How Funware Revolutionizes the Business - <AUTHOR> http://gametheoryonline.com/2010/08/12/funware-video-game-industry-mechanics-gameify

<comment><AUTHOR> Its also important to note that status or public reputation seems to be just as important as fun these days. People expect the ability to show off their accomplishments or achievements with their friends in games and sites now. The mentality seems to be "If I can't show-off how awesome I am at doing something, why bother doing it?"</comment>


Shock, awe: British government agrees that copyright has gone too far - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/08/the-british-government-has-endorsed.ars <comment><USER2> It looks like they're enabling something like fair use and realizing that the way orphan publications are handled doesn't make any sense. Not very exciting really considering these are regulations that are widely ignored by people who actually use any technology anyway.

<comment><USER3> Since there was a talk about abolishing patents etc. from the US system, I had my hopes up for a few seconds that England might've picked some of those ideals up. Looks like that isn't the acse. They're actually acting now on a study commissioned in _2006_!

<comment><USER4> Sorry to be a little picky but it's not England, it's the United Kingdom. Of all of the member nations of the United Kingdom, England is the only one unrepresented in government. Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales all have devolved governments of their own. England has no such government.

The sad fact is that the British parliament could pass a law, which can then be overturned in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland leaving England screwed. Furthermore, MPs from those countries all get to vote in the British parliament, then their devolved equivalents can vote against it locally (except in England as there's no English parliament). This happened most recently with tuition fees but can apply to almost anything.

<comment><USER5> Keep in mind, the British parliament can over-rule the Scottish one. The British law could include a clause "none of the above may be changed by the Parliaments of Scotland, Northern Island, or Wales". But contentious laws are already hard enough to pass.

<comment><USER4> You hit the nail on the head with your last part.

There's tons of little loopholes all over the place. For example, the Isles of Scilly have a slightly strange legal status, and if they're not explicitly mentioned in a law, it doesn't apply to them (I was told this by someone at the council in St. Mary's but didn't ask for the specific statute).

To be honest, if a law is contentious enough for the scots to vote against it, then the devolved parliaments are just as likely push for their national reps to vote against it on the principle that it overrules them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "Dear Big Media, Lately we havent received enough campaign funding. We have made polite inquiries before, but they have gone unanswered. We're trying really hard to keep a hold on these pesky liberals, but they are doing a really good job on gaining seats. Here's our idea for new copyright laws. What do you think? Ideas / monetary contributions to the usual accounts. Also, we've just lost the Murdoch account so we need some of our other contributors to step up. Thanks, The Conservative Party"

<comment><USER7> I think you're confusing the UK with the USA...or perhaps I'm just naive.

<comment><USER8> I don't know whether you're naive or not. I do know that in 2010Q3, Universal Music was the Conservative Party's largest corporate donor: [http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party- fi...](http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party-finance- analysis/party-funding/party-finance-analysis-Q3-2010#Top)

<comment><USER7> Thanks for the link. Although you're right, Universal Music was the largest corporate contributor in that quarter the amount in question wasn't huge (80,000 pounds) and much smaller than a lot of private contributions (12th overall). Also looking at subsequent quarters ([http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party- fi...](http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party-finance- analysis/party-funding/party-finance-analysis-Q4-2010) and [http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party- fi...](http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party-finance- analysis/party-funding/Q1-2011)) there doesn't seem to be a pattern of ongoing contribution.....which maybe backs up the original poster's claim that the content industry is late on its payments.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Now imagine if they had the Americafuckyeah patent system...

<comment><USER10> Actually, British patent law used to be super fucking screwy - <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Monopolies></comment></comment>


Software Patents: Just Because It's in Code Doesn't Mean it Isn't an Invention - <AUTHOR> http://www.intellectualventures.com/insights/archives/software-patents-just-because-its-in-code-doesnt-mean-it-isnt-an-invention <comment><USER2> Inventions are often duplicated, _especially_ in software. See the history of Knuth-Morris-Pratt string matching algorithm for a classic example.

</comment><comment><USER3> Just because you have "intellectual" in your name doesn't mean you're not a group of disingenuous idiots.</comment>


The problem with education philanthropy - <AUTHOR> https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2018/10/30/17862050/education-policy-charity <comment><USER2> If you talk with U.S. educators, you'll find them passionate and knowledgeable, with strong opinions about how to teach their students best, yet little flexibility or finances to make any changes. Many of them feel locked in by tight curriculum standards and a need to teach to the test, so the result is to just maintain the status quo. Meanwhile we see many countries around the world pulling ahead in the OECD PISA rankings. Philanthropy can help through pushing and prodding, exploring new techniques, highlighting new research, and funding tests and experiments... and there will be failures as well as successes. But to not strive to improve our education system is irresponsible - generations benefit from each small increase in capability or effectiveness. I for one hope that these organizations continue striving to improve learning for future students. Who else has the resources -- and the will -- to do it?

<comment><USER3> I think the US needs to learn again to improve exisitng systems. I think philanthropy is often a way to avoid tackling difficult issues and instead trying to score some points quickly without changing the system. Whatever the philanthropy effort come up with is pretty useless or only of use for a few people if the results that don't actually get implemented in the mainstream.

When I talk to people in the US most of them seem to think that the current systems are hopeless and can't be improved, be it infrastructure, health or education.

Philanthropy can help maybe a little but I think it's more important to improve current systems. You can't just let things for slowly and hope for billionaires to fix them. They won't.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Coming from a trade-tech perspective, companies like UTI and Lincoln that claim to offer a course for shop and engine mechanics rarely prove better than spending a year (or two) at your local city trade college.

For trades its all about your benefits. its the old-timers that move into teaching. No greybeard wants to hire on at a private school for higher private rates but ultimately lower benefits. A woman for 40 years experience as a plumber will choose _lower_ pay at the city college for better health, retirement, and vacation packages.

The state also wins big again at trade colleges because many of the instructors have worked 40 years in the largest fleets: city bus or EMS/Police motor pool. These people are legends in their field and the city goes to great lengths to keep them around. Private colleges might get the occasional lead mechanic from Nascar or a pro-racing circuit endorsement, but she hasnt held a wrench to a normal engine in more than a decade.

lastly its about content. private schools polls industry to see what they want, and if industry is short on good (cheap) oil change monkeys then thats most of what youll learn. Old-timers know you'll need more than an oil pan to bring home a paycheck. Theyll teach you things to make you faster, safer, and better at all the work you need to do.

</comment><comment><USER5> This article makes the case that within the "INT" (Importance, Neglectedness & Tractability) framework for effective philanthropy, Eduction is neither neglected nor tractable and that the money being spent by the billionaires is in some cases "cancelling out" the grassroots movements to improve education.

Yes, Education is undoubtedly an important problem to solve and the "return on investment" to society is huge, but it's one which already receives significant investment/budget and throwing more money at the problem is often counterproductive.

While the article does not mention Finland, I feel it should. Finland has considerably better education standards than (any state in the) USA by all measures on PISA [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_St...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_Student_Assessment)

In 2014, the U.S. spent an average of $12,157 per student on elementary and secondary education. see: [https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/020915/what- country...](https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/020915/what-country- spends-most-education.asp) Finland's education budget is €2,100 per capita. ($2,400 USD i.e. less than 20% of the spending!) Spending less money leads to a _much_ better outcome for students. No billionaires required. Just take the _profit_ out of education.

Tuition fees are _strictly prohibited by law in Finland. Which means _everyone_ receives the same standard of education regardless of their parents/family's financial situation. see: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Finland](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Finland)

Why Finland has the Best Education (Michael Moore Doc): [https://youtu.be/XQ_agxK6fLs](https://youtu.be/XQ_agxK6fLs) Summary: No homework! All schools are the same standard.

Top 10 Reasons Finland has the World's Best School System: [https://youtu.be/zmG4smezeME](https://youtu.be/zmG4smezeME)

Further reading: [https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-are- finlands-s...](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-are-finlands- schools-successful-49859555/)

<comment><USER6> You're conflating two different statistics:

US spending per pupil is $12,300

Finland spending per pupil is $9,800

[https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/pdf/coe_cmd.pdf](https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/pdf/coe_cmd.pdf)

If you want to look at per capita spending, the article says the US spends about 668 billion, divided by a population of 321 million, you get about $2080 per capita.

So if you're calculating it that way, the US actually spends _less_ per capita than Finland.

<comment><USER7> > If you want to look at per capita spending, the article says the US spends > about 668 billion, divided by a population of 321 million, you get about > $2080 per capita.

> So if you're calculating it that way, the US actually spends _less_ per > capita than Finland.

Nobody is calculating it that way: the US does not have 321 million schoolchildren.

<comment><USER8> > _Nobody is calculating [education budgets per capita]_

The top-level poster did, in a (hopefully unintentionally) grossly misleading apples-to-oranges comparison:

> _U.S. spent an average of $12,157 per student [...] Finland 's education > budget is €2,100 per capita [...] less than 20% of the spending!_

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> There is a general problem with philanthropy in nature. I am always skeptical of foundations that seem to pay exorbitant salaries to the executives running the foundation. There's got to be a better model.</comment>


A Quarter of Humanity Faces Looming Water Crises - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/06/climate/world-water-stress.html <comment><USER4> One of the more interesting (to me at least) aspects of the warming trend of both the atmosphere and the oceans is that for each degree C increase in the mean atmospheric temperature increases its water carrying capacity on the order of 4.2 quadrillion kilograms. Rising ocean temperatures, combined with rising air temperatures are increasing the rate of evaporation of sea water into the air.

The effect of this is transporting more water in the air over longer distances. This "side effect" of global warming will likely make _all_ of our past observations of precipitation rates in any given region completely moot. It also makes suspect any extrapolation of current precipitation trends into the future.

My reading of the current literature suggests to me that we might have an opposite problem, which is massive flooding in areas on a regular basis where previously they considered such floods "100 year" or "1000 year" storms.

What every climate scientist I have talked with agrees with, is that the current climate is being _destabilized_ relative to historical records. Thus extrapolations become more and more uncertain (have larger error bars) as the initial conditions drift further and further away from anything on record.

<comment><USER5> I wonder if it's happening already? Just last month we had record rainfall in 1 day that we'd typically get in a whole month in Kyushu, Japan.

<comment><USER6> This area of Mississippi has been flooded for five months:

[https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/03/yazoo- backwa...](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/03/yazoo-backwater- mississippi-flooding-months)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This National Geographic piece about David Bamberger and the Selah Ranch Project in Texas bears watching.

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

Surface water from rivers, lakes, streams, and reservoirs garner attention because they are visible and make the effects of changes and shortages easier to understand.

But a much more difficult crisis may already be upon us in the form of aquifer depletion and may require a complete paradigm shift in how we approach conservation and usage.

</comment><comment><USER8> It would be nice to be able to look more closely at the data here. What makes up this scalar 'water stress'? Maybe those areas using the available water are efficient?

As other commenters point out, there's a 2nd order effect: if you live in a low stress area, near (in a transportation sense, not Euclidean distance) a high stress area, you're bound to have problems unless border control comes to rescue.

I should have paid more attention in geopolitics class..

<comment><USER9> I'm wondering why areas along the Mississippi River and near the Great Lakes are considered stressed.

<comment><USER10> That's a good question, I had to go poke at the original publication and tool to get some idea. This looks like a very good database, but the NYT is being misleading when it cites "high stress" and then only gives examples that are actively running out of water.

The actual definition of water stress used is:

> _Baseline water stress measures the ratio of total water withdrawals to > available renewable water supplies... Available renewable water supplies > include surface and groundwater supplies and considers the impact of > upstream consumptive water users and large dams on downstream water > availability. Higher values indicate more competition among users._

So the first note is that this is measuring sustainability, not risk of water shortage; it doesn't factor in that Lake Superior has ~800x the current volume of Lake Powell. And it's meant to study competition for water rather than actual deficit, so 'high' stress is 40%-80% usage, and 'very high' stress is >80% usage. (In fairness, >80% is _likely_ unsustainable because we don't capture water as it arrives. Drawing 100% doesn't mean a state-wide rainbarrel, so water will still reach surface plants as wells run dry.)

Second is that it's not clear how rainfall onto the lakes is being assigned. Michigan is "high" in the middle and "low" around the edges, so maybe it's being assigned to the nearest land area without accounting for piping and the usage compacts that govern where it goes? That wouldn't matter in most places, but Lake Superior in particular would distort things hugely.

Third, these are watershed-level colorations. If you zoom in on the dark red along the Mississippi, it turns out to be Jonesboro, Arkansas. That's a hilly/mountain region with flatter land on either side, and a bunch of manufacturing. As soon as it's streams hit the White River watershed, it drops back down to yellow. If they're drawing hard without pumping water uphill they might get into trouble, but things would still be ok downstream because no one on the Mississippi is relying on that area for water.

[https://www.wri.org/aqueduct/](https://www.wri.org/aqueduct/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is likely an unpopular opinion and one with many downsides we need to be very alarmed about but I think we are going to find that if there is _any_ solution to this, the solution is going to involve a global government.

Climate change and water are Earth-scale problems. If we don't have an Earth- scale organization that has real power working to solve those problems, we're going to end up with a bunch of nations feverishly wasting even more of our dwindling resources to try to push the suffering onto each other.

Do you want countries building desalinization plants and planting forests, or do you want them accumulating missiles and building walls? Unless there is some organization with enough power to prevent countries from fighting each other, you're going to get the latter.

<comment><USER12> I disagree with your contention that water is an earth scale problem.

In fact, as someone charged with building and maintaining not only my own water sources and infrastructure, but community water resources as well, I would put forth that water resources - and their responsible usage - <USER2> governed by very unique _hyperlocal_ conditions.

We all know that, for instance, the water resources and usage are different between New York City and the Colorado River Basin - and we wouldn't expect usage and sharing agreements between those two locales. But are you aware that similar scale differences in water resources and usage can exist within the same county ? Physics and economics make them just as impractical to share and manage.

There may indeed be drivers of global governance - and I typically find them distasteful - but I don't think this is one of them.

<comment><USER13> > are governed by very unique hyperlocal conditions

Yes, and what happens when 1 area does not have available water, another does, and the area with water does not want to share?

<comment><USER12> "Yes, and what happens when 1 area does not have available water, another does, and the area with water does not want to share?"

That is a real problem - and should be addressed - but the physics and economics dictate that the sharing need be _relatively_ local.

So I would agree that it is a governance issue, but it is not going to be a _global_ governance issue.

<comment> munk-a It is a global governance issue since, much like your relative who's house was wrecked in a hurricane, the rest of the world will need to pick up the pieces when water availability collapses. I'm not against that sharing personally, but we as a world need to all get together and ensure global stability because otherwise a problem like this will be like falling dominoes where the additional water burden will spread and exacerbate the issue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'm from Sweden. We have massive fresh water sources and most projections of the future show us retaining our water advantage while the rest of the world suffers through more intense droughts.

Why do I deserve all this water just because I was born here? Why doesn't someone born in a water stressed environment deserve more water? Water is not a luxury, and we can't easily make more of it, so I just don't understand how we can knowingly transition into a more unfair world than ever and not feel bad about it.

<comment><USER10> > _Water is not a luxury, and we can't easily make more of it, so I just don't > understand how we can knowingly transition into a more unfair world than > ever_

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here.

Water is logistically hard and expensive to transfer; sustaining a place like Las Vegas is quite possible, but it relies on massive infrastructure development and expenditure to move water around. Selfishness is certainly part of the problem, from allotment-preservation in Colorado to international politics in Turkey. But to a significant degree, the core problem is that people simply live and use water in different places than it falls.

As far as an argument for allowing immigration, water fairness makes sense. But if we're talking about sharing water, I'm not sure if a lack of will is the central problem?

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Collecting rainwater on the building roofs is a right solution, also putting the trees on these roofs. And of course, desalinating - a lot of the cities from the red zone are nearby seas or oceans.

<comment><USER16> Desalination on a scale sufficient for a city requires an extraordinary amount of power. The plant in Queensland uses: "...around 3.58 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity for every cubic metre (kilolitre) of water it produces"[1]

That's not going to be affordable for many poorer countries. It's expensive enough that Queensland only turns that plant on for emergencies.

The CO2 emissions would also only intensify the problem.

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

<comment><USER17> That sounds much worse than it is. Outside of farming a cubic meter is a lot of water.

Desalination costs ~3$ per 1,000 gallons of which around 40% is electricity costs, that's generally affordable for most areas based on consumption and local economic conditions. Though again, not for farming.

<comment><USER18> Which source are you using for that number?

<comment><USER17> Several sources list 3$ as the lowest all inclusive price. Though notability these systems are much more costly when run intermittently. [https://www.advisian.com/en-us/global-perspectives/the- cost-...](https://www.advisian.com/en-us/global-perspectives/the-cost-of- desalination)

The issue is just keeping them on standby is expensive. So, if you only need one for 6 months every 3 years you end up paying a lot more per m3 of water.

<comment><USER18> Hmm. That link seems to use a paper for its source, titled "Technical review and evaluation of the economics of water desalination: Current and future challenges for better water supply sustainability".

I tracked down a copy of that paper. It opens with:

"The cost of desalinated seawater has fallen below US$0.50/m3 for a large scale seawater reverse osmosis plant at a specific location and conditions while in other locations the cost is 50% higher (US$1.00/m3) for a similar facility. In addition to capital and operating costs, other parameters such as local incentives or subsidies may also contribute to the large difference in desalted water cost between regions and facilities. Plant suppliers and consultants have their own cost calculation methodologies, but they are confidential and provide water costs with different accuracies. The few existing costing methodologies and software packages such as WTCost© and DEEP provide an estimated cost with different accuracies and their applications are limited to specific conditions. Most of the available cost estimation tools are of the black box type, which provide few details concerning the parameters and methodologies applied for local conditions."

I read through the rest of it. To the extent that it offers cost comparisons of some large scale SWRO projects, they seem to be self-reported and come from projects in Saudi Arabia, Israel, Oman, and Australia. This leads me to a couple of concerns WRT the construction and operating costs of SWRO projects:

(a) that a comprehensive, independent, apples-to-apples accounting of the costs of these projects has not yet been done;

(b) that some of the long-term costs are being externalized, _especially_ the expected impacts on local ecological systems that become the necessary dumping grounds for the wastewater;

(c) that the costs to date are severely location-specific, and do not address for instance trying to transport seawater a mile uphill as needed in many of the areas expected to or currently experiencing severe freshwater instability.

Clearly SWRO is a viable option in specific areas that have nearby access to a suitable water source, good power infrastructure (or solar availability), a lack of freshwater availability, and an appropriate wastewater treatment strategy (or, more likely -- and sadly -- loose regulations that obviate the need to address this).

But calls for SWRO as a worldwide, one-size-fits-all, cheap solution are misguided and misinformed, IMO. Mostly I worry that "just build desal" will frustrate efforts for conservation and improving existing infrastructure, especially in places where desal isn't a viable option anyway.

<comment><USER17> A cubic meter of water is 264.17 gallons. So, 50c per gallon is ~2$ per 1000 gallons. 50% more is 0.75$ per cubic meter (not 1$) or 3$ per 1000 gallons. Though if it's 100% more that's 4$ per 1,000 gallons.

That paper is also from 2012, but I generally agree with your conclusions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Nestles just launched worldwide delivery of plastic botles using drones [https://www.nestle.com/aboutus/overview/businesses/nestle- wa...](https://www.nestle.com/aboutus/overview/businesses/nestle-waters)

<comment><USER20> They are the worst for water issues.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> And another quarter* faces the ramifications of that water crises: war + massive immigration

*I don't really have an estimate but a lot IMO

<comment><USER22> Sounds like an endlessly cascading problem that will effect the whole world eventually. If we have more consumption than is sustainable then it is going to run out eventually.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> _The Water Knife_ by Paolo Bacigalupi is a great near-future sci-fi read on this subject.

</comment><comment><USER24> Is there ongoing research on methods to control weather on local level? Most suggestions i have seen are things that are meant to change the temperature of earth as a whole like build sunshade in L2 point, randomly spray aerosols to make it colder everywhere. But there must be ways to change the local weather with smaller and smarter methods, (maybe aerostats, solar updraft towers, short lived aerosols?)

</comment><comment><USER25> I live in Western Oregon where for much of the year we have an abundance of water falling from the sky. We already have tons of people moving to the area, but I wonder if the number of people moving to areas like ours is going to go up tremendously.

<comment><USER26> Ironic if there's a mass Exodus to Oregon/Washington just before the next Cascadia earthquake/tsunami wipes off half the two states. Guess that would be nature's way of enforcing population control.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> It would be great if nytimes really cared about these issues and used its power to convince people of the real changes that need to be made to society. Instead, they run pieces that side against those that are working hard to make these changes:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/02/opinion/climate-change- gr...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/02/opinion/climate-change-greta- thunberg.html)

</comment><comment><USER28> Has one of the fundamental components (water) for farming changed at all in recent years? Perhaps there hasn't been enough of a market force for innovation after the advent of irrigation.

<comment><USER29> Farmers in many areas have long been pumping out groundwater from wells at unsustainable rates. In recent years some of those wells have started running dry, or governments have imposed restrictions.

<comment> munk-a A lot of farmers in the US pay heavily subsidized prices for water, this market inefficiency is just going to lead to sadness down the line - <USER3> farmers are getting a really good deal or residential customers are being heavily exploited (or, most likely, both).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> On the plus side, hydroengineering is one of the very first technologies human beings mastered. This is an engineering problem, and it's one we can solve.

</comment><comment><USER31> Around the rocky's - I've noticed that storm drain systems are always a huge piece of infrastructure. They seem to dump to the local river. Why don't the cities harvest that water and treat it instead of dumping it into the river? They may be able to build retention ponds and hold on to it for a while. Treat it later. No need to just toss it.

</comment><comment><USER32> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_%22Bud%22_Lewis_Carlsba...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_%22Bud%22_Lewis_Carlsbad_Desalination_Plant)

</comment><comment><USER33> It's more a reproduction/migration crisis really. These cities have all grown above what their local resources can provide, its time to cut back.

</comment><comment><USER34> So, based off the map, the Indian subcontinent is basically fucked right? Although I am surprised by places like Italy or Peru.</comment>


Get Your ICO/STO/IEO Listed on the Most Popular ICO/STO/IEO Listing Sites - <AUTHOR> https://www.icogazelle.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Get your ICO/STO/IEO listed on the most popular ICO/STO/IEO Listing Sites. We can add significant value to your ICO/STO/IEO marketing efforts, saving you both time and money. With completion of a single online form, ICO Gazelle allows companies to simultaneously list their ICO/STO/IEO on up to 200 of the most-visited listing websites. We have special partnerships with the sites such as CryptoCompare, Coingecko, ICOrating, ICOmarks and many more industry leaders. On average you will save 20 - 30% on the listing fees these sites normally charge for regular and premium advertising services. By deciding to buy one of our packages you can thus save your company time, and thousands of dollars on listing fees alone.

</comment><comment><USER2> Is there a list of websites that each listing package includes?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi, I can email you a list of websites which each listing package includes. I didn't put it on the site as it would take way too much space on there as there are up to 200 listing websites on this list.

<comment><USER2> That would be great, please send it to amirbeta on the microsoft outlook service</comment></comment></comment>


Facebook returns to its roots with Campus, a college student-only social network - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/10/facebook-returns-to-its-roots-with-campus-a-college-student-only-social-network/ <comment><USER2> I was in college when Facebook first came out as thefacebook.com. It didn't have a news feed, just profiles. You could share basic photos. It's source code once showed up instead of an HTML response. At the time it was a novelty and one of a bunch of social networks. It was hard to tell what its value proposition was, but people were signing up for it soon as they heard about it.

The problem with a college student focused network is that students graduate. And college kids don't have nearly as much money as college grads 20 years after they graduate (unless the student loan apocalypse takes everyone down). I can't imagine this network would last very long as a college student only thing. There just is too much incentive to grow beyond the relatively small group that is college students.

Also, fuck Facebook for enabling and stoking the hate and FUD in this country. If you work for FB, please look for other employment. I am sure you have options. At this point I personally view working for them on the same level as working for cigarette companies: it is literally harmful to public health.

</comment><comment><USER3> The next Facebook can NOT be invented at a company like Facebook.

This may be a bit controversial so please, hear out the reasoning. From public accounts in the press as well as comments and discussions over on anonymous employee forums, it's fairly evident that the culture at _insert_large_Bay_Area_Firm_here_ has devolved into one of negativity with an unhealthy dose of politics mixed in.

We see "Product managers" numbering in the thousands, the vast majority of whom are likely better classified into an "Operations" role than anything resembling innovative work that pushes the boundaries. The definition of risk taking has reduced severely into one where, even small-ish code decisions go through layers of executive review.

A lot of what is publicly known of the early days of theFacebook.com indicate much higher risk taking appetites in a firm staffed with engineers that had a more "Fuck it" attitude. Without going into any information not in the public domain, it is clear from publicly available news reports on internal deliberations and chatter, that this culture has, sadly, died.

That's not to say they won't be profitable or successful at what they're doing . . .quite the opposite. They have a business model that allows this wasteful approach and have the luxury of being a retirement home.

The Student only social network in the OP however . . .doesn't look like a serious attempt at launching something new and exciting and will likely be dead in one or two performance evaluation cycles when the people working on it move on and hand it over to someone else.

</comment><comment><USER4> Facebook isn't returning to its roots. This is just another re-branded social media site meant to capture the attention of another generation of college students for advertising purposes.</comment>


Tachyons – CSS framework - <AUTHOR> http://tachyons.io <comment><USER2> I've used this for almost a year to power my firm's website design.

HIGHLY recommended!

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Disclaimer: I'm not associated with the framework in any way. Stumbled upon it today and found it nice and extensive. Wanted to share it with HNers.</comment>


Vatican urges Catholics to drop investments in fossil fuels, arms - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vatican-environment/vatican-urges-catholics-to-drop-investments-in-fossil-fuels-arms-idUSKBN23P1HI <comment><USER2> There is an easy way to do this, if you're so inclined.

The S&P 500 Catholic Values ETF is basically a drop-in replacement for other ETFs that track the S&P 500. I started buying it a few months ago.

[https://www.globalxetfs.com/funds/cath/](https://www.globalxetfs.com/funds/cath/)

Note that this ETF does not exclude oil companies like Exxon but does exclude companies that manufacture weapons or engage in other problematic activities.

Yes, there will of course be trade-offs between an ETF like VOO or SPY that has a much larger presence in the market. But for some people, they're willing to make that trade-off to divest from holdings they consider problematic.

* Note: If you look at the top 10 holdings in CATH, you'll see there are a bunch of tech companies, and they are certainly not above reproof, in terms of their ethics. But I think many socially conscious investors see a values-based fund or ETF, even if imperfect, as better than nothing.

<comment><USER3> Yeah, except that ETF charges literally a ten times higher management fee than Vanguard.

If the Vatican really cared, it would provide its own index and low-cost funds in a non-profit vehicle. The Vatican already has a huge asset management operation, so they can't possibly claim that this they don't have the capabilities.

<comment><USER4> Yes, you would literally be better off buying the Vanguard fund and then just individually shorting out the companies you don't like in the appropriate ratio!

<comment><USER5> Even if it's the same from an investment standpoint I don't think most people would consider it morally the same. Sorting a stock is essentially betting its value will go down. If you don't really believe it will go down, shorting a stock is just creating a profit opportunity for someone taking a long position. Right?

<comment><USER6> > creating a profit opportunity for someone taking a long position.

But this person is actually also you. You just bought and sold the same asset.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What about military contractors that dont manufacture arms, such as the firm which assembles and disassembles the monitoring system for army training exercises? Firms that perform mass surveillance, construction, pentesting. What about all the fastfood chains which operate on base? At what point in the kill chain, does participation become un-catholic?

<comment><USER2> Catholic philosophy actually has quite a bit to say about this. Generally, the question is framed as, "When can it be OK to cooperate with evil?"

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia has this little flow chart that does not go into much detail -- it's no substitute for the texts upon texts that seriously examine the question -- but gives you a taste of the moral calculations involved:

[http://archphila.org/HHS/pdf/CoopEvilChart.pdf](http://archphila.org/HHS/pdf/CoopEvilChart.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> You gotta love this pope for throwing a wrench into the Catholic Church's conservatism.

Examples: this, easing on gay marriage[1] and masturbation, and the firebomb of insisting that if you don't care about refugees and you don't take them into your home then you're not a christian.

While I myself don't care too much about the institution - things like that do remind me of the Lindy Principle. Very old organizations may appear inert and stagnating only to remind you that they do have mechanisms of change and adaptation, otherwise they wouldn't have survived thousands of years.

[1] [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Francis_and_homosexuali...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Francis_and_homosexuality)

</comment><comment><USER9> Does anyone have a link to the actual document ('Journeying Towards Care For Our Common Home')? I haven't been able to find it, via the Reuter's piece or on the Vatican website

<comment><USER2> It looks as if it's a full-fledge book, rather than just a document:

[https://www.americamagazine.org/politics- society/2020/06/18/...](https://www.americamagazine.org/politics- society/2020/06/18/new-book-vatican-presses-practical-implications-laudato-si)

Typically, if it were just a statement or a smaller document (or a papal encyclical), there would be a form of it -- in at least one language, not necessarily English -- available online almost immediately. The fact that news organizations reporting about it don't link to the text makes me think it's not available online.</comment></comment>


We want a developer to come to YC with us - <AUTHOR> http://www.webkitchen.co.uk/2007/05/we-want-developer-to-come-to-yc-with-us.html <comment><USER2> How much stock are you offering? $50K is a very small salary for a developer in Boston.

EDIT: What I was really trying to ask is whether they are looking for a true co-founder or just a paid developer. My original question came out malformed, in retrospect.

<comment><USER3> edgeztv - here is a chance to join a YC funded startup building a kickass product and be pretty much employee no: 1 ie a cofounder and you are cautious about salary.

Grab this kind of opportunity with both hands - pete and his team are a smart bunch with an awesome idea. Salary considerations ahouldn't be in your head when you are assessing the opportunity. Isn't $50k nough to live off?

<comment><USER2> I don't care about the salary - I care about the stock, which, if you read carefully, is the focus of my question :)

I would be happy on 50k if I had say 10-20% of the company. I would not be happy with 50k, however if it was 5% or less.

(Of course this all also largely depends on the idea, which I don't know about yet)

<comment><USER2> What I really meant to ask in my previous post is whether they are looking for a co-founder or just a paid developer.

In retrospect, phrasing it in terms of salary and stock was the wrong way to frame that question.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> "we've raised just over $180,000 of investment from Paul Graham"

I wonder if pg will be getting into more traditional angel type funding rounds. They've gotta be doing something pretty good to get a funding round like that from the man himself.

<comment><USER5> I wonder if they need that much financing, i.e. they have something in mind to spend it on.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Hi Guys,

I am the author and also a developer. Doesn't mean there isn't enough love for more though ;)

Peter Nixey

<comment><USER7> Flex should be your choice only when your inhouse team is not good enough at churning out sweet OOP Actionscript. This is because, using Flex makes your app depend too much on Adobe's components. This is not required in most cases. Writing custom components from scratch is the best option[making Flash IDE your primary choice].Flex should be a secondary option.

[Flex was created to make Flash Platform more accessible to Java developers who are not familiar with the timeline concept]

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I _still_ don't understand how startups without hackers work.

<comment><USER9> Digg and Elance seemed to turned out okay despite being founded by non-hackers

<comment><USER10> Digg and Elance were both founded by very technical people though, even if they weren't technically coders. Same thing with Squidoo (Seth Godin was actually a CS major in college IIRC).</comment></comment></comment>


Announce: OOTB Computing Ivan Goddard Talk At Stanford - <AUTHOR> http://www.stanford.edu/class/ee380/Abstracts/140205.html

<comment><USER2> This'd do better perhaps on the day of the talk, rather like the space launch streams are popular when they are actually live.</comment>


How intermittent breaks in interaction improve collective intelligence - <AUTHOR> http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/09/1802407115 <comment><USER2> I'd be careful about trying to extrapolate this to everyday work situations.

They were performing a very specific task (solving a traveling salesman problem) that had a clearly-defined optimum solution and little room for a lot of the kinds of thinking that are needed in business scenarios, such as challenging the business case and lateral thinking.

I didn't notice them stating a overall duration for the experiment (admittedly I did skim), but it sounds like it took place over the course of, at most, hours - not the weeks, months or years that would be relevant to someone trying to optimize a product development process. That means that their "intermittent communication" case probably still involved communication at a frequency that would be downright unsustainable in a business setting, and would certainly be something most of us would think of as "constant". For example, assuming the experiment took place over 2 hours, then the intermittent communication group would be taking a look at each other's work about every 20 minutes.

(edit: I checked again, and caught it - looks like I was being generous in my time assumptions. An entire trial lasted no longer than 14 minutes. The "constant" group was checking in with each other at least every 50 seconds, and the "intermittent" group at least every 2.5 minutes.)

It's still an interesting result, mind. But it's not going to support anyone's position on the value of daily stand-up meetings.

</comment><comment><USER3> Key takeaway from the paper

> Instead of supporting more transparency, the results imply that technologies > and organizations should be redesigned to intermittently isolate people from > each other's work for best collective performance in solving complex > problems.

In addition, Jesse C. Shore, the author posted a Twitter thread summary about this research [0, 1].

> when people interact intermittently (as opposed to constantly or not at all > as in previous work), they explore on their own AND learn from each other.

[0] [https://twitter.com/jessecshore/status/1029124892439072768](https://twitter.com/jessecshore/status/1029124892439072768)

[1] [https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1029124892439072768.html](https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1029124892439072768.html)

<comment><USER4> _redesigned to intermittently isolate people from each other's work_

Why does the organization need to be redesigned? How about we just stop trying to micro-engineer interactions, give knowledge private, quiet work space, and let them do their thing.

This is what most knowledge workers do that I've seen, when left to their own devices: first they put their head down and try to work on a problem, come up with some promising solutions and/or find some sticking points, talk it over with colleagues, then go back to work on it solo some more. Repeat until convergence or deadline arrives.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Wow just at a time I was considering this. So currently in a workshop doing an evaluation with a group of people and the amount of group think that starts to occur is unbelievable. You notice it when people start ignoring relevant information. So wrote the problem down and came up with a solution of doing a split between: 1-formulate your own ideas. 2. Then meet and discuss.

Based on this maybe ideal maybe 1. Formulate own ideas 2. Meet 3. Forumulate own ideas 3. Meet

</comment><comment><USER6> Seems like an interesting parallel to this US Army discovery: [https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2018/04/army-...](https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2018/04/army-researchers-find-the-best-cyber-teams-are-antisocial- cyber-teams/)

Over communicating may increase velocity, but it seems it decreases overall quality.

</comment><comment><USER7> On a related note, I've often wondered how the normalization of knowledge- seeking via Google affects collective and peak intelligence across a population.

My naive guess is that fast, normalized access to information increases mean intelligence, but decreases peak intelligence. I have a hunch that the production of positive outliers requires input volatility.

</comment><comment><USER8> Good result and makes sense. Sometimes people need to step away to have time to consider and integrate the new facts and perspectives they've been presented so they can attack the problem from a different perspective. Forcing continued debate can cause people to dig in on their view of the problem.

<comment><USER9> > Forcing continued debate can cause people to dig in on their view of the > problem.

Yes, I've seen it. It's refreshing when people quit talking and build their debate position as in Napster[0], the RFCs[1], and even the Nail Cabinet [2]

[0] [https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=98865&page=1](https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=98865&page=1)

[1] [https://tools.ietf.org/html/](https://tools.ietf.org/html/)

[2] [https://craftcouncil.org/post/garry-knox-bennetts- notorious-...](https://craftcouncil.org/post/garry-knox-bennetts-notorious- nail-cabinet)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Interesting parallel between this result and the technique of "dropout" which is a key technique used today in training neural networks that has found to prevent the network from overfitting to a locally optimal solution by randomly disconnecting nodes.

</comment><comment><USER11> Good, so it is in line with open offices being bad because of the constant interaction and interruptions

</comment><comment><USER12> So pair programming is a bad idea?

<comment><USER13> Shocks me that you're getting downvoted for this because that's _exactly_ what the results would imply. Of course that's in regard to the Extreme Programming always on, constant pair programming approach. Pair programming isn't totally bad of course, and has its place, but yeah the results would seem to imply that consultancy-style (I'm looking at you, Pivotal) pair programming is a good way to produce reliably mediocre code with a body shop.

<comment><USER12> Ha! Field of software programmers act like a hive mind. People latch on to something and then it becomes their religion. Any criticism causes hurt feelings.

I've been programming for long time and have seen these trends come and go. Right from xml being the best thing since invention of wheel to micro services being elixir to all programming woes.</comment></comment></comment>


I Satisfied My Passion for Software Dev and Open-Source by Doing a Part-Time PhD - <AUTHOR> http://omerio.com/how-i-satisfied-my-passion-for-software-development-and-open-source-by-doing-a-part-time-phd/ <comment><USER2> Looks like a UK PhD. Can't speak to that. But....

I did a part-time MS in the US at a relatively low-pressure school (I switched to part-time from full-time after looking at my loan level). I can confidently say that I don't wish anyone to have the experience of working all day, then coming home and working into the night on research, day after day, rabbit trail after rabbit trail. My work quality suffered dramatically between full and part time grad school.

I would love to have a PhD sometime, but I simply don't have the ability to do what I would consider adequate research when I work part-time.

edit: Oh yes. There's a collaborative environment when working in the halls of the academy. That is, IMO, an intangible and extremely valuable experience. It is _not_ like undergrad in the US.

<comment><USER3> This isn't a UK PhD, at least it's not up to the standard of any rational UK PhD I've ever seen.

I've supervised Masters theses and PhDs in the US at a top institution. No one can do a part-time PhD; it's just so much work. The fact that Reading is willing to sign a PhD with basically no research with one publication in an absurd venue is pretty sad. This wouldn't pass for a thesis proposal here!

It's also very sad that this person's adviser is willing to shirk her responsibility and just let him go without a proper education. Part of the problem with the UK is how funding works encourages this reckless and pretty selfish behavior on the part of faculty members for their own benefit.

A PhD is supposed to teach you how to do research, pick a big problem, break it down in several different ways, push the state of the art several times, and learn how to communicate in reasonable venues. Looking at his thesis and publication he's done none of the above.

As for the UK vs the US, I have collaborators there and have postdocs from there. A US PhD is like a UK PhD plus a postdoc. You're basically just halfway toward being able to do good research by the time you're done a UK PhD so standards are pretty low, although not this absurdly low. There's a reason why getting a faculty position in Europe with a European PhD almost requires a US or Canadian postdoc.

As the parent said part of what the PhD gives you is the access to people that are smart and capable. Being around them will make you much smarter and more capable in ways that are intangible but obvious in retrospect. Doing this remotely defeats the whole purpose. Because of this in the US you would never get into any reasonable (top 100 or even lower) grad school if you said you wanted to a part-time PhD.

That being said. A real PhD is worth it. You'll learn a lot. You'll work very hard for 5-6 years and at the end you'll be far better equipped in any environment.

<comment><AUTHOR> Typical one-size-fit-all judgement, bigotry, similar to making a statement like 'All VW cars are polluting'!

> This isn't a UK PhD, at least it's not up to the standard of any rational UK > PhD I've ever seen.

How do you judge without reading the thesis?, there is no thesis in the article.

> No one can do a part-time PhD; it's just so much work

You can't generalise, not everyone is the same, some people have the capacity and capability to put all in. There are part-time PhDs and there are many people who completed part-time PhDs whilst working full-time. Oxford University and many others top institutions offer part-time PhDs, it's possible and doable [https://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/graduate/courses/part- time-a...](https://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/graduate/courses/part-time-and- flexible-study?wssl=1)

> PhD with basically no research with one publication Publications usually > take a while to get through the review process, many be there are many in > the pipeline, how do you know?

> Looking at his thesis and publication he's done none of the above.

There is no thesis in the article!, it's very hard to judge without reading the thesis.

> A US PhD is like a UK PhD plus a postdoc No comment, I'm quite sure this > debate has taken place in many forums [https://www.quora.com/How-do-you- > compare-pursuing-a-PhD-in-E...](https://www.quora.com/How-do-you-compare- > pursuing-a-PhD-in-Europe-vs-a-PhD-in-USA)

And of course if you have to attend classes, it will be difficult doing it part-time.

> Being around them will make you much smarter and more capable in ways that > are intangible but obvious in retrospect.

As part time you can still meet those smart people at the university or by attending conferences.

<comment><USER4> I would guesstimate that 75%+ of the "value" of my PhD came from casually interacting with smart people (classmates, postdocs, profs) working on related topics.

These same people go to conferences, but they are busy there--they have talks to see, posters to visit, and friends/collaborators/funders to catch up with. In contrast, when you're "around", it's possible to muse and mull things over with the grad student waiting for her turn in the darkroom or the postdoc brewing coffee. "Hey, did you see this paper?" or "How do we know that <X>, anyway?"

I'd worry that a part-time student would miss out on a lot of these opportunities; by definition, they're around only part-time and most of that time is "business time."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> You can do a part-time PhD; I'm living proof of it. But that doesn't mean it's easy or recommended.

I did it while married with two kids, and a third born in the middle. I effectively worked on it part time, because I was consulting at night and on weekends to make ends meet. After my four years of coursework, we returned to Israel; I flew to Chicago 3-4 times each year (at my own expense) to meet with my advisor and make some progress.

These were extremely difficult years for me, and for my family. I was working extremely hard, sleeping very little, and making very slow progress in my research.

Oh, and my advisor didn't know that I was working during my years on campus; if he had found out, he would have revoked my funding and/or have me thrown out of the program.

My wife and children were very supportive in every way, and I appreciate that. They even agreed for me to go away for the entire summer to write my dissertation. (Which my advisor didn't even look at until six months later, but that's another issue.)

I'm glad that the author feels good about doing a part-time PhD, but what I did to myself and my family isn't something that I wish upon anyone unless they _really_ want a PhD.

That said, I should note that I'm happy (and extremely proud) to have finished. By the skin of my teeth, perhaps, but I managed to do it.

<comment><USER6> > You can do a part-time PhD

That completely depends on the subject and on your expectations. A PhD is not very well-defined in terms of energy you have to invest, nor is it a good indication of intellectual capacity needed to complete it in a reasonable amount of time. PhD programs are just too different to say anything meaningful about these things. Also your supervisor plays an important role, which is usually another unknown variable.

<comment><USER4> It works really well if there's some synergy between your job and PhD. For example, a friend of mine is working at an R&Dish job while doing a PhD. His thesis is essentially an excuse to dive more deeply into the problems he's currently trying to solve during working hours. Everybody wins!

Barring that, I think it's going to be difficult or impossible. My current (wet) lab would not consider a part-time PhD student. Most of the experiments we do are time-consuming and can't really be done piecemeal like that. Theoretical stuff works a bit better, but I think there is a lot to be said for being "around."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I know this might be a silly question but what exactly do you do in an academic research position? How do you choose a topic to look at? What do you study on this topic and what is the output supposed to look like?

For someone who might eventually want to do a PhD in the space of software, I don't exactly know what you'd do. I normally just take a problem, and write software to fix it. How is the process changed when I want a degree from it?

I'm assuming I can't just bring in a flash drive and say "Yea I did some reading and did some stuff, here is the implementation of my new X for the Linux kernel. It speeds things up by a factor of BIG_NUMBER."

<comment><USER3> > How is the process changed when I want a degree from it?

When you understand the answer to this question you're well on your way to a PhD. The PhD is not about implementing something. Although an implementation is sometimes/often a part of it. The real problem is to read a lot, get a grasp on what people understand about a topic, think about it, and say something new and interesting. That might mean coming up with some new algorithm, or a cool observation that solves a problem, or a theorem, or an experiment on humans that shows something interesting, etc. Finding good questions, learning how to ask them in the right way, and how to squeeze out what's actually doable and important from them, that's the point of the PhD. When you can do that from beginning to end, you're ready to graduate. Historically, this was what a PhD thesis was. Your first end-to-end piece of research.

As for the first few questions. That's why you have a PhD adviser. Someone who can help you pick your first few questions. Guide you on the path to getting answers, finding new questions, getting a handle on what's known, etc.

My biggest advice is find a topic you're interested in, read a few papers about it (google scholar is your friend), find a few people that work on that topic, read 1 paper from each, and when you apply for grad school in their department say something meaningful about what they've done (don't suck up, we know and it doesn't impress anyone) and what you would do instead/in addition. When people pick grad students they like to know that the student they're picking is smart, motivated, and knows enough to say something interesting about their work. It sounds daunting but it's doable. Particularly if you do summer research while in undergrad or do a good masters thesis. Good luck!

<comment><USER7> The way you put it, it sounds like you can do what ever you'd like so long as you come up with something a little extra.

Are there sample "this is what a thesis for a PhD should look like" papers? Where is the standardization?

<comment><USER8> It needs to be more than 'a little extra'. It needs to advance the state of the art. It needs to have a new idea in it. It can't just be a better implementation of something we already know how to do.

There is no standardisation. The level you are assessed against is set by your examiner.

Don't focus on the thesis or the software - those are just ways to express your novel idea, which is what is being assessed.

But yes you can do whatever you want, as long as you have a good idea and can show it works.

<comment><USER9> When it comes to being examined there are also the prerequisites to advancing the state of the art, which include demonstrating you've learned how to do research and have deep critical knowledge of the field you're working in (so you know what needs to be done to move it forward).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I left my PhD position only a couple of months in, to take up a job offer at a startup half way across the planet. It was one of the toughest decisision I'd ever made, but I have no regrets. My rewards and experiences that came from that, have been without a doubt, incredible.

But I do still yearn for academia. A part-time PhD is something that I've thought about often, but I've found it a little tough to find anything substantial on how one goes about getting started. It was such a smooth transition the first time around, I had a fully-funded position lined up before I finished my Masters.

My educational background was in Physics. My Master's was in computational physics, but all my software knowledge was self-taught, from a young age.

I would love to research getting into a Computer Science PhD, but I don't know where to start. Especially given the time since I was in my Masters, 6 years ago now, and being a different field, is it viable? Realistically, should I be looking at a part time CS MSc beforehand?

</comment><comment><USER11> Barely related-

I've been kind of curious about part time graduate studies- maybe at the masters level.

I clowned around, partied in college. As a consequence I never made any lasting relationships with my professors, and had a fairly mediocre academic record.

I did have a lot of fun in the 'intro to math research' course I got to take.

So I've toyed with the idea of taking a class a semester, maybe as a non- degree student in an effort to shore up my now rusty mathematical skills and build rapport with professors whose work I find interesting.

Even if it doesn't pan out, I get to study stuff I like and still have a solid job.

EDIT- I guess I'm fishing for other people's experiences in part-time post- bacc studies.

<comment><USER12> Do it. My university has a path for this sort of thing. You usually have to pay the same tuition rate, but it's per unit, so it's less than a full time enrollment. I'm at UCSB, and it's called Extension here. I did this to help my grad application prior to enrolling. It really helped to a) show that I could do the work and b) get me excited about it and confirm my desire to enroll.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I did a part-time master's in CS while working full time. I was able to take one course a term and it was really rewarding. I could dig into the material for each course without worrying about 2 or 3 other classes - really nice. I also wrote a thesis rather than just taking credits. It took me a lot longer (1.5 years start to finish on thesis), but it was immensely rewarding. I learned so much beyond my thesis + class topics - a lot more than I expected when I started out. Also helped that my employer paid for the whole thing!

Never thought a part-time PhD was possible (US), but maybe its worth thinking about.

</comment><comment><USER14> I did this too - a part-time PhD with a full-time s/w engg job. So its good to know there are more crazy folks like me. Essentially I took up my PhD in a topic that was statistical as opposed to what I was working on distributed systems/applications.

It greatly helped broaden my horizons professionally. The writing experience you get doing journal & conference papers is excellent. Your analytical & critical thinking skills will get an immense boost and you will know how to critique, publish & communicate well. And when it is all done you will understand why some call a "worthless academic adventure" is one of the best things you should have undertaken years ago.

To anyone on the sidelines - do it. Don't think, do it - there will be times when you think you can't and just have to quit. But have someone around who can support and kick u back in. I have an awesome wife who pitched for me every step of the way... Also have someone to provide you with the motivation to finish. I had an impatient 3 yr old :)

<comment><AUTHOR> It can be done, there are many people out there who did part-time PhDs in similar situations. Shame to see some claiming it can't be done or impossible!

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Part time PhD is interesting but probably very challenging.

He seems to have completed it in 5-6 years, which is average for full-time PhD students, so my question is what got left out? His google scholar lists a conference abstract, and his thesis. No citations. His github projects have a total of 1 pull request. Now this isn't a personal attack on the author, just trying to tally what kind of productivity a "part-time" PhD produces.

If I someone looking to hire a recent PhD. I'd look at what kind of work they authored (software/publications), and what kind of impact it's had. A PhD isn't just a line on resume, it's your statement of how useful you can be to the software/scientific community. If someone claiming a PhD title showed me 6 years of work with no meaningful impact. I'd be skeptical to say the least.

<comment><USER8> > He seems to have completed it in 5-6 years, which is average for full-time > PhD students, so my question is what got left out?

He did his PhD in the UK, where 3 years is the norm for full-time.

UK PhDs are shorter for a number of reasons.

First we specialise earlier - normally just three related subjects from age 16 - I specialised on computation, discrete maths and physics - and from your first day at university you will only study your major and no other subjects such as liberal arts requirements.

Secondly, US students are still doing classes and exams while they're a PhD student. In the UK you are expected to be researching from the first day of your PhD and you don't do any classes or exams which take away time from your research.

Thirdly, US students spend I believe a lot of time doing things like being a teaching assistant, which have nothing to do with their research. I only did a couple of hours of teaching during my whole PhD. It seems crazy to me to spend time doing work like grading undergraduates when you are supposed to be making perhaps the major research contribution of your life!

Finally, I think there's a culture in the UK that you are released from your PhD as soon as you can show you can do it. So if you publish three top tier papers in two years then what else is there to prove?

<comment><USER16> US CS PhD students only spend on average 2 semesters teaching (at Stanford/Berkeley/CMU, the requirement is roughly 2 terms of teaching, at MIT it's 1 term).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Not a PhD but is a part-time undergrad possible as well?

I'm a self learned software engineer and very happy with where I am but would really like to get a degree in math. On top of that I keep running into immigration / visa issues without a degree and got classified as "not educated enough" multiple times. I was able to offset the degree with certifications here in Asia but that doesn't seem to convince everyone.

I come from Germany's 3-class school system and have a total of 10 years of school experience ("Realschule") + 3 years vocational school on top. Work experience is at 6 years now. Most universities don't even allow me enroll because my 3 years vocational school doesn't count as "normal school", that knocks me down to 10 years of education.

My path to a math degree would be right now:

1\. Go back to school for 2-3 years

2\. Enroll 4 years in university

3\. Think about further studies

I don't mind the 4 years thing or longer part time, but having to put 2-3 years on top just so I am allowed to pay money / enroll seems ridiculous to me.

Anyone by chance experience with this?

<comment> barry-cotter No one in the anglophone world will care that you don't have an Abitur. The UK's Open University has open admission. If you have the £5,000 for a full time course load for a year they'll let you in.

Assuming three years of vocational school refers to Fachhochschule you would at the least be admitted straight into most computing degree's second or third year. Given your work experience you could probably get into some Master's degrees. Peterep down thread says he got into Oxford's Software Engineering Master's without a Bachelor's degree. His email is in his profile.

<comment><USER18> I'm not entirely sure on the details, but I hear that Open University degrees are not recognised in Germany for the very fact that there are no entry requirements for bachelor degrees. Of course, this would apply to any university without entry requirements.

I may be wrong about this (and if anyone here can set the matter straight, that would be great), but I would strongly suggest finding out more about recognition if this may pose a problem.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I'd love to do this. I think I might be in a position to do so soon, as I'm setting up some businesses to (cross fingers) generate me some income without the daily stress of staring at the markets.

I'm interested in doing this in the UK, the south if I have to show up somewhere. It would be something that requires a lot of coding and contains a heavy statistical element. A friend of mine got a full time phd where he could basically sit on his computer all day and crunch numbers. His was in biology, so I doubt I have the qualifications, but my background is in Engineering (and economics). I also have considerably more coding experience than he had.

Is there some resource where I can find some likely places to do this?

<comment><USER18> A lot of universities in the UK offer part-time PhDs. You might like to try visiting the websites of universities close to you to find out more information. There are postgraduate fairs around the country from time to time, which may be a good opportunity to speak to different university faculties.

The Prospects website allows you to search for PhD courses. Here is a link to the search results for part-time PhDs in the "computer sciences and IT" category, but you can adjust the filters to narrow down the selection: [https://www.prospects.ac.uk/postgraduate-courses- results?key...](https://www.prospects.ac.uk/postgraduate-courses- results?keyword=computer%20sciences%20and%20IT&course_hours=16511&qualifications=21368)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> For anyone who wants to do a part-time MSc and can get to Oxford for 10x1 week periods over 4 years, I can recommend: [http://softeng.ox.ac.uk/](http://softeng.ox.ac.uk/)

I got admitted without an undergrad, although YMMV.

<comment><USER21> I saw this recently but wasn't sure whether they will admit me not being a resident of the UK. Is that possible? Also, like you, I do not have an undergrad degree but, still, got admitted to another UK based uni.

<comment><USER20> There were several Americans flew in

<comment><USER21> Thanks, good to know that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I'm highly interested in how the author managed his time, distractions, studying, family, and keeping his motivation to continue to do this for this long amount of time.

Are there any self-management techniques to be learned from this experience? Is it something you could teach someone else to develop as a trait?

<comment><USER23> "a family with two children (my 3rd child arrived after I started)"

I'd wager a bet that he has a stay-at-home partner or maybe family filling in for the time he's spending on his PhD to help take care of the kids. Three kids + full-time work + all the chores of child-rearing do not leave time for a PhD.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Very surprising that a few are passing judgement, although there is no thesis in the article!, how would someone judge without actually reading a thesis?

</comment><comment><USER24> It would be more preferable to get (e.g.) 12 degrees in a year and be done with it. Online schooling that has you take tests and gives you the degrees would be far and away more rewarding than getting hammered by years of invested time and a large debt.

Unless you're the kind of personality that enjoys academia, don't bother.

<comment><USER16> A PhD should not put you in debt (if you don't have university/fellowship/RA funding you shouldn't be doing a PhD). The only cost is opportunity cost.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Does anybody have any information on completing a computer science undergraduate degree in this manner? I'd like to do it but I don't know of any resources that rank the online programs of various schools. Is your physical presence required at some point?

<comment><USER18> Universities that offer part-time undergraduate courses have different ways of delivering them. Some have regular evening or weekend lectures, whereas others are mostly online.

I'm studying Computing and IT with the UK's Open University. Module texts are sent through the post or are available online, and there are a mixture of online and face-to-face tutorials (which are optional but recommended). Depending on the student's module choice, however, they may be required to attend exams at an exam centre, or residential school.

I'm not aware of any ranking, but if you are interested in taking a course that is mostly online, you might want to search for distance learning courses in your country of residence. Of course, it may also be possible to study a course offered by a university from another country. The Open University has students studying online from around the world, for instance.</comment></comment>


A hacker's guide to uncertainty estimates (2018) - <AUTHOR> https://erikbern.com/2018/10/08/the-hackers-guide-to-uncertainty-estimates.html <comment><USER2> Discussed at the time: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18182508](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18182508)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks Dan. I guess the dupe filter did not catch it because it was a while ago.

<comment><USER2> Reposts are fine after a year or so! [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html)

Those links to past discussions are just for the curious.

[https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...](https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20links%20curious&sort=byDate&type=comment)</comment></comment></comment>


Scaling MySQL with ProxySQL - <AUTHOR> http://www.proxysql.com/blog/scaling-with-proxysql <comment><USER2> I have heard a lot about ProxySQL and the description seams to be neat here

</comment><comment><USER3> WOW, this is a must read post. Thank you so much for getting this to us.

<comment><USER2> I echo you.

<comment><USER3> Yup

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Great topic. I've appreciate the infrastructure graph. Nice reference docu

</comment><comment><USER5> Very nice overview of how to use these two products together!

</comment><comment><USER6> Great Post</comment>


SleepyHead Project Is Shutting Down - <AUTHOR> http://jedimark.net/2019/02/08/sleepyhead-project-shutdown/ <comment><USER2> Two innovations have revolutionized my life—CPAP and Sleepyhead.

I volunteered to do a sleep study at the famous Stanford Sleep Clinic some 15 years ago hoping that they would tell me I'm superhuman and don't need sleep. They came back and told me that I sleep very poorly.

CPAP machines are (finally) wonderful, but the manufacturers don't share any of the data that their machines collect other than basics like hours slept. For those of us with the intellectual curiosity to actually double click on your sleep numbers, Mark's work is invaluable. I have over 1,500 nights of sleep logged in Sleepyhead...I learned the perils of drinking wine with dinner, the value in tucking in at the same time every night, and which masks work best for me—just to name a few benefits.

I use sleep medicine to improve my life, the same way that I use a screwdriver to tighten screws—which is to say, I pay no attention to the sleep-apnea forums and I suspect most users are the same. I'm sharing all of this here in case Mark by chance frequents this forum—and hopefully if enough others like me discuss the value that this free product creates every night for so many millions of users, he may reconsider. I for one, would gladly pay for a Sleepyhead subscription if that meant continued support.

Thanks Mark, your work is invaluable.

Link to vice motherboard article about why Sleepyhead matters: [https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/xwjd4w/im- possibl...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/xwjd4w/im-possibly- alive-because-it-exists-why-sleep-apnea-patients-rely-on-a-cpap-machine- hacker)

<comment><USER3> Curious; what are the perils of drinking wine with dinner?

<comment><USER4> Drinking alcohol prior to sleep can cause poor sleep quality.

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4666864/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4666864/)

<comment><USER5> So I should day drink instead?

<comment><USER6> that's still 'before sleep', isn't it?

<comment><USER7> In the morning is optimal in terms of improving sleep. The alcohol will be largely out of your system before you sleep.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Read into this more, here [http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead- Project...](http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead-Project- Takeover-Attempt-by-AB.html) and here [http://www.apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-SleepyHead- version-1...](http://www.apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-SleepyHead- version-1-1-Release-plus-odd-posts-by-JediMark?pid=284578#pid284578)

Its not as black and white as it seems

<comment><USER9> Well, they should've called their fork something other than "SleepyHead". From what I could gather from these threads:

\- Maintainer disappeared for a while, people wanted their fixes merged.

\- ApneaBoard community made a "1.1.0" release of "SleepyHead" without the author's approval, rather than forking it and calling it something else.

\- Maintainer unhappy about them using his trademark without his permission.

<comment><USER10> As far as I read so far, AB did not fork the program. They mirrored the original binary. With the original donation links to the original owner.

It's a mess.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> No idea what 'SleepyHead' is but I understand the sentiment. I've felt the pain from the perception of not getting anything back after you've poured so much of yourself into a thing. Especially when it's for free, the lack of support starts to feel like ingratitude.

It might or might not be true. People might actually appreciate what you're doing, but never explicitly say it. However, after a certain point, your mind becomes so toxic and awful that nothing will convince you otherwise. It's really better to walk away than become a shitty, bitter husk IMO. Good luck, guy!

<comment><USER12> There's a Vice article link elsewhere in the comments, and at the end of the linked post, that explains what it is and why it mattered.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Open source is hard. Being a maintainer is hard. I've seen a lot of good people burn themselves out trying to maintain / contribute to open source software.

I think this is a great blog post / talk (not mine) about the topic: [https://snarky.ca/setting-expectations-for-open-source- parti...](https://snarky.ca/setting-expectations-for-open-source- participation/)

"Here's a bit of real talk for people: I think working in OSS has made me more bitter and short-temperated".

Best wishes to the maintainer, hopefully time gives some perspective on the problems in the community and perhaps some ways forward.

</comment><comment><USER14> From the linked blog post:

> Let it be known that the hosts of the ApneaBoard forum have finally > succeeded in their efforts to hijack the SleepyHead project.

Sounds like it's not "shutting down" as much as forked, and he's upset. Also it looks like the reason why it's getting forked is because critical bugs went out. People are relying on this to live, and he's treating it like a hobby -- because it is to him.

His post is full of recriminations and cries about being betrayed. Even the forum post someone found[0] in these comments supports this idea of a fork.

> ApneaBoard's recent "release committee" initiative is illegitimate and is > seeking to undermine my years of work on SleepyHead and undermine my role in > my own software project."

> If it's NOT SleepyHead, don't call it SleepyHead, and don't make it look > like SleepyHead... it's that simple!

The code is GPLed[1]. It sounds like there were other people willing to contribute. The code goes on, without him.

[0] [http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead- Project...](http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead-Project- Takeover-Attempt-by-AB.html)

[1] [https://gitlab.com/sleepyhead/sleepyhead- code](https://gitlab.com/sleepyhead/sleepyhead-code)

<comment><USER15> > People are relying on this to live

As much as I want free software and all that, it seems like medical devices have the best cause for DRM and all the protections it affords.

<comment><USER16> You know how bad codebases from huge, over-managed, "risk-averse" companies can be. You know that the people that make medical devices are generally huge, over-managed, "risk-averse" companies. I think you can put two and two together, and I _really_ don't think you want to go in that direction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Sleepyhead probably saved my life (literally) when I couldn't get any sleep doctors to take my condition seriously. I can't thank him enough for his contributions.

The software is quite good, too, with a better UX than a lot of enterprise apps that I use on a daily basis. Might go to show how one person's ownership can lead to the creation of great experiences in ways that the lack of ownership often found in large software projects does not.

</comment><comment><USER18> Motherboard did a nice writeup of what Sleepyhead is and an overview of the Sleep Apnea echo system

[https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/xwjd4w/im- possibl...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/xwjd4w/im-possibly- alive-because-it-exists-why-sleep-apnea-patients-rely-on-a-cpap-machine- hacker?fbclid=IwAR3zfnoX_waylvse7Pdc8_ZDuZVx3dkdUqoHj7Luqs0W8T2hqaQaOaEFDno)

</comment><comment><USER19> I have no knowledge of this issue, but there seems to be more background here: [http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead- Project...](http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead-Project- Takeover-Attempt-by-AB.html)

First post is by Jedimark, which goes into more detail, and there are some comments with other sides of the story.

<comment><USER20> For those who have only read the parent blogpost, I would suggest reading at least the first page of this thread. There certainly seems to be another side to this story.

The author seems to take any input or effort from others to improve his _open source_ and _GPL licensed_ project as a personal attack.

If you're an open source project maintainer who has an ever growing foes list of people who develop forks of your project or make suggestions you don't like, you might want to re-evaluate yourself.

<comment><USER21> > you might want to re-evaluate yourself.

To his credit, that is exactly what he did, and the result of that evaluation is visible right here; he decided that foss world was not for him.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> > If there is one tiny bit of hard learned advice I can leave behind from all > this, it would be: Friends don't let friends release full blown complex > applications under the GPL – Keep it for hacks or corporate backed stuff.

Anyone know what the story is behind this? Is it that GPL is hard to monetize?

<comment><USER23> If you read the other posts in this discussion, with links to the forum discussions, it appears that he thinks people having access to the source of the program without him as a gatekeeper and sole steward is a mistake, and allowed people to steal his work by forking the project when he was perceived to be out of communication for months on end.

<comment><USER24> Looking at the whole situation from the outside... yeah.

In my experience there's only one reasonable way to deal with "friendly" forks like that. Meet up with the folks who forked the project, thank them for their work and ask if they're interested in reunifying the codebase and joining the two teams.

And if that fails, you switch to "Okay I respect this is GPL/BSD/xyz'd OSS, you have a right to fork the code. But can you please name it something else so people aren't confused? And do you mind if I cherrypick some of your cool features and fixes back into mainline?"

Maybe I'm just turning into an old pacifist, but I just don't see the point of stoking hatred and arguments in an open community.

<comment><USER25> yes, but if you read those fourm threads, the author unfortunately has absolutely no inclination to reconcile. Shame for this project, it seems to be of tangible benefit to people with this disorder.

<comment><USER24> True enough -- but if a friendly fork is impossible and he's given up... I'd consider that fair game for a less-friendly fork provided the licence allowed it.

I know a few folks who use CPAP machines and would likely contribute to such an endeavour.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Couldn't he just get a subscriber list that pay for the software and releases? I get that it's free, and great, but ongoing support takes his time. Put up a paypal link, or your preferred method, and get 300-500 people to sign up for $100/yr (for example). If there are forums, there are paying customers.

<comment><USER21> As far as I can tell, the issue was not money but control. He clearly disliked the community taking the software in their own hands without his input.

<comment><USER26> Ouch. It would seem his choices woudld be either open source with a strong hand and commercial variant (a la Rails/Ruby Sidekiq) or open source and one lets it be free.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> A lot of small open source projects struggle with leadership and organizational issues as they become more popular with a wider userbase (and hence wider demands, such as in the case support for more CPAP machines).

It sucks but that's just how it works, and seems inevitable with the entire project focused around the primary maintainer.

Seems like Jedimark is doing the right thing by removing himself from the situation to focus on his life. It's open source so hopefully the community can fork it and maybe find an organizational model that's more sustainable for continued support.

</comment><comment><USER28> I recently read about this project in the Motherboard article. Seems like it has had a really positive impact on a lot of people's lives. Unfortunate that it has come to this.

Official Project Page: [https://sleepyhead.jedimark.net/](https://sleepyhead.jedimark.net/)

Source Link: [https://gitlab.com/sleepyhead/sleepyhead- code](https://gitlab.com/sleepyhead/sleepyhead-code)

</comment><comment><USER29> So, he says his software is GPL. Does this mean he has a Github repo somewhere? Why isn't the community pushing important merge requests to him?

<comment><USER30> This seems to be the most recent repo - [https://gitlab.com/sleepyhead/sleepyhead- code](https://gitlab.com/sleepyhead/sleepyhead-code)

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Mark, your work greatly improved my life. I completely understand you needed to walk away from this though, and I'm sorry the least among us have taken so much from you.

</comment><comment><USER32> Not so Black and White, e.g. from the apneaboard forum he trashes:

>The pattern goes like this:

1\. JediMark asks for feedback, development help etc. 2\. Folks step up to the plate and help him out. 3\. The code is improved and released. 4\. Time passes, bugs are found, new machines need support, so those that help Mark out try to contact him to inform him of these needful things. 5\. Mark goes "dark" and drops out of any online activity for MONTHS at a time. 6\. The "helpers" get frustrated and keep trying to contact Mark for direction. 7\. Their requests are ignored by Mark, repeatedly. 8\. The "helpers" start talking about trying to help fix the code themselves, since users are clamoring for the fixes with JediMark nowhere to be found. 9\. The "helpers" actually fix a bit of the code and offer it up to those who would like to use a "fixed" version, or install a patch. 10\. Suddenly, JediMark comes out of hiding, and attacks the "helpers" for not allowing him time to fix the problems himself, saying (basically) that "No one understands the code like I do, since I am the creator of SleepyHead, and your efforts to 'fix' things only messes up my progress!!!" and "You guys are trying to steal SleepyHead away!" 11\. The "helpers" are stunned by Mark's attacks and slink off away into oblivion, since they're offended that Mark thinks they are a bunch of "rebels". 12\. More months pass with nothing being done. 13\. GOTO step 4 (1)

\</comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>-

>I was your friend, for several years, until you decided that I was your enemy because I suggested you talk to Pugsy about things that confused new users. Things that confused them then, and things that _continue_ to confuse them now.

At that point, you decided I was _out to get you " and trying to destroy sleepyhead.

You've done the same with Arie, who's been helping you for far longer than I had, and now you've decided that Apneaboard is against you.

The fact that people don't _agree* with everything you might think DOES NOT MEAN THEY ARE AGAINST YOU!.

Your real friends aren't the sycophants that do nothing but shower you with praise.

Your real friends are the ones that actually give enough of a shit to tell you "hey, dude, you've got a problem.", or in the case of Sleepyhead "hey, what you're doing is hurting the program, and everybody that uses it.

Go ahead and let someone else work on 1.1, if you don't like it, FINE, just _ignore them_.

There's no reason for you to go off the deep end, making posts about how everybody is out to get you.

BECAUSE THEY'RE NOT out to get you[/u][/i][/b], or, destroy sleepyhead.

For Gods sake, you and I worked for hundreds of hours, you told me endless stories about your childhood and growing up and sent me pictures of your first Christmas tree, and you wearing the T-shirt I had custom made for you.... but when I suggested you talk to Pugsy about what confuses people... you were in one of your paranoid phases, and suddenly, I was _THE ENEMY_.

The same thing is happening now.

If I didn't care, about you... I'd just laugh and say "he's off his rocker again..." I'd really rather you get help though, so you can be a happier person.(2)

(1) Apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-SleepyHead-version-1-1-Release-plus-odd- posts-by-JediMark?pid=284578#pid284578

(2) [http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead- Project...](http://www.cpaptalk.com/viewtopic/t174687/SleepyHead-Project- Takeover-Attempt-by-AB.html)

<comment><USER33> Indeed this guy created his own problems and blames others for them. Maybe he needs some more sleep.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> His work will be missed.

It sucks that it came down to this and it reminds me of how many entitled toxic pricks exist out there just to make the work of those voluntarily trying to make the world a better place harder. It's sad that they've won this time, but his wife and daughter won big time.

If you are reading this, thank you sincerely and I hope you find joy in your future endeavors.

<comment><USER35> >how many entitled toxic pricks exist out there just to make the work of those voluntarily trying to make the world a better place harder. It's sad that they've won this time

While I generally agree with this sentiment, based on what I've read I don't believe that is what happened here. The rantings and ramblings posted by Mark really do sound like he may be struggling with a paranoid personality disorder. During a period where he was seemingly absent and unresponsive the community decided to continue to work on the project and try to iron out some bugs. As far as I can tell no one tried to hijack his project or monetize the work.</comment></comment>