Rush Drummer Neil Peart Dead at 67 - <AUTHOR> https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/neil-peart-rush-obituary-936221/ <comment><USER2> My first day in undergrad, I made one of those friends you hang out with for the first month or so before inevitably drifting apart to different social circles. His dad happened to have (really expensive) tickets through work to see Rush in our city the next month on the Clockwork Angels tour but couldn't use them. I'd never been to a concert before at that point.

Holy crap! That show changed and enhanced what I appreciated in music so much. It's still easily the most technically impressive show I've seen. I don't listen to Rush as much as I used to but I think about them and that concert often.

</comment><comment><USER3> Sad to hear. I played the drums, and he was my hero growing up. Modern Drummer magazine had a "drummer of the year" in different categories, and eventually they made a hall of fame, so it wouldn't just be Neil.

By their reckoning, the third best drummer ever: [https://www.moderndrummer.com/article/march-2014-50-greatest...](https://www.moderndrummer.com/article/march-2014-50-greatest- drummers-time/)

<comment><USER4> Bonham, Moon, Starr -- and Peart -- all above Max Roach?

Umm, okay.

<comment><USER5> I was fearing the worst when I saw Buddy Rich at #1 — he's usually the token Jazz drummer on rock-oriented lists. But to my pleasant surprise, the list actually represented Jazz drummers fairly (disregarding the rankings, which are bound to be more subjective).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There was a documentary 10 years ago about the history of the band. IIRC the band's first drummer was very talented but for whatever reason wasn't working out. The drummer had an unusual role for rock drummers -- he was actually kind of the "frontman" in the sense he would handle the audience patter, introducing the band, etc.

They found Peart working in his uncle's animal feed shop out in the countryside. He was an amazing drummer, technically speaking. Unlike his predecessor, Peart seemed to be a total introvert, and also didn't seem to mesh well with Lee and Lifeson (best pals since middle school). Nevertheless, he proved himself to be a creative leader, writing many of the band's most memorable songs, and crafting lyrics with meaning that go beyond what most hard rock bands were putting out at the time (see _2112_ and _Moving Pictures_ ).

He took a long hiatus from music about 15 or 20 years ago after the deaths of several family members, and toured North America on his motorcycle. I always wondered about that trip, and what he was able to discover.

<comment><USER7> He actually wrote a book about those travels:

[https://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Rider-Travels-Healing- Road/dp/1...](https://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Rider-Travels-Healing- Road/dp/1550225480)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Like many commenters here Rush defined so much of my teen years. Songs like Subdivisions, Limelight, both written by Peart, captured much of what I saw in my life. So sad to see Peart gone but the Rolling Stone article outlines how much sadness he had in his life. May he find some peace in the afterlife.

</comment><comment><USER9> He was amazing.

This video is a favorite of his playing. He breaks a stick and replaces it without losing a beat. It's hard to notice!

 _Neil Peart Breaks a Stick_ [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UweV2Av7RE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UweV2Av7RE)

<comment><USER10> While Peart was a virtuoso, breaking (or dropping) a stick is so common that decent drummers quickly get used to making up for it without raising notice among the audience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> "The treasure of a life is a measure of love and respect The way you live, the gifts that you give In the fullness of time It's the only return that you expect".

\- Neil Peart, The Garden

</comment><comment><USER12> You've taken care of everything,

The beats we feel, the words we scream,

And now you've gone to your eternal rest.

Those inclined to think and feel,

In all good ways did love you Neil,

And know you truly were among the best.

</comment><comment><USER13> Holy shit. I've been listening to Rush since I was 5 years old and I always thought of these guys as immortal. Just.. wow. RIP to one of the most talented drummers and songwriters of all time.

</comment><comment><USER14> This is really sad news. RIP. I actually learned about Rush through Craig Federighi's references to the band during Apple keynotes. I'm sure he's sad today as well.

</comment><comment><USER15> :(

> Selena's mother – Peart's common-law wife of 23 years

not sure how to feel about this not-exactly-wife tidbit being thrown in there; just call her his wife - these aren't legal proceedings.

<comment><USER10> This is how the late woman was always mentioned in press coverage. That they chose to never formalize their relationship was considered a big part of that relationship.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I grew up on Rush and love Neil's lyrics and drumming. One of the best rock trios ever. RIP.

<comment><USER13> Same here man. I remember exactly the scene when I first heard them - Subdivisions it was. On a music video, on VH1, 1992. Spent the next decade and more listening to absolutely everything they did and would do.

Happy to say I saw them in concert for their 30th anniversary tour, and another time on my birthday where they played the entirety of Moving Pictures. To this day, there hasn't been a concert experience like either of those days.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I started listening to Rush in 1976 with the release of 2112. I was completely blown away. They've always been one of my favorite bands ever since.

</comment><comment><USER18> What a sad day. One of rock's best drummers from one of rock's best bands. So fortunate to have seen them on their farewell tour. RIP Mr. Peart.

</comment><comment><USER19> Sad news. RIP. I haven't listened to Rush for a few years, maybe time to pull some of the albums back out and do some air-drumming.

<comment><USER13> I'm so happy we live at a time where we can go on Youtube and pull up footage from pretty much any concert they ever played - including ones that we've been to. Which is exactly what I'm doing now!

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> "God, there is no fucking drummer better than Neil Peart!"

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkQydoiDY28&feature=youtu.be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkQydoiDY28&feature=youtu.be)

</comment><comment><USER21> One of the very best. Inspired countless musicians and changed the world forever.

</comment><comment><USER22> Had the good fortune to see Rush concerts in 2004, 2007, and 2015. The scalper outside Madison Square Gardens who sold me a concert ticket was calling out, "if you've never had your prostate checked, you're too young to go to this concert!" Glad I ignored the tongue-in-cheek advice -- their shows never failed to amaze.

</comment><comment><USER23> Very shocking news indeed. Rush is not Rush anymore without him. Definitely one of the drummers that raised the bar.

RIP Neil.

</comment><comment><USER24> Incredible loss for the music world. Perhaps the GOAT of rock drummers. RIP.

</comment><comment><USER25> It seems that it was only now revealed that Neil had been battling brain cancer over the last 3 years. He had always valued keeping his private life separate from his public persona.

</comment><comment><USER26> Oh wow. He was a god to every drummer I ever played with.

Lots of black armbands.

</comment><comment><USER27> RIP. One of the best drummers and lyricists of all time from one of the best bands of all time.

</comment><comment><USER28> It's a tragic loss on so many levels...

RIP Neil...

</comment><comment><USER29> A major loss. One of the giants. Thanks for all the music and influencing hundreds of bands.

</comment><comment><USER30> This is awful news. Too young.

</comment><comment><USER31> What a loss. I'll be listening to his music for the rest of my life.</comment>


Olive Pad : Desi iPad - <AUTHOR> http://blog.arpitnext.com/2010/07/olivepad-3g-tablet-olive-pad-android.html <comment><USER2> Looks better than the iPed.</comment>


A website that allows you to build interactive decision trees / algorithms? - <AUTHOR> Hi,<p>For several years I've been waiting for someone to make an online web app that allows you to build interactive decision trees/algorithms for clinical teaching but a general teaching one will likely do. The best I've come across is iboske but thought I'd ask here to see if anyone perhaps has come across one (preferably one w/ a freemium model). Thanks in advance.<p>.
http://www.iboske.com/ https://answerpath.com/ https://www.yworks.com/pages/interactive-decision-tree-diagrams hhttps://gitmind.com/ https://zingtree.com/ https://corp.yonyx.com/ <comment><USER2> My company www.seliom.com let's you do something similar. I have only been at it for 3 months so it is still rough around the edges. I welcome you to give it a try and let me know if it doesn't work for you. I would be happy to discuss your use case in more detail as we are still trying to find product- market fit :)

Feel free to reach out at oliver[at]seliom.com

Since we don't have documentation yet, I can also give you a walkthrough.

</comment><comment><USER3> draw.io, lucidchart.com are tools I've enjoyed using.</comment>


Welcome to Your Quarter Life Crisis - <AUTHOR> http://www.eyeweekly.com/print/article/55882 <comment><USER3> This article is the story of my life right now. I am 25. I am living the quarter life crisis. What makes this article hilarious though is that it is so _true_.

Yes, its a selfish, narcissistic feeling. But in my defense it was how I survived college. Society pressures you to think selfishly because when you are in undergrad all you think about is "I need to get a high GPA to get into a good grad school" or "I need good grades to land a good job" or "I need a good job to pay off my debt" etc etc. It's all me me me!

No one pushes you to think about others. No one forces community service upon you. No one tells you to go serve the homeless. These are all things that are _essential_ to gaining a full perspective of life, yet there is almost no one encouraging you to follow that untraveled path.

My mom recently had good advice for this quarter life crisis, even though we didn't refer to this feeling as such. She said, "Life isn't clean." There is no route to success, no chemistry for happiness, no direct path to relaxation. We are all meant to encounter these feelings because that is just how life is and that is how we learn what we _truly_ want.

<comment><USER4> I agree. Earning money and respect pretty much by definition requires you to think about others. Reduced to bare fundamentals, to make money you need to think about what other people want and give it to to them because money is a very abstract paper definition of "what people want from each other".

People think "oh, to earn money I have to go to college" or "I have to go get a job". The more important point is: people don't fucking give a shit about whether you want to college or not. If you can give them nice software, food, pornography, or luxury items so they can show off they _will want_ to pay you a lot of money.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This article is a treasure trove of narcissism and self-pity. I don't mean that to be criticism; I think it's an accurate depiction of the malaise that comes from having nothing truly important to worry about. I recognize a bit of myself in it.

<comment><USER6> I'm sorry but that is nothing but a bunch of ignorant hand-waving. Whenever something like the quarterlife crisis is brought up, there is a strong current of thinking that goes something like "These people should just get over themselves"

Fact is, there are a number of huge factors working against young people these days. Consider the following:

\- You can't get a decent job without a decent education. It used to be that a highschool graduate could get a job that paid enough to support a family, a concept that is completely absurd these days. Kids these days are finishing school _much_ later than their parents, and they don't have a choice.

\- the cost of school is sky-rocketting, as it debt.

\- A rapid climb in income inequality over the last generation (check the historical gini index for reference) means that there aren't very many quality, well paying jobs available to young people.

\- young people will be stuck with the bill to clean up the fucking mess we're going through right now AND pay for the retirement and medical care of the people that have brought about this shit-storm.

The end result is, society has raised it's children with the wrong set of values, with policies that screw them over and now tries to wash it's hands clean by essentially saying that the stupid kids should have seen it all coming when they were pre-pubescent teens and manouvered around it.

<comment><USER7> Not just that, but there is so much social pressure and expectation that pushes you along through highschool, through college without much promotion toward the alternatives. Never once did I think or hear that I didn't have to go to college, that I could learn some sort of trade or technical skill instead. I blindly followed my nicely laid out path with little objection, and in a way feel robbed, though realize it ultimately my fault.

But what's really depressing is that I can't complain, at all. I am so lucky to have this life, these opportunities, but it is totally despairing to be aware of just how narcissistic and selfish it is to be able to have a 'quarter-life crisis. The fact is though, these feelings of despair exist, and for valid reasons.

<comment><USER8> The fact that someone else has it worse doesn't make your feelings any less real.

<comment><USER9> Group hug!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Guess I'm even more glad that I dropped out of high school, started hacking, played in bands, lived/worked in europe for a few years, came back to the states and now work full time from home for clients and my own start up. Maybe I hit my quarter life crisis in 9th grade but I realized what my culture offered me after school was over appealed about as much sitting in school waiting for it to be over.... Maybe all the stereotypical hardcore/straight edge lyrics about "taking control" of your life actually hit home for me - <USER2> regardless I actually love my life at 27 - know where I've been, know where I'm going and only regret that it is passing so quickly.

<comment><USER11> Congrats

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Newsflash: Twenty-somethings with no ambition will eventually realize that they have no ambition and will get sad. :-(

There, I just saved you 10 minutes of reading the article.

<comment><USER13> There's a difference between ambition and direction. I think many twenty- somethings have a lot of ambition, and no idea what to apply it to. I know I did at one point.

Not being a twenty-something any more, I'd say I now think it probably almost doesn't matter. Pick _something_ , and work hard at it for a long time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Durkheim wrote about this more than a hundred years ago. It's called Anomie.

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

<comment><USER15> So it seems the Quarterlife Crisis is nothing new, it was with generations before and it will be in the future. The good news are if others solved we will handle too.

In plus, in a similar way we both had a childhood crisis too, I can sharply remember when I was 10 I had the very sad feeling something very good ended and will never come back.

More, as the article says we are heading to the Midlife Crisis after we will solve the Quartelife.

So there is no crisis at all, it's just the human nature, the way life goes on. I'm firmly convinced we are not living just one life but many-lives-in-one separated by such crises. The only common thing in these lives -- even the body changes! -- is the presence of the same Observer accounting all life periods.

Personally I'm enjoying these crises: there are so many things out there no one should stick to just one lifeform. Yes you are free to do whatever you want unless you are constraining yourself with the TIME.

<comment><USER16> "In plus, in a similar way we both had a childhood crisis too, I can sharply remember when I was 10 I had the very sad feeling something very good ended and will never come back."

I distinctly remember a very similar feeling in my childhood. I specifically remember realizing I would have to give up daydreaming about superheroes, comic books and play acting long adventure arc narratives with my friends that could span multiple days.

Here's the ironic thing: the top grossing movies over much of the past decade have been about super heroes, receiving much critical acclaim and attended by millions of unembarrassed adults, written and directed mostly by men about my age.

Which just goes to show, maybe not everyone gave up their childhood imaginations and fantasies, after all. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> _1\. You make an impulse purchase. It's_ ... _c) your fifth beer on a Monday night._

Umm, what if I bought it deliberately a couple days ago?

Anyway, there's nothing new about this. At the age of 25, men and women should both be in the process of child-rearing. Deviate from that and nature will send you signals that something is wrong. But the money and luxury of the modern world allow this unnatural state.

<http://us.history.wisc.edu/hist102/pdocs/wolfe_me.pdf>

 _The new alchemical dream is: changing one's personality—remaking, remodeling, elevating, and polishing one's very self... and observing, studying, and doting on it. (Me!) This had always been an aristocratic luxury, confined throughout most of history to the life of the courts, since only the very wealthiest classes had the free time and the surplus income to dwell upon this sweetest and vainest of pastimes_

<comment><USER16> "Umm, what if I bought it deliberately a couple days ago?"

Then it would not be an impulse purchase.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I just read that, and laughed.

I live in South America, doing volunteer work nearly full-time, with a group of expat friends and a much larger extended family of local friends ... I come back to the states to work for 3 months out of the year.

(Yes -- I work only 1 week in 4. I do a lot of surfing down here. )

I don't want to sound smug, but I want to say that the malaise described is not inevitable. I got out when I was 23 or so, and I feel like I've managed to dodge a bullet. Starting my third year of my new life, and I can't imagine being any happier. And my imaginator is in working order.

<comment><USER6> Mind if I ask what exactly you volunteer to do? I tired of my current life and have been wanting to go away, but have not thought of what to actually _do_ if I do go away.

<comment><USER18> Heh.

Well.

I realize that I am going to immediately accrue a massively un-hackerly stigma by posting this, but what the heck, it's true:

I'm a missionary for a small and fairly unpopular religion.

The __what to do __part is the most personal part of escaping, and the part that determines if it'll be an episode or a part of your life going forward. So it shouldn't be surprising if there's very little transference between people. ;)

I guess I'd say the goal most people would like to set, regardless of how they will personally get there, is to dedicate themselves to improving lives. Yes? (We can even avoid Ayn Rand trolls by saying "lives", not "the lives of others")

How you'll go about doing it would be your thing. It's important that you be pretty darn convinced of the importance of doing whatever you escape to do.

I guess there are plenty of other reasons to escape. Ramen profitable, meet Plantain Profitable. I spent $7 for food this week, and I ate like a king (tilapia, fresh veggies, etc).

A startup that was __really __committed to being a cockroach could survive down here with an angel invester that worked at a meat packing plant.

<comment><USER19> > is to dedicate themselves to improving lives.

I believe improvement is something that is uniquely personal (e.g. to split hairs, the person is responsible for their own improvement and growth).

However, I believe adding value to the larger community by building something people want is along these lines, yes?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> A lot of this comes from being lied to their whole lives. How many of these people were told (in many different ways, some subtle, some not) while growing up that school and college and grad school were important and the key to a meaningful life? Sorry, but in reality, there is no universal shortcut to having a meaningful life. There was nothing special about the structure you've gotten used to in two decades of schooling. You have to accept this and move on. This part of the crisis has gotten much worse in the last half-century or so -- the unquestioned faith many middle-class urbanites now have in schools and colleges.

</comment><comment><USER21> For a much more entertaining version, rent "Vicky Christina Barcelona" by Woody Allen.

<comment><USER22> It's funny you say that, because I watched that this weekend, and liked it so much that I got a bunch of his movies. I enjoyed one or two more, then realized that they're all the same: guy gets married, guy is unsatisfied, guy cheats on his wife, guy decides not to leave his wife. That's the way all of his "best" movies go, at least. But you're right, it's the same sort of thing: permanent, vague dissatisfaction with what one has.

I guess I like them because I'm a twentysomething who's coming out of my own quarterlife crisis. It really is pathetic, but the problem is that even though you realize how pathetic it is while you're in it, you don't know what to do about it, so the realization just makes it worse. Being a human being is so fun sometimes. I guess that's why we have comedians like Woody Allen....

<comment><USER23> Try his movie "Zelig" if you want a meditation on fitting in. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> It has nothing to do with this article but I suggested the name "Quarterlife Crisis" for my company's kickball team, and it stuck. Perhaps appropriately, they did not win.

</comment><comment><USER25> good ending :)

He listlessly works through lunch, then goes to the bar after work to meet up with some university friends, where they talk about their jobs and make ironic jokes about other people. Back at home, he wonders why he feels so gross and empty after spending time with them, but it's mostly better than being alone.

good description of my slightly younger hipster sorta-friends lol

</comment><comment><USER26> I have lots of friends that are feeling the pain of a courter life crisis and I sometimes feel a bit of it too. I question myself with things like: Why have I not started my own startup yet? And I am really happy in my life and my job.

</comment><comment><USER27> Crikey. And I thought that baby-boomers were self-obsessed and whiny... I guess their kids are even worse.

</comment><comment><USER28> Lovely.</comment>


The performance and physics of the fish kick - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/25/water/is-this-new-swim-stroke-the-fastest-yet <comment><USER2> I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that this isn't even remotely new. Anyone who's watched the olympics knows they do the first 25-40m underwater for the butterfly or IM.

Hell, 20 years ago when I was on swim team I did the first 20m underwater. Not sure why this is "new."

Edit: yes I read the article. Doing it on your side is also not new. Has nobody ever watched the olympics?

<comment><USER3> The staying under water thing is according to the the article about 30-40 years old. That to me is extremely new. After all we've been swimming for thousands of years.

<comment><USER4> Yes... until you take into account that this is only really useful for swim races, and is not really practical for 'survival' swimming.

Its a very difficult to learn swim technique that is really only useful when you are trying to maximize your speed very slightly over a very small distance to the extent you are willing to give up your ability to breath.

'Regular' swim strokes give you the ability to continue for large distances and to breath while you swim...

<comment><USER3> But people have been doing recreational running for thousands of years. Are you implying that competitive swimming is new?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> God I hate these titles. It's potentially faster than dolphin kicking within about a foot of the surface, or in very shallow water. That's all. If you're trying to swim fast, your underwater is going to be deeper and that last foot is about the transition anyways.

So why shouldn't this be faster than freestyle? We know that deeper than a foot, this should be the same as dolphin kicking. That's the current mode of underwater competition swimming, so we have a good comparison. If dolphin kicking is faster than swimming, we'd expect to see swimmers staying underwater until the rules say they have to surface. We see that in backstroke, so underwater swimming must be faster than backstroke. We see some butterfliers go to the limits too, but not all. For sprint freestyle, however, they surface pretty much immediately, so as you could have inferred from the clickbaity title I'm calling bullshit.

<comment><USER6> I know absolutely nothing about swimming, so forgive me if this sounds dumb, but I don't feel like current competitive trends is evidence against this new technique. It's very possible that top swimmers are at a local maxima.

New techniques being discovered and transforming the competitive scene has happened at least two times in other sports - high jump and long distance running.

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

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cliff_Young_(athlete)#The_Youn...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cliff_Young_\(athlete\)#The_Young_Shuffle)

<comment><USER7> The catch here is that in competitive swimming, as mentioned in the article, FINA said that you can not go past ~15m underwater from the start or turns. The reason was that it is faster. Since they block that from being too long then they effectively prevent changes to the strokes from taking advantage of that too much. So while it's faster, possibly, it's not really possible to be used.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for helping me understand. I wonder if the popularity of new techniques would put pressure to change the rules.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This isn't new. At all. And they even say so in the article - what a terrible title.

This has _always_ been the fastest and best way to kick when underwater when appropriate for the stroke (In this case - anything but breaststroke, and ensuring you're not completely on your side if doing it during backstroke.) There's a reason why there are markers on the lanes for how far you can go underwater - otherwise swimmers would be underwater all the way until the next wall.

</comment><comment><USER9> I was disappointed (particularly given the title) not to see a comparison against freestyle swim times. The other strokes are essentially handicapped events - they measure how fast you can go given certain specific restrictions on what you can do. In some cases, those restrictions didn't anticipate underwater swimming, so that loophole was exploited (particularly in back stroke and breast stroke, where the rules resulted in slower times than free and fly). But for freestyle, where there are (almost) no restrictions on the style of stroke, does this fish-style of underwater swimming provide any advantage? I am curious if anyone is aware of a comparison.

<comment><USER10> The advantage is that you aren't fighting against the surface tension of the water. The disadvantages are that you can't breathe, or use your arms.

In my (admittedly dated) experience, a good crawl stroke (what is usually used in freestyle events) will beat the underwater dolphin kick, because the arms create a remarkable amount of forward power.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The woman in the photos is wearing swim fins, which makes an enormous difference.

Give a freestyle swimmer the same fins and (s)he'll blow the underwater swimmer away.

<comment><USER12> In the first video, where she's winning the race against others doing butterfly, she's not wearing swim fins so far as I can tell.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Looks as if somebody was watching too much tv in the 1970/80s.

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

</comment><comment><USER14> I wonder if the vortices from the fish kick would interfere with the swimming of the competitor the next lane over.

<comment><USER10> Yup, like birds (or planes) in formation fighting against the wingtip vortexes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's really hard to find and apples to apples comparison in practice. The fastest 50m swim on record is 20.91. The fastest underwater dolphin kick, different from the one in the article, is 23.10 [1]. These aren't super fair comparisons for many reasons but one major one is that the underwater has a slower start. Probably a better comparison is world record for 50m backstroke which is 24.04. I imagine if there were any olympic underwater race (be it fish or dolphin kick), it could probably get close to and possibly overtake the freestyle record, but it would probably take a few years.

[1][https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EFjQDgIfKM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EFjQDgIfKM)

</comment><comment><USER16> Curious why actual dolphins didn't evolve to use it. I'd guess it's some combination of horizontal vs. vertical stroke only mattering in the top meter of depth, and issues besides raw swim efficiency.

<comment><USER17> One reason may be that cetaceans evolved from land mammals that had evolved spine-flexing in the vertical plane as part of a galloping gait.

<comment><USER18> I think this is it. They should change the blueprint of their body and rotate eyes and snorkel by 90°. A pretty major adjustment.

This also means we could teach something about swimming to dolphins :-)

<comment><USER19> > A pretty major adjustment.

True, although flounders manage a similar 90° rotation, including migrating one of their eyes to the opposite side of their head during their early life.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flounder#Eye_migration](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flounder#Eye_migration)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> It's fascinating, and I've always wondered about the emergence of new strokes as we begin to understand bio- and fluid-mechanics better

That said, I can't see myself doing a 2.4km swim using this stroke :-/

</comment><comment><USER21> I wonder to what extent certain strokes "sabotage" other racers, since the individual lanes are really just markings overlaid on the same body of water.

</comment><comment><USER22> In summary swim like a tuna and not a dolphin by doing your underwater dolphin kick on the side.

</comment><comment><USER23> I have to try this next time I'm in the pool. I already kick ass with butterfly, so I should be able to test this theory pretty well.

<comment><USER22> I upvoted you for being good a butterfly.

Edit: It's a hypothesis you muscle head.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I wish they had an underwater sprint in the olympics. It would be great to really test how fast people can go in water.

</comment><comment><USER25> I've been using a similar dolphin kick when scuba diving just for playful fun in the water.</comment>


Internal Facebook Note: Here Is A "Psychological Trick" To Target Teens - <AUTHOR> https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanmac/facebooks-teens-tbh-psychological-trick-memo <comment><USER4> That One Weird Trick:

> We eventually identified a psychological trick:

> 1\. Set the app's Instagram profile to Private.

> 2\. Set the bio to something mysterious, e.g., "You've been invited to the > new RHS app—stay tuned!"

> 3\. Follow the targeted users.

> 4\. Wait 24 hours to receive the inbound Follow Requests. (They were curious > about our profile so they requested access)

> 5\. At 4:00PM when school gets out (The Golden Launch HouseTM), add the App > Store URL to the profile.

> 6\. Finally, make the profile Public

> This notified all students at the same time that their Follow Request had > been accepted—and they subsequently visited our profile, looked at our App > Store page, and tried the app.

What Happened Next probably won't Shock You!

<comment><USER5> Students hate them!

<comment><USER6> * _Teachers_ hate them!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > TBH noticed that teens often list their high school in their Instagram bio. > So, using a private Instagram account of its own, the company would visit a > school's location page and follow all accounts that included the school's > name.

The idea of a company targeting and following individual high school students on instagram does feel a bit "off" to me. If facebook or any other billion dollar public company were doing this, a bit of public uproar would not be out of line, even if it is perfectly legal.

But it sounds like TBH stopped doing this after they were acquired by FB, claiming that the methods were too "scrappy" for a big company. While facebook is of course now ultimately responsible for any actions that TBH took in the past, trying to make a big stink about it after they have already stopped (and using misleading headlines to boot) feels a bit disingenuous.

EDIT: I initially missed the fact that TBH was essentially pretending to be affiliated with the school of the kids they were targeting, by creating a new account per school and saying things like "You've been invited to the new <school name here> app—stay tuned!" (A fairly dumb oversight on my part as that's essentially the whole point of the story). This is indeed hugely deceitful and having re-read the article it changes my opinion entirely. Facebook should be banning companies that pull stunts like this instead of buying them out for millions. I would like to see Facebook issue a statement clarifying their position on these kinds of marketing ploys, update terms of use if necessary to prevent them, and also probably issue an apology.

<comment><USER8> Isn't that how Facebook got started: by creating networks based around schools? I don't see the big deal, especially if the school isn't developing new communication tools for students.

<comment><USER9> I think OP's beef is high school vs college.

<comment><USER10> Are highschoolers considered not able to make their own decisions in the US? In my country, high school means you're 15 and up, and that means that you're basically an adult, with some exceptions (both de facto and de iure); then depending on how much you actually act as an adult, you're allowed to do _things_. E.g. it's possible to ask a judge to allow you to start a company; all contracts you enter are legally binding if it's reasonable that you understood them, etc.

<comment><USER11> _Are highschoolers considered not able to make their own decisions in the US? In my country, high school means you 're 15 and up, and that means that you're basically an adult_

In the U.S., high school is 13+, depending on when the student was born.

Age of adulthood is 18.

<comment><USER12> I thought age of adulthood was 21 in the US? You can't drink till then or enter a lot of places alone?

<comment><USER13> You stop being a minor at 18 for legal purposes, but there are still random restrictions on what you can do (like drinking or buying handguns) until 21.

It makes about as much sense as it sounds like.

<comment><USER14> Yeah, at 18 you don't have enough sense to drink alcohol responsibly, but you are allowed to vote. This shows how little this country thinks of voting.

<comment><USER11> I think it has to do with 18 also being the age you can be drafted and sent to war. Theoretically, it keeps the politicians who send people to war answerable to those people.

It's also worth noting that until recently the drinking age varied from state to state. I grew up in New York and it was 19.

The uniform 21 age didn't come about until pressure groups like MADD went after the politicians. I believe that the feds ended up tying a 21 mandate to highway funding. (The same trick that's used to keep the public schools in line.)

And since we're on driving, the driving age varies from state to state, as well. It's as low as 16 in South Dakota. Most states it's 18, but lowered in "hardship" cases, like farm families where the kids might need to drive a tractor across a public road to get from field to field.

In South Dakota you can get a permit at 14.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driver%27s_licenses_in_the_Uni...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driver%27s_licenses_in_the_United_States)

<comment><USER15> Most states allow driving by yourself without an adult at 16, but usually have some sort of restriction like curfew until 18: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driver%27s_licenses_in_the_Uni...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driver%27s_licenses_in_the_United_States)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This seems fairly benign. What's giving it the coverage and negative feedback here is the fact that somebody call it a 'psychological trick'.

Is an ice cream truck playing music and slowing rolling down your street on a hot summer day also a psychological trick we need to guard against? Accounting for human congregations and 'appealing to their curiosity' is a part of the human existence.

Downloading junk is also a life lesson, they will learn.

<comment><USER17> > Downloading junk is also a life lesson, they will learn.

Mega-corporation - with deep pockets, professional advice, etc - <USER3> teenagers and does targeted personalized campaign, it is teenagers fault to fall for it... I see a "blame the victim" attitude here.

> Is an ice cream truck playing music and slowing rolling down your street on > a hot summer day also a psychological trick we need to guard against?

The truck guy does not know my name, the school I go to or any other data beyond that I am in the neighborhood and can hear the sound or see the truck. The truck is fishing.

Facebook is collecting personalized data, creating profiles and targeting unsuspecting minors that feel "special" for being chosen without knowing the reasons.

> TBH described its methods as "too 'scrappy'" for a big company.

So the same company that had the idea has the same concerns about it.

There is somethings that are not-so-bad (but bad) when done in an small scale, but become horrible at a bigger scale.

<comment><USER18> > > Downloading junk is also a life lesson, they will learn.

> Mega-corporation - with deep pockets, professional advice, etc - <USER3> > teenagers and does targeted personalized campaign, it is teenagers fault to > fall for it... I see a "blame the victim" attitude here.

You're really extrapolating quite a straw man from the original statement there. There's a lot of people out there that want to (and will, if given the change) scam you. Arguing that it's better to learn that in a way that at least doesn't lose you any actual money is not the same as blaming people who fall for it and/or implying that they deserve it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The irony is that this article is using a psychological trick to get us to read basically a non-story about how a startup tried to acquire users using not really a psychological trick.

"Facebook's Teen App" really means "Third Party App Facebook Eventually Acquired"

<comment><USER20> It's Buzzfeed. Their entire existence is based on psychological tricks. Ironic indeed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I don't think this practice is shady in any way or manipulative like what Facebook has done in several instances. They used some techniques to raise curiosity and get some engagement. That's just Marketing 101, with the execution method being different for this target.

Also, so much fluff to get to the point? Buzzfeed, these articles could be much better reads with some editing to cut down the length, avoiding repeating points a few times and getting to the crux of the matter quickly.

<comment><USER22> > Also, so much fluff to get to the point? Buzzfeed, these articles could be > much better reads with some editing to cut down the length, avoiding > repeating points a few times and getting to the crux of the matter quickly.

Buzzfeed's "News" Articles Used Psychological Tricks To Make Teens Think They Were More In-Depth and Professional Journalism-y Than They Actually Are

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> The entire field of marketing is hinged on applied psychology. The way that this article frames basic marketing techniques in a negative light simply because Facebook used them is the pinnacle of sensationalism.

<comment><USER24> I don't disagree, but I think it commands a certain level of "is this really good for us long term?" to ask if the fact that hundreds if not thousands of PhD holding scientists have had their collective efforts devoted to making people buy as much, download as much, consume as much, watch as much, etc. as they possibly can?

I mean marketing is marketing and always has been, but where it is today the Mad Men era marketing guys couldn't have DREAMED of having. You can now target demographics with laser precision and choose the exact sort of message that's going to hit the hardest. I mean I'm all for marketing fluff and a certain level of salesmanship, that's what capitalism is based on. But you've got actual scientists putting their best foot forward to get Joe Everyman to buy, download, watch, play, stream, etc. and all the discussions I see about this paint it as even odds. That's laughable. Joe doesn't stand a fucking chance, and we all know it, and we all just keep acting like that's ok.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Every time I see an article condemning Facebook, there's always a Facebook share button visible.

<comment><USER26> And now you can even get them on Twitter! [https://2fb.me](https://2fb.me) what a time to plug my app to the unsuspecting HN crowd.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> In order to reduce the likelihood my child is victimized online by questionable corporate behavior, I've redirected facebook.com to infowars.com in /etc/hosts.

<comment><USER28> I can't begin to express my horror at the idea of a well-meaning parent funneling their child into a pit of abhorrent fear-mongering, bigotry, and conspiracy theories. I sincerely hope this was a weird joke.

<comment><USER29> I bet it was a weird joke in the hacker sense --- however "not even wrong" the content of InfoWars is, you have to admit that it _is_ a lot more thought- provoking than Facebook.

<comment><USER28> I don't disagree with blocking children from Facebook. Replacing it with InfoWars would be a medicine that's worse than the disease.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> The trick itself isn't very shitty, but some of the mentality is:

"Our team obsessed with finding ways to get individual high schools to adopt a product simultaneously."

Seriously? getting a bunch of kids to adopt a product is what you want to obsess about? How about helping companies make a product that's not shit so you don't have to trick kids into using it.

<comment><USER31> To be fair, all the toys/consoles have been similarly marketed to a bunch of kids (for example during after school hours) for a long time without anyone getting pissed off. It's just marketing. This doesn't really seem like a "psychological" trick to me.

<comment><USER30> Toys are marketed so you buy something that's (hopefully) fun.

Apps are marketed and given away for free to collect data on how to influence children. In many cases they're designed to be habit forming or addicting.

<comment><USER31> But we are talking about the marketing aspect of it here and not the utility of the product.

<comment><USER30> The utility of the product is data harvesting

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> It always amazes me how long Buzzfeed can hold off the actual content of the article with useless banter without seemingly losing readers. The title mentions 'a psychological trick', but delays the actual explanation of the 'trick' until the very end of the article.

<comment><USER14> As someone said above, the title of the article is a psychological trick itself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> So they did grassroots marketing? Like when a barber shop creates an Instagram profile to get the word out..

</comment><comment><USER33> Talk about a rag. That article is 95% priming you what to think and 5% information. The audacity to to call out other media companies for psychological trickery is astounding. The phrase the pot calling the kettle black doesn't do it justice.

</comment><comment><USER34> How do kids have a shot at a non-fragmented attention span when companies target them like this? I'm not suggesting this is anything new in marketing, but having social media app 1 feed into social media app 2 feed into etc... I fear it's harmful to society on a whole in the long run.

</comment><comment><USER35> Given this article is on 'buzzfeed' is definitely a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

</comment><comment><USER36> The irony of Buzzfeed talking about psychological tricks lmao.

</comment><comment><USER37> Hilarious that this is being reported on by BuzzFeed

</comment><comment><USER38> Parents, uncles and grandparents getting on Facebook and other social media is basically the end of social media for teens/youngsters.

The one true thing teens want is freedom from parents and other relatives: they mostly represent a repressive force (positive or negative is not the issue) and they want to interact with other teens freely.

</comment><comment><USER39> Articles like this make me want to switch from engineering to marketing - there's so much innovation and potential for creative solutions in this field that not may people are actually aware of.

By the way, what's Facebook Quick Promotion that they mention? Is this a special kind of ad on Facebook?

</comment><comment><USER40> Everything about FB has been psych tactics since day one. This is not unique to FB, though they do have a fascinating resemblance to all the tests I took in the military, broken down into smaller pieces which I think the military could learn from.

</comment><comment><USER41> I guess we all forgot that time way back when Gmail was invite-only and you had to beg someone for a way in.

</comment><comment><USER42> What a dirty trick I must say.

<comment><USER43> What makes it dirty?

<comment><USER44> Information asymmetry.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> I see they have not mentioned the methodology of the said psychological trick anywhere</comment>


Ask HN: What can I do to get into a good MSc program from an unknown university? - <AUTHOR> I will graduate from university in mid-2019, with a CGPA of 8.6/10. Thing is, I don't have anything that distinguishes me from other candidates. Undergrads usually don't do any research here and my CGPA isn't exceptional.
But, I'd like to pursue a data science MSc from a good university. So what can I do to improve my chances?
So far, I came up with the following ideas:
- Improving competitive programming skills and rating in contests like those found on Codeforces, HackerRank, LeetCode (not sure if anyone besides Russians values these a lot).
- Pursue MOOCs and MicroMaster programs on EDx and Coursera from top US universities like MIT, Uni Michigan, Uni San Diego etc. ( I can apply for financial aid because I live in the poorest region of Europe )
- Do Data Science competitions on websites like Kaggle.
- Build a portfolio by developing my own or working on others open source projects.
Are any of these good to improve my chances even slightly? Or are there other methods that could help? Thanks in advance.
EDIT: I'm still in my home country and my main focus is Europe or Asia, since I'm poor already and can't handle student debt at all or the cost of living in the US. <comment><USER2> I have a lot of experience in academia, ranging from management to teaching to doing research and over a long period of time.

In academia the only thing that impresses is academic accomplishments. All the things that you are contemplating are unlikely to be of any value in the eyes of bureaucrats doing admissions.

You don't mention whether you are still in your home country or have moved to another country. In addition to the many world class universities in the USA there are several very well regarded CS/SE universities in Germany and France. If you are determined to move to the USA you need to be aware that in order to succeed you need good English language skills. The cost of education (even with financial aid) is very high.

If I were in your position, then I would choose to do a final year, capstone project/thesis which is very much in the field of data science. I would also research data science programmes being offered and identify who the course leaders are. Then with that information you would write tailored emails to them explaining what you are seeking, why and what you intend to accomplish. The personal contact and possible introductions could ease your path towards admission.

The common aphorism "It is not what you know, it is who you know" applies to all fields, including academia.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm still living in my home country until I graduate. I'd rather move to some other European country (I'm fluent in German and proficient enough in English, although some more practice wouldn't hurt and I'm working on it as of now).

Thanks for the idea, I'll try to do something that is related to data science for my bachelor thesis.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Web app where hourly employees can "clock in"? - <AUTHOR>

There's got to be a sweet web app to replace the old clock card machine. Any suggestions? <comment><USER2> We make MinuteDock (<http://minutedock.com>). More of a standard time-tracking program than a clock-card machine, but serves the same purpose </shamelessplug> ;)

</comment><comment><USER3> <http://minutedock.com>?

</comment><comment><USER4> I have experience with TimeForce, and it was pretty easy from an IT perspective. We used a digital punch in box, and then had it networked back to our main office from two locations.

The technological challenge is already solved. You could do something similar like www.hipmunk.com, and basically solve the social and interface problems.

We ended up pulling the system out of there for social reasons. Time clocks hurt morale.

</comment><comment><USER5> <http://trails.es> is a little too I designed to fill this void. It's unfinished and thus free, but it works and I use to every day. Just dont try to drag tasks from one list to another. It'll light our server on fire (not really, it simply breaks your account until its been manually fixed ;)e Feedback is welcome.

</comment><comment><USER6> There are hundreds of these. Web clock, physical clock, phone or mobile? Need to track client hours, or just in/out times? Some combination?

At <http://www.TimeForge.com> we handle both software and hardware clocks, along with integration for retail / restaurants.

</comment><comment><USER7> At work we use Kronos. It supports both card swipes and online log-ins. I do work for a University, so it's a pretty big employee base. Though I actually prefer to swipe my ID to clock in and out. It's easier to get into the habit. Currently I clock in and out online and I forget at least 2 or 3 punches a month.

</comment><comment><USER8> So many companies use big names like ADP or Paychex for processing that it just makes sense to use their systems to clock hours. I'm familiar with clocking in at ADP. It works, but its not pretty. It might make sense to have a small scale app for smaller companies that don't use big guys in the room.

</comment><comment><USER9> Time Force has some browser and mobile-based time clocks available at the bottom of the page:

[http://www.mytimeforce.com/time-clocks/time-clocks-by- type.p...](http://www.mytimeforce.com/time-clocks/time-clocks-by-type.php)

</comment><comment><USER10> We've been using <http://getcashboard.com> for more than two years. It's terrific. It does invoicing and a bunch of other stuff in addition to time tracking.

</comment><comment><USER11> <http://www.clicktime.com>

I wrote the industry's first Ajax-powered punch clock for them many years ago and it's since been improved quite a bit.

<comment><USER12> What are you working on now?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> We use <http://www.slimtimer.com> at work and we're very happy with it.

</comment><comment><USER14> We use <http://timetrex.com/>. I think they may have a hosted solution.

</comment><comment><USER15> <http://www.timeclockonline.com>

</comment><comment><USER16> <http://www.clockspot.com/> kinda

<comment><USER12> Why kinda? :) (Full disclosure - I work there)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Clockspot.com - but I'm bias cause I work here :)

</comment><comment><USER17> Can't believe noone said Harvest yet.

</comment><comment><USER18> paychex offers this service as well

</comment><comment><USER19> clockingit.com</comment>


Why on freelance sites, market isn't friendly to companies, and how to fix? - <AUTHOR>

Some data points:
1) On odesk.com, when you post a job, you have a radio button 'freelancers and companies can apply' and 'only freelancers can apply'. There isn't even an option 'only companies can apply'! While IRL, most companies outsourcing some work would not even talk to a person, normally a contract can be signed only with a company.
2) On elance.com and odesk.com, there is a complex set of rules (which are anyways frequently broken or circumvented) which prevent companies from impersonating individuals, while there are no rules against the contrary - individual acting as a company - and nobody seems to be interested in doing so. All contractor companies are real, but many individual contractors are fakes, indicating that the market prefers individuals. While IRL, it is common for people to open one-person companies (and there was even a popular HN article about it, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6727378, a few days back), and that seems to work, while companies pretending to be people is unheard of.
3) Overwhelming majority of work on all freelance sites is done by individuals, while IRL, this is not the case, there is almost always a corporate entity between customer and person doing the job.
Why? In your opinion, what in this market is broken causing such a strong difference from the 'normal' run of things we see in the economy as a whole? Or isn't it the problem, just a new norm?
Why on freelance sites, market isn't friendly to companies, and how to fix? <comment><USER2> >Why on freelance sites, market isn't friendly to companies, and how to fix?<

\- Supply and demand varies in different markets \- Quality of freelancers and employers varies in different markets \- Freelance sites need to create loyal followers

</comment><comment><USER3> Maybe because in the rest of the world, the market isn't friendly to freelancers but companies?</comment>


Designing a New Look for Instagram, Inspired by the Community - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@ianspalter/designing-a-new-look-for-instagram-inspired-by-the-community-84530eb355e3#.niu7wkjcg <comment><USER2> I think the old icon is very 'iconic' and to ditch that may be a mistake.</comment>


The Cost of Fixing Things - <AUTHOR> https://cate.blog/2019/02/06/the-cost-of-fixing-things/ <comment><USER2> Her entire blog is a goldmine.

Consider: [https://cate.blog/2019/05/08/where-do-you-start-when-a- team-...](https://cate.blog/2019/05/08/where-do-you-start-when-a-team-is- broken/)

</comment><comment><USER3> So, take care of yourself, even when your job is to take care of others, and be aware of your limits. Makes sense to me.

I appreciated the pointers to the other aspects of burnout beyond overwork.

<comment><USER4> We should not be tied up by our work although the society thinks that it is what defines us. In that situation, the best solution is to find another job where you do not have to do 'firefighting' all the time, life is too short to be sacrificed for that.

It's kind of frustating when you care for others, but they do not appreciate your effort. Well, big corporations care about profit, not about the employees. Try to find smaller companies or do your own business.

Wish her the best

<comment><USER5> I worked with a person like that, in a Security Incident Response role where we were interesting enough that the attacks always started when 'The Americans are celebrating another of their silly holidays'. It meant working through Thanksgiving, Xmas, New Years, and Easter.

It was good that I did it...so that I can recognize the parameters and never do it again.

But the person I worked with is still there, still defined by that job, still running scared, and damn...that's just all kinds of messed up.

<comment><USER3> I remember my learning moment. I worked 96 hours in one week to desperately save a project where the team had fallen apart. I was rewarded with a t-shirt and a six pack of beer.

Never again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is one of those articles where a bunch of people will find solace in the fact that they are not alone, despite not actually coming away with a plan to correct it. There's no real advice in here worth taking that isn't already pretty obvious to anyone that can step back from their circumstances for a moment, and this sort of information is offered in thousands of similar articles.

I can obviously relate to the author regarding a deteriorating work-life balance, and a lot of us have become burnt out or at least experienced intense stress at work. Nothing in this piece makes me believe that she has _fixed_ the problem, and it's not healthy to continue until you break, dropping everything and going on a "walkabout" to some distant place for awhile to pretend like you've solved a problem.

I found it telling that she claims to be a values-oriented person, and yet also a self-proclaimed atheist. People like her should actually try finding themselves again through religion. I'm not even suggesting a specific religion. You don't have to be a believer to gain value by setting aside time to reflect on your life, values, relationships, and why you are here. It also helps to associate yourself with other people that are searching for answers to these things. The lack of religion in people's life is a big contributor to the feeling of a lack of purpose and it allows you to become increasingly unbalanced in life as you prioritize work and material things over what's really important.

<comment><USER7> I have to respectfully disagree with your point about religion. Plenty of people find values and meaning without it being through religion. I think there is a tendency for anyone who has found something that makes them happy to automatically prescribe it for anyone who is unhappy, and it isn't one- size-fits-all. Kudos for not insisting on your religion of choice however.

Edit: I do think that the community that comes with religions is enviable. I wish that there were more non-religious groups around that would dedicate themselves to the same reflection, mutual support, and togetherness that religions traditionally bring to the table.

<comment><USER8> I'll respectfully agree with both of you.

For the past decade or so I've struggled immensely with finding meaning outside of religion. I've made progress, and I do believe it's possible.

But it's still an open question for me. Even now, a decade or so since losing my faith, I've not found a replacement that satisfies me. I feel I have the luxury to keep looking, but if I had kids or a significant other, I might consider some degree of religiosity again.

Having experimented with all sorts of 'surrogates' to the experience of being in a deeply religious community, I can conclude none of them so far make it work. For various reasons.

I'm not sure where that leaves me now. All I'm saying is that I've not found anything non-religious that comes close to what my religious community offered me. And progressive experience has only made me more pessimistic about this. Perhaps there are other things to focus on, or perhaps I've just not looked in the right places.

But it can be somewhat lonely to talk to people who have not shared my experience, because they just don't know what they're missing.

EDIT: I'm not saying people can't find meaning without religion. Rather, I've not met a single person who had a good, religious background who has not been left somewhat empty by the alternatives. It's mostly been those who were never religious, or who were semi-religious, who seemed to be okay with whatever alternative they found.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I read the first few paragraphs and skimmed some more. There's nothing of value to be found here, just a long incoherent rant.

<comment><USER10> Wow. This is a really harsh assessment. I hope Cate never reads this thread.

But seriously, why did you read this article in the first place? What were you expecting? Rather than assessing this article as a how-to guide, which it seems the responses on this thread are doing, perhaps you should read this as a different genre. Cate clearly experienced some significant hardship relating to her work and she's attempting to share her discoveries on this journey with the sole purpose of trying to help others who are on the same path.

The story will be necessarily (and intentionally, as she spells out in the article) intertwined the take-aways in order to provide context for the learning.

As someone who has been through some rough experiences in life, I'm deeply appreciative of Cate's courage and vulnerability in writing this. Bad shit happens in life and when someone is willing to talk about their pain and how they're healing and what they've learned, I've found that it's best to just shut up and listen. This is not the time for critique.

Bravo, Cate.

<comment><USER11> > Bad shit happens in life and when someone is willing to talk about their > pain and how they're healing and what they've learned, I've found that it's > best to just shut up and listen. This is not the time for critique.

Maybe between friends this is good advice, but posting something online is fair game for critique.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: YCombinator's SAFE for UK? - <AUTHOR> YC's SAFE (Simple Agreement for Future Equity) is a great document to simplify raising on a convertible note. The version on the documents section is for companies incorporated in Delaware.<p>Are there any UK companies that have used SAFE and if so, is there a version of the document for UK incorporated companies? <comment><USER2> Seedcamp have produced standard docs including termsheets for the UK: [http://seedsummit.org/](http://seedsummit.org/)

IANAL so can't definitively answer your question, however I believe you'd need UK legal docs.</comment>


Two new Behavior-Driven Development libraries for Objective-C (Nu/MacRuby) - <AUTHOR>

Last week I have released two BDD [1] libraries based on Bacon [2] (a RSpec clone) optimized for NSRunloop environments. They should both still be considered 'beta', but I want to get the word out so adventurous people can start scrutinizing, err improving ;-)
* NuBacon [3]: A port of Bacon to the Nu programming language [4], but rewritten in such a way that it properly works in a runloop based environment. This means that running the specs does not halt the main thread and specs can schedule blocks with assertions on the runloop for later execution. For now it's only in time (seconds), but this could be extended to use KVO to trigger running the block of assertions etc. I'm still working on the iOS runner, but there is a bug with Nu on iOS that I have to work on first. However, if you do want to try this out please let me know.
* MacBacon [5]: A fork of Bacon, for MacRuby, with the exact same runloop-aware code I implemented in NuBacon backported to MacRuby. Nota that I haven't used this code in a project yet, but needed it for a project I'm starting on today. (If that's not test-first I don't know what is.)
Once I have done proper releases I'll write a few tutorials.
[1] http://behaviour-driven.org [2] https://github.com/chneukirchen/bacon [3] https://github.com/alloy/NuBacon [4] http://programming.nu [5] https://github.com/alloy/MacBacon <comment><USER2> For people who want to try Nu, I haven't had much luck compiling 0.4. You probably want to try getting it from Github: <https://github.com/timburks/nu.git></comment>


Quitting everything to go to Nepal was the best thing I've done. - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/travel-writers/f753fa208322

<comment><AUTHOR>
       ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ _________ ____ ____ ____ ____
      ||s |||e |||k |||i |||n |||g |||       |||w |||o |||r |||k ||
      ||__|||__|||__|||__|||__|||__|||_______|||__|||__|||__|||__||
      |/__\|/__\|/__\|/__\|/__\|/__\|/_______\|/__\|/__\|/__\|/__\|

</comment><comment><USER2> Why is it that you can only find purpose for your life so far away on the other side of the world?

Why is it that nobody from Nepal or Tibet ever come here for the same? They come here only seeking material wealth.

I am baffled by this.

<comment><AUTHOR> Two different sides of the same coin (of romanticism)?</comment></comment>


Best Lawyers for Credit Card Skimming Lawsuit - <AUTHOR> http://gasstationfraud.blogspot.com/2016/04/best-lawyers-for-credit-card-skimming.html <comment><AUTHOR> With credit card skimming becoming so rampant, it is important that you protect your interests by engaging the services of skilled lawyers who can ensure that you emerge from the entire incident without any real losses to contend with.

[http://www.gasstationfraud.com/](http://www.gasstationfraud.com/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Hacker News is not the kind of place you want to build your shady backlinking campaign on, Mr GasStationFraudLawyer.</comment>


Ask HN: What's with that black bar at the top? - <AUTHOR> Anybody noticed that new black bar at the top of HN? Here's its HTML:

  <tr>
    <td bgcolor="#000000">
      <img src="s.gif" height="5" width="0">
    </td>
  </tr>
 s.gif is a single (1x1) white pixel <comment><USER2> It's used to pay respect to a recently deceased tech person. In this case, Larry Tesler: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22361282](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22361282)

In the past, we've had it for Steve Jobs and Aaron Swartz, among others.

<comment><USER3> and Bert Sutherland:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22370667](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22370667)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I assume this: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22361282](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22361282)

Dunno why this afternoon, and that story, rather than the 4 or more other links that cycled through since yesterday.</comment>


Show HN: WordPress Cloud IDE - <AUTHOR> https://wpide.net <comment><USER2> Whoa, that seems amazing. It is great that someone is trying to reduce the pain of dealing with Wordpress. At the other side, I secretly wished that Wordpress was a little worse so programmers would stop using it.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is really interesting. When I work on Wordpress stuff I switch from emacs to PhpStorm because I like the autocomplete, features, auto formatting etc. This would be a really nice replacement for that.

However the Wordpress project I work on has to have access to node to run gulp to compile coffeescript and sass. How would that work in this scenario? I also keep the dev/staging sites in sync with production using wp-cli import/export -- could I run commands remotely? I suspect not, but am curious.

<comment><AUTHOR> You can have ssh access, that's not yet implemented but it's on the list. All the instances run in their own private containers so you can install other apps if you want.

<comment><USER3> That's great. I look forward to getting access!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Very interesting, I'm looking forward to seeing a live demo or video. Code completion for the Wordpress Api would be a real time saver.

<comment><USER5> As of version 8 PhpStorm offers that, along with a bunch of other nice stuff for WP development. More details here: [https://confluence.jetbrains.com/display/PhpStorm/WordPress+...](https://confluence.jetbrains.com/display/PhpStorm/WordPress+Development+using+PhpStorm)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> since the program isn't available yet, perhaps a video teaser would be nice. many times in lieu of a demo I'll just watch the video to see if an app has what I am looking for.

either way, this is definitely something I could / might use and I signed up.

</comment><comment> slipstream- This looks interesting, and it may be something I'll use in the future.

Something which I find a little annoying with WordPress development is making admin UIs, to me it always seem repetitive, copy+paste work etc. Would your IDE help with that?

</comment><comment><USER7> Does this plays nice with a modern wordpress stack like bedrock or any 12factor wp?

[https://github.com/roots/bedrock](https://github.com/roots/bedrock)

<comment><AUTHOR> It's not yet integrated with roots, it will have ssh access to the machine so you can install other applications but we will look more into this. Thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Could this be used to collaborate on WordPress Core? I'm interested in start doing that but the setup process (installing VVV, Vagrant, VirtualBox, etc.) is a little cumbersome.

<comment><USER9> I am wondering other items like integration to Github or how to deployment to a wordpress site etc. I can't see these items on their landing page. Any ideas?

<comment><AUTHOR> Right now you can export or download site+database. We have git integration and deployment via FTP/SFTP on the list.</comment></comment></comment>


Sound and fury: how pronunciation provokes passionate reactions - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jan/13/pronunciation-complaints-phonetics-sounds-appealing-david-crystal <comment><USER2> I always feel weird correctly mispronouncing (?) words I know are imported, for example "Einstein" instead of "Einshtein".

While you could get away with "Einshtein", though most folks would think you're pedantic, you really can't for words with less well-known origins. For example most people pronounce "hagiography" with a "hay" sound instead of a "haw" sound, as in Greek ἁγία (hágia). But if you said "hawgiography" people would think you don't know English.

<comment><USER3> It gets worse. A decade ago, Obama actually got political heat for pronouncing the names of countries, the same way their inhabitants do.

Language has evolved far far beyond its original roots as a medium for communication, and has now become a symbol of political identity. _" If you pronounce words differently, well, you must clearly not share our values."_

[https://www.economist.com/blogs/johnson/2010/09/barack_obama](https://www.economist.com/blogs/johnson/2010/09/barack_obama)

<comment><USER4> Which is correct is a difficult line to draw though to some extent. Whilst altering the pronunciation of Pakistan makes some sense (because it's the same word), pronouncing a country the same way as the inhabitants is not necessary correct in English -- you'd probably get some sideways glances if you starting insisting on Nippon for Japan or Deutschland for Germany (or even México for Mexico to some extent).

I'd also say that language as a political/shared identity is not a new phenomenon.

<comment><USER5> Or, conversely imagine Chinese saying "The United States of America" rather than "mei guo" (美国 - mĕiguó), or Mexicans saying "The United States of America" instead of "Los rstados unidos", etc., etc.

It's ridiculous to think you should pronounce the name of any geographic entity by the way the people native to the area do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's interesting how some clever people pronounce a few words differently because they've been reading way ahead of what they have the opportunity to converse about.

<comment><USER7> I did this with the word 'awry'. I read it as aww-ree. Interestingly I _also_ knew the word 'awry' as eh-rye from hearing it spoken, I just didnt connect up that the two were the same word.

<comment><USER8> I distinctly remember saying "IN-tri-gyou-ing" (intriguing) for a bit as a kid.

<comment><USER9> Rather than "infra-red", I said "inf-rare-d" as a child.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I once saw a YouTube video in which the vlogger consistently mispronounced the title of the game _Heretic_ as though it rhymed with "magnetic". And he did this with at least one other word ("requiem")! Hearing him mis-accent these words was like nails on chalkboard. It's like where have you been, that you're reading these words for the first time, _just now_?

<comment><USER11> I've caught myself doing this with more obscure (to me) words—ones that I only encountered in text and not in spoken conversation. Debian was one ("DEE-bee- an"). I was talking to a friend one day about it when I first started using Linux ("LIE-niks"!), and he was amused by my innocence :)

> _And he did this with at least one other word ( "requiem")!_

Did he pronounce it "rek-WHY-em"? That would drive me insane.

<comment><USER4> One thing I've noticed is that if there is a word I only encounter in its written form, I only sight read it and don't pronounce it internally (I remember doing it with "Hermione" the first I read the Harry Potter series). It's almost like there's just a brief silence in my inner monologue. I can see how that might lead to odd pronunciations the first time I actually think about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Try being a Scottish kid watching TV, hearing the American kids saying "principal" as "princible" or the English ones pronouncing "drawing" as "drawringg" (or "ate" as "ett" or even worse "think" and "fink") and being told that by the world that actually _you_ are the one who speaks weird :-D

<comment><USER10> Here's one that drives me nuts (an American listening to American speech): Febyouary. Literally everybody says it and it never made sense to me.

<comment><USER9> It's just a case where the common pronunciation doesn't precisely match the spelling. How about Wednesday? Wennsday. Receipt? Island? Colonel? Do those bother you too?

<comment><USER13> > It's just a case where the common pronunciation doesn't precisely match the > spelling. How about Wednesday? Wennsday. Receipt? Island? Colonel? Do those > bother you too?

The difference is that I think that most people agree that 'Febyooary' and 'Wennsday' are incorrect pronunciations, whereas 'reseat' and 'i-land' are correct pronunciations. I don't know the stories behind these, but 'colonel' is fascinating: the reason for the pronunciation–spelling mismatch is that English used the Italian spelling (colonelle) and the French pronunciation (coronelle).

<comment><USER9> > The difference is that I think that most people agree that 'Febyooary' and > 'Wennsday' are incorrect pronunciations

Those are the most common pronunciations I hear, living in California. The U.S. and U.K. recordings on Wiktionary also omit the first "r" in February, and the "d" in Wednesday (although the UK recording seems like it has an elongated sound that implies the missing "d").

<comment><USER13> > Those are the most common pronunciations I hear, living in California.

They are also the most common in my experience, but I thought, and thought others thought, that they were nonetheless commonly judged wrong. (It is fair to argue what 'wrong' could possibly mean of pronunciation other than "what most people say", though.)

<comment><USER9> If a native speaker makes an utterance that they don't consider to have a mistake, and that other speakers of the dialect would accept as correct, then I think it's hard to say that it's wrong, even if it deviates from another dialect (and even if the dialect it deviates from is the one considered the "standard" form of the language).

Even taking it in a more linguistic prescriptivist direction though, those words _did_ often have more than one accepted pronunciation listed in various dictionaries.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The intrusive r is particularly baffling, as it's not a natural position for your mouth in the places it occurs. It's like the omitted r's in non-rhotic accents got lost and needed a place to go.

</comment><comment><USER15> As a midwesterner, I would certainly appreciate it if people would focus on the other 95% of what I said, and not that I said "bag" ("bay-g").

</comment><comment><USER16> On the question of Robots, we already have a robot accent: that digital accent that is familiar from TV and movies, which hilariously mispronounce so many wonderful words.

[https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/10/05/44...](https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/10/05/446051309/hey- siri-what-did-you-say-why-computers-still-mispronounce-names)

I do expect that one day computerised speech will be far more eloquent and sound more like HAL and less like Paranoid Android.

But what about great robot voices like Alpha 60, Hitchhiker's Marvin and Tron's Master Control Program? I hope we keep our sense of humour in the future.

<comment> Digit-Al If Sat Navs are anything to go by you'll probably be able to get downloadable voice modules to get your robot sounding like Homer Simpson or Bill Cosby (okay, maybe not Bill Cosby... ahem).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Passionate reactions about pronunciation must be a British thing. I really don't think Americans care very much unless the pronunciation is outright wrong, and probably not even then. I really can't imagine an American radio host receiving such complaints.

This is the country that gave the world "nucular" after all. (Sorry about that.)

That said, if any word in America can provoke a passionate pronunciation reaction, it's pecan:

[https://www.ourstate.com/pecan-how-do-you-say- it/](https://www.ourstate.com/pecan-how-do-you-say-it/)

</comment><comment><USER18> What is the best way to find out the accepted pronunciation of various tech project names? Is there any type of resource to make this easy (for podcasts hosts, etc.)?

This winds up being a minefield for audio content creators!

<comment><USER19> > the accepted pronunciation of various tech project names

Resque (where the readme says in the first sentence that it is pronounced like 'rescue') always bugged me. Are there any English words where 'que' at the end of a word like that makes a 'kyoo' sound? Would 'resqueue' have been such a horrible spelling?

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Linux</comment>


Ask HN: Any domain name registrars that don't require JavaScript? - <AUTHOR> I wish to manage nameservers and records via a text browser such as links, lynx or w3m.
I recall when namecheap and namesilo did not require scripts.
Anyone have current experience with a registrar free from JavaScript? <comment><USER2> Try this one. freedns.afraid.org

<comment><AUTHOR> Not a domain name registrar, but looks useful nonetheless. Looking into this. Thanks.</comment></comment>


DevDays 2011 is Cancelled - <AUTHOR> http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2011/09/devdays-2011-is-cancelled/ <comment><USER2> Nice to see Mr Spolsky taking it on the chin and not making excuses.

I would be interested in seeing an online version of any of the presentations. Pretty please ?

<comment><USER3> Agree on taking responsibility. There are a lot of excuses he could have made: economy, bad PR firm, etc. By taking blame he can now move on to fix things.

<comment><USER4> I confess I don't understand this mentality. Why do you personally care that Joel took responsibility?

<comment><USER3> If I buy something, and the vendor screws up, if they give me a bunch of excuses, I am more likely to think they'll screw up again. If the vendor takes personal responsibility, there is less chance that they'll make the same mistake again.

<comment><USER4> Ah, I didn't get that you had bought a ticket.

<comment><USER3> In full disclosure I didn't. I am just throwing out opinions from the cheap seats. :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I would have much preferred a $99 conference; I saw the announcement of this year's one and was seriously thinking of attending since I was likely to be geographically nearby this time, but $499 was really a bit much for me. I can drop $99 for a one-off day out, but $499 really seems like you need a company paying your way to it for it to be interesting. I guess this is a big difference between the nature of StackOverflow versus an Oracle Users Conference or similar.

Sounds like one major problem is that they really need Joel at the conferences for a bit of "star power", but he obviously doesn't want to spend half his year flying around to SO conferences. Not easily solved, I guess, but I hope they come up with something.

<comment><USER6> If it were me, needing to be at every location would have been a major factor contributing to this change.

Part of Joel's shtick for DevDays was that he showed how proper project management and source control (via FogBugz and Kiln) could really help a small team. Kiln was brand-new at the time, and was a big part of the demo, so I thankfully had an excuse to do the European DevDays stops to answer questions and do demos.

And it...well, it starts awesome, if you do it right: you get to see a bunch of stuff you've never seen before, you get to fly first-class if you're lucky, and you meet a bunch of brilliant people. And I think Joel really likes speaking; if you feel comfortable talking in front of a crowd, it's awesome to see all those people wanting to hear what you have to say. So in that sense, doing a pile of small DevDays is absolutely wonderful, in my opinion.

But then there's dealing with the fact that almost no venue was properly set up properly. That supplies we badly needed didn't ever quite manage to get where they needed to be in a timely manner (or, in the case of Europe, clear customs at all). That a major prop we had was going to have to be driven around London in a truck by yours truly. That we had to have SSDs FedEx'd at tremendous cost because the laptops couldn't comfortably run VMware properly, and that sometimes, it didn't really matter anyway, because something would go wrong with the projector, and you'd end up being forced to use large televisions instead. Or a speaker would cancel and be replaced at the last second by someone else, or the WiFi would just not be there even though it was absolutely required for someone's demo, or half a dozen other things. And that's just the stuff that goes wrong _at the time_ ; you're leaving out all the stuff that had to be planned beforehand.

This wore on me, and I only had just a few stops. And Joel (and I) did it two years in a row: DevDays first, and the Fog Creek World Tour second. I _have_ to imagine it wore on him, and I think that might go a long way toward explaining why he tried to consolidate the conferences.

But Joel does love travel, and I think DevDays were absolutely wonderful conferences, so that may have absolutely nothing to do with it. I think it may just be as simple as what he wrote in the post: that they tried to make it bigger and more conference-like...which in turn, made it Not Really DevDays, at which point it was competing with things like OSCON and Open Source Bridge. That's a tougher market.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Sounds like a classic case of premature scaling. [http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanfurr/2011/09/02/1-cause- of...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanfurr/2011/09/02/1-cause-of-startup- death-premature-scaling/)

</comment><comment><USER8> I love short, vigorous conferences. You get great ideas, and go home feeling energized and ready to try a bunch of new stuff you just learned.

Going to longer conferences (like WWDC, etc.) ends up causing brain fatigue after 3rd day of 5 - it's like the Gary Larson "Can I be excused? My brain is full" Far Side comic.

Also, the "hallway track" is what I get the most out of - conferences that optimize for that by offering meals and communal events on-site maximize this.

</comment><comment><USER9> It's sad, but the price really did kill it for me.

I've only ever been to a conference on my employer's dime _once_. $500 is a big gamble for me.

(I understand that companies sending devs to conferences seems to be the Done Thing in the States, but I haven't seen it happen too often in Sydney here.)

</comment><comment><USER10> Oddly enough there is another way to go. Cheap and a different city. The Lindy Hop community set up a web site to have exchanges back before 2000.

<http://lindyexchange.com/>

It caught on and has been going ever since.

Every weekend of every month there is a city throwing an exchange. You can go and stay on the cheap as people volunteer to host, and there is always incredible dancing at exchanges.

It's closer to vacation/meetup. Of course ... Swing dancing is inherently a party.

</comment><comment><USER11> DevDays 2.0 really seemed to be out of touch with the original DevDays concept.

As Joel says in the post, $99 was a good amount for someone to be able to just take a day off work and pay for the conference themselves. Had I not lost my job in mid-2009, I was seriously considering attending the one in Toronto. I could have planned a trip home at the same time, and just stopped over in Toronto rather than immediately grabbing a second - considerably smaller - plane the rest of the way.

Even had there been a DevDays Toronto again this time, it would have been out of my price range to attend, and it would have meant finding accommodations for a night and all that goes with that. I couldn't have justified it to myself at all.

Good on Joel, though, for straight-up admitting to the problems with the new conferences, rather than manufacturing excuses.

</comment><comment><USER12> Could this be the consequence of fewer updates to Joel on Software? Less pull with the community?

</comment><comment><USER13> Tangential, but a good point was made that some people had booked flights and accommodation already. I wonder if they are still deductible if the event is cancelled?

</comment><comment><USER14> I have never heard of this event until now. I would love to attend something like this. How/where was this event marketed?

Also, $99 sounds like a great price entry point. Defcon started out on the cheap, and a few years later spawned BlackHat. Sounds like a good model to follow.

<comment><USER15> Defcon: single location, labor of love (staffed by volunteers), uncompensated speakers.

Black Hat: 4 locations?, 4-figure attendance fee, significant speaker compensation, significant full-time paid staff.

It took several years of Defcon before Jeff could start Black Hat and go full time to build it.

<comment><USER14> Exactly. It's actually great that DevDays was able to charge only $99 AND compensate speakers and workers+! It actually means they one-upped Defcon in that regard.

BlackHat-caliber conferences, as you imply, will come over time as Defcon- caliber conferences explode in popularity.

Again, I know next to nothing about DevDays, and I could be totally off the mark. But it seems to me, like others pointed out, Joel tried to do too much too quickly. Jeff would have had a tough time getting BH off the ground after just two years of DC.

+My assumption here is that by stating Defcon was NOT able to do these things, DevDays was. Sorry if I misunderstood that.

<comment><USER16> To be fair, venues for conferences don't really have obvious economies of scale: not only do larger conferences often cost more per person, but the quality of the venue and the "rowdiness" (for lack of a better word; arguably the "liability" ;P) of the crowd drastically changes things.

For example, if I wanted to a one-day event with a bunch of reasonably happy low-key developers, it is quite easy. Starting on the small end, with something like 5 people, I can do it in my apartment (and people often do this, for small "meetups"), and if we went up to 10 people, everyone could come to my office.

Even if I wanted something just a touch larger, the venue costs are still going to stay near zero: if I wanted 20 people, I could borrow someone's conference room, and if I needed to go up to 50 people I know someone nearby who would probably loan me their auditorium/theater setup.

With 1-300 people (most conferences), there are lots of choices, from hotels to "community centers": often these are really cheap ways of getting a bunch of people to be able to congregate. If you have a tech conference, you might even be able to get really good rates on something like the eBay "Town Hall".

However, DEF CON is simply /not like this/. DEF CON is a four-day conference set at a fancy hotel in Vegas. This year, the estimated attendance was 10,000 people; and these are not just your "quiet developer type": these people (while largely not gambling, which is important), are drinking constantly and hacking stuff.

Yes: /hacking stuff/; like the elevators, which were half offline for a day because someone was trying to mess with them (I'm certain their other guests were not happy about this); or the lighting/sound system, which someone managed to find out had a default password, so someone central control and would cut the speaker's mic at just the right moments to drive them most crazy.

I kid you not: the point-of-sale terminals at the hotel were offline for a while one day because someone took them offline; there were rumors at the conference that someone had setup a "rogue 3G cell" (to sniff unencrypted connections; apparently people used to do similar things often at previous events), and everyone who attends the conference simply "knows" that you bring enough cash to never have to use the ATMs at the hotel: they are probably skimming cards.

And yet, this event is still managed to be run for only $150/person. Insane, huh? ;P Frankly, I have a ton of respect for how DEF CON is able to scale with this kind of insanity, and not run anything but a horrible loss (and for all I know, they do).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The key difference does seem to be that the jump from $99 to $499 turns DevDays from a conference that you can pay for yourself into one that most people are going to have their employers to pay for.

$499 for a two day conference is pretty cheap but what makes DevDays a hard sell to most managers is that the point of it is that it introduces you to technologies that you're _not_ going be using day to day in your job.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is a particularly big disappointment for me: Not only was I scheduled to speak at the London event, but there were to be talks on CoffeeScript in all four locations. While CoffeeScript talks have become de rigeur at Ruby/Rails events, Dev Days presented an opportunity to bring the language to a wider developer community. Plus, the talks were going to deal with more advanced topics than the usual "Here's why you should learn CoffeeScript." My talk was cheekily entitled "CoffeeScript: The Only Language You'll Ever Need"; I was planning to talk about tricks and tools for using CoffeeScript in all walks of life.

Of course, my sympathies go out to the Dev Days planners; this must have been a very hard decision for them, and an understandable one. Consider me RSVP'd for Dev Days 2012.

</comment><comment><USER19> I'd love to see an online conference like <http://www.mvcconf.com/> with the speakers who were signed up giving their prepared talks

</comment><comment><USER20> I don't think the multi-city approach is necessary. It seems to be more of a headache than anything else. Stack Overflow has a big enough following that they could hold a 2 day conference in SF, LA, Boston, or Seattle and it would likely sell out. It works for RailsConf, PyCon, CodeConf, LessConf, etc., etc.

</comment><comment><USER21> Someone should probably do a startup that solves the problem of "overpriced" conferences. This has always been a problem for me when wanting to attend a conferences, first comes the plane ticket, then hotel, and then the conference ticket itself (which sometimes is ridiculously high).

<comment><USER22> The problem of "overpriced" conferences is that conferences are really expensive to put on. Everything from from the location to the food costs a lot, and every place has it's particular rules about what you are allowed to bring in versus what they force you to use. And then you have to pay speakers...

We are just putting the finishing touches on ProductCamp Utah, and with no profit and no paid speakers, it is still extremely expensive.

<comment><USER23> There's a large number of experienced conference runners and planners who will disagree, and collectively have been running inexpensive but good conferences for DECADES.

They're called "SMOFs." They run science fiction conventions. (Not "Star Trek" conventions but "science fiction" conventions - books.) And the conventions are not for profit membership organizations typically with hundreds or thousands of members attending over a weekend at a cost of a few tens of dollars each.

The SMOFs are generally willing to help others run conferences by giving them advice, doing (paid) consulting work, or even fully (paid) managing conferences. A great example is Expotech, who ran MacHack.

<comment><USER24> I was co-chair of Python 2006 & 2007, and in preparation I went to SMOFcon. SF con issues have some relevance to tech cons, but only partially so:

* SF cons don't usually provide food for all attendees, which is the big cost driver for tech cons. For PyCon 2011, catering was 54% of the budget.

* Tech cons mostly don't have to worry about people in costumes, keeping under-18s out of certain events, or as much rowdy late-night behaviour (e.g. room parties).

* Tech cons really, really have to worry about the WiFi network. Recording every presentation may also impose more A/V requirements.

Going to SMOFcon was somewhat useful to me, but the differences are significant.

<comment><USER25> "SF cons don't usually provide food for all attendees, which is the big cost driver for tech cons. For PyCon 2011, catering was 54% of the budget."

Isn't the catering cost a catch-22? The only reason to expect food at a tech conference is because you (or more likely your employer) is paying out the wazoo for a conference ticket to begin with.

I'd be much more likely to go to a tech conference that was $99 and gave me no food than go to a tech conference that cost $500+ and was fully catered. I can take care of my own food needs for far less than $400 over the space of a couple of days.

<comment><USER24> That could certainly be done, though I didn't convince myself it would work for PyCon. I suspect catering is definitely optional for small events or unstructured things like BarCamps, but for large events it becomes a necessity.

If the conference has 500 or 1000 attendees, the hotel restaurant probably can't handle that many people, so there have to be several restaurants or a mall food court nearby, enough of them so that they don't get overwhelmed by the attendees. That rules out venues that aren't downtown, because suburbs may not have that density of restaurants within walking distance, but such central venues have more expensive room costs.

Another tradeoff: The lunch break would probably have to be 2 hours, because 1 hour is a bit tight for walking time + waiting for service + eating, which means less time for conference programming. Attendees _like_ lots of programming, the more the better; in fact, PyCon attendees asked for breakfast as well as lunch, so it's easier to attend an early-morning event.

And the monetary risk of running an event is large, so like Hollywood film producers, you quickly stop wanting to tinker and try something new; it's safer to stick with a format that's worked in the past.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Interesting. I wonder why they didn't just choose to promote the events more aggressively, etc. -- surely Spolsky could have gotten more registrations if he had tried.

I think there is a market for a $499 conference, but perhaps it needs to have a better reputation among management first.

</comment><comment><USER27> Price killed it for me too.

I felt like it was a no-brainer to go to the 1-day $99 DevDays in SF. When I saw the price and duration of this year's event I didn't event want to ask.

</comment><comment><USER28> BarCamp style conferences have proved it is possible, even in London which is the one of the most expensive city in the world.

</comment><comment><USER29> I don't go to a conference for food, AV, coffee or wifi. I go for the presentations. A jump from 99 to 499 seems excessive...

</comment><comment><USER30> I went to DevDays in LA in '09 (or '10?). Bummer it's not happening this year.

</comment><comment><USER31> I enjoyed the original $99 one-day conference, I thought it was a great idea. Really didn't care about the crappy wifi, food, or coffee.

<comment><USER32> I agree. Actually, I was at the $99 Washington, DC conference and remember the food, wifi and coffee being fine.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I must be out of touch. A price increase of $99 to $499 is not a "modest increase". Come on.

<comment><USER9> I think he was being facetious.

<comment><USER33> No, he wasn't. And as numerous people above pointed out, the price killed the deal.

<comment><USER9>
      And as numerous people above pointed out, ...

Including me ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2968214> ).

I was referring to him calling the price hike a "modest" increase. I read it as him being intentionally inappropriately flippant about the thing that killed the conference (in a mildly humourous and self-effacing manor).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> If it's community interaction you seek it's hard to beat GitHub drink ups on this one. Drink beers with founders anywhere they go in the world.

<comment><USER35> What has this got to with the concept of DevDays other than blatant fanboyism and a plug for github?</comment></comment>