The EPA Is Hiding Proof That a Widely Used Chemical Causes Leukemia - <AUTHOR> http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/07/the-epa-is-hiding-proof-that-formaldehyde-causes-leukemia.html <comment><USER2> That's my main complaint about the current administration and a lot of Republicans. I am afraid that their attitude about environmental regulation will cause a lot of damage for a long time and erase progress made over decades. I live close to LA and when you talk to people who lived there in the 70s and 80s and compare it to now there is no way to to view what the EPA and other agencies did as anything other than a huge success for the quality of life in this country.

I find it infuriating how the leadership of the EPA is suddenly only lobbyists and scientists get treated with distrust and disrespect.

<comment><USER3> While the EPA certainly has done a lot of great things, they've also been a vector for NIMBYism. Not every cut back of the EPA should be seen as an attempt to return the 60s.

<comment><USER2> Then let's address that specific complaint and not just stuff leadership with industry lobbyists.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Formaldehyde

> "It's my understanding," the Massachusetts senator said, "that the EPA has > finalized its conclusion that formaldehyde causes leukemia and other cancers > and that [the] completed new assessment is ready to be released for public > review, but is being held up."

<comment><USER5> Thanks for saving a click. Should be replaced in submission title.

<comment><AUTHOR> The reason why its being held up is the important part.

<comment><USER6> The reason is interesting indeed. Replacing "formaldehyde" by "a widely used chemical" is not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Good articles summarizing relationship between formaldehyde and cancer: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3893912/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3893912/) (nasopharyngeal) and [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2839060/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2839060/) (leukemia)

<comment><USER8> Also, from the EU:

* SCOEL/REC/125 Formaldehyde Recommendation from the Scientific Committee on Occupational Exposure Limits [https://circabc.europa.eu/sd/a/2882e9bc-d52e-4944-ac08-974b4...](https://circabc.europa.eu/sd/a/2882e9bc-d52e-4944-ac08-974b43957ed2/REC-125%20Formaldehyde.pdf) (It's carcinogenic; recommends 0.3ppm or less) * Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety SCCS OPINION ON the safety of the use of formaldehyde in nail hardeners [https://ec.europa.eu/health/scientific_committees/consumer_s...](https://ec.europa.eu/health/scientific_committees/consumer_safety/docs/sccs_o_164.pdf) (Minimal risk if non-occupational, but "in order to reduce inhalation exposure to formaldehyde, the room should be ventilated when applying nail hardeners.")

And: * Do IKEA cabinets have formaldehyde? [http://www.ikaninstallations.com/2015/09/22/do-ikea- cabinets...](http://www.ikaninstallations.com/2015/09/22/do-ikea-cabinets- have-formaldehyde/) (Answer: Not in the paint or lacquer, and each individual product meets California's standard of 0.05ppm - given the 0.3ppm recommendation above, I'd recommend ventilation if you've a ton of IKEA products, but even so the cancer risk seems minimized...)

Also a quote from the parent's link on leukaemia association: "As a naturally occurring metabolite in many living things, formaldehyde is also found at high background levels in many types of food, such as shiitake mushrooms and many types of seafood. There have also been instances of formaldehyde found in fruits, vermicelli noodles, and even beer [Tang et al., 2009]. Thus formaldehyde exposure via food consumption is also a possibility."

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Isn't it widely known that formaldehyde is a known carcinogen?

The article mentions it's use in wooden furniture. I believe formaldehyde is used as a glue. So what's the danger? I'd assume it's like leaded paint where it's harmless so long as it's not flaking off.

<comment><USER10> Unlike lead in paint, the formaldehyde in things like furniture is emitted as a gas.

<comment><USER9> Only initially. I thought off gassing drastically reduces over time.

Most of the time you wear a mask when dealing with high VOC chemicals.

<comment><USER10> Per [https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/formaldehyde/home/index.html](https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/formaldehyde/home/index.html), "Most formaldehyde is released by 2 years". I'd suspect most furniture makes it into your house in shorter than that timeframe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Aldehydes are bad, and this is known. They crosslink proteins spontaneously. Aggregating proteins is a major facet of aging.

Alcohol is broken town to acetylaldehyde, and this cross-links proteins in the liver and causes cirrhosis, and hopefully not... Liver cancer.

</comment><comment><USER12> So the US is accused of hiding it, but what does every other country on the planet think?

<comment><USER13> It's regulated in Australia because of the cancer [https://www.nicnas.gov.au/chemical- information/factsheets/ch...](https://www.nicnas.gov.au/chemical- information/factsheets/chemical-name/formaldehyde-in-pressed-wood-products)

<comment><USER14> I've always heard and read it is a carcinogen. For example there was big deal about a flooring retailer importing wood floors with formaldehyde residue from China. By regulated, is it banned in Australia? Or does it just mean restricted uses? Also is there any mention in Australia that it causes Leukemia?

<comment><USER8> The same link says it's not banned entirely, but limited to the same limit the EU recommends in occupational settings (0.3ppm):

>The current national occupational exposure standard for formaldehyde is 1 ppm 8-hour time weighted average (TWA) and 2 ppm short-term exposure limit (STEL).

>The NICNAS report recommends that the occupational exposure standard be lowered to 0.3 ppm TWA and 0.6 STEL based on irritation of the eyes and nose.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Britain adopts 2050 net zero emissions target - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2019-06-britain-net-emissions.html <comment><USER2> An interesting little "gotcha" to this (unless I'm mistaken, please correct if so) is that imported energy is not taken into account. The UK recently ran 2 weeks "without using coal" [1], but this completely ignored any imported energy _which did_ [2].

So, this is great - provided we don't simply pass the buck (like by sending all of our plastics to Asia).

Edit: Provide citations [1] [https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48473259](https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48473259) [2] [https://www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/britain-coal-record- mb10...](https://www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/britain-coal-record-mb1079/) (11.8% imported)

<comment><USER3> At 2.15pm today, the UK was importing ~11% via it's euro interconnects (biggest 3.8% from the Netherlands). It of course varies depending on demand and weather, and sometimes we export back to the continent.

According to [1], the UK imported ~6% in total in 2018 :

[1] [https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-electricity- generati...](https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-electricity- generation-2018-falls-to-lowest-since-1994)

<comment><USER2> Awesome - thanks for the link

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The problem with such long-term plans is of course that none of the politicians who decided this today will be around in 2050.

The most relevant question is: What are they going to do in the next 1-2 years to make the first steps? That's far more relevant than any long-term goal.

<comment><USER5> 2050 is not long term. To reach that goal in time lot of things have to be planned and started right now.

<comment><USER6> It's long term when it comes to the service life of a politician. How many currently-serving politicians will still be around in 30 years to take the blame if we miss the targets?

<comment><USER5> That's irrelevant and comparing apples and oranges.

30 years is not a long time for such a comprehensive change and it is sensible and needed to have plans and objectives over such timescale.

I don't understand the point of trying to create an argument on this. It's quite obvious that this comes along with actions over 1, 2 years and beyond from now. And we see that happening every day.

If people think that the goal is achievable within 5 years they do not live in the real world.

<comment><USER7> Why isn't it a long time? 30 years ago the internet didnt exist, we've gone from making 100 million tonnes of plastic to 400 million tonnes (and 30 years before that, we were making almost 0 plastic). The entire US highway system took 60 years. We've made it to Mars in less than 10 years. After WWII, vast amounts of Western Europe were rebuilt in a decade. The entirety of the UKs coal mining industry was decimated in 5 years.

30 years is an absolute eternity.

<comment><USER5> Random statistics do not prove a point.

Net zero emissions over the whole of the UK is a very profound change and I am not even sure that the technologies exist today to make it happen sustainably or at all.

I think many people really do not realise how profound and far reaching that is, bearing in mind that the aim is not to destroy the country's fabric and economy in the process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> 2050 is too late. Make it 2025 at the most otherwise no one in power now will have to deal with it, and it's right now that we need to start making big changes.

<comment><USER9> But then they would have to deal with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I don't know what is going on in the UK:

* On the one hand, supposedly one of the best users of clean energy ([https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-48711649](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-48711649)). Side question: where does it all come from? The UK doesn't have a lot of sunshine, nor do I see a lot of wind farms compared to other EU countries. Maybe north and around the coast? Wind seems likely given all the news about record wind output when speeds pick up. Wikipedia's number for zero-carbon production seem quite different than BBC's though.

* Government makes a vague declaration for the distant future, but Chancellor says we can't afford to do it.

* UK criticized for coal subsidies and lack of transparency ([https://www.newscientist.com/article/2130231-uk-government-s...](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2130231-uk-government-subsidises-coal-sector-with-356-million-a-year/))

<comment><USER11> Coal has declined markedly, in good part thanks to the EU (2020/2025?) target to cease coal burning. Drax is now mostly biomass not coal. Biomass that's mostly imported US pellets from mature woodland, so far from as green as it's painted. Still counted in the renewables total though. Drax remains the UK's largest single emitter.

Something like 20% of UK energy is now wind, mainly offshore. There's about 20GW capacity, with 5GW more planned or being built. Many of those are Danish owned or E.On. This is happening _despite_ the government not because of. They've effectively made onshore wind impossible now, hence all the offshore.

Solar is about 5% of the total. Nuclear about 20%.

We already had a 2008 Act committing to 80% reduction by 2050, all Theresa has done is add the rest.

<comment><USER10> Biomass is actually listed as a separate category (at least on the BBC report I linked).

Coal progress looks great but feels contradictory with the New Scientist link. Not a lot of people talking about the large gas dependency...

<comment><USER11> Gas is the big elephant in the room as it's about 40% of the total, and a chunk of coal was replaced by gas thanks to rush to gas some years back. I think about 5 or 10% of gas is landfill recovery - small, but surprisingly noticeable. More than I would have guessed, anyway. The rest is a mix of other sources including hydro, pumped hydro, and the interconnects.

Biomass seems to get included whenever a piece, or Downing Street press release, wants to tout UK generation at over 50% renewable. Separate when it wants to point out that our biomass sources aren't ideal, or the real breakdown of progress. :)

This is a rather nice page that shows the decline of coal in recent years, how long since last used, with real time updates: [https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng- interactive/2019/...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng- interactive/2019/may/25/the-power-switch-tracking-britains-record-coal-free- run)

Drax capacity is 2/3 biomass, 1/3 coal, but coal now seems to be used as generation of last resort to meet demand when other sources can't. Not sure how or why the subsidies are paid. Maybe some is to keep plants run ready but idle - but that's a complete guess, I wouldn't be at all surprised to find it's just free money for no good reason. I do know Drax got a subsidy to convert that last third to biomass when the total coal phase out comes...

It's all rather embarrassing for the UK. There is _clear_ creative accounting. Progress since the coalition in 2010 has been more via (reluctantly) abiding EU targets and industry building renewables for simple economics than UK policy. The cross-party committees on climate change have been on the ball but that's not policy. Government tries to take full credit for all of course, but in truth is holding progress back.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Doesn't feel ambitious enough, but here's hoping that other countries promptly follow suit.

</comment><comment><USER13> Too little, too late.

</comment><comment><USER14> interestingly ecotricity (green) is cheaper than EDF(nuclear) for my home. [https://www.ecotricity.co.uk/our-green-energy/our-green- elec...](https://www.ecotricity.co.uk/our-green-energy/our-green-electricity)

</comment><comment><USER15> Brits' environmental footprints are less than 3% of the global total—and declining. Three percent is the upper bound of how much the UK can reduce emissions itself. Reducing 90% of UK emissions by 2050 will cost roughly $5 trillion. But this barely makes a dent in the current global emissions trajectory.

Because of diminishing returns, it is very hard to imagine reducing UK emissions to zero. This would mean replacing every last lightbulb with LEDs powered by zero carbon energy and having everyone fly in electric planes. It is much easier to conceive of an UK scientists or engineers improving technology, say, carbon capture technology so that the diffuse benefits reduce global emissions by >3%.

<comment><USER11> Every nation needs to hit net zero. No ifs. No exceptions. The UK Chancellor's knee-jerk estimate is a quarter of yours. Even that was quickly called ridiculously high by the chair of government's own committee on climate that spent a couple of years drafting the plan.

It's going to be far easier to persuade reluctant nations, perhaps via sanctions, once much of the world is progressing or already there. Hoping for a magical future technological deus ex machina is as convincing as it normally is in novels. CCS has yet to be shown to have any viability at scale, yet may very well be needed _as well_ to achieve net negative.

Fortunately the sensible plan put forward last month is far more than LED light bulbs, which are mostly LED already.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Absolutely no need for this</comment>


The future is frozen - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/lightspeed-venture-partners/the-future-is-frozen-90a8eab4637e <comment><USER2> Isn't the term "superfood" basically a marketing-only term?</comment>


Full Distributed Teams: are they viable? - <AUTHOR> http://www.pixelmonkey.org/2012/05/14/distributed-teams <comment><USER2> IMO Fully Distributed Teams are only viable when the team is fully distributed. When i was working remotely for a startup which had a central office, i commonly found that decisions regarding development were being made which i had little to no knowledge of, despite there being a chat room and task manager which was meant to keep everyone on track.

My guess is that everyone in the office was discussing bits and pieces outside the chat room and neglecting to keep me in the loop, perhaps unknowingly. Later on they decided to have formal weekly meetings, but this didn't really improve the situation.

<comment><USER3> One easy fix - have every remote person call in to an open mic on either someone's computer or, say, an iPad that is set up with video. Then any ad-hoc chat gets captured by all the remote folks. But, it really is continual effort to get people in the chat room. It's up to everyone on the team to constantly remind each other to "take it to chat".

<comment><USER4> Yeah, this has helped us a lot. I am one of a few remote and when I can, I skype into a big screen in the central office. The account there is set to auto answer calls from its list of contacts so I can call in whenever I want. I often leave it open all day on a spare computer.

<comment><USER5> Startups with money to burn could buy one of those remote robots for telepresence :) like the Anybots QB

[http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/industrial- robot...](http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/industrial- robots/051810-anybots-qb-new-telepresence-robot)

or the texai

[http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics- softwar...](http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics- software/052710-how-i-became-a-texai-robot-and-went-partying)

Maybe one day this will become commonplace (when they become an order of magnitude cheaper, I suspect). Meanwhile, Skype is a good idea.

<comment><USER6> "Startups with money to burn"

What is that sorcery you are speaking of? ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There's no mention of Free Software projects.

There are numerous instances, including very large projects with multiple developers (Apache, Linux kernel, Debian project) in which this works quite well, and arguably several in which it doesn't (I suspect some of the desktop fails of GNOME and KDE have a lot to do with an insular psychology emerging among the development communities).

There've even been academic studies of the groups, including those by Biella Coleman (University of Chicago / Columbia), Siobhan O'Mahoney (Stanford/HBS). Steve Weber's _The Success of Open Source_ nails a few of the dynamics pretty well too, though with less focus on actual teams ([http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Success_of_Open_Sour...](http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Success_of_Open_Source.html?id=ELieXMxR1h4C)).

That said: many FS projects are highly modularized, an in particular, kernel development happens in large part by professionals paid to work at a given company on some aspect of kernel development. So the model is very mixed.

My own experience: maturity, individual dedication, group dynamics, and the absence of a "mothership" (and concomitant us-vs-the-world mentalities), as well as a dedicated effort to keep _all_ communications on the group channel (as opposed to meatspace) is critical to success.

</comment><comment><USER8> I've been working in a fully distributed team for nearly four years now as part of the chain of startup 'pivots' I've worked on: DotSpots, gri.pe and chee.rs.

It's a mixed bag. You really lose a lot not having physical interaction with your teammates (except the once or twice a year you happen to fly everyone to the same place). It's a lot easier to get on each other's nerves when you're not face-to-face. Management of people becomes a lot more difficult because of the disconnect of discussion over Skype or chat.

On the other hand, you can handle a lot more stress and workload by not having to worry about the commute and office hours. Sleep is easy to catch up on, even in the busy times. It's a lot easier to do things like taking a walk or grabbing a coffee down the street to clear your head - far less social pressure against taking a needed break than you'd see at the office. It's also a lot easier to thread in events in your life.

Ease of hiring is probably the big benefit with fully distributed teams. You have access to talent all across North America, and if you don't mind the timezone differences you can pick up people anywhere worldwide.

<comment><USER9> I agree with all of these, except the issue is the bigger investment firms want their teams in one location for the core component pieces anyway. Not sure if this is because it makes a company more sellable later on, or to make sure people are actually working, etc.. This is what's taking me the longest time is finding / getting the core team together. Meanwhile I just keep planning and organizing more and more for when I finally have a team - it's all I can do with the only unlimited resource I have - my mind!

<comment><USER8> Yeah, I should have noted that. It's much harder to be "acquirable" if you're all over the place.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> For those of you on distributed tech teams, what tools are you using? Some "core" ones I have seen frequently used are: Yammer, Pivotal, Github, Google Hangout, Skype, and real-time chat of some sort (e.g. Grove.io, CampFire, IRC server). Any others that have worked really well for people? I've been a little curious about wemux (<https://github.com/zolrath/wemux>) as of late.

<comment><USER11> I've worked at Automattic (a distributed company) for more than 5 years. The number one communication tool/method for most teams is IRC. We run our own internal IRC server, that logs everything in every channel. IRC is great for real time chat, when people are around at the same time.

Next most used communication method are internal P2s - <http://p2theme.com/> \- which is great for async communication. With people all over the world it is important to have a good async communication method.

Another reason both IRC and P2 are so important is that they have URLs for history. Anyone in the company can go back and read through the discussion.

The third communication method is Skype/Google Hangout. Many teams will have a regular (weekly is common) voice or video chat, generally less than an hour.

<comment><USER12> Which IRC server and logging do you use?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> i have worked like this more often than not. in my experience it has an amplifying effect: good people get better; trying to manage poor people remotely fails miserably.

i love it. now back to work :o)

<comment><AUTHOR> Perhaps then, it acts as a good filtering mechanism. You're able to figure out if individuals are value add or not quicker.

<comment><USER14> The trouble is that developing most software is a group activity. The result is more than the sum of individual contributions, it is also a function of how well the team works together.

Someone might be a competent developer in their own right, but not a ninjarocksuperstar. Still, if that person can understand three conflicting ninjarocksuperstars' points of view and see how to reconcile them and build a consensus, it might be the most valuable contribution of anyone on the team that day.

One of the problems with managing something like a software project is that it's very hard to measure this effect. If you're in an office where people are interacting regularly, there's usually an easy alternative to measurement: ask everyone who helped them do their job the most lately, and the guy that 75% of your team name is the quiet one who works in the background to keep everything ticking over. If everyone is 100% distributed, that guy might not be contributing at the same level as everyone else, but that's because you're not taking advantage of his skills and your team is weaker for it, which is your mistake and not his.

(I try to be consensus guy regardless of coding skill, but I'm not sure how good I am at it. That's why appreciate when there is someone who really is good at it on the team, even if their personal coding skills are merely average.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I suspect most companies with remote workers don't fall in Choice 2 or 3. I believe most companies fall into a new class which is: employees are co- located, and a minority are remote.

Speaking from experience on both sides of that coin (currently the remote- side). It stinks. Communication incentives are out of wack. Remote people feel isolated and missing out on conversations, whether needed for a project or just missing out on camaraderie. Co-located people feel the distance of the remote people, and they either make conscious inefficient communication choices to include them or continue with the confortable in-person efficient choices.

It's hard work to have a minority of your workforce remote. I believe that if the balance tips the other way, remote communication and coordination gets easier and more streamlined. Even if it's not fully remote or separate co- located teams.

<comment><USER3> My last gig was primarily co-located but a few remote. We found the best way to make it work was to treat everything as if we were remote. We all used chat rooms, IM, etc. - just like we would if remote - even though we were in the same room. Your team can do it, too. It's not that hard but it takes focus and effort.

<comment><USER16> Really, you would type in chat with someone who was next to you? A real conversation is such a great thing, that I would not give that up. Much better is what the other guy in the thread is doing, skyping into a big screen in the room as interim-big-brother. Of course, he can't walk in close to join a converstaion, but unless there is a whiteboard or something out of reach, at least the conversation can still move over to him :)

<comment><USER3> Real conversations are great, but terrible for anyone not in them. What if a co-worker is out sick? At lunch? On vacation? Without studious note-taking any ad hoc conversation is just an untracked change. Not saying they shouldn't occur but if they do, the change (if any) needs to be appropriately communicated to the rest of the group.

I've found that note-taking / decision communication happens so infrequently that it's far better in the long run to just stick to logged forms of communication.

If it's a pair programming team, of course, the documentation is in the code. But if it's something architectural or changing the direction of the product/team, it's gotta be written down.

<comment><USER16> I understand the NEED not to have real conversation, but the idea that you're typing away with someone who is next to you (when you could open your mouth and have this great conversation) is so inhuman to me, I don't think I could ever acquiesce to such a working environment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> First off, I am a big proponent of ROWE. Still, I don't like fully-distributed teams. The human factor is just too big for me. Go work from where-ever you want, come in whenever you want, work whenever you want, that's fine (as long as you get your work done)... I would still love to see your pretty face in person from time to time. I feel (bad word, I know) that distributed teams loose something in personal connection. Maybe it's just my own personality, but person-to-person interaction is huge for me.

This is actually a big issue for us right now. Being a small startup in Nashville, there isn't exactly a lot of easily accessible space for us. We have to leave where we are at right now, and are trying to figure out what our plan off attack is going to be for the next few months.

<comment><USER3> +1 for ROWE. We love/use ROWE, too, but building a gel'd team is greatly accelerated by face to face contact. We're experimenting with some Results that are tied to face-to-face contact (show up for team dinner, lunch 2x a week, etc.) that requires folks to show up. But, that feels pretty forced. I'd love to hear other experiences with ROWE and actually having face-to-face contact.

<comment><USER17> In my experience ROWE has been a pretty great success. It's really beneficial for people who are problem-solvers, not time-clock monkeys. One of the most important aspects of successfully implementing ROWE is accountability and awareness. First, you have to have some metric to know if results are actually being produced. Second, your team needs to know what the metric is, so that they properly manage their time. Also, having some times where people are in the office together is really helpful for that face-to-face aspect. Company meetings, beer Friday, etc. all work well. Some people may prefer to have a minimum amount of time you should be in the office (maybe 25%). I would not suggest having company-mandated fun time though. It's not fun time when it's required. Last thing I'll say is, if you don't have accountability and awareness, people can coast for a long time without you knowing. Regular checkups will keep everybody on the same page, and identify problems quickly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been playing around with this for a little while now. I've tried all three approaches so far. The first two failed miserably (I take the blame for most of it, transitioning from a programmer to a leader/manager isn't as trivial as I initially thought).

The distributed model seems to be working the best. We are a truly distributed company. I felt kind'o self conscious when someone would ask where our offices are. But now, I realize, we get stuff done! The team just works, and works far more efficiently than any team I've been part of before.

Granted, 10 out of 12 of us are introverts. I think there's something even better at work. Everyone shows up and does what needs to be done when it's convenient for them, we don't really have "politics" since nobody spends a significant amount of time chitchatting by the proverbial "watercooler" etc.

It's really a very unique culture. We're far apart, but we know each other thru our work and we take quite a bit of pride in our work. There are several serious shortcomings though.

So far, I haven't seen a tool that was quite up to the task of keeping the team cohesive as one unified team.

We started out using Trello (which I still think is amazing), but as we grew to past 5 people and multiple projects, trello quickly became a mess (maybe due to how we're using it). We do rely heavily on skype and dropbox.

We recently switched to TeamLab, which is pretty awesome given all the features,but it's still not right...

I wish I could just extend trello, add some wiki/blogging functionality to it and drastically improve the search.

So, I'm contending that there probably isn't any tool out there specifically directed at a distributed teams. If there's one out there that works well for you, please share... At this point we've decided to roll our own given the time and collective energy we're already spent trying to learn and implement some of the existing tools.

(BTW, our team's not specifically developers, we range from business types to designers, writers and Coders)

To be honest being out of band isn't too bad, we've always got someone working around the clock, so it feels like we're always moving along.

<comment><USER19> We felt the same pain and it's why we built Ginger (<https://gingerhq.com>).

It isn't a project management tool (lots of good ones already exist), but it is a great _discussion_ tool. Our remote team is closer together because of it.

If you try it out, we'd love to hear your thoughts, email@example.com.

<comment><USER18> Thanks! I'll sign up for it and try it out.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> People who argue for this can't just remove body language, a huge component in how we communicate, and expect that the loss can be recovered with a better project management app. There may be short-term benefits to working remotely, but there are very few examples long-term where it has worked well. This has nothing to do with the quality of the people working together, but with the bandwidth of communication being employed. Maybe that will somehow change in the future (for everybody's benefit), but it is certainly not viable now.

<comment><USER21> _can't just remove body language, a huge component in how we communicate, and expect that the loss can be recovered with a better project management app_

Since when is body language involved with getting stuff done? Or do you mean office politics and those greatly productive meeting hours?

 _bandwidth of communication_

The lower bandwidth is more than compensated by the better signal/noise ratio.

I've found communication in remote teams to be radically _more_ efficient than the usual office chitchat. You just don't waste time in poorly focussed meetings, adhoc exchanges that all participants have forgotten a minute later, or the infamous daily standups that give everyone the blurry feeling of being on the same page - without knowing which page that would be.

Chat is the primary communication channel in the teams that I'm participating in and the sole act of _typing_ something out instead of _saying_ it makes technical discussions tremendously more focussed.

It also enables a culture of meta-discussion that simply doesn't happen in old fashioned meeting-driven companies. I have many dozens of Chat-threads going on in parallel, some of which reach back months, often with long pauses. These threads contain pretty much the entire thinking that went into any given subject. Nothing is buried on funny colored post-it notes or blurry memories of long forgotten meetings.

Feel free to compare that to your "knowledge-base", "Wiki", or what have you?

 _certainly not viable now._

Says who?

I've been "the remote guy" exclusively for the past 5 years. For different companies, some fully distributed, some with a central office. If you want to maximize productivity of a _mature_ team then that is your modus operandi.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Mozilla's Release Engineering team shares their experiences with a distributed team in a slide presentation called _We Are All "Remoties"_ :

<http://oduinn.com/blog/2012/04/04/we-are-all-remoties/>

IRC and video chat are two critical components for Mozilla's teams.

</comment><comment><USER23> A big part of a successful "full" distributed team are the tools and processes that are developed and implemented. When you work in a shared office space with the rest of your team, a lack of structure and organization is much more tolerable than when you're on a fully distributed team.

</comment><comment><USER24> After 5 years working remotely, my .02 cents on the topic is that it works very well as long as you are with a team of mature developers. If any politic or personality conflicts get in to the mix you will fail miserably

</comment><comment><USER25> In my experience, if you abide by the important rule of "work with excellent people," distributed teams work well.

I currently work on a team of 12, in three countries and at least seven cities.

</comment><comment><USER26> Don't Github, Automattic, and 37Signals all have offices?

<comment><USER27> At least in GitHub's case, they have a physical office but I don't think employees really communicate much face-to-face.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Are we sure about Basho being fully distributed? Their "careers" page lists positions in particular cities and gives a few office addresses.

</comment><comment><USER29> MySQL is a good example of distributed teams working in the real world

</comment><comment><USER30> All things being equal a collocated team will always beat distributed ones -soory to be brutal but thats how it is.

Anyone who says otherwise is a sales man trying to flog video conferenceing gear or deluding themselves.

This is based on many years experience and the common factor for good projects was a team that meshed well and was in the same office.</comment>


New metal is so hydrophobic it makes water bounce off of it - <AUTHOR> http://sploid.gizmodo.com/new-amazing-metal-is-so-hydrophobic-it-makes-water-boun-1680799039

<comment><USER2> That's amazing! Two questions, though:

1) Can you varnish the area, or will my car/airplane wing need a bare metal surface?

2) What about abrasion? Will, e.g., cutlery damage the non-stickyness of the pan?

<comment><USER3> It would need a bare surface. The actual paper, at [http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/jap/117/3/10.10...](http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/jap/117/3/10.1063/1.4905616) , says:

> Metals are intrinsically hydrophilic; immediately after femtosecond laser > surface structuring, they first become more hydrophilic, but the exposure to > air turns the metals superhydrophobic. This transition is explained by > chemical interaction between the surface and the ambient CO 2, resulting in > an accumulation of carbon and its compounds on the laser-treated surface. > [14,28] We believe that the laser-induced surface nanostructures also play > an important role in enhancing this chemical interaction due to nanochemical > effects.

so it would seem that the water needs to be in contact with this specific surface.

Neither the paper nor the press release at [http://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/superhydrophobic- metals-...](http://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/superhydrophobic- metals-85592/) mentions how well it stands up to abrasion. However, the depth is only 75 μm, so I wouldn't take steel wool to it.

FWIW, "It currently takes an hour to pattern a 1 inch by 1 inch metal sample" so that airplane wing will take a while to pattern.

P.S. More discussion at [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8921655](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8921655) .</comment></comment>


Do Programmers Need Seat Belts? - <AUTHOR> http://dreamsongs.com/SeatBelts.html?

<comment><USER2> I had a job programming Java when it was still in beta and I remember having a conversation circa 1996 through the stall door in a public bathroom with two guys who thought Java was a fad and I told them no, Java was everything they said it would be.</comment>


Instagram 'bug' heavily favored Trump content over Biden for months - <AUTHOR> https://www.engadget.com/instagram-bug-heavily-favored-trump-content-over-biden-172758201.html <comment><USER2> Skipping the question of whether this was intentional, I have other questions:

1\. How do thousands of Instagram employees, including developers, use the app for _months_ without noticing this?

2\. What is the value of related hashtags anyway? I assume it makes the site more "sticky" for users, but as a user, why do I want it at all?

3\. How do algorithmic recommendations not qualify as "speech", especially in situations like this? It may be computer-generated, but it still definitely leaned toward an ideological in this case. It's not like it was organically created by users and displayed, without editorial, by Instagram...</comment>


Git-bug 0.4.0: performance, comment edition, GitHub importer - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/MichaelMure/git-bug/releases/tag/0.4.0 <comment><AUTHOR> Hi HN !

After my first presentation of git-bug here [1], I'd like to show you the progress made.

While the original version was pretty much a prototype, the 0.3 version [2] featured a caching/indexing layer with its query language, easily handling 10k+ bugs.

This last version [3] include among others things a feature that was long awaited, a Github incremental importer.

While this is still not 1.0, it's close. Work left before that is mainly the rework of the identity management [4] along with a Github incremental exporter [5] to make sure that the data model is done well enough and won't change much anymore in the future.

[1]: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17782121](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17782121) [2]: [https://github.com/MichaelMure/git- bug/releases/tag/0.3.0](https://github.com/MichaelMure/git- bug/releases/tag/0.3.0) [3]: [https://github.com/MichaelMure/git- bug/releases/tag/0.4.0](https://github.com/MichaelMure/git- bug/releases/tag/0.4.0) [4]: [https://github.com/MichaelMure/git- bug/issues/55](https://github.com/MichaelMure/git-bug/issues/55) [5]: [https://github.com/MichaelMure/git- bug/issues/56](https://github.com/MichaelMure/git-bug/issues/56)</comment>


Are you a startup founder, early adopter, or tech enthusiast? - <AUTHOR> http://startupli.st

<comment><USER2> Details about the site, founders, philosophy, etc would be welcome. At least I didn't see this information on a quick pass, and it's information that I feel is important.

It looks like YC News combined with advertising for a bunch of startups and a twitter feed and something that may be an Angel List clone.

</comment><comment><USER3> Woah - looks like an angellist.com design lookalike. Same founders or a diff entity?

<comment><USER4> Thanks for your comment! :) StartupList are close to AngelList in design, yet we have a yin/yang relationship. They cater to investors, StartupList caters to early adopters and startups.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> can't we be all 3?</comment>


Organizing Programs Without Classes (1991) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://bibliography.selflanguage.org/_static/organizing-programs.pdf <comment><AUTHOR> Related, and worth a watch: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ox5P7QyL774](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ox5P7QyL774)

It's a video about the Self language, which I think was designed using the principles in this paper.

I like it because (like Oberon) it shows that programming and graphics can be much more closely interwoven than we're used to. They were doing it in the 90's. Then we lost it somewhere along the way by trying to make everything big and user-facing.</comment>


Twitter Forum on Law and Disorder on the "Outlaw Ocean" – Starts at 9:30am - <AUTHOR> http://www.usip.org/events/law-and-disorder-the-outlaw-ocean

<comment><AUTHOR> The main hashtag is #OutlawOcean: [https://twitter.com/search?q=%23outlawocean&src=typd](https://twitter.com/search?q=%23outlawocean&src=typd)

The discussion is related to this recent HN submission of a New York Times article by Ian Urbina ('Sea Slaves': The Human Misery That Feeds Pets and Livestock) that garnered much discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9957767](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9957767)</comment>


How to Launch on Product Hunt - <AUTHOR> https://blog.producthunt.com/how-to-launch-on-product-hunt-7c1843e06399 <comment><USER2> Is it common for people to launch free open source software on Product Hunt?</comment>


Intel's CEO says its costly tablet chip strategy has paid off - <AUTHOR> http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/09/us-intel-krzanich-idUSKBN0H41RW20140909?feedType=RSS&feedName=technologyNews <comment><USER2> I think he meant "Intel paid off a lot of Chinese manufacturer to make them start using Atoms", and it only cost them $2B so far.

[http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/186367-intels-mobile- divi...](http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/186367-intels-mobile-division-has- lost-an-astonishing-2-billion-dollars-so-far-this-year)

[http://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/intel- sel...](http://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/intel-sells-quad- core-atom-for-tablets-for-5-per-chip-report/)

Their biggest success is some fly by nights nonames announcing one off $65 tablets.

<comment><USER3> >> Their biggest success is some fly by nights nonames announcing one off $65 tablets.

How about the Dell Venue 8 Pro?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "its costly tablet chip strategy paid off" ...

> "the company's mobile and communications group's second-quarter revenue fell > 83 percent to $51 million, and the unit had an operating loss of $1.12 > billion"

<comment><USER5> Bingo. That's the money quote. If you hadn't posted it first, I was going to. They're spending/subsidizing nearly $22 for each $1 of revenue.

Intel is taking lessons from Microsoft in how to waste billions of dollars in futile endeavors.

<comment><USER6> It's not necessarily futile. If Intel can grab enough of a slice of the Android tablet market that developers of Android apps that use significant native code start caring about x86 Android... all sorts of opportunities open up for them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> You think Shenzhen Cheapo Tablet Co., Ltd. will keep using them when they start charging them the full price? Hahaha!

I think Intel underestimates the level of churn and ruthlessness of the market. This ain't no Wintel meal ticket.

</comment><comment><USER8> I recently saw a billboard here in Melbourne for an Asus tablet with an Intel CPU: [https://twitter.com/john_e_barham/status/492146297416077312](https://twitter.com/john_e_barham/status/492146297416077312).

What struck me as bizarre was although the billboard had the "Intel Inside" slogan repeated at least 3 times, nowhere did it mention what OS the tablet ran, and the screenshots were basically generic stock photos with no apps in sight. As it happens the tablet runs Android but I can imagine that some of the people suckered into buying it will be annoyed that it can't play many of the games on Google Play since they'd be developed with the ARM NDK.

The whole thing struck me more as an effort to extract money from Intel's marketing budget than as a sincere effort to sell the actual tablet.

</comment><comment><USER9> Intel has a horrible horrible architecture, I really dont want to see it win over ARM Architecture which is open and superior, and wastes a lot less DIE area just for instructions that Intel Does.

<comment><USER10> The real issue is if Intel will be able to buy dominance through deep pockets. On a even playing field then the better arch would win.

ARMs business model might allow them to weather the initial storm while advancing their core architecture; their 2013 balance sheet was good, with low liabilities and high earnings. Not even Intel can keep buying market share indefinitely.

<comment><USER11> If Intel is buying market share by making superior products using fancy transistors, expensive fabs, and clever designs.... its not exactly bad for us consumers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Yes. ARM is shaking in their boots. The Atom will dominate all. It will happen right around the time Slackware destroys Windows 9.</comment>


You Have a First Amendment Right to Record the Police - <AUTHOR> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/06/you-have-first-amendment-right-record-police <comment> nappa-leon The problem with this is that a policeman with a billy club who beats you because you're recording him doesn't care about your rights and not get fired. So be careful out there

<comment><USER2> I wonder, are there any apps that upload video in real-time?

<comment><USER3> Facebook Live

<comment><USER2> I guess I should have been more clear: real-time but not live or automatically published. If it's automatically published then many people may be reticent to begin recording. For example, maybe you don't want the fact that your friend or family member is being arrested to immediately become public knowledge or otherwise shared, embarrassing video and all.[1][2] If in the end there's no police misconduct, the whole incident can remain relatively private. Yet if it turns out you're recording misconduct then it would be important that the footage be uploaded in real-time in case the cop (or anybody else) destroys your phone.

FWIW, I abstain from Facebook, Twitter, and social media in general. Apologies if Facebook Live or any other suggestion does support this.

[1] I'm white but grew up in home environments where the police were called many times, sometimes hauling someone away kicking and screaming. (Typical unintended consequence of alcohol abuse and otherwise bad life decisions, albeit all too common life decisions in poor America.) You have to be sensitive to such situations, especially in the modern electronic era where it's extremely difficult to escape past mistakes.

[2] The arrest could have been mistaken, in which case you _definitely_ don't want a video of it getting out unless there was actual police misconduct or possibly even _if_ there was police misconduct.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> and Police has Qualified immunity to beat you senseless for it without repercussions, your choice.

<comment><USER5> Qualified immunity is for civil repercussions, not criminal. Individual police officers can go to jail for committing crimes in the line of duty. Any civil lawsuits stemming from such acts, however, cannot be aimed at the individual officer, but must instead be against the city/state/feds. I'm skeptical that letting officers get sued for things they can already go to jail for would be a major additional deterrent.

(To be clear, I'm in favor of ending qualified immunity in cases associated with criminal acts, not because I think it will make things better, but because it is fundamentally unjust for the taxpayers to be forced to cover the bill for an individual officer's illegal acts, when the officer — of all people — should have known that the act was illegal)

<comment><USER6> So if poor police officers abuse people, the victims don't get any compensation? That's not good.

<comment><USER7> I can't tell if you're trolling, but in case you're not, QI doesn't prevent the victim from seeking restitution, it just puts an umbrella over the officer's personal wealth by protecting it with the department/municipality's wealth.

It's the worst part of what we complained about banks and bailouts in 2008+: it socializes the costs and privatizes the profits/impunity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> As a non-American, this sounds bizarre. Yes of course free speech is important, and being able to record the police is.

But how can recording something be considered speech?!

<comment><USER6> It's not "considered speech".

1A says:

> Congress shall make no law [religion stuff]; or abridging the freedom of > speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, > and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

It's part of the overall combined notion of "speech, press, assembly, and petition"

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Defund the police. Force agents of the state to carry malpractice insuarance.

<comment><USER10> How exactly should society enforce laws with no police? Mob Justice?

<comment><USER11> We seek to replace things that are not working all of the time. Sometimes it takes more creative solutions, but usually we can fix systemic issues we have created ourselves, as long as we have a little imagination.

Defunding the police would allow us to do things like fund more social workers and non-armed, non-enforcement officers who can help people in crisis. It would allow us to fund infrastructure for safer streets, classrooms and highways. It would allow us to fund restorative justice programs, subsidize housing for those who need help and make our society work for everyone. It would allow us to fund drug treatment and education programs, fund school lunches, and help create vocational training.

Fundamentally, defunding the police would allow us to actually identify the problems that they solve, and eliminate those they create. The problems that are left over can then be solved in different ways.</comment></comment></comment>


Wiki for code and algorithms - <AUTHOR> http://en.literateprograms.org/LiteratePrograms:Welcome

<comment><USER2> Wonderful idea, but some of code I sampled is not what I would define as literate. For example, the singly linked list implemented in C has a linear time remove operation. While this operation is inherently linear with a singly linked list (you must find the previous node), you're not required to provide it as part of the interface. Personally, I think you shouldn't provide inherently inefficient operations in the interface to a data structure. That a particular operation is not implemented should be a hint to users that this is not the data structure they are looking for. Yes, I'm nitpicking, but this is supposed to be literate code, not just correct code.

And yes, I know, it's a wiki, so I can contribute, not just criticize.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a dream for any CS student that doesn't really care about their education.</comment>


The Bipolar Lisp Programmer - <AUTHOR> http://www.lambdassociates.org/blog/bipolar.htm

<comment><USER2> This comes up repeatedly, and is usually very popular. It may not get many comments this time because many, many regular HNers will have seen it, but previous discussions will add light, as HNers tell their own stories.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20012> (2107 days ago, 8 comments)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=78739> (1917 days ago, 32 comments)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=187867> (1735 days ago, 15 comments)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=859669> (1226 days ago, 22 comments)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2275657> (712 days ago, 86 comments)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2531835> (643 days ago)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3179017> (468 days ago)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3374849> (418 days ago, 38 comments)</comment>


Do Plants Talk? - <AUTHOR> http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/aprilholladay/2006-07-24-plant-talk-baby-boys_x.htm

<comment><USER2> People can communicate by smell too - willy-nilly. Most often it's bacteria on human skin that detects changes - such as stress hormones - and respond in their own ways. Some people can smell stress in other people.

<comment><USER3> This is fascinating. Can you link me to some resources/books/articles where I can learn more? Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Cleve Baxter did a lot of research on this, and his experiments were even featured on an episode of myth busters. His research indicated that plants can sense a humans intentions. He figured this out by attaching polygraphs to plants and then directing negative thoughts towards the plant (cutting, burning etc.). The polygraph then went haywire, but when he thought nice things about the plant the polygraph stayed normal.

<comment><USER5> I'm....skeptical. I guess this would be something to try.

<comment><USER4> If I remember correctly the outcome of the mythbusters tests were plausible as the polygraphs showed a reaction to their intentions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Setting up experiments to determine if they talk would be interesting.

Finding out that most of the time they gossip about each others' foliage would be hilarious.

</comment><comment><USER7> Sometime back I read DNA has affinity towards its sibling DNA.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm an environmental studies major, so I have heard before that plants communicate with each other via chemicals and also apparently "scream" when injured (some pulse or other they measured - not something humans can hear). So I have long joked that if I were a vegetarian, I would probably favor a bumper sticker or t-shirt that said something like "I don't love animals, I just hate plants".

(Just trying to stay on-topic and not stray towards the topic lower down on the page, which may be a very bad motivation for commenting. <whistles innocently>)

<comment><USER9> I couldn't help imagine the screams from mowing the lawn yesterday.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This reminds me of a short film called "Descendants" <http://vimeo.com/8642276>

<comment><AUTHOR> that was creepy.</comment></comment>


Snowden versus the dragons - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.reuters.com/jackshafer/2013/06/18/snowden-versus-the-dragons/

<comment><USER2> "I'll update when Edward Snowden action figures are released."

This, and ad hominem psy-ops is what we're reduced to, having a US-UK gag order of the leaked evidence to eliminating scrutiny of the dragons themselves. ES needs to get his evidence aired in the open soon.</comment>


Jesse Jackson '88 tees are hot in Asia. Here's why - <AUTHOR> https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2018/10/19/17989782/jesse-jackson-1988-campaign-shirts-korea-japan-china <comment><USER2> If you remove all of the context, it does have a certain design appeal that seems to have found it's place. The typeface used is clean and elegant, stimulating the same sort of feeling a lot of us got when Apple eschewed skeuomorphism and went flat .. the layout of the line below the text draws the eye to the wearers natural lines and curves, and of course there is the ol' 88, which is just plain nice to look at wherever you place it.

As a 'random text fashion piece', there is something elegant about it .. especially in a casual space where too many times, random English phrases are used more for their geometry than their significance. Perhaps there is money to be made in copying the design, removing all irony of American politics, and replacing the words with other things .. but then again, maybe the Asian yearning for an alternative universe where Jesse Jackson was Americas first black President is a telling statement on conditions today. What would it have been like, if he'd won in '88, one can only wonder .. perhaps it would be a softer, less violent time now. And maybe that's the value of the piece as a fashion statement - a wistful, ironic appeal to the Gods, in case we do have a means to switch universes, which is the ultimate goal of fashion, always and forever, anyway...

</comment><comment><USER3> This article (excuse my word-choice) was a fucking pain in the arse. Why does it have to repeat the statement and conclusion over and over again???

I feel dumb for reading this until the end.

</comment><comment><USER4> >"Here's why"

enough</comment>


Taking Career Risks in Your Twenties - <AUTHOR> http://kevinchau.org/post/51327700976/taking-career-risks-in-your-twenties

<comment><USER2> "Make peace with the worst case scenario"

\-- anon

Just remember ... it is called a 'risk' for a reason. You will most certainly suffer some ill effects if you're doing this right, the key is to be okay with it.

Coming out of college with a degree I didn't like I spent the next 3-4 years heads down, learning and applying myself as a fullstack web developer and software programmer. It paid off handsomely for me right as I turned 30 but for most of my 20's I was behind all my peers whom I graduated with and my family didn't really understand what I was doing.

All-in-all, I'm happy with the decision I made but the thing that gets me all the time is ... what if it didn't work out?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sometimes, failure is not an option. I hope that's what drove you to succeed.

<comment><USER2> Thats a very nice and it certainly informed my drive to succeed in a very large way. But you must understand that sometimes, it just doesn't work out.

Making peace with that reality is actually more helpful that pursuing a failing life path, just because you refuse to call it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Ouch. Having taken some terrible risks-- understand that none of them appeared like such from the outset-- let me just come out and say:

... No.

You want to learn skills that will increase your job security, make you happier, and advance your career. All that is true.

You might end up taking _financial_ risks that seem heavy. $100 for an out-of- print book on a topic that you're really interested in. $750 (including airfare and hotel) to go to a conference. A couple hundred dollars of computing resources to try something out. Go for it. Those small financial risks are minuscule if they're making your life and prospects better.

That's different from risking your whole career.

"Career" is just a make-nice word for "reputation" (plus the time series of money infusions) and you don't want to take risks with that. Play a conservative game, because people are assholes and will take advantage of you as soon as there's a weakness in your story.

The tough part of all this is that it's hard to know where the worst career risks are. For example, academia is presented as a low-risk track for smart people, but the truth is that the long-term career risks are severe, even if unexpected job loss is extremely uncommon. (Finance, on the other hand, has more job volatility but much less existential career risk.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Appreciate the additional details, Michael.

I agree, you're right. My thoughts stemmed from a lot of my peers who are still in college wanting to focus on money straight off the bat, and put themselves in to terrible places inside various companies.

<comment><USER3> I feel like paying attention to salary signals is actually close to the optimal strategy, most of the time. Here's why. Your salary is how much it costs your employer to waste your time. (You'll find out that a lot of managers like wasting their reports' time. It's a status thing.)

Should you take a $105,000 offer at a company you hate over $100,000 at a great company? Of course not. However, if an offer comes in below market, you have to question whether that's for legitimate economic reasons (lower cost of living, cash-poor startup) or because it's a lower-level position than you deserve and, if it's the second, run.

Unfortunately, it's still really hard (especially when you're young) to tell a good job/company/role vs. a bad one before starting, so salary gets overvalued as a signal, because of the opacity in the career variables that, in the long term, matter a lot more.

<comment><USER4> >I feel like paying attention to salary signals is actually close to the optimal strategy, most of the time.

Yeah, when I was starting out? I was always shocked at how closely the salary correlated with how well you are treated in general. I mean, personally? If I feel like I'm overpaid, I am okay dealing with more bullshit, but that's not how it works. If anything, as I got paid more, less was expected of me. I mean, less of the hard stuff. Showing up on time, for example, became much less of a big deal as I got paid more. (For me, showing up on time is often the hardest part of the job.) - I mean, sure, I was expected to solve harder problems... and I was expected to actually come up with a working solution more often... but that was never the hard part for me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> For what it's worth, your website doesn't work in Opera.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll admit, I didn't code it.

But I thought Opera switched to WebKit?

<comment><USER2> Not yet, I think the next version of the browser (13) is supposed to have it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Dude, proof read your blog posts. Risk taking and career power plays must be all about comma splices, dangling modifiers, and incomplete sentences, if your writing is any indication.</comment>


Researcher claims Microsoft is trying to circumvent security bounty payments - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/jonasLyk/status/1282945750746509313 <comment><AUTHOR> Lock screen/Bitlocker bypass/elevation of privilege in Bitlocker: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1S4jU7knBG_Km_AdHXf8JyE8z...](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1S4jU7knBG_Km_AdHXf8JyE8zl0SOxQ9VvYFPanQy1g8/edit)

Group policy client service - Insecure file operations causing escalation of privilege: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sRrftambp4gz4koVX1Qs1l1O...](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sRrftambp4gz4koVX1Qs1l1ODDFTp1eUd6j6NvmCt1U/edit)

And a bunch more here: [https://twitter.com/jonasLyk](https://twitter.com/jonasLyk)</comment>


The Way I Work: David Karp of Tumblr - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/magazine/201106/the-way-i-work-david-karp-of-tumblr_pagen_2.html <comment><USER2> Printer friendly: [http://www.inc.com/magazine/201106/the-way-i-work-david- karp...](http://www.inc.com/magazine/201106/the-way-i-work-david-karp-of- tumblr_Printer_Friendly.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> "Every feature has some maintenance cost, and having fewer features lets us focus on the ones we care about and make sure they work very well. For every new feature we add, we take an old one out. A lot of big sites don't do that, and it's a problem."

Very well put.

</comment><comment><USER4> You linked to the second page. Here is the first page:

[http://www.inc.com/magazine/201106/the-way-i-work-david- karp...](http://www.inc.com/magazine/201106/the-way-i-work-david-karp-of- tumblr.html)

Overall, quite a heart warming story of someone being very successful yet also being happy and not killing themselves with work and pressure.

BTW, I hope Mr. Karp is not offended, but he definitely has some asperger tendencies. For example, he found it necessary to describe exactly which brand and type of pen he uses to write notes in his notebooks.

<comment><USER5> I'd say that's more "hipster" than Asperger's. The search for the perfect pen for your moleskine (or filing cards, aka.'hipster pda') was quite popular in the, erm, blogosphere a couple of years ago. Productivity minutiae can be quite amusing.

<comment> Apple-Guy Well, doesn't matter if Karp is a "hipster" or not, he is the CEO of a $40 million venture funded company. What have YOU done lately?

<comment><USER5> Huh? I'm not one of those guys who thinks "hipster" is automatically an insult, and I didn't even call him one, just that carefully selecting your pens is more a fashionable ("hip") thing to do than a sign of mental condition.

And I just _sorted_ and took out the trash, so I'm very satisfied with myself, thankyouverymuch.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I briefly spoke to Karp at SXSW this year. I had no idea who he was.

Me: "So what do you do?"

Karp: "I work at Tumblr."

Me: "What do you do there?"

Karp: "...I'm an engineer"

Me: "What kind of engineer?"

Karp: "...A little of everything."

One of my friends had to tell me he was the goddamn CEO. I've never met a CEO who was that modest.

</comment><comment><USER7> ...remember this? <http://postdesk.com/debates/should-tumblr-care/>

<comment><USER8> What relevance does that have to this piece?

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This guy seems really capable, balanced, and mature. We need more focus on people like him and less on flash-in-a-pan lottery-winner success stories.</comment>


Show HN: what do you think of our coming soon splash page? - <AUTHOR> http://www.luttie.com We are trying to crowd source video playlists. Why i started working on it? We think video discovery is and will be a problem.We could solve this by crowd sourcing video playlists. Each playlist can be followed and when new videos are added, it appears in your stream.<p>What do you guys think?? <comment><USER2> Not keen myself, I think you'd be better off losing all the fades and having all the text visible all the time and nicely typeset.

The animation obviously can't go much faster if it's going to remain readable, but it feels like it takes too long to find out what it's about, and I had to hit refresh to remind myself what it started with by the time it got to the end. Mind you I was a bit caught up in wondering why the font looked so jaggy, seems that, in Chrome on OS X at least, opensans is rendering very jaggy.

Overall it feels a bit like you got caught up in the whizzy jquery and the overall page suffers for it. A nicely set static layout would probably serve you better.

<comment><USER3> I agree. playhard, your logo and color scheme look good. But keep in mind that if someone opens your link in a background tab and then looks at it a few minutes later, all they're going to see is:

Coming soon...

Are you ready to Luttie?

Since that person is going to have no idea what they stand to gain from choosing to Luttie, they're probably going to leave instead of submitting their email.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Vitriol – distributed, serverless publishing platform - <AUTHOR> https://vitriol.co <comment><USER2> I'm going to go out on a limb here... based on modestly more private conversations than this Hackernews thread, I'm inclined to read the name—Vitriol—and the fundamentally distributed architecture _together_ as being an effective dogwhistle for already angry people further driven to extremism by the entirely appropriate blackholing of Gab.

It may be a neat concept technically, but I already don't like the direction this is taking in setting up the future of this product.

<comment><USER3> ... which will kill it, or at least keep it a niche echo chamber for deranged hate and outrage addicts. If they don't want it to be a platform for rage porn vitriol is an awful name.

The word addict here is somewhat serious. One thing I've been thinking for a while is that a lot of these hate and outrage trolls on the net are addicted to the brain chemicals these emotions trigger.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > vitriol – cruel and bitter criticism.

Really strange name choice.

<comment><USER5> When it first entered English from Latin, the word meant 'glass' ([https://www.etymonline.com/word/vitriol#etymonline_v_7846](https://www.etymonline.com/word/vitriol#etymonline_v_7846)). But that's not a sense any modern English speaker could be expected to recognize.

<comment><USER6> They might make the connection with "Vitrification" if they're inclined in that direction. They might realize that Vitr- is a common root, and might even guess what it is.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, though it's a stretch all the same. I'm not sure what the intention here is. The name is either a joke, just plain bad, or etymologically overoptimistic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Well, the name at least makes it clear that author of the system knows what it will be used for. I've reached the conclusion after years of crypto quackery and free speech nutjobs that actually, publishing platforms need to moderate what they are used for and by who. Free for alls like this attract some of the work people imaginable.

<comment><USER8> Why not give users more filtering options, rather than censoring certain views? Let the users choose what type of content they want to see, rather choosing for them.

<comment><USER9> Because sometimes one doesn't want to host a platform for, say, Holocaust denial. Platforms can, and should, moderate speech pursuant to the values of the company, which _can_ mean anything from heavy moderation to none at all.

People who want to take part in "fringe" discussions, whether it goes agains the culture, or assholes (white supremacists) will end up on whatever platform they feel the most free and secure. But what happens when a group of antisemites discovers a Jewish community, and decides to comment on their posts, and harass them over PMs? The burden is placed on them to add filters for all of the users, or the content posted, which harms the growth of the group; a new member may visit the Jewish community, see it full of hate, and decide never to join. Through inaction, your platform has traded the safety and security of one group for another, and in my opinion, it's those who seek to harm others that should be removed, not the other way around.

I worked at Reddit for three years (left two years ago), and it's taken me a long time to realize this.

<comment><USER8> I suppose it depends what kind of platform you are hosting. With something like Vitriol, where you are mostly posting content independent of other people, it doesn't seem like there is much possibility for abuse. But with something like Reddit I can see how moderation is more important, since you can direct message people.

<comment><AUTHOR> Exactly. It's not a community, it's more a tool for publishing content that other people consciously decide to follow. The point being that this content can't be shut down by a central organization, but will disappear if nobody cares about it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I got can error message on loading the user intro: "There has been an unrecoverable error connecting to IPFS. Please retry again later."

Maybe not quite ready for prime time.

</comment><comment><USER11> _This also means that it will be impossible for third parties to limit access to your articles._

?? I don't understand. Somebody, somewhere is hosting the reading UI at vitriol.co, right? That's the chokepoint to attack.

Political issues aside, it feels like this has to be client-side software in order to achieve what it sets out to - more like scuttlebutt.

<comment><AUTHOR> You can download the code from here: [https://gitlab.com/vitriolum/vitriol- web](https://gitlab.com/vitriolum/vitriol-web) and serve it from whenever you want, even localhost.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> How can I verify whether this is actually working as advertised? For all I know this is just a blog running on a central server with terrible URLs.

And what happens if I create a piece of content, close the window, and then share the URL with somebody? Will they not be able to see it?

<comment><AUTHOR> You can download the code from here: [https://gitlab.com/vitriolum/vitriol- web](https://gitlab.com/vitriolum/vitriol-web) and serve it from whenever you want, even localhost.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I really like the idea. The load of the intro page took around 35 seconds. Could Erlang/Elixir/LFE be used instead of JS/React? I am not familiar enough with IPFS to know if this is a valid question.

<comment><USER14> Lucky you. My experience ended with

> There has been an unrecoverable error connecting to IPFS. Please retry again > later.

<comment><AUTHOR> IPFS bootstrappers out there are still a bit unstable. Sorry about that - please retry.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Just curious why did you name the platform Vitriol?

<comment><AUTHOR> It comes from "Visita Interiora Terrae Rectificando Invenies Occultum Lapidem", an alchemical motto. No reference to hate intended.

<comment><USER16> Whatever the intent, how it will be perceived is effectively out of your control. Its current name is a headwind, actively working against its potential for success. If the project is important to you, you must rename it.

[https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/vitriol](https://www.merriam- webster.com/thesaurus/vitriol)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> <offtopic>

I wish we had a few years without tech buzzwords. Web 2.0, virtualization, devops, cloud, containers, microservices, serverless... I'd so, so much like to focus on something existing and make it work well. Maybe we wouldn't have 20+ crappy chat systems, but one good federated xmpp or matrix.

</offtopic>

<comment><USER18> That's all well and good, but the examples you gave are problems of scale and economics, not invention. XMPP works as well as you want it to, and clients are on all the platforms, but Apple users want to use iMessage. That's not a problem that any kind of invention can solve.

The buzzwords themselves are references to incremental improvements in the state of the tech ecosystem that allow more powerful solutions for all. An app we all have on our devices right now, Slack, was once buzzword soup. Now it's an actual solution used by businesses the world over. It's not perfect, but it works better for our collective needs than IRC ever did.

What's going to replace the Slack's of today's tech world? I dunno, but I bet they'll be built on buzzwords.

<comment><USER19> We do _not_ all have Slack on our devices.

<comment><USER18> I see many many non-technical teams that use Slack. Slack's made inroads in the business messaging market that used to be the sole domain of enterprise vendors like Microsoft, Cisco, and Oracle.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> love the concept and the name, but it isn't working (IPFS error)

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, IPFS bootstrappers are still a bit unstable. Should work now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Why aren't you storing the text content of the articles as text files? (If you were, they could be accessed from other places, not only through the Vitriol interface.)

<comment><AUTHOR> They're stored as HTML, because of the WYSIWYG nature of the editor. I guess Markdown was the other obvious choice, but editing MD is not so immediate on mobile.

<comment><USER21> I still can't browse them as HTML files.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> So there is one thing that I always think when I see something like this. So if an article is replicated and stored on every user who reads that article once wouldn't that mean after some point a user won't be able to read any more posts because they have run out of space? Also, isn't it just collectively more expensive than just paying for a centralized service?

In the same note, where would I start if I knew nothing about p2p but wanted to build something like this?

</comment><comment><USER21> How is it distributed and serverless if I'm pointing my browser to vitriol.co and getting stuff from there?

<comment><AUTHOR> You can download the code from here: [https://gitlab.com/vitriolum/vitriol- web](https://gitlab.com/vitriolum/vitriol-web) and serve it from whenever you want, even localhost.

<comment><USER21> No, because I won't have my username and all that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> irq-1 From gitlab:

> ... your article will be accessible even if you're offline, _as long as > someone is reading (sharing) it._

</comment><comment><USER23> How does this differ from IPFS?

<comment><USER24> It is IPFS based on the error that comes up

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> AKA Twitter

<comment><AUTHOR> More like Medium, but distributed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Why gitlab ?

</comment><comment><USER27> doesn't work

</comment><comment><USER28> it's great</comment>


The Daily Rituals Of The World's Most Creative People - <AUTHOR> http://www.fastcocreate.com/1682913/from-beethoven-to-woody-allen-the-daily-rituals-of-the-worlds-most-creative-people-and-what-#1

<comment><USER2> "It's the repetition that leads you to getting into a creative state. It's not the rituals themselves--they don't have any particular special power--that lead you into this zone. It's more that these artists tried to stick with the same pattern every day."

This paragraph boils down to "work every day at the same time, even if it's only for a short period of time." I've found that this helps stimulate creativity, but the biggest benefit from this consistency is productivity.

Creative flow states are not useful unless the ideas and inspiration they generate are applied to some tangible output. Establishing a routine for creative work helps ease the transition from 'creative idea' to 'creative solution' because the mind is primed to be productive for a finite amount of time and it expects to get things done.

As an aside, I find it interesting that many successful creative people have substance abuse problems. Frances Bacon is cited in the article, but creative types from Ernest Hemingway to Charles Dickens to The Beatles have regularly abused substances throughout major stretches of their careers. All of these individuals would work at their craft daily at set times, which apparently was enough to overcome the damage they were doing to their bodies.</comment>