Income-sharing agreements let students trade future earnings for investment - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-09/college-grads-sell-stakes-in-themselves-to-wall-street <comment><USER2> The obvious point to make is that American student loans already suck so this may be an alternative. However, this makes me feel really uncomfortable. The first is the same reason as student loans: At the age you're agreeing this you are very unlikely to correctly judge your own value. It's the same reason why students take on ridiculously onerous student loans.

The solution to that problem in my mind though is to regulate out of existence exploitative student loan conditions. Instead this mechanism creates a whole new way that lenders can rip students off. The Yale example is good but let me pick at this:

>Purdue, for example, caps total payments at 2.5 times what a student borrowed, so the most successful don't feel gouged. That would be a 15 year loan at 15% APR. That IS gouging.

There is a good reason why super high APR loans are heavily regulated - because they're almost certain to cause debt spirals and are only entered into by those who are desparate. The nature of finance companies creating these schemes is that the schemes will be designed to favour the finance companies not the students. So in no way does this solve the problems that students face.

<comment><USER3> 15% on student debt? Jesus christ - it's more expensive than unsecured lending / credit card debt

<comment><USER4> first, student debt _is_ unsecured lending. second, where are you getting a credit card with less than 15% APR. I want one too.

<comment><USER5> Student loans can't be discharged in bankruptcy and are often backed by the government so a default gets paid in full. Basically, effectively secured.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Am I reading this right? You have to pay 2.5% of your income for 7 years as a comp sci graduate for a loan of only $10k. Seems like a pretty terrible deal.

Edit: Avg comp sci grad salary from Purdue is $72k, assuming 5% raises on average including promotions, you'd pay about $14.6k for this loan, which is roughly equivalent to a loan with an 11% interest rate per year over 88 months.

Edit2: I was a business major, and if I used the finance major's payment percentage and term length, I would have paid $20k back over the term of 8 years which is basically like a 20% interest rate per year.

<comment> barry-cotter It is a terrible deal. Lambda School's stipend programme (places limited) pays students $2,000 a month for the nine months of their job training, while they get trained 40 hours a week and that includes interview prep and placement and job search help that makes university careers offices look like they're going through the motions, not trying to get the students a job.

And after paying students $18,000 and spending nine months getting them job ready and helping them find a job they only have to pay back

> Upon completion of the program, students will pay 10% of their salary for a > five year period once they're making at least $50,000 per year. The max > possible payment is capped at $50,000.

[https://lambdaschool.com/stipend/](https://lambdaschool.com/stipend/)

Or if you don't get the stipend

> There are no up-front costs required to attend Lambda School; we only get > paid when you do. Once you're earning at least $50k per year you'll pay back > 17% of your income for the first two years.

> Total tuition possible is capped at a maximum of $30k, so no matter how much > you're getting paid the most you could possibly pay is $30k.

[https://lambdaschool.com/about/](https://lambdaschool.com/about/)

<comment><USER7> This seems pretty amazing. If anyone who's gone through this program sees this, what's the catch/is there a catch? Seems almost too good to be true.

<comment><USER8> They're a YC company. I've seen their students on Twitter talking about how it transformed their lives.

I think it's just the first salvo in a disruption that's been waiting to happen for a while.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Make the college free and provide students with a living stipend. Return higher education subsidies (and tax brackets) to their 1950s levels. Join the rest of the developed world.

<comment><USER10> Absolutely not, at least not without making college _much_ more difficult. Otherwise it is just subsidizing adult daycare.

Many people do not belong in college and learn next to nothing, but go because they're shoo'ed along into it and the universities are in on the joke, and in on the money-making, and undergoing a drastic reduction of standards as a result.

Some data on just how bad higher ed is getting, from 2017: [https://firstname.lastname@example.com/higher-education- erodes-a7c...](https://email@example.com/higher-education- erodes-a7c9983692e0)

<comment><USER11> Many people also do not belong in an Engineering program, and that's why the 101 classes are designed to weed people out. That system already exists in higher education. At my (liberal arts) school, we have a two-strike policy. Strike 1 is when you have a sub 2.0 GPA in a semester; that gets you an academic suspension for 1 semester. You can rejoin only if you retake similar courses elsewhere and meet a minimum grade requirement.

If you are allowed to re-enroll, you have 1 strike left. Another sub-2.0 GPA and you're gone.

If the US brought such a generation-transforming policy like this to the table, the easiest part of it would be to set that minimum standard across all participating schools. Most likely already have something close to this in place now.

<comment><USER12> Anyone with a pulse can get a 3.0 GPA in college. Due to grade inflation a "C" has become a B. A 2.0 GPA in college is basically straight Fs. In order to average less than a 2.0 in college I would imagine you would have to not show up for your exams and refuse to do any assignments.

<comment><USER13> That's just not true. Have you ever taken organic chemistry, electromagnetics, or differential equations? They're incredibly hard courses, no matter how you slice it, and I'm just speaking from experience at a low-to-mid-level school. The entry-level computer science course at CMU (15-112) supposedly takes around 40 hours per week to complete homework for. Courses on the pre-med track will have pretty unforgiving curves too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I love this idea, but perhaps these kinds of financing should be offered by university endowments or by government funds? In fact, it might be useful to replace student loans with this mechanism to align long-term incentives of universities & their students.

This sort of financing might also lead to a better understanding of what sort of programs are effective. I could see financing being available for particular programs. Arts would probably suffer. That said, I think humanities might get a renewed interest -- those who can communicate effectively and solve problems are the bedrock of traditional business.

Private investors? There are lots of things that work great with private capital -- I'm skeptical that financing education is one of them.

<comment> barry-cotter Yeah, let's prop up the government and hedge funds with attached research arms. We should ignore the private companies that are already using ISAs, like Lambda School, to help people get job training to change their lives for the better and just assume that not for profits and the government will do things right because they have only the purest motives.

That worked out so well for the taxpayers and citizens of the US with student loans, and for the students. Giving universities another legal massive legal advantage over alternative means of education is a great idea. That couldn't possibly go wrong.

Sarcasm aside ISAs are not a terribly new idea and universities have tried and failed with them before, Yale and Purdue, in part because no one in universities really cares about getting it right. If you don't get paid more if you do well and don't get fired if it's a catastrophe your motivation is reasonably limited.

ISAs do need regulation but just presuming non profits and the government will do it right out of the goodness of their hearts... It's ignorant.

<comment><USER15> GP saying that it should be offered by the university because then if the university fails to produce a population of students that can make money in the job market, they will suffer.

It's an alignment of incentives much like how some people say colleges should be penalized or on the hook for having a high percentage of students that default on student loans. It would supposedly incentivize schools not to just charge students $300k for an education that gets does not prepare them for the job market.

Personally I think over-aligning these incentives and making college into a machine to make you a profitable worker sounds brutally dystopian, but something has to change about the current world.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Equity-based student loan funding is way less predatory than debt-based student loans, in my opinion, but every comment I read screams "slavery" and "wage-slave".

Of course, both types of funding can be benevolent and/or predatory depending on how you structure the terms, just like anything else. Unfortunately, our laws don't do a very good job of educating or warning young adults who are all entering predatory loan agreements that can't be voided even in bankruptcy.

<comment><USER17> The answer of course is that society should fund education in the same way as it does roads, bridges, national parks, security, governance, and other social goods. With tax dollars.

<comment><USER18> Our roads and bridges are in shambles, while our universities are the best in the world.

<comment> dane-pgp Is that because millionaires are prepared to give large donations to universities (especially if their kids get a place at the university in return), while they're not so generous when it comes to funding roads and bridges which are used by poor people?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> There's lots of things to reasonably debate about this. This is already an accepted practice for coding boot camps like AppAcademy, which I attended. At the time I couldn't get a good job and was running out of savings. I was an adult cleaning golf clubs with high school students. Couldn't get anyone to even look at my resume. AppAcademy's application was purely merit based, they just wanted to know you could solve problems and think. After the program you pay 15% if your income for the first year, if you could get a job that paid over 50K a year.

I got in. I remember I was telling some millionaire member of the club what I would be doing and he told me that he thought that was illegal and they were ripping me off. I genuinely liked most of the members, but I really wanted to tell that guy some very rude things.

It changed my life. By the next spring I had a great job I loved that was paying me way way more than the golfing club. I had to pay 30% of my first 6 months instead of 15% over the full year, which is tough after taxes. Take home pay was like 45% of my paycheck. But even during that first 6 months I was making way more than I would have otherwise. I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

Bottom line, I got a chance I wouldn't have gotten otherwise. There's plenty of ways to take advantage of desperate people. The term could have been longer, the rate higher. It could turn into a type of slavery. But if these things are limited in some way they can be a good thing. Especially if they time out, and are subject to you actually being paid. Then they are better than most other loans, and the people who you owe have interests that are slightly more aligned with yours.

That program has changed a bit since I went through. Also, I think the biggest drawback was I was expecting them to really help me get a job, but it was more throw us all out there and see who sticks. So, probably much less ideal in fields without the same insatiable demand for workers.

<comment><USER20> I'm curious: how much was AppAcademy was responsible for you getting a job?

What do you think your odds would have been if, e.g. you did a coursera track or followed some online tutorials to build your first app instead?

<comment><USER19> They didn't help much at all, but the program was still new. Their support might be better now, not sure. I do think taking the program highly highly increased my chance of employment. I would not have made the right choices about what to take, my pace would have been much slower, and my self confidence for actually applying for jobs would have been way less. I am confident about this because I was taking Coursera courses and online tutorials before the AppAcademy program. Coursera is awesome and I learned some great stuff. I also realized that I was good at programming, which gave me the confidence to apply to AppAcademy. But AppAcademy was truly a boot camp, very intense, and pushed me through everything I needed to get a job. And I was also contractually obligated to at least try to get a job.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Oh, hey. Somebody just reinvented indentured servitude.

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

Good job.

<comment><USER22> Indentured servitude requires someone to work for a particular employer for a fixed period of time. ISAs do not do this.

Words have meanings. You don't get to just ignore them to make an emotional point.

<comment><USER23> I think the parent poster might have meant sharecropping. But the point is still valid.

<comment><USER22> It's not that either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I wonder if premiums are higher for women due to increased likelihood of just becoming a housewife and providing no income?

Correct me if I'm wrong but the anecdote in the front is also a much worse deal than the table later on. 279/month = 3,348/year. Thats 6.7% of her 50k salary, which is before tax to begin with.

Tons of other loopholes I'm curious about. Like salary vs other comp?

<comment><USER25> If they are going to be cynical about it, maybe they should consider household income instead of just personal salary so they can collect from women who, due to higher education, can marry a richer husband than they could without the education.

<comment><USER24> I don't think that could be enforceable.

It would also create weird incentives. If two people have these loans, and they get married... would their payments double?

<comment><USER26> It would be hilariously unenforceable because people would just put off getting married on paper until the term of the payments is up. For couples with highly disparate incomes people already do this to take advantage of income caps for state provided healthcare.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I'm having a hard time thinking of ISAs as much more than a ridiculously high interest loan, especially for those who are self-motivated have a high probability of landing a job after doing X course.

E.g. Lambda school is $20k if you prepay and maxes out at $30k over 2 years, which is effectively a 45% interest loan. Even if you didn't have the cash (or didn't want to fork out) the cash, a typical loan taken out today will have a single digit interest rate.

Personally I'm completely happy with my federal student loan terms for the $20k or so I have left to pay. I stretched it out to 20 years, pay a 5.5% interest rate, the interest rate is deductible you make below a certain income, and barely think of it outside of doing my taxes.

<comment><USER28> I have plenty of friends who took out student loans, attended college with me, and ended up dropping out and not having lucrative careers for plenty of reasons. They would have been better served by something like this, since they wouldn't ever have to pay it back.

In a way, this is a pessimistic bet, and either way you're a winner. If you don't get a good paying job, you win because you don't have to pay; if you do get a good paying job, you win because you have a good paying job, so it's OK to pay a little more.

The details matter though; if the program is really restrictive and everyone who gets funding ends up with a good paying job, the borrowers are being exploited and there's likely an opportunity gap: people who could have done well with the education, but weren't able to access it because the funders risk model wouldn't let them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Fitting that in a world where all the same old labor fights that were settled in the past are happening again that someone would un-ironically invent a new form of indentured servitude.

Makes me laugh at people who think that non STEM subjects have no value. Perhaps opening a book in one of those non STEM fields once in a while would help you avoid reinventing things consigned to the dust bin of history without realizing it.

Nearly but not quite as rich as when ride-sharing companies accidentally invent the city bus.

<comment><USER30> Oh come on! Quit it with the hyperbole about indentured servitude. Agreeing to pay a lender a cut of your paycheck is in no form slavery.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I can imagine so many bad things happening from this. The first thing that springs to mind are the lawsuits: The term of the ISA in the article is 8.5 years. So you finish that up, and a year, two years after you make tons of money. The bank sues you, accuses you of sandbagging your earnings potential by sitting on a profitable project/idea/etc until after the terms of service. It's securities fraud. That's just to start.

</comment><comment><USER32> My daughter signed up on an ISA with Kenzie Academy (it's a digital marketing program in Indianapolis). The terms were the school gets a percentage of her earnings over $X and under $Y for two years. If she doesn't make $X, then nothing paid. Contrast that against a $20-$30k in student debt...

Some of the ISAs being done by colleges just look like dressed up student loans in comparison.

</comment><comment><USER33> Let's scale this up huge, let everyone take part, and have all of society invest in education and reap the rewards. We can call it "public education" and even capture the public externalities of having a well-educated population!

<comment><USER34> And watch the value of the college degree follow the trend of a high school diploma!

If we offered free college, how long before we start dropping the standards to earn a degree (for the same reasons we did so with high school diplomas) and have students waste even more of their lives in extremely sub par education environments?

<comment><USER35> Why do you think this hasn't happened in Europe?

<comment><USER36> My understanding is that most European colleges have entrance exams and only a fraction of people pass. And since entrance is based purely on exams, college admission is a much stronger signal than in the US.

<comment><USER37> I think it is the other way round.

You can easily enroll in any university you like, but can't advance in that major if held back in the rather difficult weed-out classes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Are these obligations dischargable in bankruptcy? It seems to fit into the discharge exception at 11 USC 523(a)(8)(A)(ii) . [https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/11/523](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/11/523)

</comment><comment><USER39> This is a little too much like The Unincorporated Man for my comfort.

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

<comment><USER31> This is literally the exact first thing I thought about when I read the article. I think the book gets a bit too ideological, but the prospect of buying a stake in someone's future earnings stuck with me as a pernicious side door into indentured servitude. At the times I shrugged it off as "well, it won't happen" yet here we are 10 years later...

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> It's interesting they talk about it as something different than a loan. It's just a loan with good terms, right?

It seems good to have a flexible pay-back schedule, no late fees, and something that adapts to my situation in case I lose my job.

But the bigger picture is that this kind of thing is allowing tuition to increase. We don't really need better ways to finance ballooning tuitions as much as we need to figure out how to reduce tuitions and get university funding for people who can't afford it even with income sharing agreements.

<comment><USER41> Well, a loan ends after you pay back the principal, this only seems to end after a certain period of time, even if you end up in a great job and having to pay back 3x or 4x the loan.

Whether this is still worth it depends heavily on whether this shows up on your credit reports...

<comment><USER40> Great point, the terms might not be great at all. I should have said relaxed schedule. Agreed, income sharing might not be worth it. Just another reason we should investigate other ways to pay for education than personal financing, right?

<comment><USER41> It seems the ones in the article end after you pay off 2.5x the original loan, at least.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> La-ang When is the state going to fund college for its citizens for the mightiest nation on earth and stop letting Wall Street find innovative ways to rape us under the hood.

</comment><comment><USER42> Isn't at least part of the problem the exorbitant high cost of college education?

This will cause the price of college to spiral higher and higher, since students can just sign away a larger portion of their future earnings.

I've heard that higher education is free in Germany, even for foreign students. Couldn't we implement a similar model here in USA?

</comment><comment><USER43> Planet Money did a podcast on this recently:

[https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?stor...](https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=708152178)

</comment><comment><USER44> How dystopian, and kids this is how the white collar indentured servitude class come to be. Gave away a Percent for education, another for housing, another for health insurance ;)

</comment><comment><USER45> How does this correlate to interest rates in the market? I am working on a student loan refinance marketplace and am really looking to make a significant dent in this problem.

</comment><comment><USER46> Might be practical, but this does feel completely awful and rent-seeking in the worst possible way.

</comment><comment><USER47> Great.. why don't we just call ourselves the new digital serfs?

Definition:

1\. A person in a condition of servitude, required to render services to a lord, commonly attached to the lord's land and transferred with it from one owner to another.

2\. A slave.

<comment><USER48> Being free but indebted is not really as bad as being forced to work someone else's land. I owe my bank a significant sum, but I am able to find work that schedules both a repayment of that debt _as well as_ a nice profit and accumulation of assets for myself on the side. That is not possible under slavery or serfdom. I owe my bank money, but I don't owe them my life, as they cannot require that I pay them back under such an inefficient and disenfranchising mechanism.

<comment><USER47> Most people would say.. duh..

Isn't this obvious?

I think you missed my point, and took what I wrote too literally, without doing a deeper analysis of what my intention was.

<comment><USER48> Maybe you need to communicate better instead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Oh boy, another way to increase the share bubble..

</comment><comment><USER50> So basically they're taking up a loan but without the legal protections and obligations of a loan? That's going to end well.

<comment> barry-cotter It would be very difficult to do worse than non-dischargable debt, like students in the US get fit student loans. I think you can get rid of an ISA by going bankrupt as it's just a loan with a variable repayment schedule dependent on income. That description elides from the fact that the terms are not standardised either in terms of caps on amount paid back or the time you pay back. It should still be dischargeable in bankruptcy though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> Hey I know, we could package these Income Sharing Agreements (ISAs) together to reduce the risk of investing in duds. Then we could resell those. I'm sure the rating agencies would get on board. Tranche the sh _t out of that stuff, and it 's fun times until we realize that people don't actually have jobs anymore, and your AAA CISA is dogsh_t. Sign me up!

OTOH... I just went back to university and am getting straight As or A+s after my first year doing Physics, Chemistry, Biology. So ... investors ... my trajectory will put me somewhere between Elon Musk and Ted Kaczynski. Who wants to bite?

<comment><USER24> I'm amused at the idea of going in as a group with your class. Getting other students to guarantee your obligations... I can't quite figure out the natural consequences for, say a class of engineers or a class of English majors. For some domains you would expect a certain rate of inability to pay. In others you would expect a certain amount of income superstars.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> The American society has progressed so far it managed to bring back indentured servitude, what an achievement.

</comment><comment><USER43> Can you say adverse selection?

</comment><comment><USER17> What happens if students sell 100% of their future income?

<comment><USER43> I don't think that would be enforceable. Besides, no sane investor would go for it.</comment></comment>


Who wants to lay flowers at Alan Turing's statue in Manchester for his Birthday? - <AUTHOR> Alan Turing's Birthday is on the 23rd of June.  We're going to make it special.
Every year, people pledge bunches of flowers to be placed at Alan Turing's statue in Mancheste, UK for his birthday. In the process we raise money for the amazing charity Special Effect(http://www.specialeffect.org.uk/), which helps people with disabilities access computer games.
Since 2013 we've raised about £5,600 doing this, and we'd like 2019 to be our biggest year ever. Anyone who wants to get involved is welcome. Donations are made up of £3.50 to cover the cost of the flowers and a £13 charity contribution to Special Effect for a total of £16.50.
If you'd like a bunch of flowers placed in your name you can donate (or see how much we've raised so far) at our PayPal Pool(https://www.paypal.com/pools/c/8eTTX8a5eq)
Reddit and some previous donors have raised over £1,000 this year, would HN like to send flowers? <comment><USER2> This is a lovely initiative. Thanks for sharing.</comment>


Origami Levels of Complexity [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDwPXRy9IFc <comment><USER2> For a little bit of context, Robert Lang is what you could call a "modern master" of Origami. He's one of the author who promoted a "whole vision" approach to model design, using lot's of circle/square packing and a very scientific methodology. He's also the author of several books (and some software!) to explain how to design your own models using his techniques.

One of the reason the last model is a new scale of complexity might be that it somehow use "old school" techniques: There is now collapse, no circle packing, it's just straight traditional (hard!) folding from start to finish. Creating such complex models from the traditional tools is usually really hard. It also has a certain elegance to it that is often very pleasing.

<comment><USER3> In my experience models made from crease patterns tend to be rather boring. Yes, it's tricky and menial to collapse them, but once you've done a few, you can fold all of them. It's a mechanical procedure, so much that these designs are usually generated with a software called TreeMaker, pioneered by Lang himself: [https://langorigami.com/article/treemaker/](https://langorigami.com/article/treemaker/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I had no idea about the level of formal planning required to make these complex objects. It's almost like a spatial algebra that's being used and then the folding part itself seems to be a two step recipe.

As I understood it, after (1) planning out your design you then (2) create a flat set of pockets with as many pockets as you need appendages, of appropriate sizes, before (3) extruding those pockets out into limbs, antennae, wings, and eyes.

Having it explained visually, it makes so much sense. A bit like a chef doing _mise en place_ before then constructing a dish. Absolutely fascinating.

<comment><USER5> If you want to learn more about this stuff, the guy in the video wrote a great book called Origami Design Secrets ([https://www.amazon.com/dp/1568814364/](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1568814364/)). It's certainly still _the_ book about origami design.

For something that still touches on some of this stuff but is more beginner/child friendly, I'd recommend Jun Maekawa's book Genuine Origami ([https://www.amazon.com/dp/4889962514](https://www.amazon.com/dp/4889962514))

There's also the OSME books ([http://osme.info/](http://osme.info/)) which collect origami related papers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have nothing to add but to say I was completely transfixed by the level of detail the hobbyist showed in this video.

<comment><USER7> Oh he's hardly a hobbyist. :) From his biography:

[https://langorigami.com/about-robert-j-lang/](https://langorigami.com/about- robert-j-lang/)

Robert J. Lang has been an avid student of origami for over fifty years and is now recognized as one of the world's leading masters of the art, with over 700 designs catalogued and diagrammed.

<comment><USER6> He referred to it as his hobby in the video...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This could almost be a proxy measure of civilizational complexity.

</comment><comment><USER9> Haven't watched the video yet, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover that David Huffman (of Huffman coding) was a pioneer in the field of mathematical origami when I attended an exhibit of his works in Santa Cruz in 2012[1]. Quite stunning to see in person.

Robert Lang and Erik Demaine were also featured, IIRC.

[1]: [https://news.ucsc.edu/2012/03/origami- exhibit.html](https://news.ucsc.edu/2012/03/origami-exhibit.html)

</comment><comment><USER10> That bird behind him is incredible.</comment>


Who Will Pay the Taxes for Universal Income from the Federal Government? - <AUTHOR> http://www.garynorth.com/public/15865.cfm <comment><USER2> While it's true that robots do not pay taxes, they also do not buy anything either. Implementing UBI has its challenges but continuing to ignore the problem of unemployment with a "let them eat cake" approach will have have negative consequences eventually ranging from a lack of customers to violent revolution.

</comment><comment><USER3> tl;dr: naysayer oversimplifies UBI to 'prove' it can't work</comment>


Show HN: Why the most popular ways to do good in careers aren't best - <AUTHOR> https://80000hours.org/career-guide/high-impact-jobs/ <comment><USER3> "Earning to give" is highly unlikely to work unless you're a very strong willed individual (in my opinion). We're social animals, so if you decide to focus on a "high earning" area you land-up working with others who are focused on their earnings. This leads to a focus on life-style (as life-style always expands to meet earnings), relative position in the group, and other values. Over time we tend to adjust our values to the social group we're in, so values other than "making a social difference" are likely.

Clayton Christensen's book "How will you measure your life" mentions this social dynamic ([http://www.claytonchristensen.com/books/how-will-you- measure...](http://www.claytonchristensen.com/books/how-will-you-measure-your- life/)) - lots of his peers started out meaning to make a difference but got sucked in. It's a fantastic book for thinking about your life in a well- rounded manner, and not too long!

Aside: Did anyone else think the title was odd? I initially thought it meant "how to have a good career", when it means "how to make a difference to the world".

<comment><USER4> Title was VERY misleading. And that whole earning to give notion is bull. You work at a non-profit or as a social worker and you have a DIRECT impact on people's lives. You donate to a charity and you have no idea where that money goes. Many charities are corrupt and don't use your dollars at a positive rate to help others and even those that do often find their donations ending up being misused or apprehended by crooks and tyrants.

Earning to give is a way the wealthy ease their conscience (not unlike carbon offsets). It is not good advice to give people with the heart, courage, and strength to be one of those front line warriors at a non-profit or in social work and to claim otherwise is garbage.

Nobody makes a bigger difference to the children and families who experience birth defects or childhood illness than the nurse in the children's hospital. Certainly not the rich goon who contributed the most money and got it named after him/her. Without that rich goon, a need would still be fulfilled by people whose lives were effected by the lack of such a facility coming together and pooling their resources to make it happen (the whole point of government, taxes, and society in the first place).

Without that nurse, there's nobody to take care of those children post surgery and offer the love, support, and attentive care that only someone with that kind of courage and compassion can provide.

No one says your mind and talents must be constrained to your job forever, but if you can do it you should.

Superman DID run vaccines to people in ADDITION to saving the world from more petty (and also much more catastrophic) crime. So the example (which in the comic is hilarious and presented ironically) the article sets itself on is a false choice.

<comment><USER5> Good thing Bill Gates didn't follow this advice or he might be a nurse instead of starting the Gates Foundation!

<comment><USER4> Yeah, then he would've been a terrible nurse instead of standardizing the PC platform on a shoddy OS, creating the notion of "software that gets paid for forever", the windows xp hardware lockout, and ruining the educational system by promoting vouchers to private schools.

Yay for Bill Gates! What a great guy!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm disappointed by the negativity here. The full article is nuanced and encourages thinking about many aspects of one of the most important decisions we'll each make. Then the replies here grab into one aspect and say "what about the others". They're right, we have to consider the others too, but may of us go through life without seriously considering _any_ of these aspects. If you took this article merely as a prod to reflect on your decisions using your own values, it could be great even without ever moving you an inch towards charity.

Persinally I find self reflection like this challenging to even consider, my mind tends to flinch away from the thought. Thinking about what would be best make me focus on what might currently be wrong. At least reading this article makes me consider my options explicitly instead of my usual implicit choice.

(I signed up for the newsletter.)

<comment><USER7> Thanks for your support tgb! I hope you enjoy the newsletter. :)

The full article is indeed quite long and nuanced. Figuring out the best thing to do with your life can't be reduced to really simple slogans.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is a Show HN because the article we link to is just one part of a much larger career guide (we checked with the mod). [http://80000hours.org/career- guide/](http://80000hours.org/career-guide/)

There's 8 articles, each with a video, and a planning tool at the end. You can get it delivered over 9 weeks by email. It's the main thing we've worked on building since Feb, and grew out of an in-person workshop that was changing lots of careers.

The guide aims to help people switch into careers that have a greater social impact. It covers what we've learned in five years of research at Oxford, including:

1\. Why you can sometimes do more good by taking a higher earning career, like software engineering, and donating to effective charities.

3\. How any reader of HN could save hundreds of lives in their career.

3\. How to work out which global problem is most pressing.

4\. What psychology says about how to find a satisfying job and make good career decisions.

See the full guide: [http://80000hours.org/career- guide/](http://80000hours.org/career-guide/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Usage stats:

* In the last month the guide has 140,000 pageviews.

* From the cover sheet, the bounce rate is 50%. Of people who start reading the intro article, about 20% make it to the end.

* Of people who land on the cover sheet, about 5% join the newsletter to receive the whole guide by email.

* Ultimately the aim is to change career plans. About 1% of newsletter subs and tool users report plan changes. Our biggest challenge right now is increasing this conversion rate.

We're keen for questions and feedback.

<comment><USER8> Your stated aim is to change career plans. Why is that?

<comment> eric-hu I'm not in any way associated with the site or the group who made it, but this makes sense to me. I'll offer my take.

I read a book recently called "So Good They Can't Ignore You." One of the author's points is that a popular idea in the last couple of decades is that one can find their passion, then all will be well in the world.

I bought into this passion principle and spent nearly a decade trying out, among other things, RF engineering, tutoring, cooking, and volunteering in a restaurant and in a drug rehab clinic. This was all after I graduated with good grades and a major in CS. I don't regret my path, but I also don't think I did much social good in that time. The volunteer work at the rehab clinic was social good, but it was low skill, so I now question it's effectiveness in the world.

Another point in that book is that people develop a lasting love for fields they get good at. I'm finding that again in software, over time as I become a better developer. I believe people don't stumble across a happily ever-after career, which is what "find your passion" implies.

As an aside, I'm glad to see this project, as it's a step in a well intentioned and more intelligent direction than "find your passion."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> One suggestion I have is to come up with tools to think about the variance in future earnings.

Let me be more specific: if a person makes $300k/year they may be willing to give away 50% if they know it is going to last 40 years. However, if the job could go away tomorrow and they may end up with a $100k job for 40 years, they will want to have saved some of the money for themselves.

Is there a good framework to think about that situation?

I read a statistic that 50% of Americans will find themselves earning in the top 10% at least one year of their lives.

We just don't know how long it lasts. When should one give it away?

p.s. great superman comic in the beginning. makes the point very succinctly.

<comment><AUTHOR> You could do hardcore analysis with a utility function and some risk-aversion weighting etc.

But some rough rules of thumb:

* Make a target level of personal consumption you want to meet over your life (we suggest income doesn't have much effect on happiness after $40k, or $60k if you live somewhere expensive, and plus $20k if you have a child)

* First, save enough that you could live for 12+ months with no income. This covers you in emergencies and career changes.

* Then save a decent fraction of your income to maintain this level of income in retirement (at least $6k per year to be able to have $40k per year at retirement).

* Always donate a small amount (say several percent) to keep in the habit of giving and learn more about charities.

* After you're meeting your saving and consumption targets, you can donate most of the remainder. Or if you're not sure where to give right away, then put it in a donor advised fund so it can be donated later.

Beyond this, it can vary from person to person, depending on how risk averse you are, how much you're prepared to sacrifice in order to do good, and how urgent you think it is to do good now rather than later. It gets complicated. e.g. if you don't think it's urgent to donate, then you might want to take care of retirement savings first, then donate later.

Some more discussion: [https://80000hours.org/articles/should-you- wait/](https://80000hours.org/articles/should-you-wait/)

<comment><USER10> > we suggest income doesn't have much effect on happiness after $40k, or $60k > if you live somewhere expensive, and plus $20k if you have a child

Huh? Are you guys based in the United States? Did you pull that number out of your ass? Do you know the difference between "diminishing returns" and "doesn't have much effect"? In the vast majority of the United States where the median income is $40k and above, it won't actually be enough to meet what most people on HN would consider basic needs - housing, healthcare, food and some savings for retirement.

> First, save enough that you could live for 12+ months with no income.

An impossible task for the majority of Americans. Again, I'm not sure where you are based, so this is forgivable.

> Then save a decent fraction of your income to maintain this level of income > in retirement

You're telling people who are earning $40k to save $6k and meet their living expenses on $34k. While that may be possible in some areas, these areas tend to be the ones where $40k jobs are at a premium and are not available for the majority of the people there. See my first comment.

> Always donate a small amount (say several percent) to keep in the habit of > giving and learn more about charities.

Donating money while earning below median income nationwide is an advice so terribly inane, it doesn't warrant a response. You're always better spending that amount (minus the marginal tax rate) on yourself or your family, especially at the levels of income you're suggesting.

> After you're meeting your saving and consumption targets, you can donate > most of the remainder.

Which for most Americans would be never. You have to step out of your bubble and look at some BLS numbers if you want to give economic advice.

<comment><AUTHOR> The $40k figure is from here (obviously there's no sharp cut off, but we chose a figure that's roughly right for convenience): [https://80000hours.org/career-guide/job- satisfaction/#money-...](https://80000hours.org/career-guide/job- satisfaction/#money-makes-you-happier-but-only-a-little)

And then even more detail here: [https://80000hours.org/articles/money-and- happiness/](https://80000hours.org/articles/money-and-happiness/)

It's $40k of consumption. So if you'd want to save $6k as well, then you'd need to earn $46k.

Our advice is addressed at college graduates. The average grad makes $68k p.a. over their lifetime. (Source in the first article I linked to).

If you're reading HN, then it's likely you can earn more. The median software engineer makes $100k, and similar with other tech jobs (that's from the BLS).

I agree it's much harder to give money if you earn below the median income in the US, though it's hardly impossible. The average low income American _already_ gives 3% on average (source in the OP), so my 1% is actually _less_ than the average.

Moreover, almost everyone in America is far wealthier than the world median. Even if you only earn $10k, you're 7x wealthier than the world median. Source: [https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/get-involved/how-rich- am-i/](https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/get-involved/how-rich-am-i/) (That's PPP adjusted)

So while I agree if you're poor in US it probably wouldn't make sense to give to other poor in the US, it could still be worth giving to the _global_ poor.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I think it was a good way to introduce the notion of living for positive impact. And it is certainly helpful for people who feel like they "aren't doing anything good with their lives" to see ways in which they maybe already are, or could be.

That said, it felt a bit "all of nothing" in the sense of picking a single strategy for impact rather than trying to be impactful all around. There is probably a place the the "7 habits of highly impactful people" piece somewhere.

The final bit that I'd suggest would be having an impact without drawing attention to yourself. A number of really great people I know do wonderful things without having to deal with the issues of public accolades. A friend of mine who became wealthy though Sun stock and good financial management of it, made the mistake of donating directly to an organization he wished to support. And while the donation was not considered "large" by him, it was the largest donation this organization had received so they put a big thank you in their newsletter. And that resulted in literally thousands of other organizations pestering this poor guy for donations. Ever since that time he has made is impact less direct and harder to trace back to him.

It walks a very fine line though, between a person believing what they are doing is helping and outside validation that it actually is. Fixing that communication channel would be big win for getting more participation.

</comment><comment><USER12> The article starts of suggesting a strategy of working and then donating your money, referencing Bill Gates and a Google software developer as examples.

This strategy is basically, vacuum up a bunch of money and then pour it into doing good. But necessarily a lot of this money gets pulled out of places where it would do good, even if that good is simply putting food on the table of a poor family.

If you're an engineer or someone who creates things, it's probably actually creating value, not just moving it around and siphoning off some of it. But often that value you create is harmful: the Google engineers, for example, probably spend a lot of time working on ads, user data collection, partnerships with banks, etc.

And with CEOs like Bill Gates, the harm is much clearer. The money that has been spent by for example the US government, on Microsoft products could have been spent on building equivalent Linux products for a fraction of the cost, and the remainder spent directly on help programs. Bill Gates isn't some savior because he inserted himself as a middle man in the process of spending money on good. Sure, he's putting money into good now, but only after taking money _out_ of good for decades, spending a lot of it on himself, and still keeping a sizable chunk for himself.

This applies to almost any rich philanthropist. They look good when they donate billions of dollars, but the world would have been better off if they hadn't amassed those billions of dollars in the first place. I'm not impressed when people decide to do a little good after building a fortune on a mountain of skulls.

<comment><USER7> Hey Devishard - keep in mind this is only one of four suggested approaches. We also say if you think your work to make money is going to do harm you shouldn't do it and link to a list of jobs you shouldn't take because they are harmful.

I don't personally agree with you that Microsoft has done much harm - <USER2> not even any harm at all on balance, given the positive inventions they made.

Certainly I don't think Microsoft was so bad that saving 10 million people's lives wouldn't go a long way to making up for it.

But if I did think Microsoft was very harmful, like you, I would agree you shouldn't earn to give there.

<comment><USER12> Even if we buy that Microsoft hasn't done any harm at all in balance (which I don't) why would them collecting billions of dollars and then disbursing them be considered a net good when the alternative is that money not going into their pockets in the first place, and doing good earlier?

Microsoft was founded in 1975. The Gates Foundation was founded in 2000. Why did we have to wait 25 years to see any money go into good instead of Gates' pockets?

Also, Gates is still very, very rich, even after giving away a lot of his money. He also helped a lot of his friends get very, very rich, and even the ones of them who give to charity will remain very, very rich. That's billions and billions of dollars that came from crushing smaller businesses, hardening monopolies, and pulling money from governments that could have gone to aid programs.

I am not sure where you got the "saving 10 million people's lives" statistic from, but if it's true, then how many millions more would have been saved by the billions of dollars that Gates and his friends have siphoned off by being middle men? Do you really think even half the money that has gone into MS will come out in the form of aid?

If $x spent to save 10 million lives saved between 2000 and 2015 are good, wouldn't $2x spent between 1975 and 2000 have been better?

<comment><USER7> Gates mostly earned money by selling products to people in the top 10% of global incomes - products they willingly bought. Most of his philanthropy has gone to people in the bottom 20% - people who earn a hundredth as much as people typically buying Microsoft software. Read more on this: [https://80000hours.org/career-guide/how-much-difference- can-...](https://80000hours.org/career-guide/how-much-difference-can-one- person-make/)

I think he intends to give away most of his money before he does - like 90% or so.

As for why the Foundation was started in 2000 - Microsoft wasn't making much money before the 90s so there wasn't much to give. Judging by Microsoft's share price, Gates only truly got rich after 1997.

<comment><USER13> > selling products to people in the top 10% of global incomes

No, the majority of customers are big corporation with a very large customer base (aka lower and middle class). The customers are the ones ultimately paying for that - e.g. when they buy food at McDonalds.

<comment><USER7> Most people in the US, UK and so on are in the top 10% of global incomes: [https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/get-involved/how-rich- am-i/](https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/get-involved/how-rich-am-i/)

Some people in developing countries would have paid for Windows too, but they would have been unusually rich to have computers when Microsoft was raking it in. And from my experience in developing countries, Microsoft software was pirated almost 100% of the time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'm flagging this because of the terrible popup. If I submit a (fake) email, it _still_ won't let me read the article, but rather redirect me to a page demanding _even more_ info!

<comment><USER7> Hey Tom, we have that second step because we often deliver free workshops to people at their universities. Just this week I was emailing people who told us they are at universities in London to let them know about date we will be available to meet them personally.

If you just click anywhere else on the page, the popup will close and you can get back to reading the page! :)

I understand pop-ups are annoying, but without them I don't think 80,000 Hours' model would be sustainable (we couldn't show much impact and so donors wouldn't fund us).

<comment><USER14> Oh well, I guess it's better to polarize the public, and have some that _really_ hate you and others that _really_ love you.

Kind-of like the US presidential candidates right now :)

<comment><USER7> If there's one thing I've learned on the internet, it's that it's hard to please everyone. ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Its ironic that the Superman comic, where in the end Superman says "this seems monotonous" also is the perfect critique of the article. The qualitative, non- quantifiable parts of what we do for a living are equally important. Who would want to be Superman if he turned a crank, at a constant speed, every day of his life?

<comment><AUTHOR> We also say at the end it's important to find something you enjoy and that you're good at, because that will result in a greater long-run impact (more success means more influence, less chance of burning out etc.).

Also we cover which jobs are enjoyable elsewhere in the guide. This article is just about impact.

[https://80000hours.org/career-guide/job- satisfaction/](https://80000hours.org/career-guide/job-satisfaction/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> It is an article, not a Show HN.

<comment><USER17> I told the authors that they could make it a Show HN after they explained it's part of a project they've been working on for months, which included an exhaustive literature review. That's a lot more work than a garden-variety blog post or article, and the intention behind Show HN has always been to let people share their work.

So while you're definitely right that by default a Show HN needs to be more than just an article, in this case it's a borderline call that we let through. HN is a spirit-of-the-law kind of place.

Edit: I forgot to mention, and don't see it elsewhere on the page, that 80,000 Hours is a YC S15 nonprofit. Sorry; should have made that clear.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> If people are looking for the full video course list here it is: [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL- BRtcBm4Yj6ZpOG49cbH...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL- BRtcBm4Yj6ZpOG49cbHut0gtuCEVXfk)

</comment><comment><USER19> This is why I'm getting into promoting colonization of Mars and beyond. All human life could be wiped out forever by a single catastrophic event which is surely more important than most other problems.

<comment><AUTHOR> Broadly, we agree that catastrophic risks are among the most important problems, but we don't think colonizing mars is the most effective thing you could do about them right now. [https://80000hours.org/problem- profiles/](https://80000hours.org/problem-profiles/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> you video thumbnail has a typo in the text "In which __careeer __". Notice the extra 'e'

<comment><USER7> Thanks! We're on it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This is an article, not a project. Does it really belong on Show HN?

</comment><comment><USER22> Summary:

Three steps to a high impact job:

1\. Work out which problems are most pressing – those that are big in scale, neglected and tractable – as we covered in part 2b.

2\. Choose the most effective approaches. Think broadly by considering research, advocacy and earning to give as well as direct work, and choose the best approach for the problem. That's what we covered in this article.

3\. Within those approaches, find a position with excellent personal fit and job satisfaction – something where you have the chance to excel, the work is engaging, you like your colleagues, it meets your basic needs and it fits with the rest of your life. Otherwise you'll burn out and have much less impact. We'll explain how to work out where you have the best personal fit in part 4.

If you do this, you'll be doing what contributes, and have all the ingredients of a personally fulfilling career too. In this way, there's less trade-off between doing what's best for the world and doing what's best for you than there first seems.</comment>


Interactive Brokers trading software bug cost them $113M - <AUTHOR> https://markets.businessinsider.com/commodities/news/oil-trader-loses-millions-on-brokerage-glitch-2020-5-1029186688 <comment><USER2> Some provocative napkin math:

Average dev salary in the US: ~$100,000

113M / 100,000 = 1,113

Would it have been cheaper for Interactive Brokers to have hired another 1,112 software engineers? What about 111.2 security experts commanding $1M salaries? Maybe they could have given $10M prizes to the top 11 researchers in formal verification.

Do security vulnerabilities impose meager wear-n-tear costs on businesses and economies? Or is the cost more like that of a natural disaster?</comment>


Ning: The End of the Red Light District - <AUTHOR> http://blog.ning.com/2008/12/the-end-of-the-red-light-district.html

<comment><USER2> Don't they know that porn picks trends? Surely Ning doesn't want to go the way of betamax and HD DVD.

<comment><USER3> I think that meme may have reached it's expiration date.

It has been true that new forms of media are first taken up by adult entertainment, but usually mass and late adopters drive the porn out, or at least make it less than significant in terms of usage volume.</comment></comment>


The 5 Stages of NoSQL - <AUTHOR> https://sookocheff.com/post/opinion/the-five-stages-of-nosql/ <comment><USER2> Reminds me of [http://www.sarahmei.com/blog/2013/11/11/why-you-should- never...](http://www.sarahmei.com/blog/2013/11/11/why-you-should-never-use- mongodb/)

> Remember that TV show application? It was the perfect use case for MongoDB. > Each show was one document, perfectly self-contained. No references to > anything, no duplication, and no way for the data to become inconsistent.

> One Monday, at the weekly planning meeting, the client told us about a new > feature that one of their investors wanted: when they were looking at the > actors in an episode of a show, they wanted to be able to click on an > actor's name and see that person's entire television career.

> The client expected this feature to be trivial. If the data had been in a > relational store, it would have been.

> I learned something from that experience: MongoDB's ideal use case is even > narrower than our television data. The only thing it's good at is storing > arbitrary pieces of JSON. "Arbitrary," in this context, means that you don't > care at all what's inside that JSON. You don't even look.

> When you're picking a data store, the most important thing to understand is > where in your data — and where in its connections — the business value lies. > If you don't know yet, which is perfectly reasonable, then choose something > that won't paint you into a corner. Pushing arbitrary JSON into your > database sounds flexible, but _true flexibility_ is easily adding the > features your business needs.

</comment><comment><USER3> Why not postgres?

with the JSON(B) datatype, you can start out with full documents and pull out relational fields/create tables as it makes sense

<comment><USER4> Exactly my advice to everyone: If you're in doubt, choose PostgreSQL. It's a strong SQL database. Yet, you can store, index and search documents in a jsonb column. You have built-in full-text search. You have PostGIS. And you can scale and shard using Citus.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I've seen this cycle play out in realtime.

I'm thankful for the flexibility that NoSQL added to the conversation, though. But I'm confident in sticking with SQL for primary purposes, and only adding in NoSQL solutions when it really fits the requirements perfectly (and I can't see those requirements radically changing anytime soon).

<comment><USER6> I do wonder if the inappropriate use of NoSQL is due to an ignorance of why we used SQL in the first place (and the article doesn't directly say this, but in a roundabout way does). In which case, perhaps the brief flirting with NoSQL at many companies served as a good reminder of "oh, yeah, queries and transactions are kind of important; I forgot about that because I began to take SQL for granted."

IOW, you didn't know what you had until you went and used something else. And maybe you won't be so quick to jump on the next hyped bandwagon.

<comment><USER7> I think it has more to do with the fact that it's a giant spectrum and we've never quite managed to build something in a particular strong enough sweet spot so at least for now you are going to continue to see the pendulum swing between NoSQL and SQL (or more usefullly, Document and Relational) databases. What's worse is that there may probably be no mainstream acceptable sweet spot, every developer/team has their own particular preference, and we might never see the pendulum stop.

The spectrum seems to be ad hoc data on the one hand versus ad hoc queries on the other. Document databases prioritize being able to store just about any ad hoc document you might need at the expense of being able to quickly pull off new ad hoc queries that you didn't originally plan for. Relational databases prioritize being able to query very complex relationships in just about any way you can imagine at the expense of making it hard to add new shapes of data.

There's no right answer, just the answer that works best for you at the moment. The pendulum will probably keep swinging for a while, and we'll see more hybrids like we've been seeing Postgres and SQL Server embracing JSON more heavily, because the right answer is probably closer to the middle ground or at least "Why not both?".

<comment><USER5> It's a question of up-front or down-the-line. Do you design your database schema, think out your queries and plan up-front? Or do you do ad-hoc, quick- turn-around development and deal with the technical debt down-the-line?

From the beginning, I saw NoSQL as being great for prototyping or MVP. But the reality of our industry is that you very rarely get to bang something out overnight, then rewrite it the "right way". Your prototype or MVP more often than not becomes the foundation of your stable, mature releases.

<comment><USER7> It's not really a question of up-front or down-the-line, even.

Some projects may never need ad hoc queries because by the time they hit scale enough that they need such reporting they might go directly to BI tools (Cubes, Elastic Search, et al) or "Big Data" tools (Hadoop, Big Query, et al) without needing an intermediate SQL step.

The same is true with transactions and consistency models. Some projects may never have a need for anything stronger than eventual consistency and may never need more complicated transactions beyond the scope of an individual JSON document. Even then, there are chunky hybrid solutions with good options for choosing a different ACID plan or locking mechanics or transaction capabilities, and just because most "NoSQL" databases are in the corner of eventually consistent and transactions only at the individual document level does not mean that _all_ are (there are definitely exceptions out there).

Again, there will always be projects and business domains on both sides of this "data spectrum". There's no wrong answer, just what's right for your specific project or business domain.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The premises of the first step are often true, but strictly speaking they are false.

Some NoSQL dbs have schema. Cassandra does [https://docs.datastax.com/en/cql/3.1/cql/cql_reference/creat...](https://docs.datastax.com/en/cql/3.1/cql/cql_reference/create_table_r.html) and I think hbase has too.

FoundationDb was (is?) ACID.

NoSQL literally means that it doesn't have SQL.

<comment><USER2> Literally speaking, "NoSQL" as much for databases as "NoHTTP" means for application protocols. It says literally nothing other than it's not something else.

It could be key-value database or it could be a graph database. It could have a schema or it could be schemaless. It could support one index or it could support multiple. It could have a permissions system or it could be single- user. It could have a server process or it could be embedded.

The author is thinking of the MongoDB and CouchDB variety.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Doesn't work for me. Google cache at [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:B3U3vwv...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:B3U3vwvsczQJ:sookocheff.com/post/opinion/the- five-stages-of-nosql/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=en)

</comment><comment><USER9> Rule #1 of NoSQL, if you use NoSQL, then your data have no business value, else they would be used for billing hence you would need transactions.

Rule #2: if you have no business value you can be fired/outsourced.

The 5 rules of grief then apply to your job. Amen.

</comment><comment><USER10> I have a couple of points, unrelated.

(1) Tabular data comes to people naturally. It's not an obscure, impractical theory foisted on us by E. F. Codd. Peer over the shoulder of your non- programmer coworkers: the front-office secretary, the project manager, the company president. You will find that each of them love Excel. They're using it for address books, project statuses, meeting minutes, and a million other things. Some might say they're abusing it, because Excel is meant for math, and they're using it just because it makes it easy to set things into tables.

(2) Organizing a complex application into tabular data is hard. Look again at your secretary's Excel spreadsheet of contacts, and you will see that it fails the first level of normalization: contact names and company addresses are repeated across rows. Changes are delicate, and the spreadsheet likely has bad data.

An application of even medium complexity, if properly normalized, will need several tables, including one-to-many and many-to-many tables. For each column, you must choose among a cornucopia of data types: boolean, integer, real, numeric, date, time, timestamp, enum, text, array, json, and several others. Furthermore, have you chosen the right constraints: primary key, foreign key, unique, check constraint, rules, trigger functions? Most pages of the app will involve joining several tables, and often there is a way to arrange it that makes it run 100 times faster. But then again, such is the case in any programming language.

So I do not blame programmers who want to reach for the NoSQL database. It is a thousand times easier to just:

       save(json_encode($_POST));

or whatever. I've been programming with SQL all day long for over 10 years, and it's still hard. I'm still finding better ways to write the SQL or use features of my database (PostgreSQL) that I wasn't using, at least not as much as I could.

The biggest encouragement I can give to someone who doesn't know anything beyond

      select * from table

is that writing it in SQL is almost always shorter than in your procedural language of choice. How would you enforce all these rules in procedural:

       create table sales (
          id serial primary key,
          sold timestamp,
          emp int references employees,
          cust int not null references customers on update cascade,
          item int not null references items on update cascade,
          qty int not null check (qty > 0),
          price numeric (12, 2) not null check (price > 0)
       )

or formulate this report:

       select emp
       from sales
       where age(sold) < '3 years'
       group by emp
       having sum(price) > 1000000
       order by 1

(DISCLAIMER: The code in this post is not guaranteed to compile.)

<comment><USER2> Scala

        sales
          .filter(DateTime.now - 3.years < _.sold)
          .groupBy(_.emp)
          .collect {
            case (emp, r) if r.map(_.price).sum > 100 => emp
          }
          .toList
          .sorted

But yeah, you're right.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Polyglot is here. It creates opportunities for a lot of folks. And it creates a lot of headaches for others. The open source NoSQL analytics project, SlamData, will reduce a lot of the friction described in these comments. I work on the project.

Three things to know:

1\. SlamData is souped-up SQL + data viz platform. 2\. SlamData send analytics to the data (computation happens in-database) 3\. SlamData connects to MongoDB, Couchbase, MarkLogic, Spark and relational stores. 4\. You can do JOINs across data stores

Four things, sorry.

If you want to know what's going on across a polyglot business or application... it's exponentially easier now. So go ahead and use the new technology -- the overhead isn't nearly as much as it was. I think this materially changes the conversation.</comment>


Why are Microsoft killing Windows Phone, when they have Continuum and x86-on-ARM? - <AUTHOR> Microsoft have x86-on-ARM emulation tech that they're developing so Windows 10 laptops can have ARM processors.
Microsoft also have a Windows 10 Mobile feature called "Continuum" that lets you connect a phone to a monitor, mouse and keyboard, and use it as a Windows desktop.
Why have they not noticed how these ideas can be combined, and why are they killing off the platform? <comment><USER2> The key word is "developing", as in, they don't have it yet. Microsoft has constantly been stuck behind developments that are waiting to be done. They obviously held out on Windows Mobile because they were gonna switch it to x86, until Intel abandoned their plans to support that, kicking the legs out from under that project. Now it's emulating x86 on ARM, a work in progress.

The problem is, they've strung along their mobile platform for years while trying to do all this, and left everyone on it without a paddle. With no devices and no point where they can conclusively say they're ready to try again, it makes sense for them to "kill it". And then launch as a new thing as some indeterminate point in the future where they actually have a product together.

As long as the Windows desktop (and particularly, Windows 10 S) development continues to push UWP, adding mobile support again later won't be particularly difficult.

</comment><comment><USER3> I think they have noticed, but running windows desktops apps on arm doesn't give you mobile apps. So yeah, you can plug your phone into a docking station and use all your desktop apps but as soon as you remove the docking station your phone is useless....because there are no apps. And by mobile apps i mean apps which are customized for a phone screen.

Also i think Intel is still holding a handle on the x86 patent thing when it comes to emulating x86 on arm.

Its really sad that the whole UWP app development stuff didn't went so well. Technically Xaml and C# are awesome, there was (is?) also a react native uwp implementation.</comment>


Review My App: Fluttr - <AUTHOR>

http://fluttr.heroku.com
Fluttr lets you easily keep track of todo items. All you have to do is remember what url you choose. Keep it secret or share to have a collaborative todo list.
I'm learning Rails and Javascript so this has been my first good experiment. Took me just a couple of hours to put this together and I'd love to hear what you think! <comment><USER2> Very cool for a couple of hours effort.

However, (oh I hate to say this) there are a bazillion todo apps out there. Every programmer must have made one.

I know you made this for learning. So, what I'd suggest is you take the same code and turn it into something more fun. Have a look at <http://www.thathigh.com/>. Technically, it's similar to your site, but it's a very viral social app, which people love.

Good luck with your experiments!

<comment><USER3> That's a statusnet site, which is in a manner similar to this. However, statusnet is more of an opensource twitter clone which doesn't seem to be intended to be a to-do list.

This on the other hand is a to-do list. Yes its pretty simple, but sometimes simplicity is elegance.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Impressive for such a short amount of time. I really like the simplicity (no signup / sign in) and that it is so easy to collaborate. If you want to expand further you should check out some of the functionality used in WorkFlowy (e.g. complete, reorder).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, definitely would be a good way for me to continue developing the app and learn more rails.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I like it. But I think that an "undo/unerase" button would be useful.

<comment><AUTHOR> Definitely a good idea, I'll be adding a checkbox that will strike out the items so you can essentially "undo" them as well as permanently delete them as you like.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> clickable: <http://fluttr.heroku.com>

</comment><comment><USER6> I love it, its so simplistic :D</comment>


Netflix: You can share your password, as long as you don't sell it - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.de/netflix-says-its-ok-to-share-passwords-2016-7?r=US&IR=T <comment><USER2> A crime is a crime, whether the "victim" says or not. If an ambitious prosecutor found evidence of password sharing, and it was actually a crime, it's at their discretion whether to prosecute. This could easily be the gateway crime to a larger prosecution.

</comment><comment><USER3> I get all my legal advice from "Nathan McAlone" on "Business Insider Deutschland." Seems legit.</comment>


The Matrix Was Intended to Be a Trans Story, Says Lilly Wachowski - <AUTHOR> https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-matrix-was-intended-to-be-a-trans-story-says-lilly-1844611323 <comment><USER2> I know I'm late to this discussion and nobody will see this, but, the Matrix is very clearly an exploration of the philosophy of Jean Baudrillard...

Simulacra and Simulation (French: Simulacres et Simulation) is a 1981 philosophical treatise by the sociologist Jean Baudrillard, in which the author seeks to examine the relationships between reality, symbols, and society, in particular the significations and symbolism of culture and media involved in constructing an understanding of shared existence.

Simulacra are copies that depict things that either had no original, or that no longer have an original.[1] Simulation is the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time

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

Neo even handles a copy in the first film: [https://unfoldlearning.net/2016/09/11/beyond-modern- educatio...](https://unfoldlearning.net/2016/09/11/beyond-modern-education-2/)

Is this then a metaphor for being trans? That's awfully circuitous.

</comment><comment><USER3> Just like in real life, the post transition sequels are disappointing.

</comment><comment><USER4> This seems a little retconned, kind of like how J.K. Rowling says that Hermione was black and such.

<comment><USER5> JK Rowling seems like she'll take any credit that people want to ascribe to her.

The idea that the Wachowski sisters intended this meaning based on their experience but were overruled by the suits feels more legit based on who they are in the world.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> There should be a law, sequels should come within 2-3 years. Cartoons were way better, so many episodes. Cartoon to movies taking too much time. Now Matrix it's long time for a sequel.

</comment><comment><USER7> Fascinating article. Both the creator and the audience can have their own interpretations of the same story. I think Lilly's is pretty easily defensible and makes a lot of sense.</comment>


I want to study in europe/usa I need help  - <AUTHOR>

next year is my final year at high school.I want to study in europe/usa but I don't have many options.You can get a scholarship from the goverment to study in usa but they choose what you study and you have to be first or second in the country wich is really hard(I mean really)my second option is to get a job there and support my study but it's expensive there(study) and what if I loose my job one day how can I continue to study and getting a job is not easy.I worked for a startup for sometime that never shipped anything they didn't even have an idea so I can't put anything on my resume other than that I don't have any side projects I just start it and don't complete it so I don't have anything to show to an employer.so what can I do ? <comment><USER2> The best way to arrange to study in the USA or Europe is to have lots of money to pay fees, living expenses etc.

Short of that it is difficult. In most of Europe it would be difficult to get a visa to study if you also intended to work (actually you are allowed to work in the vacations).

If scholarships are available from your government - I would grab one. Just because you are nominally studying one thing it does not stop you from also taking in some classes on a subject of interest to you.

<comment><AUTHOR> I need to be first or second in the country just to go to usa.

<comment><USER2> OK - crazy idea - start an on-line university in your country.

Beg some server time from a cloud supplier. Ask proffs in USA, UK etc to donate course material (for CS based courses ask HN users to create course material). Once things get started - it just might lead you to all of your goals.</comment></comment></comment>


CDC scientists pursue deadly monkeypox virus in Africa - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/national/health-science/monkeypox/ <comment><USER2> The American Council on Science and Health suggests that we don't worry too much: [https://www.acsh.org/news/2017/11/07/dont-freak-out-about- mo...](https://www.acsh.org/news/2017/11/07/dont-freak-out-about- monkeypox-12099)

</comment><comment><USER3> Not to be morbid, but what is the actual cause of death when this kills you? I wonder if it is difficult sometimes for the public to understand the danger behind a disease because it's difficult for them to bridge the gap between "this is really unpleasant" and "this will kill me".

<comment><USER4> Pox diseases seem to kill more or less alike, and here is what's known about Smallpox:

 _In fatal cases of ordinary smallpox, death usually occurs between the tenth and sixteenth days of the illness. The cause of death from smallpox is not clear, but the infection is now known to involve multiple organs. Circulating immune complexes, overwhelming viremia, or an uncontrolled immune response may be contributing factors.[20] In early hemorrhagic smallpox, death occurs suddenly about six days after the fever develops. Cause of death in hemorrhagic cases involved heart failure, sometimes accompanied by pulmonary edema. In late hemorrhagic cases, high and sustained viremia, severe platelet loss and poor immune response were often cited as causes of death.[24] In flat smallpox modes of death are similar to those in burns, with loss of fluid, protein and electrolytes beyond the capacity of the body to replace or acquire, and fulminating sepsis.[48]_

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

In particular this caught my attention, _...overwhelming viremia, or an uncontrolled immune response may be contributing factors..._ What that probably means is at some point the virus amplifies freely in infected tissues, and may precipitate an extreme feedback loop such as a cytokine storm. That would certainly explain the rapid fatalities suffered by the hemorrhagic form.

That mode of death, extreme viral reproduction and immune cascade leading to death is also seen in Hemorrhagic Fevers, and other classically devastating infections.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I usually detest sites that hijack scrolling, but this article does it quite effectively and usefully.

</comment><comment><USER6> I'm surprised the international community hasn't built a few walls/fences to contain threats like those.

<comment><USER7> It's likely transmitted by a small mammal, they aren't sure which one.

It's pretty hard to build a rat proof fence, especially across hundreds or thousands of miles, and it is an "outbreak" concern more than anything, it doesn't infect many people:

[https://www.cdc.gov/poxvirus/monkeypox/about.html](https://www.cdc.gov/poxvirus/monkeypox/about.html)

The reason they are trying to trace it is that every human infection is an opportunity for an adapted, transmissible virus to emerge.

<comment><USER8> While it will certainly be hard to contain, there are historical precedents for containing disease outbreaks where small mammals are the vectors. A notable case is the Bolivian hemorrhagic fever, caused by the Machupo virus, where an outbreak in 1966 was largely extinguished after two weeks by extensive trapping of the rodent vector[1]. Of course the effectiveness of trapping depends on many factors, and it is not always feasible. Studies like the ones being conducted by the CDC are essential for understanding these diseases and inform strategies on how to contain them.

If you're interested in reading about the initial cases of various emerging diseases (or rather, emerging diagnoses), Laurie Garrett's book, _The Coming Plague_ , is a good read.

1\. [https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/1/3/95-0308_article](https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/1/3/95-0308_article)</comment></comment></comment>


Learn indexing dammit - <AUTHOR> http://gun.io/blog/learn-indexing-dammit/

<comment><USER2> Maybe those 5 "conventions" are in no particular order, but I'd argue you should first check your indexes and only then consider "trying cacheing". Also, I'd think it'd be better to create indexes after "rewriting your code to use raw SQL", as indexing is usually (meaning almost always) designed to support queries; hence, you need to have queries first.

</comment><comment><USER3> agreed. yes, they are a bit out of order.</comment>


World's first dual-core smartphone debuts in Korea - <AUTHOR> http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/LG-Optimus-2X/?kc=rss <comment><USER2> I was living in Korea when the iPhone debuted. It was partnered as a McDonald's promotion, "Mac Tonight."

Koreans like phones that are versatile:

"Other features are said to include a GPS, Bluetooth, 802.11n, USB 2.0, and HDMI connectivity.

A DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) device, the Optiumus 2X is compatible with devices such as HDTVs for what LG describes as a "console-like gaming experience taking full advantage of the phone's HDMI mirroring, accelerometer and gyro sensor." It also offers HD video playback and recording at 1080p, says the company."

<comment><USER3> I'm not sure I'd be very interested in HDMI connectivity on a phone. I'm much more interested in the direction Apple seems to be taking with the AppleTV and AirPlay.

With HDMI on a phone, not only you have to go to your TV to plug your phone to it, but you then can't use your phone anymore or switch tasks easily. Also HDMI cables and connectors are usually pretty stiff which doesn't really work well with a light device. What I mean by that is that your device is kind of flying around on your TV stand until the cable finds a good position. (this doesn't happen with heavier things like a BluRay player)

AirPlay, in principle, (I haven't tried it yet) would bring the same benefits wirelessly.

<comment><USER4> HDMI phones will replace PCs.

You dock it into a monitor and keyboard, and your data and environment are all there. People used to do this with laptops. It is also cheaper (or, alternatively, you'd spend twice as much), and you can only use one at a time anyway (you can still make calls, using a mic/speaker or headset).

Of course, cloud-computing also promises same data/environment... but I think network reliability is not quite there yet, and public trust in it is a step beyond that.

<comment><USER3> Sure, phones might replace PCs at some point. However, phones with HDMI outputs are already out there and the current use for HDMI is in my opinion impractical.

What you're describing is putting your phone on the desk, next to you while you can interact with it directly with a keyboard/mouse. But I haven't seen a phone that's designed to be completely controlled this way.

The current use of HDMI is pretty much only to watch pictures and videos on a TV, isn't it? In which case you're on one side of the room on the couch, away from your phone. The phone itself still being the only thing you can use to interact with it. There might be a few models out there where you can already do what you describe, (I'd be interested if you know of any) but for the most part, this is not the case yet.

Current example: Flip cameras have an HDMI output. Which makes sense I guess. However it's actually very inconvenient to use: going back and forth between the TV and the couch to select a video...

<comment><USER4> I note that you're acknowledge the future possibility, and discuss the present. I just wanted to record these thoughts:

To recap _disruption_ : A new technology appears that isn't as good for the users of the incumbent technology, but it has different qualities which appear to other users. Over time, both approaches improve. But a curious thing happens: the incumbent technology overshoots the needs of its users, and the new technology becomes good enough... yet also has those other qualities.

I think it's inevitable for PCs to get smaller, and the phone form-factor seems to have traction (making parts available, establishing standards etc). Of course, it might not be an actual phone, but just borrow the same technologies. It's also possible for wireless docking (to monitor and keyboard). Of course, you might have two monitors (one for relaxing, one for work), as most people do these days.

 _Skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it is._

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Once again reminding us that no matter how cool our phones are in the U.S., East Asia stays a step ahead. _sigh_

</comment><comment><USER6> Almost all popular smartphones are already dual core -- one core for the applications and one for the modem stack.

<comment><USER7> So now its 2 for applications and 1 for modem?

<comment><USER6> Sounds like it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> _The Optimus 2X uses the Nvidia Tegra 2 system-on-system chip, with dual Cortex-A9 cores running at 1GHz. LG boasts that the Tegra 2 enables the phone to offer "instantaneous touch response," ..._

You know "shit's bad" when you all of the sudden need two cores to get a responsive UI :) Incidentally, the iPhones never needed that...</comment>


Ask HN: Any startups hiring in Spain? - <AUTHOR>

We don't hear much about Spanish startups here, I was wondering what are the most prominent ones and if there are any currently hiring? <comment><USER2> Yup. Some are pretty good and also have a presence in the Bay Area.

Teambox - [http://www.teambox.com/company/jobs/](http://www.teambox.com/company/jobs/) 3scale - [http://3scale.net/jobs/](http://3scale.net/jobs/) Tyba - [http://tyba.com/jobs/](http://tyba.com/jobs/)

More random jobs: [http://www.jobfluent.com/](http://www.jobfluent.com/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the info, the jobfluent.com board seems quite promising, I wasn't aware of that site before.</comment></comment>


NUMA Deep Dive Part 2: System Architecture - <AUTHOR> http://frankdenneman.nl/2016/07/08/numa-deep-dive-part-2-system-architecture/ <comment><AUTHOR> Submitted above as it seems not everyone noticed that part 2 already is available well.

Also note that part 3 is available as well [0]

[0] [http://frankdenneman.nl/2016/07/11/numa-deep-dive- part-3-cac...](http://frankdenneman.nl/2016/07/11/numa-deep-dive-part-3-cache- coherency/)</comment>


Show HN: FormWho - Contact form tracker - <AUTHOR> http://www.formwho.com/

<comment><USER2> Good work...looks like something similar to dropifi...isn't it?...I am myself interested in this space...maybe we will be future competitors..:)

A few (frank) suggestions:

Not a big fan of name.i.e FormWho.

You should charge more and prcing should be more granular.

Post a free/trial version.

Start building email list.

Show some form of user validation/feedback on frontpage...e.g. used by so and so ...etc

Good Luck.</comment>