Today's Brexit Likelihood Score - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2016-brexit-watch/ <comment><USER2> I love Bloomberg's flair and talent when it comes to producing rich articles that feel like true web-based projects. In this story, for example, the way a single star falls from the EU crest at the top, and also how the cursor X-axis position acts as a guide for the marker on all charts on the page.

However, one chart I take a (small) issue with is their "Today's Brexit Likelihood Score" chart — surely it is much more intuitive to have the blue ('remain') bar filling up the inverse of what they're currently drawing? I.e. 76.27% filled

<comment><USER3> I came here to say this. It's incredibly confusing to the point where I wonder if it's a mistake or bug.

<comment><USER2> Yeah, but what makes me think it is a mistake is that they are focussing on a '23% chance of Brexit' figure, using the same blue as the chart line. So perhaps what they really ought to do is just swap the line around.

<comment><USER4> They should use the same 3 colours as in the line chart below, and not add undecided to remain.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm more inclined to trust bookmakers than polls. [http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/eu- refe...](http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/eu- referendum/referendum-on-eu-membership-result)

Currently, the best odds you can get for 'stay' are 4:9, and the best odds for 'leave' are 21:10, which suggests odds of about 2:1 for staying, i.e. Bloomberg is overconfident.

<comment><USER6> Sure, after last year we definitely don't want to be too eager to assume that pollsters know what's coming in the UK, and if they fail as spectacularly as in the GE then certainly the bookies may prove to have been more accurate, but then so could me picking chance percentages out of the air and telling people they're my predictions.

What makes you think either the bookies or the punters have any clue what accurate pricing would be for that market?

<comment><USER5> The bookies' entire business model is to have a better clue than anyone else about what the accurate pricing would be. If they fail at that, they don't stay in business for very long.

<comment><USER7> Isn't a bookie's business model based around laying off one side of a bet against the other rather than predicting the future?

When you win at long odds, in a perfect system, it's not the bookie's money you're taking it's a share of money collected from the punters who bet on the favourite (minus the bookmaker's margin).

The bookie shouldn't care what's likely to happen or not, their pricing should be based on the collective opinions of the punters, right or wrong.

      > So how does a bookmaker set his original odds? We mentioned before that most of
      > the early bookmakers will have a number of experts in each sport and they will
      > come to a decision as to the opening prices. However, it is important to note
      > that the odds they set are not based on the true probability of the teams
      > winning, but rather what the general betting public perceive the true
      > probability to be.

[https://betting.betfair.com/the-art-of- bookmaking.html](https://betting.betfair.com/the-art-of-bookmaking.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This approach should be taken by both camps. By that I mean, use actual real data to drive their point. At the moment all we get from both sides us emotional opinions and speculation without a single data point to back it up. I am on the fence regarding the eu (and I'm both British and European nationality wise). I want to be persuaded this way or the other but not by emotions. I want cold hard facts and analysis. And I'm getting none of that.

<comment><USER9> Absolutely. It's a head vs heart debate. I understand the heart bit. But the head bit seems open-and-shut to me (remain). I've yet to see a convincing argument to leave that doesn't lead with heart (immigration and the UK innate supremacy over Europe).

There is a distinct lack of facts from both camps.

<comment><USER8> For me its the opposite. My heart wants to stay, my head resists. To (maybe badly) put it in code, its like a great interface provided by this wonderful company people like to love, but the practical implementations of that interface are so lacking it looks bad on the interface itself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMk6aVsl8Rs#t=66](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMk6aVsl8Rs#t=66)

If you're interested in this topic, I recommend this discussion with (pragmatic) economist Mark Blyth and Yanis Varoufakis. They talk about brexit, Greece, and what it will take to fix the economic mess in the EU.

</comment><comment><USER11> Given the British' press ability to predict the last elections and political outcomes, I remind everyone that nothing is set until the votes are tallied. This article really gives us nothing but a snapshot that is probably already outdated.

</comment><comment><USER12> nice

</comment><comment><USER13> It's funny how one might think that being in the EU is voluntary, but as it seems, a country cannot get out, or really, regain any sovereignty, for fear of economic problems. That is like saying "I cannot leave this abusive relationship because I will be lonely and heartbroken." and continue to get punched and scratched every day.

<comment><USER14> If you are in a relationship with someone and you share rent for a flat, breaking up with them would mean that now you live on your own and have to pay 2x as much. It's a serious economic concern, because it might cripple you financially, at least until you find another roommate or move.

But, that doesn't mean that you are not free to break up with someone. You just have to be an adult about it and live with the consequences.

<comment><USER15> I mean, there is a more subtle point right there.

In actual abusive relationships this interdependency is one of the important factors that keeps the abused in the relationship. It's one of the things that makes abusive relationships so hard to escape and consequently so horrific.

That said, interdependency is also just as much a part of non-abusive and completely healthy relationships, i.e. the mere existence of interdependency doesn't decide whether a relationship is abusive or not.

To me the EU and UK relationship is a clearly non-abusive one. I wouldn't call it healthy, but mostly because the UK is frequently completely disengaged from the process and disinterested in actually being part of the relationship. They could have so much say and power … but they don't want to. Rather they want to spend all their time worrying and drawing up horror scenarios.

I do not want the UK to leave, but I also don't think that a UK this disengaged is not very productive to have inside the EU.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Should we stay or should we go? No one seems to have a clear idea. But the UK is full of middle aged and the older generation who are scared shitless of change. The younger generation (18 - 35) aren't in a position where the EU membership effects them in any tangible way. So we'll end up staying for the wrong reason. Fear.

Where I live we get a metric shit tonne of EU funding, but I assume that if we left, the funding would just come from the government. Or we'd get none. Who knows? Who knows if the EU funding will dry up if we stay? We are so powerless it is unreal.

<comment><USER17> > The younger generation (18 - 35) aren't in a position where the EU > membership effects them in any tangible way

You mean the age group which actually travels, studies abroad, looks for new jobs which right now they can choose from all over the EU, has more international contacts than previous generations, etc. ? I'm sure they're more affected in very practical ways than older generations.

I'm affected in at least 3 ways, and I'm not even in Europe anymore.

<comment><USER16> > the age group which actually travels, studies abroad, looks for new jobs > which right now they can choose from all over the EU, has more international > contacts than previous generations

Oh yeah, rich people stuff.

I don't know many people who've done that. I know one guy who left for the USA, I know one or two older people who go on a regular holiday out of the UK each year. 90% of my friends have been abroad once or twice, but it's not an influence on their current EU debate.

<comment><USER17> Not only rich people. 8 people from my first university class did a year abroad on EU programs. (some couldn't afford it otherwise) At my last university, most of the year was not from the UK, which was funny when a GCHQ guy tried to recruit people - most of them not the right nationality to hire.

Or from another side, I expect most people from Poland are not going to work in the UK because they're rich and can afford it. They move where the work is and suddenly two parts of the family have a reason to travel internationally. Exactly because they're not rich.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Vanadium redox battery - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery <comment><USER2> These are fascinating batteries. Yes, their energy density is less than Li-Ion but, are most suitable to cater to intermittent power sources such as Solar and Wind.

Hopefully, with enough space, a solar or wind generating station can be turned into a base load station. I guess that's where data analysis and computing will help.

An intelligent power controller / charger could theoretically turn a single wind turbine into a miniature base load plant, i.e, a power source that supplies constant power, buffered by these flow batteries.

I am hopeful that with better materials, not only with the flow batteries be eco-friendly, but also more energy dense.

Also, in the future, such batteries hopefully could make an individual house completely grid independent.

<comment><USER3> There's no real compelling reason to locate the batteries near the generator.

<comment><USER4> Not next door no, but they are going to have to be in roughly the same region, because power losses over long distance transmission become significant in pretty short order.

<comment><USER5> I think you put the batteries near the load point. Transmission losses are more painful for higher cost energy (battery storage), than low cost (excess wind power).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Vanadium batteries are very promising, however the energy density is the main issue here. Lead Acid batteries have a better ratio however obviously lead is toxic and it requires more than just lead. The fact that Vanadium batteries capacity is limited to just the size of the tank (slight oversimplification) is a positive for sure, their life span is also a positive factor. It also, while classed as toxic, is not classed a seriously hazardous.

<comment><USER7> Like most redox/flow batteries they have a very big shortcoming and that is a very limited operating temp range for vanadium it's 10-40c that means they'll need environmental controls installed in almost every case.

<comment><USER8> Given that these batteries would be used mostly in stationary applications, where space is less of a problem, the only question is how much extra power would the heaters and/or coolers need, and how much waste heat the charge/discharge releases (some of the waste heat could be used instead of the heaters, but would put more demand on the cooling system). Unless the amount of waste heat is too high, it doesn't sound like too much of problem to me; given proper insulation, most of the heat would come from the battery itself.

<comment><USER7> Cooling/heating Li-Ion batteries which have a wider range and are mechanically easier to cool than liquid Redox batteries is a big challenge, this one is a much bigger one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The temperature limits issues can be (in most cases) solved by simply putting the batteries underground.

If you can go deep enough, temperature is almost constant, check, as an example, Fig. 4 here:

[https://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Cooling/EarthTemperatu...](https://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Cooling/EarthTemperatures.htm)

</comment><comment><USER10> Vanadium is the latest beneficiary of the battery craze

A metal used to harden steel could also help prevent global warming

[https://www.economist.com/business/2018/07/21/vanadium-is- th...](https://www.economist.com/business/2018/07/21/vanadium-is-the-latest- beneficiary-of-the-battery-craze)

</comment><comment><USER11> One company attempting to make commercial products:

[https://www.google.com/search?q=storen+technologies&oq=store...](https://www.google.com/search?q=storen+technologies&oq=storen+tech&aqs=chrome.4.69i57j69i60l3j0l2.4896j0j4&sourceid=chrome- mobile&ie=UTF-8)

On a bigger Grid scale:

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

</comment><comment><USER12> I'm super confused...a lot of people say that this battery works only between 10-40C but I remember a couple weeks ago and there was a Stanford article on how they made a mebrane operate at room and high (200C). Is the 10-40C a limit on Vanadium or the membrane used?! If it is the membrane, does that mean the article is click bait?!</comment>


Linux developer who took on Torvalds over abuse quits 'toxic' kernel community - <AUTHOR> http://www.zdnet.com/article/linux-developer-who-took-on-linus-torvalds-over-abuse-quits-toxic-kernel-community/ <comment><USER2> We get it--Torvalds is an ass, but this "news" is old. It's great that the developer quit, I'm sure someone will fill the void.</comment>


The Uncertain Future of Bitcoin Futures - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-11-23/the-uncertain-future-of-bitcoin-futures <comment><USER2> The BTC future will settle against a spot reference price so you cannot take delivery.

My big issue with this is if the reference price is manipulated by exchanges (there is a lot of speculation about that exchanges aren't being honest with their trades) there is no way for the future to correct this. Shorting the future would do nothing. The future is a prediction on that settlement index and not the actual price of BTC. The usual move would be to take delivery and sell elsewhere or carry the underlying.

I really wish BTC wasnt financially settled. I have no trust in the current BTC exchanges. They really don't deserve it.

<comment><USER3> > My big issue with this is if the reference price is manipulated by exchanges > (there is a lot of speculation about that exchanges aren't being honest with > their trades) there is no way for the future to correct this.

How would this manipulation be done by the exchanges in practice?

a) If they lie about the last trade price, their order book wouldn't match this.

b) If they use deposited USD to buy up BTCUSD sell orders (to push up the price), their USD assets would no longer match their USD liabilities.

And if only a single exchange does b), its USD assets would quickly drain from the exchange, as arbitrageurs would 1) buy cheap bitcoins at the other exchanges 2) sell on the expensive/cheating exchange 3) withdraw USD from cheating exchange (draining USD that is already in short supply because of the cheating) 4) deposit USD at low-price exchanges and repeat 1).

<comment><USER2> I've worked in trading for a while now, and after talking to a could people specifically about bitcoin, inter-exchange arbitrage isn't as big as it should be. The issues tend to be around clearing and counterparty risk (BTC on two different exchanges have different prices reflecting the difficulty in moving BTC off the exchange). There is a lot of friction in BTC movement which really shouldn't exist.

Also you assume exchanges operating financial information is open and trusted which is definitely not the case.

It's easy for the exchange to paint the tape with false trades and it doesn't cost them anything. A large player getting a fee discount can self trade without much loss either.

I don't think the order books are to be trusted with these BTC venues.

<comment><USER4> > _There is a lot of friction in BTC movement which really shouldn 't exist._

Maybe this is protecting the BTC market from flash traders?

<comment><USER2> I don't know how you call this massive volatility and fraud "protection" from me and my cohorts. BTC could use the depth provided by high volume electronic trading, and also the linkage between all the venues and alt coins.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Two interesting arguments the article discusses.

1) Will customers be able to sue JPMorgan Chase & Co. due to facilitating institutional trading customers access to these futures, when the CEO said that Bitcoin is a scam/fraud?

2) When the futures clear, you basically end up with dollars, which is odd to an extend as a future in oil will literally give you oil once it clears.

___________

On 1 I think that as long as those institutional trading investors are given a prospectus stating that Bitcoin could be a scam, invest in these futures at your own risk, it should legally shield JPMorgan Chase & Co.

The only time I can imagine JPMorgan Chase & Co. would be on the line is if they wrote an prospectus that said this is a good investment whilst the CEO is out in public talking about how much of a scam it is.

On 2, I would say this stops the CME Group Inc.'s futures exchange having to find a way to deal with actually running Bitcoin withdrawals that could open up hot wallet hacks, etc.. and in the long run this should bring down the overhead (fees) on the futures.

In addition what is the point of getting actual Bitcoin once the future clears? Obviously these customers do not want actual Bitcoin. I would say a future that ended with actual Bitcoins would scare away a lot of possible customers.

<comment><USER6> Re: 2

Everything you say is true and acknowledged in the article, but as ML also points out they are also all arguments against bitcoin.

<comment><USER7> This is going to speak to my naivety around futures and how they work but if you're ending up with cash instead of bitcoin and there's no actual bitcoin wallets/bitcoins involved, what on earth are you actually _buying_ when you buy a Bitcoin future in this manner? It sounds like the one, sure, answer is "not Bitcoin". Can anyone explain this to a neophyte like me?

<comment><USER8> There are two possibilities when buying a commodity-backed security like this.

You could buy a representation of the actual commodity, such that every $X you own represents $X of Bitcoin. That's known as a "cash commodity", or an "actual", or various other terms.

Or, you could buy what amounts to a _bet_ on the future value of the commodity. Those don't need to correspond to any actual amount of the commodity. Those are called "futures", which are one type of "derivative" (because they're _derived_ from the value of the commodity without directly representing an amount of the commodity).

<comment><USER7> As one of the other commentators mentioned (and has been called out a few times), in the case of other futures, you are actually settling them with the commodity in question, but in the case of this product, you are settling with cash. I think I understand what you're saying, and I don't think I have any fundamental problem with it -- mainly because I don't invest in the futures market so it's simply "unimportant to me" how it works in this case -- but I'm curious: is this a normal practice?

Is it more common for a futures-based product to be settled with the product it's based on or is it more normal for it to be settled in this manner?

My curiosity, if the way they're executing on this is unusual, is "why"? I mean, take oil futures as a good example. It'd seem a _whole lot easier_ to settle a BTC future with actual BTC than to settle an oil future with actual oil, so why isn't it the other way around? Heck, why wouldn't _all_ of these futures-based financial products be handled in a cash-based manner -- what's the downside? (I'm not arguing for or against either method -- I _really don 't know_).

My apologies if these are truly stupid questions -- I imagine I sound to someone who works/studies this sector like people sound to me who think "Facebook" and "The Internet" are interchangeable terms, but if you're willing to play along, here, I certainly appreciate it. :)

<comment><USER9> Keep in mind that most commodities futures contracts are never settled. They are closed before expiration (rolling into a new contract if you want to keep the position open). Many brokers will close your position before expiration, because they are not prepared to handle delivery, even if younwant to.

There are also some commodities futures that are cash-settled. Futures on financial indices, interest rates and such are usually cash-settled. But some futures based on financial instruments are "physically" settled, like US Treasury futures.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Related to this, does anyone know of a way to bet against bitcoin (or cryptocurrencies in general), without buying cryptocurrencies themselves?

There are lots of more-or-less sketchy cryptocurrency exchanges which allow you to shortsell bitcoin, but these all require buying cryptocurrency in the first place as collateral.

The upshot is that if you bet against bitcoin and win, you win a bunch of... bitcoin. Not so useful if you want to bet on a big collapse of crypto in general.

Selling bitcoin futures seems like a way to bet against bitcoin in the long term, using actual USD, although I don't think that will ever be an option for smalltime investors / individuals.

<comment><USER11> eToro let's you short BTC, Dash, Ethereum, LTC and XRP, though no leverage is available for those, and the spread can be a bit daunting.

Disclaimer: I don't usually trade crypto there, this is not investment advice.

EDIT: apparently it's not available in the US.

If you sign up with my referral link we both get $20: [http://etoro.tw/2BmqxQb](http://etoro.tw/2BmqxQb)

<comment><USER10> I should clarify that I am in the U.S... seems like most of these sites are unavailable here.

<comment><USER11> Oh, sorry. I believe one of the main exchanges (bitsane/bitfinex Maybe?) was going to make options and margin accounts available, don't remember which one. There's also cex.io, but it's in the UK.

I guess you'll have to wait for JP Morgan's fund to go live...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> As opposed to other futures, which are totally certain.

<comment><USER7> Heh, I get the sarcasm implied here, but I think the bigger issue is that a lot of "futures" are based on things that have reasons[0] for the price moving the way that it does. Oil futures, while unpredictable at times, have an element of research that can be done to make an informed "bet". Crop futures are affected by weather predictions and almost all futures are affected by overall economic outlooks for the sector they occupy.

But cryptocurrency? I have yet to find someone who can give me a "good"[1] reason for prices of BTC to even bet at USD$100, let alone USD$8,000. The probability that in two months the price is $0.01 or the price is $19,000 are equal without a reasonable, data-backed explanation about why the price, today, is $8,000.

[0] As in reasons that exist outside of the bubble of "other people are buying it and they're paying that much". Hell, 80-90% of people who work in technology/programming/software development couldn't properly explain how the blockchain _actually_ works -- and I don't mean "they mostly get it but make some technical errors/couldn't write a working example", I mean they are "deer-in-the-headlights lost" with regard to explaining how any of it works. And it's been my (anecdotal) experience that those who can wouldn't dream of putting money into it.

[1] Good, as in something other than the early "Well, there's that drug market that takes it and it's popular" or "Algorithms are trading it without human intervention and the price just keeps going up" or "Look at that! (pointing upward at the right-hand side of the price graph)". There's simply no explanation that I've heard that dares market a benefit to owning Bitcoin beyond the fact that it can be turned back into cash and the amount of cash that it can be turned into is inexplicably more than the amount of cash it could be turned into last week.

<comment><USER13> Why is gold $1,288 per ounce today? Purely because it acts as a store of value. But gold is only valued at its current valuation, because people say gold is gold and that has a certain value. You could have picked any other rare metal, or say, diamonds. Gold has limited real world uses.

The same could (not saying it will, but could) apply to Bitcoin. It seems to be growing into digital gold / a digital store of value.

The price of gold globally is $7.8tn. Bitcoin is worth $150bn(ish). If there is a 50/50 chance that Bitcoin does become digital gold, then at current valuations it will be cheap. Is it not worth investing $1 today, to potentially make $10-20-30 IF it does succeed? Those are decent odds with great upside.

This is not investment advice, just my personal opinion.

<comment><USER9> Where does the 50/50 come from? Do other cryptocurrencies also have 50/50 chance of becoming digital gold?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> What I think will happen when these futures will be listed:

\- the institutional investors who wanted to go long on BTC, had (and still have) the opportunity to buy BTC

\- considering that the ways to short BTC now comes at high costs and pretty high counterparty risks I'd say it's a pretty big chance that most of the institutional investors getting into trading BTC derivatives, will go short.

\- this creates a big opportunity for crypto currency whales to go long on the derivatives, pump the BTC price and earn some millions.

If you watched the crypto currency markets in the last days, you can notice that lots of alt coins are increasing in price. It means that somebody buys lots of them. I think they're getting ready to buy bitcoin with them when the derivatives will be listed, in order to pump its price even more.

Of course, the above is not a trading advice.

<comment><USER15> I think the alt coins are just bullish and I'm guessing they won't buy btc with the alts

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Before futures work, you need forwards. There are no bitcoin forwards because the entirety of the current bitcoin ecosystem is built on and around fraud. If we are to remove fraud and clearly currently defined as illegal activities from this ecosystem bitcoin and its value will collapse through the floor.

In order for forward market to be viable you need to have a stick big enough where pulling out of a forward contract is _impossible_ for anyone without them going to jail _and_ ( not or ) still having to perform under this contract.

The really funny part is that the feeding on the suckers ( i.e. retail pansies ) is so profitable and regulators are so pathetic that those who based on their other dealings should not touch BTC with a hundred yard pole (i.e. VCs, exchanges, law firms ) are jumping into it not just with both feet but on all fours.

I went to a BTC investors/tech people meet up not long ago. Some of the people were household names in this "community". No one could describe a difference between POS and POW; no one could speculate on internally consistent basis what kind of outcomes would be possible based on the actions of China's central bank. But everyone was very excited about all the conferences they were going to and all the money they were making off the suckers.

It really reminded me of months before the dotcom crash.

<comment><USER7> I'm a little surprised you're getting downvoted so much, but I suspect it has to do with:

> the entirety of the current bitcoin ecosystem is built on and around fraud. > If we are to remove fraud and clearly currently defined as illegal > activities from this ecosystem bitcoin and its value will collapse through > the floor.

While I agree with pretty much everything else you've said about BTC being somewhere on the not-so-good end of the "insanity" spectrum, and I've had similar experiences talking to technologists regarding PoS vs. PoW (heck, finding one who could coherently explain either was an exercise in futility). You sound like someone who probably knows the difference and it's also been my experience that those who do, generally believe the state of BTC (with regard to its current price) is overvalued[0].

I disagree that the ecosystem, as a whole, is built around fraud, or that the technology/purpose of BTC is generally for fraud. I look at BTC the same way I look at paper money. The same kinds of fraud can be performed with paper money. The same kinds of problems, such as permanent loss due to failure to secure it, can happen with paper money. The one, major thing, you can't do with paper money (easily, anyway) is buy something online with it. You can do that, in a lot of places, with BTC (and to a lesser extent, other cryptocurrencies). You can buy illegal drugs with cash and BTC but your local drug dealer doesn't take Visa (or maybe they do, now ... I don't buy illegal drugs).

I _fully subscribe_ to the belief that we're going to see a large crash happen, probably in the near future. Any time you have something that looks like an investment that's skyrocketing as much as this has and the "investors" can't tell you the first thing about "what" it is they're investing in, that's the pretty much the secret formula for a crash. And I don't think (outside of the large amount of lost money) that a crash would be a bad thing. The fact that the price continues to soar is hampering the ability for the BTC and other cryptocurrencies to be used as _anything_ other than as something to hold onto hoping for it to grow in value as it has for the last year.

There's another side to this, though ... I've been saying BTC would/should _crash_ since it was about USD$100 and I've been wrong. I'm willing to accept that I'm wrong here, but unwilling to bet my own money on that chance.

[0] Where by "overvalued", I mean, more overvalued than anything in the history of the known world.

<comment><USER17> Don't think many drug marketplaces use bitcoin anymore, since bitcoin has a fully public ledger. Private coins such as Monero or Zcash are used now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> How can this ever become an efficient market unless CME accepts BTC as collateral?

If I sell futures contracts against 10 BTC, and I have 10 BTC in my Bitcoin wallet, I'm fully hedged, and I take no risks (provided the wallet in question is sufficiently secure).

If CME requires USD as collateral, how would I hedge my position? If the BTCUSD price rises 10%, I can't sell my BTC for USD (to use as collateral) because then I'd expose myself to further price increases before expiration.

Unless I'm missing something, this will become an inefficient market, bottlenecked by the ability of contract sellers to come up with USD collateral.

A solution could be to collect a Bitcoin public key for contract buyers, and require sellers to send the BTC amount covered by the sold contracts to a "collateral BTC address" which can be redeemed in two of the following ways a) by the contract seller, e.g., 7 days after expiration of the contract b) by the contract buyer+CME (2-of-2 multi-signature) after expiration of the contract. CME would keep the USD proceeds, from selling the contract, in the seller's account at the CME. If the Bitcoin USD settlement price doesn't rise to more than the contract selling price, CME would simply transfer the settlement price USD amount from the contract seller's to the buyer's account. If the price rises a lot, the buyer of the contract would be able to (by CME providing a signature as well) redeem the bitcoins sitting at the "collateral BTC address", and sell the bitcoins at the current market price (which the contract buyer would have 7 days to do before the contract seller can redeem the bitcoins himself).

This way, CME doesn't store any bitcoins themselves, and contract buyers are responsible for keeping their own private keys safe (optimally, private keys should be generated on an offline device, and the public key safely transferred to an online computer). In order to steal BTC collateral, an attacker would have to steal _both_ the contract buyer's _and_ CME's private key.

<comment><USER18> You simply cover your futures position before expiration (buy as many contracts as you'd previously sold). At the same time, you can sell your BTC for USD.

In futures markets, almost no one takes delivery, but instead they close ("cover") their positions before expiration. For example, airlines use heating oil contracts as proxies for jet fuel, because they are similar products whose prices move together. But airlines will never but heating oil on the futures markets to put in their Boeings and Airbusses.

<comment><USER19> In the electricity market, futures (base futures or peak futures) are almost always used

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> It's been fun watching Bitcoin as a whole and especially watching financial folks try to wrap their brains around Bitcoin, its price and seeing them try to define exactly "what it is". Even my in-laws are investing a small amount in Bitcoin and Litecoin ... the two of them have a Verizon Wireless internet connection and a computer from 2004 -- read: not technically savvy in the least.

As someone who's done about 20 years worth of investing in stocks and mutual funds and has a very low tolerance for gambling[0], I wouldn't _dream_ of investing in Bitcoin. Last year, however, I _did_ mine Ethereum. The result of that mining turned out quite well for me, costing a little in electricity[1]. I further rationalized it by the fact that I could put the video cards I purchased to work for me in other ways -- I might not have purchased the card that I did were I not targeting price/watt in mining, but the cards I purchased were slightly better than the ones I would have and I'm very happy with them for rendering and some of the fun I'm having playing with ML using CUDA, and hey my ffmpeg transcodes are quite fast, too! I jumped on ETH mainly because of the fact that I had played with Bitcoin in the early days and managed to mine about 20 of them which I lost due to reloading a server[2] and not caring about my USD$0.25 worth of BTC[3].

All of that aside, I don't mine any longer -- the difficulty is too high and with my setup, the best I can hope for is to get a couple of Ether a year. I started mining ETH because they were doing something different from BTC and I had the sense that the price would go up (though, again, didn't expect it to hit $475 as it has today). The thing of it is -- nobody can answer the question "why" in a way that makes me comfortable. It's, effectively, a bet that someone elses' imagination will feel that the price of these bits are worth more than they are now. While I've gotten the sense that a lot of investing works this way, at least from time to time it _appears_ to track with real-world things, like earnings and the state of the overall economic sector that the company is a part of.

I think at least some of the price movement has to do with the fact that Bitcoin is wildly unregulated (and I believe when the inevitable hammer of government steps in, that price won't soar or remain as high). The fact that my in-laws have money in the game (though, for practical purposes, it's pocket change) tells me the days of free-wheeling non-regulation are very numbered, though I have a hard time figuring out _how_ you even regulate something like this (particularly a product like ZCash). And the worst of it is that from a regulatory standpoint, it'd be easy to argue that a lot of the transactions taking place look a whole lot more like money laundering and a whole lot less like "a digital equivalent to cash[4]". The fact is, the treasury components of our governments _love_ that we hate carrying around pieces of easily lost paper and prefer to use regulated intermediaries that helpfully provide reports to them about our incomes and spending habits which can be used to ensure we're operating according to the law. The numbers of traditionally "Cash Only" businesses are approaching zero which is starting to put _any_ transaction that doesn't involve one of these regulated entities into the "questionable" category.

I'm fascinated by all of this, personally. It's mostly played out as I have expected -- when the value of BTC started exploding, the numbers of cryptocurrency and cryptocurrency related products started exploding as did the number of thefts, viruses/criminal elements specifically attacking or using cryptocurrencies. And, of course, the scammy-sounding me-too start-ups trying to find some way to use buzzwords from the cryptocurrency space (though the "ICO"s surprised me quite a bit both in the sheer number of them and the number of people willing to buy into them). Most of the off-shoot cryptocurrencies were nearly identical to one of the leading products with ZEC and ETH being outliers with unique features and spawning their own copy-cats (I'm also watching PIRL with curiosity[5] since it seems centered on improving transaction speeds, more stability around management/updates and focused early on getting an actual marketplace up -- plus, it's based on ETH, which I find very interesting as a technology).

[0] I brought $20 to Las Vegas with the full intent of losing it. It took four days for that to happen and I still felt badly about having wasted it despite it providing me with several hours of entertainment across a variety of video poker machines.

[1] As a guy who has three servers running in his basement and likes to keep the air conditioning set at a frigid 68 degrees, the difference between my already outrageous electric bill and my slightly more outrageous electric bill wasn't something my budget noticed. The servers were mostly idle, anyway, so why not have them doing something while they're not doing anything?

[2] I found the technology interesting and mined more as an academic experience. I don't remember the exact date, but it was within a few months of when the network went live ... I didn't even use a pool and managed to net somewhere around 20-25 of them in a couple of months. I loved the "idea" but wrote it all off as a cypherpunk's wet dream, not something that would actually have value in the future. Oops!

[3] IIRC, there wasn't even a way to see the price of BTC in USD because the only way to turn them into cash was to find someone who wanted to buy them from you.

[4] As in, similar anonymity and similar risk -- you lose or have your wallet stolen, your cash is also lost. Unfortunately, people won't see it that way when it's _their_ money.

[5] I even ended up firing up my mining rig, though that was mostly because I was feeling the itch to delve into CUDA, again, so I took some time to add some optimizations to the mining code I had tweaked last year. I don't expect to make money from it, just I like didn't expect to do so for ETH, but I'm enjoying playing around with code and technologies that I don't normally get exposure to in my day job.

</comment><comment><USER20> > Of course this makes sense, because handling bitcoins is mostly terrible. > The fate of every bitcoin exchange, I often say around here, is to have its > bitcoins stolen, so CME is quite sensibly launching a bitcoin exchange > without any bitcoins to be stolen.

This is a strawman. Only fools keep substantial Bitcoin balances in exchange wallets.

Edit: OK, fools and ordinary people. But this is an article about investors in Bitcoin futures. The author could have at least mentioned offline wallets. Also, it's true that you need exchange wallets for speculation. But there's the Kelly criterion, and you can keep most of your winnings offline.

<comment><USER21> Though, there is no shortage of attacks against electronic wallets on personal computing devices either. The average, technologically moronic user might actually be _safer_ storing his Bitcoin on a trustworthy exchange, as opposed to a personal wallet protected by a weak passphrase, if any, on the same computer/phone where he surfs, reads email and runs software of dubious origin.

Best way to protect against unauthorized use of your funds, as the article notes, is to go really old school and print your private keys out on a piece of paper, and store it in a physical vault.

Of course, none of this would be a problem if the exchange acted as a trusted ledger and could simply revert any unauthorized transactions on the user's funds. Like a traditional bank, but just with all the crypto hype!</s>

<comment><USER20> One can have _numerous_ Bitcoin wallets. I have dozens of active ones. I'm not a speculator, so I don't keep anything substantial in exchange accounts. Unless you're holding more than a few Bitcoin, you don't even need to go full offline. Linux VMs on Linux hosts are not likely pwned. You clearly wouldn't keep much on a phone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I think many people are missing the inherit value of a decentralized currency. You trust your government today, and you have a stable currency. If that is not the case tomorrow, you will wish you held crypto.

<comment><USER23> Crypto can't function without a functioning society, and as best as we can tell, without a government you don't have one of those.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Is it possible that the concept of "money" has been upgraded? That cryptocurrencies are simply better as a store of value than dollars, for reasons A through Z? For example, people don't like the costs and regulations associated with fiat currencies - therefore, crypto is better for them. It's like trying to ban alcohol or drugs - people still like them, so you can never ban them, no matter what the government wants. So crypto will never be banned (longterm).

It's still such early days in this area, if you are curious at all, buy some BTC and ETH and sit on it.

<comment><USER25> > Is it concept of "money" has been upgraded?

That sentence alone nicely illustrates why people loath bitcoin enthusiasts.

> people don't like the costs and regulations associated with fiat currencies

I have a savings account. It doesn't cost anything. The only regulation that matters to me is that it is insured against loss and theft.

> trying to ban alcohol or drugs - people still like them, so you can never > ban them

Illegal drugs are banned. Hence _illegal_.

> no matter what the government wants.

Governments don't "want" things. People do–and elect governments to do it. The overwhelming majority is against legalising heroin. If you believe you can run a mainstream currency with the power requirements of a small country without and not be subject to government regulation, you are delusional.

Look: Nobody is currently using Bitcoin as a "store of value". Nobody but drug dealers is currently using Bitcoin as a transactional currency. The only reason anybody is buying bitcoin is speculation, or, if you will, FOMO. With transaction costs in the double digits, and a security story worse than leaving a bag of money on a public bus, Bitcoin has zero underlying value as anything but the air in a bubble.

<comment><USER24> Illegal drugs are banned, but anyone who wants them can still get them. The point is, what the government wants and what society wants don't need to be synced.

Your argument has been said when Bitcoin was $1, $10, $100, $100, $10,000. You will keep saying it at $100,000. And no one cares - the only way you can be proven right is if / when BTC goes to $0. And if it never does, you can keep saying the same old arguments, waiting patiently forever until it happens.</comment></comment></comment>


Jeff Bezos Taught Me When to Quit - <AUTHOR> http://www.chrisfharvey.com/2012/02/jeff-bezos-taught-me-when-to-quit/ <comment><USER2> > I followed my heart. The universe took care of me.

Survivorship bias. Other people have followed their hearts and the universe didn't take care of them, but their posts aren't likely to be posted on HN and upvoted to the front page.

<comment><USER3> Usually, I too think survivor bias. However, in this case, his action seemed to be a no-brainer. This was 1999 - not 2008 to 2012. I had just graduated from undergrad with a CS degree and was very naive. Yet, I had companies and groups within companies fighting over me.

So ... he was in a hot job market, had a bad boss, a job where he didn't seem to be learning anything and a low salary. The course of action seems pretty clear to me. I don't think he needed "Jeff Bezos'" call to action to help him on this one. Quitting less than 2 months into a job does seem harsh (not sure if I'd do it) - if he waited a year or so, the tech boom would be over and then things would be different. So, perhaps he did get lucky with the timing.

<comment><USER4> I think it's much better to quit 6 weeks in than 6 months in. When I'm looking at resumes, a very short stay tells me it just didn't work out. It happens.

I think it's also ok to just leave something like that off the resume. Especially after you've had some other job.

But if you're there for a substantial amount of time (say, 3 months or more) that's harder to explain, and I think you need to keep it on your resume for a lot longer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > _"Another new MBA was hired in my group. I found out her salary was higher > than mine, although I had been told that my salary was "standard for new > MBAs.""_

Heh, replace "MBA" with "engineer" and this was my Amazon experience circa 2011. I was 2 years into the company, getting rave reviews and kudos from management, with pitifiul 1% "raises" a year... and then I found out they're paying a fresh undergrad more than I was making.

Oh, and verbal promises of an upcoming promotion... and then nothing come review-time.

[cue sad trombone]

I did the same thing as author, except I found a 30% raise at another company before leaving ;) Damn it felt good when I gave notice.

For those not in the know: Amazon's attrition rate is sky-high, and while management acknowledges this and has some token measures to try and mitigate it, nothing major is being done (i.e., none of the big, big reasons people quit are ever addressed - pay, advancement, on-call stress, etc).

Now that I've got some distance between myself and Amazon, I consider the whole thing a learning experience. 'Twas my first job out of college, and I suppose learning to read poor advancement, bad pay, and bad management at that stage of my career was better than doing it later.

<comment><USER6> Amazon is a giant company, so this statement is kind of broad, even in the context of engineering groups. I know plenty of engineering groups with people who have worked there 5-10 years, while others are a sausage factory of oncall hell, it really depends on your team--just like with any other giant company (insert Yahoo, Oracle, etc. here).

Also, in their defense, they do in fact try to address this: for example, a couple years back they had a focus on operational excellence to reduce oncall pages company-wide.

(Yes, I work at Amazon)

<comment><USER5> I apologize for sounding brusque, but yours is a defense of Amazon that I've heard many times - multiple times from people who ended up quitting in frustration/anger. It's a view I held _myself_ until things got bad enough to make me leave. Things are always fine, until they aren't, and then they have a tendency to compound very quickly.

> _"Amazon is a giant company, so this statement is kind of broad"_

It really isn't. Amazon's attrition problems are company-wide, and not limited to a few bad orgs. Amazon's on-call problems are also company-wide, with only a minority of teams spared from it (actually, I was on one of those teams, thank God). Amazon's policy of not readjusting employee compensation to fit a rising market is _also_ company-wide. So yes, they are a huge company, but that is not a defense.

I was a returning intern, so I knew a lot of fellow ex-interns returning full- time. My opinion of Amazon is formed by both my own experience and also a whole lot of commiseration with others from across the company stretching over every org.

In fact, of all the interns I returned with, only 3 remain, 3 years in. In fact, _several_ quit without even fulfilling their first year. They willingly handed back their signing bonus clawbacks (+tax!) just to GTFO.

My impression is that senior-level engineers see a whole different world. SDE1/2 employees are just cogs, but SDE3 and up are treated like Faberge eggs. Unfortunately, I was only a lowly SDE1.

> _"just like with any other giant company (insert Yahoo, Oracle, etc. > here)."_

Amazon is trying to hire at the level of Facebook and Google. Comparing oneself to Yahoo and Oracle (both known for being particularly poorly managed, and the latter having a reputation for being a bit of a code sweatshop) is not praise.

Hell, Amazon's hiring process may be _harder_ than Google's. A full-day of 5-6 interviews, including lunch interviews, with a single member of the group having full veto rights over all other interviewers. It's a wonder they have anyone passing said gauntlet. With that high of a hiring bar, new hires trickle in, and the attrition rate pretty much negates any hiring anybody does.

> _"a couple years back they had a focus on operational excellence to reduce > oncall pages company-wide."_

Platitudes. I was there. Nothing _actually_ changed. I know a few sub-orgs had _actual_ drives to decrease technical debt and drive down operational pain, but for everyone else it didn't do squat.

Amazon's on-call misery stems _from_ the high attrition rate. It's a vicious cycle. Most teams accumulate technical debt since they are constantly under- resourced, what with people leaving all the damned time. Most teams I've seen have perpetual open headcount, and never enough hands to really root-cause and fix the chronic problems that are waking up their on-calls at 5am on a Saturday.

Combined with upper management that keeps trying to drive features and this is a recipe for disaster. The pace at Amazon is relentless (which is often good), but it affords almost no opportunities to refactor, redesign, rearchitect for better operational performance. Hell, if you want a prime example of this, look at how the Catalog systems are set up. It's like a brick wall extended by wooden beams extended by rebar extended by I-beams.

<comment><USER7> What's SDE ?

<comment><USER5> Software Development Engineer - the standard title for coders at Amazon (and Microsoft). You have SDE1, 2, and 3's, increasing in seniority. Beyond SDE3 you have various titles where you're no longer considered strictly an engineer (Architect, Principal, etc).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think the advice is actually good, all around. I also think it takes a certain degree of courage for a CEO to advise workers to quit on this sort of basis. Bezos's stature just grew a bit in my eyes.

Additionally it's a bit of an inspiring story.

There's another time and place to quit too which seems to me to be touched on in the article. If you are in a position that is well below your skills, very often times HR won't give you a chance to work to your capacity. It's usually better to quit and later re-apply than to try to work your way up within a company. I saw this at Microsoft and have reason to believe it happens everwhere else.

<comment><USER9> > I saw this at Microsoft

As a bit of MSFT-specific advice, if you're in the dev/test/pm org and an IC and feel this way, you should make sure that you're having a regular (e.g. every six months) 1:1 with your manager's manager. During that, you should try to get a deeper understanding of what the next level means. There are certain levels (63, 65, 68) whose promotions are significantly different than the other levels and can be intimidating, particularly to first-time leads. For example, at 63, your lead might have to justify the promo to your PUM, and at 65, your lead has to convince your discipline manager to justify it not only to your PUM but has to provide enough info about your comparable work to have it justified with all the discipline managers across your division at the calibration meeting.

Unless you are in an extraordinarily technically deep area (e.g. compiler frontend, database internals), you should not expect your lead to be an amazing manager. If they were, they'd have left you behind and be a manager of managers within ~3 years because there aren't nearly enough of those to go around.

<comment><USER10> @larsberg's comment tells me (as an outsider) why Microsoft will die. It has the corporate equivalent of arteriosclerosis. Whether theirs products are good or not is beside the point.

All companies are both predator and prey. With inscrutable insider rules like this Microsoft cannot move fast enough to survive as either.

<comment><USER8> I was recently reading what I had written about Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, and Oracle in 2004 as part of a business plan. My outlook for Microsoft was simple: Painful days are ahead but Microsoft has what it takes to succeed. Sun, not so much. Oracle could go either way.

Seems I was right about Sun, not sure yet about Microsoft. I now think Oracle is in a better position than they used to be.

One of the major things I noted was that Microsoft, despite a major institutional aversion, has been slowly developing and expanding services businesses. They have continued to do this, for example now offering to host Linux VPS's via Azure. Their services offerings in 2003 were more anemic than they are today. They are on the right track to deal both with open source competition and long-extended upgrade cycles.

I don't think Microsoft is about to die. They may be cut down to size but I think their offerings are large and diverse enough that they are more likely to be pressured to evolve than disappear. Many businesses in fact do this, see IBM's transformation into one of the world's largest IT services firms in the world.

<comment><USER8> Just as a note on the factors I looked at:

1) Cash positive operations and cash reserves

2) Healthy services business (customer satisfaction, etc) These are important because they are a hedge against open source software and upgrade cycles that extend as hardware matures.

3) Lack of vertical integration/insularity

4) Organizational awareness of issues.

Sun scored relatively low on these, Oracle depended on how heavily you rated customer satisfaction and customer perceptions, and Microsoft scored high on everything but healthy services businesses, but there they were growing and trying lots of things.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Nice organizational insight: Yes, in theory the higher up managers should do something about the bad boss, but they don't know there is a problem, and a conflict is hard to solve, since you don't know who is to blame (and tend to side with the boss, because he is more like yourself, and you probably know him better)

High turnover, on the other hand, is a good signal of failed management, and if you can find another job, then you'll probably do better that way.

<comment><USER12> When the higher-up managers _are_ the problem, there's generally little hope except to leave. I worked someplace that had about 50% of the dept leave in a 9 month period (I was part of the 50%) - towards the end of that period it was harder for people to not get the signal that there was a leadership/management problem, and the owner eventually stepped in, but not until a lot of damage was done.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I think the point of the article is connecting to the emotional (and sometimes spiritual) experience of quitting.

I think everyone should quit or get fired from a job at least once in their life. People talk about starting this or wishing things were better, but until you've gone through the utter terror of quitting/being fired, you never know how resilient you can be moving on to the next challenge.

It's kind of like starting a business. You can talk all you want, but until you do it (or it happens to you), you don't get it.

The universe might have taken care of him, but that is because he realized it's not about how you fall down (even if you jump down), it's how you get up. If you keep getting up, the universe WILL help you out.

<comment><USER14> Yeah, quiting can be enlightening! Since I wasn't fired, I can tell about that. I know peole who wanted to quit for some time but never got to it. Now, they still want to but are no longer able to. I never want to reach that point, I value my own freedom and independance to much for that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I agree that you should quit when your 'boss is bad', but in a way I also think that what you did was also stupid.

Amazon is a great company and with effort you would have climbed the ladders there if you were good enough. Jeff Bezos -is- a smart guy and he is taking the company in the right direction as opposed to Yahoo!, which is a giant of yesterday.

You had been there for six weeks and had a problem with someone else being hired who got paid more? Why did she get paid more? I've been in the industry long enough to know that salaries are never equal. They are part of the negotiations and are often affected by the situation the new employee is in. A lot of companies pay more for certain employees because of their background situation. If an employee is qualified and shows promise, then companies often offer a supporting hand, because otherwise the employee simply could not afford to work there. A lot of companies pay more to an employee if the employee asks for it when it is about 'their value' and not about value of someone else.

It was incredibly stupid to complain that someone else is getting paid more, when you had been there for six weeks. You didn't sound much smarter than your boss there.

I would never allow a new employee march in after six weeks and ask for a raise, unless they invented the next iPhone or iPad. You did spreadsheets. You would have gotten a 'no' from any and every executive I know of.

</comment><comment><USER16> Don't count on the universe. First find a new job, and then quit.

</comment><comment><USER17> I was feeling sympathetic with the author regarding the raise until I realised he was asking for it a few weeks after joining. I think his boss was right, he accepted the salary when he joined; if he didn't like it he should have negotiated at the time. I'm sure a raise would have be considered after a suitable period.

<comment><USER18> Right, so he made a bad decision by taking the job. It's still much better to realise you made a bad decision and cut your losses (by quitting), than blindly sticking with it.

Given he was about to quit anyway if he wasn't offered a raise, there was no harm to asking.

<comment><USER19> But then it looks like Jeff Bezos didn't teach him when to quit.

There's a difference between a bad boss and making a bad salary negotiation when you take a new job.

Nice post anyway, but it's a little bit like "I've seen it in the tea leaves".

Edit: typo

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Quitting a job and following your heart during the largest tech boom in human history, when jobs were jumping out of windows onto unsuspecting passer-bys, might make for a great story, but I'm not sure it's great advice for young kids today, with under-25 unemployment in the 20's in the U.S. and much higher elsewhere.

Unless you've got something lined up, or a lot of cash set aside, I'd advise being very conservative in this environment.

</comment><comment><USER21> This is really hard advice for a lot of people to stomach. That free-falling feeling you get the morning after you quit, and the bittersweet terror of being unemployed are brutal realities, but you're usually better off quitting in the long run.

<comment><USER12> having a cushion in the bank helps immensely. i realize everyone has different risk tolerance levels, but... having a year of expenses in the bank gives you a much different perspective on things than living check to check, or even having 1-2 months of savings.

<comment><USER21> Very true, but it takes a long time to get there when you've got a family to support.

<comment><USER12> or have been deep in debt. :)

No doubt it often takes a lot of hard work and discipline. Sometimes just thinking about that being a possibility is too much for some people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> It would be interesting if the author ever went back and figured out whatever happened to Bill, the horrible boss. People like Bill often don't last long in a swim or sink environment like Amazon.

If you're not a superstar, and I'm as un-superstar (sic?) as you can get, and you've been around long enough, chances are you've held a job with shitty pay and shittier boss.

Whether you depart for greener pastures or try to stay put make the best out of your situation and work on improving yourself and the company, says a lot about you also.

</comment><comment><USER23> If there is anything I'd tell a new college grad it would be build a financial cushion as fast as humanly possible. I don't care if you are in debt from your loans... build one - immediately. And yes it is hard when you start out.

Why? You will hate your job one day and probably sooner than later. It just happens, its part of the learning curve. I don't mean that you are always going to hate your job but you inevitably will end up in a situation with a crappy boss doing something you didn't realize you signed up for.

Your cushion will give you perspective. Instead of looking at your crappy job as your life raft and clinging on for dear life, you will be better equipped to realize you have options. If you really don't want to go to that job anymore, you can reasonably wake up and stop the next morning.

Another thing that nobody talks about is that having a cushion can inadvertently gain you more respect in your workplace. I used to work for a group where one of my work buddies was pretty financially independent (this doesn't mean fabulously rich) and unlike everyone else who was desperate to keep their job my work buddy would speak his mind to management. When projects were unreasonable he would tell them to take a hike. Well guess who got all the interesting work and respect.

Seriously build a cushion if you are new to the work world - it only makes your life better.

</comment><comment><USER24> Who would say that they have a bad boss at an "all hands" meeting? Wouldn't have to quit after doing that...

<comment><USER25> I bet it was a "planted" question to reinforce the hierarchical culture and approach to management they seem to have. Otherwise, that would be a very silly thing to ask the CEO, indeed. I think his answer was completely logical in that setting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> More people need to do this. It seems that among adults, the most effective message you can send is "goodbye". Sad, but, in my experience, true. Even then, some people will never learn.</comment>


Ask HN: Is it possible to get a tech job without a degree? - <AUTHOR> Serious question. If you have a story, success or cautionary, please share. <comment><USER2> I have one semester of college, in which I took psychology and political science.

I've worked as the lead network architect for a large ISP, as a developer and then lead developer of a network security tool, as a security researcher (I have a pretty decent cite record and a fun list of universities with courses that have taught papers I wrote), as a 2-time startup founder, the first of which was VC-funded, as a lead developer for a large-data Internet backbone monitoring system, and as a product marketing manager for several years. The shortest of these roles was 2 years; the longest 8 (and counting).

No. You do not need a degree. Early on in my career, I was asked for my GPA and then my SAT scores, by HR, after passing a job interview on Wall Street; I declined to continue the process. I've walked from all similar requests ever since. Not only do I think it hasn't cost me, but I think it has also helped me, by keeping me out of jobs at companies that suck.

If you're going to skip college, be very serious about your craft. Opt for difficult jobs. Tune your career so that you are always on the verge of being overwhelmed. Read like crazy; particularly, read papers, not blog posts. Learn a systems programming language and a functional language, then _stop_ with the languages and start building things from papers. Be careful about getting wedged into things that are just barely programming, like CRUD web apps and iOS design. You can do good work in those settings, but the median project is (technically) boring. You know something is going wrong when you start promoting your unit test or A/B testing tools.

Watch out for IT. IT for people without a degree is a trap.

Consider staying in school long enough to pick up math. Math didn't matter much in my first 10 years or so, but it matters a lot to me now, and doing it on my own is a slog. I would pay a lot of money to be taught serious linear algebra and calculus instead of hacking and slashing my way through the subject on my own.

<comment><USER3> If I were asked for a GPA or an SAT score at any job interview, I would walk as well. It's completely irrelevant, and highly dependent on the school you went to (is a 4.0 at DeVry better or worse than a 3.0 from CMU?)

It sounds like you're a little older than a person who would be debating going to college, though. I had a coworker that trained me at my current job who only had a few classes at a community college. Being hired a decade after him, it was required that I have a bachelors degree. Things have changes rapidly in the past few decades in terms of HR expectations at larger companies. I'm not trying to detract from your advice, because I think you're absolutely correct. I'm just wondering if you would be able to replicate your success today.

<comment><USER2> Maybe it's hard to get a job at Google without a degree (at least, if you're not a software security person). Don't work at Google. There's an industry full of small software startups and an open war for talent right now; start your career at one of the shops smart enough not to pay attention to college records. For every successfully-executed role in your resume, it becomes progressively more and more insane to screen you out based on your degree. Since the starting state on screening by degree is already "pretty crazy", it doesn't take long to make college irrelevant.

But again, to make that work, you need to be serious enough about your craft that you can demonstrate ability clearly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm occasionally a hiring manager for engineers, and yes, it's very possible to get a job without a tech degree. Tech interviewing usually has four major steps: 1) sourcing candidates, 2) filtering resume candidates, 3) technical phone screen, 4) in-person interview.

For most companies, having a degree only matters in the first two phases, and ability/interviewability matters in the last two.

Experienced engineers avoid getting filtered out in the first two phases by working through their network, which allows them to skip those phases entirely. If you're trying to break in without any experience, it's much harder because you probably don't have a network and degrees are often used as a filter during candidate discovery and resume filtering (especially when the engineering manager is working with a recruiter).

My thought would be to proactively send your resume directly to a bunch of job postings, especially ones which go to a "jobs@$company.com". Anecdotally, I know I don't get many direct resumes these days, so I'd end up reading them, skipping any explicit filtering.

</comment><comment><USER5> I attended college for 3 years at which point I dropped[0] out to work full time at the web dev company I was working part time at. I will be starting my 3rd job (In the tech field, I left college for my second tech job) on January 2nd.

I have people constantly telling me I should get my degree (Older friends/family) and the ones who don't bug me about it often say things like "But he will eventually...". That said I have not yet had it hold me back in the tech field as all of the places I have talked to care more that I can do what they need than if I have a piece of paper. About a year and half after dropping out I have ZERO regrets, I am now seeing my peers who stayed in school complain about not being able to find jobs (on FB and the like) while I have had no problems at all finding a places that will hire me.

The thing to remember is to never stop learning. Some of my peers (both in school and at where I work) see finishing college as the end of having to learn where it couldn't be further from the truth.

[0] [http://joshstrange.com/why-i-canceled-my-college- subscriptio...](http://joshstrange.com/why-i-canceled-my-college- subscription/)

</comment><comment><USER6> I suspect ~50% of HN could confirm that but.. just one cautionary point, not having a degree could make it significantly harder to work overseas, if you were to want to do that. For example, if you were outside the US and wanted to go to the US on an H-1B, it's _possible_ without a degree but somewhat harder.

<comment><USER7> It goes the other direction too. Canada, like many countries, has a point system. Its been a long time since I considered an offer in Canada but its a simple game theory optimization puzzle, to get the same number of points I could either get a degree, or become fluent in French, or work X years in some field or another. Programmer types tend to be pretty good at numerical optimization, think of it like a RPG game with various tradeoffs to level up.

One interesting thing to research for either immigration or jobs in general is do you get a CS degree or any STEM degree or any degree at all in any topic?

You're probably more employable if you're better rounded, so even if you are going IT instead of bench work, a Chemistry degree might help you get a job in IT at a pharm company more than an actual CS degree. Ditto finance if you want to work at a bank, etc. Employers love already trained subject matter experts.

WRT immigration this is a gross generalization but you get more points for "any" STEM degree... so if you're not going to learn anything in an IT type degree, why not get the physics degree you always wanted, immigration isn't going to care.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I've been employed as a software engineer since age 19, and I'm almost 33 now. I've worked for companies like MetLife, Tommy Hilfiger, Yahoo!, and IMVU, and my lack of a degree has never been an issue.

It helps that I was always a hobbyist (I started playing with my dad's Commodore 64 when I was 6). For the most part, everything I learned I learned by building stuff. I dropped out of college when I was 19 because my financial aid fell through, and instead of continuing with my bachelor's degree, I decided to enroll in a 9 month program at a technical school. That allowed me to fill in some of the gaps that my own tinkering didn't really cover -- things like object-oriented programming.

After that, I got my first job programming online surveys in Perl, and I've been employed ever since. Getting your foot in the door is the most important thing. You only need to find one person who believes you can do the job, and if you're intellectually curious enough, you can easily learn by doing. My first job was with a small business that didn't have anyone doing any programming, so there was nobody to tell me I wasn't good enough during the hiring process, so I was able to fake my way into having a job that gave me the employment history to work my way into bigger companies and higher salaries.

</comment><comment><USER9> So here is some contrarian opinion:

You don't need to go to college, but if you have time and money, I'd say do it.

There is ample of evidence, that you don't need a degree to have a successful career, especially in the IT sector. Then again, what do you really need? I used to think like most comments here, where college (especially in the US) is a colllasal and expensive waste of time. And if you measure it in hard skills/knowledge learned, maybe it is.

Before I dropped out, I tried to get my BA/MA in four years by only taking CS classes. It was terrible, I didn't learn anything useful. Only after returning to college from our failed startup, I realized the great benefits from college: Exploring your interests, the social setting of college, running into people from all different backgrounds and opinions. It's a truly unique experience and IMO the competitive advantage of the American tertiary education.

I'm not saying people should do one or another or whether its worth it, but it does help to get in different perspectives from time to time.

</comment><comment><USER10> Here's my advice.

First, some context. I have degrees in math and experience in computing. I am now part-owner of an established company, and occasionally we recruit. The following is my experience based on some successful hires, some unsuccessful hires, and many, many CVs and interviews.

When I look as a CV I want to know what value you'll bring to my company. I want to know why you'll be worth the money I'll pay you, and how well you'll fit. Yes, there was a job description, but your role will change, develop, and in the end you may be doing something completely different from what we originally thought we needed.

So I want to see, quickly, what value you claim you'll bring to my company. That means you'll need to have thought about that, and tailored the CV to match not just the job description, but the homework you've done on what we do. In particular, that makes it hard to get a job via a recruitment firm.

After that, I want to see the evidence that your claims are true. Do you claim to write clear, usable, effective code? Show me some code. Do you claim to work well with others? Tell me of specific occasions that I can verify.

Sometimes you can't provide evidence, and I understand that. Make it clear that you understand that I will somehow need to verify your claims. Be sympathetic - put yourself in my place, and help me see you as a potentially valuable asset.

And all this is true even if you don't have a degree. State that you know things, and then provide evidence. I've employed people with and without degrees, and it's been interesting to see how different people have worked out.

tl;dr - No, you don't need a degree. Yes, you can get a job, but you need to provide evidence of value other than by quoting that you have a degree. Sometimes that's better.

 _Edited for typo and word-crafting._

<comment><USER11> Interesting! I'm building a way for people to apply for tech jobs by showcasing their experience, and skills backed up with evidence (www.accredible.com - just posted a Show HN after seeing this thread. Edit: reached the front page!). It sounds like your hiring thought process matches this philosophy!

<comment><USER10> The challenge with all these things is to make sure that the evidence hasn't been faked. That's why we end up asking people to do some simple tasks in house, before then even considering proper pairing sessions on real work. We had a candidate who actually surreptitiously did a "phone a friend" wile allegedly producing some trivial code to do something FizzBuzz-like.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I think the best answer you're going to come away with from here is this: Yes, it is possible, but it is more difficult. YMMV.

<comment><USER13> That's probably true.

Also: Just saying "tech" makes it hard to discuss. Tech ranges from IT (Helpdesk throughout very advanced network architecture), to Software engineering (Websites (html) to integrated systems, to application development), to many more obscure and loosely-related fields.

<comment><USER14> And not all "tech" relates to computers traditional "engineering" has non degree entrance options.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'm technically a high school dropout (one gym class shy; they required 4y and I didn't have a chance to get third-party credit for those, unlike other classes,...), as well as an MIT dropout. (I dropped out of HS to go to MIT early, then ran out of money and couldn't pay for MIT, and also had a chance to do an anon ecash startup if I dropped out, so rather than doing ROTC, I did the startup, and never submitted any paperwork to the HS on the degree.

It's never really been an issue. I variously say "some high school", "some college", and "some grad school" (due to later classes...) on demographics forms, depending on context.

I still vaguely want to get something purely for immigration-points reasons in various countries. There are European programs at ICL and LBS to get an MBA without reference to undergrad; there are exceptional cases where one can get into a PhD program without reference to undergrad. To finish undergrad itself would have a high time cost (since it's been so long, potentially 2-3y, especially if I wanted to do aero or nuclear eng, and would need to refresh heavily on calc/physics), but maybe.

Startups generally don't care for any individual role, but it might influence the overall arc of your career.

</comment><comment><USER16> Yes it is - providing you are willing to learn the trade yourself.

I've been freelancing as a php developer since I was 20 years old. Now that I am 26 I have landed a decently paid full time php/sysadmin job that I really enjoy.

Between the ages of around 14 and 20 I spent a lot of time messing around with html and playing with linux installations which gave me the foundation to learn more advanced skills later on.

My main advice would be to take any job that you feel will increase your knowledge. If you don't like it, change jobs after a year or two.

Get some friends who work in the area of tech that you want to move into and talk with them about their solutions to problems.

If you can't find any friends in real life then find some on irc/reddit/hackernews/github...

Other people (and other people's code) can often provide you with a far better education than a degree.

One last thing - if you know anyone who is currently doing a computer science degree ask them what books they are learning from (for example books about object oriented programming eg java, books about database normalization, books about project planning).

There is a goldmine of knowledge out there providing you are interested to use it!

</comment><comment><USER17> I stuffed up my education for one reason and another and never got a degree. When I eventually had to do work I started out de-stapling things so that they could be scanned in. I did this for about 9 months - after 3 months my boss actually got me a destapler so I didn't have to use my fingers.

BUT, I saw that he had an Issues list in Excel that he would spend hours fiddling with. I wrote a bunch of VBA for him to make it easier to deal with and he was ecstatic. I managed to use this as a sort of portfolio and got a job that was all Excel and MS Access.

I convinced those guys to let me do their website, and used that as my next portfolio to get into an actual software shop. I worked my way up the ranks there until I was the highest paid guy, before moving to where I am now as head of development.

All you need to do is:

\- work hard, which is easy if you're actually interested in it.

\- continually think, "how does this benefit me in getting my next job / further my career?" This is a constant exercise.

</comment><comment><USER18> I didn't have the option to get a degree, no one told me about loans or how to get them, lots of people told me I wasn't "college material", and I kind of stopped talking to my parents at 18. It's possible I could have figured out logistically how to pay for school at 18 with no parental support, but, I didn't. If you have any kind of support structure that will help you pay for or borrow (cheaply! and not too much!) for your college education, as someone who started working with no degree and then got their degree, I strongly recommend that you get your degree.

I found good jobs without a degree, though it was largely through luck and networking. If you don't have a degree the "normal people" channels are closed to you and you have to use connections and people you know. of course, the "normal people" channels are for suckers so this is probably for the best...

After a few years of working professionally without a degree, I went back and worked on my degree part time. I'm finishing now. I went to a pretty good school (in the top 15 for CS) and I took pretty hard classes with a minor in math. I think that the experience helped make me a better software person. There were definitely concepts in algorithm design and data structures that I might not have experienced professionally, professors were really smart and I could go to their office hours and talk about real-world problems, and I think that learning more about math helped me think better.

I was (mostly) intelligent about what gen-eds to take and where (at a community college) so that the time and money value was maximized. I think it was a good investment. There are many jobs that you will be locked out of without a degree. Some people might say, all the better, but those environments can also be one of the few places doing something you really want to work on, like a university or national lab. Good luck finding a startup that is doing pure R&D in CS...

</comment><comment><USER19> I'm a self-taught programmer, started aged 10. Didn't go to university because by the time I'd finished school I'd had enough with education and I'd already started getting freelance work.

That was nearly 20 years ago now (I'm 38), and in that time I've worked as a developer on 3D graphics engines, real time physics engines and core tech in the games industry (for about 10 years, one project with Shigeru Miyamoto!), and then left that to start my own medical software company (8 years ago).

I now employ developers. And whilst I don't ignore the 'qualifications' section of a CV/resume, I really don't see it as remotely vital. I'm far more interested in whether you have a passion for the job, past projects etc.

So yeah, it's possible to get a tech job without a degree. Some places will insist on it. But they're not the places you want to work.

</comment><comment><USER20> The Tech industry is one of the few industries where you can do very well without a degree. I know people off the top of my head making > $50k without a degree in the Midwest US. (so, say, $91K in San Fran using WolframAlpha's cost of living adjuster.)

Like most things there are some caveats.

It will be harder to get into the top tier tech companies, Amazon, Microsoft, Google, etc, hire people without degrees, but not nearly as much as other organizations on the other tiers. Similarly, there are certain high frequency low latency trading firms that won't look at your resume without some MIT connection.

Some places will hire you with no problem, but have rules that will eventually cap your salary. These are usually government offices, state-run universities, etc. (For example, I know of universities where no programmer without without a master's degree can get past tier XYZ)

</comment><comment><USER21> I got a graduate position earlier this year in an ad-tech company, coming from 10 years in a completely unrelated industry and without a degree (I'm 33 and in the UK).

I worked through some Codecademy courses, developed my own site and blog and got to grips with things like Ad-Sense to get a feel for the ad-tech side of things. I pushed my self-taught achievements and motivation in my CV as well as my 10 years prior in a stable corporate environment.

I had to take a pay cut to get my foot in the door, but within 6 months I was picked for another team and was back up to my old salary. I'm now in tech support, but not IT specific (it's more APIs, datafeeds, SQL and site debugging). I get plenty of exposure to the underlying company tech and there are a lot of avenues for advancement in the future so I'm really happy I made the career jump.

</comment><comment><USER22> Very easy to do. No degree here, building web apps on and off for twenty years almost. I've met tons of other developers who had no degree also, some of them very successful open source "stars."

However, it's not possible to get a tech job without learning a lot, so if you go in without a degree, you probably have to be the type of person who reads a lot and does a lot of research as a matter of habit. (Quite possibly has to be true even if you _do_ go in with a degree.)

Also an enormous caveat, I had an incredible pre-college education, at least compared to most Americans. Programming classes when I was 11 years old, two years each of Latin and Ancient Greek while I was still in high school. I think I might technically have been doing college-level math in high school, too, but I'm not 100% sure.

</comment><comment><USER23> It depends.

I dropped out of Uni after one year (this was about 10 years ago). The thing was, in the hobby/amateur game development circles I was well known. Had written a bunch of tutorials, a book (when they still used dead trees) and knew folks in various companies. This made getting job easier. Now, after 10 years of work history, no one gives a damn about my lack of degree. I've working in more industries than most, form junior to Technical Lead positions.

But if I was 18/19 today, no side projects, not very well known, it would be different. When I was more involved in recruiting, I never cared about the degree, but without one, and without a work history, what can you really show me that proves you can do the job?

</comment><comment><USER24> Yes, absolutely. It's not what someone's degree makes of them, but what they make of their degree. Conversely, getting a tech job without a degree is based on always building a track record of results, output, and experience. Same thing for degree guys.

In a way without a degree, you may have more lee way in the types of interesting projects you can put on your LinkedIn.

The bottom line is, always be building, and always be shipping something to show what you can do. Technology is one area where one's education isn't as relevant as the ability to learn anything, in a self-directed and self- teaching way.

</comment><comment><USER25> It is possible; however, it is a LOT _easier_ with a CS degree (it is easier with a non-tech degree than without a degree at all :). Chances are a degree will also help later, when getting better jobs.

You will see many comments of people who've made it without a degree; they exist, but statistically it is much easier with one :)

If you can, get into a public university (at least if you're in the US or Mexico, where I have experience). It is usually affordable, and they provide a good education. It is usually easy to get a job in the field while in college.

</comment><comment><USER26> I think it comes down largely to what you know, and if you can show it. I don't have a degree and I have a great job. I also get contacted usually multiple times a week about jobs. I maintain some open source projects, I have an active SO profile, Github profile, blog and I keep LinkedIn up-to-date. That seems to be enough. Regardless of whether you have a degree or not those are all valuable things that can show what you know and help your career a lot.

I just don't think you need a degree if you know what you're doing.

</comment><comment><USER27> I've been working as a web developer since I was 17. It wasn't hard for me, but I had an incredible good luck by then, getting my first freelance clients out of nowhere.

I'm about to get a master in computer sciences, and I really think it is worth the time (no money in my case, I'm from Argentina). It teaches you the foundations of CS and that normally improves your way to think about technological problems and problem solving. Also, it generally qualifies you for different kind of jobs.

<comment><USER27> Another great thing about studying is that you get to know a lot of clever people interested in the same areas of technologies that you are. And also, depends on your personality and the school maybe, a lot of possible business contacts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I am living proof that it is. I stated teaching myself how to program in 2006. I did a lot of freelance work for a number of years. I was laid off in Spring 2011.

A programming position opened up at a local manufacturing company. I submitted my resume which spoke heavily about my freelance experience. I got a call for a in person interview. During the interview they surprised me with a hand- written programming test.

It turns out that I was the only person that actually passed the test out of 15 applicants.

</comment><comment><USER29> I have been programming since I was 10. I finished high school at 14, entered a semester of college at 16 I then dropped out promptly (with straight A's) because I found the material to be boring and inaccurate. One teacher was seriously telling students there was no reasonable need for a computer to ever have 64mb of ram. (Perhaps I might of made a different choice had I chosen something besides a rural community college).

In any event I was disillusioned with the whole college experience and started taking on quite a bit of contract work, and over the next decade started/participated in 5 startups. I intentionally chose challenging projects at the edge of my comfort zone to gain experience and build real-world problem solving skills. During this time I built a wide network of connections which gave me the ability to do contract work for several well known companies and exposure to a wide range of technologies and problems.

Since documenting some of these experiences on my resume/linkedin in detail a few years ago, I have never had a problem getting salaried jobs or contracts making more than most of my degree-holding peers and getting frequent new job opportunities to consider.

I have also been a hiring manager more than once, and have always interviewed people based on their ability to solve real world problems with an actual editor and access to google. I tend to gravitate towards companies that test new applicants this way as well. Companies that dismiss me based on my lack of formal education, I dismiss as well. Companies that judge on paper instead of skill probably lack the diverse workforce I wish to be a part of.

As an added story, I have a friend that applied for Google without a degree. He was denied. He actually contacted them back asking why he was dismissed so quickly. He was told it was because he lacked a degree. The end. He had the balls to push back insisting he is capable of doing the job and has plenty of experience. The recruiter relented and pushed him up to the next stages... and he got the job.

You don't need a degree, but be prepared to network a lot, have a healthy amount of confidence, and be willing to push back against dismissive recruiters. I won't say which path is better, because that depends on the individual... but I can say skipping college to focus on real-world experience was one of the best personal choices I ever made.

</comment><comment><USER30> Without a degree? Sure, but you're going to have to put the time in either way.

I know lots of developers, great developers, who don't have a degree. The degree may be required some places but most it's just "required". One of the best devs I know misspelled his main tech (at the time) 3 different ways on his resume. You're going to have to know your stuff but it's completely possible.

</comment><comment><USER31> Experience can definitely overtake a degree if you can prove you know your stuff. I have a friend who spent a semester at college and hated it, eventually dropping out. But he's very tech-savvy, taught himself almost every language, and has been programming for over 10 years. He's making $90k a year up in Canada. No degree. So its possible, but you have to know how to market yourself.

</comment><comment><USER32> I believe you can get a tech job without a degree. However, that is just a short term goal. What about your long term goals? I believe having a degree further separates you from other non-degree holding candidates. I believe that when there is another bubble bust or economy collapse, those without degrees will be trying to complete their studies in order to compete against those with degrees.

</comment><comment><USER33> I would hire any developer who could point to his or her prior work. Build something I can see for fun, contribute to open source. I would ask you why no degree in the interview just so I don't hear something like "I ain't into no book learning."

One more bit of advice. Own the "no degree" mystic. Make me believe it was by choice, not by happenstance.

</comment><comment><USER34> I did one year of college, where I was studying Business Information Technology. Was distracted by my part-time job, and dropped out after the first year - continued to work full-time. Sold that business eventually, and now here I am, years later, without a degree but on a H1B visa in the US working as a senior web developer at a videogame company.

</comment><comment><USER35> I have a BA in a social science and have worked as a software engineer for mega-corps, government and startups. Some companies like to filter by degree, but I generally wouldn't want to work for those companies anyways.

The only way it has held me back is specialized fields, like machine learning, would be hard to get into without at least a masters.

</comment><comment><USER36> Absolutely! I would reach out directly to startup companies hiring that you're interested in working for, who are more apt to base your application on coding projects and a technical interview. Large, older tech companies with HR departments are probably a lot less likely to look at an application without a degree.

</comment><comment><USER37> Absolutely. However, be mindful that along with a degree comes a certain amount of potential networking/professional relationships that you may need to push to replicate as well outside of the university environment.

Demonstrate you are a creative and tenacious problem solver and you will be valuable, degree or no degree.

</comment><comment><USER38> Absolutely.

When hiring, i'm much more inclined to take someone straight out of school (or someone currently, I dunno, working in a bar or not working at all) who has some good code up on github or some personal side projects over someone who has a degree and no other apparent interest in coding.

</comment><comment><USER39> Yes, but I've seen cases where companies use said fact to their advantage and dock the employee's pay compared to those who did have a degree. At least in the US, there are many places where having a degree not only helps in finding a job but provides a salary baseline.

</comment><comment><USER40> I just helped start LaunchCodeSTL.com with Jim McKelvey and a few others here in Saint Louis. Many of the people we talked to came from random backgrounds and the people who have shown they really want a tech job have been absolutely successful with it.

</comment><comment><USER41> It appears Google has been hiring a lot more people without degrees than they did before:

[http://www.businessinsider.com/google-hiring-non- graduates-2...](http://www.businessinsider.com/google-hiring-non- graduates-2013-6)

</comment><comment><USER42> I'm a Software Engineer at a small time company and I have two semesters of general education at a community college but I don't hold a degree.

Our Senior SE doesn't hold a degree either and he's worked in the industry for over 10 years.

</comment><comment><USER43> I think it's possible if you can prove your knowledge with very good references. In my opinion, it's more important to get the job done instead of having a degree but no clue about the work you are supposed to do.

</comment><comment><USER44> Holding only a degree in English from a small liberal arts college, I taught myself programming, and eventually spent about 10 years as a full-time programmer in "corporate America." So yes, it's possible.

</comment><comment><USER45> Yes. I actually spoke about that recently [http://blainsmith.com/articles/tedxalbany-the-master-of- my-f...](http://blainsmith.com/articles/tedxalbany-the-master-of-my-fate)

</comment><comment><USER46> Late to the party, but I haven't graduated anything since middle school, majored in a liberal art at a state school and have been an engineer at a certain search engine company for almost a decade.

</comment><comment><USER47> I know two people who are excellent programmers and have stable jobs. One of them started a Math degree, but dropped out after the first semester. The other one has a degree, but in Philosophy.

</comment><comment><USER48> If it helps, I do have a degree in mechanical engineering but am working in software. For all its problems, a Github portfolio is a very good way to show what you know.

</comment><comment><USER49> Yes. I have no degree but taught myself sql, pl/sql, and eventually became a senior systems analyst/developer supporting Oracle EBS implementations.

</comment><comment><USER50> Rephrase the question and answer it. Is it possible to write code and develop softwares without a degree?

</comment><comment><USER51> Serious answer: Yes, experience matters more than credentials.

<comment><USER52> I support this. If you got past projects to show you can get a job even with largest companies out there. They might be pushing you towards eventually getting a degree once you work for them though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> Yes. Taught myself everything. Now in US on an O-1 Visa.

</comment><comment><USER54> Yes.

</comment><comment><USER55> Yes, now go away.</comment>