The Missing $1,000,000 Tax Bracket - <AUTHOR> http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/03/missing-1000000-tax-bracket.html <comment><USER2> People that don't understand economics always want to talk about this big nebulous pool of money that apparently sits in vaults somewhere actively making the rich richer and the poor poorer. This is simple hogwash. the vast majority of the wealth is tied up in the working capital of the corporations that these ultra-wealthy run. The people we should be focusing on helping aren't the 'poor'. Give them money and it disappears. On the other hand, if you give small business owners (who represent the vast majority of millionaires, and employ about 75% of the people in the US) you get new jobs and new products. remember the old adage about giving a man a fish vs teaching a man to fish? If you HAVE to subsidize something subsidize free fishing polls, not free fish.

<comment><USER3> Supply side economics has a fundamental flaw: it lowers aggregate demand. The middle class has been able to make up for this over the last 30 years in two ways - by having women join the workforce, and by taking on more and more debt. Debt can be piled on for quite a long time, but when the credit bubble pops, you get what we are going through now. And when consumers find out that debt is not income, and they retrench in their spending, then there is no market for the goods all the saintly business owners are making. This is the worst case scenario.

<comment><USER2> _Supply side economics has a fundamental flaw: it lowers aggregate demand._

I can't make heads or tails of this. if oversupply occurs prices decrease.

<comment><USER3> Supply side economics does not really increase supply. That's just the moniker. Supply side economics means tax cuts for the well to do, who will supposedly then create the jobs that will grow the economy. But this rests on the middle class stagnating - something that has in fact happened in the last 30 years. The top 1% control 22% of wealth (as of 2006), compared to 8% in 1980. For comparison's sake, the last time this percentage was this high was 1928. If you don't think there's a high correlation between income inequality and levels of debt, then you are fooling yourself.

There's a point at which the middle class being too poor puts the entire economy at risk. We are there now. Being an acolyte of supply side economics today is like being a communist in 1989 - you can keep believing in the true faith, but it's been refuted in the real world.

<comment><USER2> what are you talking about? income inequality doesn't mean anything if everyone's standard of living is increasing. Would you prefer YOUR standard of living to go DOWN just so you can have the satisfaction of watching the rich get poorer? I would much rather have everyone get richer even if that means the rich get richer. You're comparing percentages but you're neglecting that on a per capita basis the 78% of 2006 is much much larger than the 92% of 1980. It's not even close.

whose debt are you talking about? household debt or government debt? if the former it is up to people not to live beyond their means, if the latter the government is simply stealing from us. Where we are at now has nothing to do with the middle class and everything to do with government intervention in 1995 and again 2000 and 2001.

what the hell has modern macroeconomics done to our country? all over the place I see specious analysis such as this comparing numbers that either don't mean anything, are inaccurately measured, or can't be shown to be an indicator of other things.

edit: I pulled up some numbers

GDP in 1980: $2.7 trillion

GDP in 2006: $13.2 trillion

Population in 1980: 226.5 Million

Population 2006: 298.4 million

GDP per capita 1980: $11,920

GDP per capita 2006: $44,000

$11,920 in 2006 dollars according to the CPI: $28,824

we're not quite twice as wealthy, but we're far FAR richer now than in 1980. Income inequality means nothing.

<comment><USER3> You are wrong. Everyone's standard of living is not increasing. Quite the opposite. Adjusted for inflation, median incomes have stagnated or declined in the last 30 years. Household debt has skyrocketed oftentimes as people have simply tried to keep up. Yes, some people have lived ostentatiously beyond their means, but many others are just trying to stay afloat, and deal with the rising costs of everything as their paychecks stay the same. Conservatives told people that incomes did not matter because their investments (stocks and houses) were rising in value. This fallacy has been utterly exposed.

The gains in GDP have more or less gone entirely to the top 10%, and in particular, the top 1% of the population. This makes everyone else feel like the pie isn't growing - because it isn't for them. Now that their stocks and homes are worth substantially less, and their credit is drying up, people have to spend less. And this fall in aggregate demand has disastrous consequences - not just here, but abroad as well, for all the countries that depended on exporting things to US consumers (Germany, Japan, and China).

Income inequality is of course not in itself a bad thing; it is the consequence of an economy where risk and work are rewarded. The question is extreme income inequality. Obviously this is a subjective matter. You may not think we have extreme inequality now, but when it's at the highest level it's been in 80 years, I'd venture that it is extreme. And extreme inequality often leads to falling aggregate demand and debt deflation. In short, a depression. If you think income inequality means nothing, you know nothing.

<comment><USER2> your own numbers refute that. look at your original percentages. do basic math.

the amount the wealthy control has almost tripled, but the amount of overall wealth has almost quintupled.

imagine that the nation's wealth is represented by a dollar and I control 8% of it. Over time the wealth of the nation doubles but my percentage control has grown to 22%.

before I got 8 cents and the rest of the nation got 92 cents to share.

now we have 2 dollars that I get 22% of...44 cents.

the rest of the nation now has $1.56 to share. Discounting the fact that i'll probably reinvest part of my 44 cents, the nation is still much wealthier than before.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> My ideal income tax structure would look like this:

If you make under $25,000, you pay no income tax. Everyone else pays 20%. You receive tax breaks for disabilities, children, educational spending, and charitable donations. Corporations would be taxed at 30%, but owners could take profits without being double taxed. Corporations could also receive up to 50% tax breaks through charitable works and/or donations (provides tax incentive for community projects, being 'green', or donating to a cause).

It all seems reasonable to me. Maybe I'm missing something. This would also simplify the complicated and bloated tax code we currently have. It could also encourage more businesses and workers to move here, which would stimulate growth.

 _Note: I chose 20% because I saw somewhere else a chart that showed that the ultimate tax revenue the government took in regardless of tax rate over the past 50 years or so was 20% of GDP._

<comment><USER5> Here's the chart I'm pretty sure you're thinking of: [http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/ED- AH556B_ranso_200...](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/ED- AH556B_ranso_20080519194014.gif)

from the 2008 Wall Street Journal article titled "You Can't Soak the Rich": <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121124460502305693.html>

The phenomenon is called Hauser's Law: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hauser's_Law>

and intelligent criticism of the chart can be found here: [http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/odd- numbers/2008/05/20/...](http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/odd- numbers/2008/05/20/lying-with-charts-wsj-edition?rss=true)

<comment><USER4> You sir, are a gentleman and a scholar. Thanks for bringing those articles up. I checked the last link you mentioned, and I wasn't really satisfied with the criticism. Maybe I just didn't understand the article, but it seemed to me that all the author said was "A lot of other tax rates balanced out the highest marginal tax rate shown in the curve." I would have liked to see an alternate conclusion instead of a simple refutation. But again, thank you very much for the links.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The problem I have with the phrase "Taxes for the rich" is not so much the "taxes" part as the "the". Who are these rich people? How do you draw the line? What does it mean for a society to push more and more people into this category in order to tax them punitively?

<comment><USER7> If you're making over $380k, then you're in the top 1% of households in the US by income.

If you're making over $150k, then you're in the top 5% of households in the US by income.

If you're making over 100k, then you're in the top 10% of households in the US by income.

[http://elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/saez- UStopincomes-2006prel.pd...](http://elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/saez- UStopincomes-2006prel.pdf)

There are some lines. I'd draw it at "top 5% by income."

<comment><USER8> I wouldn't define 'rich' by income alone, because 150k ain't rich in the Bay Area.

<comment><USER9> That's like saying "150k ain't rich if you have a 100k/year gambling habit" or "150k ain't rich if you have an enormous house purchased with a big mortgage". Living in the Bay Area is a luxury that only the well-off can afford without great hardship; it has benefits which mean that many people do it even though after paying to live in the Bay Area they don't have much disposable income. Just as many people choose to take out large mortgages, or buy fast cars, or gamble, or whatever, even though they may not then have much disposable income left.

<comment><USER10> The same can be said of living in the US. You could move to a cheaper part of the world, perhaps even telecommute. You could argue that you grew up in the US, so staying home is not a luxury. Those who grew up in the Bay Area don't see living there as a luxury any more than you see living in the US as a luxury.

<comment><USER9> Actually, I don't live in the US. But yes, living in the US is a luxury, but that isn't relevant to the US tax system because everyone taxed by the US (more or less) lives in the US. (When people say things like "we should tax the rich more" or "we shouldn't tax the rich more", "rich" is really shorthand for "among the best-off of the people being taxed".)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is an idea whose time has come. Look at what happened during the last depression: the top marginal tax rate jumped from around 25% to over 90%. I think a broadly-graduated marginal property tax on non-agricultural properties is also a good idea.

A lot of people made off like bandits during this bubble. A 70% tax rate at income over a million is probably unavoidable. We can't just fleece the average tax payer for generations and leave the top 1%, many of whom profited during this time, undisturbed on their St.Barts vacations.

<comment><USER4> I have a hard time understanding your logic behind this. The people who make more money (including those who 'made off like bandits' like you say) were already taxed for their earnings. Are you saying that these people (who profited during the bubble) will keep earning money? Or maybe you're saying that we need higher taxes now so that the next bubble the government will get in on more of the action?

Also, how is the government fleecing the average taxpayer anymore than it is fleecing the rich? Aren't the rich not only taxed more (because they earn more), but taxed at a higher rate?

<comment><USER11> That's the reason for the heavily-graduated property tax -- to target specifically those who might have profited under the bubble, yet who are not profiting as much now.

I never intimated that "the government is fleecing the average taxpayer more than it is fleecing the rich." (Although Warren Buffet has said just that.) And since we own the government, I find "fleece" to be a strange word. Yes, the rich pay a higher rate on some of their income. And what we're saying here is that there should be even higher rate for income over a million.

<comment><USER12> This "bugger your neighbor" attitude that prevails in this country is removing every freedom that we teach our children make this country great.

Hell yes. Take more money at the point of a gun, why not? They have more money than you do, the greedy bastards. They don't deserve it. You deserve that money, or you know somebody that does. Go for it!

<comment><USER13> > This "bugger your neighbor" attitude that prevails in this country is > removing every freedom that we teach our children make this country great.

This "defend the wealthy" attitude that prevailed in this country for the last 30 years has nearly ruined this country and served only to further increase the economic inequality between the rich and the poor.

If you think that what makes this country great is that the rich are allowed to walk all over the poor then fuck you. Now give me your wallet you greedy bastard, you can skip the steak so someone else can get some health care.

<comment><USER14> It's not a defend the wealthy, it's a defend what you earned, and that you should not have your wealth stolen from you by jealous people who wish they had what you had. I'm not wealthy. Income inequality is not by definition bad.

Your self-righteous attitude is disgusting, do you live at a subsistence level funneling all of your extra income to the needy around the world? If not, then how can you demand that others skip their steak to provide health care for someone else.

<comment><USER13> You are not an island and what price society decides to set for its services is not theft, they are not stealing from you and you do not earn anything outside the platform society provides for you which enables that earning in the first place. Society has a right to take a share of your earnings; so says our constitution.

Extreme income inequality is bad because it's bad for society as a whole and at some point society as a whole becomes more important than the individual.

Your self-centered fuck the rest of the country it's my money attitude is equally disgusting. We aren't talking about the whole world, we're talking about our country, because that's what our social contract obligates us to support with our taxes. I pay my taxes, don't cheat on them, and don't whine about it and call it stealing like a self centered narcissist who thinks his right to property matters more than someone else right to life. It doesn't, not even in the natural world; people would just kill you and take your property by force to survive.

If, as a collective, society decides to limit the maximum wealth an individual is allowed to obtain and funnel it back down to limit the amount of poverty, thus capping both extremes and making life generally better for the vast majority of people, well... I'm good with that as are the vast majority of people.

Inequality is not bad, you have to let people reap rewards for their efforts, up to a point, but not to the point that it damages us all.

<comment><USER15> _you do not earn anything outside the platform society provides for you_

What an interesting statement. Sounds to me like you're saying the individual is there to serve the societal structure, instead of the other way around.

As a simplification, I would certainly hate to live in a place where society made decisions for me. I'd much rather live in one where I made decisions for society. In other words the government is made legitimate by the informed consent of the natural legislature -- the people. The people do not exist to serve the government. Individuals exist just fine without governments, but not the other way around.

The entire structure of a democracy is that, at the end of the day, it is the person that is ultimately sovereign. Democracy isn't some club used by the majority to tyrannize the minority. If we were talking about Jim Crow laws, this would be immediately evident -- you can't simply take things from people because a greater number of voters want to. But somehow because we're talking about rich people the message doesn't sink in.

Okay. I allowed myself to get sucked into this. Sorry. I know better. It just seems like you guys are so close, yet I know in my heart you're not going to come to any kind of understanding.

<comment><USER13> > What an interesting statement. Sounds to me like you're saying the > individual is there to serve the societal structure, instead of the other > way around.

No, I think one can't exist without the other, but what I'm saying is things like trade and property don't exist outside the social structure setup by society in today's world.

> Individuals exist just fine without governments, but not the other way > around.

Actually, no, they don't, because there are no individuals, there are just lot's and lot's of people and we can't get along without some form of government. With no explicit government in place, crime rules. We can all agree that criminal rule is not "getting along fine", and in fact we have, it's why we create governments to begin with.

No man is an island, we are tribal creatures, and always have been even before we were man.

> Democracy isn't some club used by the majority to tyrannize the minority.

Actually, it is exactly that. We've put protections into place in many circumstances to force a super majority to be required, but it very much is tyranny of the majority. Look at the laws around us we're all forced to obey and tell me it isn't?

America is NOT a society based on individual liberty and freedom, it IS a society based on the moral whims of the majority. If this were not the case, there would be no victimless crimes and the default position of everything would be legal and getting something made illegal would be a huge battle. This is the exact opposite of what were are now.

Interesting and enjoyable comments from you though, thanks.

<comment><USER15> You realize that the United States had _no_ federal government for 12 years, from 1775 to 1787, right? And that for a large part of its history, people were responsible for their own crime control?

I could go on -- at length -- about various places where people did just fine without government structure. In the old west, for instance, marshals might not make it through town but once every couple of months. Didn't seem to slow down westward expansion that much. European traders worked all over the world just on a handshake and a promise for centuries.

Anthropologists studying tribes tell us that there are a few things that distinguish true tribes from modern cultures. One of those is the idea of private property: what is mine is mine and you can't take it from me unless under very unusual circumstances. In very primitive societies, the chief or the tribal elders can come around and just take what they want. It's only after we had the concept of private property and contract law that we saw significant economic and cultural growth. It was observing this state of nature that eventually created the political theory that is the bedrock of the country.

In communist China, just after the revolution, they would have "people's courts". These courts basically consisted of a mob of people who would bring in rich people, describe at length how they "exploited" the workers, and then strip them of all their goods. Sometimes for good measure they'd send them to jail or kill them. It was great political theater -- the crowds loved it -- but what were the results?

This was not a time of record growth, or even a time when the lives of the average citizen got that much better. All they really ended up doing was just replacing the folks who got rich signing contracts and respecting property rights with the folks who got rich being politically connected and doing whatever they liked.

Just some things for you to consider. I know I don't want to see any version of people's courts here in my lifetime.

<comment><USER13> No federal government does not mean _no government_. Everywhere you find people you _will_ find some form of government they have setup to resolve disputes even if that government is no more than what they consider a fair arbitrator. If we all agreed on everything we wouldn't need a government but that just isn't going to happen, ever.

Yes, for short periods of time small groups of people can get along without a government. That is not relevant, we're talking about a country here and you aren't really suggesting that we could get by just fine without a government are you? Government means any ruling body, not just the feds.

I don't want to see those kinds of kangaroo courts in place either, but the privilege of property, and it is a privilege, is not absolute and never has been. When necessary, we've always had some means of seizing it for the good of the many over the whims of the individual. This is as it should be. We should respect property rights as much as possible up to the point that they start hurting the many too much.

<comment><USER15> Yes, you are making my point. What happens in these cases? What happens, say, when a merchant from Venice seeks to work with an Arab trader in the 14th century?

Each voluntarily gives up some sovereignty to create a minimal set of rules so that a transaction can take place.

Government (at whatever level) consists of each of us voluntarily giving up some of our sovereignty so that we can have private property and contract law. The protection of our property -- our lives, our housing, our money, etc -- is the goal here. Without that protection, and without our voluntary surrender of power, government becomes something you _do_ to somebody else. It becomes a tool of control. Jefferson was against the U.S. Constitution, for instance, for just that fear -- that by removing politicians from the people at some point you lose the heart of a democracy.

Now of course we have to have a national defense, and therefore we're going to have taxes. I don't think anybody wants zero government. In fact, government can do lots of cool things, like a space program or promote clean energy. But the key question remains: are people voluntarily giving up sovereignty for freedom to transact? Or are they stuck with no choices? Is government something for maximizing freedoms, or something for equalizing property? Are we still getting equal representation for our taxation? Is government something we create, or something that we're stuck with?

If property is a privilege to be taken at the whims of the majority, then we're back to the caves again.

<comment><USER13> It's a different world now. I can't just grab my shit and move west a few hundred miles to get away from this government, or go find a new continent and establish a new country with the rules I like. The world isn't that big anymore. Consent to being governed is no longer an option. We will be governed whether we like it or not.

You can only look back in history so far before you see the world was so vastly different that comparisons aren't valid anymore. Government is already something past generations has done to us and there's no going back, it's already a tool of control, Jefferson already lost.

> But the key question remains: are people voluntarily giving up sovereignty > for freedom to transact? Or are they stuck with no choices?

The question does not remain, we've been stuck with no choices for decades if not generations. No natural born citizen alive today _joined_ the U.S. voluntarily, we were all born stuck with it.

It's not _if_ property is a privilege, property is a privilege, period. The government can seize it, destroy it through inflation, or whatever else we let them do and they've been doing it for a long long time.

Your arguments are all so _academic_ and _what if'y_ , man I'm talking about reality here. The government can seize your property for suspicion of drugs, lose the case, and keep your property. They can seize the ultimate personal property, your own body, and imprison you because of what you chose to put into your own body. That's life in this country.

This idea that government is some voluntary agreement between the government and the governed just isn't the real world anymore, the days of overthrowing the government are long gone. You're talking about what government should be, I'm talking about what it is, so what's your point again?

<comment><USER15> Dude, you keep moving the goalposts here. I explain one part to you and you change the subject to be something else.

I'm talking about the theory of governance, which doesn't go anywhere. Some things work and some things don't. There is a reason why the United States became such an economic powerhouse. Those first principles don't ever disappear.

So when you say something like _you do not earn anything outside the platform society provides for you_ : it's demonstrably false both in historical and current terms, it reverses the role of the individual and society, and it adopts a wealth redistribution principle that has failed over and over again.

Other than that, it's a great idea. I'll leave you to it.

<comment><USER13> Dude, sorry, don't mean to move the goal post, but I have an excuse. I'm doing all this laying at home with pneumonia doped up on codeine. I really was just trying to understand your point.

If that is demonstrably false, then please do demonstrate, because I don't believe that for a second if we're talking about the real world and not some abstract ideal government.

Governments have a monopoly on the markets I'm allowed to trade in and will jail me if I try to trade outside of their markets, so they clearly provide the platform and law and rules upon which all trade is based.

This is to my benefit, without those laws and rules someone could just take my property by virtue of being bigger and badder. The government is at least the big bad that I have some say in how it's structured rather than some random company which I have no control over.

Conservatives like to point out how redistribution of wealth has failed over and over again, but look around man, the entire civilized world is liberal, heavily liberal in American terms, so it certainly has not failed as far as I can see.

This idea that America has somehow succeeded where others have totally failed is something I just find absolutely absurd. Not being number 1 is not failing. Every other government in the world is not a failure.

As far as I'm concerned the measure of the success of a country is how happy it's people are, not how much money it cranks out. Happiness is not measured in dollars.

<comment><USER11> Fantastic thread, you guys. Gnaritas, in my opinion you've got it absolutely right. There are some strange memes in America, such as that it's the richest country on earth, socialism is bad and anything government touches turns rotten. The problem is that the truth is rarely found in extreme locations.

America is certainly not even a contender for richest country, and as you state, many countries, especially in Europe, are showing that socialism works quite well. It's the reason we're moving to that model with healthcare.

> the measure of the success of a country is how happy it's people are, not > how much money it cranks out

Exactly. And countries with more smaller gaps between the rich and poor are almost exclusively much happier. I've been to two countries which are very similar (I won't state which to avoid offending anyone here), but Country A was depressing and sad, old women drunk in the streets -- I couldn't leave fast enough. I went to Country B and, although it was poorer, the people seemed much happier. It was much more alive and upbeat. I found out later that Country A has a huge disparity in wealth, Country B very little. I credit this with being the single strongest contributing factor to the quality of life in these countries, and a huge factor generally in the quality of life in any country.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The problem is that the notion of an income tax is considered a legitimate way of funding the government. In reality the government should be funded by property, sales, and tarrif taxes (not protective tarrifs, just a fee to offset the cost of government).

The current income tax we have now is worse than the serfs had, @least they only had to work 1 or 2 days on the fields for no pay. We have to do that on our income, let alone all the other taxes and fees we need to pay.

<comment><USER16> If I were to start a country, I would cap spending, and pay for things with a fiat currency. Inflation would be an unavoidable, flat, and implicit tax. The trick would be to control spending.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> In Belgium, the 50% tax bracket starts at some 30,000 EUR/year. And that's exclusive of the 13% social security tax.

There must be some kind of sensible middle road...

</comment><comment><USER18> I was bored, so I made this table of effective tax rates for various incomes/years, indexed to 2007 dollars.

<http://mharrisdev.com/income_tax.html>

</comment><comment><USER19> I would like to see the charts compared with GDP per capita. Just curious if there is any correlation.

<comment><USER20> Just make sure you get the direction of causation right ..</comment></comment>


Typewriters about to become a page in history - <AUTHOR> http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/typewriters-about-to-becomepage-in-history/432497/?loc=interstitialskip <comment><USER2> I'm looking for a daisy-wheel printer that can be run from a modern computer. Purchased an Olivetti typewriter that could supposedly print from a 3.5 floppy, but it didn't work.

Still looking.

<comment><USER3> Just a hunch - I bet a lot of the printers from the 80s (eg the TRS-80 one) speak plain ASCII over a standard parallel port, with CHR(10), CHR(11) and CHR(13) for line feed, page feed and carriage return. (Although I'm guessing, so check before you buy!)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I still use my mechanical typewriter (a Royal Aristocrat handed down to me by a family member) quite frequently. Computers are nice, but they also offer many distractions and lack that wonderful tactile feedback that mechanical keys provide.

</comment><comment><USER5> Conformation bias strikes again. There continues to be is a market for electronic typewriters and people are making them. Mechanical typewriters may be defunct but that is not the only kind. Everyone expects them to have gone away so they don't bother checking the facts.</comment>


There is no such thing as good hiring, only good firing - <AUTHOR> http://www.fonality.com/blog/there-is-no-such-thing-as-good-hiring-only-good-firing

<comment><USER2> "while you shouldn't hire the guy that walks in one hour late, and didn't notice a Cheerio stuck on his lip, anything else is fair game."

As far as I can tell, The author is suggesting that interviews are completely worthless. He's saying that until you actually deal with someone in the workplace, you have no way of knowing how they will perform. He's saying that there is no way to effectively differentiate applicants.

This, to put it simply, is complete bullshit. It's clearly possible to remove the absolute worst applicants through interviews (i.e. can't put two lines of code together). Furthermore, how do you get absolutely _zero_ idea of the work ethic and ability of the person you're interviewing? The only conclusion I can come to is that this author has no technical knowledge whatsoever, and therefore can't distinguish between applicants.

This author is suggesting the 'spray and pray' method of hiring: hire a new developers, fire those that don't perform in the workplace, rinse, repeat. This is pure insanity.

I really hope I'm missing something, but the author really is pretty clear: "your skill as a manager is not based on your ability to get good people into your group, but on getting bad people out. The sooner you cull weaker players, the sooner you can replace them with stronger players...and improve the human composite of your firm."

<comment><USER3> Not only that, but (and I realise this may not be the norm in the HN population) many of us work in places where people can't just get fired because it turns out they are not an A-player. I could get an F-player fired, but if I hire a B-player I am stuck with them. One of the important real-world geek herding skills is getting the most out of your B-players.

That said: he is right in that most of the hiring literature is lame if not outright stupid. I was once passed a book by upper (non-tech) management on how to interview people and it really did tout all the nonsense cliches, like the quality of the candidate's handshake. I am still boggling to this day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I would never interview with a company with a corporate culture like this, and neither would most of the hackers I've worked with. While I prefer to work with great people...

1\. Not being at the bottom of the barrel, I have alternatives. Why would I leave a situation for one known for hiring just about anyone and spitting them out at heavy rates? There's a name for those types of gigs: contracting jobs, and they pay for the risk.

2\. The corporate culture developed through such a system must be awful. Why start making acquaintanceship with a new co-worker when even odds say they'll be gone in a few months?

3\. It makes for lazy management. Sometimes, the problem is the process doesn't fit the problem. But why go through that when you can just fire them?

Finally, this could only work in the major tech hubs. I'm a friend of a friend away from most non-DOD projects in my area, and that's not terribly uncommon. Unless you're hiring straight from university, you're probably going to have a difficult time filling positions fairly soon.</comment>


Public Enemies: Social Media Is Fueling Gang Wars in Chicago - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/underwire/?p=226351

<comment><USER2> Fascinating and tragic article.

Paul Tough wrote a fantastic piece in NYT last year that really helps contextualize what's going on in Chicago, in my opinion [1].

It's also pretty sick how people continue to profit off of things that directly contribute to the immiseration of the urban poor. As stated in the article, Interscope are profiteering off of all of this misery. I respect Jimmy Iovine's sense of music and business, but how in the world does he sleep at night? Another example [2], and one by our own government [3].

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/19/magazine/obama- poverty.htm...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/19/magazine/obama- poverty.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0)

[2] [http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/09/08/le...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/09/08/left- with-nothing/)

[3] [http://www.esquire.com/features/rick-ross-drug-dealer- interv...](http://www.esquire.com/features/rick-ross-drug-dealer- interview-1013)</comment>


Building artificial wear into video games makes you scum - <AUTHOR> http://joncanady.com/2010/08/25/buying-used-video-games/

<comment><USER2> Obviously we as consumers should demand that video game manufacturers stick with their analogy better. Instead of working perfectly until first say, the game should gradually decay, even for the original owner. That way if I want to play a 10 year old game that I haven't maintained, I would have a far worse experience than I went and bought a new copy.</comment>


TED Day One: Mars Isn't a Good Backup Plan for Humanity - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2015/03/wired-ted/

<comment><USER2> > "For anyone to tell you Mars will be there to back up humanity is like the > captain of the Titanic telling you that the real party is happening later on > the life boats," Walkowicz said. "It is hubris to believe that > interplanetary colonization will be enough to save us from ourselves."

I cant buy this. Life boats are there for an emergency, and to continue with the Titanic example, these lifeboats helped a bunch of people and hindsight says we should have had a bunch more.</comment>


Google+ will burst the tech bubble - <AUTHOR>

We have seen the exact same scenario during the first tech bubble.  The tech darling of the time, Netscape, had it's head torn off by the 800lb gorilla (Microsoft) and that marked the beginning of the end of the DotCom bubble.<p>This time around the flagship startup, Facebook, now has a credible threat from Google.  The difference is Facebook isn't yet a publicly traded company.  And I have a funny feeling the artificially inflated valuation of Facebook is just as quickly deflating right now.  If Facebook's value starts declining before it goes public it could be trouble for just about every other startup that has not already gone public. <comment><USER2> Upvoted because this is a great debate!

I think the circumstances are different in this case. Many people I know don't like Facebook or the idea of Facebook anymore, so Google may have a hard time persuading people Social Networks are still the new-new thing. In the case of Netscape, browser use was growing like crazy and still is 17 years later.

In a way Netscape helped tear it's own head off. There was the Netscape 6 nail in the coffin. The team rewrote the entire product from scratch. It's been oft quoted as an example of why not to do a rewrite. Facebook's engineering team appears to be strong on the surface.

There is no network effect with browsers and social networks have the strongest network effect of them all. So Google has to overcome that too.

Google does use second-mover advantage to great effect though, as MS has. Imitating is fun when you're a monopoly with a great engineering team. Companies they've taken ideas from:

Symbian

Nokia

Hotmail

Apple's App Store

iOS

MapQuest

Yahoo Finance

Altavista and all other search engines.

GoTo.com (first PPC ads)

</comment><comment><USER3> IMO Facebook is not in any great danger from Google plus. Smaller start ups maybe, but Facebook has the not-tech-savvy market by the balls and google plus certainly isn't going to take them away. My brother, sister and father all use Facebook, none will be switching to google plus unless all their friends do, their friends won't switch unless their friends do... the Myspace/Facebook comparison doesn't work either, a large portion of Facebook users now didn't ever use Myspace, it's not as if they've moved _away_. Myspace was popular in the era where social networking was for teens and " _nerds_ ", Facebook rose to popularity when social networking was for everyone, google plus can't just waltz in and take all those users. Google plus is just another tech industry circle jerk, it'll be a long time before it ever comes close to harming Facebook (if it does). How many people are using google plus and _not_ Facebook? That's what matters most. Everyone I know who uses google plus (which is a small group) is still using Facebook.

<comment><USER4> It's not like you have to choose Facebook xor Google+. You can use both.

For me, it's looking like I'll use Facebook to keep up with old schoolmates and relatives, and I'll use Google+ for keeping up with other circles (e.g. photographers and tech reporters).

TV didn't kill radio.

<comment><USER5> [Quote]TV didn't kill radio[\quote]

Nope, but the internet is. (i work in radio, BTW)

Can't happen soon enough, if you ask me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> FB has but to do one thing to remain king of the heap and that is to maintain focus. The more junk they add to the site, the more ads, games, stupid apps (find out who's stalking you!) the uglier and more MySpace-like it becomes. FB succeeded in large part because it refused to be everything to everyone and become uglier. That said, the experience I get viewing my FB feed is aesthetically less pleasing as the months go on.

G+ OTOH is the new, shiny, clean kid on the block and my feeds are still pristine.

If FB continues on the path they are on the influential thought leaders who hate clutter will completely leave for G+ and that will be the beginning of the end of FB.

Would G clutter up G+ with junk? Not likely. They LOVE all that more detailed info you're voluntarily giving them that they can then serve up tailored (revenue-generating) ads on your Gmail, searches, partner sites, etc.

</comment><comment><USER7> Netscape's death throes began in 1998. The 90s tech bubble finally collapsed in early 2000.

Assuming this year marks the beginning of Facebook's death throes and extrapolating from recent history: Until 2013, let the (tech startup) good times roll!

</comment><comment><USER8> Since gPlus has been integrated into the entire google experience, from gmail to blogspot, I think they have a chance against fb, but it will take a while.

Second, they have to make gPlus extremely easy to use to ensure that people will switch and stay with one product.

Third, gPlus has better video chat (multiple at a time I believe) than fb, so they have to encourage this as often as possible to keep users engaged and returning.

</comment><comment><USER9> I beg all of you to read this article by Douglas Rushkoff, it predicts the demise of facebook cleanly. My opinion, time is up for facebook.

[http://edition.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/01/07/rushkoff.facebook....](http://edition.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/01/07/rushkoff.facebook.myspace/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Arguably this drives up the values of everyone who is otherwise at Facebook's mercy though. Zynga on Google+ and Facebook is less subject to Zuckerberg "cutting off their air supply" - to repurpose a phrase from the 90s bubble.

</comment><comment><USER11> btw, Facebook Like button is way more popular than Google +1 button.

On my website, for every 1000 Facebook like button clicked, there is only one Google +1 button clicked.

proof: <http://likehub.com/></comment>


Google Codejam contestants advancing to round 2 by country - <AUTHOR> http://pastebin.com/zHPtKy6c

<comment><AUTHOR> My friend made this table of contestants advancing to round 2 of Codejam by country.

I found the Indian proportion interesting. Even with those cheaters less than 3% advanced.</comment>


HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday - <AUTHOR> https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2018/01/homepod-arrives-february-9-available-to-order-this-friday/ <comment><USER3> I already have and am satisfied with Alexa, but HomePod interests me because of Apple's general stance towards privacy. Has there been extensive discussion on how Apple plans to differentiate Siri's data usage/sharing vs Google and Amazon?

But honestly, the main obstacle for me is Apple's lack of 3rd-party integration. For example, it appears that Siri can't be used to access Spotify. With Alexa, I can scope music requests with "Alexa, play some jazz _from Spotify_ (as opposed to Amazon Music)". I can even configure Alexa to use Spotify _by default_ \-- e.g. prioritized over Amazon's own offerings.

I've a pretty large iTunes library from back in the day but I've completely stopped buying from iTunes (and haven't bothered to check out Music) because of lack of interoperability.

<comment><USER4> Wouldn't the "sirikit" availability start to solve the problem of 3rd party integration?

<comment><USER5> SiriKit has specifically scoped "intent domains" for acceptable usage and music controls aren't one.

[https://developer.apple.com/documentation/sirikit#2863953](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/sirikit#2863953)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I feel exited about home assistants in the same way I am excited about home automation: the premise seems useful in a general way, but I struggle to think of use cases that have a meaningful effect on my lifestyle. Also - I can't shake the privacy concerns.

<comment><USER7> Putting aside the privacy concerns, the home automation + home assistant combo is actually pretty useful. It definitely beats fumbling through apps to do smart home stuff.

Since getting an Echo, I notice my wife constantly changing the temperature on the Nest because, well, it's so easy to bark out a command when you don't want to get up or don't have your phone handy.

Prior to getting an echo, I only used my Wemo switches for scheduling lights to come on and off when we were away. I use voice commands for turning groups on and off all the time now. Since it's dark when I take out the dogs in the a.m., I use a "good morning" routine that turns on my downstairs lights and tells me the outside temperature so I know which coat to wear. I'm surprised at how dependent I'm becoming on Alexa for otherwise mundane stuff.

Having said all of that, I guess I made the choice to value convenience/functionality over privacy. I see the Amazon/Google assistants as "Big Brother with benefits".

<comment><USER8> I get the temperature from my Apple Watch 90% of the time but I have been using Alexa more and more now that I have Echo/Dot's everywhere because I don't put my watch on until the end of my morning routine. I'm growing quite fond of saying "Alexa, Good Morning" and my lights coming on, it giving me the temperature, and it playing the 2-3 "news brief"'s I've picked. I'm VERY close to removing a few daily short podcasts from my podcasting app (Overcast) because I just listen to them on Alexa now.

<comment><USER7> I find the Routines feature can be quite useful, especially if they are performing multiple tasks. I just added "start work" and "quitting time" to toggle my office lights. I wanted to use "work time" in place of "start work" but that sounded too much like "what time" to Alexa. Routines are also useful for controlling my TV and media devices with my Harmony Hubs (although don't get me started on how you have to use a third party service to control each additional Harmony Hub you have).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Things I want from HomePod:

1) To work with only the tracks I have downloaded in my iTunes library. Currently I have to use a 3rd party music player because the stock music player won't respect my wishes in this regard.

2) To be able to turn Siri off

3) To sync with an existing audio system, so that I can play music through my home audio system in my living room, and HomePods in my bedroom and bathroom

4) To avoid the weird situation where latency causes music to not sound synced, so that if I'm listening in one room, I'm not hearing music from the other room with a half-second delay.

I am hopeful on all counts except for the first one. Apple seems dead set on forcing their idea of music enjoyment onto me. Then again, perhaps the behavior forcing me onto a third party player is/was just a bug.

<comment><USER10> Actually I'm hoping what HomePod can do: when I come home listening to Spotify/Audible/podcast on my earphone+iPhone, HomePad auto turn on when I walk into house, the song/audiobook/podcast I'm halfway listening to on my iPhone will automatically transfer to HomePod to continue playing.

<comment><USER9> When Bluetooth is in a good mood, it'll do that. I'll have music going on my Bluetooth headset, then my home receiver will come into range and the sound will jump over. Requires my receiver to be set to the Bluetooth channel, so if it's been on the TV channel I won't hear the music.

Also sometimes it just doesn't want to switch and I'll have to do it manually.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> >Coming this year in a free software update, users will be able to play music throughout the house with multi-room audio.

Interesting that a key feature that the competition already has won't be shipping at launch. I wonder if this is related to the Homepod's previous delays.

<comment><USER11> You can already AirPlay to multiple devices (including homebrew kodi boxes) from iTunes in MacOS. AirPlay 2 just brings this to iOS.

<comment><USER12> The changes in AirPlay 2 will be a little more than that. To make it work more like Sonos, it requires that the receiving device buffer a lot more of the audio to make it resilient from wi-fi instability, and it probably requires some changes to that devices are synced up at all times. And I sure hope they're doing something with latency.

As I understand it, Sonos can do some of these things because their audio is transmitted over a proprietary wireless connection, so it's not competing with Internet traffic. I use AirPlay today over ordinary home wi-fi, and it's awfully unreliable — stutters all the time, sometimes doesn't play, long pause before audio will start, etc. — and larger buffers would certainly help here.

<comment><USER11> My AirPlay experience is a lot better. From my Mac I can play music simultaneously in my living room and kitchen very reliably. From my phone I can play to either speaker, however the kitchen unit (Airstream S200) stutters when I move the phone into a known poor signal area at the back of the kitchen.

There's about a 2-3 second buffer with current AirPlay. It warns you of this when use use the a GarageBand app.

Try enabling IGMP snooping on your router and see if that helps.

<comment><USER12> Thanks for the IGMP tip! Turns out Mikrotik's RouterOS got this feature a month ago, and I've turned it on now. So far so good.

<comment><USER11> Good luck!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> What's innovative about this? I feel like I'm reading an Amazon Alexa or Google Home ad.

<comment><USER14> I'm interested in one as a new speaker. I don't expect I'll enable Siri. I want to use it as an AirPlay target.

I was previously considering a Sonos, but the Airplay2 support will be baked into the OS so I don't need to use a clunky 3rd party app.

<comment><USER15> Although presumably with Airplay 2 you would still need your phone to play the music from, where with Sonos, once it was playing, you wouldn't need your phone as the speakers themselves would have the music. Though that might not be useful for your use-case.

<comment><USER16> We don't know for certain yet, but the AppleTV will opt to play music from iCloud as opposed to streaming from the AirPlay device if possible. You'd hope this functionality has been extended to the HomePod.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Amazon already has a better sounding Echo and so does Google so I am not seeing a value prop from HomePod. This round has been clearly won by Amazon with Google inching very close and based on reviews, Google assistant seems way better than other assistants in general. Since Siri uses Google search now, it may only be slightly better than Alexa.

Too late and too little by Apple, they missed this boat. Cortana seems pretty fun on the surface but is nowhere to be seen in this AI race. Guess Microsoft got their strategy wrong yet again.

<comment><USER18> _Amazon already has a better sounding Echo and so does Google so I am not seeing a value prop from HomePod._

Google and Amazon could project a 3D hologram of the band as the song plays, and I still wouldn't let one of those things in my house. From my POV, it boils down to two camps: "I'll trade some privacy (for arbitrary and ever- changing values of "privacy") for better sound" vs. "I'll listen to a tinny 1" speaker as long as it isn't spying on me". You sound like you're in the former, myself in the latter.

Besides, you don't know if the competition sounds better or not, at least not until February 9th.

 _Too late and too little by Apple, they missed this boat._

In an age where "no wireless, less space than a nomad, lame" is a meme, I'm surprised you'd let that one slip. OTOH, even someone like myself whose only debate is "buy two, or try just the one out first?" has to allow that there's yet no guarantee that this isn't iPod Hi-Fi 2.0.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I have a Sonos Player 1 in my room, and I play Spotify on it (Spotify can dectects it). The setup is a headache but the music quality is quite good but it keeps disconnecting even though I have really Wifi connection (I wish the device supports Bluetooth as an alternative). I still recommend it to my friends but I always warn them about the unstable connection.

> HomePod can also be used as a speakerphone with iPhone for crisp and clear > audio quality.

I hope this means I can play anything from my iPhone like car because that's a dealbreaker if I can't Spotify or podcasts.

That being said, I hope there is a way to test HomePod live at Apple store. I don't want to spend a couple hundred dollars for something turns out to be bad. My Sonos was a gift from my company so I didn't have to worry about it (fwiw... not realky important, but I work for a music company, my boss owns two, and he said it was :) so I guess I should believe him right?)

</comment><comment><USER20> How is the podcast functionality? My biggest frustration with smart speakers is the poor support for pausing and resuming podcasts.

</comment><comment><USER8> My 2 big things with home automation devices (and we can argue if this is really one of those) is:

1) Full voice coverage (I shouldn't have to redirect my voice or scream for it to hear me in any room).

2) Enough devices that talk to it so that it is habit-forming to use it for lights/tv/etc

I can see the HomePod doing 2 as that's more about what you have aside from the HomePod but I'm worried about #1 due to the price tag.

If I have a 3 bedroom house and a large enough Kitchen/Living Room we are talking about 5 devices. For HomePod that is $1,750. For ALL Echo's it's $500. If you were smart and did a mix of say 2 Echo's and the rest Dot's: $320 (At the $40/dot price point, I picked mine up at $30/ea). That is a HUGE price difference. The Dot's were so cheap that I stuck a few in bathrooms as well for even better coverage and it's awesome.

</comment><comment><USER8> I was (and still am) looking forward to HomePod but at $350 I just can't really afford it. I have a series 1 echo, 2 dots Smartthings Hub, 3 bulbs, 2 power outlets, and 1 wall switch. In total I paid somewhere in the range of $400 TOTAL for all of that. HomeKit approved devices have been, on average, more expensive (and yes I understand why) than their Smartthings counterparts. I love being able to control the majority of lights I need to switch on/off with just my voice and having Alexa in every room makes life easier for setting alarms/reminders/music/lights/etc.

I'm not saying I will never buy a HomePod but for me: control > sound quality. And when price IS an issue you can't beat the Amazon ecosystem.

PS: Also writing skills and the like for Alexa is pretty easy from my experience

</comment><comment><USER21> Will be interesting to see a feature comparison with all of the other existing voice-controlled speakers out there. Seems like a couple of recent blogs posts linked on HN were saying that Apple was starting already behind the competition in this space.

<comment><USER22> Apple is rarely first to market for anything. They didn't release the first mp3 player, they released the _best_ one. They didn't come out with the first smart phone, first tablet, or first smart watch, either. They rarely shine in feature-to-feature comparisons, either. The iPhone did _less_ than the blackberries it destroyed. It just did the important things better.

It will be interesting to see how the Homepod plays out. If it's successful, it almost certainly won't be because it out-features the competition. And they almost certainly haven't lost because they weren't first to market.

<comment><USER23> I agree with everything you said about Apple's MO.

But this thing is expensive. Siri almost seems grafted on (they wouldn't even let people try it at the announcement) to a speaker that was already in development.

I wonder if this will be the iPod HiFi 2.0. Sounds great, too expensive, no one cares.

I'm curious about it but have no real interest in it as a speaker or assistant.

Reviews should prove interesting.

<comment><USER7> >> But this thing is expensive.

I don't necessarily agree. I was shopping around for multi-room audio solutions, namely Sonos. I don't think the Homepod price is that out of whack compared to Sonos or Google Home Max. And this is coming from someone who generally finds Apple products way overpriced.

<comment><USER23> That may be. I guess it's within reason for the multi-room solutions. But

1) How big is that market?

and

2) It doesn't do multi-room at launch

This all just feels odd to me. Like it slipped through a hole in Apple's process.

<comment><USER7> 1) Don't know. But not all of Apple's other markets are as huge as iPhone/iPad/Mac Laptops (i.e., Apple TV, Mac Pro).

2) In fairness, Amazon Echo did not do multi-room at launch either. I tend to think Apple fans won't have a problem waiting for that feature update. I'm not an Apple fan myself any more, but in general, when they do a feature, they do it right.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> HomePod costs $349. I know Apple products are pricy but 3.5x is insane. I have a (Google) Home mini and its fun - it isn't really that useful but ok for $30-50. While history has proof that Apple is able to extract higher prices, I feel this product will fail at this price point.

<comment><USER25> You really can't compare a HomePod and a Google Home Mini. As an owner of the latter I know that the sound quality is absolute crap - I never play music through it. Meanwhile, that's the whole reason to get a HomePod. It's better compared to expensive Sonos speaker setups.

<comment><USER24> I was comparing to Echo $99 or Google Home $129. Home mini's speaker is pretty awesome !

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Is this supposed to compete more with Sonos, or with Google Home / Alexa? I can't tell.

I have a Sonos setup for my home and I absolutely love it. The sound quality is great, and the Play:1 speakers are less than half the price of the HomePod.

</comment><comment><USER27> Does anyone have the 411 on the API to this thing? How will apps be developed?

<comment><USER28> By the chosen people, whom have had developmental access bestowed upon them by the grace of Apple.

Seriously though; there is little to no chance that this will not be another locked down device with which Apple will try to monetize your home to the fullest possible extent.

<comment><USER29> Or: people who paid Apple's $99 developer fee? Hardly a group of "chosen people". This would make sense if you were talking about something like CarPlay, but there's no discrimination here other than the one I mentioned.

<comment><USER28> Try launching a new browser on the iStore. You're free to compete, as long as you don't compete against Apple.

Microsoft was fined 561 million Euros for doing the same.

<comment><USER29> Literally on the homepage right now: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16213280](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16213280)

<comment><USER25> You have to use the Safari rendering engine, though - Apple will not allow any others in the App Store.

I don't think that's as big of an issue as others do, but it is still a restriction.

<comment><USER29> Which is the same one that Apple itself uses. This was an issue a couple years ago when Apple kept the fast Nitro rendering engine for itself, but now that they've provided it to everyone else I wouldn't call it anticompetitive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Too late to the game IMHO. A three year lead has let Alexa integrate itself into hundreds of products. And if you want a better speaker just buy the Sonos version.

<comment><USER31> Bloomberg - <USER2>

"The big competitors in the mobile-phone industry such as Nokia Oyj and Motorola Inc. won't be whispering nervously into their clamshells over a new threat to their business….The iPhone is nothing more than a luxury bauble that will appeal to a few gadget freaks. In terms of its impact on the industry, the iPhone is less relevant."

Not that this speaker looks like a huge game changer, but coming out of the gate late is something Apple has proven adept at.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> How can you release a music player when your music ecosystem is completely broken? iTunes is so bad I have to pay for an app (Waltr) to put music on my phone.

And Apple music sounds like garbage. I don't need a high-quality speaker to stream garbage.

<comment><USER33> If you're not satisfied with 256kbps AAC then may I suggest [https://www.ponomusic.com/](https://www.ponomusic.com/) ?

<comment><USER32> I honestly cant tell what Pono does from their website?</comment></comment></comment>


Deconstructing Facebook Paper's photo panner - <AUTHOR> http://subjc.com/facebook-paper-photo-panner/

<comment><USER2> Of course this feature is far from new / original. This app featured this effect years ago [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/photoloupe/id409722314?mt=8](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/photoloupe/id409722314?mt=8)

</comment><comment><USER3> Nice post! Another similar control [http://github.com/chroman/CRMotionView](http://github.com/chroman/CRMotionView)

<comment><USER4> Also, [https://github.com/howaboutwe/HAWTiltedImageView](https://github.com/howaboutwe/HAWTiltedImageView)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> If anyone is interesting, I wrote a proof-of-concept Android implementation of this UI. Not as polished as this though. I didn't make any attempt to ensure the scrolling time was consistent for different image sizes, and left out the scrollbar. But this code would get you started.

[https://github.com/jasonostrander/TiltToView](https://github.com/jasonostrander/TiltToView)

</comment><comment><USER6> Sweet new blog, goes straight to the iOS reading list.

</comment><comment><USER7> I haven't used Paper yet, but is the photo panner different than the one used for large images on iOS 7's wallpaper/lock screen?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, it's functionally very similar

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Truly wonderful post. Curious though, could something like this be replicated with HTML5 and JS?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks very much! There's a great HTML5 clone of the same feature [https://github.com/tregoning/photoTilt](https://github.com/tregoning/photoTilt)

<comment><USER8> A thousand thanks to you good sir!</comment></comment></comment>


Is scarcity alone valuable? A social experiment. - <AUTHOR> http://danhulton.com/2014/02/is-scarcity-alone-valuable-a-social-experiment/

<comment><USER2> You should allow payment in dogecoins too. I purchased at 0.25 cent btw. Another suggestion is you might want to change the increment of payment to small number than 0.05cent. The value of the service increase directly with the number of people viewing the site. The initial users will want to get in because they see it can be big, so they don't mine spending a few cents, but you want as much new users as possible so the word can spread. Also, provide some mechanism that they can spread the word about their purchase.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I'm going by the whole "if your first release doesn't embarass you, you released too late" mantra. PayPal's easiest for me because I've done a bunch of IPN integrations already. I want to add BTC and DOGE as well. It's kind of a learning project for me to mess around with, as well as an interesting question.

<comment><USER2> Well good job so far. I like the concept.</comment></comment></comment>


Dogecoin prices rises +800% in two weeks - <AUTHOR> http://www.cryptocoincharts.info/v2/pair/doge/btc/coinedup/10-days

<comment><USER2> To the moon my HN friends!

Post your wallet addresses, I'll send you some dogecoins in the morning to get your collection started!

You can download a graphical client from [http://dogecoin.com/](http://dogecoin.com/)

<comment><USER3> D6NgzgWK6H8dCeyck3zcLAp4d75KVBXrkR

(I do wonder why you can afford to just give away coins. Many thanks, though.)

<comment><USER2> doge is love and love must be shared

6b72b94acdf96903cd7b9e7f332ceaf8b4eb647ca3327eab71a95810e7f783f7

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> And it's currently falling. Market cap has lost about 6 million since peak. A shame, but there were/are some absurd "price floors" at 180 and 183 satoshi that were causing other people to put buy orders in at artificially higher prices due to needing to be able to actually buy doge.

There has also been a huge influx of miners and difficulty has shot up drastically this week, indicating higher demand. So we have 2 forces driving prices up, but some of these miners seem to be stepping back since hash difficulty has increased drastically as well, and it is no longer as rewarding, though still the most profitable crytpocurrency to mine currently.

<comment><AUTHOR> It has already overtaken Namecoin in market capitalisation.

<comment><USER4> Yes, but it has fallen since peak. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of dogecoin and have a few hundred dollars worth. I'm just pointing out that value had a local peak overnight and is currently in flux after quite a long climb, then a drastic hockey stick over the past 2 days.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> D5Z4tinWdqG79tMDqTCmQ28Bha7s3mW4SP In few months we'll have a big party for DogeCoins :) Thanks in advance ! All the best!

</comment><comment><USER6> Much coinsze doge DRDzKWPgqdejoXVt9eVPHDisHtKf81aJYc

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Did we get flagged of the frontpage or what?

</comment><comment><USER7> to the moon shibes DNnHo6co2nuwVozodSCtsqaPzsi7RsYRpw</comment>


Antivirus For Apple Hits The Right Price: Free  - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2010/11/02/antivirus-for-apple-hits-the-right-price-free/ <comment><USER2> Can anyone comment on the prevalence of malware on OSX these days? I was under the impression that it was nil. What is this software for?</comment>


What do I have in common with a Super-Intelligent AI? - <AUTHOR> I'm self deprecating. <comment><AUTHOR> _chirp_</comment>


A Programmer's Plea to Laptop Makers - <AUTHOR> http://www.kevinwilliampang.com/post/A-Programmers-Plea-to-Laptop-Makers.aspx

<comment><USER2> I want an OMAP-based laptop that can run off batteries for 24+ hours on a single charge, that runs Linux, emacs and Django on a decent, 800+ line screen.

The way it is, the article is a series of complaints of a Visual Studio user who, appearently, can't rearange the windows in its own environment. Not everyone uses Visual Studio and most of those who use should be able to set up their environment comfortably.

I am fine with a widescreen laptop: I just use the rest of the screen for things other than source-code. For me, any landscape screen is less than perfect. I would much rather use a portrait monitor, but a laptop with a portrait display is less than practical.

I never used a square screen... Anyone willing to sell an NCD-16 1024x1024 X terminal?

<comment><USER3> I've been hungering for an OMAP laptop too, the TouchBook is quite clever and should be out soon: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=500365>

For the handheld / pocket form-factor there's <http://openpandora.org/>

<comment><USER2> The problem is the screen. 600x1024 is the bare minimum. I use an Acer Aspire One, which is a great netbook, very responsive, runs everything I throw at it at decent, if not breathtaking, speeds, but the screen is the weakest point. When on a desk, I always hook it up to a desktop monitor.

Unfortunately, the Intel GMA driver is buggy (<https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/302227>). Annoying but functional.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> He wants a 10K RPM HDD and a laptop that stays cool ... Those two seem mutually exclusive to me. It takes a lot of energy to spin platters that fast, and it all gets turned into heat in the end. MLC SSDs are pretty cheap these days - if you really do that much dev work on your laptop, invest a few hundred dollars in a good one.

<comment><USER5> >It takes a lot of energy to spin platters that fast, and it all gets turned into heat in the end.

Wrong. Just the wasted energy turns to heat. Wasted by means of mechanical/electric friction. The usefully used (to put it this way) get's transformed in kinetic energy (platter rotation)(most), other electrical energy (transformers) and more.

<comment><USER4> Almost all the energy a computer takes in (over 99%) is 'wasted' as heat.

Talk to anyone who has ever run a datacenter. The heat output of a machine is exactly equal to the amount of energy consumed. Maybe a watt or two leaves the room as electrical energy on a network cable, as sound energy, or as EM radiation.

Where else does the energy go?

Look at this as a freshmen year physics thermodynamics problem. Your system of interest is the computer case. It has 500 Watts coming in. It has 0.5 watts leaving as EM radiation, 0.5 watts leaving as sound (i.e., vibrations in the air), and 1 Watt leaving on wires connected to it. The other 498 Watts are necessarily heat.

<comment><USER5> Oh common. I objected to you saying that _all_ energy drawn gets transformed to heat. That's patently false, unless the system you're studying has either efficiency 0% or is indeed a heater of efficiency 100%. Anything in between contradicts what you said. In the specific case I've objected to is even easier to see the problem. The HDD platters spin. That's work done. Energy transformation from electric to kinetic. Whether its quantity is bigger or smaller than that that gets transformed to thermal energy is a matter of efficiency. Otherwise the kinetic one would be free and Perendev and Bedini would be inclined to post here.

<comment><USER6> I appreciate that you've taken the literal interpretation of the world "all", but if you're going to be pedantic (which isn't very helpful or interesting in any case) at least be correct, please.

Eventually all the kinetic energy in the spinning platters is converted to heat. It is converted continuously to heat by the process of friction between moving parts, and by the time the platters stop moving, all of it that was kinetic is now thermal.

<comment><USER5> I'm sorry if I seemed pedantic. It was not my intention. I took "all" literally because I thought that it was important in that context. The problem was pointed to be heat and I thought pointing out that heat is the result (and directly proportional with) the inefficiency of the design (friction mainly) and power drawn, would be useful. It thus seemed that increasing efficiency and/or reducing power requirements would be a nice way of solving that particular wish in the original article. Therefore I thought that assuming heat was unavoidable was not a good/correct idea and tried to argue that. The tone was already set to "let's make wishes". If you want to argue that all energy goes to heat in the end... irreversibly even, I think you move to a different level altogether.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Most code is in the first 80 characters, so having the abililty to see 300 > characters across usually just leads to a bunch of excessive whitespace.

Why isn't there a horizontal line-wrap as well as vertical? A text editor that, when stretched horizontally beyond 80 columns, creates actual "text columns" ala newspapers, and flows line 103 to the top of column 2 after line 102 hits the bottom of column 1. Wouldn't be that hard, would it?

<comment><USER8> Well, he said he was using Visual Studio. Everything is hard in Visual Studio.

In emacs, I could see two files next to each other with C-x 3. Or, I could see the same file in two columns by typing M-x follow-mode after C-x 3. (In fact, I use a 1920x1200 display for most of my coding, and I end up with 3 emacs windows next to each other. Very efficient. Wide-screen is _great_ for coding.)

<comment><USER9> For what it's worth, this is Hacker News. We're polite here and try to avoid snark whenever possible. We tend to offer explanations when we refute something rather than resorting to name calling. Observe:

<http://img.expatsoftware.com/blog/vs_split.gif>

That's a screenshot of Visual Studio with files lined up in columns. It's actually a really good development environment. You should give it a try one day.

<comment><USER10> I have. Of many bugs, the random irretrievable code deletion feature was my least favorite.

<comment><USER5> I've up voted you. Could someone explain the negatives? I had problems with both Microsoft and Borland IDEs coerced to multicolumn (which had to be multiwin, no other way) _on the same file_ too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I used a ThinkPad T40 last summer, and I was surprised at how much I grew to like it. But one thing drove me crazy: F1 was where esc should be: <http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/sc/20947059-2-200-DT4.gif>

Clearly, the keyboard layout was not designed by a vi user. Took me a few weeks before I was moving my hand far enough to hit esc and not F1.

<comment> old-gregg Don't you think it's actually better? Look how nicely Esc is separated from other keys. Just like it should be on a real desktop keyboard.

I stopped using Thinkpads after they started using worst LCD panels in the industry, but i will never, never forget their gorgeous full-size keyboards. The picture you've posted brought a tear to my eye...

And yes, I'm a vim user.

Speaking of laptops: he correctly mentioned unfortunate proliferation of glossy LCDs with limited vertical real estate, but there is more: _all_ laptop LCDs now are 6-bit, i.e. 262k colors only.

<comment><USER11> I see no reason to separate esc from the other keys.

"Better" or "worse" doesn't really apply. What matters is it's different from every other keyboard I've used. To me, esc is the key above the tilde. You wouldn't, for example, put the key for 'g' someplace else. My guess is the person who designed the keyboard figured no one would care if esc moved, because hey, who actually needs to use esc often?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This is one reason why learning either vi or emacs key mappings and then using those in your IDE of choice is a vital skill. With these under your belt, your hands should just about never have to leave the home row on the keyboard and you can forget about where the freakin Home key is.

</comment><comment><USER9> I don't think the laptop manufacturers really understand how important that Home block is to developers. It effectively rules out all but two manufacturers from consideration. The _only_ choice of development machine is a Thinkpad or a Dell (and only certain models from each line). All other brands have eliminated themselves by unrolling that key block.

The Widescreen point also hit home, but since there are only two laptop options anymore, and both of those offer models with a sanely proportioned 15.4" display, it's not really an issue anymore.

<comment><USER13> The home block is a little less important to me as an Emacs user, but I find it very important in applications that don't have Emacs keybindings. I really don't understand why most laptops don't use a layout similar to my Thinkpad. Even the very compact Thinkpad X-series gets this right.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The only point I disagreed with was the weight vs. heat one. I travel a lot (think hitching across Africa, not flying to NYC on business), and the laptop accounts for most of the weight in my pack. I very rarely use it on my lap for any extended length of time, but there are times where I carry it on my back for hours. 4 extra pounds would be a dealbreaker.

</comment><comment><USER14> No sane person would use a fullscreen laptop, unless perhaps their ONLY task was programming. Even then, it makes more sense to me to have my vim window take up half the screen and something else relevant, say a browser, take up the other half. Fullscreen is dead, please don't try to bring it back.

<comment><USER15> Vertical halves or horizontal halves? Personally, I use maximized vim and browser windows. Alt + tabbing between vim and the browser is trivial, but I need the extra screen space for vim because I often need to split vim between several files. I'm sure I don't need to make a case for how alt + tabbing between different vim windows quickly gets old.

<comment><USER14> In that case, if you have a widescreen you can have two :vsplit going; on fullscreen there probably won't be enough columns for that. FWIW, my personal preference is having vim full-screen on one of my widescreen monitors which is rotated into portrait view. I routinely have four or more :sp windows going. Once again, far better utilization than with fullscreen.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > But for the typical Visual Studio developer, this usually isn't the case.

You VS people sicken me. Speak for theeself, heathen! _{C-x 3 | Mod-Shift- Enter}_</comment>


Unstructured Thoughts on Making Websites - <AUTHOR> http://emiller.info/making-websites.html

<comment><USER2> Markus Frind might be the Michael Jordan of entrepreneurship: the example of a one-man ad-supported multimillionaire has led a lot of people to follow a difficult path, as Jordan's example led millions of kids to make playing pro basketball the focus of their life. It gets a lot easier when you have a cofounder and you do something that people want to pay you for, so keep that in mind when you're making your plans.

</comment><comment><USER3> Sounds like the author followed the YC mantra, and managed to make a couple of things which people liked. Then, he couldn't figure out how to market it. I think this is where (something like) YC could have given him a huge boost, with that initial announcement on TechCrunch. Almost sounds like a textbook example of why a marketing-oriented cofounder would have been useful.

</comment><comment><USER4> reminds me a bit of Cringley's: Commandos, Infantry, and Police.

<http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000025.html>

<comment><USER5> I had not seen that before. It really resonated with me. My current situation is perfect for police. But that's not where my calling is. I want to be a commando.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Seriously unstructured. Initially when I was reading the article, it seemed to be making sense but later it goes completely haywire.

Overall this is what feeling I get after reading the article: maybe Evan has got bored of all the things he did and wants to do something exiciting now. What exciting? He doesn't know.

</comment><comment><USER7> When change got stuck in office coke machine, upon handing over the keys Michael Dell said he learned the most important thing to building a successful business: how to delegate.</comment>


NLNet grant approved to fund development of a libre RISC-V and 3D GPU chip - <AUTHOR> https://www.crowdsupply.com/libre-risc-v/m-class/updates/first-nlnet-grant-approved-to-fund-development <comment><AUTHOR> Project page on NLNet site: [https://nlnet.nl/project/Libre- RISCV/](https://nlnet.nl/project/Libre-RISCV/)

<comment><USER2> The more interesting page to me is: [http://libre- riscv.org/3d_gpu/](http://libre-riscv.org/3d_gpu/)

The other pages are full of ideology and some rather gross (market) fallacies. It all seems designed to feed into governmental circles and keep the subsidies coming (ok with that). On this page they even mention price competition, great! :)</comment></comment>


Show HN: Practice makes perfect. An alternative way to learn Swift - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/domenicosolazzo/practice-swift

<comment><USER2> Hi, this looks great, and i've just been wanting to learn swift, but it's a bit overwhelming! Is there a recommended path towards working through the repo?

also i wanted to load a few of the games in the Games folder, but there aren't any ".xcodeproj" files, is there something else I should be doing? Thanks!

<comment><AUTHOR> I will take a look to the .xcodeproj and write more about the path that I follow while writing these projects :)</comment></comment>


CIA: We can neither confirm nor deny that this is our first tweet. - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/CIA

<comment><USER2> I see they are only following other government organizations. I think it would be hilarious if they chose a handful of people in the US population to follow, just to freak those people out.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm trying to imagine the qualities the CIA looks for in a Social Media Manager.</comment>


New Scheme-Based GPU Programming Language - <AUTHOR> http://devopsangle.com/2013/07/09/new-scheme-based-gpu-programming-language-set-to-turn-chips-into-supercomputers/

<comment><USER2> I'm sorry, stuff like this just annoys me: "Lisp is the ultimate example of programmers bending towards making things easiest for compilers."

No. It makes it easier for parsers. Like that macro you want to write. If you think the hardest part of a compiler is the parser, boy you're in for a shock.

<comment><USER3> Not to mention GPUs have no stack, no recursion.

<comment><USER4> You can compile away those issues with a sufficiently smart compiler!

[https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2364563](https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2364563)

(Caveat: I'm the author of that paper)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This would be very useful; I've written some OpenCL code (called from Python, but I coded the Kernel and set up the buffers in C myself) and it's full of pitfalls; much harder than just "here's an array, here's a procedure. run it in parallel for me."

I beleive there are already ways to do this (IIRC, F#'s original demo showed off trivially parallelisible functions), but a simple interface (i.e. something that looks like a high level language with a REPL etc) is key. As someone who's generally excited about anything that makes you write Scheme, or anything that integrates with Python, I'll be keeping an eye on Harlan!

<comment><USER6> The reason it's harder is because it deals with device specifics as well as type of memory and mapping, queues, workgroup size.. etc.. This framework might be cute but all it really is doing is what compiler vectorizes have done for ages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5970975](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5970975)

I'm very excited about this. I think Functional Programming is good at expressing parallelizable concepts (FP is inherently parallelizable since it avoids shared state) and always wondered why I had to C my way through parallelization.

</comment><comment><USER8> The project in question: [https://github.com/eholk/harlan](https://github.com/eholk/harlan)

</comment><comment><USER9> Very clever design decisions. The "high level" code should be written in a smallest and cleanest language possible, and then compiled, via C, into all that mess they called OpenCL.

<comment><USER6> Hah. OpenCL is no mess. It has a very specific spec for achieving performance. A big part of it is the data transfer from host to device and mapping or read/writing.

These high level abstractions aren't decisive on any of that and will cause pain and angst when you are really pressed for performance. C is the best for OpenCL if you want real performance.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Ironically the screenshot shows Python code.</comment>


Disrupt Tech Recruiting II – So You Want Ari Gold? - <AUTHOR> http://www.javacodegeeks.com/2012/09/disrupt-tech-recruiting-ii-so-you-want.html

<comment><USER2> great follow up to first discussion: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4555165></comment>


Elon Musk still thinks a Mars colony will save us from a future dark age - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/11/17106910/elon-musk-ai-threat-mars-moon-colonization-nukes-sxsw-2018 <comment><USER2> I'm one that thinks that a future dark age is coming. If we look at Purto Rico we can see how fast the human infrastructures can fail and how long it takes for them to come back online. If it wasn't for the aid that the mainland US has available, it's possible to say that it would be decades before they can recover.

We are becoming less able to understand how our systems work and without that knowledge, it's extremely hard to the get systems back on.

Given the possibility of our systems failing in mass and our need to encrypt all our knowledge the possibility of a dark age is very possible.

But why a Mars Colony, I think preparation for a dark age here on Earth and a moon colony would be a better option.</comment>


GrooveHQ's 'Free Forever' Plan – What You Should Know - <AUTHOR> http://haydenjames.io/groovehqs-free-forever-plan-what-you-should-know/ <comment><USER2> Wow, if this is true, then its awful. As of right now the offer of free forever is still up on the website.

> In software dev, sometimes a test without writing weeks and months of code > is worth it. We've had this test going for 3 months and haven't had anyone > complain.

If the blog post is accurate, this is a really telling statement as to the ethics of the company. It's one thing to A/B test your new logo or colour of your "Sign Up" button. Its another thing to fraudulently offer a service to people.

Or put another way, the moment you offer free for life, it had better be because you mean it, not because you are trying to trap people into using your service.</comment>


Ask HN: Freelancing, where, how and should I? - <AUTHOR>

I've detailed my life situation here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5378269 and freelancing as a (temporary) solution has been mentioned several times.
I have no experience with that whatsoever (nor working as a programmer), but I know I can write code and I'm ready to learn anything that would help me making some money out of it. I'd say my skills go like this: Python > Scraping > HTML5/CSS > JavaScript > Django/Flask > SQL > PHP > Templates of sorts (Wordpress e.g.) > Writing > Linux administration >> Graphic Design
It would be really great if someone with experience in freelancing could point me in the right direction or answer some questions I have.
What freelancing websites and marketplaces are thrustworthy and well-frequented? Just googling led me to sites like freelancer.com, seated in Singapore and with quite a lot of shady offers. Although I wouldn't decline writing bots or private data scrapers as long as there is no world domination involved.
How can I compete with Indian and Chinese people working for $5 per hour? Such sites seem to be flooded with cheap offers. But they probably do their work just as good as I would and without a portfolio, references or a diversified skillset I can't offer anything they can't.
Are popular freelancing offers US oriented or is it possible to work as an European without a stack of complicated paperwork, regulations and rules to start?
Is choosing a very specific skill and building upon it the best way to get consistent jobs? Should I build some sample outputs/templates/guis for problems I feel the most comfortable solving and put them on some static page/heroku/similar?
How do I know a project is right for me and I'm able to solve it to the best of my knowledge? <comment><USER2> I have hired freelancers from US & India for my project via elance,freelancer - Few suggestions/comments -

* Even if the freelancer doesn't have any previous reviews on the site,I'll look for his oss contributions or 'github' projects or contributions to stackoverflow or other forums.

* I don't want to hire 5$ per hr programmer , simply because of their low rate. I prefer good and reliable person even though cost will be little higher.

* Quality of work is important, Though I'm an Indian,I have to admit the fact that US freelancer did great job compared to Indian freelancer.

* If you want to stick to python please don't put Windows admin on your skills page.It will scare people like me.Please concentrate on specific set of 'related'-skills (Python,Web Scraping,jQuery / Prototype,HTML5,CSS).

Best of Luck!

ps: For your first customer begin with 15$-20$ per hr. Once you get reviews,slowly increase the rate :)

</comment><comment><USER3> Just try this: come to Tajikistan and I'll chop off your finger. I promise, it will change the way you feel about the most capable tool you have - YOUR BODY!

or... Post an ad in most popular (non-geek and geek) local newspapers/social groups/newsletters something like...

Pay me to learn quickly and properly (in person): 1\. Choosing your best laptop/mobile; 2\. Installing/Removing and using ANY program; 3\. "0" to power-user of MS-Office and Internet; 4\. Special: Find and download ANYTHING that the web has; 5\. Special: Web development and e-commerce from scratch to a working online store.

Freelancing isn't just about design/code (I'm a 10+ yr.exp. freelance translator, faaaar from best ones :)))

You'll find good people in need of such skills and YOU need to meet NEW people! How can they know about your soul, voice and smell? (forking your repos?). Be NICE and friendly (not confident!), keep doing mistakes! And "surprise", girls want to learn too! Basta! :))

</comment><comment><USER4> Personally I started on Elance and while there are people charging ridiculous low amounts I just priced what I felt I could do it for at a fair rate that was still competitive but enough for me to find it still worthwhile. Sure I did not get a lot of jobs, but I did get a few and those were enough to get onto the ladder.

From those jobs I built up a network of clients which have slowly expanded due to things like word of mouth and recommendations.

I got my first few jobs with no portfolio(heck I still don't have a public one) or degree.

My advice to you would be just dive in, price what will make it worth doing to you and then once you have some experience in the field and network of clients you can raise your prices.

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm slightly younger than you, but I'm emerging from the same situation and I'd like to talk to you. My email is on my profile. Unlike you, I didn't go to college, so that made things worse. I feel I've wasted the last 3-4 years, but I'm trying to turn things around. I'm convinced that my stagnation happened due to not being sure if I wanted to be a designer or a developer, and if I wanted to get a real job or start my own business.

Anyway, I'm a designer with some knowledge of web development. I'm not a great developer, but I'm trying to become a better developer, and in the process, a better designer. Let's share the ride.

<comment><AUTHOR> I didn't go to college either, I just had the chance to and didn't use it. With a degree everything would have been easier.

I'll write you soon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've been freelancing since 17, and most of my work has come from word of mouth. Tell your family and friends that your looking for work and have faith in your abilities. I never spent time on going for the low quality jobs on elance or similar because I learned early on that you shouldn't be trying to compete based on price. Charge high prices and you will get more respect and quality gigs.

</comment><comment><USER7> 1\. Start on a small project and work your way up

2\. Try to work for someone you know, so you can make your beginner mistakes

3\. You can't compete with $5 and hour, but anyone hiring you is going to be paying for the fact that they can see you face-to-face (i.e. you're selling the service and hand holding as much as the code)

4\. Once you feel comfortable the branch out

</comment><comment><USER8> I started out on rentacoder.com (now vworker.com) - I found that I could look for local work and I didn't have to be the cheapest. The first few jobs I worked on were very low value, but it helped build my rating up. All in all I probably only earned a couple thousand dollars while at uni but for me back then that was a lot of money.

<comment><USER8> Just looked it up, now vworker.com is freelancer.com...

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I started out on Elance many years ago and to be honest it's pretty tough to make a decent living off.

If I were you I'd try getting out and about locally and meet people face to face. Lots of developers have too much work that they'd be happy to load off onto someone else who's competent. Try looking for local developer meetups or user groups.

You say you're based in Europe but you don't mention where, some places are better than others for finding work. Spain is pretty bad for example from what I hear whereas the UK is pretty good. Also in a particular country the number of jobs and quality will vary from city to city.

You could do worse than go to one of the places where there is a lot of development work, getting a courier job or _anything_ and meet people until you get the work you want.

</comment><comment><USER10> Many people wouldn't want to hire a distant foreigner to do their coding. Many wouldn't know how to anyway. What you will provide is face-to-face assurance, fast response time, speak their language and most important of all _have an ongoing relationship with them._

By relationship, I'm not suggesting you make love to them and have their babies. Its not that kind of relationship. I'm suggesting that you support the project long after its finished. That's what most of your clients will want, so be prepared for that. Good luck.</comment>


Is China establishing cyber sovereignty in the United States? - <AUTHOR> https://en.greatfire.org/blog/2017/may/china-establishing-cyber-sovereignty-united-states <comment><USER2> I would say that in all fairness the amount of worldwide control the Chinese government has on the Internet pales in comparison to the reach of the US government, even though both have very different approaches to cyber sovereignty. I'm not condoning the actions described by the author, of course, just pointing out that the alarmist discourse may be misplaced.</comment>


Where to buy a dual-CPU linux workstation for HPC? (ideally in Canada) - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> You're probably looking at a Supermicro system if you DIY. Otherwise you could try the business line workstations from the normal OEMS.

[http://www.supermicro.com/products/nfo/superworkstation.cfm](http://www.supermicro.com/products/nfo/superworkstation.cfm)

Warning though -- some of those supermicro systems are very loud, and rival similar 4U rackmount systems. In fact, most of them have rack mount conversion kits available to be loaded into a server room.

</comment><comment><USER3> You could buy the parts and build it yourself. You could find somebody local to assemble you one. You could order one from Dell or HP or Lenovo -- at least Dell seems to have a reasonable markup over parts cost, I haven't looked at HP or Lenovo.</comment>


National Security Letters are now constitutional, judge rules - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/04/in-a-reversal-judge-now-says-national-security-letters-are-constitutional/ <comment><USER2> Does it even matter? They do as they wish without impunity or oversight. Rulings like this are meant to pacify the public and normalize surveillance.</comment>


The spaza sector in South Africa is changing - <AUTHOR> https://www.iafrikan.com/2020/02/25/spaza-shops-township-economy-business-south-africa-corporate/ <comment><USER2> This was really insightful. Despite being South African and having grown up and lived around Cape Town most of my life (the last three decades) this article is quite illuminating.

<comment><USER3> Agreed. If you're interested, there's a book called The Kasinomic Revolution by GG Alcock that dives into the potential (and importance) of the informal sector of South Africa's economy. It doesn't go into the employee exploitation that the article covers but has some truly amazing insights.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> South Africa's economy is a mess, and worsening rapidly. The finance minister was due to present the budget today; I haven't checked up on it. Debt to gdp ratio doubled over the last decade. Moodys was the only remaining non-junk rating - may be about to change too.

</comment><comment><USER5> > Some were earning as little as R400 (about US$27,22) per month.

I find this horrible to parse, though presumably you get the hang of it eventually. I assumed it was missing a zero until I looked up the exchange rate. A grim situation (the wage).

<comment><USER6> Not unexpected:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inequality_in_post- apartheid_S...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inequality_in_post- apartheid_South_Africa)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_eq...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality) (Sort by World Bank Giny %, South Africa is first)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The problem with the argument is that they distinguish between 'informal because it's the only choice' and 'illegal law evading scumbags slumlords'. So if you follow that line of thinking, if you enjoy only slight success with your informal business, you become the scumbag and should be bulldozered. That's tantamount to reducing township inhabitants to beggars. Given the history of these areas, it's extremely unfortunate.

<comment><USER8> That seems like an important distinction to make for observation, I mean if you want to write a paper about what's going on, lumping these things together may be very misleading.

It's indeed a bit delicate for governments to make different rules based on size, but many do, there are lots of rules you don't have to follow until you have 50 employees, etc, in many countries. They don't exactly bulldoze you at 51, but they do incentivize staying under this.

But the size of the gap just sounds just crazy here, "labour laws ... retail workers must earn at least R3,701 per month" compared to "earning as little as R400 ... per month" \-- call it a factor 40 between the legal minimum wage, and the going wage which provides these (useful, even essential) services. That's a big gap to bridge!

<comment><USER7> That's a good point. It would be perfectly reasonable to enforce some labour rules there. I don't think the article is all bad and some of the things mentioned definitely can't continue.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> A super-interesting book on all this is Jonny Steinberg "A Man of Good Hope". Or at least partly on this, the man in question is a Somali who goes many places, but one of his jobs is to work in such stores. And his inside perspective is very different to TFA's fairly academic interview-some-people one.</comment>


Testicle size 'link to father role' - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24016988

<comment><USER2> The causality may actually be the reverse of that I inferred from the title:

 _...But it is not clear if the process of having a baby may have some effect on the father.

"We know, for instance, that testosterone levels go down when men become involved fathers," said Dr Rilling._</comment>