Smartphone cradle used to cheat "10k steps/day" health insurance discounts - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/akaDashan/status/990054109855141888 <comment><USER2> I did something similar in college. A company paid cash for installing software that displayed ads on the bottom of your monitor. It qualified your ad viewing activity based on mouse movement.

At night I would open the software, wrap my mouse cord around an oscillating desk fan, then go to bed. Earned myself $50/month

<comment><USER3> I remember the AllAdvantage.com cheat as well. It became so popular to game that one that not only were novel tactics like yours employed, but automatic mouse hijacking apps for Windows made some headway for those that didn't want to sit and click ads ad nauseum.

I may have made a quick buck on this back in the early 2000s.

<comment><USER4> _click ads ad nauseum_

There is a browser extension that does this for you:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10611594](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10611594)

It was removed from Chrome's appstore, so it must be very effective... [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13327228](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13327228) ...and shows very clearly whose side they're on.

<comment><USER5> "So, an advertising company that used to have a motto about not being evil, but abandoned it, built a web browser."

Realistically that wasn't going to end any other way :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I bike 15+ miles a day but my work's discount program doesn't "support" biking. If I was into vigilante justice, I'd consider a solution like this too. But as it is, I'm quite content biking for my own sake rather than some pittance of a benefit.

<comment><USER7> are you more likely to sustain an injury than someone who is mostly idle?

<comment><USER8> Do you have statistics to indicate biking is inherently more dangerous than other activities or are you just repeating a certain assumption you have?

<comment><USER9> This is interesting... I am in my 20s and bike ~20 miles per day. Over the last 5 years I have had 3 broken bones due to bike accidents including one which required an ambulance ride. With few exceptions, I only go to the doctor for bike-related injuries and my annual physical. To my health insurance provider, do the benefits to my cardiovascular system and general fitness offset the cost to treat my injuries?

I am guessing the insurance companies are looking far enough into the future where the long term benefits to my health outweigh the short term risks, but they are definitely losing money in the short term.

<comment><USER10> 3 incidents per year at 20miles/day is higher than the statistical average. Are you biking in a way to increase the likelihood of an incident, biking in an area that is less safe than the average bike ride, or did you just have an unlucky year?

<comment><USER9> That is 3 incidents over 5 years. I don't think that is too much of a statistical anomaly. One of the injuries was from a pedestrian stepping into the bike lane without looking, one was from a car merging into me, and one was from a collision with another cyclist while racing.

<comment><USER10> I will agree that 3 incidents over 5 years is closer to the normal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've always found that anytime time a financial outcome is tied to some sort of behavior incentive, weird behaviors come out. This especially comes out in sales, where whether you like it or not, individuals will typically optimize for the best financial outcome, which is not always explicitly connected to what's best for the company.

<comment><USER12> There is also the Cobra effect as a subset of unexpected outcomes.

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

<comment><USER13> I much prefer the German word for it, "Verschlimmbesserung."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> EconTalk from three weeks ago was _The Tyranny of Metrics_ [1] about how when metrics are tied to compensation, they often have disastrous consequences, even to the point of achieving the opposite of the desired effect.

[1] [http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2018/04/jerry_muller_on.htm...](http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2018/04/jerry_muller_on.html)

<comment><USER15> Yes, this reminds me of the Cobra Effect from India: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I wonder how many people use stuff like this to cheat the system? I remember seeing someone on reddit bragging about attaching their Fitbit to a reciprocating saw to get more steps than his wife.

I couldn't figure out why it was that important, but with insurance discounts, I can definitely see the financial incentives.

<comment><USER17> A lot. I'd be surprised if any Business Management 101 class didn't teach that if there is a reward involved, people will maximize for whatever critera you measure.

<comment><USER18> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect)

 _The term cobra effect originated in an anecdote set at the time of British rule of colonial India. The British government was concerned about the number of venomous cobra snakes in Delhi.[3] The government therefore offered bounty for every dead cobra. Initially this was a successful strategy as large numbers of snakes were killed for the reward. Eventually, however, enterprising people began to breed cobras for the income. When the government became aware of this, the reward program was scrapped, causing the cobra breeders to set the now-worthless snakes free. As a result, the wild cobra population further increased. The apparent solution for the problem made the situation even worse_

<comment><USER19> What did the Delhi residents themselves think about cobras? Were the natives OK with cobras running around and it was just the British that wanted to reduce the population?

I'm curious because if everybody disliked wild cobras loose in the city I'd have expected the breeders to kill their stock when the bounty ended, not free it.

<comment><USER20> Why would you expect that in a world where people dump hazardous waste into rivers to save money?

<comment><USER21> Because dehazarding waste is more difficult than chopping up a snake?

<comment><USER20> But letting the snakes go is even easier. Use the example of people littering instead of using a trash can, or not flushing public toilets, if you need a demonstration of how people can't be bothered with even simple tasks.

<comment><USER21> Most people aren't worried their litter will literally come back to bite them. Were the snake breeders really unconcerned that dumping a bunch of snakes out the back window wouldn't have consequences?

<comment><USER18> They were breeding poisonous snakes in a land where those snakes already live in the wild, I doubt they were worried about having a few more of those snakes out there.

These breeders were trying to scam a government program so they didn't exactly have the highest scruples, expecting them to do _anything_ to aid society is probably too much to expect.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Wellness programs and similar initiatives are so repellent to me that I'm pretty sympathetic to everyone fooling them.

<comment><USER22> Turn it around- perhaps the low risk individuals find subsidizing the high risk individuals equally repellent. Wellness programs allow those individuals to recover some of their premiums.

<comment><USER23> Low-risk individuals subsidizing high-risk individuals? We just call that "insurance."

<comment><USER24> That's not a trait inherent to insurance. Premiums can be adjusted based on risk so that everyone "subsidizes" everyone else by the same amount on average.

<comment><USER20> In this case the people who most need insurance cannot afford it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I've seen folks wrap their step tracker in a couple pairs of socks, then either throw it in the dryer, or tie the socks to a ceiling fan on low. Those particular folks called it "going jogging."

<comment><USER26> I'm so glad these incentives have contributed to expediting the eventual heat death of our universe

<comment><USER27> To be fair, you posting this comment __also __contributed to expediting the eventual heat death of the universe, so.

<comment><USER28> Fortunately he has fit bits on all 10 fingers so it wasn't a waste

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> What you measure - you optimize. They measured cellphone shaking. They got optimized cellphone shaking.

I will also share another famous quotation of mine which I intend to eventually get tattooed somewhere (when I can figure out how to make it look good.. I have no tattoos): "Make game of that which makes as much as thee." \- from The Rubiyat by Omar Khayaam.

<comment><USER30> _Omar Khayyam_

Great quote. But you probably know, that the English translation is more inspired by Omar, and much of what you enjoyed was the work of FitzGerald.

[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/bookreviews/516526...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/bookreviews/5165263/The- Rubaiyat-of-Omar-Khayyam-by-Edward-FitzGerald.html)

Full Quote:

 _"But leave the Wise to wrangle, and with me

The Quarrel of the Universe let be:

And, in some corner of the Hubbub couch'd,

Make Game of that which makes as much of Thee."_

<comment><USER29> I originally found the quote in a computer science book, and it interested me enough to seek out The Rubiyat to read. The version I found (online I believe) was actually a translation of several different versions of the work I believe? I'm not sure who the translator was. The quote in particular was only present in one of the 'versions' of the work. I imagine translating poetry, of all things, would be tremendously difficult, but as I don't know many other languages I had to take what I could get. Regardless of source, I think the quote is very insightful and stupendously relevant in todays world that seeks to reduce all people to an easily manipulable optimized factor in a rigid system. Viewing those systems as a game to optimize in turn seems the only rational course.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> similar but different, a manual labor app store rating farm:

[https://cdn.vox- cdn.com/thumbor/zHQqznuFPd6EO1ryjV2Zlc6MSxY=...](https://cdn.vox- cdn.com/thumbor/zHQqznuFPd6EO1ryjV2Zlc6MSxY=/0x146:439x439/920x613/filters:focal\(0x146:439x439\)/cdn.vox- cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/45675836/53899d01jw1eovdjy4jmgj20hs0npaeh.0.0.jpg)

</comment><comment><USER32> The obvious defect in this device is that it doesn't charge your phone while it walks it for you.

</comment><comment><USER33> The Wells Fargo effect: if you optimize for a number, you'll get that number.

</comment><comment><USER34> Next up: GPS cradles to proxy your driving habits into granddaddy mode to get cheap car insurance.

<comment><USER35> It seems like the additional miles added might defeat the purpose

<comment><USER10> Yeah, but spoofing GPS is possible. The black box insurance gadgets typically wire directly into a car, so it'll be harder send fake data from that pipeline, but totally possible.

The benefit would come from smoothing extremes. Lie about speeds over 80, reduce big accelerations and hard breaking. Lieing about total miles could also work, but I think that could be done by just unplugging the box, or only sending it power and not data.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> This would presumably work as long as your insurance provider doesn't have access to your location or any other means of figuring out that your exercise routine is odd.

<comment><USER37> You could claim you were on a treadmill

<comment><USER36> Right, in the middle of a Harbin restaurant where a bunch of other people like to also seem to like "running on the treadmill".

<comment><USER38> Perhaps there's a gym on the second floor!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> My uncle in China had a seat belt chime defeater that also doubled as a bottle opener.

</comment><comment><USER40> Funny enough, my wife works at an insurance company that has "walking stations" where you can work while on a treadmill and the fitbit doesn't detect steps that way unless you remove it from your wrist and jam it in your belt or bra, which doesn't always work when the walk stations are not private.

</comment><comment><USER41> I'm sure I've something similar come up a few times recently, but never with any source discussing the health insurance plans that supposedly collect this data.

Has anyone come across anything on these insurance plans? I'm sure it's something many companies would love to do but I remain skeptical.

</comment><comment><USER42> It always makes me smile when I see the hoard of people proudly step forward, and boast, "oh yes, here are examples of how I've cheated various systems!!"

Which is fine. That's human nature.

But. No shame.

<comment><USER43> Not sure I see anything shameful here. More like clever.

I'm reminded of that guy[1] who earned tons of airline miles by taking advantage of an ill-thought-out pudding promotion.

1: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Phillips_(entrepreneur...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Phillips_\(entrepreneur\))

<comment><USER42> Clever and unethical aren't disjoint. Lotta clever thieves and scammers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Herbie Hancock and Jim Whiting rocked it in 1984!

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockit_(song)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockit_\(song\))

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHhD4PD75zY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHhD4PD75zY)

</comment><comment><USER45> I was using the Samsung Health app not for insurance just for personal reasons. I was doing well most days I waked a minimum of 10,000 steps or so I thought. So I opened up the app to find it was not working because it had updated and I had to agree to new terms first. :(

</comment><comment><USER46> These program will all be illegal at the end of the year anyway, so don't invest much in hacks.

<comment><USER47> Do you have a source on that? Also, what country?

<comment><USER46> Best thing is to google "ada aarp eeoc gina" for timeframe of last few months. An example

[https://www.provanthealth.com/industry- trends/2018/3/26/what...](https://www.provanthealth.com/industry- trends/2018/3/26/whats-happening-with-aarp-vs-eeoc-on-march-30)

"In the fall of 2016, the AARP brought suit on behalf of its members, arguing that the ADA and GINA regulations are inconsistent with Congress's statutory requirement that employers' wellness programs be "voluntary." The AARP argued its members were injured by being forced to pay higher health insurance costs to avoid disclosing personal health information. In the fall of 2017, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted summary judgment to the AARP, holding that, although the term "voluntary" was ambiguous in the ADA's and GINA's statutes, the EEOC's interpretation of the term was not supported by a reasoned explanation and therefore was not entitled to the Court's deference."

[http://www.psfinc.com/articles/aarp-vs-eeoc-lawsuit- update-s...](http://www.psfinc.com/articles/aarp-vs-eeoc-lawsuit-update-still- no-clarity/)

"If the current court order stands, wellness programs may not be allowed to tie incentives to wellness programs subject to the ADA or GINA."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> serious question: is it insurance fraud?

</comment><comment><USER49> One day all of us have to do stuff like this to keep up.

<comment><USER50> Can some AI do it for me?

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> Metrics exist to be cheated. For better or for worse.

</comment><comment><USER52> Maybe if you're smart enough to do that, you're smart enough to care about your health in other ways and thus you should still fit into the price model that the insurance company uses ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

<comment><USER53> I'm on Medicare in Australia (so universal healthcare mostly funded by 2% of all taxable income that came in real handy for me last year) and I have an incentive to walk 10,000 steps every morning. A coffee with artificial sweetener from 7 Eleven will do it. And I aim to listen to good podcasts or the like while I do.

I wouldn't do it otherwise. Even the flimsiest of pretenses will do it.

<comment><USER54> You are in aussie and drink 7/11 coffee by choice? Turn in your Australia card mate...

<comment><USER55> Not everyone in Australia lives in Melbourne :) (just the best coffee drinkers)

<comment><USER53> Bingo, plus it's the only place open other than Maccas at the time of day at a near enough perfect 10,000 step distance along an indirect route.

Doing it this way also takes care of the cheating concern, it's a reward I can only get by physically doing the work.

Plus, it gives me a quiet time to watch everything including the Star Trek back catalogue.

And I don't live in Melbourne so honestly brown water with a gram of sweet is a synonym for coffee.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Trump Won Because Leftist Political Correctness Inspired a Terrifying Backlash - <AUTHOR> http://reason.com/blog/2016/11/09/trump-won-because-leftist-political-corr <comment> norea-armozel Trump won because people are easy to fool. They think the industrial jobs of old are going to come back. I have to wonder if they know that the majority of those jobs even in China are rapidly being automated away. I feel for those folks in the Rust Belt because many people in Wichita, Kansas had the same sort of outsourcing hit them across all sectors (aircraft, call centers, etc). But the fact is those jobs will never ever come back. Call centers are being outmoded by online help sites. Manufacturing is being taken over by better machines producing 100 times the output of worker on their best day. This is the new normal and that means we need to consider our options but going back to 1950s industrial nostalgia isn't one of them. It's time for the Trump voters to wake up and not be fooled by the dream Trump promises but will never be able to deliver.

</comment><comment><USER2> Trump won both because in todays world whoever screams louder wins, and because of lack of competition. The real shame isn't his victory, but the fact that a 300 million people country could not produce better candidates on both sides.

Don't take it as offensive, in my country too the same happens at every election: politicians speak to people bellies, not their brains because today voters have pretty much stopped using their brains and follow whoever pushes the right buttons during speeches (god, family, safety, immigration, jobs, etc).

</comment><comment><USER3> Partially the alt right and its cast of characters definately helped him.

</comment><comment><USER4> reason.com is a libertarian joke. Okay, i'm done ranting.

<comment><USER5> You should broaden your circle. It is quite funny watching the melt down of people on hn and reddit because they don't actually know what half the country is like.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> His children might as well be something out of rich children of the corn. Disconnected from reality, equal to the Clintons daughter. They don't understand anything, but Trumps worst because just look at them. His life is a circus, and he played you all. He's dumb but he's not dumb, he learned how to outcompete Clinton without spending as much and learned how to grab quite a bit of America while literally saying not much of anything.</comment>


Show HN: Magic Spellbook" Raspberry Pi Kiosk for Total Home Control - <AUTHOR> https://www.technicallywizardry.com/magic-spellbook-raspberry-pi-home-assistant-kiosk <comment><USER2> I think you post would be a lot easier to understand if you shot a video of of it and showed some common things you did on it/with it. I am all-in on home automation but I can't tell from your post why I would want to use this over my phone or voice assistant.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I do plan to write some follow-ups on how the kiosk is used, but was afraid of the post getting too long. TBH the biggest benefit for me is what I said in the first sentence: that guests can use the kiosk (friends find it easy to use, and I'm also an Airbnb host sometimes).

<comment><USER2> Yeah, I assumed it was probably aimed at non-residents or non-technical- residents (the day I get my boyfriend to use an app to control anything will be the day pigs fly but at least he will use voice). I'll have to keep tabs on this as it does look really cool!</comment></comment></comment>


The Rebirth of Pro-Natalist Public Policy in America - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/12/pro-natalism/547493?single_page=true <comment><AUTHOR> Bryan Caplan wrote an interesting book, _Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids_ , that is also germane to this topic ([https://www.amazon.com/Selfish-Reasons- Have-More-Kids/dp/046...](https://www.amazon.com/Selfish-Reasons-Have-More- Kids/dp/0465028616)).</comment>


Ask HN: How do I become an expert at network adminstration? - <AUTHOR>

I'm tired of being loosely familiar with a great deal of concepts, and yet a master of none. Of knowing at an "enthusiast" level how traffic works, but not having the knowledge to attack a scalable problem. For instance, I could network the hell out of my home, but anything larger than that? A small business? A large corporation? A neighborhood, a government, a nation? How do I scale theoretically and apply those concepts pragmatically? What are the fundamental questions I should be asking myself and researching when I think of some hypothetical question like, "How would I manage email for a company with 50,000 employees?" Where does one even begin to tackle that kind of problem?
Furthermore, how would I acquire an intimate knowledge of networking beyond such a local scale. How do I learn the inner workings of the Internet's infinitely complex design without having to (without a clear plan of attack regarding importance) read the RFC cover-to-cover with a dictionary and Google within arm's reach?
(Actually, I wouldn't mind a kind of top 100 RFCs to know like the back of your hand.)
How do I scale my own research?
Sorry, I know this is a big, fat, somewhat nebulous question, but this is what I want to do with my life. I want to build networks, and I want to use that knowledge to add value to the world. I don't want to get some certificate that says I know how to do something. I want to start reading the vast amount of free information out there and actually start doing it. Maybe after that I'll get a certificate.
I'm a FreeBSD user, though I usually carry a MBP around. I know my way around tcpdump, and can throw up some fancy filters if given enough time to read through the man page. I can even script a little bit in perl and bash. Emphasis on 'a little'. I'm self-taught in all aspects of computing, and I went to school for English.
I'm 27, and I want to be a desirable piece of talent by the time I'm 30. <comment><USER2> I would say that you should get a copy of Network Maintenance and Troubleshooting Guide: Field Tested Solutions for Everyday Problems, 2nd Edition by Neal Allen and get a couple of switches, setup HAProxy and couple of routers and get to work. You should be able to simulate the traffic virtually but the know how of the physical is always important too. Plus look into VMs like the Cisco UCS vm for looking at fiber switching and F5 BigIP vm for load balancing a bit vendor specific but free...

</comment><comment><USER3> Learn everything in TCP/IP Illustrated like the back of your hand. Buy old high-end gear on eBay ($50k switch from 8 years ago? $200). Setup your own network. Get a half rack at a datacenter and run your own network and servers. Get a job at a company that has interesting network requirements like high capacity and/or high availability. Read UNIX Network Programming. Learn how to write high performance client and server programs.

</comment><comment><USER4> Avoid RFCs unless you're working on a specific problem. You're also not going to be able to become an expert in all the different fields, so focus on specific fields.

For IP networking, I can specific recommend the following books as "force multipliers" of knowledge:

\- Routing TCP/IP (Cisco Press)

\- Network Warrior (O'Reilly, Cisco-centric, but good, easy to digest intermediate knowledge of layer 2 and 3)

\- TCP/Illustrated (A deep dive into TCP/IP. RFC-level depth but easier to conceptualize)

If you're looking for recommendations for other specific areas, let me know and I can probably point you in the right direction.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, aside from being able to build networks, I'm mostly interested in securing them in the best possible way. I know there's no such thing as perfect security, but I like the challenge of always trying to be one step ahead. This probably stems from an interest in crypto, too.

(found a cheap copy of TCP/Illustrated 2nd ed. on Abe Books. I do so love that site.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Install GNS3 ([http://www.gns3.net/](http://www.gns3.net/)) and a bunch of virtual machines (servers, routers, firewalls, etc.) get to learnin'!

</comment><comment><USER6> Setup servers in a virtualized network at home and try to build a "mini- internet". Setup fake companies with internal and external resources. Web servers, email, DNS, DHCP, routing, etc.

</comment><comment><USER7> You can become an expert at netadmin, but not without administering real networks -- have you tried applying for any junior netadmin positions or internships?

<comment><AUTHOR> Some context that I couldn't fit into the < 2000 char limit (but probably should have).

This is the embarrassing part. I'm actually two months into my first junior level position at a colo, and I administer a group of my own servers behind a CARP'd redundant firewall that I set up. I even have access to an old Catalyst that's just sitting around. I know how to set up servers no problem, but what I don't know how to do is make a complicated cluster of machines work together. I sometimes write down hypothetical networking requests to figure out, but I haven't started building out any of those with the spare machines we have around.

I don't feel inept at my job. I don't even feel like I'm useless. But what I do feel is a vast chasm of knowledge and experience between me and my superiors. Knowledge so vast that it seems unobtainable to me. My own skills and knowledge have increased dramatically, and my appetite for learning daily is, honestly, voracious. I just can't shake the feeling that I'll never be as good, with them all coming from academic backgrounds that focused on computing.

<comment><USER8> What do you mean by "make a complicated cluster of machines work together?"

At the simplest level, you have a big switch in the middle of your servers that only connects to other switches that then feed your servers. That's about all there is. You can pile on redundancies, bondings, vlans, software defined networks, and other things as needed, but with the minimum requirement of only "work together," those additional parts aren't required. (We're ignoring Internet connectivity here and just "making machines in one facility work together.")

Everything is just tiny pieces. The tiny pieces get put together to grow networks larger. It can be complex, but it's not impossible to figure out.

If you're working at a colo, ask a few people to draw you diagrams of how the facility's network is laid out. Then ask them to draw how a typical customer deploys their network within your facility.

Ask, get confused, learn, ask more, then you'll have it all figured out pretty fast.</comment></comment></comment>


(Constructive) Criticism to make SS09 even better - <AUTHOR>

Like pretty much everyone else, I enjoyed SS immensely.
But everything can be made better, right?
What's your advice for next year? <comment><AUTHOR> Birds of a Feather signs?

Hackers are often shy. How about in between meeting there are labelled gathering points about topics: scaling, Rails, hiring, PR, etc.

Bonus points if speakers can be be convinced to visit one.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Question tokens? Perhaps only 2 for the day? or based on Karma?

<comment><USER2> Or at least don't invite that one guy back.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> More pizza! And a better distribution system. That was a bit of a zoo.

Given all of the "we're hiring" pages posted, I am sure some can underwrite that. Maybe Sequoia?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Have HN names on the nametags. BIG. iamlamegringo did this and I loved (and copied) it.

edw519 had a shirt with it, and that was great too.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Shut down wifi during talks?

inspired by Meg Whitman.</comment>


Comcast Ditching 250GB Data Caps, Exploring New Options - <AUTHOR> http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2404557,00.asp

<comment><USER2> as a founder of a defunct ISP (est 1991), I sure wish we could have charged by the bit, instead of connection speed. And it does seem to me that if Internet service is sold by the bit it is a communications service, not a computational service (those have legal meanings and ramifications).</comment>


Patterns can assignable around the users now - <AUTHOR> http://dbpatterns.com/blog/patterns-can-assignable-users-now/

<comment><USER2> Here is the title of this submission: "Patterns can assignable with the users now"

Here is the title of the original article: "Patterns can assignable around the users now"

Apart from my usual advice to copy the original title, neither of the titles makes the slightest bit of sense.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for suggestion. I changed the title.</comment></comment>


Reddit Users Lose Real Money After Meme Currency Bot Dies - <AUTHOR> http://gizmodo.com/reddit-users-lose-real-money-after-meme-currency-bot-di-1795125165 <comment><USER2> > his company is broke, he's broke, and the bot is broke _because he spent all > the coins_ , after he himself ran out of money.

(emphasis mine)

How did he think this was remotely acceptable? Jesus Christ! Don't operate custodial accounts if you don't understand the consequences. You _can not_ just spend other people's money, no matter how broke you are...

If that's your only option, give everyone their money back and declare bankruptcy.

<comment><USER3> > You can not just spend other people's money

This is exactly how banks operate.

<comment><USER4> This is why banking regulation and licensing exists. It's also well understood that a bank will do this with your money, while a regular custodian should not.

If he'd made it clear upfront that the funds would be loaned to a risky business venture, with no reward, and people still chose to trust him with money then arguably that would be fine from a moral standpoint, but he didn't, and I'm sure he didn't because he knew nobody would have agreed to it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's worth pointing out that this fiasco has nothing to do with cryptocurrencies. In the absence of regulations and legal enforcement, the exact same thing can happen with any bank or brokerage account. _" We went bankrupt due to subprime bets, so we're taking all of our customers' savings to bail ourselves out. Fight club, lol"_.

Given that this was a legally registered business, I hope this scumbag faces criminal prosecution and imprisonment. It's time we started locking up white- collar-thieves the same way we lock up burglars.

<comment><USER6> I grew up in an upper middle class area and a lot of my friends were a sort of radical libertarian. The most interesting thing about cryptocurrencies for me was them slowly realizing why a basic level of financial regulation is important.

<comment><USER7> >The most interesting thing about cryptocurrencies for me was them slowly realizing why a basic level of financial regulation is important.

Anarcho-capitalism is all fun and games until you discover you're not really a wolf among the sheep.

<comment><USER8> Fantastic way of putting it!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> What'd he spend it on? Is this really hosting intensive? I'd think it'd fit in free tier usage or something. And even if not, it can't be more than what, a hundred or two a month? I don't follow what "creating a business" actually meant as far as why his costs went up. He was running a bot. So, you get an LLC, no big deal, it changes nothing. That's like what, 50$ in some states?

What am I missing? Unless it comes out that he started hiring people (to do what??) or if he quit his job and started spending people's money for his rent -- why'd he suddenly incur any serious expenses?

Also what's it got to do with crypto currencies per se? If banks offered some super easy API for USD-USD transfers and he had shoved all this money into a WellsFargo account would he somehow not have spent it?

<comment><USER10> > According to Mohland, in 2015, all Wow Such Business employees were laid > off, including himself, and he began pouring his personal funds into the > service to keep the bot alive.

It sounds like at some point, for some reason, he had employees. Unless he's just using weird wording and he was the only one.

<comment><USER11> Does this mean he was running on wallet funds from the start? It doesn't sound like he had any investors or any revenue at all.

<comment><USER9> He raised $445K in a seed round. The article is really crap and doesn't fully explain what he did. [https://dogetipbot.wordpress.com/2014/12/05/on-tipping- dogec...](https://dogetipbot.wordpress.com/2014/12/05/on-tipping-dogecoin/)

I think this story could have gone "we raised $x million in series A" and have some sort of exit in some hype-bubble and he'd be lauded as a genius.

Edit: It seems that they built this: [https://honeyledger.com/](https://honeyledger.com/) \- chargeback free way for streamers to get money from fans. Not a bad idea.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I knew Mohland and the DogeTipbot project pretty well. He did have a few employees mostly working in customer support.

He was a stand-up guy and a strong advocate for the Dogecoin community. People are talking about the fact that he liquidated the assets from user wallets as a malicious action, and while I agree it was a terrible choice, I see it more as a bad decision.

Backed into a corner he tried to leverage a businesses asset holdings to keep it a float in time to recover. Depending on your jurisdiction this is something banks do all the time as part of your balance is not liquid and invested elsewhere.

The issue here is his business didn't recover and wasn't ever going to.

Last I heard Josh's plan was to keep the main part of the bot free and charge for websites and streamers to accept tips from the Dogecoin community. He wasn't an idiot like this article tries to portray. There was a reason he was keeping the consumer end of things free. But, the micropayment landscape had more competitive options than a niche currency.

All in all its sad to see the business fail but this was poor business choices, not maliciousness nor stupidity like the article tries to claim.

<comment><USER13> For what its worth, customers' fund are not "business assets". He had no legal right to spend that money.

Now, he may have thought he could use it to float some funds, and put them back, and no one would be any wiser, but that's definitely illegal.

He may not be a bad person, and he may not be an idiot in the larger scheme of things, but this was an idiotic move, and a terrible (and unethical) decision, that may very well have legal repercussions.

<comment><USER14> He didn't spend anybody's money. He spent their dogecoin which is a bunch of made up gibberish.

<comment><USER15> FWIW, he had no right to spend his customer's made up gibberish either.

<comment><USER12> Had no moral right. Did he have a legal right? That's more complicated.

(Still don't think he should have)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Sad, but predictable. There's a mantra in Bitcoin: if somebody else has the private key, you don't own your cryptocurrency.

<comment><USER17> Any bank could "just" spend your money on your account

The central bank just prints money and thus steals 'value' from you (devaluation)

It's a matter of trust into an entity

<comment><USER18> Ok, sure. Even if banks can be slimy, they can't be nearly as slimy as anonymous internet folk working in unprecedented/unregulated legal areas.

All trust is not equal.

<comment> nv-vn He wasn't anonymous though...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The comments from reddit posts are worth reading:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/69vycc/important_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/69vycc/important_im_taking_dogetipbot_to_a_server_farm/)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/6a1eh0/options/](https://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/6a1eh0/options/)

<comment> aaron-lebo Yikes.

 _So, you stole everyone 's money to support your personal business and then claimed bankruptcy once all of everyone's money was gone. Is that correct?

Then you complain when some hacker takes the money from the ponzi type scheme your running and now the result of all of it is, everybody lost their money including you?

Bravo Mo_

How do people like this exist?

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Real shame. As an active community member, I can tell you that mohland was pretty much revered by the Doge members, because of how influential and prolific DogeTipbot was across the sub. People were tipping each other on a huge scale of engagement unseen anywhere else (by me, anyway).

Then, it turns out not even our dev-mascot can be trusted... What a pity.

It's also interesting to see some of the discussions around the creation of a decentralised tipbot... But it seems like this would not be possible[0], because the keys to the wallet(s) would always need to be in someone's hands (or a few people's anyway).

[0] - [https://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/6acho0/a_decentra...](https://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/6acho0/a_decentralized_reddit_tipbot_is_not_possible/)

</comment><comment><USER21> I had some of those. I didn't really lose "real money".

</comment><comment><USER22> Why does it always seem like "Lose real money" is the "E pluribus unum" of cryptocurrencies?

<comment><USER23> Because "crypto" is Latin for "things will definitely go wrong" and "currency" is Latin for "real money."

<comment><USER24> Crypto is Greek, actually.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Can someone explain how these coins went from zero value to having value? The articles kind of skips over that part, saying that getting listed on exchanges made it worth something.

So simply being able to trade it for real money (+ hype, + limited supply) made it actually worth real money? The only thing that needs to happen for a currency to exist is liquidity and x number of people to think its valuable (who buy/sell it)?

<comment><USER26> > The only thing that needs to happen for a currency to exist is liquidity and > x number of people to think its valuable (who buy/sell it)?

Yes? Of course, trading can vanish just as quickly as it came.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I knew about exit scams ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exit_scam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exit_scam)) when it came to illicit sellers/marketplaces for drugs but I'd never thought that I'd ever see an exit scam for a tip bot for a meme cryptocurrency.

</comment><comment><USER28> > In finance, customer funds are supposed to remain segregated from the > business's funds. They live in a separate legal universe, and this rule is > meant to insulate the business and customer from each others' failures.

Can we get a source other than Gizmodo?

<comment><USER26> [https://www.handbook.fca.org.uk/handbook/CASS/7/13.html](https://www.handbook.fca.org.uk/handbook/CASS/7/13.html)

Admittedly that's for serious investment rather than daft things like tipbots.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I always thought Moolah and Mohland shared a remarkable amount of characters.

</comment><comment><USER30> Wow, the author has a huge chip on their shoulder when it comes to cryptocurrency. Also, how is Gawker still in business?

<comment><USER31> Gawker was acquired by Univision last year.</comment></comment>


NTSB identifies origin of JAL Boeing 787 battery fire - <AUTHOR> http://www.ntsb.gov/news/2013/130207.html <comment><USER2> Interesting bits:

> the majority of evidence from the flight data recorder and both thermal and > mechanical damage pointed to an initiating event in a single cell. That cell > showed multiple signs of short circuiting, leading to a thermal runaway > condition, which then cascaded to other cells.

> Boeing ... determined that the likelihood of a smoke emission event from a > 787 battery would occur less than once in every 10 million flight hours ... > there have been two critical battery events on the 787 fleet with fewer than > 100,000 flight hours.

Seems like Musk was right in his guess after all ([http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/elon-musk- boeing-7...](http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/elon-musk- boeing-787-battery-fundamentally-unsafe-381627/)), but it is shocking how badly Boeing got its estimates wrong. Does anyone know exactly how they came up with these numbers?

<comment><USER3> From what I have been reading, it seems non-engineering people have taken over Boeing. I wouldn't be surprised these suits have been pressuring everyone to get the 787 out and the culture goes from there.

<comment><USER4> That reminds me of HP. I grew up using their awesome technical products (RPN represent!) and now I get sad every time I see them in the news.

Have any pointers on the switch from engineering-driven to whatever they are now? I'd love to read more.

<comment><USER5> I have an hp48 emulator on my phone, I use it all the time these days.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> If I understand correctly, this finding seems consistent Elon Musk's hypothesis on how the battery is fundamentally unsafe. "Large cells without enough space between them to isolate against the cell-to-cell thermal domino effect means it is simply a matter of time before there are more incidents of this nature,"

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5137641>

</comment><comment><USER7> Interesting report. Elon Musk's comments aside, one would think that Boeing would short a cell on purpose in a battery pack to verify their assertion that the failure of one of the cells would not propagate to other cells.

That said, if this is the proximate cause of the smoke and fire then it points to some ways to fix the problem that don't involve completely re-designing the way the plane is built which is good news for Boeing.

As for the 'other chemistry' arguments, one of the challenges of various battery chemistry is the rate of charge and the rate of discharge. My Battlebot team went through a number of battery packs for our robots[1] and found that the energy-density, charge rate, and discharge rate was one of those "pick any two" scenarios. A pain to work around.

</comment><comment><USER8> Were I the folks in charge at Boeing, I'd be looking at a joint venture with Mr. Musk, starting today. I suspect that the difference in estimates are owed to the usual testing phenomenon---you test for what you can imagine and that is heavily conditioned by your expectations. Same reason that the folks who write software/engineering/whatever should never test it. You need a team who's main goal in life is to ruin someone else's day. When I worked for EA, the testing team was the biggest PIA you could imagine. But if they could come up with bugs, imagine what real life could do. (Pesky 8-year old kids...<grumble/>)

<comment><USER9> >Were I the folks in charge at Boeing, I'd be looking at a joint venture with Mr. Musk, starting today.

Boeing and Lockheed are pretty much the only space flight companies working with the government. Musk has an issue with this which is why his battery predictions are so enjoyable.

[http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-10-16/business/35279...](http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-10-16/business/35279938_1_space- exploration-technologies-satellites-eelv)

<comment><USER10> Boeing and Lockheed are major players, and you're right about the rivalry, but they're not the only ones. ATK (the former Thiokol) is a major player in the Space Launch System project, and politically very well connected; there are also smaller fry like SpaceX and Orbital Sciences (makers of the Pegasus air- launched rocket, and the other commercial supplier for ISS cargo resupply).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Woah, the photos of the charred battery are fairly dramatic:

[http://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/2013/boeing_787/boeing_78...](http://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/2013/boeing_787/boeing_787.html)

<comment><USER12> Much smaller than I would have expected. That thing can start an engine that large?

<comment><USER13> These batteries (or more often, ground power) are used to first start a small turbine engine in the tail (APU) which generates the compressed air used to start the main engines.

Further reading: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auxiliary_power_unit>

Edit: after further research, it seems compressed air is not used on the 787. It's all electric (two generators on the APU and on each engine):

"The power source for APU starting may be the airplane battery, a ground power source, or an engine-driven generator. The power source for engine starting may be the APU generators, engine-driven generators on the opposite side engine, or two forward 115 VAC ground power sources. The aft external power receptacles may be used for a faster start, if desired."[1]

1\. [http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/articles/qtr_4...](http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/articles/qtr_4_07/article_02_4.html)

<comment><USER12> Ahh, that makes more sense. Thanks!

<comment><USER14> Early jet aircraft used a ground cart to provide power to get the engines started.

Evidently adding the APU saves enough money to justify its significant weight.

<comment><USER13> I think it's less about money and more about stuff like:

\- backup power for emergencies \- allowing attempted engine restarts in the air \- allowing the airplane to be self-sufficient should it be forced to land somewhere without ground equipment (or big enough ground equipment)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Who did the what now???

      As investigators work to find the cause of the initiating
      short circuit, they ruled out both mechanical impact damage
      to the battery and external short circuiting.

Sounds to me like no orgin was identified at all. All they know is that the fire started because of short-circuiting. But what caused the short circuiting? I don't know?

<comment><USER16> Read a bit further:

 _Chairman Hersman said that potential causes of the initiating short circuit currently being evaluated include battery charging, the design and construction of the battery, and the possibility of defects introduced during the manufacturing process._

They don't know the precise cause, but they have narrowed it down to a few possibilities.

<comment><USER17> _Chairman Hersman said that potential causes of the initiating short circuit currently being evaluated include battery charging, the design and construction of the battery, and the possibility of defects introduced during the manufacturing process._

Paraphrase:

"The thing we built doesn't work properly, and we think it could be because of how it works, how we designed it, or how we built it".

Sounds like a useful assessment.

<comment><USER18> Of course it's useful. It's just like debugging code: when the bug first surfaces, the cause can be anything in a large space. As you learn more of the characteristics of the bug, the problem space grows smaller until you eventually identify the root cause.

They've just learned what areas to focus on.

<comment><USER19> "how it works, how we designed it, or how we built it" is pretty much inclusive of every possibility and doesn't rule anything out. In other words, useless.

<comment><USER16> The NTSB is not saying what you are claiming. They are only talking about those possibilities in reference to one specific failure mode: a short circuit in a single battery cell causing a fire that spreads through the entire battery. That rules out a lot.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Except they actually haven't, yet:

 _Chairman Hersman said that potential causes of the initiating short circuit currently being evaluated include battery charging, the design and construction of the battery, and the possibility of defects introduced during the manufacturing process._

<comment><USER21> This. It's pretty obvious what happened to the battery; the question is why, and why testing didn't bring the issue to light. Is it a maintenance problem? A quality control issue in manufacturing? Something unknown about the physics of flight or the interplay between various electrical systems that reduces the safety margin? Unknown at this time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The temperature those batteries (and those used in newer RC planes - LiPo) burn is ridiculous.

You buy some electronic/hobby equipment while traveling, put in your luggage among your clothes. In mid-flight those things get shorted and everybody is doomed.

Those batteries can ignite when shorted due to shock or tearing - which is pretty much what happens to some luggage on every flight.

<comment><USER23> And then when the TSA bans batteries in checked luggage everybody says, zomg, my constitutional rights are being trampled.

<comment><USER12> Oh I don't know, such a ban might be uncharacteristically rational for the TSA. ...actually, how many plane crashes have Li-ion battery failures in luggage caused? No it wouldn't be, a ban like that would be par for the course.

<comment><USER24> The luggage compartment is much hotter than the flight deck, especially on a freighter. If your luggage is parked in the hold during summer when the air conditioning units are off that is a major concern. There is concern that DHL flight 6 could have crashed for that reason.

<comment><USER12> What we know is that, for whatever the reason, the rate of catastrophic failure has been quite low in the past.

When new information becomes available we are able to update our risk assessment, it isn't necessary for us to wait for more plane crashes. I don't see any new information here though, the risks posed by Li-ion batteries and fires on airplanes have been well understood for quite some time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This seems a politically motivated press release by the NTSB. Boeing certainly wants to get their planes back in the air. This misleading declaration that NTSB has identified a "cause" is the first step in removing the grounding order on the aircraft.

 _Chairman Hersman said that potential causes of the initiating short circuit currently being evaluated include battery charging, the design and construction of the battery, and the possibility of defects introduced during the manufacturing process._

</comment><comment><USER26> The choice of Li-ion battery saved only 30 kg over a same performance and specifications NiMH battery used without a single insident in 6.6 million hybrids produced over the last decade. There was no valid reason to use Li-ion system in this case. Even only 1 fire in 10 million flight hours mens a fire every year once 1500 Dreamliners ar flying as Boeing hopes. Switch the battery now, it is totally unnecessary risk

</comment><comment><USER27> Reminds me of the dell lithium ion battery recall that was caused by metal fragments in the cell during manufacturing causing shorts in the cells.

</comment><comment><USER28> Not sure about Boeing, but batteries made in USA never failed me.

<comment><USER29> That really solves it then, who needs testing, FAA, NTSB and other alphabet agencies!

Maybe you should tweet to Boeing's CEO, let them run to CVS or Radio Shack to buy a few US made batteries and call it a day.

<comment><USER28> My point is the more we outsource important pieces to the cheaper ends of the globe - the more expensive it becomes for everyone to fix the consequences.

<comment><USER30> The 787 batteries are built in Japan, which is not at all cheap, and in general has a much better reputation for quality and reliability than the U.S... This is _particularly_ true for high-end specialty products—like airliner batteries.

[Japanese companies outsource all their cheap goods manufacturing to other countries.]</comment></comment></comment></comment>


The 2020 Census Is a Cybersecurity Fiasco Waiting to Happen - <AUTHOR> https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/03/the-2020-census-is-a-cybersecurity-fiasco-waiting-to-happen/ <comment><USER2> * Census never a problem before

* Now has a citizenship question on it

* Republican president

This is my shocked face that Motherjones now has an issue with it.

This is an opportunistic article riding on the Facebook data hype more than any real concern for security.</comment>


Technical job post tips for the desperate - <AUTHOR> http://blog.hirelite.com/technical-job-post-tips-for-the-desperate <comment><USER2> So basically, recognise that you are employing human beings rather than machines, and treat potential candidates with respect rather than going for obviously one-sided positions that good candidates are going to see right through? It's a little sad that this isn't just common sense, isn't it?

What I don't understand is how nearly universal bad employment conditions seem to be. I can understand businesses wanting to maximise the benefit from investing in hiring staff. However, all the evidence I have ever seen shows that sustaining long hours is counter-productive, supporting a good work-life balance keeps happier and ultimately more effective staff, etc. The big improvements in productivity I've seen have all been at companies that have dramatically _improved_ their staff's working conditions, for example by experimenting with shorter working weeks, complete flexi-time, allowing off- site working by default, etc.

How is it that even large companies with dedicated HR departments, training for managers, etc. still seem to push in the opposite direction? I suppose good working conditions, particularly those based on flexibility, are always open to abuse, but surely staff who are going to take advantage regardless will just find other ways to do so if you judge them by bum-on-seat metrics. Meanwhile, I wonder how many people take advantage of employers in some way mainly because they consider the deal to be abusively one-sided otherwise, and how many good people never get hired in the first place because they wouldn't work under those conditions...

<comment><USER3> _dramatically improved their staff's working conditions, for example by experimenting with shorter working weeks, complete flexi-time, allowing off- site working by default, etc._

I believe it is a case of known cost, hidden benefit. Basically each of those items has a fairly easy to measure cost(shorter work weeks for salaried individuals basically means you are paying more for less.) Where as improvements in productivity are not so easily measured before implementing them.

<comment><USER2> > I believe it is a case of known cost, hidden benefit.

Sure, that much I understand. What I can't figure out is why such ignorant and short-sighted policies are still tolerated, given that they directly impact the effectiveness, the reputation, and ultimately the bottom line of each business that adopts them.

It's not as if the empirical data is particularly hard to find, or as if there aren't small businesses (and probably the occasional larger one, but it's rare) benefitting from more enlightened relations between employer and employees. So what are we missing? What overriding factor drives larger companies, for all their more formalised policies and training investments, to such poor people management?

<comment><USER4> > What I can't figure out is why such ignorant and short-sighted policies are > still tolerated, given that they directly impact the effectiveness, the > reputation, and ultimately the bottom line of each business that adopts > them.

Where are the numbers?

> It's not as if the empirical data is particularly hard to find,

google "programmer productivity working conditions" doesn't find anything quantitative on the first two pages.

<comment><USER2> Try looking for more general terms using Google Scholar.

For example, here's a UK government report from the mid-2000s, featuring several relevant industrial case studies:

<http://www.bis.gov.uk/files/file14239.pdf>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Ooh can I play too?!

* Don't require 10 years experience with a language or technology that less than 10 years old * Don't list hundreds of unrelated skills required because you're hoping this position will do the work of 5 employees and 2 consultants. * Don't mention "self-motivator". Who would describe themselves otherwise? * Don't call the position a "Director of" when it has no direct reports, no hiring budget, and itself reports to an intern in marketing. * Don't ask how many ping pong balls would fit in a school bus unless your business is directly related to filling buses with ping pong balls.

<comment><USER6> > Don't ask how many ping pong balls would fit in a school bus unless your > business is directly related to filling buses with ping pong balls.

In job postings? Do you have the following in mind?

        Send applications to firstname.lastname@example.com where X
        is the number of ping pong balls that it takes
        to fill a standard yellow school bus.

<comment><USER7> Hint: you can fit more if you melt them.

<comment><USER8> But then they are no longer ping pong balls... Just plastic goop.

<comment><USER9> They never said the ping pong balls had to stay as ping pong balls.

I'd be thinking about filling the tires with liquid ping pong balls too, but maybe I'd be missing the spirit of the question...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Another thing I like to see is when the posting talks about what sort of projects you'll be working on.

The latest example of this was GazeHawk's job posting:

 _"Eye tracking gives you a ton of data with a lot of dimensions. We want to show that data to our users in a way that's easy to parse. That means interactivity: HTML5, Canvas, JS."_

Just a single sentence, but it engaged me, got me thinking, and gave me a good idea of the sort of projects they're working on.

<comment><USER11> _Another thing I like to see is when the posting talks about what sort of projects you'll be working on._

Yes, for me this is critical. If there's nothing to convince me that it's not just another job working on the same CRUD I could be working on at any other place, I won't give the posting any further attention.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> _Don't look like a recruitment agency_ \- Absolutely. Even when my job search was in its most desperate throes, I was reluctant to apply for any job that wasn't straight-forward about who they were or what they did.

 _Guarantee a response_ \- I don't think a guarantee is all that necessary, but a timetable for the process is always nice. Along those same lines, I always greatly preferred postings that had an email address, even better if it's a person's. But really, just something that indicates an active, rather than passive process. Filling out a form and hitting submit just has a hopeless, waiting-at-the-dmv feel to it.

</comment><comment><USER13> I usually avoid anything that has the word "rockstar" or similar wording. To me, it implies unrealistic expectations of knowledge and/or performance.

I will also avoid anything that has a long list of prerequisites. If there's more than maybe five or so disparate technologies requiring multiple platform knowledge, then the job you're offering should probably pay double what you're offering.

<comment><USER14> When I was most recently looking for a job here in Connecticut, it seemed like every job posting had "PHP", "Python", or even ".NET" in the title, and then required 4+ years or so of Java as well. With no explanation.

I just assumed the poster had no idea what they are talking about, and moved on.

(Edited for grammar)

<comment><USER15> I get a lot of emails from recruiters who obviously have no idea that Java and Javascript are different languages. I wonder if many of those postings should have said "Javascript" instead.

Anyone who says I'm a "strong candidate" for a big-corp Java job requiring 6+ years of Java experience after looking at my resume is very confused and won't be getting a call.

<comment><USER16> Bingo. This was definitely the case for a recent local freelancing/consulting job post; an associate took up the position and tipped me off to the Java/JavaScript mixup (though I don't think the post asked for X years experience).

Something to consider though... if they can't even accurately name the language, can they really judge the experience required in said language?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> How about listing requirements that are actually requirements? If you don't need 7+ years Mirah experience, don't ask for it. I never apply for jobs that I don't actually fit the 'requirements'.

Every time I see someone ask for more experience than is possible for a language, I wonder what other lies they're going to tell me or unreasonable things they are going to expect.

<comment><USER18> Listing any required years experience with a particular technology seems like a mistake.

A good engineer is a good engineer and shouldn't need N+ years experience with a language/framework/tool to make an impact on a good team that's willing to do a little training.

<comment><USER19> When I see something like "7+ years PHP experience", I wonder what it is they think they're using that as a proxy for and why they don't just mention it directly.

It's not like there's a standard progression in technologies where you learn certain things in years 5-7, etc.

I can see there's a difference between say 1 years and 3 years, but is there really a difference you can count on being true if someone used a tech for 5 years vs 3? 7 vs 3?

<comment><USER20> > I wonder what it is they think they're using that as a proxy for and why > they don't just mention it directly.

A very smart developer who I respect once said something like: when you are young, you have lots of energy and want to learn/use the latest technology. As you get older and gain more experience, you start to see the patterns. It's not about the technology, there are repeated themes and solutions. But when you start realizing this and have accumulated 7 years of experience, you may be transitioning out and wanting to begin starting a family. So the people who might be most qualified might be wanting to leave the intensity of coding for the relative stability of management.

As someone once said - the entire premise of capitalism is based on overpaying the first few years and underpaying you for the next 20 or 30 years.

So perhaps 7 years of experience is a cludgy filter for the relative graybeards who understand that technology is just a tool, not an end.

<comment><USER21> >As someone once said - the entire premise of capitalism is based on overpaying the first few years and underpaying you for the next 20 or 30 years.

Someone with no understanding of the term "captialism", apparently.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The problem is that a lot of these suggestions are very superficial and don't consider the underlying reason companies are doing what they currently do.

For example if you specify a salary you end up anchoring the negotiations, if a candidate is not quite up to the level you're looking for but you want to hire them anyway, the candidate is much less likely to accept a job offer where you offer a salary below what you stated in the ads, even if they would have accepted it otherwise.

Furthermore you need to consider the impact disclosing salary levels has on current employees, if the market is tough you may have to offer a salary above what current employees are earning, which can be very damaging to morale and can make your staff feel hostile towards the new hire from the start.

<comment><USER23> I don't think the suggestions are superficial. A company does not need to follow _every single one_ of these tips in order to increase their applicant signal/noise ratio. Many companies would achieve this goal if they simply refused to "look like a recruitment agency" and took the time to write job posting for humans, and not robots. I tend to be turned off by completely impersonal job postings, even when they list interesting technologies. Also, imo, a company has little to gain and much to lose by trying too hard to be cool: as stated in the article, you don't need ninjas, and you don't need to tell us that you only hire the top 1% (if you have to say it, it probably isn't true).

But you make a good point about the salary, and it is especially relevant for large companies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> When I post job ads now, I ask interns for their blog URL, websites they've done, URLs to open-source projects, and their Twitter account if any. I'm not looking to find out personal stuff, but I want examples of what they do, how they learn, and if they'll be a fit for us.

When I used to just ask for a cover letter and resume, 99% of the people who interviewed with me were just awful. Now I tend to get good dev interns who want to be here and have similar drive and ambitions.

I'm not saying that a person who doesn't have any OSS experience, a blog, or a Twitter account wouldn't be a good developer, but then if they're not interested in OSS, teaching, doing things on their own (outside of work/schoolwork) or sharing, then they may not be a good cultural fit.

<comment><USER13> What if they don't keep a blog? I'm pretty sure I have a decent amount of technical information in my head, I just don't bother to blog about it.

As for Twitter ... seriously?

<comment><USER24> I believe I already addressed that in my post - you could be an awesome programmer. But would we be able to get along with eachother? Would you be able to get along with the rest of the people who do use Twitter and who do blog about what they learned? It's likely not, and now we can both look for other opportunities.

<comment><USER25> That's so arbitrary. There are plenty of devs on Twitter that I could never ever get along with. Plenty not on twitter I could. There are plenty of people blogging about their profession that are good at it, and plenty that are good at it that are not blogging.

At my startup of the 8 devs, we had 2 on twitter and 3 with their own blogs, so the bulk of us didn't do either. But we got along great. Why wouldn't we? What does Twitter and blogging have to do with interpersonal relationships?

<comment><USER24> Well, I did say "and twitter account if any". Looking at someone's twitter stream who's poking at some new library or talking about some code they wrote tells me a lot more than "1 year of php development" on a resume.

It may be arbitrary, but github+blog+twitter has worked well here.

<comment><USER26> Twitter is tricky. I very rarely if ever tweet about technical topics for a couple reasons:

1\. I don't think anything technically interesting can be accurately explained in the 140 characters provided by Twitter.

2\. Simply announcing what I'm working on is self-congratulatory back-patting. No one cares what I'm working on that hour.

3\. I have many non-technical friends (e.g., no one else in my frat is CS). I would not alienate them from a conversation by only talking about tech all the time.

<comment><USER27> The same could be said for non-technical topics:

1\. I don't think anything interesting can be accurately explained in the 140 characters provided by Twitter.

2\. Simply announcing what I'm working on is self-congratulatory back-patting. No one cares what I'm working on that hour.

3\. I have many friends with different interests. I would not alienate them from a conversation by only talking about X all the time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> I would add as a couple of other tips:

1\. Provide a contact email, esp. for larger companies, filling out a n page submission form is a killer.

2\. Use LinkedIn and the other boards not headhunters, Dice and Monster feel like headhunter spam. At least with LinkedIn you can connect from a posting, to a company to an HR person.

Personally I would love it if Dice had a filter headhunter option, but it probably would kill their #1 revenue stream.

<comment><AUTHOR> Awesome tips. Indeed actually has an "Exclude staffing agencies" option on their advanced search: <http://www.indeed.com/advanced_search>

<comment><USER28> That's the thing, we need employers to actually post for themselves with a contact address. Your site is a form of that, where you connect with 10-15 direct employers, which is great. We need more of that on the boards, via linkedin, maybe stack overflow, indeed, startuply. However I think this issue affects larger corporations even more so, and they use Monster/Dice, how do you improve that?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I just saw a job posting that said they were looking for a "young and energetic person". Isn't that illegal?

<comment><USER30> In the US, it is definitely illegal.

EEOC: _It is illegal to publish a job advertisement that shows a preference for or discourages someone from applying for a job because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, or disability. For example, a help-wanted ad that seeks "recent college graduates" may discourage people over 40 from applying and may violate the law._

One exception is BFOQ (bona fide occupational qualification). Some obvious examples are labor jobs, religious education and the performing arts. There are gray areas as well, such as a college-oriented start up hiring recent college grads, however the company would need to prove that the age requirement was necessary to perform the job in question. Personally, I think it's rather hard to make that case for programmers.

Interestingly, a preference for minorities is not a BFOQ. It is illegal to specify race or gender even if end goal is workplace diversity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> "Hirelite is on a mission to put headhunters out of business. We host speed interviewing events using video chat where 20 job seekers talk to 20 companies for 5 minutes each..."

Hey, what an awesome idea!

</comment><comment><USER32> Wow, this looks like the exact opposite type of person I'm looking for when I hire.

I'm willing to pay high wages and even stake in the company, but if I do, that person should be willing to work hard and be dedicated to the building quality projects, rather than clocking in and out.

Is this how all developers feel? Do they all expect remote work?

I understand the need for working from home, but as a business builder, I like being able to sit with a developer and plan and build together.

<comment><USER33> I'll go out on a limb and explain what developers 'feel'.

 _Say that you're comfortable with remote work_ \- In the case of a local employee, I don't want to have to commute 5 days a week, 2 hours to an fro. Sometimes I just don't feel well enough to go to the office, but I'm not as bad as to not work at all. Sometimes I just need a change of scenery. In the case of a international employee, sometimes the best person for the job will not be a local hire. Sometimes it makes more business sense to hire cheaper for a quality employee that doesn't operate out of your immediate area. You can easily fly a developer over for a few days every month or two if you want to discuss things in person, but most of the time a Skype call is more than enough. Be flexible and you'll keep good developers happy enough to go all out and really want to make YOUR product better.

 _Drop the degree requirement_ \- Not sure if you approve or disapprove here, but if you're willing to pay high wages and stake in the company make sure that you're not discriminating on formal education. The moment I find out that I'm being payed less because I don't have a title, instead of it being because of the quality of my work and my experience is the moment I start looking for a new job. In my case, I've never been discriminated based on a diploma, and more often than not I've been payed more than employees with degrees because of proven experience and productivity.

 _Guarantee the job only requires 40 hours per week_ \- Hard work does not mean that I should work 12 hours a day, not even because you pay 'high wages'. You want quality projects? Keep your developers happy. Don't push them to put work over families, social life, or hobbies. Be flexible, specially regarding office hours. Do this and the day you tell them that you just got a retarded deadline pushed a month early, you'll find developers working 80 ~ 100 hours a week to get the project done. You reap what you sow so to speak. Of course, you'll have to be a team player and give them a few weeks off the next week though.

 _Offer to train people in a new language_ \- Offering benefits to further your employees career makes almost any developer a happy camper. Buy them books and send them to conferences. It's an investment that's well worth it. I'm pretty sure you probably agree with this one, but it's important to point it out nonetheless.

My point is that if you want great developers to feel at home in your company and help you build a great product, you need to be as flexible and laid back as possible towards your developers without, of course, giving in to mediocrity. You might like employees that work 12 hours a day every day and are always in the office by nine am, but the people you need are the ones that will move your company forward, and more times than not this are the one's that want their employment conditions to be 'fair' and easygoing.

<comment><USER32> I'm fine with much of that, but only after someone proves that they deserve it. To me, these seem more like rewards or perks than initial offerings.

As an employer, if someone comes in to my office with those requirements, they need to show me that they can produce...otherwise, we're not starting off on the right foot.

Can you imagine someone in any other field asking for the same? They would be laughed out of the building. I'm not saying that makes it right or wrong...but it's certainly interesting.

I guess my point, and what's most important to me, is not the tally of hours worked, but someone's willingness to buy in to our product, and more importantly, their ability to recognize the difference between getting by and getting things done. Team goes both ways.

<comment><USER34> That's interesting because I don't put in hard work until my employer proves they deserve it. Someone has to make the first move. Do you see the dilemma here?

<comment><USER32> So you're saying a good salary is not enough to merit good work in return?

<comment><USER34> That's exactly what I'm saying. Money only gets you so far, and first impressions are hard to break. To _really_ make me give my all, I need to work some place where I'm valued and not some cog in a machine. If my first impression is that you view me as a machine that you put money in one end and code comes out the other, then you'll have to work twice as hard to get rid of that impression once I've proven myself to you (assuming I stick around long enough _to_ prove myself to you).

<comment><USER32> So what's value?

Respect in communication and expectations or letting you run the show?

<comment><USER34> I didn't say anything that alluded to me (or any other employee) wanting to run the show. Are you really attempting to get the most out of the employee- employer relationship or are you trying to put down threats to your authority?

<comment><USER32> No, this isn't about authority at all, at least for me. I just got the impression that you were sort of drawing a line in the sand, and I was trying to ascertain why. I'd still love more insight.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> These are generally really excellent points. I'll just quibble with a few:

* Say that you're comfortable with remote work

Uh, excuse me but don't say that unless you _know_ how to make a remote situation work for someone. I would say instead, "be open to someone relocating but make clear whether you'll pay for that or not". Ads saying "local candidate only" are really obnoxious (what, does the person needs a California passport or something?)

Further, a lot of this advice is along the lines of "be an absolutely fabulous employer". And while I like the idea of employers becoming the absolute best, on the way to that ideal they'll still be hiring employees. So really, I want an ad that's going to reflect the real pluses and minuses of a less than perfect employer. For example, don't say 40 hours a week unless you mean it, etc.

</comment><comment><USER36> So do companies prefer it when candidates apply to them directly, or does that just irritate them (ie. If they've used agencies/headhunters to advertise their vacancies)?

</comment><comment><USER37> Honestly, If I were recruiting developers/creative/technical people the least thing I'd be doing is write a job post.

</comment><comment><USER38> I think this list doesn't go far enough.

Minimum salary should be $300k per year. Guaranteed zero overtime, and you get to spend 25 of your 30 work hours per week on side projects or learning new languages (from home, of course.)

Anything else is just oppressive and restricts creativity. If you say otherwise you're probably just a lame business guy who hates hackers.

<comment><AUTHOR> I understand your comment. The list is very developer friendly. But it's just meant to help companies that want to appeal a bit more to developers and get more applications.

There are great companies with great people out there who just don't know what developers are looking for. They don't have to implement all of these tips, but maybe they'll be able to mix and match them with what already works at their company.

<comment><USER38> I have to say that sometimes the sense of entitlement among developers here gets to pretty absurd levels. There's an attitude that developers are the only ones that matter, and anything that adds any kind of accountability is oppressive.

$90k+ salary, guaranteed max of 40 hours per week and a few % equity at a startup? if a sales rep or manager asked for something like that in an interview they'd be called pompous. For example, if a startup has raised $500k in funding, this would mean not only would they be spending 20% of their funding on a single developer in the first year, but they'd give up a big chunk of equity and get someone who has 3 other projects on the side they're working on. That's seems fair? that doesn't smack of an entitlement complex?

p.s. I'm a developer and run a startup.

<comment><USER39> Salaried developer employees are different from founders or executives. I can measure a founder's performance in terms of number of users or amount of revenue. I've yet to see a meaningful numerical measure of developer output. It is possible to meaningfully grade developer output only in qualitative terms, not quantitative ones. Quantitative measures are oppressive. If you want to rate me, I want someone to pay attention to what I'm actually doing, and I want someone who is capable of understanding what's going on. That's not asking too much. But that kind of investment means one manager is capable of managing fewer people, and you have to have really talented managers, and so people don't like it.

I have no problem with accountability. Very simply, if you need to keep tabs on me (already a step down in the relationship), then I expect you to do it in a qualitative fashion, with a person capable of evaluating progress. Closed tickets and hour estimates and burndown charts and all the rest of that stuff is a fiction, and it makes an incompetent manager look real busy when he is actually doing nothing. And it wastes my time when I'm trying to do important work.

They call these metrics time saving devices, but if you don't have time to go around and peer at what's actually happening in the shop, then you aren't actually evaluating anything.

You don't need a person to track metrics. If these fictions worked you could set up a machine to track progress and send reminder emails, and even to fire people who were consistently too far behind.

To put it in a not nice way, the managers at startups I've met were experienced people who weren't skilled enough to cash out during the first bubble, or who never made it to an executive position or to starting their own company. They were untalented, and their advice was bad. If they had been genuinely capable of showing me how to perform 10% better, I would have received them as saints, or as angels from on high, and would probably have spent as much time around them as possible. That was not the case.

The other reason people like metrics is because of the squeeze. You're already operating under the assumption that I might not be working at full potential, that's why you want the additional accountability. If I am working at full potential, and you assume you can squeeze 5% more out of me, and start to press down, then maybe you do get 5% more in the short run, but in the long run you've caused a problem.

In their less guarded moments I've heard people in these positions claim their job is to improve performance by just a few percentage points, and that will justify their position. Multiplied over a department, these are huge gains. Unfortunately, that's an exceedingly difficult proposition for someone without special insight, and the only way it's going to happen is if they are in control of the results metrics. Which they are.

Maybe you can recover a few percentage points in a clunky, inefficient company. In a hot startup one overseer is not going to squeeze that much out. They're just annoying.

I doubt you can get rid of middle managers. They're there for a reason. Someone has to digest what's going on for the higher ups. But there's probably a better way for them to do their jobs than inserting themselves where they don't belong.

<comment><USER38> I guess you'll have to take my word for it that I'm not talking about the obviously silly ways of making developers accountable (like LOC or tickets closed.) I'm a developer, so I know that typically managers who don't know how to code shouldn't be managing coders.

What I'm talking about is developers who demand above market wages, and shorter hours (than lawyers, or doctors, or automotive engineers etc.) and less commitment, and more equity. There are a lot of these guys out there, and a lot of people on here who think like that. I'm saying that's a childish, entitled attitude that ignores the reality of starting and building a company. Sometimes you can't have it all.

<comment><USER40> Unless you're hiring someone fresh out of school, they've likely had some experience in the job market and base their expectations of salary and conditions on that.

It's not really a sense of entitlement if I can point to similar positions x, y, and z and ask why you're not offering the same, is it?

Expectations, whether or not you find them realistic, are not created in a vacuum. I can't pay my mortgage or feed my kids on a "pre-money equity-only" job. Taking a deep pay cut for a stake in NewCo? Been there before - at the end of the day, 5% of nothing is still nothing.

If you're looking for someone who is willing to take a big risk for very little (immediate) reward, you aren't looking for an employee, you're looking for another co-founder.

<comment><USER38> I totally agree with you. That's exactly my goal in hiring early employees - they are de facto co-founders that should get a ton of equity and a livable salary.

If someone wants 90k and 40 hour work weeks they should go work at Microsoft or IBM. That's not how successful startups are built. You need to be ultra frugal, extremely dedicated (to the point of obsession) and have lots of exposure to the up side.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Space bully: Jupiter may have kicked giant planet out of its orbit - <AUTHOR> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2015/11/06/space-bully-jupiter-may-have-kicked-giant-planet-out-its-orbit.html <comment><USER2> posted earlier: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10502910](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10502910)</comment>


AskHN: Any Interest In A Schneier Block Cipher Self-Study Group? - <AUTHOR>

Schneier Block Cipher Self-Study - https://www.schneier.com/paper-self-study.html<p>I'm thinking of working through this.  If anyone else is interested we could set up some kind of mailing list (I will be making slow progress, I imagine, and am not the kind of person who solves problems in a group, so for me the list would likely be more about finding relevant papers and the like, or sharing ratings about which are harder, but each to his own...) <comment><AUTHOR> Clickable - [https://www.schneier.com/paper-self- study.html](https://www.schneier.com/paper-self-study.html)

Direct to PDF - [https://www.schneier.com/paper-self- study.pdf](https://www.schneier.com/paper-self-study.pdf)</comment>


Android Market to overtake App Store in August 2011  - <AUTHOR> http://www.mobilebusinessbriefing.com/apps/article/android-to-overtake-app-store-in-august-2011 <comment><USER2> As an iPhone developer, I just don't really care anymore about the size of one app store versus another. It's all about which store you can make real money from. Apple has paid out over $2 billion to developers (data from March 2011) and what has Google paid to Android developers? $50M? $100M? A tiny percentage compared to Apple.

There are so many blog entries at the top of HN about Android developers who made $500/mo from their apps. Guess what? $500/mo is nothing. $500/mo doesn't even pay for rent. If you write an iPhone app that doesn't look like Interface Builder exploded and you don't make at least $500/mo then you're pretty much a miserable failure. I have friends that have built the simplest, most inane iPhone games on a Sunday afternoon that make over $1000/mo.

The successes of iPhone developers absolutely dwarf the articles I've read about Android developers' incomes. I'm not talking about big game development houses either, I'm referring to 1-3 person teams (designer, coder, coder typically) who make tens of thousands of dollars per month. I'm personally friends with at least a dozen people who have apps that make this much. It's not even a surprise anymore when a nice-looking iPhone app makes $50k in its first month.

The reality is that iPhone developers who make decent apps make a lot of money. I don't care if the Android Market is 5x the size of the App Store if Apple is still paying out billions of dollars to developers.

<comment><USER3> Google only recently made it possible to do in app selling, which I believe will actually make it much, much easier to get money for our games, especially as android users are more willing to buy in game upgrades.

But that is only half the equation the other part being that users can expect to find an app that can solve their problem - which is important for the users to buy an Android phone in the first place (it is also partly why I have written of Win7 phone).

<comment><USER2> A large issue of the revenue difference is that you can return apps for up to 24 hours on Android but you can't return an iPhone app. Because of this, friends of mine who use Android phones will routinely download an app to use for a specific situation they're currently in, then return later the following day. It's not the app is bad, it's just that they used it for the one thing they wanted to use it for, and can now just get their money back. It's like buying a tux for your wedding and then returning it the next day for a full refund. This may be a huge plus for users, but as a developer it really, really sucks.

<comment><USER4> The refund window was reduced to 15 minutes a while back. Which IMO as an Android developer is too short; 1 or 2 hours would be better.

<comment><USER5> As a successful android dev, I want the window gone. If they want to email me for a refund, fine, I'll refund with no questions asked, but letting people play my paid apps while they wait for the doctor to call them in and just getting a refund sucks.

<comment><USER6> Don't you think those people are cheap enough that they're probably not going to download your app at all if they can't refund it? Isn't that little bit of exposure better than nothing? Maybe if they end up really liking your app, they'll keep it. Can you know how many people who keep your app tried it in the first place because of the refund window?

I can understand your frustration from seeing a lot of refunded apps, but as a user, it can be frustrating to have to pay for every app that I try, without being able to really see if it's up to my standards or solves my problem. Which is why I much preferred the 24 hour window, esp. for apps that you can't really test drive well in 15 minutes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Does anyone buy this analysis? No, not the idea that someday there may be more apps in Google's app store than Apple's, but the drawing straight line projections and marking a circle around the intersection and looking at the date axis and saying "OK, that's the day!"

Shouldn't there maybe be an obligation to think about the data you're analyzing. Like, maybe some of those Android apps represent apps that were available for iOS? Maybe the "researchers" should look into the percentage of Android-only apps and iOS-only apps and try to see in which categories there are growing or shrinking leads for one platform or another?

This "finding" seems more like a typical attention-whoring move. It's like, in 1998, posting a poll asking whether Sun or Microsoft or Yahoo was going to buy Apple. It's designed to gin up outrage and therefore attention. Don't feed the troll.

<comment><USER8> It's not scientific but I still think it has value. Two different firms have forecasted a month that they believe the Android app store will overtake the Apple app store in numbers. This metric has value and it's what research firms are paid to do.

<comment><USER7> What is the value of the metric? And what metric? App submissions per unit time? I suppose that metric has _some_ value. The projected date that the Google app store will have more apps than Apple's iOS app store is not a metric: it's a naive extrapolation.

What value do research firms deliver? For whom? In the past, many people have accused various research firms of shilling for various industry players, e.g. Gartner for Microsoft. I've never heard of a research firm providing insightful, actionable, accurate, non-trivial analysis. ("Sun will rise tomorrow!") The only people who I know of who cite research firms' reports are people in large corporations who are out of touch with reality or sales people or people at companies that have an interest in having others believe what a research firm is saying.

Market research can be scientific in that it can reflect a basic intellectual honesty and be the result of critical reflecting on findings and asking whether they make even the least amount of sense.

When people use the term "scientific" the way you did, it often appears to be a defensive move, a way to say, "Of course this isn't a repeatable double- blind controlled clinical trial!" But there's much more to science than that. Most of what we know we know through the application of scientific methods (perhaps better-called habits of mind) in situations where gold-plated studies are impractical or impossible.

\---

ADDENDUM

I am being harsh because research firms contribute little or no value. They're little better than web content farms in terms of the volume and value of information they produce. They feed pointless speculation. They flatten complex issues into simple-minded horse races. I am far more supportive of people doing real work that turns out to be spectacularly wrong. Research firms produce thick, black, sooty smoke that pollutes the marketplace, both the literal marketplace and the marketplace of ideas.

<comment><USER8> "attention-whoring", "troll", "naive", etc. Why are you getting so offensive about this article?

I agree that this metric has little value. Quality of apps, average sales per app and exclusives are all more important. However, this is still a metric used by marketing and I believe some consumers do care about "the biggest app store". I think Apple has used app numbers in various commercials.

This article doesn't conclude which app store is better (and actually says smaller is better for sales). It is simply stating that based on the current trends, Android will have more apps.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Speaking as an iOS developer who has switched to Android (because of client contract demand), Android lacks the Wow app. The app like the visual AR translation app (which despite its flaws). Or The Elements iPad app.

Android lacks exclusive, luxury-type apps. It, for lack of a better phrase, lacks snobs.

Snobs mean more for a market and the developers that pursue them, than sheer numbers.

</comment><comment><USER10> What specifically in the Android Market will overtake the iOS App Store?

\- The fake-licensed 'Spiderman' and Wolverine clone games with the same graphics and massively slow Quake engine port? The fake Rolex watch widgets? The fake Citizen watch widgets? Various other 'same code, different graphics' spamware apps?

\- John's maze test? Other games that lack actual scoring or gameplay, but are more tech demos?

\- The great games that have ads plastered all over their Android versions, like Angry Birds, as the developers think users are cheap and don't bother providing a paid version.

Massive ghetto is massive. That's not an achievement.</comment>