.</comment></comment>


The Absolute Most Useful Thing I've Done At My Job So Far - <AUTHOR> http://dev.lookery.com/post/69447828/the-absolute-most-useful-thing-ive-done-at-my-job-so

<comment><USER2> Perhaps producing nice graphs out of textual logs could be a bigger business? (I guess it already is.)

<comment><AUTHOR> I think the most interesting thing for me was the whole idea of using tools like this to visualize and monitor code with somewhat complicated dependencies.

I'm pretty sure there'd be heaps of useful applications for this kind of tech. Have you got something in particular in mind?

<comment><USER2> Not really. But I played around with graphviz for visualizing railroad schedule graphs. It was quite pleasant --- and beats starring at the adjacency lists.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, something like train timetables? Or you mean something like generating railroad maps?

Edit: While googling, I came across this <http://railroad.rubyforge.org> which is also a pretty cool use of graphviz. But probably different to what you're talking about. :)

<comment><USER2> Neither. Let me explain: In a train timetable every train goes from an A to a B. Because we want to minimize the number of locomotives needed, we have to reuse them. That means we have to decide what connection a locomotive serves next after driving A->B on Monday morning.

Train timetables also usually live in a cycle time (i.e. it repeats after a week).

So as a result you get a directed graph with the 'A->B's as vertices and the transition between them as arcs.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah I think I've kinda got it. That's pretty cool.. thanks for explaining. :)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Nitrokey Storage 2 Released - <AUTHOR> https://www.nitrokey.com/news/2018/nitrokey-storage-2-released <comment><USER2> I love the nitrokey stuff. If you want some practical examples, see the articles I wrote on the different models: [https://raymii.org/s/tags/nitrokey.html](https://raymii.org/s/tags/nitrokey.html) \- both HSM, Pro, start (which is a gnuk stick).</comment>


Teaching Mathematics – Graph Theory (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://jeremykun.com/2011/06/26/teaching-mathematics-graph-theory/ <comment><USER2> I agree that teaching mathematics too formally prevents students from making concrete connections. I like how the OP made the abstractions intuitive. And made the jargon less intimidating.

As far as the 'mathematician's lament' goes though, I think all that is needed is for our culture to foster greater respect (and potentially payment) for teachers. If someone can put passion into their work, these successes tend to arise naturally.

<comment><USER3> _Formally_ formally has no superlative.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I haven't even read the article cause my laptop is gonna DIE soon.

I just wanted to say that graph theory is very beautiful and helped me to understand linear algebra in a much more intuitive way than "kernels and images" in college precalc. Directed graphs are wonderful representations of maps, linear or not.</comment>


Show HN: AnonTorrent - <AUTHOR> http://www.karelbilek.com/anontorrent/

<comment><USER2> Whilst I like the service to the wanna-be-hidden uploader I think this puts you into too much risk yourself.

Imagine someone creates a torrent containing child pornography (of course taking the most extreme example) and uploads it to your server - YOU will be responsible for being the initial seeder of this torrent. I don't believe the laws in the Czech Republic will care that you tell them "oh, but it ain't my data - somebody anonymous uploaded it to my server". You still are seeding it to others.

<comment><AUTHOR> Not sure about the laws.

I will surely provide the source code after a while so anyone can do an anomymous seedbox like this. otoh, it's not that easy to set up... you have to get the torrent service (I am using transmission-remote) and the tor hidden service running

I think the risk is comparable with running Tor relay.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> While I approve of the concept in principle, I fear all the wrong types of people will make use of it. And I don't mean pirates...

<comment><USER4> I think he is trying to make something that is open for everybody to use. Trying to control what people use it for is like Comcast trying to throttle bit torrent traffic

<comment><USER5> Yeah, I'm sure he'll be proud of that in prison;) This is not about the morality of it but about the risks for him.

Besides that, it's not the same. People are free to use any other service while comcast is the gateway and for many the only choice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The idea and implementation are clever but in essence it's just a custom- tailored Tor gateway, right?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> It is verry possible that if more people try it, my server won't handle the traffic.... let's hope not

<comment><USER7> I like the idea of this project, but how long do you think it will take before your seedbox host gets complaints and shuts down your server? Especially if you'd charge for this service, you can expect a storm of legal action.

<comment><AUTHOR> I hope that by the time it gets 20 seeders, the torrent has enough "life" to sustain itself, but it's not yet so popular to get any complains.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> At 50Mb files, what the hell is the point? Just find an unsecured wifi connection and use a file locker site.

<comment><USER9> You appear to have missed the words "alpha" and "proof of concept". Further, this is explicitly mentioned as an alternative to file lockers, on the grounds that they can delete the file in the future.

Whether or not this is a good/productive/useful idea remains to be seen, but you haven't really raised a substantial rejection.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I support what you are doing, but I have some questions.

What are you doing to stop your location leaking through torrent trackers? I believe bit-torrent through Tor is not anonymous in and of itself. Is your torrent client doing hostname lookups via the conventional UDP? Have you made sure you are not leaking these requests? There have been many privacy leaks through bittorrent clients in the past, and I was wondering what steps you have taken to mitigate against this possibility.

<comment><USER11> It's not BT through Tor. Which is good because BT over Tor is a terrible idea :) You sent your file to his server over Tor, and he seeds it via completely normal means until there are 20 other seeds.

<comment><USER10> Ok. So the "hidden service" is not intended to be anonymous then? Just as a check to ensure that the user knows they are on Tor? Because, in order to be the first seed, you will generally leak your IP. If not, what steps have you taken to make sure the first seeder (the host of this service) are anonymous?

<comment><USER11> You send your file over Tor. That way no one (not even him) knows who you are. Then he seeds your file for you. You remain anonymous.

<comment> mike-cardwell Yes, but that's how Tor would work even if he wasn't using hidden services. The point of a hidden service is to give anonymity to the server as well as the client. But in this case, his server isn't getting anonymity because it is simple to locate.

<comment><USER12> It also protects against man-in-the-middle attacks by exit nodes, though I'm not sure how important that is in this case.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Why not mix AnonTorrent with Anomos (<http://anomos.info/>) ?

<comment><AUTHOR> That seems... awesome.

If this worked as advertised, there would be no need for AnonTorrent :)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Halcyon or sinatra/padrino for a simple rest/json webservice? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> There's no real good answer here. Either you want something _really_ lightweight, you will go with Sinatra. Otherwise, something a little more heavy but with lot more features, you will go with Padrino. This choice will depends on what you're familiar with, and what you already know and love. If you're new to both, maybe have a good look at Padrino could be the answer.

<comment><AUTHOR> The question is not on sinatra / padrino, but on padrino / halcyon ;)

<comment><USER2> Ok, my bad, was reading too fast. Halcyon seems nice, really focus on JSON, which can be handy when building a REST/JSON API. The answer will be more a personal choice, within what you prefer. Sinatra has a way to describe routes and endpoints using its DSL that, in my opinion, is way nicer for a simple REST API that Halcyon. Halcyon looks a lot more like Rails (in routing, controllers etc)., which might not always ease readibility.

Still, there's no real good answer here. Padrino/Halcyon can both work on Rack, Thin or Mongrel, so performance would normally be almost the same. The difference will be in the style of code you want to write: simple and really explicit DSL like Sinatra/Padrino, or something more like Rails with Halcyon.

<comment><AUTHOR> Another option could be to use Rails, with this gems: <https://github.com/spastorino/rails-api> ?</comment></comment></comment></comment>


UnBox the Chomsky Archive – MIT Libraries - <AUTHOR> https://libraries.mit.edu/chomsky/ <comment><USER2> I would love to see Chomsky's archive unlocked. I don't see how or why MIT needs to go on a crowd sourcing drive to do so however.

The fact that they are doing so would suggest to me that there isn't a long term commitment to the material.

Crowd funding efforts by places like this just strikes me as cynical.

I would rather support an institution or project which actually needs financial support, than to put money into the mega wealthy MIT.</comment>


Show HN: A dashboard about myself - <AUTHOR> http:// alpblog.heroku.com/personal-dashboard/

<comment><USER2> to OP: there's a space in the URL that should be removed.</comment>


Waterfall - International Conference on Sequential Developmentn - <AUTHOR> http://www.waterfall2006.com/ <comment><USER2> I like this one: WUP: The Waterfall Unified Process</comment>


Show HN: Co-work with professionals from your area in your or their home office - <AUTHOR> http://www.sharehomeoffice.com <comment><USER2> I'm working at home so I can't get COVID at the office. This sounds like it can help get it delivered to me at home. Sweet!

This seems more like the AirBnB for home offices of the post COVID world - where companies decide it's cheaper for them if people just work from their kitchen counters or wherever. But we're not part COVID anything at this point.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> How? 1\. Login with linkedin profile 2\. Upload 1 pic of the space you want to share 3\. Browse interesting people in your location 4\. Invite them to co- work in your home office or ask to meet in theirs Why? 1\. Real personal interactions when working from home/freelancing. 2\. Inspiration and motivation from other people raises your productivity

</comment><comment><USER3> Could you also make short videos of the working place so the people will be able to see where they gonna enjoy their time?

<comment><AUTHOR> this is something to consider in the future. Why would that be better than a good qualiy pic of the workspace which someone wants to share?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Is this the new way of widen your horizon & working faster & more efficient?</comment>


History of Lambda-calculus and Combinatory Logic - <AUTHOR> http://wadler.blogspot.com/2008/06/history-of-lambda-calculus-and.html

<comment><USER2> Great link. Thanks for that!</comment>


Lector – an interface to Tesseract OCR - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/zdenop/lector <comment><USER2> Paperwork ([https://github.com/jflesch/paperwork](https://github.com/jflesch/paperwork)) is a great tool too. I'd take a look at lector. Been trying to get a sane (heh) ocr setup for a while.

<comment><USER3> Does paperwork give you a nice interface for training? The models that tesseract ship with are fairly terrible on everything I've tried them with, but add in 5 pages of training data and it becomes great.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Many more here: [https://code.google.com/p/tesseract- ocr/wiki/3rdParty](https://code.google.com/p/tesseract-ocr/wiki/3rdParty)

</comment><comment><USER5> also check out [http://vietocr.sourceforge.net/](http://vietocr.sourceforge.net/)</comment>


What are some of the extensions / add-ons you use for your web browser? - <AUTHOR>

What are some of the extensions / add-ons you use for your web browser? <comment><USER3> In Firefox:

— Adblock Plus: makes the Web so much less claustrophobic.

— Firebug: Although I don't do much actual web development, I'll often use it to grab the URL of some Flash video so I can watch it in a real media player, or disable some CSS mistake to make reading more comfortable (letter-spacing, I'm looking at _you_ ).

— Firegestures: I miss the old RadialContext extension, but mouse-gestures are an acceptable replacement.

— It's All Text: Configured to open files in a tab in the currently-open gvim instance, it's vastly more comfortable to edit lengthy wiki-pages or file detailed bug-reports than using the dinky little textarea control.

Honourable mention:

— Tree Style Tab: The best thing about this extension is having a huge expanse at the left-hand-side of the browser upon which I can double-click to get a new tab, but making it easier to work with massive numbers of open tabs (say, API references for various classes I'm working with + various google searches for error messages + the bugs I'm working on fixing) is much appreciated too.

</comment><comment><USER4> Under Firefox, I consider Adblock and Noscript to be essential. I also use Tab Mix Plus (so that I can change tabs by hovering the mouse over them, without needing to click, and also for the changing of tab color when I haven't look at one), Tab History (useful from a usability standpoint, and because I often forget which tab I was originally in), and Autopager (so that I don't have to load pages as often/wait for them to load, if it's linear stuff - <USER2> articles).

Under Chrome, I'm only using one, Adsweep, which doesn't work nearly as well as Adblock, but is better than nothing.

</comment><comment><USER5> For firefox, fisheye tabs, ad block, no-script, firebug. Plus some bookmarklets to make pages easier to manage: zap colors, linearize, remove redirects.

And greasemonkey, with about a dozen scripts for various sites.

</comment><comment><USER6> ClickToFlash & AdBlock Plus for Safari. I find the web almost unusable without these tools. I block ads with no remorse. You can only push people so far before they decide to fight back.

</comment><comment><USER7> Firebug. Without it, I would be working blind. Developer tools when I have to got to IE.

</comment><comment><USER8> Firebug, Web Developer Toolbar, Eventbug, MeasureIt and ColorZilla...</comment>


Don't mess with IBM - <AUTHOR> http://www.cringely.com/2012/10/22/dont-mess-with-ibm-one-downside-of-suing-a-tech-company-that-thinks-like-a-law-firm/

<comment><USER2> Sounds vaguely like walmart's anti-union emergency lawyer team:

 _Wal-Mart has responded to the union drive by trying to stop workers from organizing -- sometimes in violation of federal labor law. In 10 separate cases, the National Labor Relations Board has ruled that Wal-Mart repeatedly broke the law by interrogating workers, confiscating union literature, and firing union supporters. At the first sign of organizing in a store, Wal-Mart dispatches a team of union busters from its headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas..._

 _...The retaliation can be extreme. In February 2000, the meat-cutting department at a Wal-Mart in Jacksonville, Texas, voted to join the UFCW -- the only Wal-Mart in the nation where workers successfully organized a union. Two weeks after the vote, the company announced it was eliminating its meat- cutting departments in all of its stores nationwide. It also fired four workers who voted for the union. "They held a meeting and said there was nothing we could do," recalls Dotty Jones, a former meat cutter in Jacksonville. "No matter which way the election went, they would hold it up in court until we were old and gray."_

<http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2003/03/against-wal-mart>

</comment><comment><USER3> The post by Cringely provides no references, which I find odd. I found a Bloomberg wire article [1] about the judgement, but nothing at all about the alleged subsequent retribution.

[1] <http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/23/technology/23IBM.html>

<comment><USER4> Recap of the "payroll restructuring":

[http://www.informationweek.com/ibm-responds-to-overtime- laws...](http://www.informationweek.com/ibm-responds-to-overtime-lawsuits- with-1/205917177)

Workers' petition, with names and an occasional email:

<http://www.petitiononline.com/petitions/ibm1701/signatures>

Short legal recap:

[http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/features/overtime_calif...](http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/features/overtime_california/overtime- california-ibm.html#.UIaphcWHLh5)

<comment><USER3> That seems to be appalling behaviour by IBM.

I did an intern year with IBM UK in the late eighties and (with hindsight) it seemed to have very good employment practices. I wonder if IBM in the US was once like that, and if so when things changed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> guard-of-terra If the company is in position to treat you as a slave (e.g. it can decrease your compensation or degrade your status without suffering and the only thing preventing it from this is their goodwill), there is a good chance they would.

If the jobs market is so badly screwed that they can treat server admins as slaves, maybe USA is no longer sustainable after all?

Because you know, in a normal job market, those server admins quit. And IBM has to hire new server admins. For considerably higher salaries (because of bubble inflation and because of haste to fill positions).

<comment><USER5> No, it's quite possible to hire new server admins at the same salaries or less, and just endure lower quality work. I see it all the time. It all depends on where the company's priorities are, normal job market be damned.

<comment><USER6> I think you didn't get his point. You're actually agreeing with him. You're saying that it's quite possible to ignore the notion of a normal job market in the USA. So, it's not sustainable, competitive equilibrium don't exists.

<comment><USER7> I think instead he's saying that in a "normal" job market it's possible to higher server admins of lesser experience for lower pay and suffer through the consequences of having to train them up and get them proficient. There's good business reasons not to do this but that doesn't make it any less of a normal job market

<comment><USER6> But it's a normal assumption on this kind of discussion to deal with employees of the same quality. You can always pay lower and get less.

<comment><USER5> If that were a normal assumption, we wouldn't be seeing otherwise decisions in the real world so frequently.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The solution is to unionize. I really don't understand why we don't have an IT union, especially for network ops and engineering - it's a very logical aspect of the industry to standardize and unionize.

<comment><USER9> I _hate_ unions and everything about them.

You don't like working conditions in the company - leave. You don't like conditions in your industry - switch specialty, go elsewhere. Too lazy to switch or too gifted to leave? Well, sure, OK, let's instead arm-twist and blackmail employer.

Given, there are circumstances when you can't leave or switch. Say, if you are a miner in a small mining town. One employer, one skill set, no possibility of re-training. But unions are essentially an artifact of the 19th century.

<comment><USER10> The very concept of work/life balance is an artifact of unionization. You hate everything about unions? Fascinating. How many have you worked for?

Edit: upon reflection my original comment left a lot on the floor so I'm circling back to pick some of it up.

Here's what a "typical" union experience looks like:

The union hall staffs individuals that find work for you. The bulk of back- office paperwork and other hassles (including wage negotiation) are handled on your behalf by the hall. When you first hire on it's typically as a pre- apprentice (no prior experience) or apprentice (some applicable experience to the trade). OJT and training/certification materials are provided for you.

Your coworkers are trained, experienced craftsmen. All applicable safety guidelines are rigidly enforced. From day 1 you are presented with the kind of benefits package that is no longer available to your average worker. In addition to credible health insurance this includes pension, annuity, on the job training and certification, and death benefits. In addition to your wage you are guaranteed additional compensation for overtime and hazardous work.

By way of comparison, working in the trades for a non-union shop is at best a crapshoot. There's no guarantee SS and other taxes are being taken out correctly or at all. I've known several subcontractors who've gotten royally screwed by the IRS come tax time when they found out that they (unexpectedly) owed thousands in taxes. Safety guidelines are routinely ignored, it's nothing to get shorted on your paycheck (or go weeks without pay), benefits are typically non-existent, no guarantees of overtime, and you're working sink or swim with whoever the boss could scrape together to form a crew, typically for less money than you'd make in a union shop and that's after dues. General contractors also tend to maintain a good-ol-boy network, so you go rocking the boat about substandard pay or unsafe working conditions and it's a very real possibility that you could find yourself blackballed in your area.

TL;DR: Union: guaranteed pay, safe working conditions, training provided for career advancement, benefits, retirement plan. Non-union: good luck, buddy.

Full disclosure: I worked in the trades (both union and non-union) for several years before changing career tracks to become a programmer. I do not regret my time with the Union and would go back in a heartbeat if for some reason coding was no longer a viable career option.

<comment><USER11> Based on anecdotal experiences mine were nearly the opposite. Now I was never a trades worker but I did work for a unionized company. Up to a few months ago before leaving for private sector.

 __Union: __

\- Everyone is complacent with work, majority of time is spent faking work or finding ways out of work (pay raises are not tied to performance)

\- Net pay below average for industry (Below 50th percentile)

\- Under-skilled workers protected by the union from being let go.

\- Successes & Failures of the company are shared amongst the entire employee base. As a result there is no motivating drive to work harder to push better products out faster because there is no direct feedback resulting from it

\- Training is provided on a seniority basis

 __Non-Union: __

\- Identical benefits (or at the very least negotiable) but higher base wage

\- Skilled workers who are hired based off of recommendation of trusted employees _exclusively_

\- Strong motivating factor to produce more deliverable work as it is a direct correlation to the business's success and therefore yours (profit sharing)

\- Pay raise is tied to performance

\- Training provided on an as needed basis -> The new guy might get training before the 10 year vet because he/she is the one going to be working with that particular skill set in the short time frame

\----

Shared amongst those is equal work/life balance and safety. Labour laws have protected the workforce from shady practices you experienced (arguably an isolated incident). I'm thankful for what unions of the last few centuries have brought for us, but speaking in the majority of cases I've heard of, (anecdotal: take it as you will) they are now power hungry bodies that are corroding industry from the inside out.

<comment><USER10> I can't speak to your experiences other than to say it's disgusting mismanagement if true. I've heard similar stories involving non-trades union companies. I've also heard amazing success stories involving companies bought out of bankruptcy by their employees and turned into financial success stories. Guess it depends on the people involved.

One thing I can address is this:

" Labour laws have protected the workforce from shady practices you experienced (arguably an isolated incident)"

In manufacturing and trades (especially trades) this isn't even slightly accurate. Laws don't protect people, they provide a theoretical framework for compensation or punitive action after the fact. In practice a private citizen has almost no chance against a corporate lawyer in court, so it's almost impossible to prove workplace safety violations. On the rare ocassion that something does stick in court companies caught violating worker safety laws typically get a slap on the wrist, meanwhile whistleblowers better have a spare career up their sleeves or line up a settlement big enough to retire on because they won't be working for any outfits in their industry once they pull the trigger on a court case. Good luck proving the last company you interviewed you didn't hire you because you blew the whistle on your last employer. :/

<comment><USER11> You're probably right on trades but what you said about management is entirely right. You can have good workplaces and bad ones regardless of union status.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The final statement in the article engages in a fallacy that all members in a job market have the same level of mobility without consideration of individual factors, such as:

* Potential age-bias for older workers ([1] is an example of the discussion related to this, without being exhaustive obviously) * Local job market (relevant and equivalent positions) * Physical mobility (family situation, value of house in market relative to mortgage for re-location) * Spousal situation (Spouse may not be able to relocate)

It's always so easy to dismiss the workers in these cases and say "they should just leave," but this meme gets out-of-hand. The reality is it's often no easier to leave than to stay, and in some situations quite difficult to do so. This should never be used to excuse abusive practices by employers with the line "well, the market will take care of it."

[1] <http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/h1b.html>

</comment><comment><USER13> Offtopic, but the flash on that page slows my browser down to a crawl. C'mon, guys, this is 2012, you can't write a tag cloud in JavaScript?

<comment> mike-cardwell It's 2012 and you're still letting Flash run automatically on arbitrary web pages? Next you'll be telling me you still have the Java plugin enabled...

<comment><USER14> I don't have control over it on my work computer.

<comment><USER15> That's employee abuse, just like this article is talking about! You should quit and find a better job, the market always provides! (sarcasm).

<comment><USER16> That would be a doubtful reason to put on an application: "Corporate computer did not have script & embedded content control."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> If you're with them in the US right now and you want to keep your job, yeah, probably best not to mess. This is because it is pretty much stated policy to scale the company back in that area, in favour of building the company in 'growth' markets where people are cheaper and closer to the action.

There's not enough growth in the US to support the revenue requirements of the behemoth, and as US employees are both expensive and easy to get rid of _, they tend to be the first to suffer.

(_compared to, say, EU employees who are also expensive but harder to ditch).

<comment><USER18> Denmark is known for its flexicurity model. We're not hard to ditch, and we're even easier to employ.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexicurity>

<comment><USER17> Interesting. I think the (generous) social security provision is what's missing from the US at-will model.

<comment><USER19> The very generous and un-bureaucratic short-term unemployment benefits really help as well, I think. For up to two years, you can get up to $3k/month unemployment without even having to deal with a government office, through an a-kasse, which are subsidized membership organizations you can join. They'll help you find work as well, and line up classes or unpaid internships if you need to gain skills/experience.

It ends up smoothing over some of the friction that discourages people from changing jobs, because if you quit your job and take a few months to find another one, you still get a livable salary in between, so there isn't this huge fright of being between jobs that keeps many Americans from jumping even when it would ultimately be advantageous to do so (the fact that you don't lose health care coverage when you quit your job helps too).

<comment><USER20> Two years of unemployment benefits are considered "short-term"? Wow.

In the US, benefits usually run out at 26 weeks. Congress took note of the Great Recession and extended that to 39 weeks, or 48 weeks in states with over-6-percent unemployment, but that extension expires at the end of this year.

And Americans only get unemployment benefits if they are laid off; if you quit or are fired for cause, you're screwed.

<comment><USER21> If you're self-employed and even if you are able to make the same wage for 10 years, and pay taxes, you get zilch. Makes no sense to me.

By the way, the max is 73 and 63 weeks (was 99)

[http://jobsearch.about.com/od/unemployment/a/unempextension....](http://jobsearch.about.com/od/unemployment/a/unempextension.htm)

<comment><USER20> Well, if you employ yourself and you could collect unemployment insurance after laying yourself off, some would consider that gaming the system.

<comment><USER21> If I work as a consultant for 10 years and on average make $100k a year, I have to pay taxes on said $100k, like everyone else. Actually as a self- employed person I pay more than those with jobs, yet if the economy or my business collapses and I get no clients for 6 months, why would I not be entitled to collect on what I've paid into the system?

Someone who came right out of college, made $50k for two years, _is_ entitled to double digit weeks of unemployment benefits.

Edit: Egg on face. Just looked up the details, while I pay taxes, it seems none of these go towards unemployment insurance, unlike when you're employed, which is why the self-employed don't qualify. Lots of differences from state- to-state too, but in NY it's impossible to "participate" unless you set it up as an s-corp.

<comment><USER22> If you really want to you can set yourself up as an employee, pay taxes as such, and be eligible for unemployment benefits.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I wonder how they could have won the lawsuit... <http://www.dol.gov/elaws/esa/flsa/overtime/info.htm>

"The FLSA requires that covered employees in the United States be paid at least the federal minimum wage for each hour they work and overtime pay at one and one-half the employee's regular rate of pay for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek."

For the FLSA section 13(a)(1) exemptions to apply, an employee generally must be paid on a salary basis of no less than $455 per week and perform certain types of work that: [...] is in the computer field, or [...]

<comment><USER23> Did you not keep reading?

> A number of states have also enacted minimum wage and overtime pay laws, > some of which provide greater worker protections than those provided by > FLSA. In those situations where an employee is covered by both Federal and > state wage laws, the employee is entitled to the greater benefit or more > generous rights provided under the different parts of each law.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> This doesn't really surprise me. At some point IBM did the numbers and figured out they were more profitable concentrating on services, and they ditched their printer division, ditched their storage division, ditched their laptop division, etc..

Companies are supposed to be money making machines that always follow logical decisions to make more, it's supposed to make selling business services/software to them easier because you just have to prove you'll save them money, but I don't think a lot of them would have changed over like that. They play hard ball, even with themselves.

That said, I've worked for IBM, and was treated very well. I worked overtime all the time, though, and it wasn't odd to see managers around even very late at night doing the same thing. I don't think I've ever had a full time programming job where everyone didn't work overtime for salary without overtime pay, actually. I think there were some contractors around when I was there, but they counted their hours, only did little jobs that amounted to exactly what they were told, and were not very effective or useful. You didn't want one on your projects, that was for sure.

So it doesn't surprise me if IT professionals who start demanding that start getting listed as more expensive for the business and cut out. It is the logical money making decision by the business after all.

<comment><USER25> Just because its a logical decision on IBMs part dosent make it ethical . You 've completely neglected to mention your view on whether this is right or wrong.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> It surprises me that this doesn't count as "constructive dismissal".

<comment><USER27> It might, but you'd have to argue against IBM's lawyers to prove it. They seem to have a reputation for effectiveness, so that might not go so well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Why does the article talk about lack of overtime as if it was a bad thing?

<comment><USER29> It means overtime work without overtime pay.

<comment><USER28> Article says:

> Next IBM restricted the workers to 40 hour weeks so there would be no > overtime. > VP approval was required each time someone was needed to work > overtime. The net result was all the server admins worked exactly 40 hours a > week and for 15 percent less pay.

I'm assuming they weren't physically allowed to work for more than 40 hours a week and I wonder why it's perceived as a bad thing.

<comment><USER30> I honestly won't be surprised if the workers were expected to work overtime, but just weren't allowed to _log_ more than 40 hours a week in their timesheets.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Don't _work for_ IBM.

I'm not one to normally subscribe to the 'if you don't like the working conditions don't work there' line of reasoning, especially in the US where unions are so weak. But in tech, eh, we have options.

<comment><USER32> That's naive.

a) The lawsuit was _settled_ in 2006 (ref andyjohnson0's post <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4687336>). The article doesn't say when it was instigated, but it was likely a couple of years prior to that. In 2006, the tech industry was still working its way out of the collapse of the tech bubble.[1][2] Workers and companies were still pretty shell-shocked.

b) A lot of people live in places where the technology sector is not that strong and thus there are not that many options. Often moving is not a viable option due to family responsibilities or other circumstances.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble>

[2] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nasdaq2.png>

<comment><USER31> Uh, thanks for the wiki link to the dot-com bubble, I guess.

a) I don't really care about. I doubt much has changed and I don't think it was from fiscal necessity. Also, if they were shell-shocked in 2006 I can't imagine things have improved since then. It's actually disappointing as I rather admire IBM's leadership in open source. Alas, much easier to damage a reputation than build and keep a good one.

As for b), okay point taken. So, don't work at IBM, _if you can help it_.

<comment><USER33> "b), okay point taken. So, don't work at IBM, if you can help it."

You can't really help it because there is no guarantee that IBM won't just come along and buy the company you work for. I know lots of people that quit my company when IBM bought it. For this one older lady (HR Director) she has had to keep getting new jobs because 2 of the last companies she worked for got bought by IBM. She doesn't want to work for them so she just had to find another job and then quit.

<comment><USER5> That's a scary track record. Seriously, what are the odds? :)

<comment><USER34> Pretty good apparently. My current small employer was almost bought by IBM. Only because it is privately owned, and the owners didn't want to sell.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Comparison of sorting in C++ and C - <AUTHOR> http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp/rants/c++-vs-c/

<comment><USER2>
        Ratio 1 is hand coded divided by the library routine

I think you did the opposite.</comment>


Engine Yard's sponsorship of RVM is coming to an end - <AUTHOR> http://rvm.io/

<comment><USER2> I hate (yes, it's that strong a word) the problems related to versioning in Ruby ... and even with RVM, you have to figure out which gems are compatible. My solution is to get rid of my Ruby applications. I'm not a Ruby developer, and my career path isn't likely to afford me the time to really learn it.

I'm a Java developer, and we have our own version of dependency hell (that I've learned to avoid and/or navigate), so I'm not trolling, but rather wanted to point out that often issues like dependency management (there are others) simply cause marginal developers to leave.

<comment><USER3> > often issues like dependency management (there are others) simply cause > marginal developers to leave.

I think that's true, and true in just about every language/environment, it's not unique to ruby, right? Dependency management often causes marginal developers to leave, in many langauges/environments.

Dependency management itself has gotten a _lot_ better in ruby -- bundler is pretty great.

But multiple ruby version management is still a mess. I wish ruby would have a single dictatorial-blessed solution to multiple ruby version management, like I understand python to be.

And even bundler isn't perfect, for sure -- I wish bundler was more integrated with rubygems, which would for instance make the `bundle exec` dance unneccesary.

Interestingly, both of these issues, as I see it, are related to the decentralized open source nature of the ruby ecosystem. Which has plusses and minuses.

(And both dependency management and multiple version management can be hell in Java, for sure. I am not a Java developer, and the most common barrier I run into when trying to deal with Java is... maven. And last time I had to run multiple versions of the JVM on one machine, it was hell. I hope it's gotten better.)

<comment><USER4> > I think that's true, and true in just about every language/environment

Agreed, although it seems as if nodejs may have solved most of the hard problems in this area by way of their unique require() module loader and the design of npm. After learning it, I wish every package manager worked that way.

<comment><USER5> Ran into same issues with nodejs. If one of your dependencies use libxy 1.2 and your app depends on libxy 1.4, you have to be careful which one gets loaded first and hope one is compatiblew with the ohter. Good luck if the APIs are different. NPM _seems_ to solve the problem but it really doesn't.

<comment><USER6> This shouldn't be an issue at all. Your app would get libxy 1.4, and your dependency would get libxy 1.2. It shouldn't matter which is loaded first, and unless those modules somehow store something globally, they shouldn't conflict in any way.

npm does solve the "multiple versions of a library are used by different packages", unless that libxy you were using did something fishy. Can you give more details?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> So Engine Yard ends their support of JRuby in 2012. Then, just a few weeks ago, they end support for Rubinius. Now, they'll be ending support for RVM next week... A shift in strategy? Financial troubles? Either way, it seems they need to update their "Engine Yard Loves Open Source" page: [https://www.engineyard.com/community/open- source](https://www.engineyard.com/community/open-source)

<comment><USER8> Oh how fickle you are. A company that supports an open source project out of pocket for two years now doesn't love open source because they have moved onto other things? Over time, technologies change, stabilize, and/or become obsolete, expecting them to support one project forever is silly and boring.

How about: dear Engine Yard, thanks for 730 days of open source love, can't wait to see where you invest your time next.

<comment><USER7> I don't disagree, which is why I'm wondering if this is a case of not having enough money to continue supporting these projects, or a case of seeing the momentum or the need for support in open source changing to something new. So far, though, I've only seen Engine Yard drop support for projects. If, tomorrow, they announced that they were starting to support a handful of Go or node.js projects, then I think we'd all have a much different view on this news.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Here we go again. We've got companies building skytowers using the steel and concrete we fund with bake sales. Our most important open source projects are dependent on corporate philanthropy that can disappear overnight.

We can debate the merits of RVM/chruby/rbenv yet all agree that open source version management projects are essential infrastructure for Ruby. Sure, we're grateful that EY funded RVM (and other projects) for so long. But what now?

I contributed $50 to the RVM Bountysource campaign.But a one-shot charitable fundraiser is a slim reed on which to sustain a project like this. Tens of thousands of developers use RVM. And the companies they work for spend millions to develop businesses that could not be be built without the infrastructure provided by open source projects such as RVM. It's skytowers funded by bake sales.

<comment><USER10> Welp there are people trying to address this, [https://www.gittip.com/](https://www.gittip.com/) for instance.

<comment><USER11> Gittip is chump change.

The amount of money raised so far for rvm's current crowdfunding is about the amount that the top receiver on Gittip might get in 20 weeks. [https://www.gittip.com/](https://www.gittip.com/)

You say Gittip is trying. That's true, but I think they slipped into a slow growth pattern months ago. At its current rate it would take years for it to be a viable way of funding more than a handful of open source hackers.

<comment><USER10> > The amount of money raised so far for rvm's current crowdfunding is about > the amount that the top receiver on Gittip might get in 20 weeks. > [https://www.gittip.com/](https://www.gittip.com/)

That is not a technical problem, that is a social one. The OP said

> But a one-shot charitable fundraiser is a slim reed on which to sustain a > project like this.

And he is correct, the gittip style is probably better for long-term but faces problems as you pointed out, although again, I do not think any of them are technical in nature.

(Probably the biggest problem being the complete lack of companies on gittip et al and the feeble amounts, in terms of companies' budgets anyway.)

<comment><USER11> This supports my point. My point is that Gittip is irrelevant and there's no reason to believe it will become relevant. If it were a technical problem and yet had reached its current level of success, I would think that if they fixed their technical problems, it might become relevant. Since it's a non-technical problem (social problem, positioning problem), how to fix it is unknown. The quickest path would very likely involve tearing the whole thing down and starting over again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The RVM 2.0 plan doc[1] doesn't seem touch on one of my serious problems with RVM: how will it implement ruby environment integration with the shell? Specifically, I've found that RVM's use of shell functions is horribly brittle in some important cases. So much so that I've banished it from all environments that I control (to date, in favor of rbenv and/or ruby-build).

For comparison, rbenv simply needs ~/.rbenv/bin and ~/.rbenv/shims added to $PATH. I'm all for magic when it's seamless[2], but I've not found that to be the case with RVM. Using PATH makes it quite clear in any given execution context whether rbenv is managing a command.

[1] [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xW9GeEpLOWPcddDg_hOPvK4o...](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xW9GeEpLOWPcddDg_hOPvK4oeLxJmU3Q5FiCNT7nTAc/edit)

[2] By "magic", I mean underlying complexity that creates practical simplicity.

<comment><USER13> As I said elsethread, I haven't yet considered production, but I just switched to chruby for my development environment rather than rbenv. I still use ruby- build when I need (I just needed a version not supported by ruby-install), but I have switched wholesale to chruby, and having found chgems in researching a different answer, I may look at using that as well.

chruby really is the simplest possible thing you can do to solve this problem, and in combinations with chgems, it solves isolation better than RVM does without the brittleness of the shims that rbenv has (ultimately why I moved away from rbenv). Installs are substantially easier with ruby-install and/or ruby-build, although RVM is _probably_ better at this part in general. Extract that out from RVM and I'd consider using it.

<comment><USER14> I'd argue that you don't need _any_ of rvm/rbenv/chruby in production.

<comment><USER13> I'd agree. Something as simple as chruby makes having multiple interpreter/gemset versions easily usable from something like cron without introducing a lot more overhead, though, or having to remember to put all the variables &c. in place everywhere you need them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> First time I've ever felt compelled to actually leave a comment on HN. And full disclosure - I work at Engine Yard.

Thanks Brian Shirai, Michael Papis, Wayne Sequin, Kirk, Evan, Dr. Nic, etc... and Engine Yard for the support of all these projects. Getting to working with these gents has been one of the highlights of the last few years for me.

</comment><comment><USER16> Go was born in Google. Docker was born in dotCloud. Each of these projects are really "moving the chains" in my world. Perhaps EngineYard is looking at this and thinking of ways they could focus on something which could be equally as important.

Also, I just went to the EngineYard web site and Ruby isn't mentioned any more prominently than the other ecosystems it supports. Why keep supporting projects in the Ruby ecosystem when you have moved into a much wider world?

</comment><comment><USER17> The conversation at [https://www.bountysource.com/fundraisers/489-rvm-2-0](https://www.bountysource.com/fundraisers/489-rvm-2-0) has a lot more meaning to it, primarily why RVM vs. rbenv vs. chruby all deserve to exist.

As for me and mine, I'm in the land of docker now...

<comment><USER3> For those curious, what that page by rvm authors suggests is that:

> _Tools like rbenv or chruby can work well in simple scenarios, especially if > you're very skilled with the Unix shell. However, as environments and > dependencies grow in complexity, these tools quickly become inadequate. RVM > seems more "complicated" because it does a lot more to make handling these > scenarios easy._

> _To paraphrase Jonathan Jackson, RVM is to Rails as rbenv is to Sinatra. > Sinatra is a lightweight framework whereas Rails is much more robust. > Sometimes Sinatra just fits, and other times you 'd be a fool to not go with > Rails._

I think people with complicated scenarios have had... mixed experiences with whether rvm really makes complex scenarios easy. I suspect many people with complex scenarios prefer a simple tool like rbenv or chruby (disclosure: I prefer chruby having worked with all three), which they can then figure out themselves how to invoke to do exactly what they need.

It may be that some people with complex scenarios prefer rvm. It would be interesting to hear from them. (for real! I'd be interested!)

But I suspect that the bulk of rvm users are not actually sophisticated users with complicated scenarios, but instead beginner users with fairly simple scenarios. For a variety of reasons. Becuase rvm is what you find when you google. Because rvm holds out the promise of not making you understand anything about what it's doing or anything about bash or shell environment, and having it Just Work (whether it fulfills that promise... _especially_ in non-simple scenarios... there are mixed opinions. There are definitely _some_ people who have moved from rvm to rbenv or chruby in fact _as_ their environments have grown in complexity, and they had trouble figuring out how to get rvm to work in their environments. ).

People try to be really sensitive not to insult rvm. And I've tried to be sensitive here, while still saying what I perceive. Lots of people like rvm, for sure. And rvm was first, and a huge boon compared to the no options that preceeded it. And nobody wants to be rude, or get into a fight. But people's sensitivity and desire to avoid controversy also means when you google around... you pretty much just find rvm, even though _some_ (many? I don't know) have in fact moved from rvm to chruby and rbenv -- including sometimes moving as their environments become more complicated.

I am not sure it's accurate to say that developers routinely find chruby or rbenv "quickly become inadequate" as environments and dependencies grow in complexity ('quickly'? really?).

<comment><USER18> _It may be that some people with complex scenarios prefer rvm. It would be interesting to hear from them. (for real! I 'd be interested!)_

I like the sandboxed gemsets that RVM provides. It seems you can do something similar with rbenv if you use this add-on [1].

I've also used the RVM gem programmatically to install gems on the fly in an isolated environment, and optionally tear the whole thing down when the program completes.

1\. [https://github.com/jf/rbenv-gemset](https://github.com/jf/rbenv-gemset)

<comment><USER14> > I like the sandboxed gemsets that RVM provides. It seems you can do > something similar with rbenv if you use this add-on [1].

There are many ways to skin that cat. It's not a particularly difficult problem to solve. I wrote one of my own[0] - it's worth doing that yourself to understand how it works, I'd say.

> I've also used the RVM gem programmatically to install gems on the fly in an > isolated environment, and optionally tear the whole thing down when the > program completes.

That's quite an interesting approach - is this for continuous integration?

[0] [https://github.com/regularfry/gemenv.git](https://github.com/regularfry/gemenv.git), [https://github.com/regularfry/rv.git](https://github.com/regularfry/rv.git)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Some time ago I blogged about how we stopped using RVM in production: [http://blog.arkency.com/2012/11/one-app-one-user-one- ruby/](http://blog.arkency.com/2012/11/one-app-one-user-one-ruby/) . Many people here said that RVM might be over-complicated for the simplest cases and I think in production when there is only one app is the most simple usecase that you can get and RVM is overkill in such situation. In development however RVM is awesome, especially when you are a contractor or freelancer or you work on multiple open source ruby projects and gems and must switch between ruby versions often.

Michał Papis, the current maintainer is a great person and I wish him best luck in funding the project. If you want to meet him in person, he will probably be at wroc_love.rb 2014 conference ( [https://twitter.com/wrocloverb](https://twitter.com/wrocloverb) ) . Check out what he learned so far on working with RVM1 and what are the plans for RVM2: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wN- iIC3S1ZM](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wN-iIC3S1ZM) . I remember that some of the ideas for RVM2 were invented after our Ruby User Group meeting at 3 a.m. in the night, when we were trying to think about most science fiction approaches to RVM such as even a client server architecture. That was a crazy night :)

The biggest problem with RVM1 is that it is written in shell and even if there are people from Ruby community that would like to support this project, their skills are in Ruby language, not bash or zsh, etc. There are plenty of people who would like to help maintaining RVM but they just hit the wall when they see the amount of bash code in the project.

</comment><comment><USER20> Add me to the list of people that would like more information about the rvm vs rbenv question. I switched to rbenv a few months ago because I wanted something to manage my ruby version only, not gemsets and the rest and I use bundler and shims now.

<comment><USER3> What sort of more information would you like? You mean more and different people's opinions/experiences? or something else?

<comment><USER20> Yes more opinions :) I'm a relatively new Ruby developer so tend to swing whichever way the last good article I read leads me towards, so more is always better

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I wish people wouldn't freak out so much about this. RVM is pretty mature at this point, and there are some really great alternatives like rbenv and chruby.

</comment><comment><USER22> Is gem set management still required if using bundler?

<comment><USER23> Not required if you use bundler.

But after you are done with the project, there is no easy way to delete the gems that the project uses all at once.

<comment><USER24> If you bundle install with the `--path` flag (which you should), you can specify the location the gems will be installed (typically something like `--path vendor`) which gives you the ability to easily remove the gems the project uses all at once.

Coupled with `bundle package` which stores all the .gem files in vendor/cache, you can ensure that your application always has its gem dependencies available.

Here's a great article with more information about all the above: [http://ryan.mcgeary.org/2011/02/09/vendor-everything- still-a...](http://ryan.mcgeary.org/2011/02/09/vendor-everything-still- applies/)</comment></comment></comment>


Drivetrain Design for Boosted's Electric Skateboard - <AUTHOR> http://boostedboards.posthaven.com/technical-progress-part-ii-dual-motor-drivetrain <comment><USER2> Any chance these will ever get down to ~$300? I guess what I'm asking is if this is the Tesla Roadster and there's an economy model a few generations down the line? Or will this always be for people more serious about using them for commuting, etc?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's possible to get something like an electric Razor scooter for ~$300, but the parts they use to hit that price, like lead-acid batteries, make it a lot less appealing.

Just like a car or motorcycle, right now there's a floor to how cheap it can be and still be great. If that gets lower over time, all the better.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It looks amazing, but I'm having trouble understanding where the power comes from.

The Kickstarter says 20 mph, 6 mile range, 2000 watts, which gives an energy of 600 watt hours.

A Macbook battery is around 60 watt hours, and weighs about 1.5 pounds; 10 of those would weigh 15 pounds - and take up a ton of space. I don't see the volume of even ONE in any of the photos I've seen.

Where's 600 watt hours of battery hiding?

<comment><AUTHOR> The battery is just under 100 watt hours. The motor power lets you accelerate uphill, but the range is calculated from riding at a constant speed on flat ground.

<comment><USER4> I wonder what sort of grade it can climb, and how far. As a "last mile" vehicle this looks quite promising but for me the "last mile" of my commute is my entire commute (well, two miles), and it is straight up a hill.

Eh, walking is probably good for me...

<comment><USER5> I rode one of these at SXSW. It has a lot of torque. I am 230 lbs and it had no trouble getting to top speed in a hurry. I didn't try it on a hill but I bet it'd do fine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I love this post because it shows some real engineering. The fact they put so much effort into the test equipment shows that there's some serious characterization going on vs. just throwing together parts.

<comment><USER7> I really wouldn't call this "real" engineering. As a mechanical engineer it really sounds like they literally threw it together and hoped it fit after they tested the motors "...models were assembled together in the CAD software to check for fit, clearance, and interference." I saw no mention of fatigue analysis or FEA, both are now days required for "real" mechanical engineering. Without that just cross your fingers the motors don't fall off after 1000 miles. Other than that it is pretty comprehensive.

<comment><USER8> >I really wouldn't call this "real" engineering.

Throwing stuff together and seeing if it works is the essence of engineering.

<comment><USER9> How so?

Properly engineered stuff will work as designed. Imagine an A380 falling out of the sky on the test flight and engineers exchanging betting money based on whether it flew or crashed. "Well, that didn't work.".

Engineering does everything to take the uncertainty out of design as much as possible. It's the anti-thesis of throwing things together to see if they work.

<comment><USER8> Ok, there are some things that don't lend to the iterative approach. Airbuses, bridges and skyscrapers would be three examples.

When you are designing the wing for the A380, probably a good idea to bust out the FEA software. But it's still going to be tested with hydraulic rams.

<comment><USER10> As far as I am concerned, bridges have fallen, buildings have broken, and airplanes have crashed. I guess its a different iterative process then software, but neverthless, it is an iterative process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I really hope the link between the remote and the board is secured properly, it would be a really nasty prank to overpower the transmitter from some vehicle and to cause it to accelerate or come to a sudden stop. Griefers are not limited to being active online.

</comment><comment><USER11> I think this is still, by far, one of my favorite "last mile" solutions. It's got a pretty slick look, it'll do basically all of the work for me, and I could carry it inside somewhere pretty easily.

Biggest downside I'm wondering about is only being able to use it when it's dry out (not sure there much to be doe about that while staying reasonable).

I'm a fairly avid cyclist, though. I think than between a boosted board and my trusty bike, I'd cover a pretty huge swath of my use cases.

Really interested in this.

<comment><USER12> I've ridden a long board in the rain. My legs have never been so wet. FAR wetter than biking or walking in the rain.

With this at least you could wear boots because you wouldn't have to kick/push/coast.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> One of the reasons for which motors in scooters and other electric vehicles are large and bulky is that they have to be designed to last a long time in real world environments.

The motors being used for this project are hobby model aircraft motors. These motors put out a lot of power per unit volume but are most definitely not designed for continuous duty at anywhere near to full output. They are also not sealed against the elements and have bearings selected for reasonably balanced loads with relatively low radial loads.

I have piles of these on my workbench ranging from cheap Chinese units to top of the line German designs. I use these on our planes, helicopters, multi- rotors, boats and cars. At the top end you have amazing hand-crafted quality with a prohibitive price (unless you want to pay $8,000 for a skateboard). At the low end they are cheap and they are junk. I've seen everything from magnets coming off, coils burning out, power leads coming off, bearings going bad prematurely and shafts bending.

In short, while the design process is interesting, I think the most fundamental flaw is being ignored: The motors are not designed, nor are they suitable for, this kind of an application.

</comment><comment><USER14> Obligatory: [http://xkcd.com/139/](http://xkcd.com/139/)

What are the safety concerns of something like this? A top speed of 20mph will definitely be unstable for general usage, and even 15 seems more like bicycle territory, where you're seated and have an aerodynamic shape.

We might see many people falling off of these in the future...

<comment><USER15> A longboard turns in the direction you're leaning and so is dynamically stable. In fact (counter)steering is more intuitive than on a bike because you don't have to coordinate lean and handlebar angle.

The main issue with skateboards is 'speed wobble' vibration in the trucks, but a well set-up board generally isn't prone to this.

<comment><USER16> Most wipeouts I've had on my longboard are when the board stops suddenly from debris and you continue moving forward, usually with your feet trailing slightly behind. Its a recipe for injury, and its why this mode of transport is only for those capable of taking a good tumble every now and then. The solution is to not travel faster than you can run, and to always be vigilant for small rocks, twigs, sand, and especially things that will jam under a wheel but continue to slide forward like pinecones.

The length of the longboard mostly prevents speed wobble which is an uncontrollable side to side swaying which tends to increase in amplitude once it starts.

<comment><USER17> A few addendums, from someone who spends too much time and money on longboards built for going fast. You generally only encounter the issue of the board stopping suddenly on small debris (referred to by street skaters as 'chalking') when you are traveling close to walking speed on small wheels. I personally skate around 3x walking speed, and these boosted boards would make that even higher.

Secondly, speed wobbles are caused by riders primarily, with gear only impacting it slightly. Put a new rider on a fantastic downhill setup, and they'll probably get speed wobbles, whereas experienced riders can have no trouble riding short, turny board at highspeed. (Look up Maryhill for more info, it's a race where slalom boards are commonly used).

<comment><USER18> Can you elaborate more on what newbie riders are doing wrong to induce speed wobbles?

(I'm a snowboarder, and am thinking a lot about getting a longboard for my ~4km commute that I'm currently riding)

<comment><USER17> It's partially about weight distribution, and partially about confidence. For the most part, biasing your weight distribution towards your front foot, and making sure you lead your steering with your front foot, and you'll be fine. The rest comes with experience. Does your commute contain any downhill sections?

<comment><USER15> Absolutely correct. On a longboard at speed, you have to keep your weight forward. This is partly to keep the front truck under control, and partly because flex in the board means that the end of the board with most of the weight steers more.

If you panic and lean back, you're effectively only steering with the rear truck, which is _not_ a dynamically-stable situation. Things go wrong very quickly at that point.

<comment><USER17> Ah, I tend to keep my weight fairly centered at speed so I'm stable if I have to break tuck. Also, I don't ride a deck with any flex, and I ride split angle trucks so I inherently have more turn in the front. But yeah, for beginners, weight on the front.

<comment><USER15> Good point. A centered stance might be ideal, and may just seem 'forward' in comparison to the typical shortboard stance.

And now I think about it, it might not be board flex that limits front-truck turning when leaning back - rather, the lack of weight on the front truck might allow the outside wheel to lift. Either way, it's a bad situation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Can you apply this to folding kick scooter?

Lightweight electric kick scooter could be useful to larger audience as a "last mile" solution.

<comment><USER20> For more than a year, I commuted to and from work (3 miles each way) on a lightweight electric scooter I bought on Craigslist for $100. It's been a while, but I used to skateboard, surf and snowboard, but having the handlebars of a scooter in an urban environment is huge for me in terms of control and safety. I used to call it the poor-man's Segway.

Edit: Not mine, but these look nice: [http://www.goped.com/products/Electric.asp](http://www.goped.com/products/Electric.asp)

<comment><USER19> They are extremely heavy.

My current kick scooter weights 12 lbs and i consider it heavy. I can't imagine handling 35 lbs, my bike is lighter :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Awesome.

A go pro video of going from Filbert and Lyon to Filbert and Van Ness, now that would be rock: [http://goo.gl/maps/OlHc7](http://goo.gl/maps/OlHc7)

For those that don't live in the city, it's one of the steepest streets in the western hemisphere.

<comment><USER22> [http://www.strava.com/segments/948473](http://www.strava.com/segments/948473)

The 11% average over 1km isn't too bad, but the start looks pretty steep. Strava shows it at up to 40%. That's not exactly 100% accurate, but I've ridden 25-30% slopes on Strava and they are hard enough that on my road bike I can't stay seated (the front wheel comes off the ground) and if it is the slightest bit wet the rear wheel slips when you stand.

I'd be very impressed if this can make it up there with a person on it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I'd love to see a mountainboard/pneumatic tyre version of this for us poor souls cursed with terrible road surfaces. I'd also love to see compatibility with Original Skateboards spring trucks.

But anyways fantastic product, I'll definitely be picking one up at some point.

</comment><comment><USER24> On the image showing the brushed vs. brushless... How much of that size difference is due to gearing? A scooter shaft's output is much lower RPM than a skateboard. Your gearing seems to be via belt drive.

Any chance you'll sell just the motors...? ;)

<comment><AUTHOR> You're right, there's a gearbox on the brushed motor and not on the brushless one. The gearbox is the part with the shaft sticking out, and the motor is the part with the heatsink fins.

And you can buy the motors already! We are using a slightly modified version of a RC airplane motor. Our first prototypes used motors we bought at a local hobby shop.

<comment><USER25> Can we buy a kit of the motors and drive train and put it together ourselves?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I really wish the city I live in has much better bike lanes or sidewalks so I could use this thing to get from point a to point b further than just my suburban neighborhood. I can't wait to see people riding these things in the city.

</comment><comment><USER27> I wonder if they ever considered hub motors for better efficiency and quieter operation (no belt), or would it be too big technical challenge to custom- build (basically the wheel and motor would be single integrated unit).

</comment><comment><USER21> Great video about boosted

[http://youtu.be/U1scP9uZP9Y](http://youtu.be/U1scP9uZP9Y)

</comment><comment><USER28> Interesting, but I'm still waiting for hoverboards.. 2 years to go :)</comment>


Startup Steps, Learned over 22 Years - <AUTHOR> http://lancewalley.wordpress.com/2010/01/28/business-startup/

<comment><USER2> Wow, some of you guys are being pretty harsh. This isn't "The Only 9 Startup Steps" it's just 9 steps most people need to take and if you're unfamilair with them it's great to see some information laid out about them.

Personally I found it pretty useful. I'm working on some of them but it's unfamiliar territory and I'm not sure what all needs to be done exactly. I found this to be some good practical advice that complements some of the more esoteric higher level advice that we normally see around here.

</comment><comment><USER3> When you list 9 steps and not one of them is "Build something", you're probably doing it wrong.

Edit: You know what, I take this back; not only too harsh but somewhat off topic. I think the title got me expecting one thing and upon reading another felt unfulfilled.

<comment><AUTHOR> The steps are more about setting up a business rather than running a business.

Not all business build something either. Say you simply want a business to do consulting under. In the article, his PerlUSA he started with was just that.

<comment><USER3> Fair point, not all business' build things: I would suggest not even bothering to "set up a business" until you at least have a) something to sell and b) someone to sell it to, however.

<comment><AUTHOR> A consultant is selling themselves... their skill set and their time. If you are a consultant with no clients, then sure you don't need a business, but good to have one set up before you get clients.

Sometimes having a business is as simple as a DBA... cheap to do and a couple hours, looks more professional to have a client pay a company than cutting a check to Joe Smoe.

In my opinion, any time you are entering into a contract with a third party, it is best to have a legal entity set up. Talk to any company whose been around a while, consultancy or product company, and you'll hear war stories about deals gone bad. When you are still small, there'd be nothing scarier than having a deal fall through and leaving your personal assets exposed if they decided to sue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This advice is garbage.

Which is not to say that it's FALSE, per se, but that it covers the purely mechanical details.

Yes, you need a checking account.

Yes, you need a tax ID.

But, heck, you need a desk too.

And, if you don't eat meals, you'll die, and never do a startup, so why not put that on the list?

Having launched two bootstrapped startups over the last six years (<http://SmartFlix.com> and <http://HeavyInk.com>) I would NEVER give this advice to someone - it's like saying "The secret to becoming a tennis pro? Simple: 1) guy a tennis racket; 2) but tennis balls ; 3) and never, EVER forget to buy tennis shoes - you just can't play barefoot".

This stuff will all get done in due time, because it HAS to get done. There's not need to itemize steps which more or less take care of themselves.

The IMPORTANT stuff is the stuff you find in Steve Blank's book Four Steps to the Epiphany, and in a few other great business books (Getting Everything You Can From All You've Got).

1) figure out you value proposition (who are you helping?) 2) who are you selling to? 3) what is your unique selling proposition (how do you convey the value to your would-be customers?) 4) what is your plan to iterate in discovering your customers? 5) what is your plan to iterate in discovering the proper marketing channels to reach your customers?

etc.

"Get a bank account" is the kind of bogus filler that you find in a housewive's magazine about how to turn her candle making hobby into a small little business selling to friends and relatives.

Entrepreneurs need REAL advice.

<comment><USER5> That's easy to say that if you've done this before. This is a nice list for people like me who may want to break from corporate life but have not run a business and would like to see the practical steps outlined somewhere (so as to minimize the obvious missteps).</comment></comment>


Why JavaScript Is Eating HTML - <AUTHOR> https://css-tricks.com/why-javascript-is-eating-html/ <comment><USER2> > this HTML-in-JS pattern (or something else that provides the same benefits) > will likely be around for a while

I fear this is true. I fear it because sites that are implemented this way are sites that are unavailable to me. Every day, it seems, the web becomes smaller and smaller.

<comment><USER3> I think it's true that we may have gone too far in the direction of developer experience vs user experience. I'm interested to see how we find solutions that solve both problems. Properly server-rendered JS sites that can be interacted with as static HTML but progressively enhance on more capable devices might be a solution, but it still doesn't feel right.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I hope some of the good stuff finds its way into html.</comment>


Contextual search and advertising, powered by your conversations - <AUTHOR> http://friendfeed.com/messel/dfb9ba56/contextual-search-and-advertising-powered-by

<comment><AUTHOR> I have a web facing version up and working (test version). I'll link it here once I work out a way to get more API calls from Zemanta</comment>


Is Pornography the New Tobacco? - <AUTHOR> http://www.hoover.org/publications/policyreview/41599902.html

<comment><USER2> This article attempts to draw parallels between tobacco an porn in the promotion, use, addiction, and rationalization of the "substances."

I'm not moved. Tobacco kills and injures people even innocent bystanders. There may be a case for psychological damage, but the author herself admits that the damage may be a learned reaction. At the end she looks at the political aspects and says the the political supporters (by innuendo) are left wing liberals like Obama and Henry Waxman.

Whoa there Nellie! Then I see "Mary Eberstadt is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and consulting editor to Policy Review." Says it all.

<comment><USER3> I think you only skimmed the article. She makes your same points, particularly that tobacco does indeed directly kill and injure people, and pornography does not.

Her section on politics does not seem to have a particular slant to these eyes:

"It is hard to imagine Henry Waxman, for example — one of the most voracious elected officials in pursuit of the tobacco companies — adopting any similar animus toward Big Pornography. It is equally hard to imagine the Obama administration taking much of an interest in prosecuting obscenity — if indeed its members even believe that obscenity as such can exist."

Do you disagree? Do you think that Waxman and Obama ARE likely to go after "Big Pornography" or start pushing for the enforcement of obscenity laws?

And if you would look more closely, you would realize that this IS the website for Policy Review, Hoover Institution, Stanford.

<comment><USER2> > Unlike tobacco, which was traditionally defended by a coalition of > libertarians and politicians from conservative tobacco-growing Southern > states, pornography's most prominent defenders in the public sphere — > including its industry spokesmen — associate themselves with the progressive > wing of Democratic Party politics. It is hard to imagine Henry Waxman, for > example — one of the most voracious elected officials in pursuit of the > tobacco companies — adopting any similar animus toward Big Pornography. It > is equally hard to imagine the Obama administration taking much of an > interest in prosecuting obscenity — if indeed its members even believe that > obscenity as such can exist. The recent ascension to the No. 2 slot in the > Justice Department of a lawyer who in private practice had numerous times > defended Playboy, Penthouse, the largest distributor of pornographic videos, > and other pornographers just emphasizes the point.

is the paragraph that I based my innuendo comment on. Fundamentally, most porn is protected as artistic expression, child porn excepted. It's a fools errand to spend resources on prosecution that's going to be overturned. That's probably the position of Waxman and Obama.

I admit that I read the article quickly, but more than skimming. I thought the analogy was stretched, even she seemed to think so at times. But at the end linking liberals, Democrats, feminists, and porn political contributors was just a bit silly. Given that nothing can be done about it legally, the article was just political theater disguised as argument.

<comment><USER4> _It's a fools errand to spend resources on prosecution that's going to be overturned. That's probably the position of Waxman and Obama._

Whoa, _really_? If the Supreme Court said "Porn is obscenity; it is not protected speech," you think Obama would demand that RedTube be shut down? Can you imagine anything like "We must stop these purveyors of sexually debased materials" ever emerging from Obama's mouth?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The only "harm" she shows pornography as causing can be summarized as follows: sometimes people get fired for watching porn at work, and sometimes people get divorced over it.

Neither of those are endemic to porn itself. Divorce can be blamed just as much on prudishness on the part of the non-porn-watching spouse as addiction on the part of the porn-watching spouse.

<comment><USER6> Isn't chafing harmful?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Seems like a lot of wishful thinking on the part of the author. Sure there are a lot of similarities. But the article seems to be pushing her all-too- apparent agenda of taking down the porn industry the same way the tobacco industry was taken down. But she doesn't make the distinction between thoughts that may be harmful and something that causes actual physical harm.

</comment><comment><USER8> There's a fictional character called Jennifer in the piece, who finds smoking morally wrong. Is this really a common view? Surely few people object to it if it's done in a way which minimises or eliminates passive smoking...

<comment><USER3> Aside from the bible belt you mean? Oh heck yeah, there are. Why do you think there are so many attempts to ban smoking, not only in public places where non-smokers go, but also in tobacco shops where all the hired help smokes, in cigar bars, and even in your own car?

I follow an RSS feed for smoking ban news because I am a casual cigar smoker and a libertarian. It is happening all over the country.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The author makes the assumption that tobacco was stigmatized by a moral crusade-- a key mistake. Even if it was correct, anything rebellious is cool, so this argument holds no water.

The real reason smoking is out is obvious! Have you ever smelled a smoker's breath? Their clothes? Ever had smoke blown in your face? Ever sat down on a couch covered months of acquired ash? Ever had an ashtray spilled on or near you? Stepped on a cigarette butt? Ever seen a woman who's been chain-smoking for 10 years?

It's gross.

Porn, however, is always in excellent taste. ;)

</comment><comment><USER10> No.

</comment><comment><USER11> The article succeeds at drawing interesting, often poetic parallels between two unrelated concepts.

It does not succeed at giving reasons to ban pornography.

<comment><USER3> It's rather hard to fail at something that you were not trying to do in the first place.

Why so many HNers assume she has a vendetta against porn? I read the whole article and did not detect a bias either way.

I know nothing about this writer, nor about Policy Review, nor about the Hoover Institution, so perhaps I speak from ignorance.

<comment><USER12> Then why write it? That is a new, interesting angle no one else has offerred, and it must have been inventd by someone for some reason.

It ws interesing in many ways that are unintentional: e.g. because it shows how to fight this sort of plan: don't allow harm to enter the debate.

That killed cigarettes, so if porn wants to survive, prove it causes no more harm than, say, over-exercising or any other "addiction" to what is otherwise a non-addictive thing.

<comment><USER13> _That is a new, interesting angle no one else has offerred, and it must have been inventd by someone for some reason._

Isn't that reason enough?</comment></comment></comment></comment>