Diaspora Co-Founder Ilya Zhitomirskiy Passes Away At 21 - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/13/diaspora-co-founder-ilya-zhitomirskiy-passes-away-at-21/ <comment><USER3> The founders of Diaspora were in a really unenviable position. They started off with a wave of national press as well as solid financial support from grassroot users. As time went on, it became increasingly clear that they would not be able to accomplish the goal they originally set out to do. They had failed. Publicly. This can be very devastating psychologically to someone who has always 'succeeded' in life.

I'm not saying this was the case for Ilya, or had any part in his death, but I know for me it would have been hard to swallow. There are many silent founders out there that gave up everything for an unrealized dream in the path to startup success and it has a real toll on psyches.

Best wishes to his family & friends.

EDIT: This appears to be a very controversial comment. The vote count seems to be oscillating up and down very rapidly. I don't want to make this out to be a discussion about Diaspora, so I won't comment further on that point. But the mental health of founders is a real issue and rarely discussed. Maybe there should be a more open discussion about this issue.

<comment><USER4> Very important comment. The biggest risk in doing a startup is not the financial risk per se.

It's the psychological risk of knowing you really, really tried -- and still failed. That is the hard part, because everyone goes in with Dilbert/mass media notions of how easy it is to be a CEO or (just as bad) Social Network illusions of how easy it is to grow meteorically while fighting off lawsuits.

The truth is that it's not easy, that it takes a special and lucky person. If you fail it's really hard to realize you aren't that special. The possibly healthier (?) way of dealing is to convince yourself that it was bad luck, or the other guy cheated. Then it's not as much of a hit to the ego, to the sense of your own capabilities. But it's hard.

<comment><USER5> It doesn't take a special person, so much as it's simply the case that no matter who you are, your startup is likely to fail.

When I was much younger and starting my first (fundably doomed) startup, one of my cofounders liked to say, "yeah, most businesses fail, but those statistics include companies trying to sell soft drinks to Eskimos and combination Chinese food/pizza restaurants". Then we'd all chuckle, knowing that the statistics most certainly didn't capture dynamic new technology firms like ours.

No. Most companies fail. Look at the list of dead YC companies. Those were screened by a team that has specialized in doing nothing but screening founding teams and then attempting to give them every advantage their considerable and growing infrastructure and connections can give them. And they still fail.

Because that is what startups do. They fail.

The best, most talented, most experienced founders in the world would presumably be among the first to tell you that you can't read _anything about your self_ from the simple fact that your company failed. Learn what you can, but don't ever let it grind on you.

(Some people just shouldn't be in this game, for whatever it's worth, like Matt Damon said about the no-limit players in Rounders; not because they can't, but because it's not healthy for them.)

<comment><USER6> Actually I will take that further, as a small business owner.

EVERY business fails. Every single one. Some businesses somehow manage to stay in business when they run out of money and keep going on until they succeed. However, that's what businesses are up against. I think going into that armed and aware is one thing that makes success more likely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Horrible. This news is so tragic I really can't focus on anything else now. Which is probably the way it should be.

Our community stresses the importance of achievement, success, and technology so much that it's easy to forget what's really most important: each other. Sometimes it takes terrible news like this to jerk us back to that reality.

I never knew Ilya, but if any of his friends of family visits this forum, please know that many thoughts and prayers are with you.

I have no idea what was behind this, so just a few (possibly related) thoughts:

\- Let's never forget that everything we do is for other people. They outrank all the ones and zeros. Go hug someone important to you.

\- If you ever believe the possibility of something like happening is > .00001, do something, anything. If you don't know what to do, contact me (see my profile) and I'll help in any way I can. Nothing can be more important.

\- This was the ultimate failure. I'm so sorry to hear this and hope that Ilya's family and friends somehow find peace.

<comment><USER8> >> If you ever believe the possibility of something like happening is > .00001, do something, anything. If you don't know what to do, contact me (see my profile) and I'll help in any way I can.

Its a nice thought, but people in this position often don't want help.

My best Friend was doing a PHD in a Biochemistry related field at University College London back in 2003. He was an outgoing person, had a hot girlfriend and lots of friends. He had a what seemed like a great life and an even better future.

One night we went out together and had a great night. We went our separate ways about 4am and I we arranged to meet at 5pm the next day.

At 2pm the next afternoon I got a call from his flat mate saying that he had committed suicide. He had access to all kinds of chemicals and substances at the as part of his PHD and he had been taking little bits for months and months and making a potent cocktail of poison. He drank the poison and died instantly.

There was no note, no explanation and no reason anyone knew. I was the last person (friend) to see him alive.

I guess I'm saying - even balanced, successful people have their reasons and you will never know or be told what they are.

<comment><USER9> Unfortunately, an outgoing personality is a great way to protect yourself from people asking you the very painful question of "what's wrong"...I know now, after wrestling with depression for years, that sometimes it's harder to face your depression and explain your pain to others than it is to simply be depressed in the first place. What better way to defend yourself than by acting exactly opposite of how you really are?

<comment><USER10> If someone is at that stage where you are contemplating this, here is a tip....just do it. By that I mean commit suicide of your _current_ life, not of life. Most of what weights someone down are the fears, struggles, embarrassment, your peer groups, jobs, etc. If you can't find a way through it, just leave it. Give all your stuff away, give away your money, give up your computer, leave your friends and family, pack a backback, travel to Africa, resign your life to helping others. Think of it as you ended your life and now you're just a servant to others. You don't have any aspirations of success, any ladders to climb, just live to help others.

Go without any plans, any future, just go and see what happens. You'll be free. It may be dangerous, you might not make it, but if your other choice was death the day before, then everything now is just gravy anyways. Don't worry about it.

This may sound silly and simple and extreme, but if you _are_ at that stage then this should be your stop gap. From now on when you're in that dark spot just think about when you're going to pull the trigger on this, not on yourself.

Of course there are lots of things you can do before it comes to this, but if you're past that, just leave your current life totally.

<comment><USER11> I'm not sure this is good advice. I have no experience of this kind of thing, but it seems to me that cutting yourself off from everybody who cares about you is one of the worst things you can do. Now you have no money, no friends, no family, and nothing to stop you when you next start to feel like jumping off a cliff.

It sounds like a good start to a _story_ , but bad real-world advice.

I had an ex-gf who worked on a suicide hotline, and apparently one of the most powerful things they had in their arsenal were questions like "Who do you think would find your body?" and "How do you think it would affect them?" and other encouragements for suicidal person to think about how their suicide would affect those around them. If you're backpacking alone in Africa, having taken your leave from everybody in your life two months ago, it seems like there'd be a lot less to keep you.

<comment><USER10> You miss the point. You would have already jumped off a cliff. This is one thing you do before. Of course try all the other things. But if you _are_ on the ledge, consider this before. If you think about it, is the consideration of this is similar to "who will find your body, how will they feel". It's one additional stop gap to prevent the worse outcome.

<comment><USER11> I don't think that's how it works.

(Also, no offence, but I'm disinclined to take suicide-prevention advice from anyone named "necro"...)

<comment><USER12> I can confirm (at least in my experience + the experience of others I know who suffer from serious clinical depression) this is not how (serious) depression works.

I sincerely doubt it would make any difference, largely because of how you feel about life + yourself (it would require an acceptance of capability of doing such things) + the point of trying to help such a horrid world. I think the more immediate consideration of those people finding your body, etc. will be more effective as that's something undeniable and forces you to consider others in a non-fanciful way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The death of the founder of any well-known startup merits mention here. The startup community is a close knit global one, we don't just meet each other at professional networking events, we share our lives with each other.

Perhaps unlike any other profession we have a closeness that binds us, we socialize, we date, we make lifelong friends from within the startup community.

Even if we don't know the startup founder directly we know of their work, their successes and their failures, their contribution to the story of the startup world.

Speculation suggests that it may have been self-inflicted, even if it's not true, it's worth stepping back and appreciating the fact that startup founders often find themselves under immense pressure and often keep it quiet.

When's the last time you asked someone how their startup was doing to get a reply "not so good", founders are expected to be eternal optimists and this expectation can make it harder for those struggling or suffering to ask for help from their friends (who are often from the startup world themselves).

Maybe we need a Startups Anonymous to give founders a place where they can drop their public persona and be honest about the worries that are keeping them up at night.

<comment><USER14> Completely agree, and for that reason I started a meetup here in London recently called London Tech Founders Anonymous (<http://www.meetup.com/LTechFA>); we've had two great sessions thus far, and indeed as you've noted, one of the points raised in support of the initiative by attendees present at the inaugural session was the liberation of the format due to the group's aims; viz., steering participants away from the ubiquitous "We're killing it!" in favour of actual truth and deeper bonding/learning that, in my opinion, seems underserved in the community generally.

That being said, great initiatives like FailCon (<http://thefailcon.com/>) do exist, however I personally don't believe a consumption-centric format (i.e. standard lecture/conference/meetup format) will cut it; deep interaction and open sharing on a regular basis is the only way.

We in LTFA adhere to Chatham House rules (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_House_Rule>), so there is confidence when unburdening ourselves... and that's a big part of it, tbh!

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> There are rumors that his death was self-inflicted, which is quite sad. Every time we see a young smart kid die like this, it should remind us to remember others as we go through our lives. Too often we ignore other peoples feelings, and then something like this happens. Take a moment to talk to the people you love to make sure something like this doesn't happen to them.

(If it turns out this is inaccurate, please excuse the speculation, but I still think this is important.)

<comment><USER16> Serious question, is "self-inflicted" a euphemism for "suicide"?

<comment><USER17> Yes "self-inflicted" is a medical/legal term which includes suicide.

In some jurisdiction there is a difference if "the balance of mind was disturbed" or if the coroner believed it was an attempted suicide (cry for help) that 'went wrong'

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Ilya was an incredible person. His heart was truly driven by bringing about positive change in this world. Diaspora was only the beginning.

He was genuinely one of the kindest people I've ever met. Along with that, one of the most driven and intelligent peers I've ever encountered. Any time I ever had a chance to converse with him, it was always a very pleasant experience. He was someone I felt I had truly connected with. I only wish I could tell him that now.

Take care buddy. Thank you for enlightening me.

<comment><USER19> I couldn't agree with you more. Ilya had the brain of a genius, an incredibly brilliant and extremely humble, which made him extremely unique. Ot top of that he was an idealist who also took action to create more good in the world. He had a big heart and a genius brain, I'm still struggling to accept that he's gone...

<comment><USER20> Just so. Ilya was one of the most creative and clear-eyed people I ever met. He had a gift for projecting possibilities into the future and condensing a great deal of thought into a few observations.

I was inspired by time spent with him, and my own ideas flourished as a result. It's painful to think that noone will get to talk or dream with him again, but I am grateful for the brief time I had.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> On a flight from San Francisco to New York I had the good fortune to run into this gentleman. He was kind, thoughtful, and had a very deep sense of commitment to those who had donated funds and had put their hopes into Diaspora. His picture is one I expected to see again, just not like this.

</comment><comment><USER22> Fuck everything about this piece of news. I knew him. I can't believe I'm finding this out by logging into HN. Fuck.

<comment><USER23> Sorry man.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I just met Ilya a few weeks ago at Noisebridge.

As a community we rarely talk about the darker side of a startup. We make it seem like ancient Roman warriors on the quest to glory. In reality it can be a dark, depressing road. Depression is real and can hit harder than anything you've ever experienced.

How many people talk about how depression? How at times things will seem so hopeless that you won't have anywhere to turn? It is certainly not the most popular topic.

</comment><comment><USER25> Why don't we wait for official comment before speculating on the cause of his death. The last thing his family/friends/coworkers need is false rumors. Not saying they're necessarily false or correct, I just think we should wait out of courtesy. I know I'd hope people do that if I died...

</comment><comment><USER26> This is too sad. Only 21 for goodness sake; his life was just beginning. Even without having known him, this feels painful and I cannot imagine what his family and friends are going through. I'm reminded of a Yoruba (West African language) saying to "kill someone alive", i.e. effect of something so painful on a person such that although technically alive, for all intents and purposes, he/she is dead. How does one possibly (if ever) recover from losing a child/sibling/friend in this way?

My condolences to all who knew him.

</comment><comment><USER27> Wow. I never met Ilya in person, but I spoke with him several times via a private mailing list of people doing social network research. This is incredibly unfortunate. In my limited interactions with him he was always incredibly intelligent and willing to help out others.

</comment><comment><USER28> I'm reminded of Gene Kan, but I am unsure if the circumstances are similar:

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

The similarities are that there was considerable press coverage of Diaspora and that they seemed, at least to me, destined to fail mostly just because it was a hard thing to do given their structure. It is a true shame that this individual took the failure personally as it wasn't at all his fault, again it was primarily structural in my opinion. Gene Kan I understand was somewhat susceptible for other reasons to depression.

<comment><USER29> Tweets from ~12 hours ago suggest that the circumstances are indeed similar.

<https://twitter.com/#!/search/zhitomirskiyi>

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Vitamin D levels affect state of mind, and if you're coding through the night and sleeping through the day, you're probably low on Vit D levels - or rather, you could be a lot higher if you wanted to.

<comment><USER31> I used to get Seasonal Affective Disorder every year around this time. Since starting on Vitamin D, the symptoms have yet to return. It's also improved my sleep patterns.

<comment><USER32> Me too, bought a SAD light or a happy light as I like to call it. Seems to help in the British winters.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Anyone passing at such a young age is simply a massive tragedy.

</comment><comment><USER34> I find it very saddening that so many people here are speculating that Ilya committed suicide. It's disrespectful to speculate, especially in such a case. Get a life.

</comment><comment><USER35> I am touched by the loss of Ilya.

Kipling's "IF" seems an appropriate addition to the discussion thread tonight. \--- IF.....

IF you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated, don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise: If you can dream - and not make dreams your master; If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, ' Or walk with Kings - <USER2> lose the common touch, if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds' worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

\--- Thank you Ilya.

</comment><comment><USER36> "Zhitomirskiy committed suicide, a source close to the company confirmed to CNNMoney."

[http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/14/technology/diaspora_cofounde...](http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/14/technology/diaspora_cofounder_died/)

</comment><comment><USER37> Holding out hope here... but this whole ball started rolling with one tweet like 14 hours ago. I haven't seen a single source confirm anything yet. Any chance the net is getting punk'd right now?

<comment><USER38> as his roommate i can confirm that he has indeed passed away. i thank you for your hope and optimism, but sadly these things can only go so far sometimes. life and death are very real and very sudden things, and i hope that his memory spurs you to fight for what you believe in while you can. goodness knows he did.

<comment><USER39> Can you tell us how? My condolences. I was watching a couple interviews with Ilya on Youtube and it's clear he was a very bright kid with a lot of potential.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Things like this often give me pause for thought. Often this community, and indeed myself, drive myself to attain better results, and generally push towards a wealthy career, so often we can forget what is truly important.

I'm a religious person, so often this translates to worrying about how I'm prepared should I also meet an early grave, but its important that in times like this that we also see the importance of others in our lives, our family, relationships etc.

Easy to forget that the thing we work so hard for can be wiped away in a split second.

My deepest sympathies to all involved.

</comment><comment><USER41> Much too young. The poor guy.

</comment><comment><USER42> We'll miss you, Ilya. Thanks for your guidance and friendship.

</comment><comment><USER43> So sorry to hear that Ilya's gone. I only had a chance to meet him a few times, but I found him intelligent, thoughtful and friendly.

I don't know the circumstances of his death, but I do hope that his family and colleagues get to see what an impact it's had on the hacker community.

I look forward to hearing ways that they'd like us to honour his passing; until then I'm going to do it the way I know best -- keep hacking.

</comment><comment><USER44> Very sad news. My sincere condolences to his family and friends.

</comment><comment><USER45> How did he die?

<comment><USER46> Suicide.

<comment><USER47> How do you know?

<comment><USER48> Because people don't say "he died suddenly" without saying the cause unless it was suicide.

<comment><USER49> Not really. There are several causes of death where this is the case, though admittedly suicide is one of them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> If rumors are true, my finger is pointing to the get-rich-easy self-promotion advocates like [you know who]. There are many kids in the coming generation who took their nonsense too seriously, sometimes like a cult. Just to make a few bucks selling books. No harm done, right?

</comment><comment><USER51> Sometimes deep (non-organic) depression can be a clue to the revelation that you've been untrue to your own nature. The depression is an opportunity to review what you've been doing, what you've been missing, and make plans to recreate your life in a way that's more positively rewarding.

It's awful to see young lives wasted in this way... whether they're 'promising' in conventional ways or not. Many people have made it through The Abyss to go on to great things - which can include things that are completely unimportant to society at large. No need to be engulfed by the values of others. Be true to yourself.

</comment><comment><USER52> This is now the top story on the front page of Yahoo UK, with a large picture of Ilya. I'm not sure what to make of that.

I suppose one thing we can learn here is to be more sensitive about other peoples' work. Sometimes tech-related articles/comments/rants take a very harsh tone, and even though it might be valid criticism, it's easy to forget that some developer might have poured his/her heart and soul into what you're dismissing (or even ridiculing).

</comment><comment><USER53> "We shall have to work faster."

<http://yudkowsky.net/other/yehuda>

Even if it was suicide, this too we will overcome.

</comment><comment><USER54> Considering loneliness is often associated with depression and suicide, it's interesting that his project was pure social networking.

</comment><comment> k-mcgrady Very sad to hear. My sincere condolences.

</comment><comment><USER55> In case the other thread won't bubble to the front page (though I expect it will):

CNN confirmed it was suicide: [http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/14/technology/diaspora_cofounde...](http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/14/technology/diaspora_cofounder_died/)

</comment><comment><USER56> Very sad news indeed.

I hope the passing of a co-founder doesn't result in the passing of the project as well.

</comment><comment><USER57> Baruch dayan H'emet. This is very tragic. Nothing else to say. Rest in peace.

</comment><comment><USER58> Regarding telling suicidal people to think about the people who care about them before taking their lives...some suicidal people don't have anyone who cares about them. That's why they're suicidal.

</comment><comment><USER59> Poor man. I've been through some of what he must have experienced to come to his conclusion and it's very unpleasant. I hope his family and friends are all OK.

</comment><comment><USER60> 22 years. That's no time at all, not on this planet.

</comment><comment><USER61> Extremely sad over the untimely death at a very young age. May his soul RIP. Prayers and condolences to all his near and dear ones.

</comment><comment><USER62> RIP. So young :/ not that it makes much of a difference now, but I hope it was peaceful.

</comment><comment><USER63> This is extremely shocking! He was much too young! :(

</comment><comment><USER25> So sad. Rest in peace.

</comment><comment><USER64> Rest in peace.

</comment><comment><USER65> Rest in peace.

</comment><comment><USER66> so sad :(

</comment><comment><USER67> This is really sad. My condolences to his friends and family.

</comment><comment><USER68> Who let people start dying this fall!!?!

</comment><comment><USER69> this somehow reminds me of the movie "Antitrust" ...

<comment><USER70> Young programmer working on an open source competitor to large company suddenly dies.

Insensitive perhaps, and I don't believe anything similar happened, but FWIW I had the same thought.

</comment></comment><comment><USER71> what a senseless death

<comment> k-mcgrady There is no point to speculating. If they don't want to say just leave it at that.

<comment><USER71> it's basic human nature to speculate

that's why the news of Michael Jackson's death caused Twitter and even Google to crash

<comment> steve-howard I think we like to hold ourselves to a higher level of discussion here than your average tabloid.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER72> What purpose do stories like this serve? People consider asking for details to be rude. Other than tabloid style storytelling drama, why else should strangers care?

This man died young, but so did the local 19 year old young woman killed just after midnight by a driver just after she rescued an injured dog from the road.

You can already see someone saying the cause of death does not matter, but why does this death announcement matter?

edit: Poster removed his admonishment regarding questions about the cause of death.

People close to this person obviously will suffer due to their loss, but his death announcement gets posted here in some sort of limbo where no one (or very few) knew him. But we must respond with condolences to people we don't know about a person we only know though his involvement in a web application.

edit2: Twitter messages directed at the deceased indicate suicide.

<comment><USER73> If suicide does turn out to be the cause of death, it is worth talking about. I won't say that there's nothing more tragic than suicide, but it is certainly senseless/needless in almost all cases.

The more awareness of suicide, the risk factors, and how to not tread into that space, the better.

<comment><USER74> > _The more awareness of suicide_

Suicide has a strong triggering effect; see "Werther effect".

Talking about suicide has to be done carefully to avoid triggering further suicidal behaviour; especially after someone has just completed suicide.

I'd agree that more awareness of suicide prevention is very important.

<comment><USER75> I receive annual suicide awareness training at work. One of the things they train us to do is, if we suspect someone might be considering suicide, to ask point-blank: "Are you thinking about hurting yourself." Most people will answer honestly, and then you can get them help if they need it. So while discussing suicide in the abstract can trigger others to commit suicide, discussing it directly with a potentially suicidal person is a critical first step in preventing suicide. Also, most people don't know what to do when dealing with someone suicidal, and the only way to teach them is to talk about it, which creates a bit of a catch-22 when you combine that with the Werther effect.

<comment><USER76> I have also heard that if a person is all of the sudden talking about buying a gun or telling others how they would never commit suicide, out of the blue, one should be very worried about them.

<comment><USER77> The gun thing / statement thing is also an indicator that someone is being threatened. Bad either way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER78> I hope he had a cryonics contract.

....

In reading the above, some people might think it insensitive to 'peddle' this here, and I almost censored myself because of that.

But that's not helpful at all.

People are dying unnecessarily because they don't understand physics, cognitive neuroscience, and the possibilities the future allows.

May he live again conditional on him being cryo-preserved. Otherwise, it is sad news that yet another human has been annihilated.

<comment><USER57> With due respect, cryonics won't work. Why? Because "I am a strange loop" as Hofstadter would put it. We are NOT the code. We are the code execution. Think of the human subject as a really complicated, recursive sort of while(1) loop. When the program ends, we end. You can freeze the source code all you want - possibly even restart it but there is no reason I know of to think that such a restarted program would be "me", more like a fascmile of "me". I could be wrong, but not sure why I would be.

<comment><USER79> When I save the state of RAM to nonvolatile storage, then later put it back into RAM and continue executing, there are senses in which you could legitimately say it's not the same program. But they're not the senses I care about.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: does playing the "social media game" help you when starting a startup? - <AUTHOR>

Just a thought I was making to myself.
I noticed that some of my friends who also want to be entrepreneur are playing what I call the "social media game" very hard. Which means they're tweeting quite intensively, they follow "important" people, trying to answer some of their question so they can get noticed etc.
I'm just wondering if this is a massive waste of time, or does it actually help ? To me it seems all fluff and makes me want to open my IDE and start typing code so I'm actually building something. Am I the only one having this behaviour ? Should I adapt ? <comment><USER2> Twitter accounts for a substantial portion of our traffic and sign ups. Social media marketing _feels_ fluffy, but it does help to generate awareness at the very least. Do your customers use Twitter/Facebook? If they do, it seems like a good opportunity to try to engage and understand them better.</comment>


Flipped Iceberg (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://www.alexcornell.com/antarctica/ <comment><USER3> Can I complain about popular iceberg imagery? Most of the depictions of icebergs (1) that show them underwater are completely fake and like the "dead butterfly" post here recently aren't even remotely plausible. They're always shown as tall and skinny, but that's ridiculous, they'd be unstable. I've read that the classic picture is actually composited from two above-water shots, one flipped upside down and blue tinted to look underwater. Some of the images in that Google search I link are ludicrously unrealistic.

(1) [https://www.google.com/search?q=glacier+underwater](https://www.google.com/search?q=glacier+underwater)

<comment><USER4> One of the most famous (and profitable) iceberg photos is a composite.

See [https://petapixel.com/2015/09/24/the-iceberg-stock-photo- tha...](https://petapixel.com/2015/09/24/the-iceberg-stock-photo-that-has- earned-over-900k/)

[http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/iceberg.asp](http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/iceberg.asp)

<comment><USER3> That's exactly what made me realize this. Everything since then seems to have just copied that image. Of course, it partly makes sense. Icebergs are generally too large to photograph underwater clearly since visibility will probably never be that good and the lighting would be terrible, so they'll always have to be composites.

Also, whoops. Why did I link to a search for "Glacier underwater" instead of "iceberg"?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I humbly submit this magnificent calving:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC3VTgIPoGU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC3VTgIPoGU)

Mind boggling. A chunk of ice the size of Manhattan rolling over.

<comment><USER6> That was terrifyingly beautiful!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Jökulsárlón lagoon in southern Iceland is a fascinating place for this - <USER2> blocks of ice break from the glacier at the top end and slowly float towards the outlet of the lagoon to the sea.

Near the outlet the iceburgs catch on the bed of the lagoon and tumble as they melt. There's a glorious variety of colours as the ice as the freshly exposed dark glacier ice is exposed - like in the attached article - before the ice surface melts and it returns to a white colour.

<comment><USER8> I was there last year but it was quite overcast and foggy. Even still, we did catch minor glimpses of these gorgeous icebergs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Something for scale in those images would have been nice. Perhaps the video does the size justice.

<comment><USER10> Yes, definitely. You can almost trick your mind into believing it's a high-res photo of blue jello.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I wintered over in Antarctica at Palmer Station last year (2016). We saw icebergs flip frequently, never got any photos of this quality though.

Antarctica is an incredible place, truly nothing else like it.

</comment><comment><USER12> A pity that the photos are of such low resolution.

Also, there is no reference, so you can't tell how big the structure really is.

</comment><comment><USER13> Why did iceberg flip over? Is this related to warming?

<comment><USER14> The submerged part melts quicker than the top.

<comment><USER15> Also snow can accumulate on the top of the iceberg.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> A better link is: [http://www.alexcornell.com/antarctica/](http://www.alexcornell.com/antarctica/) His background video is also worth a look: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srO3IWVmVus](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srO3IWVmVus)

<comment><USER17> Highest res of original image: [http://www.alexcornell.com/wp- content/uploads/2015/05/Alex-C...](http://www.alexcornell.com/wp- content/uploads/2015/05/Alex-Cornell-Antarctica-e1435421008309.jpg)

<comment><USER18> That is _by far_ the funkiest mirror I have ever seen.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Their terrible popovers (namely the Dunkin Donuts one) break scrolling on the page and make viewing the content impossible. Well done.

<comment><USER20> Like seriously, what the hell link did I just click on? This has to be the worst mobile ad experience in recent memory.

<comment><USER21> Firefox mobile + *Ublock = bliss.

<comment><USER22> You probably mean 'ublock' (autocorrect issue?)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> (2014)

</comment><comment><USER24> Did that Iceberg rollover when it heard the news today ?

</comment><comment><USER25> 2015

Why are we allowing pics now?

<comment><USER26> Such comments are boring to read. Clearly enough users found it interesting and on-topic enough to upvote.

"Please don't submit comments complaining that a submission is inappropriate for the site. If you think a story is spam or off-topic, flag it by clicking on its 'flag' link." [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> The underside of an iceberg is known as the "covfefe"

</comment><comment><USER28> The flipped iceberg is beautiful to see. The Antarctic iceberg crack that developed a fork isn't.

[http://www.bbc.com/news/science- environment-39779761](http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39779761)</comment>


Just 7.3% of Stockholm's inhabitants developed Covid-19 antibodies by April 30 - <AUTHOR> https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/nyheter-och-press/nyhetsarkiv/2020/maj/forsta-resultaten-fran-pagaende-undersokning-av-antikroppar-for-covid-19-virus/ <comment><AUTHOR> >However, the public health agency had previously said it expected about 25% to have been infected by 1 May

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/21/just-7-per- cen...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/21/just-7-per-cent-of- stockholm-had-covid-19-antibodies-by-end-of-april-study-sweden-coronavirus)

<comment><USER2> I keep seeing completely contradictory information on this. Just a few days ago I saw that they were on track and expecting to reach herd immunity some time in June. Then I read there is doubt, and it would take a month or so longer. And now, they are nowhere near that goal.

It is easy to understand why there is so much frustration in the world over this pandemic. For my household, we're going to continue to err on the side of caution.

<comment><USER3> It's because new cases peaked at the end of April for Sweden, so the population is probably already most of the way towards herd immunity.

How is that possible? Two main theories are being explored:

1\. The population didn't start out 100% susceptible like the models assume. Some large fraction of people may have pre-existing immunity from prior coronavirus infections.

2\. The population is non-homogeneous. The models assume everyone is equally virulent and equally susceptible. If that assumption is changed and the models re-run, they show the epidemic taps out at about 15-20% infected.

[https://www.nicholaslewis.org/why-herd-immunity-to- covid-19-...](https://www.nicholaslewis.org/why-herd-immunity-to-covid-19-is- reached-much-earlier-than-thought/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Just a notice - there is a "in English" button in the top-right corner.</comment>


Time to start donating to Apache for Java fork legal issues and development? - <AUTHOR>

Even though I also use Ruby and Lisp a lot, Java is fairly much key to my business. For donations: http://www.apache.org/foundation/contributing.html <comment><USER2> <http://openjdk.java.net/></comment>


Keystone pipeline spills 210,000 gallons of oil - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/11/16/keystone-pipeline-spills-210000-gallons-of-oil-on-eve-of-key-permitting-decision/?utm_term=.9d2d71ae508d <comment><USER2> For scale, this is about five train cars worth of oil.</comment>


Options for full-text search (with and without IndexTank) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.indextank.com/117/options-for-full-text-search-with-and-without-indextank/

<comment><AUTHOR> An overview of full-text search options, comparing Google's offers, WebSolr and IndexTank.</comment>


Covid-19 has led to a pandemic of plastic pollution - <AUTHOR> https://www.economist.com/international/2020/06/22/covid-19-has-led-to-a-pandemic-of-plastic-pollution <comment><USER2> Governors will start locking states down soon as plastic infection rates skew logarithmicly.

</comment><comment><USER3> ...and information pollution.

<comment><USER4> CDC Influenza and pneumonia deaths by influenza season and age: United States, 2008–2015: [https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/health_policy/influenza-and- pn...](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/health_policy/influenza-and-pneumonia- deaths-2008-2015.pdf)

sha3_256:94b10eebd74923586d3ddbc762499de0ac42eb835663d8768fa9bcc786c1811a</comment></comment>


Lean startup tools for Rails apps - <AUTHOR> http://www.subelsky.com/2009/11/lean-startup-tools-for-rails-apps.html <comment><USER2> "Speaking of Github, I'd love for them to implement pre-commit hooks, because then you could prevent developers from making commits any time the build is broken, which prevents people from ignoring problems in a large code base and just tunneling on building their one little feature. Right now if you want to implement this, you need to setup your own source control repository that can talk to the continuous integration system."

What? No! The whole point of git is a commit should be cheap. If you start restricting commits when the build is broken then you might as well be using Subversion.

</comment><comment><USER3> That is a good list! Good idea "using SimpleDB for dumping a lot of important metrics data" and reminded me to install webrat, which I just did (people at a Merb Camp were raving about webrat) and from the github doc page, it looks like a good and easy way to sanity check that web apps are not broken.</comment>


RAF jets fly with 3D printed parts - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-25613828

<comment><USER2> Why not? If the manufactured parts meet the same technical requirements as traditionally manufactured parts, go for it. It's practical for non mission- critical parts, but it's not like they're printing replacement parts for engines or major structural components.

</comment><comment><USER3> The US Air Force is starting a research program to produce 3D-printed rocket engines to "launch critical assets into Earth orbit." : [http://weirdgrants.com/#g19](http://weirdgrants.com/#g19)</comment>


Memory Access Patterns Are Important (2012) - <AUTHOR> http://mechanical-sympathy.blogspot.com/2012/08/memory-access-patterns-are-important.html <comment><USER2> One critical thing I wish I could go back and remind my younger self:

The cache is shared across processes.

The net result is that cache latency/hit rate is highly dependent on what else is using the machine. CPU bound tasks (like, say search engine backends) tend to leave extra storage space (say for things like image serving). Streaming images out of a machine can completely thrash the cache without using many cores. When your net latency is based on the slowest percentile to come back, one badly co-scheduled process can ruin your entire cluster capacity.

<comment><USER3> Intel finally added cache partitioning in Broadwell, which lets you restrict parts of the cache to certain cores. Combining that with pinning tasks to cores can help with cache thrashing.

<comment><USER4> Is that enabled by default? Turned on in the BIOS or early boot?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Martin's videos on lock-free algorithms are very informative and gives great insight on how to push the JVM to the extreme. [http://www.infoq.com/author/Martin- Thompson#Presentations](http://www.infoq.com/author/Martin- Thompson#Presentations)

</comment><comment><USER6> This kind of article stands in interesting contrast to the recent post on "non-programmers' solutions to programming problems."

On that post, jbclements commented [0] that we are reaching / have reached a point where "the conversation shifts from 'how can I meet the machine's needs?' to 'how can the machine meet my (programming) needs?'"

The idea of "the machine meeting my programming needs" still requires a programming platform that has been designed with a great deal of mechanical sympathy.

[0] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11509543](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11509543)

</comment><comment><USER7> If main memory is so slow, would it be better to treat cache as memory and handle it directly in code rather than try to trick it into doing what we want?

<comment><USER8> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scratchpad_memory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scratchpad_memory)

On the original PlayStation, the scratchpad was a PITA. You had to weigh the speedup against the cost of manually copying in and out the the pad. A modern implementation would copy via DMA like the PS3's Cell processors. Still a PITA, but at least the payoff for the effort can be quite good.

<comment><USER9> Came here to post this.

The other advantage of cache over explicit control of the on-chip SRAM is that it allows code to be inherently forwards and backwards compatible, rather than tying the code to a specific machine with a specific amount of on-chip memory. And I imagine the nightmare would only increase if you had to factor multitasking into an explicit scheme.

The primary benefit of explicit on-chip memory is not, AFAIK, that you can manually manage it significantly better than a cache, but that it takes up significantly less die space and has lower access latency. You really see this idea shine in tiny cheap microcontrollers that have no external memory.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> See also Ulrich Drepper's "What every programmer should know about memory" [1], mentioned in one of the comments.

[1] [https://people.freebsd.org/~lstewart/articles/cpumemory.pdf](https://people.freebsd.org/~lstewart/articles/cpumemory.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER11> I did a similar project a couple years ago to benchmark the effects of different memory access patterns. The whitepaper [0] includes some graphs for how performance changes as you add more threads on different cores.

[0] [http://stoneridgetechnology.com/wp- content/uploads/2014/12/C...](http://stoneridgetechnology.com/wp- content/uploads/2014/12/ComputevsMemory.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER12> In the old days, mechanical sympathy was called RTFM

<comment><USER13> There are a lot more manuals these days, and they are way longer. Also it turns out that a lot of code from those old days was crap, so maybe RTFM was inadequate.

<comment><USER14> Most of those manuals were shitty to begin with.

You end up having to read the entire thing to properly understand a part of the functionality that got its own chapter. And don't get me started on the toy examples. The happy path is the least useful example you can use. I would stumble on that by myself.

<comment><USER12> Seriously, I should have been more specific. If you take a comp. arch. class, then you get the generalization. After that, you can just read the relevant part of a manual.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


GitHub Pages – Usage Limits - <AUTHOR> https://help.github.com/articles/what-is-github-pages/#usage-limits <comment><USER2> I am the Product Manager for GitHub Pages. As has been mentioned multiple times here, the usage limits were not in response to a specific external event. The limits have been an internal policy (in one form or another) for as long as I've been involved (nearly 4 years now), and we chose to publicize them in a series of updates beginning early this summer.

This is a classic case of "this is why we can't have nice things". If you're using GitHub Pages for your personal site or to document/talk about the work you're doing on GitHub, in general, you should be fine, even if you get HN- level traffic every once in a while.

The problem comes when a small handful of users use GitHub Pages for things like automated version checks or configuration distribution, as a makeshift ad CDN for for-profit sites, pushing an automated build every minute, or to distribute large assets (for which things like Releases are a better fit).

When a user (ab)uses GitHub Pages in a way that threatens our ability to build or serve other users' sites, technically or practically, we need to step in, and those posted limits are intended to help set expectations as to what you should and shouldn't use GitHub Pages for. But again, the vast majority of the nearly 1M users that use GitHub Pages will never hear from us (and in most cases when they did, we proactively reached out and provided ample warning/offered to help).

<comment><USER3> > Additionally, GitHub Pages sites must refrain from:

> Pornographic content

How strict is this rule?

There has been some interesting open source AI projects related to NSFW images (eg. Yahoo_NSFW, Open_NSFW, MilesDeep). What is GitHub's policy regarding this projects? Could a GitHub page present results? What about a link to download a training dataset?

I also just noticed that Open_NSFW's web page is hosted on GitLab ([https://open_nsfw.gitlab.io/](https://open_nsfw.gitlab.io/)). Would a page like this (which might be considered pornographic, depending on your interpretation) be allowed on GitHub pages?

<comment><USER2> See the section on "Sexually obscene content" in the GitHub Community Guidelines ([https://help.github.com/articles/github-community- guidelines...](https://help.github.com/articles/github-community- guidelines/#what-is-not-allowed)). We purposely chose the word "obscene" and not "explicit" to allow for explicit but educational, scientific, or artistic content like this.

<comment><USER4> Clever, but respectful. I did not expect this response, but thinking about it again in context of the company it is coming from, I can see why you chose that response.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> ##### EDIT: The title for this link started as "GitHub Pages sets usage limits", but was changed to "What is GitHub Pages?" by an HN moderator, putting this post (and most of the discussion going on in here) completely out of context. I don't agree with this decision. Most HN readers know what Github Pages is - it's the new usage caps that are the news here. Those caps are new - I've been tracking Github Pages for years, and the only cap they previously set was the 1GB repo size (total changes ever) limit, and occasional heresay from people that used to work on it: [https://www.quora.com/What-are- bandwidth-and-traffic-limits-...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth- and-traffic-limits-for-GitHub-pages/answer/Zach-Holman)

[https://neocities.org](https://neocities.org) free plan, for comparison:

Storage: 100MB (1GB by end of January).

Bandwidth: 50GB (never been enforced, many sites are over and it's fine).

SSL: Yes (forced SSL starting Jan 1st).

Change limit: one per minute, never enforced.

Number of hits: No set limit, would be in the millions if I did.

Number of changes: No set limit, not enforced, probably never will be.

 _But our usage limits aren 't going down_ \- they're constantly going up as we upgrade and improve our infrastructure. In fact, due to some upgrades to our anycast CDN I'm going to raise the BW limit to 200GB right now. Merry Christmas.

<comment><USER6> Does Neocities support anything like webhooks, so people can do normal workflow of pushing to GitHub and having it be auto-deployed. Or even pushing to a Neocities remote would be fine too. I currently use a Raspberry Pi server that uses webhooks and it's very nice.

<comment><USER7> It doesn't have webhooks, but it has a full API. You could use CircleCI or another build tool to publish your site when you push to GitHub. This way you also get more control over the build process and can use tools other than Jekyll.

[https://neocities.org/api](https://neocities.org/api)

You could also create a webhook using their API and AWS API Gateway + Lambda.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> As someone who works on a SaaS project that has vastly different utilization by different customers, sometimes limits are more a way of ensuring that customers understand the expected usage of a product and don't get you into the situation where a customer is adversely impacting all the other customers and has the attitude of "you said it was unlimited!"

I've definitely seen postings here and elsewhere about CloudFlare having to deal with sites whose usage is so much that it impacts other customers. While it's in their ToS, it isn't stated as a limit and there's often a backlash.

I'm guessing that the GitHub "limits" are likely soft. As long as the usage doesn't start adversely impacting their systems, they might not care. But there are certainly cases where an individual customer might do something that they would want the ability to shut down because it is getting to the point that it causes reliability or performance issues and these limits give them cover to do that. User expectations were set that this isn't an unlimited free-for-all.

When you architect any system, you do so with certain usage patterns in mind. If you're running a SaSS project, customers might (quite innocently) not understand your intention for the service and use it in a different way that works for them, but puts your systems in pain and adversely impacts other customers.

[http://githubengineering.com/rearchitecting-github- pages/](http://githubengineering.com/rearchitecting-github-pages/)

Based on that post, it seems that any individual file is located on one active fileserver and one standby fileserver. That means that if any one individual file becomes extremely popular, it has the potential of impacting other customers located on the same box. It seems reasonable that this architecture works well for the vast majority of GitHub Pages sites, but that it wouldn't work well for some users. Yes, there are ways of mitigating the problem. You could write a balancer that isolated high-volume customers. You could do a more complex replication scheme to more locations. But that's work not needed for the vast majority of users and their intention probably isn't to become a high-volume webhost.

Similarly, one can imagine a customer with a multi-GB repository making automated changes every few seconds. It's a little hard to imagine, but in a long tail of SaaS customers, people do all sorts of weird things. Now they're potentially having more data to be copied faster than they can actually copy (a spinning disk won't write multiple GB in under a few seconds). Or maybe they have a certain number of "copy workers" and they don't want loads of large jobs from one customer backing up the queue.

We've definitely had customers ask our support about usage that's 1.5x some of our "limits" and honestly we probably wouldn't have even noticed. The limits are there for us to set expectations that resources cost money and we've architected our systems in certain ways that we expect certain types of usage. But in a SaaS world, someone has always (usually innocently) found something they think is a perfect fit for what they want when it really isn't made for that.

</comment><comment><USER9> Is that new? I'm pretty sure that was on that page last time I looked at it (sometime this summer) already.

EDIT: quora answers here [https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth-and- traffic-limits-...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth-and-traffic- limits-for-GitHub-pages) mention a rule change ~ half a year ago, but not entirely clear what was added. Wayback machine only has a few months old versions of the page that already include these rules. So this possibly was added this year, but not very recently.

</comment><comment><USER10> Is this not a chance for github to make some money? I'm about to launch a site on github pages (simple html site, no backend) and there's a tiny chance of it going viral. If it were to reach the 100k limit for requests I'd be more than happy paying github to keep it hosted there.

I already have hosting with the likes of hostgator but they probably couldn't even handle 100k like github would.

<comment><USER11> For simple static pages (with no backend), I would highly recommend putting them on Nearly Free Speech (NFSN) [1] and using the free tier of CloudFlare in front of it. NFSN charges only for what you use, unlike hosts like hostgator and others that have a monthly payment of a few dollars, at the minimum. Excluding domain costs, it will cost you just pennies a year or a few dollars a year. You can also opt for cheaper bandwidth on the site if you wish.

Without ClouldFlare in front, your costs on NFSN may become quite high depending on the size of the content and number of requests.

[1]: [https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net](https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net)

<comment><USER12> I used to host some stuff on nearlyfreespeech. I liked the idea in principle, but keeping my account topped up and them charging me extra fees just to pay them became annoying. I switched to Amazon S3 and couldn't be happier. It was harder to setup but worth it.

<comment><USER13> > them charging me extra fees just to pay them became annoying

NFSN isn't charging you extra fees to make payments. They are being transparent about the fees everybody else hides in the total cost.

<comment><USER12> Not really. Look at their fee structure. It is more expensive than what Stripe, Paypal, and Square charge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Gitlab pages has a much higher repo size limit of 10GB, and they support custom domain https. I couldn't find anything about bandwidth limitations.

[https://about.gitlab.com/2015/04/08/gitlab-dot-com- storage-l...](https://about.gitlab.com/2015/04/08/gitlab-dot-com-storage- limit-raised-to-10gb-per-repo/)

<comment><USER15> And they also have an order of mangitude less users..

<comment><USER16> Should that matter when you're running a website?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Do the "requests" mean page views or http requests? A single page view almost always has multiple http requests.

Github really needs to add https support for custom domains. It's 2016, https should be the default.

Worth mentioning that Gitlab pages supports https for custom domains. I am considering moving my blog to Gitlab. Anyone know about the resource limits and performance under Gitlab pages?

</comment><comment><USER18> Use CloudFlare to proxy-cache your Github pages and it should be fine as long as you set correct caching rules.

<comment><USER19> Besides Cloudflare, there are these 2 github specific solitions [https://github.com/schme16/gitcdn.xyz](https://github.com/schme16/gitcdn.xyz) & [https://rawgit.com/faq](https://rawgit.com/faq)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> There was a great recent thread with lots of alternative static hosts discussed: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13021722](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13021722)

</comment><comment><USER21> Somewhat off topic, but related since it's not documented _anywhere_ : you can put ads on your GitHub Pages install.

I'm not positive to the extent and what internal rules may apply. But out of curiosity I emailed the GH legal dept and they said it was fine (after checking around and getting back a couple weeks later).

So if you want to monetize your open source projects with Adsense or otherwise, that's actually an option! (Not that I have or ever will)

</comment><comment><USER22> If you're getting over the bandwidth limit of 100GB or 100,000 requests per month, you could definitely afford to host your site elsewhere...

<comment><USER23> Actually, 100,000 requests per month is a little less than a req per second. Which means that if you want to have all the services that GH is offering, I guess you would pay quite a lot (relatively speaking).

<comment><USER24> > a little less than a req per second

There are 86400 seconds in a day. At a little under a request per second, you're going to hit 100k some time around 3am on the second day, depending on what you take "a little under" to mean.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> So this limit is technically per repo, right? I've created a small organization for myself to store mirrored government sites. None of them (so far) take up more than a gig, but I'll probably refrain from pushing giant mirrors on to Github. It's not that it isn't trivial to push these mirrors on S3, it's just that Github pages provides so many user-friendly endpoints.

A researcher recently asked me for help in mirroring one of the CMS.gov subdomains. Of course, by default, Github Pages serves up the mirror as if it were the real site:

[https://wgetsnaps.github.io/marketplace.cms.gov/](https://wgetsnaps.github.io/marketplace.cms.gov/)

But the researcher was obviously more interested in the documents published on the site than the site itself. So I told her to just checkout the subdirectories which are easy to nav via Github.com's standard repo listing: [https://github.com/wgetsnaps/marketplace.cms.gov](https://github.com/wgetsnaps/marketplace.cms.gov)

But even better, I told her she could just download it as an archived zip, another endpoint that Github provides automatically, and peruse the file tree on her own operating system: [https://github.com/wgetsnaps/marketplace.cms.gov/archive/mas...](https://github.com/wgetsnaps/marketplace.cms.gov/archive/master.zip)

And of course, there's the option to git clone it. These are all features that can be reproduced, but I use Github not to save money on AWS, but just because of how discoverable the repos are.

</comment><comment><USER26> What they mean with 100.000 Requests / Month? Requests are normally every file access, not a user visit.

I have small OS-Projekt with ~20.000 Visitors / Month, 1 Pager with some Scripts and Images. This page has more than 100.000 Requests and less than 2 GB Traffic.

I know that github pages are not their primary use case, but then they should better drop the support completely or add a support plan. (i would pay for it)

</comment><comment><USER27> For comparison, Fastmail provides static website hosting as part of their email service, and it has an 80,000 request or 2GB bandwidth limit per day. 100,000 requests or 100GB per month is extremely low.

Yes, I know that Fastmail is not free, but website hosting isn't their primary service, and I'm using it as a comparison for the amounts allowed.

</comment><comment><USER28> Participate in an Interview on Experience with Different Git Tools

My name is Angela and I do researches on the user experience for different Git tools on the market. I'm kicking off a round of discussions with people who use Git tools. Ideally, I'd like to talk to people that sit on a team of 3 or more. If this is you, I would love to talk to you about your experience with <using> Git tools, or just some of the pain points that are keeping you up at night when doing your jobs.

I'll just need 30 mins of your time, and as a token of my thanks to those that participate, I'd like to offer a US$50 Amazon gift voucher.

If you're interested, just shoot me an email with your availability over the next few weeks and we can set up a time to chat for 30 minutes. Please also include your timezone so we can schedule a suitable time (as I'm located in San Francisco). Hope to talk to you soon!

Cheers, Angela Guo email@example.com

</comment><comment><USER29> Is this news? This has been around at least since June: [https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth-and-traffic- limits-...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth-and-traffic-limits-for- GitHub-pages)

Has anyone actually encountered enforcement of these limits?

</comment><comment><USER30> I've seen multiple amateur projects handle the Reddit hug like champs because they were static front-ends hosted on GitHub Pages with cautious AJAX calls to backend APIs. With a limit on 100,000 requests per month (which could be consumed in a few hours in such case) I guess this era is over.

<comment><USER29> This has been around for a long time (see other answers in this thread), so if you've seen any site handle the Reddit hug in the last year, no reason anything should change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> There's always neocities. You only get 50GB free a month, but paid seems cheap, and they seem to have their hearts in the right place.

[https://neocities.org/supporter](https://neocities.org/supporter)

</comment><comment><USER32> >GitHub Pages sites have a limit of 10 builds per hour.

I didn't know this. It seems one should work locally with Jekyll and only push once everything is done and tested.

Couldn't this be relaxed via/for incremental builds?

</comment><comment><USER33> Github Pages is a special type of hosting. It's first ever transparent hosting. What you see is what is in the repo. By wathching the repo people can be quite sure they won't be hacked or served special JS they dont expect. That's why I'd love to see paid plans.

<comment><USER34> You can say the same thing for every "static" hosting. As long as you don't run custom code server-side, every line of code run on the client is readable by anyone whichever hosting you use. GitHub Pages offers no more guarantees than "no (custom) code is run on the server". Also I'm pretty confident the 99% of users won't look at the code in advance anyway, even if they can understand what it does.

<comment><USER33> Github offers you to "watch" a repo out of box, and if many users do it, much harder to backdoor.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> hum... that's strange move after Gitlab releases the "pages" feature also on their product. Definitely want to see more something like free tier and being able to have more if having a paid plan.'

<comment><USER29> Again, as pointed out multiple times in this thread, this isn't new.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> At least they have enabled https... I am using to for a longer time and didnt know it was possible until now.

<comment><USER37> But not for custom domains, sadly.

<comment><USER38> How would Github "enable" HTTPS for custom domains? Do you want them to provide you with a free certificate for every custom domain you add?

On the other hand, if you _do_ possess a cert for your custom domain, then HTTPS works just fine [1].

[1]: [https://rishav.js.org](https://rishav.js.org)

<comment><USER39> So you're using Cloudflare. Do you have Strict SSL enabled? If not, you don't have authenticated encryption. Hiding the problem is not a solution. If GitHub doesn't let you set a custom certificate, Cloudflare isn't a solution because they don't have a way to pin a certificate rather than relying on CA authentication.

<comment><USER38> Yes, I believe you can enforce HTTPS using Cloudflare. I don't know about it because I don't manage the domain, I simply use the subdomain.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Wow, is there any way to get more views? I can pay, i need more than 100k

</comment><comment><USER40> I wonder if 2048 respected those limits.

</comment><comment><USER41> They're called Pages, not Websites. If you're hitting these caps it's time to revisit your needs and your vendor/provider.

</comment><comment><USER42> The new restrictions have been put in place not long after the Bloomberg reported that GitHub suffers from a loss of $66m in the first 3 quarters this year -> [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-15/github- is...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-15/github-is-building- a-coder-s-paradise-it-s-not-coming-cheap)

The title should be update to reflect the what's happened - the changes.

<comment><USER29> As mentioned in other comments, this isn't new, it's been around at least since June [https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth-and-traffic- limits-...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-bandwidth-and-traffic-limits-for- GitHub-pages)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: As a freelance dev how do I get back on top after hitting rock bottom? - <AUTHOR> TLDR; My main question if you needed emergency dev work to pay the bills how would you find it? Sob story alert below...
I had a decent client back in May/June but on June 1st rent was due and the client hadn't paid so I let them know development would cease till I received payment. I then got an email I was removed from bit bucket and slack and then ghosted.
I've been trying to find a new client ever since but for some reason it's been hard going. Usually they find me and I've had to turn them down.
I've reached out to all previous leads and clients and nobody has any work right now.
We just moved into a cheaper apartment but spent all our savings on deposit, first and last months rent, one month of storage and a uhaul, and groceries and gas.
Today my Internet bill came due $247 for August and July plus a moving fee.
I'm flat broke, our credit isn't great. I don't have anyone to borrow money from. I even tried r/borrow on Reddit.
Without internet I can't even work on my side project I'm trying to build (a Reddit tool for scheduling across multiple accounts, view all inbox messages across multiple accounts, view all slack/twitter DM's, and a scrumboard that I can add leads to via one click and autofollowup with them in a few months. Basically it'll make managing job and freelance on slack and Reddit much easier.)
I just need one good client my hourly is $80 but I've even tried dropping back down to $50 and no takers. I'm almost 40 with two boys under 3 years old and at the end of my rope. I'm trying to fight back depression but it's getting harder each day. Imposter syndrome is starting to set in even though I know I'm a solid developer.
I know react, Vue, express, ionic, node and laravel. I can also get around in a rails app. What I don't know I can learn.
Willing to do weekly pay where I might work an average of 50-60 hours per week for 1800/week. <comment><USER2> That sounds stressful, I'm sorry to hear

How often does this sort of thing come up in freelancing? On average, do freelancers make as much as full time employees over say a 5 year span?

(For absolute emergency cash, you could hit up a temp agency and probably be working tomorrow while you wait for new contracts. The pay would be terrible but its also almost zero commitment - you could leave the day you sign your next contract)

edit: based on your submission history since at least 2014, it sounds like things have been bumpy for a while now.

"Ask HN: About to be homeless, any ideas for a junior dev?" [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7854029](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7854029)

"Ask HN: How to get first Dev Job with no shipped code" [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9827867](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9827867)

"Ask HN: How would you raise $200 in 3 days?" [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7727241](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7727241)

I'm not sure what the answer to your short term problem is, but you may need to look at some bigger-picture solutions in the long term. I hope things work out for you!

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm willing to lend you some money to get things going again. My email is in my profile.

</comment><comment><USER4> Sounds like you are in dire straights. You need a quick solution, and the only one I can think of is to beg friends and family to help you out in a big way. Ideally find a relative who will be happy to have you and your family stay with them while you get back on your feet. Find other people to lend you or give you money. In the longer term, with these responsibilities I suggest finding a good job and forget about freelancing.

</comment><comment><USER5> Check out codementor.io. There's a lot of work there on demand (from other developers needing help); $80-120 an hour is typical (though you do have to pay them a 20% commission, so $64-96). They payout weekly. There's also some freelancer work there as well. I've done work there in the past, and had very good experiences.

<comment><USER6> wonder why it's called code mentor. they're either a mentor for education purposes or doing work unrelated to that.

<comment><USER5> A mentorship doesn't necessarily have to be free or charitable. That said, most of the calls lean more towards training or debugging than "mentorship".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is getting a full time job an option? You seem to have marketable skills.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah I've been applying. I live in a remote part of utah so remote job is a requirement. But thankfully there are a lot of those I just need some side work till I find something long term.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Call your local TekSystems or similar software body shop. They likely can toss you in a crappy job you won't like in a big enterprise IT environment... but you'll be getting a paycheck.

</comment><comment><USER9> Hi there. I am sorry to hear about your misfortunes. Keep your head up something will come up. Meanwhile (although it might not cover all your bills) you may wish to register on [http://www.mooctors.com](http://www.mooctors.com) as a technology tutor for MOOC students. You set your fees and availability (best set it for a month out). I hope this could help a bit.

Best Athan

</comment><comment><USER10> Shoot me your contact info. I might be able to bridge some of the gap with side work.

John @ curtisdigital.com

</comment><comment><USER11> Have you tried the freelancing websites to kickstart some new leads? (Toptal, Upwork, etc)

<comment><AUTHOR> Upwork yeah, not top talent they claim to use top 2% of devs I feel more top 40% I'm definitely good but not 10x good. I've been holding off till I'm more confident.</comment></comment>


Hudson moves to Github - <AUTHOR> http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Now-Hudson-moves-to-Github-1190087.html

<comment> brown9-2 A statement from Sonatype on this:

 _First, I'd like to address some misinformation. The use of Github itself was never an issue. It was how the original movement of the sources to Github was executed, and why, that created tension. Github is just a tool and it is a better choice for source control, at least in the short term, for several reasons:

...

We proposed using Github on the Hudson list, and in short order agreement was reached and the move was initiated. Winston did the infrastructure work last night to push the sources for Hudson over to Github. It was really that Simple. It's amazing how smoothly things go when you clearly communicate your intentions to all stakeholders. We hope to keep improving the infrastructure for Hudson so if you're interested please join the Hudson Dev list!_

[http://www.sonatype.com/people/2011/02/hudson-moves-to- githu...](http://www.sonatype.com/people/2011/02/hudson-moves-to-github-were- not-forking-around/)

This guy seems incapable of making a statement about the Oracle Hudson without taking potshots at it's creators and former leaders.

<comment><USER3> Making a big decision is always a simple matter when you have only 2 people left to talk to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> FWIW, we have followed along this move at Etsy, where we've been using this CI server for many months now.

We started out with Hudson, but after observing the unethical shenanigans from Oracle (particularly the erasure of the author's contributions from their wiki), we moved to Jenkins.

</comment><comment><USER5> This is ridiculous. Oracle and Sonatype are just trying to confuse the users into downloading the old and undeveloped hudson by moving to github. From my perspective this is a childish and immature move by both companies.

<comment><USER6> Undeveloped? I didn't follow every detail of the Hudson-Jenkins story but I thought the split was relatively recent. Have the codebases diverged that much since then? I would expect to still be relatively the same. Or are you referring to future development?

<comment><USER5> Yes, I am referring to future development. While it's possible that some development will continue on Hudson, the main contributors are sided with Jenkins.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> How Ironic indeed.

Oracle insist that the hosting must be on java.net. Sonatype state that it's 'standard practice' to host on a 'blessed' repository.

Short memories indeed.

<comment><USER8> FWIW, here's the Oracle rep saying that Github wasn't an issue: [http://java.net/projects/hudson/lists/dev/archive/2011-02/me...](http://java.net/projects/hudson/lists/dev/archive/2011-02/message/165)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Is this simply a move to sow seeds of confusion or point to something more fundamentally wrong with java.net?

I visited java.net recently to find out more about the Java Advanced Imaging project (which I discovered has some issues) but after seeing page after page of locked projects it will be a long time before I return, if ever.

<comment><USER10> The reason Jenkins nee Hudson was moving to GitHub in the first place was that Java.net was fundamentally broken; long outages, SVN was clearly not the right way for a project like Hudson to be run (commits came from all plugin authors, so the repo was touched constantly), fairly useless interface. The week long unnotified outage was just the final straw, the community had been asking for GitHub for a long time.

That they've now done this shows just how bitter, twisted and mercenary they've become. After this whole affair started from a move to GitHub, it's now magically the right thing? I very much doubt it. It's Oracle doing everything they can to try and screw Kohsuke and Jenkins.

Note that this is the same Jason Van Zyl that passive-aggressively deleted Kohsuke's edit history from the Hudson wiki.

<comment><USER11> > this is the same Jason Van Zyl that passive-aggressively deleted Kohsuke's > edit history

I don't think this was passive at all. It was an aggressive-aggressive action, his response to Kohsuke's inquiries on the subject were passive-aggressive.

<comment> brown9-2 I'm not sure who has been coming off worse in these post-fork actions - <USER2> or Sonatype (Van Zyl's company).

<comment><USER12> Oracle already had the lowest reputation possible. Sonatype had no reputation before the incident, and now they have a bad one. So I think Sonatype loses, because the way consultants like Sonatype get hired is quite different than how Oracle products get bought.

Oh well, at least it's _fun_ to be an egomaniac that destroys communities...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Wow, the bad press really got to Oracle. I'm impressed. Anyway, they have proven to be unreliable and have shown a very dangerous view of Open Source.

I hope this turns out well for the original contributors, but I'm afraid that months from now "the regular folk" will have forgotten this quarrel and chose the proven name Hudson over Jenkins. I will do my best to prevent this in my wider network.

</comment><comment><USER3> If there was a way to down-vote a project on Github, I'd down-vote Hudson into oblivion. Just let it go Oracle, you lost. Stop being like the kid that pulls the girl's ponytail because she called you a fatty. You are a fatty.

<comment><USER14> The closest approximation to this is how many people are watching a project. Sometimes when I can't figure out which fork is the main one, I use this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> What a mess. It's really too bad that Oracle seems to be fouling up every aspect of their relationship to the Java community. I am truly worried about the fate of JVM libraries and languages.

</comment><comment><USER16> Will the SHA-1s match up and will it be easy to pull from one into the other?

</comment><comment><USER17> If anyone's looking for an alternative (yes, an expensive one), I've been extremely happy with Atlassian's Bamboo CI tool for a couple years now.

<comment><USER18> and more to the point, Team City is free for up to 20 devs.

Potentially Hudson has a richer range of plugins, but both TC + Bamboo are a lot nicer to use.</comment></comment>


Joel Inc., Stackoverflow Careers and Jumping Shark - <AUTHOR> http://www.cforcoding.com/2009/12/joel-inc-stackoverflow-careers-and.html <comment><USER3> I hope we are too busy finding good things to build, good ways to build them, and good people to build them with (and for!) to sit around gossiping about who's over the hill and who sucks.

The entire spirit of HN is to upvote what you like. We don't need to engage in meta-discussion about which blogs are worth reading because we simply upvote the specific posts that are worth reading. Prolific and consistently good writers simply appear more often.

If you, I or anybody else doesn't like what Joel writes or Jeff writes or Reg writes, the solution is definitely to write a blog post. But not this post. Instead, write the kind of blog post you want people to read. Be a force for positive change.

And if you don't feel like writing, don't get sucked into pointing fingers and sneering at others. Spend your time reading the good stuff.

 _Once there was a horse tied up on the side of the street. Whenever someone tried to pass, the horse would kick them. Soon a crowd gathered around the horse until a wise man was seen coming close. The people said "This horse will surely kill anyone who tries to pass. What are we going to do?" The wise man looked at the horse, turned and walked down another street._

<comment><USER4> I beg to differ with you. It's highly articulate criticism coming from a regular JS blog reader and with an incredibly high reputation on StackOverflow (Cletus seems to be the 4th top ranked user.)

Cletus's post raises very valid points and expresses the feelings of betrayal of many people who contributed to StackOverflow many hours of work for free. And he shows several contradictions in what Spolsky preaches and what he practices.

Ironically your comment doesn't add much to the discussion and criticizes Cletus' blog post for being a negative post. Also you seem to confuse the author of the post with the submitter in HN:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=fogus> <http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=cletus>

Finally, you say Cletus is telling people "which blogs are worth reading", what makes me think you actually didn't read the whole piece.

<comment><USER3> I did read the whole piece.

I don't care who Cletus is, I was responding to what he(?) wrote. If his post was good but he had a low SO reputation, would I discount his opinion? And I have no idea there is a cletus here as well as there. I wasn't paying any attention to who he is for the same reason I was dismayed by how many words he(?) used to discuss who Joel is.

Finally, I never said his post was not truthful. There is dreck in the world. I know that and so do you.

p.s. But yeah, I hesitated before commenting on account of the irony. And then I removed the first paragraph, which originally read:

 _Fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck._

Not my most articulate writing by a long shot...

<comment><USER5> Cletus is a male name.

Stats & origin: <http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/1/Cletus>

<comment><USER6> Cletus isn't his real name anyway - it's William Shields.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Stackoverflow Careers deserves serious criticism. I think it was delivered too soon. They should have waited until StackOverflow became more established.

I've used Stackoverlow on occasion but I don't think the point system means much, and shouldn't be used for an associative career site. People that are competent aren't on stackoverflow all day answering questions for people that didn't read the documentation.

<comment><USER8> > People that are competent aren't on stackoverflow all day answering > questions for people that didn't read the documentation.

Agreed. If I were hiring someone a super high SO score might put me off - especially if they pushed that as a good thing about them.

<comment><USER3> For the sake or discussion...

Should we apply the same thinking to blogging? Are competent programmers too busy programming write blog posts?

<comment><USER9> I don't think that they're universally too busy to blog, but I do think that the truly great programmers blog very infrequently because they have better things to do. Paul Buchheit's blog shows about one entry per quarter while he was working on Friendfeed, then it went up to about one per week after the FaceBook acquisition. Marc Andreesen has gone dark since starting his venture fund. I know many really awesome programmers at Google who have _zero_ Internet presence, because they're too busy coding. If you want to know what Rob Pike thinks, you read his code, because he doesn't write much otherwise.

I've found that when I'm working on something really cool, I tend to go relatively dark on the Internet too, and there's an inverse correlation between my comments and my productivity. In other words, when I talk I don't know what I'm talking about, and when I know what I'm talking about, I don't talk. ;-) But I cycle through doing/talking phases several times a year, so I'm continually refreshing my experience. Someone who's been doing nothing but blogging for 3-4 years (which seems to be the time it takes to build a major audience) is probably pretty rusty technically, which makes their advice suspect.

<comment><USER10> _I do think that the truly great programmers blog very infrequently because they have better things to do._

This is really presumptuous, and makes a leap from correlative to causal on the back of a couple of blanket assumptions.

The first is that there are better things to do than blog: based on what? If someone feels the itch to write about something they really care about, and doesn't want to bother with more formal methods of publication, I think that blogging is one of the best things they can do with their time. It is not like they are producing nothing; they are producing something that will -- hopefully -- propagate ideas and critical thinking. This sounds like a very good thing. Not all problems that are looking for an answer will have that answer found in a block of code; sometimes the wetware needs to be refactored.

The second is that people who blog more than infrequently are apt to be technically rusty, and should be subject of suspicion. This make me suspicious of those who would assert that. Again, based on what assumption? I agree with the claim that if they blog more they have less time for other things besides blogging; rollover minutes only work on some cellphones. But to claim that because they blog more they _know_ less; this is quite an extraordinary claim. It wants to lump everyone who blogs a lot in with the blowhards. What if someone has a lot to say, and thinks it is important to get those ideas out? It sounds like you would tell that person to shut up and get back to work. I worry about the consequences of this.

<comment><USER9> We're talking in the context of "truly great programmers". It makes sense that truly great programmers get that way by programming. That doesn't mean blogging is a useless activity, or that bloggers are bad programmers. Actually, I think most bloggers are _good_ programmers, better than the average non-blogging population. But by and large, they aren't _great_ programmers, because the jump from good to great takes that extra bit of concentration and attention that's consumed by blogging.

Think of programming ability as a pyramid. There're a vast amount of programmers that show up at work, put in their 8 hours, and never really think about what they're doing. These people generally don't read or write blogs. Then there're the people that are passionately involved in their craft. They blog. Then there're the people at the very top of the field - the Guy Steeles, Rob Pikes, Jeff Deans, etc. They usually don't blog, because they put all their concentration into their code, and when they take a break, they do things like photography or swing dancing that take them completely away from programming so they can recharge.

The interesting thing about this distribution is that the average blogger is a better programmer than the average non-blogger, but the average great programmer does not blog.

FWIW, I consider myself a good programmer, but not a great programmer. And I've suspected for a couple years that the reason I'm not a great programmer is because I talk too much and code too little. So I dunno if I'd tell the general blogger to shut up and get back to work, but I certainly tell _myself_ to shut up and get back to work, usually with lukewarm results.

<comment><USER11> I agree that great programmers tend to be focused on programming, to the exclusion of most other productive intellectual activities.

It's ironic - I feel exactly the opposite of the above poster. I just find it too easy to slip back into programming, instead of blogging about my work or spending the time to open-source any of my projects. I wish I was blogging more (or at all, for that matter).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> There are two issues here: the business idea (of the jobs site), and Joel's puffery.

I'll make no comment on the latter point, but I have to wonder about the former-- if the hiring process is broken (and I accept the argument that it is), what's a better angle for a start-up than what Jeff and Joel have done?

<comment><USER3> With respect to programming jobs startups, it seems like there are at least two ways forward. One is to find a new way to match programmers with existing jobs. The other is to find new kinds of jobs entirely.

YCombinator has funded at least one company finding new ways to match programmers with jobs. And I think YCombinator itself is a new kind of job for programmers :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I think the main issue here is that Cletus is in Australia. Assuming things haven't changed since January, Australia accounts for only 3% of the traffic to Stack Overflow[1]. It's hard to expect a critical mass of employers less than a month after the employer beta started[2], especially given how few potential candidates are in the area. Jeff has already floated the idea of offering a coupon[3] to interested employers, demonstrating that he's aware of and working to correct the issue.

Besides, it's _way_ too early to say that Careers has "jumped the shark", considering that the public wasn't even aware of its _existence_ two months ago.

1: [http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/01/where-in-the-world- do-...](http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/01/where-in-the-world-do-stack- overflow-users-come-from)

2: [http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/11/careers-employer- beta-...](http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/11/careers-employer-beta- underway/)

3: [http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/31649/whats-your- cv-...](http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/31649/whats-your-cv-hit-rate- on-careers/31650#31650)

<comment><USER13> Offtopic: I went clicking through your profile then your Careers CV and see that you did the modos rep tracker. I'm addicted to that thing, so thank you very much. It would be interesting if you added # of visits by user ID then told me that I was visiting way too often because I was a top X% user of the tracker :) Great tool, it has a permanent spot on my bookmarks bar. Thanks again.

<comment><USER6> Thanks! Sorry it's been broken for the past day or two, the profile page had some major markup changes. As soon as I get some time I'll get it working again (hopefully today) and I'll incorporate a little stat that tells you how many times you've hit the tracker in the past day/week/month/lifetime. And, um, if you know anyone that's hiring, feel free to pass on the link to my CV. Thanks. :-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Does anyone else think that while Fogcreek and 37signals have done something cool, a whole generation has tried to imitate them with little success and the constant posting of Joel + Jason does this site little/no good?

<comment><USER15> I tend to agree, with one caveat: Joel is a good writer and I am almost always entertained by reading him, even when I disagree.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Always interesting how blog posts critical of Spolsky always create so much chatter here....or, almost always. If you happen to include Paul Graham as a target in the same blog post as Spolsky (Blogs Are Godless Communist Bullshit), it seems people here aren't as interested in the article for some reason. Funny that.

<comment><USER17> You seem to be implying that, on news.yc, it's okay to criticize Joel Spolsky, but not Paul Graham. I think it's that you don't have enough controls in your experiment.

I read this longish blog post in its entirety. I don't agree with all of it, but I think the author made some valid points, and that he's making a good- faith effort to be constructive. I also read the longish Giles Bowkett blog post you're talking about. It was very much _not_ constructive, and in fact was all the way across the scale to conspiracy-theory, tinfoil-hat-style nutbar-ism. I'm not surprised it didn't score very well when it was posted here.

Have you noticed how Paul usually reacts to criticism? Say somebody posts a comment here that is vaguely critical of something he wrote. Paul's usual response is along the lines of: "Are there specific things you can point out that I was wrong about?" That doesn't sound to me like a guy who considers himself beyond criticism.

<comment><USER16> I'm not saying Paul considers himself beyond criticism, I am saying that the community here jumps at the chance to heap criticism on Joel (there are many historical examples of that here)....the only exception I am aware of is the article in which Paul was also mentioned...for that article, hardly a peep.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The second half was a very verbose way to say "it's hard to start a marketplace."

Fair enough. It's hard, but there are success stories all the time.

Karma + pay-to-be-seen + leverage-blog-fame is one set of infinitely many jump-starting gimmicks. Many potential job hunters won't bite, but the subset that remains might be exactly what certain employers want.

</comment><comment><USER19> I've met Joel in person, and he's bright, but not visionary. Some of his writing his interesting, but I'm generally unimpressed.

Disclaimer: I'm not impartial. I interviewed with Fog Creek in the summer of 2008. I was rejected, which didn't upset or surprise me. However, when I called to ask why, I got a non-answer (HR: "we'll call if we can release this information"). I'd been unemployed for 4 months due to health problems, the economy was falling apart, and they wouldn't even help me out a little bit by telling me why they said "no". Amazing. If he'd had the courage to tell me why I was turned down, my opinion of him would probably be neutral-to-positive.

<comment><USER20> Almost no company will tell you why you weren't hired. In the US, as soon as a company gives you a reason for why you were not hired, you can sue and argue that the grounds for rejecting you were frivolous. Worse, if the exact phrasing used in any way possibly implies that you might have been rejected for a protected class (even if that's not actually the case in reality) then you can sue for truly ludicrous amounts of money.

Neither of these are hypotheticals; one company I worked for had had a couple of lawsuits due to the former, and last I heard, a friend's company was halfway through a lawsuit due to the latter.

This is another area where you can thank the lawyers for making it a mess for everyone.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I feel sorry for anyone in this industry who looks toward people like Joel Spolsky for guidance.

<comment><USER22> Care to elaborate? His guidance seems to be reasonable and consistent - <USER2> it should be taken with a grain of salt (some of it feels anecdotal rather than factual), I don't find it unhelpful, as you posit.

<comment><USER11> Joel isn't outright dishonest, but when he presents his views he usually does it with the intent of improving his business, or rationalization for his business decisions - so there's a strong slant to his talks. You can see this in a lot of places - Everything from his talk about 'great work environment' - "and that's why every programmer at Fog Creek has two monitors and their own office!" to his suggestions of how to hire the best programmers concluding with "That's why you should use StackOverflow Careers". When he's not outright pitching his company or products, he's rationalizing decisions. Clearly, Ruby on Rails was too immature for FogBugz - that's why his team developed a custom programming language to power BUG TRACKING software.</comment></comment></comment>