My Response to "Are we overcomplicating software development?" - <AUTHOR> https://neilonsoftware.com/2017/01/18/my-response-to-are-we-over-complicating-software-development/ <comment><USER2> "Process," is the answer to the question, "how do we get a team of talented engineers to design and implement software together?"

The answer to what should that process be? I'd look to the SWEBOK[0] for an introduction to the state of the art.

As for the question at stake here... let me use the words of someone much smarter than myself:

> _Simplicity is a great virtue but it requires hard work to achieve it and > education to appreciate it. And to make matters worse: complexity sells > better._

> _Dijkstra (1984) On the nature of Computing Science (EWD896)_

If you don't appreciate the true difficulty of programming you're bound to create problems and spend most of the rest of your time debugging them later on. If your chief motivation is to sell a software product or service powered by software then it behooves you to create complexity. It seems more impressive when you can't explain why some component or feature doesn't work in a single sentence. You just want to control that complexity enough so that you can maintain the illusion of order.

If you want to achieve simplicity you have to work at it. It's hard and doesn't come for free. You really have to think. There's no way around that.

[0] [https://www.computer.org/web/swebok/index;jsessionid=306e197...](https://www.computer.org/web/swebok/index;jsessionid=306e197849715725b82e977c6b54)

<comment><AUTHOR> (I'm Neil, the author)

I can't find a "like" button anywhere, so I'll just say "Like".

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> (in regards to the original post that started this)

I could rant for hours about how so many misuse the term "Agile" and the misunderstanding the idea(s) behind being agile. But I'm at a point where I almost don't care anymore. The use of "Agile" as though it describes a specific, prescriptive methodology is so ubiquitous that it's almost impossible to talk about the subject.

Let me just say this... go read the Agile Manifesto before issuing any criticism of "Agile" and repeat this 10 times - "Agile is NOT a methodology".

Scrum is a methodology. Crystal is a methodology. RUP is a methodology. XP is a methodology. OpenUP is a methodology. TSP is a methodology. One or more of those methodologies may be "agile", but "Agile" itself is NOT a methodology.

<comment><USER4> Note that Agile values "people over process," so having too heavy a focus on process violates the Agile manifesto by itself.

<comment><USER5> You conclusion is wrong. Agile finds value in process, as well. Read the last line until this sinks in:

        That is, while there is value in the items on

the right, we value the items on the left more.

There is a lot of value in the right process, the process however needs to be a servant to the needs of the people. You can be agile with long complex processes so long as you pay attention to how the processes affect the people and ensure that every time a process is getting in the way of someone it is a good thing.

I think we would all agree that process needs to stop the "cowboy coder" who otherwise would check in code with many syntax errors just before leaving for a long vacation. This example is nearly a straw-man it is so trivial - but if anyone doesn't have personal processes to prevent it the team will need to create a process of some sort. This could be a simple don't do that again talk, a HR process to fire the guy, a automatic backout process, a formal checkout for pushing, or whatever - the choice is up to your team, and depends on team factors like if this is a one time mistake or a repeated offense.

Going to the other extreme, medical software that could kill should have long complex processes. Agile is perfectly fine with this.

Agile is taking issue with some [big companies] that have created such long cumbersome processes in ages past that no longer serve the needs. Sometimes they created a complex process because of a one time mistake that is unlikely to happen again. Or maybe the process made sense in light of the tax laws that were changed in 1986. Some processes actually are required and useful, but because of all the cumbersome ones they are ignored until it is too late.

<comment><USER4> I don't know if you realized this, but all your examples are of how process controls people. Can you even explain what it means to make people more important than processes?

<comment><USER5> Process is about controlling people, so of course my examples are controlling people. The trick is they are process controlling people in areas where they need to be controlled. Contrast this to processes that control people in ways they don't need to be controlled.

Is someone checking that are login to your computer at exactly 8am every day? That a process that controls people but isn't needed for most programmers. The process makes perfect sense in context of assembly line workers: if even one person is late the entire line cannot start.

One thing that I didn't say but should have is that process should not be the first thing to fall back on. You might have to deal with the guy who pushes broken code all the time, but there are other solutions other than process that you should explore.

<comment><USER4> Most of your post is still about processes, justifying why they are good. I don't think you get what it means, still: "people over process."

<comment><USER5> looking back, I accept your criticism. I'm an engineer, ultimately I understand things like processes better than people.

I stand by agile saying people over process, but I have no clue how to actually explain it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The point about "Agile the philosophy" being better than "Agile the practice" seems like a red herring to me, since so few get "Agile the philosophy" right. It's the same way I feel about things like HATEOAS: maybe it's good as a Platonic ideal, but if no one is reaching that ideal, then how useful is it really? There need to be suggestions that we can _actually_ put into practice.

<comment><USER7> Exactly my problem with Agile. The philosophy is immense and hard to follow. Everyone sees it differently. The practice of it, thus, is always unique, and never consistent. We need something better.

<comment><USER8> Agile is never wrong: it is only the humans that have failed it.

More consulting, of course, is required.

<comment><USER9> That second line is the only thing that distinguishes Agile from communism ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Why does this need its own thread? (Other than ego-stroking the OP) Seems like any response could be in the main thread or linked from there rather than splitting the discussion.

<comment><USER11> Are we running out of threads? :-)

Threads are cheap and this came to my attention more strongly this way than if it had just been a comment.

Every piece of prose posted here is, in some way, a response to something.

I'm not sure it's "ego-stroking," strictly speaking. What's wrong with giving the author recognition?

<comment><AUTHOR> (me = author) FWIW, I can totally understand how it could come across as ego stroking. In this particular case I wasn't trying to, but I have been guilty of it in my life. As for recognition, trust me - give it a week and no one will remember my article ever existed. I honestly just wanted to answer ian0's question thoughtfully, and made the best call I could think of.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Response to this: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13426896](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13426896)

</comment><comment><USER13> Cloud DevOps is complex, but we're just moving on-prem complexities and hardware complexities to the cloud, so it's a fair trade.

Microservices, when done properly, are significantly less expensive than traditional service layers.

Continuous Integration is one of the greatest improvements in software development.

<comment><AUTHOR> 1) Yes, plus security concerns...that were really always there because clearly all those enterprise firewalls were not stopping anyone. Just ask Yahoo.

2) "When done properly" \- therein lies the rub.

3) Absolutely agree, but I have seen teams screw it up time and time again. Never really figured out why that is.

<comment><USER14> I suppose #3 might fail because of the "frog in boiling water".

If you throw a frog in boiling water it will freak out. But if you throw a frog in cold water and slowly bring it to a boil, it will never notice.

I actually like to submit completed modules when they are ready. I find constant pushing makes things a lot more complicated.

edit: fix terrible spelling

<comment><AUTHOR> Re: #3, perhaps so. I have seen many a good CI process go to hell over time. I could argue no one would have a CI process if in the beginning it wasn't making life easier. It would seem no CI process survives contact with the dev team.

Re: Modules, generally I do as well, but what is a "module"? A function? A class? A library? A plugin? An extension? A listener? A handler? A subscriber? A publisher? A DAO? A DTO? An in-memory service? A networked service? A microservice?

The philosophy that I subscribe to is continuous integration is not the same as "everyone check into the same branch anytime they want as often as they want" but also that it is not "everyone work in their own branch until time has run out and we have to force all of our stuff to work together." That middle ground can be very tough to find, but I find that if the CI system and the architecture are not designed to work together, devs will always thrash around between those two extremes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I agree with a lot of this, but I think there is a single correct answer for the best way to first learn about the "Agile Philosophy": [http://agilemanifesto.org/](http://agilemanifesto.org/)

<comment><AUTHOR> (I'm the author) Well...yes...and that's where (I hope) most people will start. What happens next, I've found, is that people's own confirmation bias' kick in, and they take the manifesto and make it describe (in their own mind) what they are already doing and/or want to do.

The manifesto (to me) is how people who understood the nature and goals of Agile summarized their sprawling, complex, interconnected - and valid - thoughts. At the risk of being hyperbolic, I think of it like E = MC^2. Yes, that is a good summary of Einstein's theories, but if all you ever know of them is this summary you'll miss all the implications of what happens when you put it into practice. Probably a terrible example, but the best I could think of.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I upvoted it at "Microservices are a concept, not an implementation."

<comment><USER17> I don't really understand what it means.

<comment><AUTHOR> This is a good place to start:

[https://martinfowler.com/articles/microservices.html](https://martinfowler.com/articles/microservices.html)

The opening sentence sets the tone well for the article well:

"'Microservices' \- yet another new term on the crowded streets of software architecture."

A colleague of mine once said that his work (he was a business strategist) was "slowly coming into focus." We're pretty far along today in our understanding of microservices, but at the time the article was written (early 2014) microservices were "slowly coming into focus". Reading what people where thinking when the industry was trying to define them should help in understanding what they are today.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I agree with ian0's perspective, but I am compelled by Neil. I think we can learn a lot of patience about the state of software development from this article.

<comment><AUTHOR> I appreciate that - thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Yes, Very much so. Could not agree with the author more.

<comment><AUTHOR> Careful - I know that guy (I am that guy). He hardly knows what he's talking about half the time, and for the other half he makes it up as he goes along.

Seriously though, glad you liked it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> OP vs this response is great example of gaps in "actual usage" vs concepts

</comment><comment><USER20> I'm not sure this article is really saying too much at all. I started with extreme programming back in 99 (after following the proponents and all the heated discussions on the most brilliant OTUG email list)

Many many times I have seen this kind of question, "Aren't we just making this too complicated?"

and the response being "It's not complicated, if you misunderstand X Y or Z you are probably going wrong"

My observation is, many things of the things we leverage in the software world are answers to problems. Some of those answers seem so good, and work brilliantly when combined with other answers we package a set of answers as a "process / methodology" and advocate it.

But sometimes for some people the answers don't really match the problem, or need adapting to the problems at hand. Now, without good insight into the original problems, then YES it will be "too complicated". Any time you do things for problems you don't really have it is

A phrase that was thrown around in the early days of XP was "Brain Engaged", to try and highlight that you don't blindly do things, you need to be aware why you are doing something and adapt as necessary.

However! If someone says "hey this new new way of approaching design is awesome", and it piques your interest, You _should_ blindly learn/try that something new and debug it till you get an understanding of why it was considered awesome. At that point you can brain engage it as needed.

So back to the original question, yes, we do make things too complicated and we shouldn't do things that don't make sense. It may not make sense because we have the knowledge and experience to know it doesn't, or it doesn't make sense because we are too inexperienced. Both are valid reasons to stop and start asking what is going wrong? why isn't this working? In the world of "Lean" this is the idea of "Stop the line", sort things out, start moving forward again, even if slowly at first.

All that doesn't mean you should keep things really basic without changing, it is very important to know how to adopt ideas for doing things better and that actually contribute to things we care about.

Also important to try not to become a cynic, eg, "tried microservices, they suck, OO sucks, imperative sucks, VB sucks, NoSQl sucks". When we become cynical of something it becomes very hard to be brain engaged in regards to them. Also the opposite is true, becoming enamoured with something can limit our brain engagement also like "Functional program all the things!, unit test all the things!, scale all the things! deep learn all the things! distribute all the things! Reactive all the things! things! the all Forth"

<comment><AUTHOR> "I'm not sure this article is really saying too much at all" I believe to be accurate, and I'm the author. I wasn't so much as making a statement or a point as addressing the questions in the best best way I knew how.

If "The Dude" wrote a response to Ian0's original question, I would think it would have a similar sentiment to mine, though far more concise: "Yeah man...but, you know - no man."

<comment><USER21> Value is always found in the honest exchange of ideas, and I found the link to SWEBOKv3. I'm happy for your post bringing it to my attention!</comment></comment></comment>


Court outlaws German Weather Service's free weather app - <AUTHOR> https://www.dw.com/en/court-outlaws-german-weather-services-free-weather-app/a-52735502 <comment><USER2> > The German Weather Service (DWD) will no longer be allowed to provide > general weather forecasts in a free mobile phone app. … [DWD] will only be > permitted to offer extreme weather warnings for free and … a DWD app > offering general weather forecasts must contain advertisements or be > purchased by users.

The government service is forced to put ads in its free app. WTF?

<comment><USER3> We've got a problem in germany with anything spent for by tax money. If something is done by tax money and some private company is doing the same with their own money the will go to court because the other one has an unfair advantage.

For example we have some tv channels being run by tax money (not absolutely correct, its a forced pay for everyone not included in taxes but its basically the same) without any ads. Any many free private channels fiddled with ad pauses. The tax ones wanted to put their movies online in a netflix style for free long before netflix but the private ones wonnin court because it would be unfair. Nowadays they are allowed to put them online but only for 30 days after airing in tv, everything else would be unfair to the real low-quality free channels...

<comment><USER4> If that is the argument, then I think the priority now for the DWD is to offer a cheaper and better product.

I think this also means that the DWD can now be more business orientated and perhaps grow their income?

I am not German, but I am trying to see whether this can be to the DWD's advantage.

<comment><USER5> Lets say that the government and DWD developed equivalent apps but DWD did it at half the cost. If the government app has to charge users based on its costs, then it will be twice as expensive, and lose out to the more efficient private company. But if they are just allowed to give it out to consumers for free (which a private company can't do) then it will dominate the market even though it is not the best use of resources. I assume that is the rationale for this law.

<comment><USER6> If you meant DWD (=government) did it at double the cost, then this makes sense.

<comment><USER7> I believe travisoneill1 was confusing the government weather service DWD with the firm filing the suit, WetterOnline.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is beyond me. So if I open a pay-to-visit park in Germany, can I get the courts to close down all open-access parks? This isn't natural competition, more like subsidizing by faking scarcity. What's more, the public sector should (contrary to this development) provide more internet services and resources: that's a good thing. Their financial incentives in many cases are better than the private sector's. And, they should do it for free where it makes sense, like when you're already indirectly financing the public weather department.

<comment><USER9> This is a court ruling I would have expected to see in America, not western Europe. WTF is going on over there?

<comment><USER10> Money rules everywhere.

Courts in the German state of Baden-Württemberg also recently forcibly privatized the State Forestry Service's logging operations because they were considered a monopoly (the "Forstkartell") and the sawmill industry sued in hope of lower timber prices.

This forced the regional Forestry Service departments to split into two organizations - the logging operations and the government authority, now regulating its former self. Government and state forestry services are now supposed compete with each other on prices.

Of course, this ended up _increasing_ timber prices due to the resulting mountains of paperwork, the organizational chaos that would be expected from splitting up a hundreds of years old government organization, and the extra personnel/training required.

Lawyers got paid and tax payer money was burnt, and the main purpose of the Forestry Service - environmental protection and research - suffers from the overhead.

Oh, and the state-ran broadcasting organizations need to _delete_ productions - paid for by everyone's broadcast tax money - from their online media libraries after a few weeks because private media organizations sued because it supposedly competes with their for-profit streaming services.

<comment><USER11> Germany also killed Walmart there via existing entrenched shops simply complaining about the price competition.

That seems far more German to me than something the US would tolerate. They rank below the US in economic freedom, but not by much:

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

As you mentioned it might be a regional thing. But maybe I'm being idealistic considering the US's general shift away from markets and the cronyism in certain pet industries.

<comment><USER12> > Germany also killed Walmart there via existing entrenched shops simply > complaining about the price competition.

First time I heard that. The generally accepted explanation over here is that they _couldn 't match_ prices of established chains that had well optimized supply chains, and that they absolutely failed to account for cultural differences regarding how to deal with customers and employees.

Edit: [https://youtube.com/watch?v=58_BZjnbMyw](https://youtube.com/watch?v=58_BZjnbMyw)

<comment><USER13> Grocery stores in Germany are 1/2-1/3 the price of the US. I could see Walmart botching a German operation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Interestingly, all of the data which is shown in the DWD app, and third-party apps, is available free of charge since 2019.

You can look at the price list here: [https://www.dwd.de/SharedDocs/downloads/DE/allgemein/preisli...](https://www.dwd.de/SharedDocs/downloads/DE/allgemein/preisliste_2019.pdf)

All the important stuff is free.

So one would just have to develop a free app to process and display this data ;)

<comment><USER10> Interesting, I did not expect the high-resolution COSMOS-D2 and ICON weather models to be available free of charge. Cool!

Basically, the data is free, but most higher-level processing results are not (like point forecasts derived from the models).

<comment><USER14> Actually, point forecasts are also free – but only for places where they already have to create the forecasts (you can find those on their FTP for free).

It's high quality data, for free, you'd just have to build your own frontend.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Don't German citizens pay for this information through taxes? Is this different from forbidding citizens from using the police instead of private security companies because they're providing security services "for free"?

<comment><USER16> Well, the security part (extreme weather warnings) were and will be free, just the weather prediction part is not. And from the brief period where it was free I remember it as being a impressively good app, completely unexpected from a government agency, which was probably one of the reasons the company sued...

Edit: The data is also freely available for private use on their website, just not as nice and compact.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Maybe the commercial companies should not compete on quality of data with publicly available data from the government ?

They can still provide their app, but must offer something better than just the same data.

WTF.

</comment><comment><USER18> > The private Bonn-based firm considered the DWD app anti-competitive as it > put commercial providers at a disadvantage since they could not provide the > information for free.

Is the official data not free? Maybe the solution should rather be to make the data free, rather than make the official app non-free?

<comment><USER19> My private firefighting service is struggling to get off the ground due to the government's anticompetitive price dumping at well below market rate.

<comment><USER20> Firefighting used to be a private service since Roman times until recently. Some old buildings in my city still bear a plaque saying "Fire insured" signaling that in case of fire, they should be saved. If not, the firefighters would just control the spreading to other (insured) buildings.

<comment><USER21> Capitalism has taken a hit since Roman times.

<comment><USER20> Yep. People talk about "peak capitalism", "late capitalism" etc. but they don't realize the world used to be much, much more extreme. Even until a few centuries ago, even public cops or prosecutors weren't a thing.

<comment><USER22> Isn't that why people call it _late_ capitalism, because it is in its final phases? Pure, unfettered capitalism has been dwindling for a long time, mostly because of issues like slavery, severe exploitation of workers and forced child labor. Yet still many issues remain.

I would say peak capitalism is colonial times, when companies had private armies and people were enslaved/massacred for profit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Note that this is the status quo since 2017, when the DWD lost in court the first time.

At that time they began to charge 1,99€ and have done so ever since.

I've happily paid that, as in my opinion it is one of the most reliable weather forecasts for Germany, not only for the general audience, but also for prosumers. For example, they provide high quality precipitation radar images, I regularly can determine the onset of rain with minute accuracy.

</comment><comment><USER24> There's a very interesting article/podcast episode about how the weather data is freely shared between countries: [https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/the-weather- machine/](https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/the-weather-machine/)

It only makes this news sound even worse. Weather information only exists because the source data is freely shared, thinking anyone can lock down this information is obscene.

</comment><comment><USER25> In my (German) opinion, the court did a great job by stating only that they need ads in general but leaving the amount undetermined.

Most likely, the DWD will show a one-time ad to everyone activating the free weather service. Most likely, they can even make it 5 minutes of uninterrupted ads, because everyone knows that it's a one-time thing and it's easy enough to ignore your phone for 5 minutes if you can choose the time when the ad plays.

And afterwards, the DWD has realized a year worth of ad revenue per user and is free to provide the service for free and ad free like they used to.

So while technically WetterOnline won, it won't have much consequences.

That said, I myself am a paid subscriber for WetterOnline because their worldwide real-time radar videos are super helpful, and the German weather service obviously provides data only for Germany. So I'm not really sure why they felt the need to sue in the first place.

<comment><USER26> Let me frame this in another way, the court acted in the best interest of a private company over the interests of its own people.

<comment><USER27> Courts are decidedly _not_ a political instrument, their judgements should be by law, not by utilitarian considerations.

<comment><USER28> The courts are run by people in the same unpopular political establishment as the rest of the country. Yes, they absolutely are a political instrument, although some people like to pretend otherwise when they get their policies undemocratically rammed into law through the courts.

All legal systems make utilitarian considerations. Furthermore, legal systems like Germany's are even more respectful of common sense than ones based on English common law.

<comment><USER27> > The courts are run by people in the same unpopular political establishment > as the rest of the country.

I don't disagree, but that's de facto. Nominally, they're independent and Germany doesn't rely on judge's guesstimates as much, they are supposed to apply the laws, not create them, which is why the German Constitutional Court has been criticized for becoming politically activist instead of remaining neutral.

Since they're de facto appointed by the political establishment, you can't expect them to not be carefully selected for "obedience by accident" (they're independent, they just happen to think the same way), but you can also not do it too obviously if you don't want to shake the cage too much or people might disregard the courts completely.

Government institutions with mission creep issues that start to grow is a common problem in Germany, and the courts regularly tell them to stop, this isn't a new development.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> WetterOnline has pretty lame app which didn't change much over last 10 years or so.

[https://www.wetteronline.de/apps](https://www.wetteronline.de/apps)

If everyone gives them one star Apple will kick their app out of Appstore.

<comment><USER30> I like the app (on Android though) and paid 3 Euros or so once. Their weather and rain "radars" are really useful.

<comment><USER31> The "funny" thing is that they are using data provided by DWD (for free) for those.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Here in the US I have a free, open source desktop weather app (OpenWeatherMap) that lets me set the location to many German locales. On my phone I have something similar. Surely people in Germany could install these same apps? Who is paying for weather in Germany?

<comment><USER33> This is totally missing the point.

The point is DWD is tax financed service to process weather data and to distribute it to the once that need such weather data. As it is pay by taxes, the data is distributed free of charge. The are many services, even the one you just mentioned, that uses exactly that data to distribute it further. DWD build its own app to inform about severe weather conditions as this is also allowed by DWD. Then DWD added just the regular weather data to the exact same app including rain radar and such things, that OpenWeatherMap for example does not provide. DWD got sued for this by the companies who using the exact same DWD weather data and selling it to the customers either by adding ads or by subscription.

By the way OpenWeatherMap is providing just basic weather data that is actually allowed to be included into the app for free. We are talk about much more detailed data.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Reminds me of the Candle Maker Petition about the unfair competition of the sun. Very good read with good insights. It's satire.

</comment><comment><USER35> The Norwegian Meteorological Institute provides free, worldwide weather forecast information via an API [1].

Perhaps some public-minded German-speaking developer could create a free no-ad app using this data, to provide WetterOnline with some competition.

[1] api.met.no

<comment><USER36> You can also use the webpage and mobile app "yr.no" for free global forecasting.

<comment><USER37> To reduce costs, they don't particularly encourage use outside Norway / Nordic countries.

Last time I read the API documents, they were only in Norwegian for this purpose.

Edit: it seems this is no longer the case; at least I can't find it on the site. But my Norwegian skills are practically non-existant.

<comment><USER38> English info on the yr.no data access api is here: [https://hjelp.yr.no/hc/en- us/categories/200450271-About-Yr-t...](https://hjelp.yr.no/hc/en- us/categories/200450271-About-Yr-the-API-and-our-privacy-policy)

This data is provided by the Norwegian meteorological institute: [https://www.met.no/en/free-meteorological-data](https://www.met.no/en/free- meteorological-data)

There is also a private Norwegian weather provider, StormGeo: [https://www.stormgeo.com/](https://www.stormgeo.com/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Is NOAA allowed to develop US weather apps? I vaguely recall that Accuweather or others lobbied to prevent official US NWS weather apps from existing.

<comment><USER40> It was way worse than that. Back in 2005, Rick Santorum, the republican senator from AccuWeather's home state, introduced a bill that sought to privatize the National Weather Service's weather data and forecast products. AccuWeather's Founder and CEO, brothers Joel and Barry Myers, were among Santorum's biggest campaign donors, and they argued that the NWS forecast products were unfairly preventing them from making money on their similar products. Accuweather used the NWS data themselves, so they sought to prevent the NWS from publishing the data publicly, while preserving their own access to it.

Not coincidentally, Donald Trump has nominated Barry Meyers to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

A good summary is at [https://www.outsidethebeltway.com/rick-santorums-war- against...](https://www.outsidethebeltway.com/rick-santorums-war-against-the- national-weather-service/)

The bill was called the National Weather Service Duties Act of 2005.

<comment><USER41> At that time there was also an effort to privatize aviation data, the Aeronav products that the FAA produces. It was a huge clusterfuck but in the end calmed down.

In both cases the result would be significantly worse applications for consumers. There's a lot of fantastic weather apps built on free NWS and NOAA data, things like Dark Sky, that would be impossible if the data were not freely available. Same for aviation with apps like Foreflight.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> This is very surprising for a country like Germany, which has a long history of providing public services for the common good, rather than profit oriented motives.

On the other hand, a comparably developed country like Australia is seeing many essential services being privatised, but the weather service rightfully remains a sacred government entity, with a high amount of public trust. [http://www.bom.gov.au/app/](http://www.bom.gov.au/app/)

> With the BOM Weather app you can check the weather—wherever you are—from > Australia's official weather source, the Bureau of Meteorology.

<comment><USER43> >has a long history of providing public services for the common good, rather than profit oriented motives.

Hahaha. BOM charges extortionate, nonviable prices for <i>everything</i> above the basics. Australia is one of the hardest countries for us to get reliable weather data from.

The trouble with government agencies run on a cost-recovery basis, is they have no incentive to do anything at a cost that will be recoverable.

<comment><USER44> Should run govt agencies on a 75% cost recovery basis.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> This seems like a bad outcome for consumers. I don't the context in Germany, but in my opinion: weather information should be a public service available to everyone for free.

Commercial providers can provide alternatives with features that people are willing to pay for. For example: better UI, push notifications when it's about to rain (as Dark Sky does), morning push reminders to take an umbrella if the day is looking rainy, etc.

<comment><USER46> The flip side is weather forecasting is a rapidly evolving field. R&D into techniques for more accurate forecasts is very expensive, and governments aren't great at that kind of innovation.

If all weather forecast apps were paid for, apps would have revenue to perfect their models, and true competition would exist between them, both in terms of price, but also quality of results.

<comment><USER47> This is such bullshit. Prove to me that NOAA/ECMWF/JMA/BOM/UKMet Office are bad at forecast innovation. I'll wait.

<comment><USER48> Put the Brazilian INPE in this list too, it's sad that some people created an imaginary world in their heads where innovation comes only from private companies...

When we're talking about physical sciences most of the work is done by universities and research centers, a lot of them funded by public money.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> This makes perfect sense to me if I think how things are in Romania (and I suspect it's the same in Germany too).

The Romanian state entity _sells_ access to their weather data. So any 3rd party would, indeed, be at a severe disadvantage with a free app.

Last I checked they wouldn't even _confirm_ if at least the severe warning notices were available to the public without a license.

So, the thing that's missing here is: where were WetterOnline getting the data from? They clearly were paying for it. I suspect they were getting it from none other than the German Weather Service.

The solution would be, of course, for this dataset to be free. But German Weather Service preferred the courts to find another solution...

<comment><USER50> Most of the data is free and access costs no money. Some of it is even free across all of Europe due to open governmental data regulations.

Some detailed or highly localised data would probably only be available commercially. But satellite data for example can be downloaded realtime by anyone.

<comment><USER49> Then why was WetterOnline paying for the data and how could they make a case out of it. Something is still missing...

<comment><USER51> If WetterOnline was paying for their weather data then they didn't get their data from DWD.

The DWD data is completely free. You don't even need a registration or API key or something like that. I just tried and downloaded Radar images. I can't read that format, but I could download it.

The issue is that the legal mandate of DWD is just to provide the data and not to compete with private companies. It probably made sense when those laws where written, but now it is just stupid.

<comment><USER50> The problem with such a non-compete law is that your public service doesn't really need to change much over time, but a commercial business might figure out a way to make money off of it and suddenly the private side changed forcing the public side to shut down or something like that and now everyone that was building on top of that public stuff gets screwed over. The side- effects are so big, it's hard to capture in a law.

<comment><USER51> > private side changed forcing the public side to shut down or something

As far as I am aware they are purely funded by Taxes, so I can't imagine any way that these private companies could change to force the public service to close.

<comment><USER50> Well, say a weather data service is provided by the government but is only allowed to operate as long as they don't compete with a commercial service. At that time there is no commercial service so it's fine.

10 years later a commercial service is started and now the public service has to change because that's what the law says. The public service didn't do anything wrong and didn't change anything, but because something in the private space changed the public space now has to stop providing a service. That's what I meant by change in the weather data example.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> Disturbing to see. We have the same issue in the US as well. Specifically some companies want NOAA/NWS to give their data to private companies who buy licenses and then the public can go to those companies (ex: AccuWeather). To me, weather (current observations or forecasts) is a public safety thing. Whether you're driving in the mountains and need an accurate forecast to make a go/no go decision or if you're a pilot and need to know freezing levels or other items. I've seen other things like aviation charts and terminal plates where private companies don't want the FAA to give it away for free, either (again: public safety - it should be free).

</comment><comment><USER53> The article is a little bit light on the details. While I don't agree with the situation, the decision is based on the law for the DWD[1]. According to §4 (1) Nr. 3 DWDG, the only public information is for weather warnings. While in reality, most other information is free, providing it for free is not the tax- payed task of the DWD. According to §4 (1) DWDG, it may only provide free information for the public if it's due to their legal obligation.

[1]: [https://www.bundesgerichtshof.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilung...](https://www.bundesgerichtshof.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/DE/2020/2020028.html)

</comment><comment><USER54> I mean, this is an understandable argument, but the moral harm of the government broadcasting the weather data they _produce anyway_ for free is not so great (in my opinion) that it should be stopped.

If DWD has an API, I guess somebody should just put up an open source app on F-Droid, and maybe somebody will pay to put it on Play. I don't know about iOS anymore, last time I made an iOS app it was kinda something you would only do if there was money in it.

I agree somewhat with the general argument, but I don't think the courts should be pushing for "peak neoliberalism" at any cost.

</comment><comment><USER55> That's preposterous! I presume that the German people have already paid for the German Weather Service, and their app, with their taxes. In general it seems suspect to have companies make money off of repackaging data created with public funds...

Glad the US isn't the only place with the privatize everything problem? (Please allow me to be hyperbolic.)

<comment><USER56> Is it fair that public funds are used to destroy one company's business? That seems like a path to corruption. Imagine in the US if Democrats or Republicans were able to take reprisals against uncooperative businesses once they won power...

<comment><USER57> "Fair" or not, if there's only one business i.e. a monopoly, then it ought to be socialized. Is it "fair" to profiteer because you're the only provider of something people _need_?

(This is a very old question - note the vitriol reserved for millers of flour in the Canterbury Tales.)

<comment><USER56> Why are you talking about profiteering? This was just a business doing it's thing.

State sponsored enterprise is what happens in autocratic countries. At the whim of the ruler enterprise is expropriated, whenever something is seen as adequately tempting.

You may think some ill-informed voting public is an okay form of autocratic governance because you'd slap a 'democracy' label on it, but it would result in widespread expropriation of businesses by government officials who would consequently wield immense power. The economy would collapse because the incentive to outperform would be gone. There would be a brain drain from private enterprise into government bureaucracy. This is the principle reason why socialist and autocratic governments have relatively unproductive economies. When The People's Republic of China realized this and permitted private ownership and enterprise, their economy took off as people found an incentive to work harder...

<comment><USER57> >State sponsored enterprise is what happens in autocratic countries. At the whim of the ruler enterprise is expropriated, whenever something is seen as adequately tempting.

Oh boy, you are _not_ gonna like it when you hear about the "military industrial complex".

>The economy would collapse because the incentive to outperform would be gone.

You speak as if huge chunks of our society haven't been socialized with great results. You want to re-privatize the fire department, so they have more incentive to put out fires? Privatize the police force, so they have more incentive to stop crimes? It's not so straightforward as "private enterprise = proper incentive structure" \- it's possible to engineer incentive structures with better outcomes than the free market.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> I am curious how this would work in the UK. The UK national met service, Met Office, has a free app, but has to show ads (not sure if there is a legal requirement similar to this case). Its biggest competitor is the BBC weather app which is also tax funded and is not allowed to show any ads. Up until a couple of years ago BBC got its data from the Met Office anyway so the two apps were basically showing the same data. However, now the BBC get its weather information from a private weather company. Anti-competition laws and tax-funded organisations is a complicated business!

</comment><comment><USER59> I wonder if old versions of the app will still work. Assuming the endpoints are not going to change. Also it seems that I can't find the app due to my search region. Can someone provide a link to the app?

<comment><USER60> You can find the links to their App on DWD Website German version[1] seems like they've already implemented the ban. The warnings are free, but you have to do an in-app purchase of 1.99 to see the forecasts, etc.

1\. [https://www.dwd.de/DE/service/dwd- apps/dwdapps_node.html](https://www.dwd.de/DE/service/dwd- apps/dwdapps_node.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> Same in the Netherlands: weather forecasts on public radio have since more than ten years been provided by a private company instead of the national weather service.

</comment><comment><USER62> If this is a valid basis, should they be blocked from offering a website too? If you don't think so, why? I can add a page to my home screen.

</comment><comment><USER63> Reminds me of John Oliver's coverage of AccuWeather. [0]

[0]: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMGn9T37eR8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMGn9T37eR8)

<comment><USER64> I was so about to mention that!

<comment><USER65> I will have to watch. I didn't realize this was all a thing

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> Jokes on them, I never knew about the DWD app before any just now bought it because of this article.

</comment><comment><USER67> And I immediately went and bought this DWD app for 2€, even if I get the same sources and visualization from the free Windy app. The DWD app is just better, and has a nice widget.

</comment><comment><USER68> I mean this should come with a tax break. Since one benefit is gone and now we have to rely on the bullshit service of this incompetent jackass of a company.

</comment><comment> Anthony-G This real bullshit – particularly given that the private companies base their forecasts (indirectly) on the observations that national meteorological services such as Deutsche Wetterdienst collect and provide for free as scientific data. These observations are used as the input data for the same Numeric Weather Prediction models that the commercial companies want to make money from.

Neoliberals want to have their cake and eat it. Unfortunately, neoliberalism is currently (over the past couple of decades, with a small stumble in 2008) the dominant ideology within European politics.

</comment><comment><USER69> I remember an episode of Last Week Tonight from season 6 where in the USA some pricks wanted to do the same on the free app of the respective gov department. And Trump made the hear of that dept one of the founders of (was it??) Weather.com so he can sabotage the app from the inside.

I don't remember the story, it was another brilliant example of how USA is allowing large corporations soil on everything free and wants the sharks to keep biting people's flesh (just like in healthcare, insurance, guns, etc.).

</comment><comment><USER70> This is very dumb and probably (ironically) hurts the business environment in Germany

</comment><comment><USER71> Court doesn't outlaw anything. They interpret laws. Lawmakers should change these laws.

<comment><USER72> The German legal system to a large degree has the extent and actual interpretation of the written laws determined by case law. I don't know if this is a landmark case, but if it is (which I would assume) then this is very much outlawing this practice.

<comment> em-bee that is not correct. germany does not use the common law system where case law is binding, but the civil law system where each case is taken on its own merrits against the law as it is written. past cases are only used as advice to help interpret a new case, but judges have the freedom to not follow that advice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER73> Is it even right to spend tax payers money for running a Weather Service, if it can be handled by private companies?

<comment><USER74> Can't you say that about almost anything.... Is it even right to spend taxpayers' money for running a Health Service, if it can be handled by private companies?

Oh, right -- that's the US. No thanks.

<comment><USER73> The US is still one of the most rich countries. In many countries with "free healthcare" you usually don't get anything without a bribe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER75> The law about the weather service clearly states that the weather service should provide information about severe weather.

The decision isn't about what would be nice, it was a purely legalistic question whether the law gave authorization for additional free services. Which it clearly doesn't.

This decision wasn't surprising.

Edit: dislike this comment as much as you want. The commentary in legal circles in Germany was exactly this. Nothing beats HN in legal expertise in a foreign country!

<comment><USER76> I don't really see people complaining about the decision so much as about the law which was the result of heavy lobbying.</comment></comment>


How Jetpac Built a Photo Quality Algorithm for $5k in 3 Weeks - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/how_two_startups_used_games_to_beat_the_developer.php

<comment><USER2> The 60 second challenge thing strikes me as extremely short-sighted. It _is_ impressive to be able to solve a series of tiny bugs with just 60 seconds for each one, but I don't think it's the right metric to find the elusive "10x" programmer.

It's my opinion that "10x" programmers are an order of magnitude faster than their peers not because they are lightning-fast at spitting out code (although they may be). They're faster because they can analyze the problem, drill down to its essence, and come up with an effective plan for solving it. Contrast this with a poor programmer, who might code circles around the problem, wasting time writing code that could just be taken from off the shelf. It doesn't matter if the poor programmer somehow is brilliant at punching out correct code if the code they're punching out didn't need to be written in the first place.

It's like selecting creative writers by holding a contest to see which ones can spot a grammatical mistake the most quickly. Sure, that's a helpful skill for a writer to have, but it doesn't mean that they'll write anything worth reading.

<comment><USER3> Or we can assume that the company that does the hiring via 60 second challenge is not ran by complete idiots and they do keep track whether those hires end up being effective employees for them. Let's give them the benefit of a doubt.

Your argument seems to be that there are only two possible programmers: effective designers that are slow to code or fast coders that are bad designers (designer in terms of code architecture, not graphic design, of course).

I claim that there are no good architects that are slow coders i.e. all good architects are also good coders.

When you look into research of skill acquisition, or even common sense, in order to become good at something you first have to master the basics before you master higher-level skills.

In the field of programming, being able to implement a piece of highly constrained code are the basics of our craft.

Once you're really good at that, people move up to tasks that have less constrains and are therefore high-level: choosing an implementation language, designing how pieces of the whole app fit together etc.

But you won't ever get to do that if you were not able to quickly and confidently implement a function that someone else specified, just like there are no chefs who can't cut vegetables very quickly or basketball players that are brilliant tacticians but can't run very fast etc.

Mastery of basics is not a guarantee of mastery of higher-level skills but it is a prerequisite.

<comment><USER2> > _Or we can assume that the company that does the hiring via 60 second > challenge is not ran by complete idiots and they do keep track whether those > hires end up being effective employees for them. Let's give them the benefit > of a doubt._

You don't seem to be aware of just how disastrous a bad hiring decision can be. The direct financial cost is easily in the tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on how long it takes to identify their poor performance, warn them, and finally fire them (all the while documenting their performance rigorously to avoid frivolous lawsuits later on). Beyond that, the opportunity cost of having a poor programmer in place of an excellent one is even worse. It is far, far better to avoid a bad hire in the first place than to catch them later.

> _Your argument seems to be that there are only two possible programmers: > effective designers that are slow to code or fast coders that are bad > designers (designer in terms of code architecture, not graphic design, of > course)._

I'm sorry, but you wrote a lengthy rebuttal to an argument I never made. Read my comment again. When describing the "10x" programmer, I never said that they _had_ to be a slow coder. In fact, I explicitly said they "may be" lightning fast. My actual argument was merely that the most dramatic improvements in software construction speed are due to making better decisions about what to code, what tools to use, how to approach the problem, etc. And, in my opinion, the benefits of making good decisions about these things absolutely dwarf the benefits of being able to slam out the code in record time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Spoiler: The algorithms actually work by doing text analysis on the captions and other metadata, and no actual image analysis.

<comment><AUTHOR> the algorithm needed to execute quickly. image analysis takes too long.

<comment><USER5> What's the bottleneck? Bandwidth for downloading images? Understanding of an algorithm that would do the job?

<comment><USER6> Bandwidth and general cumbersomeness of dealing with larger amounts of data with starving-startup resources. I actually spent about a decade of my career focused on image processing, and while I love it's power, I knew how much of an engineering challenge it can be at massive scale. I need to do a blog post about this, since I know my choice is a bit surprising and needs explanation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> brown9-2 Is 30,000 photos a large enough dataset for a ML exercise like this?

It might just be journalistic simplifying but I wonder if they overfit their data with such specific "good" and "bad" words:

 _Among the best words: Peru, Cambodia, Michigan, tombs, trails and boats. What photo captions are the most likely to signify a bad photo for a travel magazine? San Jose, mommy, graduation and CEO, Warden says._

</comment><comment><USER7> The essence of the post is about using crowd sourcing to alleviate start-up challenges, I think they did a good job of exposing these opportunities to founders, (BTW, its also great PR for kaggle), Good Article all in all.

<comment><USER8> I'm not sure why you were down-voted at least a couple times for this comment. You've done a much better job of summarizing what this article was about than the "spoiler:" above (which is more based on the title than the point of the article).</comment></comment>


Smarterer/Pluralsight Wants Me to Cease and Desist Taughtful.com - <AUTHOR> Today, less than 2 months after launching the beta of my social learning platform, Taughtful (taughtful.com); I received a cease and desist letter from Pluralsight/Smarter stating that Taughtful is too similar to Smarter and that I have willfully stolen their intellectual property. Taughtful is 100% my own code, my own design and my plans extend far beyond the original scope of Smarterer. You can read the entire C&D letter here, which I have already forwarded to my attorney: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B741TFQThWSldVpaR2tEMGVubU0
For those who are not familiar with Smarterer, it was formerly a free website where people could create and take skills tests online. They had an extensive API which allowed integration into services such as eLance, etc.
Fast-forward to today, Smarterer.com got bought out by Pluralsight and absorbed into their monolithic learning solution and is no longer publicly accessible. They essentially took this wonderful crowd-sourced learning tool and closed it off, for profit.
I have been designing a similar platform for well over a year now and back on March 15th I launched my beta.
I have much more plans beyond just crowd-sourced skills testing with machine-learning in the background, but that is where I have started. I have plans to parter with recruiters and organizations so people can automatically apply for jobs by taking skills tests, I plan on exposing a developer API, building in social-networking aspects into the platform so people can teach/learn from each-other, the ability for people to create and charge for courses, etc. I want to disrupt the public education system. If you want to learn more about the future plans, check out https://taughtful.com/about
I welcome any comments on this matter, I personally would love to hear any and all feedback, be it positive or negative. Thanks! <comment><USER2> Can you withstand an ongoing, drawn-out, multi-year legal battle with a very well-funded corporate legal team?

Their legal claim appears to be very weak (based entirely on their terms of service) but they can almost certainly outspend and outlast you.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, that's my worry. I am already dealing with another baseless IP lawsuit, however in that case I am counter-suing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'm not familiar with smarterer, and I'm just as unfamiliar with intellectual property law, which leads me to ask you, is there any way, process or resource for you or other aspiring web designers to evaluate or design (or reevaluate or redesign, maybe in your case) a web-software product to determine if and how it's distinctly different enough from a competing product(s) to at least tentatively be considered original. Basically, "How could we ever determine when or where a product or its features or designs within cross from 'original', into 'infringed'?"

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm not sure, I know Apple has both successfully and unsuccessfully litigated such cases.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This doesn't seem too serious, and I would treat it as such. Relax. Take a deep breath!

For example, they say "the potentially infringing or misappropriated content available on [your] Website". Keyword there - 'potentially'.

Earlier on in the letter, they say your content 'may' infringe on theirs.

It seems their motivation for contacting you is because you expressed some displeasure in the recent acquisition and that this has motivated you to steal their IP and become a competitor. Whilst its fair for this to motivate you to become a competitor, it isn't fair to assume you would steal their IP in order to do so. "...the recent acquisition by Pluralsight of Smarterer and your displeasure at the subsequent change in services and products offered by Smarterer, the extent and context of your activities establish that any infringement or misappropriation is willful..."

They have only asked to remove infringing content - not to shut down. "rights. Pluralsight is hopeful that the similarities between the Website and Pluralsight's Intellectual Property were inadvertent and that you were unaware of the obligations placed on you by agreeing to Smarterer's Terms and Conditions. Under the circumstances, Pluralsight would like to resolve this matter amicably."

Therefore, I would politely invite them to clarify which of your content they believe infringes on their IP, and make sure you inform them that by inviting them to clarify what content is infringing on their IP, that you aren't admitting that it is indeed infringing.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you, that is exactly what my attorney and I are doing. I share the exact same sentiment. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> "I have been designing a similar platform" \- not a good idea to write this on a public forum, they will definitely use this phrase against you in court.

<comment><AUTHOR> Is that illegal? I don't think so.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> \- and note many striking similarities between the Website and Pluralsight's (formerly Smarterer's) Intellectual Property.

\- Moreover, given your previous relationship with Smarterer.

I suppose it depends on what the laws in the US are over software.

I mean all word processors look the same but I don't see C&D letter flying around.

However, when you get lawyers involved you start to loose money quickly.

<comment><AUTHOR> The letter is extremely vague, I have a meeting with my attorney on Wednesday regarding this situation. I will post an update as soon as I have one.

<comment><USER6> "The letter is extremely vague"

Maybe, but it looks like they figured out you had an account with them and they have a clause in their terms about intellectual property.

If your screens look similar they will try to hold you to that agreement. It doesn't look good.

At this stage you can back out with no costs, I suspect if you move forward they will try to get back their legal fees.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's like saying that if Mark Zuckerberg had a MySpace account that they could sue him for creating Facebook. No-where in the terms of service does it say anything about creating a similar service, even my attorney agrees that there is no basis there.

"They suggest that your previous association with them gave them rights in certain intellectual property (presumably, copyright and/or patent) which you are using in your website. If your code is wholly original, they may claim copying if the design or approach is derived from a prior work they (or their predecessor in interest) created. However, that does not extend to the concept or ideas."

<comment><USER7> The C&D indicates you had a developer account with Smarterer. That seems significantly different from Mark Zuckerberg having a MySpace account.

<comment><AUTHOR> I never had a developer account with Smarterer. They shut that down before I could ever apply.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I don't have any legal advice, but I'm interested in how this plays out. Many of us are probably working on a side project that, on some level, resembles an existing product.

Perhaps you could capitalize on this situation.

<comment><AUTHOR> Certainly, I will definitely keep you guys updated. Today I met with my attorney, he is sending an initial "We received your shot over the bow" letter. Next week we are going to draft up and send over a formal response requesting the specific alleged violations of their IP.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I am not an attorney.

My advice is to not say anything in public forums like this until you have talked to one competent in this area. Sure it sucks. That's business.

Good luck.

</comment><comment><USER10> "...Your previous relationship with Smarterer...."

What was your previous relationship with Smarterer ? Can you clarify ?

<comment><AUTHOR> I signed up on their site at some point to take skills tests.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Do they have any patents on this technology? Best to speak with a lawyer.

How much traction do you have with your site?

<comment><AUTHOR> I do not currently have much traction with my site, but it is something I have been working on for a very long time. This is a passion of mine and I think their claim is completely baseless.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I have no legal advise, but I just wanted to say that I think "Taughtful" is an awesome name!

(Also, the "weapons & combat" category is a turn-off --- I wouldn't register on a site that seems to cater to gun enthusiasts.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the compliment regarding the name! As far as the concern you brought up, there are other weapons besides guns; ones more sophisticated, such as swords, nunchucks, etc; also, martial arts and other combat techniques are taught on a regular basis, all around the world, to and by people in all walks of life. It is my duty not to hold any biases, nor enforce any unreasonable censorships regarding the education process. In case you didn't notice, the category picture does not contain any guns in it at all, those are 2 foils crossing, they are used in fencing which is a highly regarded combat sport. Regardless, you are welcome to your beliefs as they are your own and I will not attempt to dissuade you.</comment></comment>