Rambo's Death Chart - <AUTHOR> http://www.slashfilm.com/wp/wp-content/images/rambo-death-chart.jpg

<comment><USER2> I think the trend is very interesting and the post is perfectly appropriate for Hacker News.

</comment><comment><USER3> If he was _hacking_ at people with big knives, this would be related to Hacker News, but the chart doesn't have that. So, no up vote.

<comment><USER4> Rambo made his own knives from rebar in the jungles of Burma. I'm up voting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> the chart is relevant, to us

it's the first movie intelligence solution application to be seen in the wild

movie intelligence in the next big thing, the new rave, en vogue and in demand

i hope to see the same done on another very interesting movie called "revenge of the nerds" if they ever make a sequel for that, which they should. the intelligence chart will include, the numbers of computers, servers, hand- helds, girls in bikinis and refference to Perl specially the line "it's scary the number of things you can do with Perl"

yes i once saw a perl script and it was indeed scary, all horror movies from now on should be written in Perl

Programming languages and movie intelligence will changes the cinema industry as we know it

next thing you know, you will go to the cinema and in the middle of the movie, you will be presented with a BSOD and the movie will restart

</comment><comment><USER6> The ratio of bad guy to good guy deaths: (0 0.015 0.39 0.92). So looks like Rambo reflects the sense of fear that the bad guys are winning/catching up. Not sure how to explain the big jump between 1985 and 1988 (Chernobyl, Challenger, Lockerbie, Iran-Contra?)

</comment><comment><USER7> Correction: The whole thing is a sex scene.

</comment><comment><USER8> this is very pertinent to my interests

</comment><comment><USER9> I don't remember that many good guys dying in the fourth one.

<comment><USER10> > I don't remember that many good guys dying in the fourth one.

Assume that "good guys" includes all non-"bad guys". (Villagers, missionaries, extras, etc.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> ...

</comment><comment><USER12> I dont know what's worse... the bullshit people come up with to justify 36 upvotes or the post itself.</comment>


Ask HN: Are you in a morally or ethically compromised situation at work? - o-o-o If so, what are you doing or not doing about it?
I teach in an art program in higher education in the U.S. The debt burden graduates face vs. the income they will make does not make sense to me.
The only viable action I can think of is to quit and not participate. <comment><AUTHOR> Yes. Basically this is why I went away from a very successful career in tech sales to Fortune 500 companies and became software dev. Being a dev enables me to work in a much broader group of companies, so I can at least abandon those I'm going to find not in line with my moral values.

Look, buddy, this is a very serious problem. The more you're going to work on your personal philosophy, the more problems you're going to have with moral compromises like the one you've mentioned. Please, do yourself a favor and try to deal with that problem BEFORE it's going to be a much bigger issue.

I'm kind of proud of you because of your "The only viable action I can think of is to quit and not participate". If more people could be like that, most of the evil in this world would be long time gone.

<comment> o-o-o Are the only options to opt out or ignore? Doesn't this make this somebody else's problem?

<comment><AUTHOR> This is how I see it: the only reliable / stable model in which our civilization has a chance is the one in which everyone auto-regulates himself. In other words everyone must take responsibility over one's life.

You start with yourself. Make yourself resourceful, healthy, etc. Then you can have a solid chance to do something for others. The other way around - immersing oneself in helping others combined with sacrificing yourself is a big pathology. Ayn Rand has been writing about that her whole life. Besides, it's easy to do virtue signaling coming down to presenting oneself as an altruist. Building a life that works and has meaning is much harder. Don't go the easy route.

Whether you opt out or join doesn't matter. What matters is if at the end of your existence you can look at yourself with peace in mind. Start with small things. That's not a shame at all!

We're not in a complete control of reality, but every one of us with sufficient effort can master his own life. This is how we can produce something that's bigger than the sum of its parts. So, the starting point is very simple: contribute to stuff that matters, refuse to cooperate on harmful enterprises. Neither of them has the "ignore" part in it. Only ignore those things that don't matter.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> Disclaimer: I'm an amateur artist that at one point almost went to art school. Some professional artists talked me out of it and 20 years later I am still thankful.

Its such a well-known meme that attempting to become a professional artist by dropping $250k on a BFA is a fool's errand that I wouldn't feel bad about being an art teacher.

Now, if they make you lie about it and repeatedly tell students they are gonna be making 6 figures upon graduation that's a different story. That would be kind of unethical.

The advice that I got was basically this: If you live and breathe art, you will be a professional artist and a degree isn't going to have much of an impact on that. Make a portfolio, apply to jobs, and maybe some day you might want to take a few classes that seem interesting. There are no shortcuts to being a competent artist. Anyone CAN learn to draw/paint/sculpt incredibly well. Almost nobody will because it requires 1000s of hours of practice. Art school can't give you that passion. If you haven't already spent thousands of hours honing your craft, maybe you aren't passionate enough.

They were totally right. I like to draw once in a while, but I have other obsessions that I was passionate about, and I got incredibly good at those (good enough to land my dream job without a degree) while I merely liked the idea of being an artist.

Another critical bit of advice: Art is not like many other professions, the 80 year old painter is usually at the peak of his performance. Not only is he probably better than you, he's probably also much much faster at being good. If you do freelance work, he will be your competition.

That doesn't mean you can't make it, but you gotta find a niche that works for you and you it has to truly be something you are passionate about.

</comment><comment><USER3> I used to tell my customers that most custom web sites are expensive to create and it's unlikely for them to recoup their cost. Most customers would back out and a few would actually move forward. I felt it was the only way to proceed.

I found out later that many of the customers that backed out would go somewhere else to get the work done and most were happy with what they paid for.

I decided to change my approach. Now I give, as close as possible, an estimate, where I make sure to be as accurate as possible, and let them decide for themselves, if it's worth the cost. Each customer has their reasons why they do what they do. I don't have all the answers.

</comment><comment><USER4> A once did some contract work for a company that provided software for Car retailers. Their old software would present some information - comparing the price of cigarettes verse some insurance policy (against a car load), and try to convince people that finance through the dealer was the best. On examining it I realized the original version was not doing the math correctly. On fixing to be accurate, the dealer items were not the obvious best choice. I refused to change it, I was let go. Which was fine by me.

</comment><comment><USER5> I tried for years to deal with the lies that employers wanted me to put as answers to questions in customer information security questionnaires. Most of these questionnaires are shit and so are most answers. Finally, I got sick of it and essentially got fired. There is no perfect security. Customers and vendors need to understand that.

</comment><comment><USER6> I work for a government funded organisation, and a large amount of our 'output' is work that I don't believe the government should have _any_ role in providing, as it competes directly with private businesses.

<comment><USER7> Why can't the government compete with private business? Competition is good. And certainly a better use of taxpayer money than just massively funding private corporations (vide Lockheed, Boeing)

<comment><USER6> Governments doesn't have to make a profit, so they can undercut private business and distort markets. Governments should not intervene in the market except in cases of market failure (and they shouldn't be funding private corporations at all).

<comment><USER7> That depends on the market. There are valid reasons for states to get involved in business:

* some markets can never be free due to their nature (their services are not negotiable): e.g. medical care, pharmaceuticals

* some markets just create monopolies or else are horribly inefficient: e.g. metropolitan transportation, railways

* sometimes it's better that the government-funded service doesn't need to make a profit, because that way it can serve more of the government's people better: e.g. housing, education, public transport in general

* even stronger influence can be exerted on other states if you control powerful companies operating there: e.g. PRC's approach

<comment><USER6> Well I think that some of that falls generally under market 'failure', so I don't necessarily disagree. But when the market is working the government should butt out.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Because chasing your customers for money sucks. We phone – you get paid - <AUTHOR> http://invoicehunter.com

<comment><USER3> Thanks Matt. That's a great point that collecting debts takes a lot of time and persistence- and lots of freelancers and independent workers would pay someone to do it. Kudos. No one Accounts Receivable Managemnt for freelancers is a growing need and if you can do it right would be awsome.

I've taken a deep dive into the reasons why freelancers and independent workers and small businesses go unpaid and one of the issues that I keep coming back to is the fact that unlike everyone other creditor, almost, freelancers and independent workers don't have access to top shelf debt collectors and commercial collection attories, and collecting debts is a huge pain point for them. Debt collectors and commercial collection attories report to db, skip trace, and have folks trained to find assets and deadbeats. They don't work for freelancers and independent workers or small businesses because they operate on volume and freelancers and independent workers and small businesses have only a few debt To get freelancer and independent workers access to top collectors, I've started a company that aggregates their debts into portfolios and then assigns them to my network of collectors - <USER2> weekly- who work the accounts. Im really excited about the project because not only can we get the debt to the right collectors but it turns out that when all that debt is in one place we can do all sort of near stuff, like figure out who the deadbeats are who consistently don't pay or pay late and whether or not the debt can be sold to investors, shifting the risk of non payment completely off the freelancers. Currently were in beta at www.indepayment.com. I'm proud to say we're beating the industry average for collections (which is about 12%) and we're going to be suing our first really bad debtor who we found owes multiple freelancers money. Without Indepayment each of those freelancers would have been on their own collecting. Also, we only change when we collect. check us out and I'm happy to answer any questions.

<comment><AUTHOR> I like your idea of aggregating a bunch of small debts - that's smart. And great for the freelancer if it means they get access to a better level of collection service than they could otherwise afford or find.

Figuring out who the deadbeats are is great too IF you can reach scale (hence your free service is important) and likewise for calculating a score.

What's your average commission charged to the freelancer and do you find that many have the ability to oncharge collection costs to their clients?

tx

<comment><USER3> We're trying hard to reach scale in the next few months. We charge a flat $99 upon collection. I would love if we could charge the debtor the fee but the first rule of collections is you grab what you can get. Our commercial collection attornies can tax the costs of the action (court filing fees, service fees,etc) to the debtor, which then becomes part of the judgment but most of the time when the freelancers has the option of getting paid before there is a judgment then those fees tend to get waived.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi everyone... this is a side project we've started and keen to get feedback on.

The hypothesis we're testing is whether there is a bunch of freelancers, designers, engineers etc... around the world that have 1 or 2 overdue invoices that they're struggling to get paid, but getting them paid takes time they don't have and requires an awkward phone call they'd rather not make.

We've tried to make the experience much easier, friendlier and faster than hiring a traditional credit control person – so you can get that phone call off your To Do list faster.

Keen to hear your thoughts... would you trust us to make the call on your behalf? What are your questions / concerns?

Thanks in advance.

Matt Co-founder

</comment><comment><USER4> \- Not clear on the difference between you and a collection agency. \- Do you guys report to Dun and Bradstreet? \- What's the difference between the free and $5 friendly call? \- When you do "the firm" call, that sounds vaguely Mafia-like. Are you going to threaten to break the guy's kneecaps? Call him repeatedly at 3 in the morning? I get that vibe from your product name.

Would much prefer to pay for results. And I would want to be able to hear a recording of the call so I can audit you guys to make sure you're representing our company in accordance with our values.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good questions. tx

No we don't report to DnB. We have found that a percentage of invoices get paid from an email reminder, then another percentage from a follow up phone call. So you can get a bunch of invoices paid without having to go through the Debt Collection process.

Good point on differentiating the friendly / firm calls – the difference with firm phone call is the person we use (she's a bit more clinical in her approach) plus it also includes a follow up phone call. I agree adding an example of the phone call would help a great deal in giving you confidence.

Paying for results is something we could explore - maybe no result no pay? Although our value proposition was more about you not having to take the time and pain to make the call yourself.</comment></comment>


A cheap 555-based Geiger counter - <AUTHOR> http://hackaday.com/2016/10/16/a-cheap-555-based-geiger-counter/ <comment><USER2> No, it is not based on the 555 IC, it is based on the Geiger Tube.

<comment><USER3> well it's using a 555-based power supply (555 drivers a step-up transformer), bit ambiguous but I think it qualifies.

I'm really glad to see this kind of thing on HN, much nicer than the usual "framework for X".

<comment><USER4> Do the resistors out there qualify as well? What makes a car what it is? Certainly not it's right headlight.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I once tried to make Geiger counter from webcam. I covered the lid with dark paper. I put it in front of a banana and then I read frames from it and counted noise spikes. Didn't work.

<comment><USER3> Pedantry: It wasn't a geiger counter because it wasn't using a Geiger-Müller tube.

I don't think you'd see much of a difference even with a decent Geiger counter from a banana. The levels of radiation in food are tiny, and building equipment to measure it is not easy.

Probably if you found decent radiation source, or perhaps took it up in an airplane you'd see a difference.

<comment><USER6> if you're a little crazy you can take the radioactive americium out of a smoke detector and use that as a source

<comment><USER7> And if you're a lot crazy you can build a fission reactor... our maybe that was a different source isotope?

<comment><USER8> If you're not that crazy, you can build a fusion reactor, although the design necessarily requires more energy than it puts out. Teens have built these for science fair projects.

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Are there no voltage boosters that can take 9V to 400V without a transformer? Seems like most of the build here is the power supply with a two component "counter" (which is really just a clicker since it does no counting).

To me the much more interesting part would be where to get cheap geiger tubes.

Edit: this has some answers on the power supply [http://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/70143/dc- dc-c...](http://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/70143/dc-dc- converter-12v-to-400v-is-this-possible)

<comment><USER10> Boost converters beyond 10:1 usually require a transformer. Efficiency of a transformerless boost converter goes down with the voltage gain, so there's a practical limit. It can be done without a transformer if you need very low current, but you need a big inductor. Here's a Geiger counter kit that does it.[1]

It's rare to use a Geiger tube for this today, because PIN diodes can also detect radiation. But they need a low-noise high voltage power supply and a lot of low-noise amplification. Some circuits for that: [2] Geiger tubes have the nice property that the output signal is quite strong.

I've been designing a boost converter that uses a 555 timer as the oscillator. It's part of a driver for my antique teletypes, which need 120VDC at 60mA briefly to pull in the selector magnet, then about 4V to sustain the magnet hold. Existing solutions are bulky and about 5% efficient. I've designed a version that is powered from a USB port. The design is on Github, in KiCAD format.[2] (Work in progress; haven't fabbed the board yet.) I'm using a 10:1 flat surface mount transformer from Coilcraft to get the size down.

[1] [http://www.rhelectronics.net/store/radiation-detector- geiger...](http://www.rhelectronics.net/store/radiation-detector-geiger- counter-diy-kit-second-edition.html) [2] [https://www.maximintegrated.com/en/app- notes/index.mvp/id/22...](https://www.maximintegrated.com/en/app- notes/index.mvp/id/2236) [3] [https://github.com/John- Nagle/ttyloopdriver](https://github.com/John-Nagle/ttyloopdriver)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I have assembled two of these: [http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/like/321502371329?lpid=107&chn=ps](http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/like/321502371329?lpid=107&chn=ps) they re great fun. Best radiation source are old thorium doped gas incandescent gas mantels: [http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Geiger-Counter-Test- Source-Thoriu...](http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Geiger-Counter-Test-Source- Thorium-Mantle-scintillator- check-/322274097903?hash=item4b09087aef:g:nVAAAOSw0fhXlKuP)

You are welcome.

<comment><USER12> Where did you source your Geiger-Müller tube?

<comment><USER11> The Russians sell them by the bucket on ebay:

[http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/TESTED-SBM-20-GEIGER-MULLER- TUBE-...](http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/TESTED-SBM-20-GEIGER-MULLER-TUBE-COUNTER- STS-5-NOS-SBM20-20-/121971429216?hash=item1c66104f60:g:n~0AAOSw9N1VkV7W)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> 400V on non-isolated wires? Sounds dangerous.

<comment><USER14> It's not voltage alone that will harm you it's the amperage... and resistance of your skin.

You have nice table in this article: [http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/textbook/direct- current/chpt...](http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/textbook/direct- current/chpt-3/ohms-law-again/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> There was once a project called the ultramicron or something that was sent into the EEVBlog. It was an open source project that was smaller then this.

The owner removed the public schematics and made it a closed source project sadly. I hope someone has a backup of his published files because one day I will be building it.

<comment><USER16> I hadn't heard of this, but it looks interesting. Thanks for bringing it up!

I found the EEVblog post[0] and was going to suggest that one could reconstruct the schematic by stitching together several frames from that video. However, it looks like someone did fork[1] the public repository before Andrey moved all the files to his server's FTP/GitLab setup.

A long, detailed post from Andrey on 2014-05-19, which presents the finished Ultra Micron, is still up[2]. I can't read Russian, but Google Translate seems to have done an okay job on it. There were also several posts on that blog from just the past couple months, so it looks like he's still actively working on it.

[0] [http://www.eevblog.com/forum/blog/eevblog-776-world's-smalle...](http://www.eevblog.com/forum/blog/eevblog-776-world's-smallest- digital-dosimeter/)

[1] [https://github.com/virtmedia/ultramicron](https://github.com/virtmedia/ultramicron)

[2] [https://misrv.com/%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%B8%D0%BC%D0%B5%D1%82...](https://misrv.com/%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%B8%D0%BC%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%80-%D1%83%D0%BB%D1%8C%D1%82%D1%80%D0%B0-%D0%BC%D0%B8%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%BD/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is an awesome find on HN. I was just the other day wanting a Geiger counter to use as a random number generator. I was sure that I wouldn't be able to find one for an affordable price.

<comment><USER18> just use a reverse-biased zener diode.

either way getting truly unbiased random numbers is entirely non-trivial.

<comment><USER17> Ty!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Well, a Geiger counter will only give you audio. If you want video, you can build yourself a cloud chamber (there are how-tos on YouTube).</comment>


Show HN: Leapcast, a ChromeCast clone - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/dz0ny/leapcast

<comment><USER2> That's pretty damn cool.

Have you looked at Miracast/WiDi?

WiDi at least seems to be RTSP with some uPNP trickery over an ad-hoc wifi connection.

<comment><AUTHOR> Miracast is wireless HDMI replacement with DRM and all that stuff and as such is nogo from the beginning. From what I read, you need special hardware because it uses one or more wifi channels simultaneously. Anything under WIFI- Direct will probably never work with open-source hw/sw.

<comment><USER2> OK, WiDi as in Intel Wireless Display, not Wifi Direct. I've played a WiDi "stream" in VLC - it will fall back to plain old RTSP in some cases.

Intel have a GPL WiDi archive, but I haven't taken a look yet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, cool.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


You will become who you choose to be around - <AUTHOR> http://kevinchau.me/becoming-those-around-you <comment><USER2> Although I have to accept that the premise is generally true, it is also a little concerning. Friends, close friends, seem like they're "supposed" to be a bond like family: someone you're always there for in good times and bad.

Instead, philosophies like the one espoused in this article transform that deep friendship into a friendship of "utility". It kind of reminds me of the political marriages sometimes considered typical of the upper classes in various historical societies: when "love" may not even be a factor in a marriage.

I have a friend that has said similar things to this article. It makes me wonder: are we friends because we've been through a lot and share that bond, or is he my friend because I present a certain "utility" to his success? If the latter, does that in turn mean our friendship is discarded as soon as I fail to present that utility?

<comment><USER3> Why does it have to be either or?

Maybe your friend initially wanted to be friends with you for the utility reasons. But now over the years you've grown beyond that, you have a bond.

This is one of the reasons it's so hard to get rid of toxic friends (not saying you are toxic, just an example.) You've formed that bond that keeps you together even after the utilitarian reason is long gone.

Which begs the question, are there any friendships that don't start from a utilitarian reason? Why did you become friends in the first place? Did you work together? Have similar interests? Did you just need someone that wanted to play late night Japanese board games with you?

No matter the reason, it doesn't make your bond any less real.

<comment><USER4> also depends on how you define a utilitarian reason. If you are new somewhere for example, you will try to get to know people just so you are not alone, and first connections that served to just not be alone might develop into great friendships. Aren't new connections and friendships always utilitarian in some shape or form in the beginning ?

<comment><USER2> I think there is truth to this. Even beyond "new". Maybe I like to think that I'm friends with my friends because I care for them, but is there another reason; a subconscious utility I'm deriving from them too?

<comment><USER4> Probably, even if its just having a good time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> You may not "become" but there is definitely tremendous influence on you based on who you hang out with. Even if you are the leader/aggressor type, you will start getting "influenced" by the other party. I am saying this strictly based on my own personal experience of course.

This topic has resonated with me a lot lately. My professional life has not really been moving where I want it to be in last 3-4 years. Yes, ultimately I am to blame and no questions about it. But all my friends/co-workers/family I hang out with are very similar to me in many ways. I realized that I think a lot like them now. Nothing wrong with that but it is just not where I see myself.

In contrast, many years ago, I really wanted to do something drastic in my life which would mean going against all odds. I pulled it off. The only reason I can think of now is that I hung out with people who were already doing that drastic thing. I followed them and hung out with them. We became really good friends. Not to take away my hard work that I put in, but if I had to give the main reason I succeeded then was the company I had. I should mention that those people were all much better than me at what I wanted to be.

You want to be an entrepreneur ? Go hang out with other entrepreneurs who are already doing it. Of course, you cannot be a sycophant. You still have to do the hard work, you still have to sweat it out but the right company and influence on you can really speed your drive towards where you want to be.

Ok, I wrote all this stuff but time to really go and find the "company" I want to be in. I know what/where they are but it is just my laziness that is keeping me from getting to it. This post probably gave me the kick in the butt I needed. Really hope so.

</comment><comment><USER6> It is _good_ to have friends who aren't quite like you. It is good to have friends who don't work in the same fields as you, or who aren't obsessed with chasing success. Why? Because, hopefully, they can call you out when you start handing yourself over to workaholism/bad relationships/excess drinking/etc. Ideally, you'd let these people stretch you so you can balance yourself out; even if it means part of your entrepreneurship neurosis is lost.

These sorts of articles disgust me; it's insane how much people value their career.

<comment><USER7> I didn't read it at all as entirely career focused. The author is saying "if you have high ambitions, don't hang around with people who have low ambitions." He's not saying "live in a bubble."

This has less to do with the advancement of a career and more with your long term goals. The people you are around the most will be the ones who influence whether you reach your goals. Definitely have friends who are very different from you in terms of career, activities, interests. But don't have friends who want you to go out drinking every night if you have grander aspirations.

<comment><USER8> Note that this kind of advise is good for the 20 somethings. That's like how your parents want you to avoid hanging out with the wrong crowd at school, don't be stupid a few years later.

As you grow older though, it takes so much effort to maintain friendship that you will naturally lose contact with people that do not share your values in some respect.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I very much agree with Kevin here. I grew up in a very average neighborhood with low ambitions and never really challenged myself. In college, I got with the wrong people my freshman year and eventually lost my scholarship.

Being out of school and with a chip on my shoulder has led me to learning how to code, starting a startup, and being accepted into a top college accelerator despite not being in school. The people I am around now are KPCB fellows, former interns at top startups, and thoroughly ambitious. Without this environment, things would not be moving nearly as quickly.

Conversely, my brother went to a Math and Science academy and is now at an Ivy league school. The same Ivy League school I am now at as part of the accelerator program.

Like people attract like people. So if over time a person becomes a new person, why should they feel held down to the old people that they were once like? I know for me the friends I am making now are like me and they are pushing me to become better. Ultimately, that is what you really want in a friendship.

</comment><comment><USER10> I think the causation is at least partially the other way around - people you choose to spend time with reflect who you are.

When you try to game the correlation by forming friendships aspirationally, this largely breaks down. It's much more important to come to terms with who you are than to try to become more like someone else. When you're trying to be X, you're not X, you're just someone who's trying to be X.

</comment><comment><USER11> If you'd end a friendship because your friend wasn't ambitious as you, who would want to be your friend anyway?

<comment><USER12> It's rarely intentional. When you're young, friendships are unique. Your best friends are always together and it's very time consuming. If you decide to be more ambitious, it means you are also deciding to be less present in your friend's lives. It may take months/years, but you drift apart.

I've done this a few times in my life. I'm still friends with those people today, but it's the "text once in a while" kind of friendship. The kind of friendship where you talk about old memories more than create new ones. It just happens.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I generally agree with this. Not only does hanging around amazing people make you a bit more amazing, but it generally increases your drive and pushes you in whatever direction your buddies are going in.

Maybe it's just me, but I also get a huge kick out of doing what other people I know WON'T do.

Maybe it's some innate craving for attention, money, fame, whatever, but I really love doing things completely differently than my peers. Whether it means working on projects most people don't find interesting, pushing myself to do things wayyyy out of the ordinary in regards to jobs / physical stuff, or whatever -- I get a lot of satisfaction from pushing myself beyond what everyone else is doing.

I don't always come out successful, but when I do, it feels fucking fantastic >:)

I have a pretty diverse group of friends -- so I'm not sure if this makes a difference -- but I find myself wanting to constantly out perform my buddies (even though I'm happy to help them succeed, and vice-versa), as a way to stand out or something.

Shrug.

</comment><comment><USER14> I'd kind of beg to differ on this one.

Six years out, of my high school friends, two have left the hometown (in addition to myself). Of my college friends, half are un(der)employed.

I don't strive to be different from them; I like my friends. I still spend time with them, I get together with them whenever I can.

Now, at my job, I'm in a very typical enterprise-y position, with all the things that that entails. I've been informed that I'm very talented, that I'm a rising star; but really, I just want to keep moving my career forward. I'm not going to do it at (too great of) expense to my social life or my relationships, but I want to be in a position where I've got a chance to grow and learn. It's become increasingly evident that that may not be here.

</comment><comment><USER15> Also, "having a friend" and "choosing to be around" certain people are 2 totally different things. There are many ways to be around people including volunteering, playing sports, and especially taking a job. Those people can exert great positive influence on you regardless of whether you become friends with them.

Obviously, there are many people that we're very close friends with, even though we're rarely surrounded by them.

So its generally when you're _choosing_ your friends around some utilitarian metric that you begin tread into sycophantic waters.

</comment><comment><USER16> Surround yourself with world class olympians - become world class olympian.

</comment><comment><USER17> Even assuming it is true - aren't there a whole lot of other things one could optimize first, before sieving out friends?

Who knows, you might even become an inspiration to your friends and they might change along with you.

Also if you do things you want to do, the people you spend the most time with will change automatically. For example if you start going to startup meetups, you will hang out more with people who do startups. If you start doing more sports to lose weight, you will end up hanging with more sporty people.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is so true and also helps explain how echo chambers develop. I always try to change my perspective on something big at least once a month. Last month I disabled flash and all my Chrome extensions. Holy cow, the default internet is weird!

I build web sites, so this helped me see the way certain people (my dad) experience the internet.

<comment><USER19> your dad doesn't have flash enabled ? how many toolbars did yo install ?

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> There is also the opportunity for you to be the change you want to see, and be the influencer to inspire and empower those around to "become you" \- positivity and inspirations spread fast and far.

</comment><comment><USER21> Biblequote :

Stay away from a fool, for you will not find knowledge on their lips.

<comment><USER22>
        Prove all things. Hold fast to that which is good.
        1 Thessalonians 5:21

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Being somewhat introverted, this means that I am my girlfriend, my cat, and my computer. (Not necessarily in that order :)

</comment><comment><USER24> I like the entrepreneurship story, as well as the overall message.

</comment><comment><USER25> This is too generalized. There are born leaders and there are born followers. Followers are influenced by those around them, while leaders forge their own path no matter what. However, a well rounded person knows when to adapt. They lead when necessary, and take instructions when required. There are some people who will never become like those around them, but will instead shape those around them to their own image.

Edit: Downvotes with no counterpoints? That means I must be right, because the truth hurts.

<comment><USER26> Because what you just said is also very generalized. You put people in two buckets: followers and leaders. Where's the in-between?

<comment><USER25> > However, a well rounded person knows when to adapt. They lead when > necessary, and take instructions when required.</comment></comment></comment>


Hawaii First to Harness Deep-Ocean Temperatures for Power - <AUTHOR> http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/hawaii-first-to-harness-deep-ocean-temperatures-for-power/#b09g04f20b15 <comment><USER2> Hawaii is a chain of seamount islands, so the deep ocean isn't far away. That's unusual. Continents have a continental shelf, and it's usually a longer pipe run to the deep ocean, which means the 4°C cold water warms up along the way, plus pumping costs are higher.

Solar works so well in Hawaii that the power company there is trying to stop it. Once batteries get a little cheaper, Hawaii will be mostly solar.

<comment><USER3> Pumping costs would not be higher due to depth. There is a whole lot of pressure at greater depths. That by itself can bring the water up. There might be a slight difference in density of warmer water over cooler water that could add to pumping costs.

But I agree with the first point: water warms up along the way unless they were to use insulated pipes like heat exchangers.

<comment><USER4> > There is a whole lot of pressure at greater depths. That by itself can bring > the water up.

The pressure inside a deep pipe will be the same as that outside the pipe. Where will your differential pressure come from?

<comment><USER5> From evacuating the water at the top of the pipe.

<comment><USER6> How does that differ from standard run-of-the-mill pumping?

Edit: ok, I get it, there's no suction, just removal of the water, and the pressure of the ocean pushes it back up to sea level.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Seems kinda pointless this only doubles the original pilot which was 50KW.... The plan was to build a 40-50MW plant within 3-5 years and expand it to 100MW+ over the following decade.

[http://www.bizjournals.com/pacific/print- edition/2010/11/12/...](http://www.bizjournals.com/pacific/print- edition/2010/11/12/ocean-thermal-energy-conversion.html)

This tbh looks less like any type of commercialization but more of a consolation prize to LM since the Navy paid for the original pilot and was supposed to pay for the expansion but due to the drop in oil prices it never came off the ground.

Also the average household consumption in Hawaii is 2.3kW/h (gotta love air conditioning) so looks more like 40 houses with peaks averaging at almost double that.

BTW in comparison most commercial Gas Turbine power plants produce 400 MW per unit, or 600 if coupled with a traditional non-critical steam turbine which harness the excess heat.

Low power Gas Turbines small enough to fit in a sipping container which can be delivered by truck average at around 5MW, so this whole apparatus will produce produce 50 times less power than something that can be fit into a container, other unites like the TM2500 by GE which can be towed by a single truck can provide as much as 30MW of power. [https://www.ge- distributedpower.com/products/power-generatio...](https://www.ge- distributedpower.com/products/power-generation/mobile-units/tm2500)

So besides catching some headlines and paying some dues to LM i really don't see this being any thing but a waste of money.

<comment><USER8> Your own link explains why it's not 'pointless':

 _There is no data on maintenance costs, possible environmental impacts on the marine environment or potential engineering problems that could arise with a full-scale model — not an enticing combination for private investment. ... The pilot is needed to produce the information necessary to attract investment for a large-scale model ..._

<comment><USER7> Old link was for announcing the original pilot and they've built that one, they are already scaling it in China and other places why not scale it in the US?

<comment><USER8> > Old link was for announcing the original pilot and they've built that one,

You seem confused about something, that link is announcing a 5-10 MW system they didn't build. Or rather what they built is the system that you're calling useless.

> they are already scaling it in China and other places why not scale it in > the US?

That question is answered in the comment you replied to. China doesn't care about things like marine life and runs on giant government capital investments.

<comment><USER7> Well you sure seem to think so, while everything pointing to the fact that they are just bringing the initial pilot to full capacity rather than developing or scaling the technology further.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Man, I really would have expected scientific american to do a better job with their units. Power (watts) is a rate, so a 100 kW facility will power 120 homes, not "120 homes for a year."

<comment><USER10> Yes. kWh and kW confuse journalists no end. Even with a little common sense and no science knowledge, it's clear that the plant won't stop operating after a year of 120 homes because it's somehow used up all its energy. What did the author expect would happen after that year was up?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Arthur C. Clarke wrote about an ocean temperature power generator like this in a short story back in the ~1950s. Reading this article, I now understand why systems like this haven't been more common. :)

</comment><comment><USER12> I have to ask, but since so much of Hawaii's electricity production feeds air conditioners wouldn't it be more efficient to pipe this cold water into houses as coolant? Or to a datacenter?

<comment><USER7> The temperature of the littoral water in Hawaii isn't cold enough (77f/25c during winter an 85f/28c during summer) for efficient transmittance cooling not to mention that salt water can't be used for evaporative cooling like the one being used by commercial AC units for fairly obvious reasons.

<comment><USER13> Is it hard to evaporate half of saltwater and dump the rest back?

<comment><USER7> It does't work that way crystals will still form, and salts mean free ions free ions mean corrosion.....

<comment><USER13> If you evaporate half of seawater, you're still down at one quarter of salt's saturation level. That will form crystals even if you keep things mildly mixed?

Corrosion is a worry, but isn't that something you can fix with material choice?

<comment><USER12> Corrosion is an immense problem with salt water in large systems. Eliminating dissimilar metals across so many parts is tricky. Even then, unless you're going to plate everything in gold, corrosion will happen. The far easier solution is a heat exchanger between the saltwater and some other working fluid (ie radiator fluid) inside the system. I'm a bit surprised that the hawaii rig is pumping in actual sea water rather than dropping a radiator into the depths. That intake pipe will corrode eventually.

<comment><USER14> Indeed, it is. I think I was vaguely aware of them previously, but I ran across a reference to sacrificial (galvanic) anodes a ways back. Fascinating.

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

 _A galvanic anode is the main component of a galvanic cathodic protection (CP) system used to protect buried or submerged metal structures from corrosion.

They are made from a metal alloy with a more "active" voltage (more negative reduction potential / more positive electrochemical potential) than the metal of the structure. The difference in potential between the two metals means that the galvanic anode corrodes, so that the anode material is consumed in preference to the structure._

Essentially, the galvanic anode is "sacrificed" as corrosion attacks _it_ rather than other bits of your mostly-metal structure in salt water.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Good to see that the concept which was first presented to me in an ACT problem is finally becoming a reality. It would have been nice to have heard about this before taking a timed test. Much too fascinating and time consuming.

</comment><comment><USER16> Meanwhile in Hawaii, solar power is generating more power than the grid can handle.

</comment><comment><USER17> What are the environmental impacts of sucking the heat out of the ocean?

<comment><USER18> It makes the water mode dense, the opposite of this

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Unintended consequences of deep sea ocean warming.

<comment><USER5> No one worries about these things when the numbers are big. I say the same thing about geothermal energy.

<comment><USER19> Just like the ocean and the atmosphere is an infinite sink for carbon. Look at fraking causing earth quakes, things we can't internalize will never effect us. The crust of the earth is an eggshell floating on liquid rock, we should take care of it.</comment></comment></comment>


Large-scale, well-typed edits in Unison, and reimagining version control - <AUTHOR> http://unisonweb.org/2015-06-12/editing.html

<comment><USER2> At the first sight, I though it was a new version of [https://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/](https://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/) but it seems completely different.

</comment><comment><USER3> I personally like the (language-dependent) "series of actions" approach.

So, you quite literally send to the VCS "add this parameter with default value <foo> to this function", "make a copy of this function", "add this function", etc. With transactions.

And the VCS "just" replays the edits. Note that the VCS will occasionally have to munge the human-readable names in the case of what would be otherwise a conflict. But the VCS doesn't deal with things at that level anyways. You really should end up dealing with things at the AST level and rebuilding the source code when necessary.

Think of it like a refactoring tool integrated with the VCS.

</comment><comment><USER4> This is a huge surprise! I had been under the assumption that asynchronous semantic edits were the only true way forward. Synchronous large-scale edits?! If you can make it work, even only half of the time... that is an enormous productivity boost.

Well--fair warning, it's happy hour--but allow me dump my incoherent gut armchair objections.

\- Large-scale edits mess with large-scale invariants. Can this edit calculus and scoping mechanism truly deal with arbitrary changes? Or is "arbitrary changes" a white rabbit, and can you come up with a calculus that handles all "reasonable" changes?

\- I had previously thought that the only way we're going to get past the {software upgrade,data migration} bottleneck is through semantic VC. Developers make mistakes. Software evolution as a gradient (rather than the status quo of progress in fits-and-starts) seems extremely unsafe. Does Unison make all mistakes undo-able?

\- Won't "branchless" conflict-free versioning be the same as constant forking, creating an enormously fragmented software project? (So postmodern!) How do you get everyone back on the same "master" mainline; surely not all possible Edits can commute?

I guess all these concerns are irrelevant if you treat synchronous editing as the golden path, and fall back to async for the hard stuff.

<comment><USER5> What's semantic VC?

<comment><USER5> Oh.. version control?

<comment><USER4> Yeah it's covered halfway through. VCS that does merges wrt code structure rather than lines of text.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Patch theory?

<comment><USER7> The difference, I think, from patch theory is that Unison always preserves types while editing. Patch theory works with untyped text. The main result of [1], which Unison seems to be based on, is that you can form any well-typed term in the simply typed lambda-calculus this way. Unison seems to go even further: "[f]rom any starting codebase we can get to any other codebase".

[1] Editing Functional Programs Without Breaking Them, Amsden et al. [https://ifl2014.github.io/submissions/ifl2014_submission_32....](https://ifl2014.github.io/submissions/ifl2014_submission_32.pdf)

<comment><USER6> I wasn't aware patch theory was necessarily limited to untyped text, that's why I brought it up. Do we know where Unison is drawing from for what it does?

<comment><USER7> I don't think patch theory is untyped in principle. But all developments I've seen are untyped. And it's probably good this way, for typically you don't want to tie a version control system to a specific programming language / typing system. There is recent work on patch theory using category theory [2] and homotopy type theory [3], maybe that introduces a types angle (I have only skimmed these papers).

I think Unison is based on [1] quoted above, but I'm not sure.

[2] S. Mimram, C. Di Giusto, A Categorical Theory of Patches.

[3] C. Angiuli, E. Morehouse, D. R. Licata, R. Harper, Homotopical Patch Theory.

<comment><USER6> It seems wasteful not to use insights from one domain (untyped, textual) in another (typed, contextual).

I knew about (not that I understand it) the connection homotopy...mostly just worried there's work happening that isn't informed by research.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Building a Home Network with Podman - <AUTHOR> https://www.ldelossa.is/blog/home-network-pt1/ <comment><AUTHOR> 2 part series on creating a home container lab.

[https://www.ldelossa.is/blog/home-network- pt1/](https://www.ldelossa.is/blog/home-network-pt1/)

[https://www.ldelossa.is/blog/home-network- pt2](https://www.ldelossa.is/blog/home-network-pt2)</comment>


"If you find it, you have a choice to make." - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/KodyKinzie/status/1124433879933177856 <comment><AUTHOR> Quote:

"If you travel a mile deep in the tunnels under LA, you might see a dim blue light in the distance, illuminating a USB thumb drive.

If you find it, you have a choice to make."

Disclaimer:

I do not know this guy or what this is all about... but the combination of picture and corresponding text serves to capture my imagination...</comment>


Thinking Functionally In Ruby – A Great Presentation by Tom Stuart - <AUTHOR> http://www.rubyinside.com/functional-programming-in-ruby-2713.html <comment><USER2> I want to watch this, but I can only watch the postage stamp-sized video linked from the first paragraph. If I actually visit the video's page on Vimeo, it tells me that the video is private. :(</comment>


King Williams college quiz 2014 - <AUTHOR> http://www.kwc.im/#panel1 Apparently you can't edit a url if you accidentally post a bad one.<p>http://www.kwc.im/uploads/gkp-questions-2014-15.pdf <comment><AUTHOR> Apparently you can't edit a url if you accidentally post a bad one.

[http://www.kwc.im/uploads/gkp- questions-2014-15.pdf](http://www.kwc.im/uploads/gkp-questions-2014-15.pdf)

I do this with my friends each year. The rules for us are simple. No internet, you can use any books you have access to and people you know.

</comment><comment><USER2> You can delete the post and submit the correct one. If there is no current discussion and you don't abuse this to spam, the moderators will not be unhappy.

</comment><comment><USER3> Don't attempt this quiz unless you want to feel utterly ignorant.</comment>


Find the best trekking destinations in Nepal - <AUTHOR> http://www.appkosh.com/app_details/index.php?pn=com.longtail.treknepal

<comment><USER2> can't tell if this is spam that got through to my rss or what</comment>


Ask HN: What do you like to do late at night? - <AUTHOR> Since it's almost 1AM EST I wondered if those of you who are still up were doing anything you'd like to share with the rest of us. <comment><USER2> Read on Kindle when really trying to sleep.

Otherwise, watching The Office 100th time.

Or if really not sleepy, then working on my next side project idea. Most likely the excitement of that new idea is keeping me from sleeping.

<comment><USER3> >next side project idea.

I am more interested in the side project idea a guy would have watching The Office that many time. Care to elaborate?

<comment><USER2> I have a baby who likes to wake up at 6AM, so don't really have luxury to work on side projects every night.

Wife and I like to watch some TV before going to bed. Sure I could do a bit of programming during this time but got to prioritize relationships over hobbies/projects. Usually we are watching a new show but after that we will play The Office because we have seen it enough that we don't really pay attention to it. It is kind of nice to fall sleep with some background TV noise. Like white noise machine in baby's room.

Also it might be strange but I find it easier to fall sleep to TV than complete silence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I endlessly swipe my phone trying to find something that makes me fall asleep. As I do this, I meditate upon why this is a terrible idea, but continue doing it anyway.

</comment><comment><USER5> After being a cofounder at a startup, I have this rule: No work at night. Keeps your mind fresh and focused on the next day.

<comment><USER4> The strange thing is that I _know_ I need some entertainment and rest at night, but I do anything except sleeping.

I actually find work very relaxing, which makes it even more tempting to do at night. Basically, more work done, more money, less problems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Play the Ludo board game (on an actual board) [0] with my wife, talking about how our day went while nice music plays in the background. [1]. I know this is old school, but it's fun!!!

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludo_(board_game)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludo_\(board_game\))

[1] [https://www.saregama.com/carvaan/hindi?srgm_tracker=carvaan_...](https://www.saregama.com/carvaan/hindi?srgm_tracker=carvaan_home)

</comment><comment><USER7> Hang out with my wife.

</comment><comment><USER8> I read using a reading light if I can't sleep.

I use to use a kindle paper white, but I am finding that being able to make notes on paper is still better.

Note on the reading light, I use one that does not have the blue wavelength.

</comment><comment><USER9> Either read, or put on my headphones to either play guitar or listen to music on my record player (this way I'm away from my screens).

I'm almost never staying up late as I go to sleep at around 10pm every night.

</comment><comment><USER10> Binge browsing for hunting some prospective leads. Right upto 4 am almost everyday.

</comment><comment><USER11> I go for a power run, take a quick shower afterwards and go straight to bed.

<comment><USER12> How long after dinner do you go to run? And how long or far do you usually run?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Speed watch TV programs that I recorded during the evening.

</comment><comment><USER14> reading, writing, coding, thinking, meditating... anything that is helped by quiet and solitude</comment>


App A/B testing startup raises money from ex-VP of FB and Cassandra co-creator - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/01/appiterate-raises-seed-funding-from-saif-partners-joins-growing-list-of-ab-testing-startups/

<comment><USER2> The video looks promising! Is it that easy to publish changes?

<comment><USER3> Yes. The visual editor helps you do drag and drop changes and publish them in realtime.</comment></comment>


Twilio's Cloud Architecture Principles - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoq.com/news/2011/04/twilio-cloud-architecture <comment><USER2> is this much different than highscalability.com? Or good architecture principles that have been known for web dev for years?</comment>


Ask HN: Thoughts on porn startups? - <AUTHOR>

I'm really curious to what HN has to say regarding porn startups; I dont mean the ones involved in production, but end-user, etc. <comment><USER2> What is there to say about porn startups that can't also be said about non- porn startups?

<comment><USER3> About the only thing that I can think of is that porn is a highly competitive and crowded industry. Unless you've got some "secret sauce" that is extremely hard to replicate, I wouldn't even consider it.

<comment><USER4> Try exploring the yet unharnessed sections of the EM spectrum. We have age-old visible-light porn, Paris Hilton introduced IR-light porn, the TSA pioneered x-ray and millimeter-wave porn, while some researchers dabbled with CAT-scaner machines. There is a huge potential still remaining! Near-UV, far-UV, far-IR (thermal), not to mention luminescence and fluorescence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Maybe you could do a chat roulette where instead of blocking the penis, you embrace it. Well, not embrace it. You don't want to touch it. Eeew. I just meant that... oh nevermind.

I agree with top comment. A startup is a startup. You only have so many resources though (time and money) so make sure this is the area in which you could kill it the most.

Just like with any startup, look for something which you can improve on. Except for bigger boobs. They can go bigger, but they are already big enough on the sites which specialize in those things!</comment>


9th Circuit Rules Apple Owes Retail Workers for Time Spent Security Screening - <AUTHOR> https://www.macrumors.com/2020/09/03/apple-owes-retail-workers-time-spent-bag-checks/ <comment><USER2> As a teenager, I worked running boardwalk games for a very well known theme park. I don't want to say the name, but let's just say it was one with _many flags_.

Every day the workflow was as follows:

      1. Sign-in in the employee entrance office.
      2. Get your cash bag from costumes.
      3. Pick up $200 worth of singles from the cash office for making change which both you and the teller would count out.
      4. Go through a security check.
      5. Walkthrough the park from the employee entrance to where your game was (often the other side of the park).

The whole thing took 20 minutes and we would signed-in to start being paid at _the next_ 15 minute interval from when we arrived at our game.

When we checked out, we did the whole process in reverse but would be signed- out for the previous 15 minute interval when we left our game area.

All in all, we were losing 40-68 minutes of wages per day. Worse if there were long lines in the office or costumes or the cash office.

Of course, we were also only paid $6.15 an hour and had to pay union dues out of that, so in total, it didn't add up to much...

<comment><USER3> It's stunning your union would permit this shit. It's no wonder Americans in general are so sour on unions if this is a representative experience.

<comment><USER4> Unions are hard because employers can basically do whatever the fuck they want to fight the union and they usually only get the NLRB injunction/penalty months/years later, after everyone originally supporting the action has been removed by the company.

Some unions are also just in the pocket of management. I have friends who are teamster organizers and they've told me some managers in some industries will actually request unions.

<comment><USER5> To expand a bit, a union is supposed to be democratic - the workers themselves organize to promote their own interests. But many unions that remain these days have become professionalized. They have their own well-paid administration and lobbyists, and their levers of power are political contributions and signing restrictive long-term contracts with employers.

Here is an article I found that goes into this: [https://www.labornotes.org/2002/06/corporatization- unions](https://www.labornotes.org/2002/06/corporatization-unions)

<comment><USER4> > their levers of power are political contributions and signing restrictive > long-term contracts with employers.

I'm curious how you think this differs from traditional practices, generally i think of signing security clauses + political influence as basic union 101.

There've always been professional organizers as long as there've been unions. They're hardly "well-paid" by private standards.

<comment><USER5> Both styles of union have a long history, but the alternative practice is to rely more heavily on strikes and other workplace actions, and less on pay-to- play politics.

It may be "union 101" to sign no-strike clauses but there are unions like the IWW that have always rejected them.

<comment><USER6> What you need is a union law similar to germany. In germany, when you apply to a job where a union has created a union employee contract (ie, standardized pay, standardized hours & benefits), then you can choose to use that contract even if you are not part of the union and you are entitled to still do your own contract even if you are in the union.

The only time you have to accept certain parts in your contract no choice is if they are mandated by the worker's council, which is voted for democratically by workers from and for a specific company and they can veto anything the company does or demand changes with a 50% share in board votes.

<comment><USER4> I don't see how this is different from a US union contract, which is approved by the majority of the local.

Generally, the union will not make the dues optional because that is how unions collapse in the US.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I worked at Best Buy during college, and if you closed you'd have to wait for a manager to unlock the door for you and check your stuff.

If I had to wait more than a minute or so, I'd fill out a time correction for the time I was spent locked in the building. Anytime someone said anything about it, I said if I'm stuck in the building I'm under the company's control, so I should be paid. Eventually managers just started getting there faster when I paged them.

A while later Best Buy was sued for this and lost.

<comment><USER8> I worked for Best Buy (Geek Squad) as well, about 12 years ago. I had the same experience. Even if they were going to pay me for the time, it felt wrong that they told me I was not able to leave. At times you could be waiting for 15 minutes. It was my first job at 16 years of age, and I didn't have the care or confidence to correct the time punch. At my store they would have to approve time punch modifications, so it would have been obvious if you did that every night.

The one person who did get fired for stealing was simply grabbing laptops, removing them from their box, and casually walking out with them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The fact that Apple let this go to court is disappointing.

Apple should do the right thing here, even if they are not legally obligated.

Pay retail employees for all work which is required of them. Do not dither over trivialities.

<comment><USER10> Disagree, as Apple, it is in their best interest to fight this.

For apple, employee are expenses, reducing expense and increasing profit is what a company should do.

<comment><USER11> ...was it worth the legal costs?

By this logic they might as well try not paying their employees at all and letting that go to court too.

(To clarify, it's not that I _necessarily_ think there's anything particularly egregious about the original practice since it seems commonplace, but the replyee's sentiment that they should've just given in is absolutely correct.)

<comment><USER10> If they won, yes.

>By this measure they might as well try not paying their employees at all and letting that go to court too

If they can figure out the way to do that, they should.

<comment><USER11> No, no they should not. I am not going to argue with this.

edit: Also, "if they won" \-- that's an assumption that is _already_ false. If you just disregard risk all the time, you go out of business.

<comment><USER10> Not saying to disregard risk. Of course the cost vs benefit analysis have to be done.

<comment><USER11> OK, but you also shouldn't disregard ethics. Even if you have the most egregiously simplified view of capitalism, disregarding ethics continuously can catch up with you. Plus, there are _plenty_ of other reasons to not short- change your employees. Your employees are.. You. They're your company. If you try to skimp on paying your employees, they will find ways to return the favor. Trust me, I worked in retail.

<comment><USER10> Not saying to disregard ethics.

>you try to skimp on paying your employees, they will find ways to return the favor.

That would be included in the cost/risk part. If the cost/risk of skimp on paying your employees < benefit then they should do it.

<comment><USER11> Looking at the world through the lens of only corporate cost/benefit and essentially disregarding externalities feels unwise. You could always just follow the rules as they were intended to be followed, not end up in the news, not pay court fees, and have happier employees, regardless of if your bottom line will _technically_ better at year-end. (I know roughly ~nobody actually does this, but wishful thinking.)

Regardless, at this point you seem to basically be saying, "They should do it, unless it's not worth it." Everyone else is saying "It's not worth it, and that's why they should not do it."

<comment><USER12> > Regardless, at this point you seem to basically be saying, "They should do > it, unless it's not worth it." Everyone else is saying "It's not worth it, > and that's why they should not do it."

Some people are also saying "whether it'd be worth it or not, they should not do it."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Will this also apply to the California Supreme Court ruling that Amazon won back in 2013?

[https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/10/business/supreme-court- ru...](https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/10/business/supreme-court-rules- against-worker-pay-for-security-screenings.html)

<comment><USER14> Judging by this quote, there's a good chance SCOTUS overturns a ruling on this topic by the 9th circuit a second time.

> Justice Thomas disagreed, saying the appeals court had "erred by focusing on > whether an employer required a particular activity." The right test, he > said, was whether the activity "is tied to the productive work that the > employee is employed to perform."

Maybe the 9th will overturn en blanc before it reaches SCOTUS.

<comment><USER15> That's a very silly viewpoint. If I have to travel to the North Pole to change a lightbulb, should I only get paid for changing the lightbulb? If the security screening takes 9h, would we really expect employees not to be paid? If so, these would be pretty terrible job arrangements.

<comment><USER16> It's based on the wording of a 1947 law, maybe it's time to change that law. I can see the need for clarity here though. Should employers pay their workers for time spent commuting to a job site/office? Can I live three hours away and make a cool 6 hours of extra wages listening to audio books on my way to/from work?

<comment><USER17> For commuting to their regular workplace? No. If an employee chooses to live three hours away from the office, that's their problem.

<comment><USER18> What if an employer chooses to be located three hours away from the nearest affordable housing?

<comment><USER19> Then don't take the job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Always amazing to see how things are decided by tiny reading of the English language. The law states…

 _Hours worked' means the time during which an employee is subject to the control of an employer, and includes all the time the employee is suffered or permitted to work, whether or not required to do so_

The lower court read that as "hours worked is the time under employer control where the employee can work whether they do it or not". The supremes cut that into two statements at the ", and" and made "subject to the control of the employer" stand alone in addition to when they could be made to work.

By definition the supremes are correct, but the judges that ruled the other way are also very experienced judges.

Also important… Apple (probably accidentally) forfeited the "de minimis" argument which says employees don't have to be paid for small, incidental periods of time off the clock. I was expecting this case to be a declaration on reasonable "de minimis" requirements. Instead we got a sentence diagramming exercise.

<comment><USER21> > The lower court read that as "hours worked is the time under employee > control where the employee can work whether they do it or not". The supremes > cut that into two statements at the ", and" and made "subject to the control > of the employer" stand alone in addition to when they could be made to work.

(1) I think you meant "time under _employer_ control"?

(2) Are you suggesting the lower court just ignored the "is suffered" part?

<comment><USER20> 1 - thanks, fixed.

2 - the lower court appears to have used the back half of the sentence as describing the components of the first half.

Given the supremes' reading, the back half doesn't need to even be there, though I guess if you can conceive of someone working for a company but not subject to the control of the company it would cover some ground. Heaven knows I've had employees like that.

<comment><USER21> 2 - But if the circuit court used the back of the sentence to read the first half, time going through security screening would've seemed like a pretty obvious example of time that the employee "is suffered", right?

My understanding was that's not what happened though. See page 7 for the summary of the district court's reasoning.

<comment><USER22> Are you saying "is suffered" stands alone? What does that mean? I read it as "is suffered to work", meaning the employee is allowed to work, which in this case it sounds like it might not apply.

<comment><USER21> Yes. I understand to "be suffered" here means "to be made to go through something unpleasant/undesired/etc."... which is what a security check is. The point I take being that if you make employees "suffer", you can't use their inability to perform work during that time as an excuse not to pay them. (Note the word in between is "or", not "to".)

<comment><USER22> That's not my understanding of "be suffered".

"He suffers a loss" means a man is suffering a loss. The loss is hurting him.

"A loss is suffered" means someone/something is suffering a loss. The loss his hurting someone/something.

"The employee is suffered" means someone/something is suffering the employee. The employee is hurting someone/something.

Your definition would match "the employee suffers", but that's the opposite of "the employee is suffered".

<comment><USER21> > "The employee is suffered" means someone/something is suffering the > employee. The employee is hurting someone/something.

Huh, interesting. How does this make sense in context though? The text says _" all the time the employee is suffered or permitted to work"_ must be compensated, so you're saying the law says that an employee must get paid for all the time he spends doing either of {hurting someone/something, being permitted to work}? Why would there be a law to mandate paying employees that hurt people...?

<comment><USER22> I think they're using an alternate definition of "suffer".

> 4 : to allow especially by reason of indifference

>> the eagle suffers little birds to sing

> — William Shakespeare

[https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suffer](https://www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/suffer)

So "is suffered" would actually just be a synonym for "is permitted" in this case. So essentially "is suffered" could be removed with no change in meaning, since "is permitted" is already in the law. As for why lawmakers decided to insert what appears to be a useless and confusing synonym, I'm not sure.

<comment><USER21> Oh interesting! Thank you!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Good. It's not a part of their commute, and it's required to start/end working. So, just fricking pay them.

<comment><USER24> Yeah, the Amazon ruling never made sense to me. If your employer is restricting what you can do with your time (I.e. wait for a security screen before leaving work) then they need to pay you for that time.

<comment><USER25> It's not so much what makes _sense_ \- I think the vast majority, if not everyone, on HN would agree that it makes sense to pay an employee if they are required to perform a particular time-consuming security screening while on the work site as part of their job. The question is, what does the _law_ say - and, rather than have judges go against the law, and do what _they think_ makes sense, the proper approach is to change the law.

<comment><USER26> Equity stands on equal footing with law in the Constitution, and is often more efficient. Specific performance in paying the back wages and and injunction against further shenanigans is an equally viable approach.

It's worth reflecting on the fact that people on the more powerful side of asymmetrical contract relationships are often motivated to do whatever they can get away with, and the absence of a sufficiently specific law is often treated as a license to shift a cost burden onto the weaker party. The problem with your approach is endless multiplication, specification, and complexity of law, which drives up the cost of getting into a legal dispute for everyone.

<comment><USER27> The problem with the opposite approach is "legislating from the bench", which leads to legal uncertainty and comes with plenty of its own problems. That complexity you mentioned doesn't go away, it just gets shifted into case law instead of statutory law.

Law isn't complex just for the benefit of lawyers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> This should have been an open-and-shut case, its unbelievable that it took years to re-affirm established norm that employees must be paid for their time, no matter what the firm decides to waste it on. So don't waste it.

</comment><comment><USER29> Like many people, I worked retail. I never got angry at the security guy trying to let me out the door, but it was frustrating to wait 5 minutes here and there unpaid.

I agree that people should be paid for that time.. but I'm also curious where the line is drawn? I left the city to work on a small town because my commute 5 miles/day was 15-20 hours/week. I suppose you can argue many jobs pay well enough to cover that... But people also work retail in those areas.

An ideal solution would be to spread out the cities -- encourage more remote working (though not like we currently see)... But in lieu of that, where is the limit?

Is employee parking, which is a 5 minute walk to the back of the lot, covered? I had a friend that works at a car factory... If you don't drive that manufacturers car, you park in lot B, an extra minute or three away. Is that any different then being forced to stand at the for to leave a few minutes now and then? (It's not always 5-15 minutes, where this example is a constant).

Please accept this as a thought experiment... Not a criticism against better pay for retail. Everyone deserves the pursuit of happiness.

<comment><USER30> The limit, legally, is pretty cut and dry: commute time is not paid, anything on site is. If you have to wait in line for security, that's paid. If it takes 10 minutes to count out your till at the end of a cashier shift, that's paid. If you're sent to another location in the middle of the day, time getting there from your normal place of work is paid.

There are a small handful of edge cases that vary by state (e.g., if you have to change into a uniform when you get to work, that's considered on-the-clock in California, but not federally), but not many.

<comment><USER29> How do you feel about "employee parking" being an extra minute or two away? That time adds up to... And it's virtually the same thing -- "company policy mandatees you ___"...

I agree with everything you're staying, but add I said, this is a thought experiment... What would be a good line to draw?

<comment><USER31> > What would be a good line to draw?

Parking is a convenience, a benefit as such. Your responsibility is to arrive at the entrance, ready for work on time (or clock in). When someone from the company prohibits you from entry to clock in or leave on time, that is on the company.

Another aligned argument here, could be that the closet food restaurant is 20 minutes away and you have 60 minutes for lunch. It is not the companies responsibility to make sure you make it there and back in 60 minutes, you account for traffic, ordering time, eating time etc. But if the company stops you at the door with a security guard for 10 minutes, before you can go get your lunch, and when you enter back from lunch then it's their problem.

<comment><USER32> > Your responsibility is to arrive at the entrance, ready for work on time (or > clock in).

This seems circular, like saying you shouldn't get paid for working on a project at home because you agreed to be responsible for completing the project at home. In both cases it is a task that requires time and effort, which you are doing for the company's benefit, not your own.

Ultimately these factors are included in the employee's mind when they seek and negotiate for jobs. All things being equal, you take the job with shorter commute and same pay because the commute is part of the job in your mental calculation. You can also negotiate for more pay to offset a long commute.

<comment><USER31> > Ultimately these factors are included in the employee's mind when they seek > and negotiate for jobs. All things being equal, you take the job with > shorter commute and same pay because the commute is part of the job in your > mental calculation. You can also negotiate for more pay to offset a long > commute.

There are many choices at play here, some may even may live further away to offset the cost of living or have a bigger back yard etc. I am sure that many do this in the cities.

But all things being equal if you are wage earner, you generally get paid by the hour and thus time spent at work at the companies need or request, should be paid for. If you cannot leave your job on time, then you should be paid for that time.

Some things are just inflexible in any workplace, both from an employee's and an employer's perspective, and a legal one.

Now those fortunate people who are salary earners, they get to negotiate a little more. However generally (unless they have a flexible agreement), there is still hours of work which are committed to.

All others like contractors etc fall into a different pile.

<comment><USER32> > Some things are just inflexible in any workplace, both from an employee's > and an employer's perspective, and a legal one.

They're just shifted from official numbers to some form of hidden cost. The economic situation is the same. I'm presuming no one at the apple store actually makes minimum wage, so ultimately Apple will counter an increase in hours clocked by a reduction in hourly pay. Though I'd expect them to be sneaky about it.

The cutoff for reporting hourly wage is something like $47k. Everyone either negotiates directly or else affects the wage indirectly by not competing for the job (requiring the company to offer more to attract employees). Companies give regular raises to their wage workers for completely rational self-serving reasons. And obviously a business wants to employ from a larger (and therefore better) pool of potential employees beyond those who live on the same block. Common sense says people are going to consider the cost of the commute (both in time and money) when considering the gross income they would get from the job. So for everyone apart from minimum wage workers, there's still some overall average component of pay based on how much people think the commuting part is worth.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Many decades ago something similar happened with Best Buy employees and waiting to leave the building. My memory is fuzzy but I recall it having to do with some ruling by a government authority. Basically at night shift we could clock out but had to wait for the manager to let us out of the building. Sometimes were were waiting for 15 + minutes. All employees got back pay.

</comment><comment><USER34> The circumstances of this case seem similar to Integrity Staffing Solutions v. Busk, which involved workers at an Amazon warehouse in Nevada.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity_Staffing_Solutions,_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity_Staffing_Solutions,_Inc._v._Busk)

<comment><USER35> This is exactly what I thought about when I saw the headline. Amazon won that case and refused to pay for the security checks, does this ruling mean that they'll have to start paying too?

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> The fact that this awful nickle and diming of staff doesn't get vetoed by someone with a shred of awareness about PR, morale, good management and anything else beyond short-term balance sheet thinking speaks very ill of the company concerned.

<comment><USER37> They know that the bad PR won't affect their bottom line much, if at all, unless it turns into some kind of Draconian regulation/penalties, which it won't.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> It seems there was a similar case in 2014 about Amazon workers not getting paid for screening time. The US Supreme Court decided unanimously that Amazon did not have to pay them.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/10/business/supreme-court- ru...](https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/10/business/supreme-court-rules- against-worker-pay-for-security-screenings.html)

How is this case different from the precedent established by the Amazon case?

Edit:

In the 2014 case, it was the 9th Circuit that was being overruled. I wonder if this decision is destined for the same fate.

<comment><USER39> State requirement vs federal requirement. A better question I think is how did the US Supreme Court get the decision so spectacularly wrong?

<comment><USER38> > A better question I think is how did the US Supreme Court get the decision > so spectacularly wrong?

I think when there is a unanimous decision, you can't just jump to that premise. Remember, the job of the Supreme Court is to interpret the law. Laws can be bad or unjust (without being unconstitutional) and the Supreme Court will go with what the law says.

<comment><USER40> From the New York Times article at the time:

 _The case that the Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday turned on the meaning of a 1947 law, the Portal-to-Portal Act, which says that companies need not pay for "preliminary" or "postliminary" activities, meaning ones that take place before and after the workday proper. The Supreme Court interpreted the law in 1956 in Steiner v. Mitchell to require pay only for tasks that are an "integral and indispensable part of the principal activities for which covered workmen are employed."_

So, if someone disagrees, it seems as if their beef is with the 1947 law rather than the Supreme Court. While I'm sure there are grey areas, there isn't any real disagreement that, in general, workers aren't paid for getting dressed and commuting for example.

ADDED: From a lay perspective somewhat related would seem to be the question of whether workers are "on the clock" when changing into work clothes and protective gear. And the answer seems to be only to a limited degree. (Basically yes for special protective gear but not for work clothing in general.)

[https://blogs.orrick.com/employment/2014/02/05/get-paid- for-...](https://blogs.orrick.com/employment/2014/02/05/get-paid-for-getting- dressed-supreme-court-clarifies-changing-clothes-under-the-flsa/)

<comment><USER41> I'm curious what additional context the SCOTUS applied when interpreting the phrase, "integral and indispensable part of the principal activities for which covered workmen are employed."

My first thought when reading that phrasing is: if we assume that the security checks are NOT integral and indispensable, wouldn't that imply that the employees are free to skip those steps?

Or, from another angle, are there _any_ limits on what activities are defined by employers as "integral and indispensable" or "principal"? E.g., could Amazon define the time spent walking from workspace-table to an equipment rack as outside the scope of paid work?

IANAL; I'm sure these questions have already been analyzed to death. If anyone knows where a layperson-accessible discussion is available I'd be grateful for a link.

[EDIT: reworded for clarity]

<comment><AUTHOR> > "IANAL .... where a layperson-accessible ..."

as a side note, let's not separate ourselves from lawyers in our ability to reason about and determine what's fair, ethical, and just. it's well within our power to interpret and rationalize about human relations.

a little specialized training in argumentation doesn't give lawyers special powers in this regard. that is, let's not fall for either regulatory capture or an appeal to authority (that's not to say that lawyers don't often have relevant specialized experience to bring to bear in litigation and negotiation).

<comment><USER42> > as a side note, let's not separate ourselves from lawyers in our ability to > reason about and determine what's fair, ethical, and just. it's well within > our power to interpret and rationalize about human relations.

It should be noted, though, that appellate court opinions usually contain many citations to prior cases, quoting excepts from those cases and applying much subtle reasoning to try to justify saying the present case is like the prior cases whose ruling are similar to the present court's ruling, and much subtle reasoning to try to distinguish the present case from those prior cases that came to a difference conclusion.

It's real easy to go off track when trying to follow this. When reading cases in law school I had to resort to using something like 6 different colors of highlighter at once to mark up the cases in my book to help keep track of what was going on.

Yes, we indeed can (mostly) all reason about and determine what is fair, ethical, and just. But we usually don't have to provide extensive justification for how we reached our conclusions, and most situations where we have to make such determinations are fairly straightforward.

Courts are usually dealing with edge cases, where there are conflicting interests and it is not possible to come to a fair, ethical, or just outcome for everybody.

<comment><AUTHOR> that's a good point, i took some (cross-discipline) law classes in college and did experience that intricate web of argument across time and jurisdiction a bit, which was not fun to say the least.

and certainly we can't be fair, ethical, and just for everyone all the time, but i don't think that means we should cede legal authority to only a special class because the arguments can get subtle and intricate. if anything, it seems to be good rationale to me for putting more effort into making the law simpler and less opaque (realizing that's harder than it sounds).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> So does this mean Amazon is going to start paying for their security screenings?

<comment><USER44> Sure.

They could easily charge thousands of their shady vendors peddling fakes to customers an extra fees to compensate for that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> The notion that an employer can mandate things to do but not pay for that time is completely ridiculous. This is a good decision.

</comment><comment><USER46> Awesome that's great. It'd be interesting if you could some how extend that to commuting, so hourly workers taking trains in for service work are compensated for their times in transit.

<comment><USER47> I (and probably many people here might) have thought about that in the past as well. It will surely be great from the employee's perspective, but thinking more about it, let's say a work day is 8 hours long. What if I stay 4 hours away from the office? I come and go everyday, and technically get paid for full day's work. There has to be some limit to it from the employer's perspective.

Please note that Europe had ruled a few years back that the time spent in commuting 'for work' must be counted as work hours (e.g. plumber travelling to client's location). But employees travelling to the same office everyday were excluded from that rule as far as I remember.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Does it strike anyone else as absurd that a $2 trillion company has spent 5 years and untold millions arguing over whether it must compensate employees for the 15 minutes it takes for a company-mandated frisk?

In fact, Apple lawyers argued before the California Supreme Court that the time was not mandated since employees could waltz just opt to 'not bring things with them'. How insane is that - the search is not technically 'required' since people don't technically 'need' to bring things with them when they come to work? Who doesn't need to bring a purse/phone/backpack to work?

The whole thing feels straight out of some alternative (dystopian?) future America like Infinite Jest.

<comment><USER49> >Does it strike anyone else as absurd that a $2 trillion company has spent 5 years and untold millions arguing over whether it must compensate employees for the 15 minutes it takes for a company-mandated frisk?

As an Amazon employee, no, it does not.

<comment><USER50> It's almost like the big corps are in collusion to keep wages down, whether they employ tons of low-wager workers or only a few.

<comment><USER51> We all know it is about motivation, money and economies of scale.

Motivation - make money for rentiers, otherwise get sued.

Economies of scale - many low paid employees means differences in how you treat them can add up to millions.

Result - employ people to reduce those millions in costs.

Don't blame the man, blame the game.

<comment><USER52> When the referee blows their whistle, the individual player who transgressed against the rules or spirit of the game is individually punished, and collectively all players benefit from this, even the one penalized. That the one penalized may not agree with or comply with the referee is beyond the scope of accountability of one referee's ability to enforce the rules of the game.

<comment><USER50> But Apple's economies of scale are in east Asian factories, no Apple stores.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> This is really great. How did amazon's case manage to get the opposite ruling, years ago?

<comment><USER54> Amazon was ruled using federal law as not everyone in the suit was based in California. In this case, it's Californians suing under California law.

<comment><USER53> The ninth circuit is a federal court with no jurisdiction over state laws.

<comment><USER54> Either the Ninth Circuit overstepped their jurisdiction when they ruled[0] on whether Apple violated "California Industrial Welfare Commission Wage Order No. 7",[1] or they actually _do have jurisdiction_.

My knowledge of the courts is that they are pretty strict about jurisdiction, so I'm led to believe that they actually _do_ have it.

Also, they mention that they do:[2]

> We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291.

[0]: [https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2020/09/02/1...](https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2020/09/02/15-17382.pdf)

[1]: [0;p.9 "III"]

[2]: [0;p.9 "I"]

<comment><USER53> Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> Now onto Amazon, meat plants, and many other large-ish businesses that do this corrupt abuse of their workers time.

</comment><comment><USER56> I don't understand- how were they not being paid? If I had to show up for a 9 to 5 and there was 15 minutes of security screening, I'm showing up at 9 and getting paid for it, not showing up early. Am I OOTL on something here? Were they threatened with termination?

<comment><USER7> This isn't screening to get in, it's screening to leave. So your shift ends at 5, and they make you wait in a line to get out the door--after you'd already clocked out. And yes, you would be threatened with termination if you didn't wait in the security line

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> Didn't this already get ruled the other way by scotus?

<comment><USER58> Federal law in the Amazon case, California law in this Apple case.

<comment><USER57> Ah! That makes sense. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> The idea that they wouldn't is laughable/horrifying.

</comment><comment><USER60> edit: wrong thread</comment>


Zeromalist – Unlock features by pushing minimalism to zero - <AUTHOR> http://zeromalist.com <comment><USER2> Reading this encouraged me to archive all my emails. Easy, but I needed the reminder.

I've unfollowed a lot of my friends on facebook, but the author's scheme goes beyond mine. If you unfollow all friends, but turn on notifications for the people you do want to keep tabs on, then you know when you're done.

I just went through it for my ~330 friends. Took about 20 minutes. I admit that in the middle I thought it wouldn't end, but that's because it's an infinitely-refreshing page, so you can't see your progress!

I haven't yet reaped rewards of fixing my facebook, but I'm looking forward to it. [edit]: Ok, it's been 20 minutes and not a single new thing-to-look-at on facebook. This feels good.

Thanks for posting this list. It's motivating to have unifying theme for zero- inbox, a clean house, and less social media.

<comment><AUTHOR> Very glad this post inspired you to do it all the way to zero, congratulations! You'll probably see some things pop out in your feed once in a while from pages, groups, and such. Just remember to unfollow those as well when it happens :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Great document. Lots of this rings true to me. I have two "$thing Zero" anecdotes:

Paper Zero: Have a paperless office

Consumerism Zero: Rather than buying items based on advertising or impulse, do deep research to find a quality product that meets your needs.</comment>


GFaaS – Great Firewall as a Service Censored? - <AUTHOR> I'm currently researching Chinese censorship and I was hoping to use the GFaaS website published here a few weeks ago.<p>It allowed testing China's Great firewall. It was called GFaaS. Can anyone find this anymore? I searched Google and it came up with no results. <comment><USER2> This one?: [https://gfwaas.github.io/](https://gfwaas.github.io/)</comment>


Americans own less cars per captia than western europeans - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/08/its-official-western-europeans-have-more-cars-per-person-than-americans/261108/

<comment><USER2> The report authors seem to be arguing that income inequality in USA is so bad that an emerging lower/middle class cannot afford cars and the rich have all the cars they will need.

This strikes me as plausible.

The Atlantic is saying actually our young people aren't poor, they just want iphones instead.

This strikes me as implausible platitudes.

Is the Atlantic a Left / right wing paper (it appears on HN a lot so I would like to know)

<comment><USER3> Historically it's a literary magazine. It's changed focus in the last 5-10 years. Andrew Sullivan was an editor there. Sullivan is an "openly gay Catholic" conservative. Jeffrey Goldberg is a writer there. He was at The New Yorker, wrote about international human rights, and Castro invited him to Cuba. James Bennet is the editor-in-chief. He was at the New York Times for about 15 years before then. As editor he "featured a cover story on Britney Spears, a change from The Atlantic's tradition in higher culture." (All cribbed from Wikipedia.)

I would say it's literary and good journalism. If Colbert is right, and reality as a well-known liberal bias, then it's liberal. Or, see the Talk section of the WP page for a rather lengthy discussion: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:The_Atlantic> .

I think it's shifting to include more technology coverage under its traditional cultural commentary/literary style. Sort of somewhere like a mix of the Economist and Wired.

While I would like that, I'm irritated with them for spamming various sites, including HN and Reddit. See [http://www.dailydot.com/society/atlantic- slaterhearst-jared-...](http://www.dailydot.com/society/atlantic-slaterhearst- jared-keller-reddit/) . I've commented on some of their self-posted links here on HN, including questions about the article, and got no followup, which tells me it's more spam than trying to engage in dialog. So I tend to ignore links to their site.

<comment><USER4> While I agree that the Atlantic tends to have good journalism, that's most true of its feature-length articles from the magazine proper. Imo these blog- style posts that they also do have more mixed quality.

<comment><USER3> I didn't actually follow the link. For the reason I mentioned. :)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Best way to track usage of js widgets and buttons? - <AUTHOR>

My social news site has a widget and external voting buttons a la Digg and Reddit.
What's the best methods to track usage?  I want to know what sites they're appearing on and how many impressions they're getting there.  The number of referrals would be great as well, but I don't think this information is gettable since the links are created in js.
Two approaches I thought of, neither seems adequate:
1.  Both widgets and buttons make use of an iframe.  I could embed Google Analytics code in the framed page that gets called so I can track these "hits."  This seems like it might hurt performance on the sites that run the widget/buttons though.
2.  Track requests made in the php logs to the image files used in the buttons and the widget.  My issue with this is that I'd  much prefer to track usage via Google Analytics so I can more easily compare the data and explore it.
Suggestions? <comment><USER2> There are widget analytics services such as ClearSpring, Gigya, and Widgetbox.</comment>


Do as I Say, Not as I Do: 'Moral Hypocrisy' in Powerful People - <AUTHOR> http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2009/12/galinsky.html

<comment><USER2> Good to see a study on this, but not surprising at all. Most of them think they are "better" than the masses, and don't have to follow the rules. "Life's a game and it's not fair. I break the rules so I don't care."</comment>