Is KeePass safe? - <AUTHOR> https://keepass.info/ <comment><AUTHOR> "This is the official website of KeePass, the free, open source, light-weight and easy-to-use password manager." I'm a TechnoDolt: is it safe?

<comment><USER2> Yes. Better answer, depends on what __you __do with __your __vault file.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have no idea what a "vault file" is. TechnoDolt, remember?</comment></comment></comment>


Hoboken, the Startup Village Across the Hudson - <AUTHOR> https://h4labs.wordpress.com/2015/08/12/views-from-hoboken/

<comment><USER2> Looks beautiful and I'm sure the "seeds" that have been planted there will grow big and help startups in Hoboken thrive. Here's a related post [http://startups.in/announcements/startup- hubs/](http://startups.in/announcements/startup-hubs/)

<comment><USER2> Here's the direct link to startuphubs discussed in that post [https://startuphubs.com](https://startuphubs.com)</comment></comment>


The National Park Service Now Owns the Home Where Martin Luther King Jr Was Born - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/15/us/mlk-home-national-park-service.html <comment><USER2> The National Park Service is probably the best agency in the entire American federal government. I have been to about 45 different states, and NPS- administered properties represent the most consistently positive contact I've ever had with the government.

Additionally, the properties that NPS administers are the most majestic places I have found in America. They are critical protectors of America's natural and historical heritage. It's great and fitting that they are taking over MLK's home. He is one of the most consequential leaders America has ever had. Had he not been assassinated, he probably would have become President.

On a related note: I spend a lot of time thinking and reading about and using infrastructure. I have a fantasy project wherein the USA draws down some percentage of its bloated rank-and-file military and instead establishes funding for an NPS park ranger to work at every school in America.

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

<comment><USER3> > Had he not been assassinated, he probably would have become President.

That is a stretch, I think. As bold and inspiring a legacy that MLK left after his death, just think about what he faced while he was still alive. His turn in his last years from fighting solely against racial injustice towards also advocating for victims of capitalism of whatever race proved to be polarizing for the American public and it may have threatened his chances for elected office. Plus, his sexual life, as we now know, was eavesdropped on by the FBI and it is not hard to imagine that being used in a smear campaign if he ran for office.

<comment><USER4> You discount his ability to shape his environment. He was not just a peg to fit into a hole. He had the charisma and vision to challenge assumptions.

<comment><USER5> Charisma and a vision of a better future within reach is a great tool for rallying the masses, even if you have skeletons in your closet. MLK was hated by most Americans when he was alive, but looking at past presidents, its totally possible his high turnout minority could have overwhelmed what turned out of the rest of the electorate at the polls.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The place where George Washington was buried was in state of despair for several years and government refused to take over his estate and turn it in to national monument. If it wouldn't have been due to local ladies association who ran the campaign to save and preserve it through donations, place would have been even overrun by new developments. Same thing happened to John Adams's estate. It is interesting to see this in US because if you go to Russia or China or South Korea, governments have gone to extra-ordinary length to produce monumental structures to preserve their "father" of the nation.

<comment><USER7> Good. We shouldn't have personality cults in the US. The founders saw the Constitution as the one holy and freedom giving thing, not fallible human individuals. Remember: rule of law, not of men.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Worth noting it was bought by the National Parks Foundation, the nonprofit wing of the NPS

</comment><comment><USER9> It couldn't be in better hands considering all of the in fighting between King's children over his legacy.

</comment><comment><USER10> I'm confused why this is on the front page of Hacker News...?

<comment><USER11> My guess is because it's interesting. I know most other articles are just "eher ma gerd FB is so evil!!", but sometimes other topics like this fall through the cracks.

<comment><USER8> HN is explicit in its policies of allowing anything its readers find interesting. The GP is a seasoned HNer so must know this by now, I'm curious what their beef is with the link.</comment></comment></comment>


Biggest mystery in mathematics in limbo after cryptic meeting - <AUTHOR> http://www.nature.com/news/biggest-mystery-in-mathematics-in-limbo-after-cryptic-meeting-1.19035 <comment><USER2> Here's a detailed report on the situation from one Brian Conrad, who attended the meeting: [http://mathbabe.org/2015/12/15/notes-on-the-oxford-iut- works...](http://mathbabe.org/2015/12/15/notes-on-the-oxford-iut-workshop-by- brian-conrad/)

</comment><comment><USER3> Not mentioned: Kedlaya was Mochizuki's student and then later his teaching assistant back in '92-'94 (for a tough course[1]). Mochizuki hasn't had that many students; Kedlaya might be one of a few to have an advantage in understanding his approach.

The bad news is that the new participants seem to have made no progress on the IUT papers themselves. But the good news is that some substantial progress was made on the background material, and that there are some folks still interested in continuing.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Math_55](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Math_55)

</comment><comment><USER4> I don't understand how something, that anyone understands, can be this cryptic. Someone some time ago mentioned that all of Einstein's major papers on special and general relativitiy can be covered in a semester or two.

Isn't the hard part discovering this stuff?

How can anyone discover mathematical proofs but it is so impossible to communicate them that nobody in the world can follow your train of thought? I mean people are really, really good at communicating. It's kind of what we do.

I don't understand how anyone can publish proofs that don't succumb easily to understanding by experts who concentrate on them for a long time, perhaps with tiny hints by the author.

It's not as though we're looking at fragments written in a long-lost language we have no access to, from a culture nobody has access to, on unknown subjects, and with the authors dead hundreds of years ago! The author is right there. The subject isn't even art (like poetry criticism or something), it's fully rigorous.

Understanding someone's proof (for devoted experts) should be easy, right? What gives?

<comment><USER5> The papers on Inter-universal Teichmueller theory span over 500 pages alone, and they build on material developed earlier that needs to be understood too. Those papers were published a little over 3 years ago, so claiming that they can't be understood "by experts who concentrate on them for a long time" might be a bit premature.

<comment><USER4> but the article doesn't make it sound like it's not "fully understood." the article makes it sound like not even the summary is known - for example, what parts of the other papers are used, what isn't. As though the experts didn't even known what parts of theories were being referred to. very bizarre.

<comment><USER6> The summary is known. Have you read the abstracts?

<comment><USER4> Did you even read our article, jsprogrammer? That's what I'm reacting to. It says:

>A consensus emerged that the highlight of the workshop was a lecture on 9 December by Kiran Kedlaya, an arithmetic geometer from the University of California, San Diego. He zeroed in on a result from a 2008 paper by Mochizuki that linked the statement of the abc conjecture to another branch of maths called topology. The link was immediately recognised as a crucial step in Mochizuki's grand strategy.

This is why I'm making the reference to ancient lost texts. I mean, if the result of a 2008 paper is crucial, you'd think the guy would have just mentioned this fact. It's as though they're investigating some long dead guy's hidden thoughts. This is a direct quote: "There is still no clear answer to lingering questions about how things are ultimately going to fit together." What? Wouldn't the guy just _tell_ you how they're ultimately going to fit together? I'm utterly perplexed at the process the article describes, when the author is available and can give hints.

<comment><USER7> What I understood from [http://mathbabe.org/2015/12/15/notes-on-the-oxford- iut-works...](http://mathbabe.org/2015/12/15/notes-on-the-oxford-iut-workshop- by-brian-conrad/) (posted elsewhere here), is that the problem stems from differing motivations. On one hand, Mochizuki wants to make his proof fullyt complete and correct (being both fully general and covering all special cases), but the community wants broad strokes intuitions. From Mochizuki's perspective, he _has_ told everyone how things fit together, but _fit together_ means something different for others. The workshop attendees want to know what things they can gloss over to get the big picture, but as of yet, nobody who understands the proof has succeeded in communicating that information, probably because they don't share the same motivation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> If you don't follow how it came mathematicians have so much trouble with some papers:

This is part I — [http://www.kurims.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~motizuki/Inter- universal%20...](http://www.kurims.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~motizuki/Inter- universal%20Teichmuller%20Theory%20I.pdf)

<comment><USER9> Jesus. This surely requires a computational proof.

<comment><USER10> It is essentially a communications problem. Brian Conrad summed it up:

 _For every subject I have ever understood in mathematics, there are instructive basic examples and concise arguments to illustrate what is the point to generally educated mathematicians. There is no reason that IUT should be any different, especially for the audience that was present at Oxford. Let me illustrate this with a short story. During one of the tea breaks I was chatting with a postdoc who works in analysis, and I mentioned sheaf theory as an example of a notion which may initially look like pointless abstract nonsense but actually allows for very efficient consideration of useful ideas which are rather cumbersome (or impossible) to contemplate in more concrete terms. Since that postdoc knew nothing about what can be done with sheaf theory, I told him about the use of sheaf cohomology to systematize and analyze the deRham theorem and topological obstructions to construction problems in complex analysis; within 20 minutes he understood the point and wanted to learn more. Nobody expects to grasp the main points of IUT within 20 minutes, but if someone says they understand a theory and does not provide instructive visibly relevant examples and concise arguments that clearly illustrate what is the point then they are not trying hard enough. Many are willing to work hard to understand what must be very deep and powerful ideas, but they need a clearer sense of the landscape before beginning their journey._

[http://mathbabe.org/2015/12/15/notes-on-the-oxford-iut- works...](http://mathbabe.org/2015/12/15/notes-on-the-oxford-iut-workshop-by- brian-conrad/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I remember at university how, when attending the few multi-disciplinary meetings or get-togethers, I would marvel that these people - on the same campus! - didn't get together more often in order to share and stimulate growth or share strategies, which inevitably occurred during these meetings.

I wonder why a handful of qualified mathematicians couldn't get together and go to Japan to sort this proof out...

<comment><USER12> Having worked in a university mathematics department I noticed that the pure mathematicians tended to keep themselves to themselves, for instance not attending talks by visiting mathematicians unless it was of direct relevance to their research. In contrast, we theoretical physicists would listen to any visiting speaker just for fun - even on occasion experimental particle physicists, applied mathematicians or computing specialists. Perhaps pure maths is just more deeply specialised and leaves no possibility of such dilettanteism.

<comment> Al-Khwarizmi I think it's probably because it's very difficult to understand a pure math talk if you didn't already have significant understanding of the subject before the talk.

I don't work on pure mathematics, but I work in a field of computer science where there is both theoretical and empirical/applied research, and I do, and enjoy doing, both.

However, when it comes to attending talks, I do go to a lot of talks on empirical subjects just for fun, but I hardly ever go to a highly theoretical talk for fun. I only do that if the talk is highly related to the specific work I do; if you see me in a theoretical talk otherwise, it's probably just for social compromise.

The reason is that I can perfectly understand the gist of an empirical paper in 20 or 30 minutes, where there is no way I will understand a piece of theoretical research by listening to a talk if I haven't gone through the paper carefully before (and if you have done that, there is often no point in going to the talk anyway). Honestly I think the talk format doesn't lend itself too well to highly theoretical work. I have learned _a lot_ about empirical research and obtained many useful ideas from talks, but in the theoretical field, the useful ideas and insights I got from talks are few and far between, and I would probably have obtained them more efficiently from reading papers anyway...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I view some of these math researchers like startup founders who are absolutely brilliant technically, but who lack almost all ability to interact with customers, investors, etc. As a solo founder, they will fail. However, if they attract a co-founder who complements their skills, they can be wildly successful. It sounds like Mochizuki would have benefited greatly from such a co-author, in order to truly prove his result to the community.

<comment><USER14> Math is objective. The proof is either correct or not. Human interaction doesn't matter, except for perhaps marketing the importance of the results. In this case, the history of the problem itself has done the marketing, so any valid solution would be a wild success regardless of how socially eccentric the researcher is. Another recent example of such a mathematician is Grigori Perelman.

<comment><USER15> Mathematics, being a human endeavor, is fundamentally _about_ human interaction. There's no point to doing math if there is no communicating it to other people.

<comment><USER16> You can argue that everything can be reduced to human interaction, but mathematics is certainly not about human interaction in any meaningful sense

<comment><USER15> It's the only pure way to describe existence. That isn't meaningful? Mathematics is a language, first and foremost. To argue otherwise is to fundamentally misunderstand its goals, methods, and form.

You can draw all the squiggly lines on paper that you want, but it won't mean anything until someone else interpets it. You cannot prove logic that only exists in your own head, because you cannot prove yourself rational. Your very existence does not even make sense without other people perceiving you.

<comment><USER16> Languages do not require human interaction. I do not argue that there is no mathematical language.

<comment><USER15> Language without human interaction is an undefined operation, like raising zero to the zeroth power, or clapping with one hand.

<comment><USER17> Are you including interacting with oneself?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> > True to form, Mochizuki himself did not attend, although he did answer > participants' questions through Skype

Why not present his papers through skype? If the problem is just a dislike of travelling. It could also help with any issues related to public speaking or that type of thing.

</comment><comment><USER10> Here's a comic that makes light of the situation:

[http://www.sandraandwoo.com/comics/2014-11-24-0636-hodge- the...](http://www.sandraandwoo.com/comics/2014-11-24-0636-hodge-theater.png)

From:

[http://www.sandraandwoo.com/2014/11/24/0636-hodge- theater/](http://www.sandraandwoo.com/2014/11/24/0636-hodge-theater/)

</comment><comment> guard-of-terra I guess we can now ask a lot of simple questions in math for whose there can be answer, but the solution itself is untenably long to be produced or understood by mere mortal, not a computer or computer-like individual.

Same way as we can't really reason about inner workings of machine learning model that yields useful results.

Talk about transhumanism.

<comment><USER19> Just because his proof is long, convoluted, and cryptic doesn't mean that there won't be a simpler proof down the road. Maybe some of the tools just haven't been developed yet. Look for example at how the Greeks and Romans struggled with mathematical problems many of which are today easily solvable in high school because we have advanced techniques and a positional notation for numbers.

As far as I understand it, a lot of the problem stems from the fact that Mochizuki is quite a hermit. And that's a problem if you want others to understand what you have done for years.

This workshop was crucial that it showed several people that trying to understand the proof could be a worthwhile task.

<comment> guard-of-terra What if there won't be? What if, for many of questions, the only proof is as decipherable as MD5 of question?

<comment><USER19> That's probably highly improbable. Look at how many different proofs the are for the pythagorean theorem: [http://www.cut-the- knot.org/pythagoras/](http://www.cut-the-knot.org/pythagoras/)

I'm not mathematician but I guess if there is really only one possible proof for a given question (Gödel might have proven that this is impossible but I don't know for sure), then the question isn't actually an interesting one. Because this would mean that the question touches only very few topics.

But the abc conjecture is interesting because it has lots of links with deep questions in number theory.

<comment> guard-of-terra Okay. What if there's a lot of proofs, but the shortest of those is still not within reach of human intellect?

<comment><USER19> So far, we don't know if there are any proofs that are beyond the human intellect. I don't think that we currently believe such a thing to exist theoretically.

Every provable conjecture should be understandable in principle by a generic human mind.

Now, there for certain systems that are so complex that proofs within those systems are beyond us. Not because we couldn't understand them but because learning and applying all the rules of that system takes longer than a human mind is able to live (currently).

But that's just a practical limitation, not a theoretical one.

<comment> guard-of-terra I'm talking about practical limitations. It turns out human exploration becomes impractical :(

<comment><USER19> Practical limitations can be overcome.

At first it was artificial light sources, then glasses, then machines speeding up calculation and now machines that do calculations themselves.

There is certainly a practical limit of what a human mind can grasp but that limit is far away and with tools, it is even much farther.

We won't run out on difficult problems to solve anytime soon.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> the reason they fail to understand the proof seems the same everybody else fails at math. funny even the greatest mathematicians can have this problem.

</comment><comment><USER21> "A consensus emerged that the highlight of the workshop was a lecture on 9 December by Kiran Kedlaya, an arithmetic geometer from the University of California, San Diego. He zeroed in on a result from a 2008 paper by Mochizuki5 that linked the statement of the abc conjecture to another branch of maths called _topology_. The link was immediately recognised as a crucial step in Mochizuki's grand strategy. "

</comment><comment><USER22> I'm not a mathematician at all but does anyone know if this may have implications in the field of cryptography, because it involves prime numbers? Also, the word "cryptic" in the title. ;)

</comment><comment><USER23> I just learned about Math 55 and would trade plenty to teach that course.

The problem here is that Mochizuki uses too many German Nazi references.

Those people had no academic integrity whatsoever; and their works are exclusively stolen, through _war crimes and the Holocaust._

After you do the right thing, and translate Mochizuki's nomenclature into French and Slavic; the proof is no longer valid, and the problem is negligible.

For the record, Oswald Teichmüller is a fraudulent Nazi war criminal who robbed Felix Hausdorff during the Holocaust.

The undeniable fact that Oswald Teichmüller is solely published in a _journal of racial propaganda_ makes Mochizuki's choice of terminology questionable at the very least.

The fact that I am being suppressed for this demonstrates unambiguously that Mochizuki's proof is nothing more than media hype and puffery.

<comment><USER24> I dont understand what you mean. Can you clarify?

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> On a related note, Shinichi Mochizuki has been speculated to be Satoshi Nakamoto.

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/05/19/ted- nelso...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/05/19/ted-nelson-says- that-bitcons-satoshi-nakamoto-is-shinichi-mochizuki/)</comment>


The Circular Electron Positron Collider - <AUTHOR> https://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2016/09/16/the-circular-electron-positron-collider/ <comment><USER2> I'm under the impression that the reason we couldn't confirm the Higgs boson before the LHC was that electron-positron colliders could not easily produce the massive particles needed. Proton-proton or Proton-antiproton collisions seem to be much more useful for Higgs production. The Large Electron–Positron Collider _almost_ got us there and it exceeded 200 GeV. What then would a 250 GeV machine do for us?

<comment><USER3> The argument in favor of an electron-positron collider is that there is much less "junk" in the detector from the hadron collision. So the trade-off is that you produce a lot fewer Higgs bosons, but, in principle, you are able to measure each Higgs much more precisely. Having a machine at 250 GeV puts us at the sweet spot for producing the Higgs with mass 125 GeV.

There is some discussion in the community about whether it truly is going to advance the field to build such a machine. It's not super clear whether the various proposed 250 GeV machines will improve on what will be done by HL-LHC. From the Chinese point of view, though, it absolutely is the right decision to build this machine on the way to a 100 TeV hadron collider, since they desperately need to build up some local expertise in constructing/operating a large collider.

<comment><USER2> Ah, thanks. This gives me better perspective.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't know if it matters that much, if there are direct results from the research itself. I mean, the World Wide Web worked out pretty well. I don't know if that would be a thing without CERN. There's lots of cool engineering that has to happen to build stuff at that scale. Maybe the age of cool side effects is over, but it seems like time and time again, we get great stuff.

NASA with smoke detectors and aluminum cnc machining. Cracking the enigma gave general purpose computers. Just trying to do something no one has done before forces discovery of other cool stuff, independent of the actual research goal.

<comment><USER5> What new technologies have been developed at CERN, for the LHC?

<comment><USER6> I'm more involved in the analysis / software side of research, and somebody who is working on hardware can probably tell you more about technology spin- offs. In fact, I'd like to hear about them, too.

One thing that has been pioneered at the LHC is grid computing. Basically we were doing cloud computing before it was cool. Of course, the requirements of science and industry are different, and we were quickly overtaken in scale by Amazon, Google, etc.. But still, particle physicists were among the first to connect different data centers across the world to a unified resource. You just say "do this computation on this dataset" and the system finds the optimal place to perform the calculation without copying too much data around, and delivers the packaged up datasets back when it's done.

Many spin-offs are small improvements of existing technology, giant leaps are rare. An example of an incremental step are improved solar panels [1] using LHC vacuum technology. There is also a lot of work done on superconductors and magnets that is cutting-edge, but I don't know if it has found application yet.

We have a lot of hardware development that is really interesting, but too far away from consumer electronics to be used as a spin-off, like radiation hard electronics, or high precision particle detectors. Maybe some of this will go into medical devices.

We used to be early adopters of machine learning (e.g. neural networks) and pattern recognition techniques, but have been utterly surpassed in these fields by industry recently, and are only starting to import modern techniques, like deep neural networks.

[1]: [http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/breaking/2012/03/16/cern- spi...](http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/breaking/2012/03/16/cern-spin-off- more-efficient-solar-panels)

<comment><USER7> The superconductor stuff is persistent physics myth; commercial superconductors were largely developed for NMR spectrometers used by the petrochemical industry about a decade before superconducting supercolliders.

<comment><USER8> Interesting, any references?

<comment><USER7> [http://www.nmr2.buffalo.edu/resources/edu/matr/40yearsofPNMR...](http://www.nmr2.buffalo.edu/resources/edu/matr/40yearsofPNMRS.pdf)

first superconducting NMR magnet was built in 1962, by a commercial NMR company (bruker). 1970 was the first commercial superconducting FT-NMR.

The first superconducting synchrotron was planned around 1974 (ESCAR) and wasn't completed. the SSC was first discussed in 1976. CEBAF is the first accelerator to actually deploy superconducting technology in any form... But its use is in the RF chambers (the walls of the rf chambers are superconducting which allows them to transfer energy by charge oscillation more efficiently to the electron beam), not in the bend magnets.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If you build it, they will come

</comment><comment><USER10> _The Chinese political landscape is entirely different from that of the US. In particular, for large scale constructions, the political system is superior. China has already accomplished to date many tasks which the Americans would not, or could not do; many more will happen in the future._

Eh? Speak up, it's hard to hear anything up here on the Moon.

<comment><USER11> List of countries who have landed on the moon in the last 40 years: China.

<comment><USER12> In the last 40 years?: China, USSR.

<comment><USER11> I was working off [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_the_Moon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_the_Moon) , which says the last Soviet moon landing was 40 years and a month ago.

<comment><USER13> I don't understand. There are plenty of probes from other countries listed in that article.

<comment><USER14> Those were all orbiters (plus two impactors).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Interesting use of the console by the BBC News website - <AUTHOR> Just happened to have my browser console open when I visited the BBC website today, and saw something I wasn't expecting: A job advert! Complete with coloured BBC logo.<p>Is this a common thing or is it unique to the BBC site? <comment><USER2> Many places do it. Facebook, if I remember, has big warnings about copy and pasting random scripts though.

</comment><comment><USER3> I think its that console browser are more powerful now and can run standard websites now.</comment>


Postcards from the east: on the art of everyday communist life - <AUTHOR> http://calvertjournal.com/features/show/4458/owen-hatherley-postcards-landscapes-of-communism <comment><USER2> Those Albanian flats by the sea look amazing with the rake and the little balconies for each.

I know the reality would have been somewhat grim and that ordinary people would not have been able to have one.

<comment><USER3> > Albanian

I think you mean Albena not Albania, unless there was a typo in the article.

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

<comment><USER4> Correct, you are. The image caption says: Albena, People's Republic of Bulgaria

<comment><USER2> Oops, I apologise to any Bulgarians! Those buildings look really amazing though. Wonder if they are still there...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It was not a communism, it was a flavour of socialism. Just like China, Sweden and USA.

<comment><USER6> They called it communism, everyone else called it communism. That it didn't really fit the textbook definition matters little.

And in my opinion this is how communism looks in the real world: crooks take over and you get a totalitarian regime. Anything else is an utopia.

<comment><USER7> By the same logic hacker is someone who breaks into systems and causes mischief. That ship has sailed as well and clinging to the original definition is a lost cause.

<comment><USER6> Well, different circles, different definitions. On HackerNews I expect everyone to translate hacker = programmer. On CNN I expect hacker = Kevin Mitnick.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Content sounds interesting, unfortunately it doesn't load without Google Analytics, Twitter and Facebook.

<comment><USER9> If you have a moment, what tool do you use to detect/block those?

<comment><USER8> Adblock edge on this browser.</comment></comment></comment>


YouTube-MP3 Fights Google With Lawyers and 220K+ Signature Petition - <AUTHOR> http://torrentfreak.com/youtube-mp3-fights-google-with-lawyers-and-220k-signature-petition-120703/

<comment><USER2> I don't really understand what's the problem here. YouTube don't want him to do what he's doing, so they've blocked his servers from accessing their site. Isn't that pretty much end-of-story?

Maybe it's true that they can't _legally_ threaten him (I don't understand the relevant laws here), but they're certainly within their rights to IP-block him.

<comment><USER3> Since DoS attacks are illegal, I guess you might be able to interpret this as a form of that. It could be an unreasonable usage of YouTube resources from a single source.

Maybe this can set a precedent for the PadMapper-Craigslist situation.

<comment><USER4> The difference is that Padmapper used the Craigslist API, whereas this site appears to be able to skirt Youtube's API restrictions because it doesn't use the API.

There also is some way it can skirt the general TOS because of a German law that says TOS can only be applied between two companies when a contract is signed, which apparently never happened. I don't quite understand it, but I'm not a German lawyer.

<http://edge.youtube-mp3.org/gcase/wbs.pdf>

EDIT: I was misread. Padmapper didn't use a Craigslist API. Craigslist's TOS does state that scraping is forbidden and leniency is at their sole discretion. I'm not sure how that would play out in a German court, as they seem to have a different view of how TOS work between companies.

<comment><USER3> If PadMapper used an api, then why did they receive a cease and desist?

<comment><USER5> It appears they didn't, but in answer to your question generally, many APIs will often be subject to usage limitations. Twitter and Google Maps being two examples that immediately spring to mind.

<comment><USER3> My point was that with an API, you don't need to send a cease and desist. You can simply cut off API access.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think the central complaint would be that the site in addition to taking traffic away from Youtube, was then serving ads to users of the site thereby obtaining revenue.

Google probably have no issue with individuals using tools to download mp3s (or at least realise there is nothing to be gained in pursuing action) but when third party sites are intentionally diverting revenue away, this is bound to cause issues.

The legal analysis is interesting in terms of copyright infringement. Particularly as to whether the existing method used by Youtube is a 'technical measure' designed to prevent infringement.

I think it arguably is as a large majority of users will not download videos direct as a result of the system used by Youtube.

</comment><comment><USER6> I use this to download from Youtube:

<http://rg3.github.com/youtube-dl/>

<comment><USER7> Same. When I was 15, I wrote a little script that used youtube-dl and then ran the resulting download through mencoder to strip out the audio. I don't see why teens today can't do the same :-)

<comment><USER8> youtube-dl has an --extract-audio option built in.

<comment><USER7> Hm, it may not have had it a number of years ago, I'm unsure. I would have looked at the man page though so I'm certain there was a reason for using mencoder in the end.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> mplayer-share He's not using the API, he's just downloading videos as any user would and feeding the videos to ffmpeg to produce mp3's.

It's alway been possible to download YouTube videos. They use progressive download, not ("encrypted") streaming a la Adobe.[1] And they used to use ffmpeg internally as well. Not sure if they still do.

The only explanation I can think for Google's strange response to this is that they are under pressure from the RIAA. The RIAA may not like this particular site for some reason. There are certainly others like it.

1\. There is a common myth that YouTube uses "streaming" and that Adobe flash player is needed to watch YouTube videos. The RIAA is probably among those who believe this. It is simply false. I've never had a working Flash player since I don't use Windows or Linux and I've been watching YouTube videos since the beginning. Not to mention videos from various other sites that tell users they need to install Adobe flash player (and open themselves up to flash cookies).

If the RIAA was really serious about stopping people from listening to music via YouTube, they would do better by going after Google. Though I think we all, including the RIAA and its members, know they can't win that battle. The courts ar are on Google's side. And fingerpinting and DMCA notices just won't cut it.

So this guy is really just a pawn in the game. Google can "negotiate" with the RIAA, while this guy cannot.

</comment><comment><USER9> "Google closed his Adsense account"

This guy was tempting fate. Serving ads on content hosted by the same company, allowing them to see every penny in traffic? I'm amazed some account manager with a grudge didn't pull the plug sooner.

So far we've seen the Twitter app shutdowns, Padmapper-Craigslist as chrischen noted, and now this. The established players continue to amass their information into silos, while the demands of the greater internet keep upping the water pressure.

</comment><comment><USER10> And that's why not all software will be in the cloud.

</comment><comment><USER11> Snippet from <http://www.youtube-mp3.org/situation-update>

_Update: Google has released a new YouTube app for Android which allows videos to be downloaded and stored in a permanent fashion on the device. I don't think that it is necessary to comment this._

How convenient that they decided to start shutting down services that download videos/mp3 from youtube while launching an app to do exactly that</comment>


"Office Space" creator Mike Judge shooting new HBO parody of Silicon Valley - <AUTHOR> http://www.deadline.com/2012/12/hbo-greenlights-live-action-comedy-pilot-from-mike-judge-king-of-the-hill-writers/ <comment><USER2> > " _Silicon Valley_ is set in the high tech gold rush of modern Silicon > Valley, where the people most qualified to succeed are the least capable of > handling success."

This could work.

<comment><USER3> However, it seems pretty unfair. I've met maybe 30 people who have gotten rich from startups. None have really changed all that much.

There's plenty to parody (pivoting, easy money, demographics, ivy league obsession, VCs, new angel investors, the term "disrupt") but how people handle success is really not one of them.

<comment><USER4> Pivoting could easily become the show's running gag.

Just before closing credits: "Well, that space looks like it's going nowhere. We've decided to pivot and focus on coupons for pet owners, and it'll have a really big social aspect to it too."

Next week: "Well, it turns out that cat owners don't get out much, so we're pivoting. We think that what they really want is to stream music over their pet's collar"

Third episode: "Well, who knew that Cocker Spaniels are frightened by Ke$ha? So we're pivoting, and what we're going to focus on now is overnight construction materials delivery. Concrete mix, FedEx'd to your door!"

<comment><USER5> That, and hoodies.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Mike Judge and the other writers stopped by our offices at Tout.com (startup in SF) and were asking us about startups and being a developer. We told them about meetups and open source stuff. Probably won't affect the show, but it was fun talking to them and seeing they were really into it.

Here's him asking about ruby: <http://www.tout.com/m/t0x6dh>

judge drawing on one of our desks: <http://www.tout.com/m/q8ppc1>

here's the full stream: <http://www.tout.com/hashtags/MikeJudgeToutHQ>

</comment><comment><USER7> If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend Judge's 2009 movie 'Extract' with Jason Bateman of Arrested Development.

It sort of inverts the Office Space formula and shows the sometimes taxing, even soul-crushing nature of entrepreneurship.

It seems to follow the pattern of Office Space and Idiocracy in being panned by critics and ignored by audiences at first, and then quickly developing a cult following and being recognized as pretty brilliant.

<comment><USER8> I consider Idiocracy to be the greatest satirical film post WWII.

<comment><USER9> That's an opinion(so of course it can't be wrong) that I have heard, it is being debated fairly intelligently downthread along with a debate about the fantastic King of the Hill and Office Space.

Here is a list of movies that critics and non-critics consider to be much better post WWII satires than Idiocracy, according to internet ratings of these movies. Note: many of these are more humorous and brutal while being less crude and light-hearted than Idiocracy. Also many have plot, emotion, and deep characterization.

Films: American Psycho, A Clockwork Orange, Fahrenheit 451, Nineteen Eighty- Four, Dr. Strangelove, Office Space(also Mike Judge)

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

My main problem with Idiocracy as a satire is that the message it sends is flatly incorrect, because the rules of their world are not the same as ours. It is a satire of some alternate universe in which we are not living, it has no applicability for the world we live in.

Film's message: "If our societies ever end up giving a competitive advantage to low IQ people, time travel will be necessary to correct society's decline."

The truth:"If our societies ever end up giving a competitive advantage to low IQ people, natural selection will take care of it, since intelligence seems to be a competitive advantage for apes."

I think the true message is also a better call to arms for both intelligent people and unintelligent people. The movie Idiocracy seemed like it was made to be consumed by the citizens of the low-IQ world, in both plot and acting. I do enjoy its light-heartedness.

Much more realistic are the famous dystopian texts, especially Harrison Bergeron: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron>

<comment><USER10> The time travel is a plot device. It exists only to set the stage for the story.

The satire is the stuff like politics being an obvious (blatant?) popularity contest and people not having any notion of where their food comes from. You know, like today.

I think even the fall of society depicted in the movie is mostly a plot device. For instance, in much of the developed world, trash is simply thrown on a big pile (generally a special, well managed pile, but nonetheless a big pile).

The movie isn't a warning where we are headed, it is a withering criticism of where we are.

<comment><USER9> I mostly agree with what you are saying, and I don't feel like it is in conflict with anything that I said in my comment. One point about our trash - is it "simply thrown on a big pile", or is it "strategically centralized so that future people can effectively recycle it when it becomes economically feasible"? In a post apocalyptic wasteland, you will find me making runs to the "grocery store" that is the trash dump.

I think it appealed too much to "the masses" to be enjoyed by "sophisticated" people. And I think that the satire bits were much too sparing to really be absorbed by "unsophisticated" watchers. No one under the age of 18 that I talked with has any idea that this movie is a "withering criticism of where we are". Here's why:

I do agree with you that the movie had satiric elements, and I agree that it pointed out the specific issues that you say it pointed out. But if you watch the movie, these issues are only briefly mentioned, they are not explored or analyzed. If the film was pared down to the satire bits, it would be about 7 minutes long. The plot of the film was Luke Wilson the time traveler saving the world, the serious satire elements were the setting. Well if the plot doesn't get the message through, we can use the characters, right? Unfortunately, the low IQ people in the film were incapable of talking about their problems in a sympathetic way that most people can understand. Few people recognized that the characters were actually caricatures, because they were so dumb and happy about their lot in life. When you watch Schindler's List, do you relate to the characters that are unsympathetic oppressors or to the characters that are sympathetic and oppressed?

My friends and family were effected much more by the satire in Planet of the Apes, which is very similar movie to Idiocracy. The main thrust of both plots is "a hero saves the day," and the satire elements are mostly setting. PotA works as satire because some of the ape and human characters had problems that they were struggling with, just like you and I! None of the lower IQ people in Idiocracy was struggling with anything; the "dystopia" was NOT a nightmare for them, because they had IQs too low to express any anguish and garner any sympathy.

I think the movie would have made an excellent short film, and I think Luke Wilson would have been brilliant in it. It would have made a fantastic Family Guy episode for those that enjoy Family Guy. It failed as a feature length film which is disappointing from such an effective artist as Mike Judge.

<comment><USER9> My friends and family were _effected_ much more by the satire

should be

My friends and family were _affected_ much more by the satire

There were many effects of the movie - one was to make the watchers cry, the other was to make dinosaurs explode onscreen. They were affected by the movie. I have affected the deal - pray that I do not affect it further.

Affect is always a verb. Effect is always a noun, except when it's a verb. In that case you rely on a subject/object agreement thing, and English should really drop both words and use ffect instead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Athough Mike Judge's projects haven't always been a commercial success, everything he's been involved in has been damn entertaining. I'm really excited to see how this turns out.

</comment><comment><USER12> He also made Beavis and Butt-head, which is just as classic compared to Office Space IMO.

<comment><USER13> And Idiocracy, which was vastly underrated even though marred by what seems to be studio-meddling (the annoying narrator, for instance). Idicoracy is especially amusing because as the years go on, it only seems _more_ prescient.

I'd also point out that King of the Hill was a great show, if a little too dry for most tastes.

<comment><USER14> King of the Hill is a terrible show. It looks like a 12 year apology for making office space. Where-ever office space attacks and mocks the traditional power structure, king of the hill carefully reinforces it. King of the Hill is not a little too dry it is a lot too stupid.

In fact if I were prone to more paranoia, I would suggest that some Hollywood honcho sat Mike down in some dark office and explained to him that he has done a terrible thing by making office space, and he has to suffer, and only if he suffers willingly and eagerly for more than ten years by continuously making this awful trash called King of the Hill, only then he will be back in the good graces of the powers that be. But of course that is just my imagination. I am sure nobody actually had to explain this to Mike Judge. He likely figured it out on his own.

<comment><USER15> KOTH is one of the best animated comedy series of the last 30 years, with a writing staff that included the co-writer of Idiocracy (and Tropic Thunder, which was also excellent), Wyatt Cenac, and writers from Mr. Show, Kids in the Hall, The Late Show, Parks And Rec, and the Simpsons (and during their good years). The voice talent is probably the best assembled ever for any animated show, including The Simpsons, anchored by Stephen Root, also one of the best character actors of the last 40 years.

I don't think Mike Judge has much to apologize for; also, if you really think KOTH "carefully reinforces the traditional power structure", your irony sensors are so irreparably broken that you should have all of modern culture explained to you via a translator.

<comment><USER16> Wait wait...surely Adventure Time, Frisky Dingo or The Venture Brothers are of equal excellence.

I'm not sure if I'm being serious or not. I do love those shows though.

<comment><USER15> Adventure Time is surprisingly excellent (I don't watch a lot of TV, but my kids watch AT).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> He has to track down the person who originally came up with the status code "PC LOAD LETTER" and give them a cameo.

He _has_ to.

<comment><USER18> What the fuck does that mean?

<comment><USER19> It's an _Office Space_ reference.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> This sounds amazing and 80% of the comments in this thread just sound bitter.

</comment><comment><USER21> This reminded me of the Vooza webseries [1]. Some of their skits are corny, but I think they show that there is potential for a good startup oriented series.

[1] <http://vooza.com/>

<comment><USER22> For sure, their Radimparency spoof is pure comedy gold, and rather scarily close to portraying a large portion of the startup scene here.

<http://watch.vooza.com/post/27284828649/radimparency>

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I expect it would be more realistic than Randy Zuckerberg's show.

</comment><comment><USER24> I hope this gets past a pilot episode.

<comment><USER25> Who makes pilots anymore? What they really need is a Minimum Viable Production.

<comment><USER26> With a 30 second elevator pitch.

<comment><USER27> and a node.js backend!

Man they don't even need writers, just read HN all day.

<comment><USER28> The script is just an adaptation of this twitter account: <https://twitter.com/shit_hn_says>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> This reminds me of the "Office" episode where "Wuphf" is a Silicon Valley startup spoof. In Ryan's "profit" projections[1] he's asked about his plan for revenue, and he replies:

 _"First rule of Silicon Valley, you think about the user, the experience. You don't think about the money, ever."_

[1] [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-wmzwXd31Rw8/UI6hLHjRvnI/AAAAAAAACK...](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-wmzwXd31Rw8/UI6hLHjRvnI/AAAAAAAACKY/ko9368dGnx0/s1600/wuphf- profit-projections-edit.jpg)

</comment><comment><USER30> I would be beyond content if this was nothing more than 30 minutes of the Start-up Guys [1] with Mike Judge creating buzzword fusion words for company names. [1] [http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6507690/hardly-working- sta...](http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6507690/hardly-working-start-up- guys)

</comment><comment><USER31> He made the Goode Family, which was short-lived but from most accounts, terrible. Hopefully he'd be able to grasp SV culture as much as he did in Office Space, and not miss it by going after typical caricatures of San Francisco.

</comment><comment><USER32> Wow. That's great. There is a Santa. :) Can't wait.

</comment><comment><USER33> It's all over now. SV can only become a parody of itself.

</comment><comment><USER34> I'm confused, isn't Bravo already airing a parody of Silicon Valley?

</comment><comment><USER35> Any idea when this might air?

</comment><comment><USER36> oh my. this has the potential to be soo great.

</comment><comment><USER37> "fuckin' a"

</comment><comment><USER38> They should get Ashton Kutcher involved in this, he's one of the few actors who has actual real-life involvement in Silicon Valley (he's already doing the SJ biopic).

<comment><USER39> This comment is part of your tryout for a writing position on the show I assume?

Well done. This is exactly the kind of idea that the show is probably going to be ruthlessly mocking.

<comment><USER40> There are a lot of things to mock about it (and boy do I), but Kutcher is a pretty bright guy.

<comment><USER39> Really? Everything he has ever said or done in public has lead me to the opposite conclusion.

His financial advisers and PR people seem exceptionally talented, he has, so far, hidden any ounce of talent from the public.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Startup Quote: Peter Shankman, Founder, HARO - <AUTHOR> http://startupquote.com/post/9696020016

<comment><AUTHOR> You can't make anything viral, but you can make something good.

\- Peter Shankman (@petershankman)

<http://startupquote.com/post/9696020016></comment>


GitHub Diversity report - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/blog/2401-the-github-diversity-report <comment><USER2> I would hate to work in a company where my ethnicity or my gender matters.</comment>


IPv6 Deployment story of heise.de(one of the biggest news sites in Germany) - <AUTHOR> http://www.h-online.com/features/The-big-IPv6-experiment-1165042.html <comment><USER2> I think this is great. I think more sites should do this. I think I should do this! I'm not a great sysadmin, but I'd like to do what I can to help the ipv6 switch-over.

Does anyone have any experience in operating a ipv6-enabled site? What is involved?

<comment><USER3> I'm running nearly all my services in dual stack mode, as my dedicated server provider hetzner.de offers native IPv6 for quite some time.

Basic IPv6 is not that hard but when it comes to things like iptables you have to take care: Most iptables frontends can only handle IPv4 or do that as default. You have to take care of the IPv6 yourself or activate it.

E.g. Phusion Passenger/nginx installer did not activate the IPv6 module on compile time (not sure if this is still the case)

Also I've disabled all RA/autodiscovery functionality which is probably not a good idea to run/listen to on the server side anyway.

I can recommend a nice directory of IPv6 ready sites: <http://sixy.ch/>

<comment><USER4> looks like rails.io currently has some ipv6 problems:

Fast:~ schmidp$ host rails.io

rails.io has address 188.8.131.52

rails.io has IPv6 address 2a01:4f8:100:9461::49

rails.io mail is handled by 10 mail100.fks.de.moriz.net.

Fast:~ schmidp$ ping6 2a01:4f8:100:9461::49

PING6(56=40+8+8 bytes) 2001:470:1f0b:1751:685d:197d:eaff:7861 --> 2a01:4f8:100:9461::49

Request timeout for icmp_seq=0

Request timeout for icmp_seq=1

Request timeout for icmp_seq=2

^C

\--- 2a01:4f8:100:9461::49 ping6 statistics ---

4 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100.0% packet loss

Fast:~ schmidp$ telnet -6 2a01:4f8:100:9461::49 80

Trying 2a01:4f8:100:9461::49...

^C

Fast:~ schmidp$ ping6 www.heise.de

PING6(56=40+8+8 bytes) 2001:470:1f0b:1751:685d:197d:eaff:7861 --> 2a02:2e0:3fe:100::7

16 bytes from 2a02:2e0:3fe:100::7, icmp_seq=0 hlim=59 time=28.155 ms

16 bytes from 2a02:2e0:3fe:100::7, icmp_seq=1 hlim=59 time=36.392 ms

^C

\--- www.heise.de ping6 statistics ---

2 packets transmitted, 2 packets received, 0.0% packet loss round-trip min/avg/max/std-dev = 28.155/32.273/36.392/4.119 ms

<comment><USER3> this service does not exist anymore. try ping6 ruby-muenchen.de instead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> For me, switching to IPv6 would mean taking a lot of time away from paying work to do something none of our clients have asked for and then dealing with the additional troubleshooting complexity of dual stack.

While I'd like to switch to IPv6 it just doesn't make sense for us to do so at the moment, even with APNICs IPv4 exhaustion issues.

<comment><USER6> Did that this afternoon - setting up a SIXXS subnet on my FritzBox 7390 home router, testing connectivity on the OSX hosts, and setting up AAAA records DNS. More details on en.blog.guylhem.net.

Of course I may have spend another couple of hours this week when I asked the tunnels, but this was first a good opportunity to learn.

I'm hosting my sites on Hurricane Electric, which is a big supporter of IPv6. All my computers have IPv6 support - even my DSL modem. The only missing link was I had not spend any time configuring it.

But tust being able to ssh from HE to my laptop or other device when I will forget it at home (which happens to me time to time), without having to setup port forwarding _will_ save me more time that that. I know how much time I spend on port-forwarding.

Fixing issues once and for good just seems "better" - and even more when I get to learn something new that will become mainstream very soon with IPv4 exhaustion.

<comment><USER5> You seem to be assuming that because you can doing something easily on your home network it would be easy to do it on a production network.

Where was your testing and from all locations used by your corporate clients? Where was the part where you had to predict the impact on end users with incorrectly set up dual stack trying to access the IPv6 site first and get buy in from the people affected? When did you produce the change request documentation and have it approved?

Things that are trivial for home and development environments are not trivial once you have a production site that need to stay up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Another site I found that runs Dual-Stack IPv6-IPV4 without problem is the popular comics - xkcd.com

~$ host xkcd.com

xkcd.com has address 188.8.131.52

xkcd.com has IPv6 address 2001:48c8:1:d:0:23:5482:d026</comment>


Quora programming contest: Solve real problems of Quora and get hired. - <AUTHOR> http://quora.interviewstreet.com

<comment><USER2> Problems aren't cool. Problems are problems, but solving problems is more than cool, it is also financially rewarding. This seems more like bug fixing without any financial incentive and the reward is finishing the job application.

I don't know if this is clever PR or not. Would the average software developer realize that they are working for free?

</comment><comment><USER3> "Solve our problems for us for your chance to win potential compensation for future work."</comment>


Oohs And Aahs: Vowel Sounds Affect Our Perceptions Of Products - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070912130815.htm

<comment><AUTHOR> Related to this topic is the famous kiki / bouba study, where certain word pronunciations are found to naturally sound "sharper" or "rounder."

see <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouba/kiki_effect>

<comment><USER2> You can watch Ramachandran explain this and much more of his research into synaesthesia and the brain in this excellent talk: [<http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4684607596399338611>]

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I thought this was common knowledge? The sounds are similar to other sounds made by sharp, light, heavy, dull, etc. objects based on our universe's physics...

</comment><comment><USER4> Problem with correlation vs. causation -

"The researchers also tested a vowel sound that is generally associated with negative meaning (e.g., the "yoo" sound in the word "putrid")"

That company in Mountain View had a tough time overcoming their negative sounding name.

Sorry, your brand is what you make it.</comment>


Facebook acquires Instagram - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10100318398827991 <comment><USER3> This is very reminiscent of Google/YouTube circa 2006. When Google bought YT it was a small team of people and a pretty nascent product that people really loved, and the usage numbers were out of control. They left the product mostly untouched and let it grow on its own. Though there was major criticism at the time, it is one of the best tech acquisitions of the past decade.

<comment><USER4> YouTube is a content paradise though. There's tons of value there and you can sell ads against it or even charge for premium services.

Where's the money in Instagram? The content is practically worthless and their only real value is in their userbase. Even though I use the Instagram client, most of the time I see photos, they come through Twitter. So that also reinforces for me that any value is in the users and not the actual content, which is mostly crap.

I'm more convinced that we're in a 2nd bubble now more than ever.

<comment><USER5> "Where's the money in Instagram?"

Preventing Instagram from developing into something that has a negative effect on Facebook. It's a "keep your enemies closer" move.

<comment><USER6> and keeping Instagram away from Google. it's a good move.

<comment><USER7> But back to the original proposition, is this indicative of a bubble when you drop 1 Billion, or >1% of your estimated market cap on a preventive/defensive measure?

<comment><USER8> you ever play chess? A pawn is 2.6% of your game's value.

<comment><USER9> I daresay that's true, but not exactly relevant. I've also played blackjack, roulette, rock/paper/scissors, and I'm not sure if logic and tactics that work in games are always valid business plans...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> So, I found something very interesting in Mark Zuckerberg's post about acquiring Instagram:

> we're committed to building and growing Instagram independently. Millions of > people around the world love the Instagram app and the brand associated with > it, and our goal is to help spread this app and brand to even more people.

Facebook has always integrated whatever it purchased (that I know of) very tightly into the core product, or just done an acqui-hire. Instead, they've taken what is arguably the best way to share photos and decided to keep it as a product that exists on its own.

This is a major strategy change for Facebook and speaks to something I have suspected for some time - they now understand that in order to continue spurring growth, they cannot just acquire and roll in every product. As the ecosystem starts to hit a long-term maturity cycle, other products that fulfill particular functions better will be key to maintaining dominance over the market as a whole.

Let's face it: G+ cannot topple Facebook (though it probably wasn't intended to anyway), Twitter is fairly specialized and Pinterest has come up with a new way to share that fits neatly with the other two. Instagram makes immense logic as a purchase for Facebook as they'll control one of the most important ways people share photos outside their product, neatly roping everyone that uses it right into the FB circle without feeling forced to do so.

<comment><USER11> They _sort of_ did it with Beluga- it became "Facebook Messenger" but was never integrated into the main app. At the time I was confused as to why they'd do that, but if you think of it as a replacement for the stock "Messages" app, and Instagram for "Camera" then it all starts to come together.

<comment><USER10> Good point - though they did eliminate the brand with Beluga, and they probably won't with Instagram. That could change though.

Besides messaging and photos, I'm thinking that few things are left as halo products around Facebook. There's no reason for a "games" app - to me, at least - but there might be logic in acquiring something like Turntable.fm for music.

<comment><USER12> I like this thread of reasoning. Also ties into the whole "Facebook" phone. If they were to build one, it's possible it would be android based so maybe that's why they were just waiting for the android app. I was thinking Spotify for the music given all the ties to FB, but may be too big now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> According to WSJ price is $1B

 _source:[http://allthingsd.com/20120409/breaking-facebook-to- acquire-...](http://allthingsd.com/20120409/breaking-facebook-to-acquire- instagram-for-1-billion/*)

Edit: Direct Source: [http://newsroom.fb.com/Announcements/Facebook-to- Acquire-Ins...](http://newsroom.fb.com/Announcements/Facebook-to-Acquire- Instagram-141.aspx)

_The total consideration for San Francisco-based Instagram is approximately $1 billion in a combination of cash and shares of Facebook. The transaction, which is subject to customary closing conditions, is expected to close later this quarter. _

<comment><USER14> Quite a jump from the $500 million valuation they were shooting for last week[1].

[1][http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/08/no-filter-required- instagra...](http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/08/no-filter-required-instagram- reportedly-raising-40m-at-500m-valuation/)

<comment><USER15> I think the mere fact that they just raised $50M @ $500M valuation is the reason that this price is so high.

Those investors in that round had to at least double their money...if the price was indeed $1B, that's all they did. Just 2X. Although, the argument can be made that a 2X return in 1 - 2 months isn't bad...but then again, VC funds don't have a 2 month life, so over the long-term value (i.e. 10 years most- times) of that fund I am not sure how beneficial that is.

Although, I guess they can't be too pissed because it must feel good to be able to at least return something to their LPs in such a short time frame.

<comment><USER16> 100% return in 3 months (it won't close to the end of the quarter) is an annualized 400% return. If you're a VC you took $50M out of a fund put back $100M, now you can make 2 bets at $50M when before you only had one. I don't see any way that this isn't a great deal for the VCs.

That being said, this wasn't part of the S-1 and Facebook really has to tell potential investors how this will affect the financials, so presumably there is a revised prospectus or perhaps S-1 in the works.

<comment><USER17> Like everyone else already said, VCs can't reinvest so they dont really want 2x returns.

Anyways, there's a excellent blog post that explains this very clearly. It is written for founders to understand the VC's perspective when investing. Does anyone know what I"m talking about?

<comment><USER18> [http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2010/08/vc-insanity- economics...](http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2010/08/vc-insanity-economics/)

<comment><USER19> Great article! Also related: Brad Feld's book "Venture Deals" goes into detail on a lot of what Dan Shapiro mentions in this article.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Some of you might find this useful:

<https://instagram.com/accounts/remove/request/>

<comment><USER21> When I read the headline I thought two things: a) Wow, the Instagram guys deserve it, congrats to them. b) I need to delete my account.

The second point is because I have been actively trying to avoid giving fb more data than absolutely necessary. No ill will towards Instagram.

<comment><USER22> Same reaction here. Pretty sad to delete it, actually. The other day I was using Instagram as an example of a social app with a friend list that WASN'T Facebook. _sigh_

Edit: spelling.

<comment><USER23> Funny, I had a similar reaction. I was really late to the Instagram party but the biggest thing I liked about it was that it was an alternative way to keep a circle of friends. For whatever reason, I quickly re-connected with some quality people that I had lost track of over the years, but was happy to find on Instagram. Fittingly, a bunch of us had actually taken photo classes together over a decade ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Anyone got some bad news about their startup that they need to release? Get that press release out, stat.

</comment><comment><USER15> Some quick back-of-the-envelope math for how much the co-founders walked away with.

Assuming the first round of $500K was @ $2.5M valuation, giving those investors 20%. So the founders are left with 80%.

Further assume the 2nd round of $7M @ $20M valuation, giving those investors 35%. So the founders are left with 45%.

Further assume the 3rd round of $40M @ $500M valuation, giving those investors 8%. So the founders are left with 37%.

Also assume that the employee stock options pool is worth 10% of equity. Founders left with 27%.

There are two founders, according to Crunchbase [1], so assuming a 50% split for each founder, each founder has 13.5%.

At $1B, each founder walks away with a cool $135M in cash + Facebook stock (which is likely to appreciate significantly in a few months) - which is likely another reason they chose to go with FB as opposed to Google.

Not bad for 2 years worth of work.

[1] - <http://www.crunchbase.com/company/instagram>

<comment><USER24> I'm not sure that your numbers account for share dilution. Let's assume the employee stock pool is 10% before any funding is raised so the founders start with 90% and the employees 10%. Assuming your numbers above are correct, the founders are left with 72% after the first round of investment (500k at 2.5m = 20%) and the employees are left with 8% (think 72 + 8 + 20 = 100). The second round of investment takes 35% of the company, leaving the founders with 46.8%, employees with 5.2%, first investors with 13% and the new investors with 35% (46.8 + 5.2 + 13 + 35 = 100). The third round of investment takes 8% of the company leaving the founders with 43.056%, the employees with 4.784%, the first investors with 11.96%, the second investors with 32.2 and the new investors with 8% (43.056 + 4.784 + 11.96 + 32.2 = 100).

If my math is correct, the founders may have ended up with more like $430,560,000 between them ($215,280,000 each assuming 50/50).

<comment><USER15> You may be correct.

I was just doing some rough calculations to show an approximate 'low-figure' of their take.

It is very possible and likely that they took away much more (because all of the variables could have changed).

For instance, that first $500K round could have been convertible debt which would have converted in the $20M round. If that's the case, then those investors ended up with 2.5% instead of 20%. That drastically changes the math and gives the founders more equity and a better outcome.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This seems ominous for Google, which spent $12.5bn for Motorola to stake a shaky claim in mobile and lord knows how much on G+; after this, what's left for them to do to stake a claim on social mobile? Buy Twitter? What else do people do socially with their phones?

Totally possible for Google to sink tens of billions into mobile and still wind up on the bottom of the value chain, commoditized along one axis by Facebook and utterly outmarketed by Apple (with its extraordinary profit margins and increasing domination of supply chains) on another.

Or maybe GOOG/Twitter is in the air, and Facebook is reacting defensively?

<comment><USER11> _This seems ominous for Google, which spent $12.5bn for Motorola to stake a shaky claim in mobile_

I was under the impression that Google paid that price (and, indeed, bought Motorola at all) for patents.

Google is doing just fine out of Android. iOS may be better marketed, but there are a hell of a lot more Android phones out there.

<comment><USER25> The game is scored in profit. Revenue and market share matters only as a means to the end of securing profits. Android has a huge market share (and, dearly bought), but even 1st & Goal doesn't matter unless you actually score.

I don't keep super close track, so maybe Apple's commanding profit share lead is eroding sharply. Last I checked, "commanding" was indeed the word for it.

Again, all I'm saying is that you can spend a lot of money for a huge footprint in the market and still find yourself at the bottom of the value chain: you can be the guys facilitating a lot of commerce for other people without taking a significant cut.

If you don't believe Google cares about that, why are they wasting their time with G+? Facebook isn't going to be a search engine. Nobody believes that. The worry is that Facebook is going to commoditize search by moving the profits it generates somewhere else.

<comment><USER26> The game is scored in total value of the ecosystem. Apple captures a higher % of iOS ecosystem value because it's the only device manufacturer. Google captures a lower % of a larger ecosystem, leaving value on the table for OEM partners. The latter is a stronger long term strategy.

<comment><USER25> No, the game is not scored in "total value of the ecosystem". The total value of the ecosystem is only relevant if you control the whole ecosystem. Google is making _far_ less profit on mobile than Apple is. If its strategy of growing the ecosystem out and skimming less profit from it is a good one, we should see it in their bottom line. We aren't, nor do we seem to be trending that way.

Maybe someday soon Google's strategy of letting a thousand Android devices bloom will pay off. But that is still a "maybe". Apple has tens of billions of "definitely's" to counter that maybe.

Meanwhile: I think people are getting hung up on this whole Apple vs. Google point, and getting away from my real point, which is that:

(i) Google's bids for a stake in mobile have been _hugely expensive_ and _not particularly profitable_ ,

(ii) Apple's bids for a stake in mobile have been _hugely expensive_ and _hugely profitable_ , and

(iii) Facebook's bids for a stake in mobile have been expensive but orders of magnitude cheaper than Google's or Apples, and could end up hugely profitable in the long term.

Facebook will end up looking pretty smart if that's what happens. They didn't even have to buy a cell phone manufacturer or write their own OS!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> How many photo-related startups has Facebook acquired now?

And what do they gain from Instagram?

A user base? Most of them are probably already on Facebook?

Technology for handling photos? Doesn't Facebook already do this as well as anyone else?

Design and UI talent for mobile apps? Don't they already have Mike Matas?

<comment><USER28> Most of Instagram's "technology for handing photos" uses S3, as described in previous Instagram tech blog posts. Instagram however has a massive big data structure which would lead to any big company getting high value out of them. Why use the tools they open sourced last week to improve your reliability if you can just acquire the entire team?

<comment><USER11> I'm pretty sure that Facebook has "handling a lot of photos" sorted:

[http://gizmodo.com/5841667/facebook-photo-library-dwarfs- eve...](http://gizmodo.com/5841667/facebook-photo-library-dwarfs-everything- else-in-the-planet)

<comment><USER29> the thing is that they don't have it sorted. Trying to do any sort of photo management(move, delete, edit) in Facebook is a pain and I always receive database errors thrown back at me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I had been wondering how a product like Instagram would ever make money. Now we'll never find out. I guess traction really does trump all other business metrics.

<comment><USER31> It's beginning to remind me of the late 90's where the only thing that mattered was number of "eyeballs" on your site, sound business plans/profits be damned.

<comment><USER32> The difference being that the burn rate of these companies is minuscule compared to what was going on the late 90s. They built a 30 million user social network with 5 engineers. This changes the dynamic tremendously.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Now before you all wonder about that valuation and technology, consider that Zuckerberg is actually buying the users and their data.

Anyone recall this back in the day? Yahoo! buying BCST.com <http://money.cnn.com/1999/04/01/deals/yahoo/>

</comment><comment><USER34> Does anyone else think this valuation is insane? It's like $300/registered user. The company doesn't have a business model. No way the handful of employees are worth $1B. My mind is blown.

<comment><USER35> More like $30/user, I should note. They have 30 million on iOS and some number > 1 million on android.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I believe this is a bit of a pony show. Facebook will have its IPO soon with an expected valuation of $100billion. A move by Facebook to buy Instagram for $1 billion works in Facebook's favor by positioning public opinion in the following ways:

1\. If Facebook has $1 billion to spend then they must be making a lot of money.

2\. If Instagram is worth $1billion then surely Facebook is worth $100 billion.

</comment><comment><USER37> $1 billion for a 13-person team? Is this the highest per-employee price tag?

<comment><USER38> I thought that was the real story here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> According to Crunchbase and Techcrunch, they raised $40M just a month ago at a $500M valuation. Something doesn't add up here. A billion dollar deal like this had to take more than a couple of weeks to close...

[http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/08/no-filter-required- instagra...](http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/08/no-filter-required-instagram- reportedly-raising-40m-at-500m-valuation/)

<comment><USER40> Is it against some regulation to do negotiations concurrently?

<comment><USER41> No. Some deals will include "no-shop" and other similar clauses to prevent this sort of thing, but it's definitely not a requirement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> I wonder if Facebook will force their sense of decorum onto Instagram. For example, there are people using Instagram to create interesting nude photography, which is something that is not allowed on Facebook (unless I am mistaken).

In any case, I bet you can expect them to force everyone to use Facebook for logging in. Yahoo eventually forced us Flickr users to get Yahoo accounts in order to log in.

<comment><USER43> According to their press release, Instagram will continue to work independently and use alternative networks. Until they prove otherwise with their actions, all anyone can do is speculate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> I think there's a great lesson here: It takes only 2 years and 13 people to overtake one of Facebook core features. And that's talking about a company that suppose to have the best programmers and designers in the world. That's something you should remember next time someone's tells you that Facebook/Google/Microsoft will do it better.

</comment><comment><USER45> Ask yourself not whether Instagram is worth $1 billion but whether Instagram is as valuable as 1% of Facebook. Sounds about right to me.

</comment><comment><USER46> I have to say: it's nice to see an acquisition where the product is valued enough to not be summarily taken out back and shot. I'm curious how it fits into Facebook's product strategy though. It doesn't seem to be their style to keep a brand around that doesn't help their main brand somehow.

<comment><USER47> wait - you think this is actually true?

<comment><USER48> Is your question about the acquisition itself or that service will be continued?

<comment><USER47> "the product is valued enough to not be summarily taken out back and shot"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> It's a little too late for April Fool's isn't it?

It seems strange that they're deciding to keep the Instagram social network up as its own independent social network, that leads me to think that their acquisition was really for their big data talent and not just to squash a smaller social network. I wish Mike Krieger's tech talk was more than two days away now, so we could hear about how they're going to merge with Facebook's big data issues too.

<comment><USER49> I can't believe this either...

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> I'm not very clear on the main driving factor of this acquisition: is it a talent grab, a technology acquisition or did they acquire Instagram mainly for the customer base.

FB really wanted Instagram. They've been in talks since August 2011: [http://thenextweb.com/insider/2011/08/24/facebook-couldnt- ac...](http://thenextweb.com/insider/2011/08/24/facebook-couldnt-acquire- instagram-so-its-making-its-own-filters/)

<comment><USER25> I feel like I can safely declare that there is no such thing as a one billion dollar talent acquisition.

<comment><USER51> Perhaps they found Instagram threatening. I'm betting they kill it now that they own it.

<comment><USER25> So you're betting that they just straight-up lied in their press release.

<comment><USER51> Correct - I don't believe them. I think they will merge the products to some degree and then let what's left of Instagram rot.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> The price tag certainly is consistent with a 100B price tag on Facebook. I'm going to assume this merely keeps the bubble going until the IPO. In finance land there are rumors of difficulty finding people to buy into the IPO and this should theoretically instill confidence

</comment><comment><USER53> Instagram is such a great experience for a number of reasons, but one of them is the separate network it provides from Facebook. Maybe I'm in the minority, but my Facebook network is substantially different from my Instagram network. /:

I hope Facebook is careful with this one…

</comment><comment><USER48> Congratulations to the Instagram team.

With all the news of talent acquisition and subsequent shutdown news, my first reaction was "oh god! yet another shutdown!".

Thankfully there are some very good statements in the announcement. "...we're committed to building and growing Instagram independently. "

Hope this is true especially for the sake of all the startups that are betting on Instagram and building associated products on top.

</comment><comment><USER54> Can someone explain how this isn't insider trading?

Day before deal: \- Instagram closed a $50 million Series B round from Sequoia, Josh Kushner's Thrive Capital, Greylock and Benchmark at a $500 million valuation.

Day of deal: \- Company gets purchased for 1 billion. \- All investors instantly double investment.

<comment><USER55> It's not insider trading, since the stock is not traded on a public market : There's no presumption that all the facts are out in the open. As long as there's no misrepresentation, it's all 'just business'.

How about : "Let me invest right now, so that I won't vote against the FB offer you've got on the table".

Or "If you let me invest now, I can make a recommendation to the FB board that they acquire you".

<comment><USER54> Thank you :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Congrats to Instagram, Django-powered projects making it big.

<comment><USER57> PHP projects buying them

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> You know, I used to be pretty lax (careless, even) about geotagging all my Instagram photos.

Now, should I continue to use Instagram at all, I'm definitely not going to share my location.

<comment><USER59> Just curious, but why the change of heart?

<comment><USER60> Facebook will add all the locations to their giant, evil database.

<comment><USER61> Instagram would have too when they needed to make some money.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> Given that a majority of the Instagram users (~30M) are on iOS, what if Apple decides to give away iPhoto for free? Or better yet, make it the default photo app on iOS?

iPhoto is not half bad. <http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iphoto/id497786065?mt=8>

Even if it's made the default photo sharing app in the _next_ release for iOS 5+ users for whatever reason, and integrated deeper come iOS 6 this summer, they'd instantly have access to several times Instagram's userbase.

They could using this as a bargaining chip in their negotiations to integrate FB into iOS / iTunes. Because Facebook, a public company, cannot have a $1B acquisition become irrelevant in a couple of months.

</comment><comment><USER63> Oh man. I could have made a billion dollars by making stuff like this. Instead I am building a long term value company like Apple. Steve Jobs may have been proud. :)

</comment><comment><USER64> Congrats to Instagram! Can't say I am not bit disappointed though with all the startups getting gobbled up by much larger companies. What's next? Pinterest?

<comment><USER43> Not saying I'd like to see it happen, but Pintrest would fit in well with Google+, moreso than Facebook. Google+ really does the sharing+comments thing well.

It's hard to know where to root. Independent start-ups give great competition to the big players, but I know a lot of people go into an MVP with the goal of making a large exit. It's a great way to get funding for your next startup.

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> The best argument I've seen for justifying this is as a way for Facebook to neutralize one potential medium-term strategic threat. That said, they still probably overpaid. Who knows how much of an element of behind-the-scenes investor favors-calling-in-favors went on as well. The whole indirect "Let's get into Facebook, pre-IPO" angle, which also sounds plausible.

</comment><comment><USER66> No, Zuck. I meant the app...

</comment><comment><USER67> After only one week using Instagram for Android it was already my favorite network. Congrats for the Instagram team, but I cant deny that I just lost much of my sympathy for the network, since I can´t stand the way that Facebook handles privacy anymore.

</comment><comment><USER68> While a bit harsh considering Instagram's success, I completely agree with this quote from Steve Jobs on startups:

<http://instagr.am/p/JNVJIwBElP/>

<comment><USER69> So Steve Jobs hated entrepeneurs who who were just looking for someone to buy they startup. Following that line of reasoning, he most have loved it when Dropbox refused to sell to Apple.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> One good thing about being bought by bigger player is that it creates a void for other smaller innovative startups. Instagram is easier to compete against now than when it was independent.

</comment><comment><USER71> Will this mean that they'll finally get a real website? I'd love to be able to browse my friends' photos. It seemed to me that the complete lack of functionality on the single photo page (not even a link to your home page?!) seemed like a big middle finger to non-mobile users. Anytime I clicked through from facebook and twitter, the fact that I couldn't get anywhere from there was enough of a turn-off to make me avoid getting the iOS app.

Or maybe it'll be folded into the horrible UI mess that is FB and go away....

</comment><comment><USER72> Looks like Gary Vaynerchuk's was right:

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKiIjhyptVA&feature=youtu...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKiIjhyptVA&feature=youtu.be)

</comment><comment><USER73> I think it's cool and bold that he's sharing specific features of Instagram that they plan to preserve. It's bold because it increases the PR cost of changing those plans.

<comment><USER74> _"we're committed to building and growing Instagram independently. Millions of people around the world love the Instagram app and the brand associated with it, and our goal is to help spread this app and brand to even more people"_

<comment><USER75> Haven't you heard, that's the cool thing for startup founders to say while trying their best to get acquired behind closed doors.

It used to be a better world when they just tried their best to get acquired _without_ making public claims to the contrary.

<comment><USER76> But that's the words of Zuckerberg, not the Instagram founders.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is an interesting take:

[http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-why- face...](http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-why-facebook- bought-instagram20120409,0,7157117.story)

Which basically has Facebook buying them because of the social traction. Suggesting that perhaps they did not want this to be part of Google+ which has a lot of pictures but not the same as Instagram does with the social connection.

</comment><comment><USER77> This situation reminds me of when Facebook was worried about Twitter: most of the worry ended up being unfounded. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that Facebook was eyeing Instagram, as Facebook's photo viewing UI is now fairly similar to Instagram's. But I wonder if the worry about Instagram merited the $1B exit. Either way, given how small the Instagram team is, they must feel mighty satisfied right now.

</comment><comment><USER78> Why did Facebook buy Instagram if they aren't going to require FB integration and allow you to post to other networks? Is it purely about traffic now?

</comment><comment><USER30> This price makes plenty of sense if you think of as "instagram was bought for x% of facebook". I don't know facebook's current valuation, but I could be convinced that instagram is worth something between 2-10% of it (500M users vs 30M users, all sharing pictures daily). The reason for the billion dollar number has nothing to do with instagram, and everything to do with facebook.

</comment><comment><USER79> You know what I'm afraid of? Facebook doing to Instagram what they did to Beluga. At work, we used Beluga to communicate about work related stuff. Facebook bought it, shut it down and turned it into Facebook Messenger. Goes without saying but we didn't move our conversations/groups over to Facebook Messenger. I really hope Instagram doesn't get treated the same way. That's all.

</comment><comment><USER80> Zuck's announcement seems really thoughtful and authentic. He hit on a bunch of things people would be worried about -- whether things would automatically post, whether you can maintain a separate follower list from your FB list. He showed respect and humility towards Instagram's follower model, and interest in bringing it into other products. I'm impressed.

</comment><comment><USER81> It's for the users, to prevent a competitor from 'owning' them - <USER2> could block the API, otherwise all of their competitors can still gain access to them. If Facebook does start to screw around with the API then they're destroying value to the consumer.

It's really too bad Instagram sold so soon. I hope they took mostly money.

<comment><USER73> The API already only gives access to 612x612 images with limited metadata. All Facebook has to do is keep them from improving the API.

</comment></comment><comment><USER82> This is a smart move by Facebook. I'm almost surprised to see them acknowledge in the initial announcement that they'll retain the ability for Instagram to interact with other social networks, although I'll be interested to see how thoroughly those features are supported as Facebook takes the reigns.

</comment><comment> A-K It's nice to see that Zuckerberg's letter actually addresses some key concerns about Instagram's future--a courtesy I haven't seen offered by many recent "acqhirers". However, to echo several other comments, it'll be interesting to see to what degree the stated intentions are actually upheld.

</comment><comment><USER83> Great, now the biggest question is whether build for growing in users or be profitable from day one, or both.

AFAIK instagram didn't make any cent. Premium filters and and ads would be the first choice, but I heard they decided to focus and grow in people loving their product.

Another big thing to deal with is: to sell or not?

</comment><comment><USER84> Congrats to Instagram. I think the real value that's been overlooked for Instagram is the Instagram community. Instagram has a very strong community around the world (www.instagramers.com has more than 250 chapter groups) and that may be one of the factors Facebook was looking at.

</comment><comment><USER85> Interesting that everyone is focused on Instagram as a company and how they just got $1 billion.

I find it interesting that Mark and Facebook were able to buy a company for $1 billion. Its like the joke chris rock said about being wealthy.

"Shaq is rich, the white man that signs his check is wealthy"

</comment><comment><USER86> I think this shows that FB felt threatened by Instagram because photos are in fact the thin edge of the wedge of social networks. People spend a lot of time on sites viewing photos and FB doesn't like when people are spending time on other networks.

</comment><comment><USER87> Smart move by Facebook. If Google had bought Instagram instead and integrated with G+, things would have gotten interesting. Wouldn't be surprised if there was a bidding war that pushed the price this high. Reminds me of the recent Firefox deal.

</comment><comment><USER88> Dear Facebook: My student loans are for sale at cost. Please contact me for details.

</comment><comment><USER89> I just downloaded Instagram for Android the other day and wondered how to save pictures on my phone with this tool... apparently you can't, so yes, Facebook and them play in the same court: you don't own your things anymore.

<comment><USER90> Every picture you take with Instagram is saved on the phone. Take a picture, optionally apply a filter, hit next, but don't hit Upload. Go to the Gallery app and you'll see an Instagram folder with your filtered photo, and a copy of the original photo in the Camera folder.

<comment><USER89> You are right, I was wrong: didn't see this folder.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER91> According to Wired.com the CEO is taking about $400 of the Billion.

Source: [http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2012/04/facebook-buys- instagr...](http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2012/04/facebook-buys-instagram/)

<comment><USER92> "$400 Million", FTFY.

</comment></comment><comment> mkr-hn What's really interesting to me is that they have a flood of geolocated pictures of places now. And they have a partnership with Microsoft. Photosynth integration on Instagram with all your photos would be amazing.

</comment><comment><USER93> The main reason they were acquired? Not the tech, not the audience (does FB need either?). I guess for the brand + engagement? Someone said as a defense against the big G acquiring them later - sounds plausible?

</comment><comment><USER94> HN is full of haterpraise today. [http://www.davidpcheng.com/post/20808337202/instagram-and- th...](http://www.davidpcheng.com/post/20808337202/instagram-and-the-art-of- haterpraise)

</comment><comment><USER95> Unfortunately you still have to write in to cancel your Instagram account.

<comment><USER96> I just canceled mine five minutes ago with this form:

<https://instagram.com/accounts/remove/request/>

<comment><USER95> Out of curiosity where did you find that link? I must have missed it when I checked the site.

<comment><USER96> The first few hits on a google search for "instagram cancel" indicated you had to write in, but then I found this.

<http://help.instagram.com/customer/portal/articles/95760>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER97> I am not an Instagram user, but after checking it out on my Android though it seems like if FB was playing keep away it was more likely to be trying to keep it out of Twitter's hands.

</comment><comment><USER98> A billion dollars is an interesting sum. Any bets on whether the Instagram founders told Mark Zuckerburg,

 _"A million dollars isn't cool. You know what's cool? A billion dollars."_

That'd be epic.

</comment><comment><USER99> Does anyone have an estimate of Instagram current yearly profit (or loss)? (sorry for the basic question, I do not know much about their service)

</comment><comment><USER100> Instagram has an awesome team and kept stealing eye-balls from facebook. It makes a lot of sense for facebook to get this team AND the product.

</comment><comment><USER101> As long as they keep instagram intact as the service it is now, then awesome.

If Facebook kills my favorite platform, that would make for a really sad day.

</comment><comment><USER102> Anyone else think that the proximity of the announcement of Instagram for Android last week to today's acquisition was not a coincidence?

</comment><comment><USER103> Congrats to the Instagram team. An amazing group of people that really worked lean and delivered what people really needed.

</comment><comment><USER104> A thought experiment : What if Facebook is making their own phone.. And the phone's camera basically is instagram?

</comment><comment><USER86> Those investors who passed on the recent round must be kicking themselves. This one has gotta sting. Ouch!

</comment><comment><USER105> 27 million iOS users + 50 million projected Android users means that this cost them roughly $13/user.

</comment><comment><USER22> 2 things I'm very curious about:

1\. What role did the Android app play? 2\. When did these two start communicating?

</comment><comment><USER106> Somebody was saying that Facebook has issue with mobile - I guess they solved the problem now.

</comment><comment><USER107> $1 billion divided by 30 million users = 33.30 dollars.

I had no idea my account was worth that much.

</comment><comment><USER108> It doesn't say but any wild guess on how much did Facebook pay?

<comment><USER53> $1b according to WSJ

</comment></comment><comment><USER109> Looks like this acquisition was in their business plan.

</comment><comment><USER110> by the way, 1 billion = 1 milliard

I was very confused since only the USA, Canada and the UK use 1 billion = 1 milliard instead of 1 billion = 1k billiard

</comment><comment><USER111> This is the Netscape IPO of the app economy.

</comment><comment><USER112> How many people work at instagram?

<comment><USER113> 12

[http://www.linkedin.com/search/fpsearch?companyId=2289109...](http://www.linkedin.com/search/fpsearch?companyId=2289109&sortCriteria=R&keepFacets=&facet_CC=2289109)

</comment></comment><comment><USER114> Facebook acting really fast nowadays, especially when comes to require good developers.

</comment><comment><USER115> Facebook should buy extragr.am as well the best web UI for instagram

<comment><USER115> Ok downvoters, not asking for a billion dollar valuation, just saying it was a good match with instagram

</comment></comment><comment><USER116> That's an awful lot of money for a business that had no revenue and had no business model of any kind.

[http://windonaleaf.net/post/20464525754/instagram-perform- ad...](http://windonaleaf.net/post/20464525754/instagram-perform-ads)

<comment><USER117> I agree...but the point was not about the revenues, the point was about making sure that when you think about photos - to share or to browse(which is the most used app on Facebook), you think about Facebook. The risk of being displaced by Instagram on that crucial activity was too high for Facebook.

<comment><USER118> So Facebook is like giant a rail company in the late 1800s.

<comment><USER117> Well... 1B is an amazing amount of money, but it is "just" 1% of Facebook post IPO value. What are the odds that Instagram growing more and more, the market freaks out, and Facebook stock loses 3-4% in a few weeks. Facebook buying Instagram is an insurance against this bumpy ride happening, and at a price much less that what it would be on the stock once Facebook becomes public.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER119> Call me paranoid but for them to spend $1 billion on this silly thing tells me they think there are big profits to be made with facial recognition data.

</comment><comment><USER120> "Sell to Goole" era is ending. "Sell to Facebook" era is beginning.

<comment><USER121> google~~

</comment></comment><comment><USER122> Best quiet period PR stunt ever.

<comment><USER123> Reminds me of when Google launched the official Google Blog during quiet period, then proceeded to post recipes for chicken on there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER124> $1 billion for something literally no one uses.

Web bubble 2.0 can't burst soon enough.

<comment><USER125> I don't think you know the definition of "literally".

</comment></comment><comment><USER126> Can anyone hear the flush sound?

<comment><USER127> Upvotes for you, sir!</comment></comment>


Silicon Valley Reconsiders the iPhone Era It Created - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/silicon-valley-reconsiders-the-iphone-era-it-created-1515493801 <comment><USER2> The iPhone is a closen-circle</comment>