Ask HN: Registrar that doesn't use Google's reCATPCHA? - <AUTHOR> Having issues logging in at namecheap.com <comment><USER2> I've been with [https://dreamhost.com/domains/](https://dreamhost.com/domains/) for over a decade.

</comment><comment><USER3> I like these guys

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

<comment><USER4> What's the port size on these guys? It mentions unlimited data transfer but I don't know how fast or if they throttle.

<comment><USER3> I don't use them for servers but I have used them for domains.</comment></comment></comment>


Why Should Engineers and Scientists Be Worried About Color? - <AUTHOR> http://www.research.ibm.com/people/l/lloydt/color/color.HTM

<comment><USER2> A better title would talk about "Why Should Engineers and Scientists Be Worried About Color _in Data Visualization_ "

I initially thought the article would talk about colours in the design sense, and in which case engineers shouldn't worry whatsoever. It's not their job.

<comment><USER3> Making a big deal out of color in the design sense in tech is probably a great way to discourage men from buying your product: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcBpXYI1r3Q>

<comment><USER4> Not necessarily, though using feminine colours probably is. I've never seen a man get annoyed by the large number of available of colours when buying a car, or even a shirt.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I've only read partway into this article, but I really don't understand what he's saying in the section "Misleading Use of Color in Your Data". I literally didn't have a single one of the problems he listed with the colored representations. I don't see color banding, and I don't have trouble distinguishing various shades of green-to-cyan. Also, I think the third grayscale image in Figure 2 is really misleading, since it's showing a 2D cross-section as if it were 3D.

Used properly, the colorscale (is that a word?) should give 3x the amount of data as grayscale, which I think is clearly shown in the fourth image.

<comment><USER6> >the colorscale... should give 3x the amount of data as grayscale

The visualization can't contain more data than the data itself!

<comment><USER5> Well, of course :) I mean the _potential_ max amount of data can be increased with color, since now you have three axes (RBG instead of L). Although now that you mention it, he was only using "hue", and holding luminance steady, so I guess in this case it's the same - just rotating around the very outside edge of the color wheel without going inside. I still think it has more visual contrast, though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> For those wondering, I believe the visualizations on this page were created with OpenDX (<http://opendx.org/>) or its predecessor from IBM.

<comment><USER5> You can register by email to get a copy, but the link they sent me is dead (looks like the website doesn't exist anymore). Someone put up a copy at [http://pagesperso- orange.fr/pierre.baldensperger/OpenDX-4.4....](http://pagesperso- orange.fr/pierre.baldensperger/OpenDX-4.4.4-Setup.exe)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I think "the rule" should be very simple: if your data has just one parameter, don't use colors! The gray scale will give you the only faithful representation of the data.

<comment><USER8> One definite advantage to colors, however, is expressing certain thresholds (as in the coast-line example). The only way to express multiple thresholds in gray-scale is to distort the scale, and then you no longer have a faithful representation either.

<comment><USER6> If you are doing this visualization for yourself, you can experiment with colors and thresholds to bring out the features that are important (in your view). And that's OK because you still have all the data at hand. If however this visualization is for someone else, such as the MRI given to a doctor, anything but a faithful representation would be very dangerous. Basically, you would substitute your judgment for that of a specialist.</comment></comment></comment>


Test drive of a petrol car (2015) - <AUTHOR> http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-car/ <comment><USER2> Very droll, but I could somehow find my (yet to be born) grand children finding it quite factual.</comment>


The White House just open sourced their first Github repo - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/WhiteHouse/petition <comment><USER2> > "President Obama is committed to creating the most open and participatory > government in our nation's history"

I'll believe that when his administration stops being one of the most secretive and most aggressive prosecutors of whistleblowers in recent history.

Sources:

[http://www.salon.com/2012/02/09/obamas_unprecedented_war_on_...](http://www.salon.com/2012/02/09/obamas_unprecedented_war_on_whistleblowers/) [http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/06/obamas- whistlebl...](http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/06/obamas- whistleblowers-stuxnet-leaks-drones) [http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/04/expert_con...](http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/04/expert_consensus_obama_aping_bush_on_state_secrets.php/) [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/us/politics/new-rules- to-c...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/us/politics/new-rules-to-curb- leaks-and-catch-leakers.html?_r=1) [http://www.salon.com/2012/03/30/the_most_transparent_adminis...](http://www.salon.com/2012/03/30/the_most_transparent_administration_ever%E2%84%A2/) [https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/us/government- documents-i...](https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/us/government-documents-in- plain-sight-but-still-classified.html)

<comment><USER3> I reckon this was simply a first-pass readme -- hands-up, who likes writing those?

I submitted a pull request that tones down the hyperbole somewhat: <https://github.com/WhiteHouse/petition/pull/5>

I sense it's essential for them to keep the project focused on the software. Partly what makes this interesting is managing the partisan nature of discourse. That's a unique non-functional requirement here.

It's a good test for Github as a collaboration platform.

<comment><USER4> If it is possible to manage the partisan nature of discourse, it is also possible to exacerbate it and to frame it in a desired way. Since this project has no special protection and seems to be uniformly hated by citizens, we can expect it to be abolished in the next Presidency and possibly replaced with something more blatantly partisan.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> And, in the spirit of the project, they'll reject all pull requests with a patronizing response about the way things are.[1][2]

1\. [https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/legalize-and- regul...](https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/legalize-and-regulate- marijuana-manner-similar-alcohol/y8l45gb1)

2\. [https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/abolish-tsa-and- us...](https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/abolish-tsa-and-use-its- monstrous-budget-fund-more-sophisticated-less-intrusive-counter- terrorism/c7L94bFB?utm_source=wethepeople&utm_medium=response&utm_campaign=tsa)

<comment><USER6> Not to worry, someone has created an issue for this bug: <https://github.com/WhiteHouse/petition/issues/2>

<comment><USER7> That's just stupid. As if the developers involved, who are likely proud of their work and the go-ahead to release it to the community, have anything to do with the petition outcomes.

People need to think things through sometimes.

<comment><USER5> It raises awareness of the issue. Why should any self-respecting developer want to contribute to a code base that does nothing but facilitate the government ignoring peoples' grievances, while at the same time making them feel like they are participating?

<comment><USER8> > It raises awareness of the issue.

OK, I'll bite. Who is now aware of the issue who wasn't previously?

<comment><USER7> You're right. It does nothing except belittle the efforts of the developers. They're trying to make their work more open which should be applauded. Just because the entire administration does not adhere to their stated philosophy, doesn't mean that we (the developer community) should be jumping on those who are at least making an attempt.

The majority of HN readers and GH users would immediately close issues / pull requests like this and be bitter about it. I don't understand why there is a double standard being applied here.

<comment><USER9> But shouldn't they? They are accessories. They are developing something that has no purpose other than to mislead people. They're writing political malware, if you will. They should be belittled, as it's completely unethical to participate in such a farce.

We should also note that making this software open (which is actually pretty badly designed, actually looking at it) is a similar farce. The objective they claim, for doing so, is somehow related to an open government. That's like claiming open-sourcing the software you use to send electronic messages back and forth is making your actual communications with said software "open." Nonsense.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I am curious about GPL compatibility in this situation. According to [1], software developed by US federal government cannot be licensed under the GPL since it is automatically in the public domain. However, the github repo readme makes the following claim:

"The project utilizes code licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License and therefore is licensed under GPL v2 or later."

While I applaud this effort and wish to see more like it in the future, is there a possible issue with licensing here?

[1] [http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old- licenses/gpl-2.0-faq.html#GP...](http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old- licenses/gpl-2.0-faq.html#GPLUSGov)

<comment><USER11> This was exactly my question. How can they put limitations on public domain code?

<comment><USER12> They can't, but only part of the code is public domain. If you want to use the whole pile of it, you do so under the GPL - if you pick out the changes made by the govt, then you can apply those elsewhere.

<comment><USER13> So effectively GPL imposes a dual (or multiple) license on the non-GPL part.

<comment><USER12> Insofar as the non-GPL part is specific to the GPL code, yes. If you reimplement the GPL code under a different license, you could reuse the public domain bits. I expect in most cases, it wouldn't be terribly worthwhile.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Just want to point out that this is not the first code contributed to open source from the WhiteHouse.gov project. Several of the Drupal modules developed for the site were made available to the community on Drupal.org not long after the new site launched. Some examples (may not be all of them):

<http://drupal.org/project/govdelivery> <http://drupal.org/project/akamai> <http://drupal.org/project/context_http_headers> <http://drupal.org/project/node_embed>

Actually it strikes me as a little strange that this code is on Github since Drupal.org has an entire section devoted to Drupal "distributions", which is what this appears to be. I mean, is the White House tech office moving to a full open source development model? Are they planning to appoint volunteer maintainers and accept pull requests? I sort of doubt it.

<comment><USER15> And specifically it includes a drupal-org.make file which is a manifest for the Drupal.org packaging system which bundles up this profile, all of it's dependencies, and Drupal core into a single download. Perhaps they are planning to put it there, or just decided to mirror it on Github for now.

Also FWIW, the petition namespace on d.o is already occupied, perhaps that is blocking the release on d.o?

<comment><USER16> A drupal-org.make file, like any .make file that the Drupal tool Drush uses, is independent of the Drupal.org packaging system.

There's a lot of pressure from within the Drupal community to host all Drupal contrib modules, themes, and distributions on drupal.org but I don't see anything wrong with a distribution being hosted on GitHub. It certainly brings more visibility to the project from developers outside of the "Drupal Island".

<comment><USER14> It does, which might have been part of the reason they did it this way. Github is increasingly "the place to be" for open source projects, so the White House probably wants to get involved there too. (I don't mean this cynically BTW--I believe they honestly are trying to move the government more toward open source.)

And a lot of Drupal developers do use Github for their own work. On the other hand when they go to check out distribution options for a new project, I bet they start on Drupal.org. It's just so convenient, and like you say, there's a strong norm within the community to put everything there. Even the few "commercial" distributions can be found there. I assume this work will show up there at some point as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Who cares? This is boring code. Save all the "it portends an open government!" handwaving for once the Obama admin does something _actually_ meaningful (in a positive way - starting a new war doesn't count).

Seriously. Much ado about a Drupal module that is used for people to petition the government to be patronized and ignored.

<comment><USER18> That's a pretty cynical way of viewing things. Take a look at the big picture: the highest office in the land (world?) is doing what we here on HN do: push public code, accept feedback, leverage open source etc. It's a fantastic start towards a new paradigm of open source code in public places. This should be celebrated; a new generation of people are running things now. It can only get better.

<comment><USER17> Thank you for doing exactly what I suggested that you not.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> It would be really cool if they let the devs use their public names and GitHub accounts to commit. As of right now it is WH-NewMedia, and there is no history. Makes me think this is a marketing excersize rather then a new leaf in federal software development.

<comment><USER20> I doubt it's a marketing exercise. There are people who really are trying to change things from inside. It takes time, and it takes a lot of small steps. Why don't you contact them and encourage them to use individual public names?

<comment><USER21> I would believe that more if there were a single White House petition that resulted in action. Even their SOPA petition response was pretty murky.

<comment><USER22> What does whether or not a petition is responded to have to do with open- sourcing code in a White House repo? Your complaint is like if Mac open sourced a component of OS X and you went on a rant about them not moving work out of abusive factories in China due to a petition.

<comment><USER23> True, but it's hard to disentangle the product from the thing that produced it. If Apple open sourced a product, I would fully expect to see criticism of their policies (probably around openness and and transparency, rather than labour) in any collective reaction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Moving from MongoDB to MySQL. I never understood why people felt they need MongoDB/NoSQL for their projects. Does anyone have an example where it was _really_ necessary/advantageous?

<comment><USER19> According to the README they say preformance improvements with Mongo. The downside was having to port all the new features over to it.

Personally I have used it to speed up development. It allows very fast iterations early on and integrates much more nicely with most languages then a SQL based solution. Also its a lot faster the MySQL.

<comment><USER25> 10gen sponsors development of a Drupal module, EntityFieldQuery[1], which aims to improve support for non-SQL databases. Although I'm unfamiliar with Drupal project layouts, I didn't find a reference to the module in the GitHub project, so I don't believe they were using it. That said, there are still challenges to making MongoDB play nicely with Drupal 7, but 10gen is aiming for better integration in version 8 (through the same sponsorship).

1\. <http://drupal.org/project/efq_views>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Here in the UK, the Government Digital Service [1] are doing much the same thing. They're building a single site for all government services and publishing all their code on GitHub.

[1] <http://digital.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/>

</comment><comment> throwaway54-762 I've never seen the name "Obama" and "licensed under GPL v2 or later" in the same document before -- cool.

</comment><comment><USER27> I'm a little disappointed; I wouldn't have thought this community to be so cynical and partisan. Can't we all just get along?

</comment><comment><USER28> While this is the first with respect to releasing on Github, in April 2010 White House also released 2 open source Drupal modules (for Akamai integration and another one).

</comment><comment><USER29> Now if we could just get THOMAS into Github so we can upgrade that beast...

<comment><USER30> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THOMAS>

So who developed THOMAS?

<comment><USER31> Hey I know this is late but I just got an email back from "O'Keeffe, Hope email@example.com" that just says it's based on a commercial system that is "out of support" and not available.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Finally I can sass the whitehouse using github issues!

<https://github.com/WhiteHouse/petition/issues/2>

<comment><USER32> Let's say you were a web developer hired to design some part of Apple's website, and by some miracle Apple let you open source your code. You, as a web developer, have no special way to contact or pass information on to Tim Cook, or any other top Apple executive. Would you appreciate sassy comments about Foxconn in your repository's pull requests?

<comment><USER23> Well, being that I would probably agree wholeheartedly with the sassy comment, I wouldn't mind someone using the release as a platform for their political expression. But that's me.

In this case the POINT of the software was supposed to be political expression, so it doesn't seem _that_ out of place to me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Ignoring all the snarky comments about how the current administration has ignored every online petition so far, this is really cool. Everyone now has a chance to have their name attached to an official government project!

</comment><comment><USER34> Great! Now if we can just get some transparency into issues that matter.

</comment><comment><USER35> Interesting case giving up MongoDB because of the complexity of adapting another application to use it. I wonder if this is a good use case for something like <http://www.nuodb.com/>

</comment><comment><USER36> Check out the first commit to this project: [https://github.com/WhiteHouse/petition/commit/fcb103e966f777...](https://github.com/WhiteHouse/petition/commit/fcb103e966f777c73d82e99fb4592df386d7aaef)

</comment><comment><USER37> Certainly an interesting microcosm of a type of democracy... I wonder how feasible this kind of model would be for actual policy making.

<comment><USER38> The more influential the channel gets, the harder people will try to game the system to push their own agenda. I.e. fake or hacked registrations, buying signatures, or trying to promote comments favorable to your point of view while burying opposing ones.

Right now the influence of this app is zero, so we don't have these problems. It's just a marketing dog-and-pony show where they can say "Look we're actually responding to people's questions" but the answers are extremely vague nothings and you have no idea if the President / Cabinet / anyone with real authority even _reads_ the petitions that have 6- or 7-digit signature counts, let alone acting on them.

<comment><USER4> Oh I don't know, it isn't much different from a system which analyzes emails to see what motivated constituents with email are saying - it's just public. I think it's an interesting experiment and a starting point. I don't think it is ever wrong in a democracy to give people a way of publicizing a message or to give elected officials visibility into relevant things people are saying publicly.

I don't know where the high expectations came from. But I might speculate that many people are starting from dislike of the President's policies and then from there tarring the website, rather than actually responding directly to the idea of the website.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Suddenly, I became interested in politics again.

<comment><USER40> Government ≠ Politics

<comment><USER41> Huh?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> $markup .= 'You've got my vote, Little Face Mitt.';

</comment><comment><USER43> Here's the quote I was looking for.

 _"A totalitarian state simply enunciates official doctrine -- clearly, explicitly. Internally, one can think what one likes, but one can only express opposition at one's peril. In a democratic system of propaganda no one is punished (in theory) for objecting to official dogma. In fact, dissidence is encouraged. What this system attempts to do is to fix the limits of possible thought: supporters of official doctrine at one end, and the critics -- vigorous, courageous, and much admired for their independence of judgment -- at the other. The hawks and the doves. But we discover that all share certain tacit assumptions, and that it is these assumptions that are really crucial. No doubt a propaganda system is more effective when its doctrines are insinuated rather than asserted, when it sets the bounds for possible thought rather than simply imposing a clear and easily identifiable doctrine that one must parrot -- or suffer the consequences. The more vigorous the debate, the more effectively the basic doctrines of the propaganda system, tacitly assumed on all sides, are instilled. Hence the elaborate pretense that the press is a critical dissenting force -- maybe even too critical for the health of democracy -- when in fact it is almost entirely subservient to the basic principles of the ideological system: in this case, the principle of the right of intervention, the unique right of the United States to serve as global judge and executioner. It is quite a marvelous system of indoctrination."_

\-- Noam Chomsky, "Language and Responsibility" (1977)

But of course, that was then, today it's totally different, right? Right.

</comment><comment><USER44> Neat. Too bad it's drupal, rendering it totally useless to people with actual taste or skill.

<comment><USER28> Do you not find it ironic that people with those qualities would not leave such an ignorant comment in the first place?

<comment><USER44> Usually I do, but I make an exception for Drupal. I've got the battle scars to prove it.</comment></comment></comment>


How to get in touch with small businesses? - <AUTHOR> I'm working on a product for realtors but would like to have more conversations. However, I run into a couple roadblocks:
     1) Cold emails/calls are a dead end.
     2) In person people are focused on their business, not talking to you
     3) I only know a few people in the space and can only get warm intros to a few people.
So, what is the best way to get in touch with people. I've heard paid Facebook Ads with a survey and email is decent. I've also heard various success stories like patio11's in-person conversations and LinkedIn spam, but neither have worked for me.
Any ideas? <comment><USER2> Trade shows are great for this type of interaction. Just be sure to NOT interrupt a client and duck out if you see one approach them.

In my area, there are regular "home shows" with realtors.

Another idea is to go to open houses. Don't take their time if there are lots of visitors, however in my experience some are super busy and some are super slows. During a slow open house I'm sure the realtor would be happy to chat 2 min. That's your chance to ask for a future 10 minutes from them.

</comment><comment><USER3> Here's a guide to FB ads for b2b stuff like this: [https://medium.com/rightpercent/guide-to-scaling- a-b2b-compa...](https://medium.com/rightpercent/guide-to-scaling- a-b2b-company-with-facebook-ads-bd95dbb9c504)

</comment><comment><USER4> Why not talk with them about their business? Everyone likes when people listen to them, even help them solve their problems - you should get to know them and that can help you where they are coming from.

In addition, this builds trust that will be pivotal at getting your product in front of more people.

<comment><AUTHOR> Great point, but how do I make that happen?

Do I email them just saying I want to talk about your business? Walk in and strike up a conversation? In the latter case I feel like I'm actively obstructing their ability to work and not sure about the former.

I like the idea, just not sure how to implement it

<comment><USER5> Being completely honest about your intentions is the best approach. For instance, tell them you're working on a new product and you think it could be helpful to someone who owns a business similar to his/hers. Say you know they're busy (all SMBs are), and ask for a couple minutes of their time to just explain what you're hoping to build and if they would give you any feedback. If you have a BETA product, offer to give it to them for free with no commitment to buy. Just make it really easy for them to say yes and make it OK for them to say no, or not even respond.

Showing up at their work is likely not going to get you what you want because their day is probably already scheduled and it could be a pretty big inconvenience. Or likely a major waste of your time. Let them schedule through email. I'd be willing to bed if you get 10 - 20 email address or companies, you'd get a couple responses agreeing to a phone call or company.

Make your first interaction short (5 - 10 mins) and work to develop that relationship as they could maybe even become your first customer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Assuming you have a LinkedIn profile, here is what I would do:

1\. Optimize your LinkedIn profile to explain that you are a Software Entrepreneur

2\. Search for Realtors on LinkedIn.

3\. Connect with them on LinkedIn.

4\. Once connected thank them for the connection

5\. A few days later, ask them for a conversation. Talk to them about their business and problems.

Steps 3-5 can be automated with a tool like this: [https://linkedprospect.com/](https://linkedprospect.com/)

</comment><comment><USER7> You should visit indiehackers.com and see if anyone has advice on this there.</comment>


Technology Adoption Life-cycle - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology_adoption_life_cycle <comment><USER2> IMHO it's worth to point out that IT "innovations" in this decade are born out of maturing internet economies rather than driven by end-user demand and technology limitations.

For example, the push for "the cloud" and "solutions" like Docker (and the obscene complexity of orchestration tools around it) mostly benefit cloud providers who want to sell large amounts of containers, which they can offer at really low cost due to the increased density afforded by Docker compared to dedicated or virtual servers. At the same time, they can't be held responsible for eg. DNS miconfigurations or basic QoS issues. But those thousands of containers replace a small cluster of Apache servers because everything has to be "web-scale". In effect, it's becoming much more expensive to run a web backend due to staffing cost alone.

Another trend has been the appification of the Web, resulting solely from the desire to sell SaaS solutions due to the decline in end-user software sales.</comment>


The Art Of Turning URLs Into A User Readable Preview - Text Extensions - <AUTHOR> http://protonet.info/post/1005627617/art-of-turning-urls-into-user-readable-previews

<comment><USER2> I wonder why these standards don't use the <title> element?

<comment><USER3> my guess: they preferred to have their own blank slate for those kinda things... plus the title contains a lot of crappy and unusable data (on quite a few pages) - I would wanna clean that on my side.</comment></comment>


Knockout.js 1.2.0 released - <AUTHOR> http://blog.stevensanderson.com/2011/04/20/knockoutjs-120-released/

<comment><AUTHOR> Is there something like knockouts dependency tracking for backbone? I haven't really got beyond scratching backbones surface (scrolling through the docs), but the abscence of dependency tracking alone would be a big drawback for me.

</comment><comment><USER2> How this compares to backbone?

<comment><USER3> Knockout focuses more on the front-end - helping you make a sophisticated UI that responds to view model changes using declarative bindings. It isn't as opinionated as backbone about how you should load and save data.

Both approaches are valid; either could be preferable depending on whether you're focusing most on the UI or on the data.</comment></comment>


Not Safe For YouTube: How Google Draws the Line Between Porn and Art (NSFW) - <AUTHOR> http://gizmodo.com/5993806/not-safe-for-youtube-how-google-draws-the-line-between-porn-and-art

<comment><USER2> ....and all the videos he points out have now been taken down lol</comment>


Google Is Buying Connected Device Company Nest For $3.2B In Cash - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/13/google-just-bought-connected-device-company-nest-for-3-2b-in-cash/

<comment><USER2> Despite their assurances otherwise I have to believe Google bought Nest to have more data on us for their advertisers.

Now they may get around things by saying they will only use composites of data but I can't believe they won't use it. Without the data I can't think of a logical reason why they would want to own Nest.

<comment><USER3> Hardware talent.</comment></comment>


Fox 'uses' a gameplay video from YouTube, and removes the original with DMCA - <AUTHOR> https://torrentfreak.com/fox-stole-a-game-clip-used-it-in-family-guy-dmcad-the-original-160520/ <comment><USER2> I've said it before, and it bears repeating here: ContentID is not, has not been, and will never be the DMCA. It was developed by YouTube so Viacom would drop the suit that would likely have stripped YouTube's safe harbor protections under the DMCA.

ContentID takedowns are not DMCA takedowns. They operate on a different, much less strict standard. Anyone that works with YouTube can flag any video for any reason (see Scripps taking down a public-domain NASA video[0]), and the content is removed immediately without giving the initial uploader a right to contest it (it can be restored laterº. A YouTube user has way fewer rights under ContentID than they do under the DMCA. If you are found in violation of ContentID, you must fight both YouTube and the claimant to have your case heard under the DMCA.

[0] [http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/nasa-s-mars-rover- crashed-i...](http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/nasa-s-mars-rover-crashed-into- a-dmca-takedown)

<comment><USER3> Dear Google: This is about as evil as you can get.

<comment><USER4> IMO it's not that black and white.

If google didn't agree to the ContentID system, Viacom would have most likely been able to strip them of their safe harbor status.

And that means the end of Youtube.

Yeah, something needs to be done, but having humans review takedowns just doesn't work at this scale, and if they aren't extremely over zealous about taking things down, they will be shut down.

Google is under the thumb of Viacom and other big media companies, and there really isn't anything they can do about it except agree or close up shop.

(Mind you, I think that there are definitely ways that Google can improve the situation, and that they should be pressured to do so, but it's not as simple as saying they are "evil")

<comment><USER3> Even if it's true that they are under the thumb of the evil media companies, Google has billions in their war chest to fight legal battles like these. Why aren't they?

Apple seems willing to fight legal battles on moral grounds; why won't Google?

<comment><USER5> They do: [http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.nl/2015/11/a-step- toward-...](http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.nl/2015/11/a-step-toward- protecting-fair-use-on.html?m=1)

<comment><USER4> I'm not trying to call you or them out or anything, i'm just curious...

Are there any public examples of them doing this for someone?

Because that is a really awesome thing to pledge, but without public actions backing it up it's an empty promise.

<comment><USER6> Here's an article with an example (a video game review by Jim Sterling that was DMCA'd by the game developer): [http://www.polygon.com/2015/11/19/9761654/youtube-fair- use-p...](http://www.polygon.com/2015/11/19/9761654/youtube-fair-use- protection-program-jim-sterling)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> SmarterEveryDay told a story in one of his videos about slow-mo clip of tatoo machine in action being ripped from one of his movies by the large press publisher, Bauer, and reuploaded on Bauer's Facebook page. Then Bauer moved on to claim DMCA on his original uploaded by him on his Facebook page:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6A1Lt0kvMA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6A1Lt0kvMA)

<comment><USER8> That sort of thing happens all the time too, as he mentions. Only he has the reach and audience to rightly raise a stink about it. Most who have their content stolen in this manner really have no recourse.

The damage is done, the money is made, and the perpetrators can just say, "whoops" and absolve themselves of any wrongdoing while they take their ill- gotten gains to the bank.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Until there is a financial penalty for wrongful use of the DMCA this type of thing will continue.

They use robots to create reports (maybe not in this case) because for them there is simply zero downside.

That downside needs to exist.

<comment><USER10> The real solution would be to require a human to certify the infringement complaint - no more automated requests.

<comment><USER11> But that can't be left to the claimant. So Google should charge a fee for each complaint to cover the cost of the verification. But then you could make the company pay more simply by uploading thousands of infringing videos…

In any case a simple air date sanity check would have prevented this particular case.

<comment><USER12> By "certify", GP might mean "certify under penalty of perjury", where the specific wording (which would probably need some notes about certifying they had verified their ownership) is strict enough to give one a bit of legal ammunition against false complaints.

<comment><USER10> Exactly. Sorry if I wasn't explicit enough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> On a similar note a Game YouTuber, Jim Sterling (Jimquistion), was frustrated that when he put out videos with some clips of video games or other movies, companies would come in and claim ownership and monetize his videos. He didn't like that since he wanted to be ad-free and these companies would essentially force his viewers to watch ads that he wouldn't even get any money for. These large companies didn't care because it's free money for them.

So he figured out how to get around stupid contentID flags. He put in clips of videos from different companies and spliced them into his videos. This caused a couple of companies to claim copyright over his video, but when there are multiple claimants for one video, Google's system doesn't give any of them any ad money. So in effect he gets to continue to use clips while not having any companies monetize his viewers.

<comment><USER14> "when there are multiple claimants for one video, Google's system doesn't give any of them any ad money"

If that's true, then couldn't he simply file a claim of his own to counter a single company's claim?

<comment><USER13> Maybe? I'm not really sure. How hard is it to get into the contentID system?

I'm guessing part of the reason he did this was more for the humor of screwing with larger media companies.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> There is no reason this kind of glitch should even be happening. There should be some kind of date attribute that gets attached to the ContentID data that Fox submits, and YouTube should reject takedowns for which that date is later than the date the video in question was uploaded. This is just ridiculous.

<comment><USER16> I agree that this should not be happening. But your solution is unworkable.

Upload priority is not proof of ownership or creation. If you upload one of Fox's movie trailers before they do, they should still definitely be able to take you down.

<comment><USER17> Original clip was uploaded 8 years before Fox published their version.

<comment><USER18> Many TV shows are not on Youtube at all except as unauthorized uploads. Should Fox be unable to issue a takedown on an episode of the Simpsons that's been uploaded since before they uploaded a copy into ContentID?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The currently implemented ContentID system isn't really at fault here. It is being effective in protecting Family Guy content appearing on Youtube. It looks at the reference video, analyzes it, and flags every video that matches the reference video by a certain percentage, and deals with it.

The real problem here is that FOX copied the exact contents of an existing 7-year old youtube video in their Family Guy episode (maybe the creators tried to give a tribute). The ContentID rules state that you should have exclusive rights to the content in a specific region, which they don't.

Thinking about this again, the ContentID system is also at fault here: it is blatantly ignoring the upload date for video's on youtube. I don't know how the ContentID system works, but you should at least give the date on which the copyright of the reference content (=Family Guy episode) starts. If FOX would try to upload the Family Guy episode, the ContentID system should give a warning that it uses already existing, older content. Now Youtube/Google, that can't be so hard to implement, now can it?

Also, Youtube should handle complaints from incorrect takedowns a bit better. Like keep a reputation on parties using the ContentID system. Say you start at 100. If you do incorrect takedowns, your reputation decreases. If you do correct takedowns, it rises (come up with some statistical efficient tool)_. If it falls below 50, you are excluded from the ContentID system for breaking the rules, or somebody could sue the party or something. Make it transparent (yearly report) to the public, so they can judge.

</comment><comment><USER20> This is eerily similar to the infamous "You made this?...I made this" comic.

<comment><USER21> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNx8cG7SrNc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNx8cG7SrNc)

<comment><USER22> Apparently historically accurate.

Also the irony of responding with an uploaded video of a copyrighted show owned by a major studio is delicious. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> The same kind of thing happened to NASA back in 2012 with some news group. Both little and big names can screw people over with this.

</comment><comment><USER24> Youtube really needs to find a proper solution to this problem. But at least they acknowledge it and and are taking steps to improve.

[http://youtubecreator.blogspot.co.at/2016/04/improving- conte...](http://youtubecreator.blogspot.co.at/2016/04/improving-content-id- for-creators.html)

</comment><comment><USER25> I know that my argument would not stand in court, but when I read this, it makes it harder for me to be against illegal downloading.

Although I prefer buying content directly from the artist, like Louis CK does. As long as it seems "fair", I buy.

That where piracy comes from: a rational argument about a skewed market.

<comment><USER26> I agree. An argument doesn't have to stand up in court to be right or moral and I believe yours is both. If FOX can abuse Youtube policies and the DMCA, I see no reason why people shouldn't abuse FOX and pirate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> Wow, I never considered the combination of a large broadcasting company that produces original content using sampled material from the internet and then automatically sending ContentID takedowns for said sampled content. It's like a takedown feedback loop.

</comment><comment><USER28> So how often are these bogus takedowns rectified? Will this be? Seems blatantly easy to fix if someone at YouTube just gives it a 5 minute look.

</comment><comment><USER29> This is ridiculous...

</comment><comment><USER30> Maybe fox contacted NES and aquired the rights to double dribble and the clip.

<comment><USER31> Konami in this case owns copyright to the game, and ironically the original YouTube poster might have a (weak) case against the original aired Family Guy episode and Fox.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Depressed Engineer again needs help - <AUTHOR>

Almost a year back, I asked for suggestions because I was depressed (read here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5723330). I tried following advices which I got but that didn't help much. Other than a better role, nothing much has changed (no hikes for 2 years now). Now, I've kinda decided to move on. The only reason which stops me from moving on is I'm attached to the company and few colleagues whom I can call good friends. I'm very emotional guy and I can't let go things easily and it's difficult for me to move on (I had lot of fights with my girlfriend over this issue).
Friends and Family always believed in me and told me that I'm very good at what I do, but I know I'm a procrastinator (I've improved a lot though) and postpone things till the last moment (still I can get things done before the due date).  I'm still depressed and can't focus on anything properly. I really need help!!!
P.S. I'm based in Bangalore, India and I'm open for remote job offers in startups. I've worked remotely, before. I'm a full-stack engineer. <comment><USER2> OK. Now I actually read your old thread. My other advice still stands because if you address the feelings you're having it won't matter what your boss thinks... And being happier in your current position is actually going to put the manager at ease so they're comfortable promoting to the next level. Sucks but that's how companies work.

Tactically I would sit down with your supervisor and discuss what's troubling you, what you're trying to get out of your career and why you're not fulfilled. Then ask them what's expected of you to get promoted: is it time on the job, is it leadership on the team, is it technical achievement? What will make me stand out in _this_ company on _this_ team? There may be details that you don't know that are blocking your progress. If you aren't satisfied with the answers then ask around to see if other teams in that company are recruiting engineers. Don't make it a competition with your boss. Stay humble. Try to be positive about what your boss advises you. Then after the meeting just use the fact finding to decide where you want to put your effort.

</comment><comment><USER2> I didn't read your previous thread so this might be repetitive but talk to a physician about medication that could help. You think you are depressed. That's a good start to fix something if there's a problem, but there might be a chemical component to the way you're feeling. It's not uncommon for creative people to feel the way you're feeling so this is a perfect place to discuss :)

</comment><comment><USER3> What do you mean, when you say "I am depressed"? You mean the clinical/medical term described on [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depression_(mood)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depression_\(mood\)) ? If so, go to a psychiatrist immediately!

But if you just mean you are unhappy with your current situation, I would say (like the advice you already got) talk to your boss. Did you do that? If you are a procrastinator, why not start a side project you feel passionate about. Apparently you can work fast, so I would suggest doing more (like side projects or learn new programming stuff). Seems silly advice maybe, but I think it might help you. But, if you really don't like your job, don't stay just because you like the company or the colleagues. You can see the colleagues after work and in weekends.

</comment><comment><USER4> You can read all self-help advice in the world regarding procrastination. You can create lists, mark "X"s on calendars, prioritize, promodo or whatever but in the end, the motivation has to come from within. To draw a perfect analogy, I read a post about how one guy suffering from heroin abuse, one day just decided to quit seeing the company he was in. You can join the best de- addiction center but still the motivation to quit has to come from within.

See the problem is just in getting started, once you start and get excited with small success you can beat the "instant gratification monkey". There is no magic solution to procrastination I am afraid. Believe me, I have learned it the hard way. You have to learn to prioritize things in life. Do you want to be one of those middle-aged fatso who regret everyday of their life?

</comment><comment><USER5> Doctor, doctor, doctor: you need a psychiatrist, and I hope you find a good one. And give yourself TIME to get better. progressively. Hope it gets OK.

</comment><comment><USER6> I was depressed for years and supplements, specifically omega 3 fatty acids, plus therapy cured me of my depression</comment>


Show HN: Infobesity - <AUTHOR> http://lambdaway.free.fr/workshop/?view=infobesity <comment><USER2> Not a Show HN.

<comment><AUTHOR> Why Not! And where should I share what I think about "infobesity"?

<comment><USER2> Show HN is for products, working pieces of code, not ideas. For that you must submit a normal link.

(But I liked your ideas on the matter, although I was expecting a solution in the end.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your gentle answer. I have no solution except to say we must believe in our intelligence and throw away prosthesis. Today my answer is in what I call the {lambda way} project, [http://lambdaway.free.fr/](http://lambdaway.free.fr/). A small blocknote with a kind of dialect of lambda calculus for dummies (like me). A dwarf on the shoulders of web browsers, the modern giants. Sometimes I come here in Hacker News and ask « Is there anybody out there? »

<comment><USER2> I had already browsed that page, but to me it seemed very complicated (I didn't even get what is lambdaway exactly), so perhaps it is too much for normal people.

(I am a mildly-experienced programmer, although I don't know anything about lambda calculus.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Maybe this one [http://lambdaway.free.fr/workshop/?view=quick_intro](http://lambdaway.free.fr/workshop/?view=quick_intro) could be easier to read.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Flash runs faster, more efficiently than HTML5 on mobile - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2010/09/flash-runs-faster-more-efficiently-than-html5-on-mobile.html

<comment><USER2> This demo says Flash animation runs faster and more efficiently than HTML5 canvas. What everyone cares about, though, is how fast/efficient video is.

</comment><comment><USER3> Too late Adobe. Everyone hates you.</comment>


Kaspersky's 'Slingshot' report burned an ISIS-focused intelligence operation - <AUTHOR> https://www.cyberscoop.com/kaspersky-slingshot-isis-operation-socom-five-eyes/ <comment><USER2> The article indicates that Kaspersky probably knew what it was doing, what it was revealing, when it issued the report. The question then is, do they or other security firms typically hold back on things like this?</comment>


How I almost killed Facebook - <AUTHOR> http://matt-welsh.blogspot.com/2009/02/how-i-almost-killed-facebook.html <comment><USER2> _"Of course, at that time I thought that social networking sites were a complete waste of time -- both for the users and those developing the sites -- so I earnestly tried to talk Mark out of squandering his precious Harvard education on such a frivolous endeavor. "You think you're going to compete against Friendster and Orkut?" was the general outline of my argument. There were already too many social networking sites out there, I claimed, and building yet another one was clearly a waste of time."_

Interestingly the argument against building a social network is still the same, and inevitably someone will come along, not listen to the advice and create the next facebook. These things seem to be cyclic in nature.

<comment><USER3> When Google startup, many people suggested that there are too many search engines out there and yet another search engine will not succeed. However, after Google, there is no major search engine emergence. For SNS, maybe there will be a next Facebook, but the chance is much rare than before. In Orkut/Friendster era, not so many people daily live on social network. For now, everyone online knows SNS and Facebook. That is the most obvious barrier for new comers, people's custom.

<comment><USER4> This.

Everything is cyclical and doomed to fail until something better breaks that repeating pattern. It happened with Amazon before Web 2.0, when everybody thought it was doomed to fail. I'd bet it happens with Facebook.

It deserved repeating, because I don't think some people get it: Friendster had a few users. Myspace had a lot. Facebook has every single college student and now it has every single high school student, and almost every person checks it at least once per day, and in the last 6 months it's been picking up in every demographic. Facebook is a part of life for those people, in a way that Twitter or Tumblr or Flickr or even a huge site like Youtube is not. It's not going down without a fight.

<comment><USER5> YouTube probably doesn't deserve to be lumped with Twitter, Tumblr, or Flickr, but you're right -- Facebook has been a part of my every day fabric for a few years now, and it's only growing.

My parents, cousins, aunts, and uncles all use it, for goodness' sake.

Sites I'm in contact with every day: Facebook, Google (search, mail, reader), YouTube, Twitter, and HN.

As an aside, I honestly think Twitter will become very mainstream. I'm already seeing more pop-culture references every day, and have friends I never would have expected to see on it following me. It's certainly busted out of the Silicon Valley bubble, which honestly surprised me a lot. A year ago I thought of Twitter as the quintessential by-the-Valley-for-the-Valley startup.

<comment><USER6> > As an aside, I honestly think Twitter will become very mainstream.

I'm rooting for Twitter to succeed independently (e.g. not acquired by Google or Facebook).

I think I started suspecting Twitter was reaching out to the mainstream (or at least the younger generation) when I would click on random public timeline and/or summize search result rows and find people who had 40-50 followers, talking about what was going on in their life (e.g. normal, average people not social media cultists)

The power of Twitter is that is like a cocktail party laced with real-time search capabilities.

<comment><USER4> That's exactly what makes me wonder whether it will succeed in mainstream despite the advent of Facebook statuses and antisocialites like myself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Matt Welsh could also claim some credit for making Linux popular. He wrote most of the user oriented documentation back when Linux was new, and founded the Linux Documentation Project.

<comment><USER8> Oh... _that_ Matt Welsh! Cool, yeah, I had the O'Reilly book with the cowboy on it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've always been curious to know how much of Facebook was Zuckerberg and how much was other people. A lot of people are quick to slap him down, but quite a few accounts say that he's as brilliant as he's credited for.

<comment><USER9> He was offered a near $1-million offer from Microsoft, just for a job there, so his ability's not in dispute (unless $1-million is peanuts nowadays).

<comment><USER10> wasn't that to acquire the app he built which suggests new music to listen to on your computer? and he rejected that and decided instead to go to harvard?

i bet he was just trying to buy more time to build something bigger. from what i've heard, he was very much on a rapid fire mode with his projects. if one failed or didn't grow very quickly, he wouldn't wait long before moving on to another one.

<comment><USER4> That music player is impressive. I didn't know he'd made anything before Facebook.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is very off-topic, but in the last few years I've noticed more and more intelligent people misspelling words phonetically ("unphased" instead of "unfazed").

I can understand someone flubbing pronunciation (eg "macabre", "learned"), but what is causing this other phenomenon? Are people (Harvard professors!) not reading as much as they used to? Are they less concerned about editing? Is this the last great challenge for spellcheck?

<comment><USER12> The most intelligent people in the world make mistakes...pretty sure spelling error is inconsequential for him.

<comment><USER11> Of course the mistake is not important. I'm just wondering about how it happens. If someone learns most of their words from books, you can tell because they will use a word correctly but say it oddly. I'm wondering what causes someone to use a word correctly but spell it phonetically. Are we speaking more and writing less? Hard to believe, no?

<comment><USER13> I don't know about other people, but I have always heard what I'm writing in my head before I type it out. Sometimes, especially if I'm a little distracted, this produces misspelled words that would be pronounced correctly or homonyms like "hear" instead of "here".

On the chance that it might help, I think the funnel is something like:

-ideas/shapes which are always moving around->selecting the appropriate/better/good enough one out of these by focusing on it more. this always feels kind of like a sorter appraising different things bubbling up and sinking on the surface of a pool.

-this selected one at the fore gets structured to be said probably more precisely that feeling right before you actually say something. if this is going well, little is lost between the thought and what comes out of the structuring, but sometimes the thoughts are much worse from the process.

-this structured thing gets more concrete as I touch type it and somehow grammar and punctuation get in there.

-this gets a look over as it is coming out for errors. is it gibberish or not, is the grammar correct, do I like it.

Depending on what I'm concerned with different amounts of effort are going into those different sections. I think the error gets put in pretty close to when it gets typed out.

<comment><USER11> That's very interesting... and a little creepy. It's like you are taking dictation from yourself.

<comment><USER13> I suppose so. It's like that for everything though. If I want to draw a drawing, some part of me is picturing the drawing before it flows out, usually looking much worse than it did in my head. If I'm writing a program, some part of me is seeing the structure and how it works and fits together before it flows out. If I'm playing soccer, I see what I'd like to be doing before it flows out.

I think it helps that the process almost always feels like a cooperative enterprise. Injury of some sort or another definitely will effect it. Something is always in my head out there a bit ahead (sometimes only very little) of whatever my body is doing.

Maybe this is uncommon but I've never really gotten that impression from talking with people or other people's recitations of their experiences. I've never really talked with too many people about it though. "How do you feel your brain and body do things?" isn't exactly the kind of question one asks in the elevator, waiting in line, or on a plane.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> How did the author 'almost kill facebook' if Zuckerberg was 'unphased' by his argument in this single conversation they had?

<comment><USER15> I don't think he is being entirely serious in this post, which is sprinkled with self-deprecation masquerading as egotism.

<comment><USER16> It struck me as egotism masquerading as self-deprecation.

It'd be like my talking about how I almost destroyed Microsoft because I used to tease Gates about he was wasting his time programming those silly microcomputers, when he was hacking late at night on his 8080 assembler/linker/simulator in the PDP-10 machine room at the old Harvard CRCT. (Which happens to be true. ;-)

<comment><USER17> _It struck me as egotism masquerading as self-deprecation._

Damn, you beat me to it! I was going to say: Egotism masquerading as self- deprecation masquerading as egotism.

Edit: That's a pretty great story about Gates, and it got me curious, so I googled some other places where you mentioned him. This one was my favorite, because it confirms a belief I have about companies' personalities reflecting their founders':

[http://caelumetterra.wordpress.com/2006/01/19/ceos-red-in- to...](http://caelumetterra.wordpress.com/2006/01/19/ceos-red-in-tooth-and- claw/#comment-1110)

It also makes a shrewd observation about Microsoft.

<comment><USER17> Meant to add: sorry for web-stalking you... that tidbit was just too enticing to pass up!

<comment><USER16> Oh, not at all. It's all public record.

You found me off in some odd corners of the net, I see (Catholic agrarianism, in this case).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> _"I suggested to him that they really needed to find a way to get people to login to the site regularly. With most social networking sites, you sign up, add your few dozen friends, and maybe for one or two weeks get a kick out of messaging them as they join your friend list. But after that, there's little or no reason to keep returning to the site -- as a result your profile just stagnates. Well, wouldn't you know it -- a few months later Facebook came out with the News Feed feature which shows you what all of your friends are up on on an up-to-the-minute basis. Pure genius! Had I only thought to patent the idea..."_

Although Matt is obviously joking, the question is why did he even write this, if not to try to take some credit for the news feed? I've thought of at least half a dozen ideas identical to what YC had later funded, and the reality is that between the time I thought of it and the appearance of the same thing a few months later, the actual development of that began months earlier, and likely multiple groups formed and applied with a similar idea, and I did not develop or apply for funding for the idea. However, in his case, it doesn't sound like he even had a similar idea, but is just confusing giving somebody goodwill advice with having a piece of the credit in the creation of any features that are released in the next three months.

</comment><comment><USER19> fleaflicker has a "front office" feed displaying a league's recent activity. I launched it 4 months before facebook's friend feed. A cool idea but hardly original or patentable.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's almost surely patentable, I think. A generic activity feed is not novel, of course, but the context (using it for social activities, methods for selecting what appears in the feed) is significant.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> While this is interesting, it is just one bullet on my list of reasons not to grade based on class participation...

<comment><USER21> I'd add "not take business advice from teachers" to your list too...

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I will always give The Harvard Crimson and the press at large more credit than Mark for spreading Facebook.

</comment><comment><USER23> Yea right.

Cry me a river.

</comment><comment><USER24> good read. different point of view.</comment>


GoLang 1.1 Updated With Race Detector - <AUTHOR> http://www.drdobbs.com/web-development/google-updates-go-open-source-language/240155311

<comment><AUTHOR> the manual <http://golang.org/doc/articles/race_detector.html> describes it in some more detail.

edit-1 : i guess, erlang's approach of immutability seems much better than any heuristic that conjured up to compensate for inherent un-safety in the language.</comment>


PSA: If haven't watched the YC startup class videos, you should - <AUTHOR>

<comment><AUTHOR> Original title, shortened due to 80 char limit

PSA: If you're starting a company and you haven't watched the YC startup class videos, you should.

</comment><comment><USER2> Or do what I did: download them as audio files onto your phone and listen to them on the go. I never felt I was missing much by not having visuals and it makes for great dog-walking material.

</comment><comment><USER3> The videos are here: [http://startupclass.samaltman.com/](http://startupclass.samaltman.com/)

</comment><comment><USER4> You really should watch them all, the quality varies a little from very good to great.</comment>


First successfully grown human skin in the lab - <AUTHOR> http://www.mediadesk.uzh.ch/articles/2014/erstmals-im-labor-haut-mit-blut-und-lymphgefaessen-erzeugt_en.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Creepy I know, but being able to grow skin like this will really help a lot of people who are injured by acid spills or burns.</comment>


Clojure JNA - access C libs from Clojure - <AUTHOR> http://github.com/Chouser/clojure-jna/tree/master

<comment> old-gregg JVM will access your "C libs" just fine, but the code written for JVM usually stays under JVM.

I am sure it's possible to go the opposite direction, but then there is "fun" of dragging this fat pig alongside your application. I.e. JVM bytecode is as useful as a swap file to CRuby, CPython, C, Haskell, OCaml and millions of other programmers. Linux would have died long ago if JVM took off. I'm glad it didn't.

Got an idea for a cool open source project? Don't bury it under 6 feet of JVM. Please.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> The reason I posted this is that recently I've been seeing some complaints about clojure performance and this seems like a great way to get close to the metal when you really need to.

</comment><comment><USER2> What are good places to look for interesting C and C++ libraries? I am more familiar with the Java world, no idea where to start looking for C libs.</comment>


Google Claims 'Quantum Supremacy' - <AUTHOR> https://fortune.com/2019/09/20/google-claims-quantum-supremacy/ <comment> core-questions Seems to me the thrust of the actual paper is:

> To demonstrate quantum supremacy, we compare our quantum processor against > state-of-the-art classical computers in the task of sampling the output of a > pseudo-random quantum circuit

So it's better at being itself than a classical computer simulating itself. I suppose this is _something_, but there's no demonstrable business value to doing that.

</comment><comment><USER2> Quote:

> The experiment described in the paper sampled randomly generated numbers > produced through a specialized scenario involving quantum phenomena.

Why even write that sentence? It literally means nothing. From a tech perspective, it makes me completely doubt both the authors competency and googles supposed claim. It sounds alot like modern snake-oil salesmanship.</comment>


Behind the Johns Hopkins University coronavirus dashboard - <AUTHOR> https://www.natureindex.com/news-blog/behind-johns-hopkins-university-coronavirus-dashboard <comment><USER2> I will say it has held up very well under the loads it will be experiencing and seen it evolve bit by bit since the very start and using it daily since that early january inception and been interesting slowly see it's reference appear and grow in usage across the various avenues of the internet.

</comment><comment><USER3> I always felt the dashboard looked and felt sensationalist and provided less information than what it could have.

Most of the view is used up to create a map that looks more like a board game, and perhaps fits people's perception of what a pandemic map "should look like" rather than being a resource of utility.

Those large red circles of arbitrary sizes don't scale well.

There many better alternatives IMHO, like the Worldometer corona tracker.

</comment><comment><USER4> It's a shame they don't get more technical on how they are processing 1B hits per day.

<comment><USER5> They're not hosting it, so that's not a direct concern. It's hosted on arcgis.org

<comment><USER4> Ah thanks, I assumed Arcgis was a project by them too.</comment></comment></comment>


Firm advertises for naked female web coders - <AUTHOR> http://www.tgdaily.com/unbalanced/55211-british-firm-advertises-for-naked-female-web-coders <comment><USER2> I can't believe it! They are actually using CRT monitors?

</comment><comment><USER3> Please mark NSFW. That image is ambiguous.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> NSFW... Sorry forgot to add it to title...</comment>


An at-home battery to make outdated energy grids more efficient - <AUTHOR> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ericclifton/orison-rethink-the-power-of-energy?ref=HappeningNewsletterJan2916 <comment><USER2> This is really suspect. Note these two quotes:

"Orison will automatically store energy when utility rates are low, and then use that energy to power your home or business when rates are high. During a power outage, it will automatically power your home or business and make sure none of your stored energy is sent back to the grid."

and:

"Simply plug it in like you would any other appliance, and you're done. Orison automatically begins working. No permits, construction, or wiring required."

Unless your home already has a transfer and isolation switch installed [which would require permits, wiring, and possibly construction], "simply plugging" this in will not prevent power from being back fed to the grid during a power outage. Which right there would be a violation of the electrical code in most locations. Why? Because homes back-feeding the grid during outages result in an electrocution risk for any linemen working on restoring the grid to operation.

So, as described, this will never meet electrical code requirements, and "simply plugging it in" would be a huge safety and possibly legal issue for the owner.</comment>


Why Shitty Products Survive and Thrive - <AUTHOR> http://deap.co/2016/01/29/how-bad-products-survive/ <comment><USER2> This is a really, really, important point. How many times have you gotten an app or a tool, used it a few times, and then not ever used it again? If you are an early adopter type you probably have many times. Whether it is todo lists or pizza delivery, if you don't do it enough to ingrain the habit it doesn't stick. And once your head is filled with the cognitive load of day to day stuff you revert to your habits (which are not 'the new thing').

My favorite example is for this is Evernote, which I know a lot of people tried and never got anywhere with. If you don't have the habit of just sticking stuff in Evernote, stuff won't be there when you are looking for it, and your habit of using it will never develop because there is no "reward" for using it. And few people have the stamina to force themselves to use something long enough for the habit to kick in.

That is why businesses, apps, and others need to have some mechanism that helps remind you for at least a month to repeatedly use the product, in order to train your subconscious in its availability. And it is why customer acquisition is so hard.

<comment><USER3> For me, this is Twitter. I'm mostly a reader. Writing tweets was incredibly unsatisfying so far and I never got into any kind of habit with it.

Sometimes, I have the urge to simply get some random thoughts out of my brain. Sounds like a perfect thing for Twitter, except with Twitter, I have the expectation that my stuff somehow gets noticed.

So instead, I use JOURNAL.TXT for that. I write the thought down, it's out of the system and the urge fades. And there's clearly no expectation for my thoughts to go anywhere. It's written for an audience of one.

<comment><USER4> Some years ago I came up with a system which I still use extensively. I added these lines to my .bashrc file:

      log(){
      pushd ~/logs;
      echo >> $*;
      date >> $*;
      cat >> $*;
      }

So whenever I have a piece of information that I'd like to keep - a thought on a project, a word from a foreign language I am learning, ideas for christmas gifts, some bash-fu and so on... - I fire up a terminal (mod+return, in my case) and enter

      log filename

Now I can type down that piece of information right away. File names could be "english" (for vocab) or "xmas" (for gifts) or the name of a project. So either the file already exists and I thus add to it or a new file is created instantly.

It is super quick and non-distracting (i.e. I don't 'accidentally' get carried away by looking at previous thoughts or tweaking the config of a journal application etc.) What's more I find it very convenient that the function automatically adds the current date to each entry.

Btw, I've got another function called "show" which I can call whenever I feel like just briefly skimming through a file

      show(){
      cat ~/logs/$*;
      }

For my daily todo list I enjoy abusing markdown syntax. I do this because syntax highlighting makes it easier to quickly scan through the files. (I use gedit with the monokai theme)

So at the beginning the list looks something likes this:

Task 1

Task 2

<!-- some details on task 2 -->

Task3

Task4

<!-- some details on task 4 -->

(comments turn gray so that actual tasks stand out)

Whenever I begin a task I place a "-" in front of its line. Now I see this red minus and thus know that I have started a task that needs to be completed. When I've finished the task I replace the - with a # and now the whole line turns blue. I've line numbers enabled in gedit so when I want to change the status of an item I simply hit ctrl+i and enter the corresponding line number. Some tasks occur daily, at least for a while. In that case I revisit a task's line again at the end of the day and remove the "#". Similarly, when I want to delete an unnecessary task I go to its line and hit ctrl+d and thus delete it. It is super primitive but I like it. ;)

<comment><USER5> > So either the file already exists and I thus add to it or a new file is > created instantly.

If you want the same thing but want to do it in an app instead of manually in the terminal you should check out Notational Velocity ([http://notational.net](http://notational.net)).

<comment><USER6> Looks interesting.

But only MacOS? No Linux?

Encrypted database? I once tried a password keeper. I think it was called xpassword or something like that. After having a corrupted database twice within days, I pass.

I you want privacy your HDD should be encrypted anyway.

<comment><USER7> nvpy is a functional but admitedly very ugly linux clone. Both can use Simplenote, which works similarly if you're fine with a webapp.

For the windows crowd there is the also ugly-but-functional ResophNotes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think perhaps the writer is using some cognitive dissonance to unfairly dismiss the market leaders as being "shitty". Any time I have used OpenTable (as a user) it has been a really great experience. It does exactly what you expect it to do, and it's always a very smooth experience.

OpenTable has been around since 1998, so I imagine they are the market leader because they were the first to market and their product works well. You can never please everyone, but just because a product doesn't have your pet feature doesn't mean it is "shitty".

<comment><USER9> My experiences with it are that it is extremely shitty. I often go to it to see if there are any tables at my desired time, and if there are, I manually call the place and book the reservation directly. Whenever I go to it, it tries to push a bunch of unrelated crap to me. No, I don't want to get daily emails about this restaurant I'm eating at once while on vacation. (Does anyone want that?) The UI is horrible and confusing. I avoid it if possible, and only grudgingly use it when I don't have another choice (near wifi, but no cell signal, for example).

<comment><USER8> >No, I don't want to get daily emails about this restaurant I'm eating at once while on vacation

I'm a spam nazi...if anyone spams me, I'll remember. I see I still have the firstname.lastname@example.com active, which means they haven't spammed me yet.

I just had another look at their site, and I don't see any UI issues myself. You find the restaurant, choose date, and it shows you the times available. You then just confirm the details and click COMPLETE RESERVATION. Nothing too skanky about that. There are boxes you can tick in the confirmation page to subscribe to updates, but they are unticked by default (at least in Canada, where it is now illegal to sign people up automatically).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Imagine facebook is a spherical magnet with ten thousand small lead balls clung to it. If you're trying to create a better magnet it can't just be the same as facebook's. Putting the same magnet near facebook's will only collect a small handful of peripheral users. If you want to capture the critical mass you have to energize a magnet with an attractive force so great that it will begin to vibrate users close to the facebook core and attract them through the empty space between to you.

<comment><USER11> I found a better analogy to be a fire.

Think of products/startups as fires, they start small, can't use large logs straight away, need constant attention, you could use a lot of petrol (financing) to get it started faster, but it could also just fizzle out immediately if the large logs don't catch fire as well.

Once they get going, you don't have to watch it so closely, you can just add a log here and there, maybe remove some ash.

The goal of the fire is to get people to gather around it. The warmth in this case matters a lot, but also the people gathering around the fire.

In fact some people might pick another fire because it has people who are interested in the same things as them.

Sometimes a fire gathers TOO many people, and it gets crowded. The maker of the fire didn't make sure it grew large enought to provide warmth to many people - and so people on the outside get cold and go to another fire.

Most of the time though, if someone is by a fire that provides enough warmth for him and he likes the people around it, there is little compelling reason to go to another one.

<comment><USER12> I am generally not a fan of analogies but I think yours is a good one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I've just learned this lesson the hard way. I had my own terminology for it, so it's helpful and educational to learn words and phrases that others will understand and use.

But absolutely, I'm exactly the type of person the article is talking about, I have experience and an amazing team, and our "improvements" have more or less failed spectacularly. We learned that design ideas that are "better" than the status quo often confuse and alienate customers, because they're already used to something, and everyone else does it that way. A de facto standard is a powerful force, and shouldn't be ignored or shunned.

I have to do _something_ different! so I'm thinking the solution is to do only one "improvement" differently at a time, and to do it very slowly and deliberately, and with a lot of two-way communication along the way. That's a theory, who has evidence for or against?

<comment><USER14> Without knowing anything about your product or market it's really hard to say, but my gut reaction is to be skeptical that the incremental improvement strategy would work out better.

Is there anything other than a "better" design that differentiates your product? Or, if not, can you acquire your customers differently, at a point where they aren't already habituated to doing things the bad old way?

Ultimately I would say your best bet is to get back to basics and spend a ton of time listening to customers and watching them use your product, and your competitors' products. You might have changed the wrong things about the design? Or maybe there's some other pain point they actually have, but no one even thinks it's possible to do things differently because they're so used to the status quo.

I would also be very mindful of incentives of various people, including both the users and the purchasers. Users in workplaces don't necessarily want something that is faster or more efficient to use (in a business setting they might have job secuirty, pay, andceven self-worth tied to knowing how to use a very complicated system). Buyers who aren't users very often buy based on specs more than design or ease of use (easier to rationally explain decision to higher ups). Consumers often buy/engage for how things make them feel, or for satisfying one of a few very basic desires (which they might not want to admit).

Not sure how applicable, or new, this is go you. These are just thoughts that come to mind.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> It reminds me of the GoT dialogue " Chaos is a ladder, my friend" : What I mean is the products that are 'shitty' and are thriving is because probably each one of them were created to solve a problem where absolutely nothing like that product existed before and the original product founders were sharp enough to notice a market and business opportunity. This shitty product was so good when it came out, it changed the way ppl did business and led to its mass adoption with little marketing. The other better products that came later on, however usable they are, are probably providing marginal ( as per the product users) value over the previous product hence lower adoption rate and requires huge marketing $. That is why if you notice a new market/business opportunity it is most lucrative path.

</comment><comment><USER16> This is a great article. So true at all the levels.

Look at any mid to large scale company and their internal ticketing systems, HR systems, travel booking systems, time tracking systems.

The last company I worked for, did not upgrade the employee laptop OS from Windows XP for over 10 years as their legacy ticketing system wasnt supported on the newer versions. Obviously this was a cost issue of the new ticketing platform but also the unknown cost of retraining the whole company. Additionally people and organizations get comfortable with the "evil you know".

Frankly as a new entrepreneur this is also incredibly hard to test in the market. Most early customer development will give you signals that they want it, but won't act when it comes time to switch.

This is why you see SaaS services succeeding by cracking few employees or small teams at a time. Think of Yammer, Slack etc.

They don't need the whole company or department to change. Just few employees or the team can use it and slowly infect the rest of the company. That would be the only way to overcome this problem (although not all products can do this).

</comment><comment><USER17> MS Office, which to this day has features its competitors don't, isn't really a great example.

<comment><USER18> Indeed MS Office can be a pain the neck, but I haven't found a better product in the same market category (i.e. desktop WYSIWYG office suites)

<comment><USER19> That's not because MS Office is great. It's because it's really capital- intensive to build an office suite, and no VC is going to fund you to compete with MS.

<comment><USER17> There are competitors today and there were others in the past.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> _" Broken gets fixed; crappy lasts forever_" [http://dandreamsofcoding.com/2013/05/06/broke-gets-fixed- cra...](http://dandreamsofcoding.com/2013/05/06/broke-gets-fixed-crappy-is- forever/)

</comment><comment><USER21> Designers often describe the terms convention and intuition as contributing to good user experience. Convention is the "institutional knowledge" described in the article. Intuition is how easy something is to use without prior experience or convention. For instance, a car steering wheel is not intuitive but is rather conventional. If you make a car without a steering wheel, it may be better, but it won't be as popular.

Regardless, I don't think the article accurately represents other forces in adoption and popularity outside of convention and intuition. There are many things such as chance, social trends, commercial backing, et al.

<comment><USER22> Ctrl F quickly revealed that you're the first poster to mention "convention" ("institutional knowledge" decoded) and emphasize its importance...

By definition, half the human population is below average in intelligence (half above)...average people typically go with the flow...the above average often question the flow...the gifted are constantly aware of the flow, but are often complacent if they're not in a position to force-feed change...

Resistance to change is a powerful force, especially when your business (owner), or job (employee) may be at stake in the form of risk-taking that will lead to uncertain outcomes...

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Perhaps a litte off topic but does anyone here hate open table, if so can you share why? I've always found making a reservation a very plesant experience. To see all the availble times and make a reservation only takes a couple clicks.

<comment><USER24> The article is from the point of view of the restaurant, claiming the backend tooling sucks, which wouldn't surprise me. Optimizing the front end consumer experience while neglecting the back office is not uncommon.

<comment><USER23> Ok, this makes sense now. I read "restaurant customers" as the customers of the restaurant (i.e. people wanting to reserve a table) not the restaurants themselves. Makes sense now. Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This article seems a little tech-centric. Products don't tend to flourish based purely on technical merit, and there could be many reasons why that product has thrived other than network effects, e.g. aggressive pricing strategies, good sales team, good marketing, brand awareness from customers, switching costs for the restaurant, the health of the food service industry, or perhaps it doesn't bring in enough customers for it to be a priority for restaurateurs, etc etc.

If shitty products tend to thrive it's probably more often due to industry lifecycles, incumbent dominance, solidification of position via acquisitions etc, and the difficulties of innovating in large organisations

</comment><comment><USER26> Can you not just clone the shitty product so existing training is still useful? Do software companies enforce copyrights on things like the location of buttons and the names of menu items?

<comment><USER27> Patents are probably the most powerful tool for entrenched players here. Adobe patented several GUI conventions including their most common shortcut key commands in Photoshop, so that competitors would always have a slight learning curve for new users.

Occasionally more aggressive companies will come after a cloned product with a lawsuit, for instance Facebook sued a number of early competitors for various intellectual property and trademark reasons. Doesn't hold up in court publicly but I imagine there have been a lot of backroom settlements made this way over the years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> This article makes a good point. Any switch to a new product has to exceed the cost / benefit ratio of the old one, and familiarity of staff in high turnover industries certainly factors in to that CBR. So, you don't need to make a product that's just "better" to compete in these industries, it needs to be _spectacularly_ better in order to convince business owners to invest the time in educating existing and new hires. An important point.

</comment><comment><USER29> Bad software survives because major investments by large organizations were made in tools that had closed (and even platform-specific) file formats. At the time, maybe no one fully understood the gravity of the investment they were making. Since the _data_ is hard to interpret consistently, competition is practically impossible.

Regulation of software is overdue. I can think of a few rules off the bat that would make a huge difference in spurring the development of quality software:

1\. New software files such as documents must be stored in a format that can be read without ambiguity by modern machines, adhering to all regulations.

2\. _Executable specifications_ for all interpretations of file formats must be provided publicly, since broadly-available cross-platform execution environments (e.g. Python) are now widely available. In other words, you're not allowed to obfuscate what your file format does by publishing a 500 page document to explain how a single spreadsheet row is interpreted; you must instead provide, for example, a short Python script to illustrate the exact behavior, that anyone on any system can inspect and run.

3\. Auditors must be able to correlate your software's interpretation of files with your executable specifications. Any discrepancies require the software to be updated, for as far back as issues have been found.

4\. Software is prohibited from re-saving any file in an older format that does not adhere to regulated behavior. Users are not permitted to avoid this type of auto-upgrade, any more than they are permitted to continue wiring their houses with last century's electrical codes.

5\. Software may not depend on the behavior of machines or methods that are impractical to obtain (e.g. "what Windows 95 used to do here"). If existing formats have such restrictions, they must upgrade according to the step above.

<comment><USER30> I love the thrust of your argument, but I think we all know how pragmatically, this will never happen any time soon. Could you imagine a "Bureau of Software Fidelity" or somesuch? We can't even get the post office to deliver mail regularly in some parts of the country, and that's been their primary function for over 100 years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Because 'economics'. Switching costs, network effects, etc...

Here's my favorite book on the subject: [http://amzn.to/1JMtX0X](http://amzn.to/1JMtX0X)

And yes, that's an affiliate link: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10982630](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10982630)

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

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

<comment><USER32> Also craigslist.org.

That site looks like 1995 called and wants its web page back. It's a triumph of non-engineering.

But that network effect. Man oh man.

<comment><USER33> What features would make craigslist better? I like it not in spite of its bareness but because of it.

<comment><USER34> I would add some minimal responsive css so its easier to click on the form elements on a mobile phone

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Every new product needs to overcome the formula "product value >> adoption cost".

You can simplify and call OpenTable shitty, but they met this threshold with their customers. Their customer looked at their product and said, it's new and different, but it is worth it.

If you can't displace an existing solution you haven't got it right.

If the value is significantly greater and it is only about UI familiarity there are many ways around it. One way is to emulate the UI of the product you are displacing. This famously happened in the Word vs. WordPerfect wars.

</comment><comment><USER36> This resonates with me with regard to software projects.

Maybe the refactoring and/or innovation aversion I've seen in many software projects has to do mostly with this institutional knowledge the article talks about.

It doesn't matter how crappy a project is or how many defects the team agrees a project has... introducing a different solution is seen as prohibitively risky or costly, given the amount of time people has spent learning and putting in place workarounds.

</comment><comment><USER37> Can anyone with startup experience talk about the effectiveness of the method that Simon Sinek promotes [1] as a way to break through a market filled with "shitty" products?

[1]: [https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_insp...](https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action?language=en)

<comment><USER38> What Simon says is actually marketing 101.. they teach this in undergrad intro marketing (without all the bs about 'greatness', etc). The problem with it when it comes to startups/small businesses, is that it's expensive. If you want to go that route, you need to get out the entire message - A + B + C. Whereas, the sales-based approach he's criticizing, you only need to get out C and part of B.

So if you want to go the marketing route, you're going to be spending a lot more on ads, pr, etc to get your entire message out there.

Despite what he says, Apple did not follow the path he says. Apple in its early days followed the sales-based approach. It wasnt until they were making money that they turned to a marketing-based approach. This is a very normal route for companies to take.

[Edit: now that you understand this is marketing vs sales.. you can find plenty of articles on this by pg, jessica livingston and others.]

<comment><USER37> Are you sure about it being marketing 101 and not 901? I can clearly see 100% of ads I've seen over the past month from established or younger companies doing exactly what Simon is criticizing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> While yes, I do use OpenTable for places at which I am already an existing customer, it's not that simple. I'm usually not willing to visit a restaurant that I might not get into. OT is the most painless way to make the reservation, and I far prefer this over calling. Without a restaurant being accessible on OT, I would not be going there nearly as often.

</comment><comment><USER40> This goes equally well for all these new languages popping up. Even if it is better at everything it does that is not enough. Legacy code and developer community consists of huge amounts of institutional knowledge. Its asking a lot of anyone to make the change.

I think about the only new languages that have a chance are domain specific languages in a brand new domain.

</comment><comment><USER34> the book Hooked does a good job talking about what makes a product habit forming. I almost think its all hindsight in the examples they use.

Positioning something in your mind is so difficult in this day and age with so much information overload.

</comment><comment><USER41> Also explains why shitty code thrives.

</comment><comment><USER42> MS Office (specifically Excel) is not a shitty product. There's a reason why it has a larger monopoly with finance types Wall Street than Google does with search. Power users can quickly build powerful financial models with it.

<comment><USER43> Doing complex modelling in Excel is not a good idea. There is no way to do proper software engineering, so bugs are common and hard to find. For examples, see

[http://www.eusprig.org/horror-stories.htm](http://www.eusprig.org/horror- stories.htm)

<comment><USER44> Except "proper software engineering" would mean whatever is being built simply never gets built.

In many cases it's better to get somewhere quickly with excel then work out if "proper software engineering" is required than never get off the ground because engineering something is too difficult.

Think of excel like lego. Someone can quickly build something out of lego. Now if someone tried to build a cathedral from lego, you might suggest that they find an architect and do some proper house building, but without lego they would never have tried.

And chances are they're not building a cathedral.

<comment><USER43> Just like I wouldn't want to live in a house built from LEGO, I'm somewhat wary of Excel models as the basis for investment strategies in major banks. The problem with the quick and hacky solution is that it's never replaced, because that would cost money, and the current solution "looks like it works".

<comment><USER45> However the excel solution has a lot of things going for it :

1) applications/reports built by the people designing and understanding the underlying needs and inner workings of whatever they're offering. Whilst very good programmers can match this (given enough - that's a lot - time), average programmers won't even try.

2) excel sheets require nowhere near the manpower required for your alternative. That factors into a cost-benefit analysis that may not favor real development.

3) Speed of development. Markets change. Investments change. Sometimes literally in minutes. Anything involving more than 1-2 people who are intimately involved in the strategy itself cannot possibly keep up.

4) Excel is in fact a pure functional programming language [1]. Unless you deeply understand excel I wouldn't be so quick to call it stupid. There are entire classes of bugs that simply can't exist in excel spreadsheets that are regularly found in programs.

[1] [http://ndc-london.com/talk/pure-functional-programming-in- ex...](http://ndc-london.com/talk/pure-functional-programming-in-excel/)

These sheets are pretty good. You can really get nice app ideas from some of them: [http://www.exinfm.com/free_spreadsheets.html](http://www.exinfm.com/free_spreadsheets.html)

<comment><USER46> "excel sheets require nowhere near the manpower required for your alternative. That factors into a cost-benefit analysis that may not favor real development."

Not to build, but to maintain and constantly clean up the errors by using the wrong tool for the job. I know form experience having wasted countless hours because my organisation insisted on using it as a tool to upload data to our database, and using it as the database before that.

<comment> nommm-nommm The errors they invariably introduce are also very expensive. Not just fixing them, but actions on incorrect data can be very very expensive. I've seen it, and in my experience its almost universal.

I'm not saying Excel is always the wrong solution, I am saying Excel is not always the right solution but it can appear to be. That makes it very dangerous.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> While we are all going off-topic, I'd like to see a "collapse thread" feature on HN. Quite often the comments page is dominated by a tangential discussion as seen here.

<comment><USER48> I agree, the author picked a really bad example(Office) to make his otherwise good point. Office certainly isn't a shitty product compared to its competition.

You can use browser extensions like hckrnews or 'Hacker news enhancement suite' to collapse comments.

[http://hckrnews.com/about.html#extensions](http://hckrnews.com/about.html#extensions) [http://hckrnews.com/about.html#extensions](http://hckrnews.com/about.html#extensions)

<comment><USER49> I love you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> dude, it's called first mover advantage

<comment><USER51> Seems like this should have triggered the dupe warning?

</comment></comment><comment><USER52>
       s/OpenTable/Microsoft Word/g;
       s/Microsoft Word/Microsoft Windows/g;</comment>


Battling Superstition, Indian Pays With His Life - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/25/world/asia/battling-superstition-indian-paid-with-his-life.html

<comment><USER2> Sad but predictable. Maybe the gullible deserve their fleecing.</comment>