Enigma Public: Broad collection of public data - <AUTHOR> https://public.enigma.com/ <comment><USER2> Sorry to be that guy, but it would be great if that left hand nav would auto collapse into a hamburger button on mobile. It's taking up sooooo much space, and it shrinks the content to the point where it's unreadable.

<comment><USER3> the layout is pretty bad on desktop too... (with the data that I tried to look at, probably 75% of the page is blank: [http://imgur.com/a/ecIKj](http://imgur.com/a/ecIKj))

<comment><USER4> You bring up a good point, IMO: the "Open in Data Viewer" button is far-too obfuscated. If I hadn't used Enigma before, and hadn't already known what was contained in a previously-visited dataset, I too would have assumed that I hit a dead end because the button was the last thing I noticed on the page.

The horizontally-flowing layout is problematic overall, but placing that "Explore Data" button much higher in the right-most column would be a decent compromise: [http://imgur.com/a/lS7ks](http://imgur.com/a/lS7ks)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is really really good.

I follow the many emerging "collect lots of public data and make available" services, and I think this is one of the better ones I've seen. The data looks quite wide ranging too.

<comment><USER6> I always feel like gathering data and formatting correct data sets is the most important part of data science. Back during classes where you're taught machine learning require perfect data sets for you to learn the algorithms. And then when you're analyzing data, you'll use a library that runs these algorithms for you. Which means you'll spend the longest time making sure that you're data sets are correct and easily useable.

I love working on these types of projects. Things like scraping sports stats (which may or may not be considered legal, but not like I'm trying to make money for them), data from posted articles, music data, data about locations of public restaurants, etc.

Finding some place that offers correct public data is fantastic to see.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why is the 'United States' not below 'Governments' like all the other countries ?

<comment><USER8> Optimizing for their audience maybe? Similar to sites putting "United States" at the top of a countries dropdown even though everything else is in alphabetical order? Just a guess.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've interacted with Enigma folks throughout the past few years, have always been impressed with their work and methodology. I've had friends who've worked at other massive-public-data-gathering startups, it sounds like a tough business, since collecting/cleaning data is hard, but having data isn't alone a competitive edge. Don't know if Enigma will find success with public data (though their offerings go beyond data, but enterprise platforms apparently), but I've been impressed at the scope of their collection and ability to wrangle data into a standardized structure.

Here's one example: Senate lobbying disclosures. Enigma has taken the original XML data sources and created several flat tables (lobbyists, issues, reports) that can be linked through foreign/primary keys: [https://public.enigma.com/browse/lobbyists/09264ee1-792f-445...](https://public.enigma.com/browse/lobbyists/09264ee1-792f-4456-99ac-50a0232ef07f)

Here's what the raw material looks like:

[https://www.senate.gov/legislative/Public_Disclosure/LDA_rep...](https://www.senate.gov/legislative/Public_Disclosure/LDA_reports.htm)

Excerpt: [https://gist.github.com/dannguyen/7588b8334f5c8954d2c2b13bc4...](https://gist.github.com/dannguyen/7588b8334f5c8954d2c2b13bc46cb292)

I've written my own scripts to clean up and organize this shitshow but it's nice to have Enigma to double-check against, or even get ideas on how to structure things. What's just as impressive to me is the work put in the taxonomy of datasets, e.g. United States > U.S. Senate > Lobbying Reports.

For less data-savvy users, just having a Google-like simple search bar is great for discovery of datasets that contain a term of interest: [https://public.enigma.com/search/google](https://public.enigma.com/search/google)

Note: Enigma has had offered this public data for free before, you just had to sign up for an account to even browse the data. This public interface is much nicer, especially for sending people links. Haven't tested out the export functions or the quotas, but in the previous incarnation, free accounts got a huge number of downloads a month.

</comment><comment><USER9> Wow that's a lot of data! Is this free? I couldn't find pricing information. How is it funded?

<comment><USER10> It looks free (Creative Commons)—they have enterprise clients to keep it all afloat.

"We release all of our data under a Creative Commons License for anyone in the open-source or civic community to freely build upon and extend. We regularly collaborate with hundreds of journalists, not-for-profits, governments, and many other committed and curious people to help put data to good use. If you'd like to help out or suggest a project, please get in touch.

For commercial applications of our data services, we have solutions for enterprises of every size. Please contact us, and a member of our sales team will help you find the best solution."

[https://www.enigma.com/public-data](https://www.enigma.com/public-data)

<comment><USER11> > under a Creative Commons License

Looks like specifically CC-BY-NC 4.0

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> It looks like Enigma dog-foods their own data infrastructure products (Concourse / Assembly?). The public data thing inspired them to build better tools for themselves and sell them. Big lesson in that: sometimes what you learn along the way will be the most valuable.

</comment><comment><USER13> Is there a REST interface or do we only get (bad) browser GUI?

<comment><USER14> [https://docs.public.enigma.com/](https://docs.public.enigma.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> What has happened to the initial idea of developing a platform for distributed homomorphic encryption?

EDIT: Seems like I am confusing it with [http://www.enigma.co/](http://www.enigma.co/)</comment>


Groundbreaking Case May Force  Cambridge Analytica to Reveal Trump Secrets - <AUTHOR> http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/a-groundbreaking-case-may-force-controversial-data-firm-cambridge-analytica-to-reveal-trump-secrets/ <comment><USER2> The US should probably have a law like the UK.</comment>


Why tech's favorite color is making us all miserable (2018) - <AUTHOR> https://www.fastcompany.com/90177573/how-blue-became-techs-favorite-color-and-why-it-shouldnt-be <comment><USER2> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17440374](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17440374).

</comment><comment><USER3> I think all cars should have red interior lights as a matter of safety. It makes me angry whenever I rent a car and it has blue lights everywhere inside at night.

It may be a Sonata or something that has a blue light on all the time just above the rear view mirror! I had to cover it with tape.

<comment><USER4> Honda Accord too between 2012 and 2017 MYs (don't know about after the '18 redesign), except the Sport trim which has red.

Fortunately, on all trims you can freely switch the infotainment screen BG color between red, green, and blue.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> An article about using red/orange for display lighting at night, written by ... "Amber Case" !

<comment><USER6> What's your point?

<comment><USER5> nominative determinism perhaps? It is rather funny.

<comment><USER6> Hah, missed that completely!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I use xgamma -bgamma .6 and xgamma -ggamma .8 in linux

<comment><USER8> I use `redshift -O 3600`

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Last I heard there isn't strong scientific proof blue light is bad for you. I mean if you go outside at night the moon looks awfully close in color to a phone screen...

<comment><USER10> Affects circadian rhythms, damages retinas: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4734149/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4734149/)

Evening use of LED screens alters circadian rhythms and has a detrimental effect on cognitive performance: [https://www.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.001...](https://www.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.00165.2011)

You can find more. Wikipedia has 40 citations here [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_blue_light_technolo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_blue_light_technology)

Your counterpoint is irrelevant. Non-artificiality isn't a guarantee of benefit: if you go outside in the daytime and look at the sun you'll go blind.</comment></comment>


Typewriter RIP - <AUTHOR> http://dvice.com/archives/2011/04/say-goodbye-to.php

<comment><USER2> Will we see a resurgence like turntables in a decade? Or is it too complicated and capital-intensive to produce typewriters?

<comment><USER3> I can see typewriters that are small and portable with nice design making a comeback, but this article seems to refer to full scale electric typewriters of the IBM Selectric mode.

Something like this olivetti might sell <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivetti_Lettera_32></comment></comment>


"We do not believe in censoring the Internet. Rather, we should censor it." - <AUTHOR> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8549112.stm

<comment><USER2> All attempts at filtering information will soon be technologically infeasible.</comment>


I Thought I Understood the American Right. Trump Proved Me Wrong - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/11/magazine/i-thought-i-understood-the-american-right-trump-proved-me-wrong.html <comment><USER2> "Another reason, though, is that historians of conservatism, like historians in general, tend to be liberal...."

Fitting then... - the article is from a Liberal in the NY Times explaining Conservatism.

<comment><USER3> Why do you think that it irony? It seems like self awareness to me.

<comment><USER2> The quote goes on to say that liberals are "too polite". That's not self awareness. We are many things, but polite???

We literally hurled every accusation/generalization imaginable at trump supporters.</comment></comment></comment>


Selling App Startup Feedback - <AUTHOR> http://blastur.launchrock.com/ I wanted to gather some feedback about a startup idea I've had. The premise is that if you want to sell a used book or rollerblades, to find a buyer, you may have to wait months to connect with the right buyer or, you have to manage 15 different listings, one on each platform (FB, CL, offerup, letgo, ebay, etc.) My idea is to use api to blast this post to all these sites so you can post with one click and almost be guaranteed to connect with a buyer, quickly. Your candid opinions are welcomed. <comment><USER2> Do you post on behalf of the seller (using the seller's FB/CL accounts), or do you use some official account to post for them?

<comment><AUTHOR> Ultimately you would just be forwarded back to the original post on my site no matter where you see the impression. ebay, fb, cl and others will likely have different rules for this regarding having an account, so in those cases we would either link the accounts (like ziprecruiter does) or just post under my company's name.</comment></comment>


Seattle's Next Big "Sharing Economy" Challenge Is Regulating Airbnb - <AUTHOR> http://www.thestranger.com/news/feature/2016/01/13/23414491/seattles-next-big-sharing-economy-challenge-is-regulating-airbnb <comment><USER2> >the service's impact in Seattle was negligible. More than 80 percent of Seattle hosts were sharing their primary residences,

That second sentence doesn't follow from the first. I know people buying houses in Seattle today who are willing to pay more than they would otherwise for a place with an extra bedroom, or even better a basement apartment, because they'll make it back and more in Airbnb rental income. And they absolutely don't have any plans to rent out the third bedroom to a regular tenant ever, so this is potential housing now off the residential market for the foreseeable future.</comment>


Apple Suddenly Catches TikTok Secretly Spying on Millions of iPhone Users - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2020/06/26/warning-apple-suddenly-catches-tiktok-secretly-spying-on-millions-of-iphone-users/ <comment><USER2> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23634138](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23634138)

</comment><comment><USER3> They also caught like 20 other popular apps doing the same thing including NYTimes, Google News, and even Google Chrome. Instead of highlighting all of those, the article chooses to play on the "evil chinese" theme, for more sensationalist headlines. Appalling, in my opinion.

<comment><USER4> "evil chinese theme" LOL. It is much more dangerous for the Chinese government to have access to more data on users than NYT or other corporations. In the previously article written by the author he says "TikTok stands out, though, given its much wider security concerns."

"Sensationalist Headline". Headline of article: "Beware If You Use TikTok On Your iPhone: Here's Why You Should Now Worry—New Security Report".

Much wow, so much sensationalism in this title. Snooping for passwords and personal data on the clipboard, I guess we should not worry about TikTok. That is why the DOD banned it's use on their bases, they banned all other apps right?

<comment><USER5> Singling out TikTok with unfounded Yellow Peril insinuations is an alt-right scare tactic to appeal to sinophobia. The Chinese aren't really doing anything Western corporations don't do, and in many ways, technologically and socially, China is ahead of the USA. You do not see Chinese police, for instance, arresting or murdering people because of the color of their skin.

Naomi Wu is stunning and brave. Brought to you by Tencent.

<comment><USER6> > You do not see Chinese police, for instance, arresting or murdering people > because of the color of their skin.

You also don't--at present--see the US government deporting over a million people to concentration camps because of their ethnicity and religious beliefs.

<comment><USER7> And yet America has way more people per capita in prison than China. If I recall there were some protests recently that were related to the skin colour of those America prefers to lock up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> There's a good Reddit post starting with: "So I can personally weigh in on this. I reverse-engineered the app, and feel confident in stating that I have a very strong understanding for how the app operates" Ref: [https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/fxgi06/not_new_news...](https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/fxgi06/not_new_news_but_tbh_if_you_have_tiktiok_just_get/fmuko1m/)

There's also some analysis whitepapers posted here: [https://penetrum.com/research](https://penetrum.com/research)

To play devil's advocate, a lot of this might be overblown. Chat apps like this have to battle fake accounts, spammers, and API scraping of all sorts. This is typically implemented via fingerprinting the mobile devices in a way that is difficult to fake or emulate. You'd _want_ to do this by collecting as much data as possible, and also obfuscating the method with which it is done.

However, obviously, this can be done moderately securely, by hashing the inputs with something like SHA512 prior to forwarding them on to the central servers.

So a lot of the outrage may be valid, but mis-directed. You don't have to be _spying_ on purpose, it's enough to add anti-spoofing features into your app and be _sloppy_ about it. You'd still want to keep your methods _secret_ , and you certainly wouldn't want to own up to sloppy work.

Combine the incompetence, secrecy, and the face-saving culture of asians, and you end up with something that at first glance looks like spying, because it kinda-sorta is.

</comment><comment><USER9> "The most acute issue with this vulnerability is Apple's universal clipboard functionality, which means that anything I copy on my Mac or iPad can be read by my iPhone, and vice versa. So, if TikTok is active on your phone while you work, the app can basically read anything and everything you copy on another device: Passwords, work documents, sensitive emails, financial information. Anything."

Ok, with such a vulnerability, I wonder how Apple has let all these apps snoop on clipboard data for so long. They go after Hey like right away, and they have let such a gaping security hole slide through for such a long time.

<comment><USER10> Apple are definitely doing some good things. In Catalina they revealed to me that Backup and sync from Google.app was spying on my Downloads folder on my Mac - something it has no business doing, and which I never intended to be happening on my computer. macOS now prompts for permission when an app tries to read a major directory area without you directing first asking it to.

But Apple are a corporation. They only do enough privacy things to support their particular business model. That explains their baffling inconsistencies.

Ultimately, Apple can't be trusted if you truly value your privacy. I'm planning a move to Linux, which is easier than ever to use these days. Linux Mint, Elementary OS, Ubuntu...it's lookin' good.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> What I find odd:

\- why was iOS allowing it in the first place?

\- why does an app have access to the clipboard unless copy/paste is deliberately invoked from within the app by the user? (my clipboard often contains highly sensitive info)

<comment><USER12> There are legitimate user-centric reasons for doing this:

\- I have an app, Parcel, that upon launch sees if I have something resembling a tracking number in my clipboard. If I do, it asks if I want to track that package.

\- A popular Reddit client, Apollo, looks for Reddit URLs in the clipboard. If it finds one, it asks if you want to open that conversation in the app.

Sure, both of those apps work fine without that feature. Those are definitely nice conveniences, though, and they're designed to make my life as the user just a little easier. So, there _are_ genuinely useful reasons for an app to do this. There's zero legit reason for TikTok to check every 30 seconds that don't involve spyware.

I want a dialog box: "Allow this app to access your clipboard?", just like you get for access to location services, photos, the camera and mic, etc. Then I can let well-behaved apps do that for my benefit, and can tell creeper apps like TikTok to mind their own damn business.

<comment><USER13> > _There are legitimate user-centric reasons for doing this_

This trope is dragged out often. The answer is no. No, these are not legitimate use cases.

Just like Cambridge Analytica wasn't a legitimate use case, neither is polling a clipboard for changes.

An application should be _told_ of changes. If there were a permission dialog to allow the user to opt-in the application to being told instead of requiring the user to explicitly paste, then maybe. Only maybe. But allowing any (third party) application to see the communication between two (first party) applications is completely unacceptable.

<comment><USER14> Can you elaborate on why not? More specifically, what is illegitimate about those use cases? Do you deny that users would want these features?

I will readily concede that the infrastructure and tools that enable those use-cases _also_ potentially enable exploits - but what is that you know about users that I don't which leads you to believe that these _use-cases_ are not legitimate?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> According to what I learned from friends who work at tiktok, the parent company are planning to formally sever the business tie with tiktok. Although the technology team is assumed to still share the same infrastructure (networking storage compute etc.). I never was a web or mobile app developer and my friends are not either, and I never used tiktok so have no idea how the client side technology going to be structure.

PS: Tiktok and the purely algorithm driven content consumption is absolutely going to be a super mind washing machine that I will never going to touch, and will teach my kids to stay away as well.

<comment><USER16> Don't algorithms dictate what content shows up on HN?

<comment><USER15> Really?

I always assumed HN just operate on user voting. And the first batch showing on front-page is handed picked, which I think it's necessary...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> It'd be nice if someone disassembled tiktok to figure out what happens with this information. We can all speculate, tiktok can release a statement, but only the binary can give the truth for this proprietary app.

</comment><comment><USER18> The last paragraph:

> _All iPhone users should update to the latest version of TikTok as soon as > it's released—and given it is actively reading your clipboard, you might > want to bear that in mind while using the app ahead of that update._

Is immediately followed by this bit about the author of the article:

 _Zak Doffman

I am the Founder/CEO of Digital Barriers—developing advanced surveillance solutions for defence, national security and counter-terrorism. I write about the intersection of geopolitics and cybersecurity, and analyze breaking security and surveillance stories. Contact me at firstname.lastname@example.com._

Zak developers spy-ware.

<comment><USER19> This is some guy ... Here is his twitter feed:

[https://twitter.com/UKZak](https://twitter.com/UKZak)

Pinned tweeet: China Has Weaponized The Smartphone: Here's Why You Should Be Concerned

And this is his company:

[https://www.digitalbarriers.com](https://www.digitalbarriers.com)

With some scary looking UK police officers carrying machine guns on the front page ...

Why does this guy get to write hyperbolic articles for the FT?

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> > The most acute issue with this vulnerability is Apple's universal clipboard > functionality, which means that anything I copy on my Mac or iPad can be > read by my iPhone, and vice versa.

Didn't know that was a thing. What an extraordinary security hole that is, and excellent MiTM password catching opportunity for Apple.

Does anyone know if it can be disabled programmatically? Otherwise LastPass (etc) are effectively getting backed up directly by Apple. :(

<comment><USER21> Why are you even putting passwords in the clipboard? On iOS and macOS passwords can (and should!) be filled by password manager extensions, which don't use the clipboard.

<comment><USER22> Unfortunately there's still "trash" apps that don't utilize the feature. I wish Apple pushed on this as much as they did with their sign with Apple policy.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What do you want to see most in the next iteration of the Macbook Pro? - ng-user Apart from the obvious 32GB ram, what else would you like to see in the next generation Macbook Pro?
I think it will be the first Macbook Pro I purchase and I really hope it lives up to expectations.
I really like the idea of Touch ID, I hope it's not replaced with Face ID. High Sierra should be interesting too.
Anyway, what would you personally like to see in the next Macbook Pro? <comment><USER2> This will sound trite, but I'm completely serious. The number one thing I want to see in the next MacBook Pro is the abandonment of the Touch Bar. Make it a row on the keyboard again.

I didn't think that the Touch Bar was useful when I first saw it, and now, six months later, I haven't found one more reason that I'd want ever want it. I don't want haptic feedback or any other kind of improvement. Apple made a mistake and should own up to it. Just throw it out.

Aside from that, I'd love to see a little better battery life and would have no problem whatsoever trading away a few more millimeters of thinness if I could get it. The MBP is thinner than I need already.

<comment><USER3> I also hate the touch bar, but far worse is how they ruined all the other keys with the new, super loud low travel design.

I want the keyboard from my 2013 model back. It was nearly perfect.

<comment><USER4> While I agree the Touchbar is a crappy gimmick (albeit I don't hate it, I think it's a useless feature), I have to disagree on the keyboard. I hate typing on my personal 2015 MBP keyboard now and have to use an Apple Magic Keyboard 2 with it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I know you say "apart from the obvious 32 GB ram", but I'm gonna say it anyway. On the off chance anyone from Apple reads this, I want to signal boost that as much as I can. It gets in the way daily, and as more places adopt docker (and Mac not having a native docker layer worth using), the RAM limit is _stifling_.

A keyboard nobody complains about again.

Better battery life.

A return to Magsafe.

<comment><USER6> It is not, and was never Apple's choice to limit the MB Pro to 16 GB.

Educate yourself:

[https://macdaddy.io/macbook-pro-limited-16gb- ram/](https://macdaddy.io/macbook-pro-limited-16gb-ram/)

<comment><USER7> "Educate yourself" is not a constructive way to disagree with someone.

Also, it's absurd to suggest that Apple could do absolutely nothing about this Intel limitation if they wanted to.

I'm sure it would cost them more time/energy than they'd be willing to spend on the MB Pro, but that's been the problem for Pro users for a while, hasn't it? Apple doesn't care as much about it as its users do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The MacBook Pro should be Apple's tank. It should be able to handle the most arduous, demanding tasks and still go 8-10 hours on its battery. Sorry if that's adds a little more weight, it's a _pro_ machine - if you want something ultraportable, svelte and light then you should get a MacBook Air.

As far as ports are concerned USB-C is great, however a USB 3.0 port and an SD card reader would be super handy for a pro machine. Seriously, people are making a living using these machines and it needs to be a little more convenient to transfer data using different media which happen to be extremely common.

I've found the new keyboard usable once you get the hang of it, though I prefer the older keyboards with a little more travel. The trackpad though - <AUTHOR> needs to be shrunk back down in size. It registers too many false inputs and its really annoying especially since the trackpad is hands-down one of the best features of the entire MacBook product line.

<comment><USER9> _people are making a living using these machines_

I think that cuts to the heart of the matter. They have forgotten who the customers are. Everything is designed for sleekness and entertainment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Differentiation.

I don't like the touch bar but I like that they tried. Now please take it a little further and clean up the line-up.

I want all the weird future bits to go in a 'modern' ultra portable. Take the 12" macbook and put an A11 or theoretical A12 in it. If there's a non keyboard touch input in the macbook line try it there.

Take the macbook pro and stuff it full of ports. And shit on intel until they produce an appropriate chipset that'll support more than 16gb. Or at least threaten them with the above mentioned ultraportable until they get off the pot and get it done. Ports, ram, a small concession on form factor & weight so a 13-14ish inch model can be useful for 8 hours on a train. Oh and more ports.

Everything else tht's a little more mass market, a little more beige, that can go in the macbook air line. Set a reasonable price point and sell little- better-than-entry-level spec'ed machine with modern components to every Tom, Dick & Harry who gives them money for the current air but really shouldn't.

Have courage Apple, take a little risk, leverage some branding to make a statement and let the pro moniker mean something.

</comment><comment><USER11> I have top of the line late-2013 model, i7 with 1T SSD and 16G RAM. There was no reason to upgrade whatsoever so far, and current MacBooks are not appealing to me at all. Mostly I would like them to return good things back and introduce new things they implemented in other products.

Absolutely NO WAY to the Touch Bar. As long as it's there, I'm not even looking further. It can have 512GB RAM or all-gold unibody or whatever, Touch Bar = no buy.

One thing I use extensively is the Toslink digital out, I love music and being able to connect portable DACs over Toslink is (was) beautiful.

I'm sure the sound system could be improved. It's nice to watch a movie in bed sometimes, but the sound is bad on 2013 model and somehow even worse (very synthetic?) on 2017.

It would be nice to have a screen that doesn't have all your keyboard imprinted all over it in a year or so.

A way to disable Apple logo glowing.

32G RAM goes without saying. I'm a developer and even without 1-2 VMs I sometimes run out of memory.

To conclude, we need faster horses, Mr Ford.

<comment><USER12> I have the 2015 model, and basically the same. (1) No touchbar. (2) intel GPU on the 15inch models. I don't like switching gpu. (2) True 4k display with wide color like the 4k imac. (3) Fanless if possible. The fan went out on my current MBP and if thing is going to last me until 2022 hopefully the next one will have less moving parts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm surprised no one has mentioned an OLED screen yet. Lenovo has been making some laptops with them: [https://www.thurrott.com/windows/windows-10/133452/lenovo- th...](https://www.thurrott.com/windows/windows-10/133452/lenovo- thinkpad-x1-yoga-2017-oled-first-impressions). Still, Apple ships so many units and has likely locked up so much capacity for the iPhone X that I suspect we're unlikely to see OLED displays in their laptops this year.

</comment><comment><USER14> More ports. The new version only has four, and one is for power. My 2015 model has power, two thunderbolt, two usb, hdmi, sd card, audio in. I use all of them most days.

I'd also want an option with the higher travel keyboard and function keys. I use those frequently. I tried the lower travel keyboard on a macbook, and it hurt my arms.

<comment><USER15> The whole point of USB-C is that a single port can do multiple things at once. What four devices are you plugging in that none of them can also supply charge?

<comment><USER14> Sorry, missed replying to this earlier:

      *Audiobox and powered USB Hub, into the two USB Ports
      *Often an ethernet cable with adaptor into the thunderbolt port
      *Magsafe adaptor
      * HDMI cable to external monitor
      * Line in audio for speakers
      * SD Card into SD card slot
      * The USB Hub has: lightning cable for ios device, external keyboard, wacom tablet, usb mouse

I haven't yet familiarized myself USB C. Would they solve this issue? I think I would need a lot more hubs, since I count 9-10 connections on a typical day.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> For the MBP as we know it, I'd love to get a 15" model without the Touch Bar / Touch ID. To me, it's a deal breaker. The 13" looks nice, but it's just too small. I'm not sure what to make of the gigant trackpad – not putting it under your palms is just so much more sensible than palm detection. (For the same reason I'm not fond of edge to edge phone displays.) Sad to see MagSafe go, as well as many other connectors. The previous model was pretty great and it's unfortunate it can't be bought (new) anymore with decent graphics.

32GB of RAM is welcome, as well as some more screen estate. I'd now probably get a 17" model if I could, but lacking that, thinner screen edges. If it can be done on the Dell XPS (and the iPhone X), so can it on the MBP.

The MBP doesn't feel all that pro anymore, though. When the MBPr was first released, it truly set itself apart from the MBP at the time. It was an insta- buy and I'm still using it for the lack of better options. Now that the consumer line has caught up, what I'd really like to see is the introduction of a legitimate mobile workstation with similarly sized innovations at a similarly reasonable price. Where is my Xeon with ECC?

Completely in vain, I'll close by stating that a bit of water/dirt-proofing would be great, but I don't expect to ever see that happen.

<comment><USER17> What are the last two laptops you've owned? When are you planning to replace your current laptop? What will the next one be if the next MBP includes Touch Bar and Touch ID? If not a Mac, what OS will you run?

<comment><USER16> This MBPr 2012 made me move back from MBA + iMac to just a laptop. Before that, MBP. Right now I'm trying to find a lightly used MBP 2015 with R9 and ~2 years of AppleCare left, to buy myself some time to either migrate away from Apple or be positively surprised with a new product that convinces me to stick with them longer. Been a Mac user for well over 10 years now, so the final decision won't be taken lightly.

I keep a list of candidates to try, including the Dell Precision 5520 and some Lenovo models. Still I'm bitter about it. As far as I can tell, nothing else I can buy at this moment will match the build quality I've come accustomed to. The user experience of (now) macOS is steadily declining too, but not to the point yet that Linux looks like an improvement. I'd fancy BSD more, but that limits the hardware options even further.

<comment><USER17> Cheers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Quadcore with HT 13inch. With Intel 8th generation CPUs, i5 and i7 will become quadcore. Now the question is will Apple use i3 or older generation CPUs for the 13inch or give the 13inch quadcore+ht like the current 15inch.

<comment><USER19> I would honestly switch back to a 13 if i could get a real quad core in it. All my work is purely CPU stuff, so all the GPU does is cook my legs and waste battery(and some apps that absolutely have no business switching on the dGPU still do, even years in, and the tray apps that let you restrict this are long since broken... grrr)

I'm still plugging away on a 2012 rMBP, so i'm a prime customer to pitch this hypothetical quad 13in model too. I like the size! I don't need the big screen! I would bite even if this was a BTO or higher end model!

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> External gpu support for Nvidia

[https://developer.apple.com/development-kit/external- graphic...](https://developer.apple.com/development-kit/external-graphics/)

Boot camp dual boot option for Linux

Official command line package manager

<comment><USER3> You can already dual boot Linux. Just hold alt when turning on the computer and select the installation media, set it up to boot with EFI, and use the same alt trick to select your Linux partition on boot.

<comment><USER20> I have done this myself too. but it's kinda hacky.

For example, linux might not recognize 3 finger gestures. I also don't recall how it handled the apple/command keys. There might need to be some better driver support.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I'd really like to see the inverted-T cursor block back... I can almost live with the low-travel keyboard and actually kind of like the Touch Bar (especially with iTerm2 support now).

The arrow keys, however, I just can't get used to.

</comment><comment><USER22> Except for some hardware issues (stuck on my 2013 MBA for 3-5 days), I have been generally happy with my 2016 MBP. Performance is solid, even for processor and memory intensive tasks. I attribute this in part to the memory management improvements to macOS in the past 5 years (without which, 16GB would be quite horrid). Battery life is generally acceptable as long as I reboot occasionally. The keyboard is a bit louder than my prior Macbook's, but I find that I type more accurately. The 15" screen is beautiful, especially given that I won't need to break my back to lug it around.

32GB RAM option (at price point of current 16GB configuration) Face ID (in addition to retaining Touch ID) Integrated FIDO U2F Upgradeable SSD (or M.2 expansion slot) Improve battery life by 30 - 40% Don't be cheap ... put the wall cord back in the box High-speed SD slot

In terms of the Touch Bar, I'm fine with it as long as I have a way to pad some dead space in the top right (where Siri is by default).

I have a couple of software quibbles as well, including:

Bring back Ctrl-Shift-Power shortcut Enable U2F support in Safari Disable Touch ID for unlock while continuing to use it for authorizing privileged actions Integrated Touch ID for sudo

</comment><comment><USER23> \- A slight increase in resolution so that the defaults are once again pixel- doubled.

\- FaceID

\- 32gb ram, I guess. I'd buy it if available, but if not... meh.

I like the new keyboard. I don't care one way or the other about the touch bar.

</comment><comment><USER24> After some research for my next anticipated laptop, a lot of people in the Mac community seem to want a 14" MacBook Pro that combines the portability of the 13" with the power of the 15". Personally, I would like Apple to match the amount of ports in the lower spec MacBooks as there are in higher spec ones; seriously, why do the non-touch bar 13" MacBooks have only two thunderbolt ports while the touch bar model has four!?

<comment><USER4> Because each of those Thunderbolt 3 ports adds significant cost. I guess they could've added two USB-C ports, but that likely would've caused major confusion for customers (the confusion is already bad enough in the USB-C port form factor imho).

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> To conclude all

\- Magnetic-USB-C OR Magsafe power connector on both sides

\- Remove touch bar

\- A lot more battery life, even if the MBP is a little more thicker

\- A cutting edge silicon lottery intel processor, ideally Xeon

\- Face ID

\- Super Retina OLED Display

\- Inverted T cursor block (arrow keys)

\- A powerful GPU

\- Multi-boot support for Linux also

\- At least 32GB Ram

\- Fast charging

People like us makes a living out of these machines. We are not here to "getting used to" all the shit Apple produces.

</comment><comment><USER26> The one thing I want from any mac is ALL SSD. And >512GB.

This is the thing that make me consider using a hackintosh. I totally will not buy a mac without a decently sized _SSD_ disk, hopefully _starting_ at 1TB. I can live with the rest....

and for the keyboard? I have _never like_ the modern mac keyboard (never used the old ALPS) so I use a external one.

However, how about put a mechanical at least for the iMac/MacPro?

<comment><USER27> The iMac and Mac Pro you're going to be using with an external keyboard regardless, so you can just swap in whatever keyboard suits you. I for one don't mind shallow travel keyboards but people who complain about the keyboards on laptops do so because most of us don't lug an external keyboard with us to the proverbial coffee shop.

<comment><USER26> Thats clear, and I agree. But if that is the common case why not build a better keyboard? Apple take a lot of pride in the interfacing of the technology, and certainly keyboards and mouses is not part of that vision, sadly...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Headphone jack. Escape key. MagSafe charger.

<comment><USER29> The proprietary chargers were expensive and disintegrate within a couple of years. Also scavenging the office for someone with the right version, and wattage of charger when you left yours at home.

No thanks.

USB-C should become a standard, so they'll be ubiquitous, cheap, etc.

If you need a safe cable you can get magnetically-connected USB-C cables.

<comment><USER30> No they didn't. I have MagSafe chargers nearly a decade old, and they work fine still.

Magnetically connected USB-C cables are a poor solution. A dedicated port for power is still the best option.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Keep the FN-Keyboard-Version, add Force-Feedback to the Touchbar.

</comment><comment><USER32> 17 inch >4k retina display (>300PPI) with GTX1070m or better.

</comment><comment><USER33> User replaceable parts. I had a 2011 MBP that lasted 5 years after a hard drive upgrade and increased ram. Without this, any MBP life span is limited to a couple years.

</comment><comment><USER27> A real function key row on the high end models. I'm very hesitant to buy at all without one.

That and the aforementioned 32GB. Other than that I'm more than happy with my 2012 model.

Edited to add: oh and bring MagSafe back. I forgot about that. Can't count the number of times it's saved my computer. On the lookout for third party adapters....

</comment><comment><USER34> Decent Nvidia GPU (GTX 10xx or equiv.). I want/need to be able to write CUDA code on my main work machine. I'm also not buying a machine with less than 64 GB of RAM as my main work machine any more.

Without that I cannot justify the price of a MBP, since I'll have to buy a second machine to complement it.

<comment><USER32> >I'm also not buying a machine with less than 64 GB of RAM as my main work machine any more.

Who is offering 64GB laptops right now?

<comment><USER34> Certainly Lenovo, HP and Dell are. Asus and Acer probably have something as well. Even Clevo/Sager offer some 64GB laptops so everybody who resells Clevo machines can also offer 64 GB of RAM

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Lower end i5 model starting at $999

Higher end model with Option to have OLED display with almost no bezel design kind of like iPhone X

</comment><comment><USER36> Discard the touchbar. Keep the fingerprint reader.

Give a better quality keyboard. Give back a proper escape key.

Quad Core cpu in the 13" model and ideally an actual GPU.

10-20% thicker body for more battery. It's already thinner than actually adds value.

Sim slot/radios for LTE data like the iPad.

A mechanical switch/shutter to physically block & electrically disconnect the camera.

</comment><comment><USER37> With all of this kvetching over the keyboard, what I'd like to see in the next version of the Macbook Pro is no keyboard at all. Go the way of Microsoft Surface Pro and make it a tablet with a full OS, great screen, battery life and let everybody use the keyboard of their choice.

<comment><USER27> Ugh, no. Do that with the MacBook ultraportable, which is basically a glorified tablet anyway. But not with a workhorse machine for keyboard-driven occupations like programming.

<comment><USER37> Nope.

<comment><USER27> You never take your laptop away from your desk? Why not just use a desktop computer, then?

And as a programmer, what the heck would you use a touch screen for?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I'd like all keys to be a small OLED screen or something similar. This would make it much easier to customise keyboards, avoid language issues and would also help with learning shortcuts. (pressing command, would change "C" to a copy symbol for example)

</comment><comment><USER39> 32GB RAM - absolute must

Standard, full size HDMI - main factor making me hang onto my current one now is actually this!

</comment><comment><USER40> Coreboot and better Linux support.

I can dream, right?

</comment><comment><USER41> Finder app that actually finds stuff

<comment><USER42> > _Finder app that actually finds stuff_

I find stuff with Finder. Mind elaborating? (Now I'm paranoid that I'm finding wrong…)

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> Nvidia graphic cards

</comment><comment><USER44> 32GB of RAM, an F-function row below the touch bar and a mag safe port next to the USB-C

</comment><comment><USER45> Magsafe, my new MacBook have been on the floor already because someone stepped in the charger.

Fortunately it landed flat down on the bottom, so no damage was done, but I got a heart attack when it happened..

</comment><comment><USER46> Waterproofing! Drinks near my laptop terrify me. A drop of water in the wrong place means your expensive work critical computer get its warranty voided and needs an immediate replacement.

</comment><comment><USER47> These are all obvious fixes. 1\. 32+gb ram, don't be stupid 2\. 2+ usb-c, plus at least one legacy usb-a 3\. hdmi 4\. either drop touch bar or make it easily support normal top row buttons

<comment><USER4> Re: #1

Go rant to Intel. It's their fault they don't support LP-DDR4 or DDR4L.

<comment><USER47> on the ram limitation, other laptops have more than 16 gig, like the lenovo laptops my company uses for ubuntu dev with 32 gig. so apple could make other choices. these other laptops work just fine.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Water resistance. It would help with cleaning and spills.

</comment><comment><USER49> Touch and stylus! I want to be able to touch the screen I do real work on. Then my tablet can be consume/entertain only.

</comment><comment><USER50> The 2013 MBP was perfect, regret selling it when thinking the new 16 model would be reasonably priced.

</comment><comment><USER51> Would like Apple to adopt an OLED screen and use two of the next A11x CPUs in the macbook pro

</comment><comment><USER52> 32-64gb RAM. That alone is why I haven't upgraded my now 5+ yr old MacBook Pro.

</comment><comment><USER53> As everyone else has said - ditch the Touch Bar, double the RAM.

Also, crazy suggestion but I think it's a much better solution than jumping on board the bizarre "everything needs a touchscreen and 48 hinges" bandwagon; make the trackpad even bigger AND also make it something comparable to a Wacom tablet - stylus and all.

</comment><comment><USER54> Touch screen? I don't have any complaints.

actually, easier way of switching between screen resolutions. I find night time with my contact on, the highest resolution on my 15" is very hard to navigate and read; I'd like instant resolution switch-ups or downs

</comment><comment><USER30> MagSafe! Its the biggest reason I haven't upgraded.

</comment><comment><USER55> More ram.

</comment><comment><USER56> Magsafe power cord.

USB and USB-c.

At least a 32GB ram option.

</comment><comment><USER57> nvidia gpu for ML training</comment>


Salary at Venture-Backed Companies - <AUTHOR> http://perceptive.ly/post/48616809088/salary-at-venture-backed-companies <comment><USER2> "But if you offer too much compensation, management and employees may begin to feel fat and happy and lose the motivation to maximize long-term value for shareholders."

IMO (and while I can't speak to the management side of it), this displays a horrifying misunderstanding of the mindset of the technical people you want to hire and pay well.

As an experienced and driven programmer, you hire me and pay me well so that my only concern regarding work is how awesome I can make the product I am working on. My name is attached to that code and that product, I _need_ it to be as good as I can make it within the other constraints you've placed upon me. You can only fuck this up by paying me too little (because then I start to wonder how I am valued and whether or not I am wasting my time with a company that doesn't value me enough), not by paying me too much.

Granted, not every programmer is like this, but the ones you want to hire are.

<comment><USER3> I have read about cats that if you need a mouser you should not worry about feeding it too much. Cats will catch mice even if well fed. Feeding it too little means it will start to scout for food far away from your place, thus catching mice elsewhere.

<comment><USER4> Though once your cat is _too_ well fed it might not be able to catch mice as effectively anymore

<comment><USER5> Completely true. Our girl cat was a killing machine. Multiple gophers each weekend -- always presented them as presents. But she loves to eat and takes advantage of the fact the other cat doesn't eat as much. She's a pudgeball now and hasn't caught much in awhile (some of that is due to age...).

<comment><USER6> > Our girl cat was a killing machine

Very true. The female is the real hunter and the one to get if you are after a mouser. The male likes to lie in the sun, much like its owner.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > If you offer too little compensation, you may not attract the talent that > you need to be successful. But if you offer too much compensation, > management and employees may begin to feel fat and happy and lose the > motivation to maximize long-term value for shareholders.

> Salary is a measure of how much value one is adding to a company, and that > information should not be a secret.

> If companies are consistently paying management teams 30% away from these > averages in either direction, there is likely a problem at the company.

This runs the gamut from superstition (paying people more may make them less 'hungry') to untrue as a matter of fact (salary is an equilibrium of supply and demand, not a measure of value added), to playing to the middle ground fallacy (you should pay upper management within this range dictated by an average).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback rayiner.

My statement that paying people excessively can make them less hungry is something that has been observed through experience. I'm not saying that this is always the case, just that it happens and is something to be aware of.

Sure, salary is a matter of supply and demand- which is why I'm advocating for more transparency so that all market participants can make decisions with more complete information of the market. But I'm saying that supply and demand SHOULD be dictated by value added.

I'm not necessarily saying that every company should pay within this range. Just that this is something to be aware of, and if there is significant deviation from these numbers, more thought should be put into the decision making process.

<comment><USER7> I agree with your central point, by the way. Salary transparency is a great thing. But some things are cliche, and I think the 'hungry' thing is one of them. "We shouldn't pay too much so people stay hungry" is something you'll, e.g., never hear Wall Street folks say about their own companies.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I spent years as an executive compensation consultant both creating and analyzing salary surveys for the world's largest companies.

What it teaches you is that: 1\. Never use averages, always use medians 2\. Sample sizes are critical, and anything below 5 samples you just can't trust (ideally 30, as the Central Limit Theorem suggests) 3\. Garbage in, garbage out: if you don't know the population of the sample, then you can't trust the output (i.e., how many employees, what's the revenue run rate, what's the user growth look like, what's the valuation and how many funding rounds, etc).

I love the spirit of this data, but based on the core principles outlined above, you can't hang your hat on this data.

In software engineering land, not knowing these three principles is like not knowing the principles of MVC.

<comment><AUTHOR> great feedback, thanks. admittedly, my data alone does not do much. Just wanted to spark some discussion on the topic, and I thought I should eat my own dog food.

<comment><USER8> Totally understand, apologies if my comment came across as harsh, just trying to make sure we look at compensation data correctly since some of those numbers look a bit high relative to what I would imagine the market 50th percentile being for newer startups.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> "But if you offer too much compensation, management and employees may begin to feel fat and happy and lose the motivation to maximize long-term value for shareholders."

God forbid if your employees are happy.

In all seriousness, I don't even remotely understand this mindset. Why would paying your employees less than they deserve or less than is optimal encourage them to "stay hungry." If anything, this is going to deter them from working inordinately hard or may drive them from the company altogether. If a company pays well, the employees have more to lose and are likely have a greater appreciation for their employer.

I just can't fathom how they expect that, by paying less than they ought to or less than their employees deserve, the employees will be _more_ inclined to work hard.

This speaks to a fundament misinterpretation of employee motivation and is incredibly disquieting.

<comment><AUTHOR> Paying management less than they deserve would not encourage them to stay hungry. But paying them _more_ than they deserve based on market dynamics could possibly cause them to lose motivation. This is definitely not a rule that occurs 100% of the time, but my point is its something to be aware of, and salaries need to be more transparent so better-educated salary decisions can be made (for all participants of the tech ecosystem).

<comment><USER10> Do you have any proof of that, other than your own anecdotal evidence?

<comment><USER11> I doubt he has anecdotal evidence or he'd have mentioned specific cases in his article. It's a theory he's working on as part of his efforts to convince the best and the brightest to work for his company, a high risk unstable start up, for below market rates. There's one of these articles out from some guy at a VC backed firm who is unable to afford competent people every few weeks. The best idea these guys ever have is to write articles telling all the "coders" that they are not as special as they think they are and would be lucky to work for a fine firm such as theirs in return for vague promises of magic beans.

Meanwhile I have no problem at all hiring the best and the brightest. It's super easy to find good people and hire them and how to do so is not a secret at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Nick, since you're advocating transparency, I'd be curious to know the salaries paid by venture capital companies, such as North Atlantic Capital. For instance, what does an associate, managing director, or marketing director make?

</comment><comment><USER13> All of the offers I get from VC backed startups are always ridiculous. They seem to believe that I have to take an economic cut just to help them _make it_. These days, I talk about compensation first, and then about the project itself. No need to waste a week talking and getting to know the team if they can't pay me a reasonable amount.

<comment><USER14> After a couple of similar experiences, I too started to mention compensation up front. While it has saved a lot of time, I'm starting to have second thoughts about this approach. The problem is that you don't get a chance to sell yourself to demonstrate why a higher salary might be warranted.

<comment><USER13> I tested that, too. But I always ended up wasting too much time. I have a base salary of _n_. If their initial estimate is under that, then I move on. I only talk to those who can at least pay _n_. Otherwise, its a waste of time. I adopted this system after I wasted a couple of days interviewing with a _technical advisor_ (this title is now a red flag for me).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Currently doing Coursera's Dan Ariely's behavioural economics course... A couple of thoughts:

\- You want the relationship with your employees not to be based solely on money. If the only reason they work for you is the salary then you have a problem already.

\- It has been shown experimentally that larger incentives can negatively impact performance. This is more important for bonuses but salary probably shows some similar behaviour. In general when you worry about the money and the stakes you become less effective.

\- What people are paid relative to their peers is important. People feel better when they're paid better relative to their peers. The actual amount is less important. This supports the "pay fairly" approach.

EDIT: An interesting observation that has been made is that requiring public companies to publish their CEOs salaries has not caused those salaries to decline. If anything it caused them to keep going up. A similar effect should be expected in VC backed companies if they publish similar data as prospective CEOs would always want to be paid better than said data.

</comment><comment><USER16> A couple of decades ago I read about a company in New Hampshire of Vermont that made skiing and hiking outerwear, definitely not hi-tech. They posted everyone's salaries on the wall, including management. If someone wanted a raise he crossed out his old salary and wrote in a new one. The president(?) said no-one abused the system because it was self-limiting it was all there for everyone to read.

I've never seen it anywhere else. It would take real guts to do it in Silicon Valley.

<comment><AUTHOR> Very interesting russell. let me know if you can dig up the write up on that!

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I find it interesting that the lowest paid person is the CTO. (Director of Sales will make more because of bonuses).

<comment><USER18> I thought the same thing (with a gasp as a CTO myself :))

But I'm going to assume this article references companies where the Technology department is more of a cost center than primary operations.

For example a SaaS company that basically just has sales/marketing and technology/operations, the CTO is also acting as the COO, so I think you could attribute the COO salary to that of the CTO in a SaaS or high-tech startup.

<comment><USER19> Developers/CTO tend not to ask for high salaries. Hence they get paid less.

(Then they broke and go insane from the perceived injustice, see that other article recently...)

<comment><USER20> Thanks for that explanation. I was wondering where my future was heading.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> He referenced "growth phase" which presumably means after having raised a venture round in the tens of millions or higher.

Certainly no one should be paying themselves this much after a $2MM series A.

</comment><comment><USER22> That VP of Sales number looks low. The article does say "salary," so it may technically be correct, but I'm sure total cash comp (not including options) is higher.

<comment><USER23> Yeah, at many B2B product or marketing companies, I assume the sales folks are heavily compensated based on commission while the CEO and founders are getting more equity (but possibly lower pay than a lot of the sales people).

<comment><AUTHOR> Definitely true for sales folks at B2B companies- total comp can sometimes eclipse CEO when adding commission. My piece is focused on salary, not commission, cash bonus, and equity. Surely, a more complete picture of total comp is more valuable, but the scope of the piece was just focused on salary.

<comment><USER22> Then I think the article should explicitly point out that salary is only a piece (and perhaps not the largest piece) of total cash comp. Otherwise it is very misleading to the naive reader.

<comment><AUTHOR> check the bottom, italicized portion of the piece. notes that the piece only focuses on one portion of compensation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I really wonder what 'average' means in this context since the average venture backed startup is a total failure.

I imagine there's also a huge disparity between the salaries of executives at companies across the seed->A round->B round->...->IPO spectrum as well.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, I am talking about growth stage, so these are companies with at least 3 rounds of financing that have in most cases raised $10+mm

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> No solution was offered here. This generic advice could be applied to anything: "in order to solve XYZ, ask some of your peers and perhaps try some products whose stated purpose is to solve XYZ".

<comment><AUTHOR> im not smart enough to come up with a solution, that's what the HN community is for. The purpose of the piece was to shine light on a problem (lack of transparency in salaries at VC backed companies)

<comment><USER25> On that note, I'll throw out an idea - maybe the valuation of company stock is not accurate enough. If it were, the problem would be much easier:

big co salary = startup salary + #shares * (stock price - option strike price).

EDIT: diving one level deeper, perhaps a company needs two valuations: one for investors buying the stock (market driven), and an internal one that employees are likely to accept. The two numbers should be the same, but during bubbles there might need to be a gap between them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> But if you offer too much compensation, management and employees may begin to feel fat and happy and lose the motivation to maximize long-term value for shareholders.

-may hold for upper level management, but VERY unlikely this holds for rank and file employees.

</comment><comment><USER27> If we're going to have this discussion and focus on the management team, then I think we need to say how much money the company has raised. My thinking about salary for myself and co-founder is definitely funding specific.

<comment><USER28> Why? If I got 50 million dollars in funding or 400k, I'd still probably pay myself only what I need to survive/present myself and pour as much into the business as possible, at least until profitability and even then my salary would remain low until profitability was maintained and began to increase rather than be an issue.

Then again, I don't have a family.

<comment><USER19> That is a very bad strategy.... You should study or read up on startup stories.

It's risk management.

<comment><USER27> Exactly. There's a time element to this. It takes 7-11 years for a startup to go public. Your life changes during that time and so does the relative impact of your salary on runway.

<comment><USER28> 7-11 years for a startup to go public, but how long to reach profitability to the point where an increase in salary won't affect that profitability? If it takes 7-11 years for that, you're probably not in the right business.

It's not about the amount you raise, it's about what stage your company is in. That's my real point there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Is salary transparency definitely a great thing for companies? I've been told that in law firms (where all non-partner position salaries are revealed) this causes a race to the bottom and is not good for employees.

<comment><USER7> It doesn't really create a race to the bottom. What it does do is basically let the most profitable firms set the salary scale. When they raise salaries, everyone matches for fear of being seen as a cut below. Nobody cuts salaries because doing so is very conspicuous in a market where most firms pay the exact same salary. So I think in that sense, transparency has the effect of pulling up the median salary and is good for employees, though not necessarily employers. On the other hand, it takes pressure off the top firms. The most profitable firms don't raise salaries unless they really have to, because they know that if they do it'll move the whole market upward and any recruiting advantage will be short-lived. So in that sense it's probably a bit worse for people at the top who might make more otherwise.

I think using salaries as incentive systems is mostly hokum except for situations where performance can be very easily quantified (e.g. sales people). I think transparency combined with lockstep (pay is strictly by seniority) is a great model, at least for organizations where everyone is mostly doing the same kind of job.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Since this is about startups, where there is usually a sizeable chunk of equity to go with the salary, it would be useful to get that figure as well.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Would love to hear the HN community's views on this taboo topic!

</comment><comment><USER31> _If you offer too little compensation, you may not attract the talent that you need to be successful._

It depends on their circumstances. There are smart people who'll work for low salaries if there are genuine reasons to do so, but not many of them. Most of us can't afford to work for free anymore.

 _But if you offer too much compensation, management and employees may begin to feel fat and happy and lose the motivation to maximize long-term value for shareholders._

Ahem. :cough: _BULLSHIT._

That said, most startup executives I've known were worth nothing _near_ $175,000 base. Most of them could justify $175,000/year _not_ to work anywhere in technology again. Then again, I've never worked for a good startup.

Alright... now, this is a fun topic. I worked for a startup with outright evil management where there were 5:1 salary disparities over the same job. One person was making $30,000 per year (in NYC) in a non-tech role, then busted his ass to move over to engineering and did so, but was told that the promotion to engineer "should be enough". People were being hired into the same role at 4-5 times his pay. He eventually negotiated more, but he was underpaid for years. That was the startup that inspired my most famous blog post.

The good news is that most startups pay market. Salary may be about 15% less than you'd get in another company, but equity (at valuation) fills the gap. The bad news is that most startups are awful places to work and you learn very little and so you tend to "job hop"; it may not even be your choice because "fail fast" is often used as an excuse for impulsive firing. After a while in that game, you have more jobs than years in your history and startups _are_ the only market left for you.

<comment><USER32> Your points are tangentially related to a question I've floated around in my head for years: when is a startup not a startup?

There's the income/profit metric (if a company is paying its CEO $200k+ and has several $150k+ engineers, they're obviously selling a significant amount of _something_ )

Or there's the acquisition metric (our goal is to be bought, and we haven't been bought, so we're a startup)

<comment><USER31> You may have followed my advocacy for open allocation: [http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/09/03/tech- companie...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/09/03/tech-companies- open-allocation-is-your-only-real-option/)

When a tech startup runs well, it's constrained open allocation. People can't just go off and "do whatever" but if the work is important to the business, anyone gets to step up and do it. There's no fighting over "headcount" or jockeying for plum projects. There is the work that needs to be done and as long as (a) people work on things that are relevant to the business, (b) people take enough of an ownership mentality to do the difficult or unpleasant stuff that's comes along with the good, they remain in good standing.

Once you have closed allocation, you're definitely _not_ a startup.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Last late stage VC company (which turns out to be run by psychopaths...):

VP: 220k base (H-1B filing)

Director (of what I forgot): 180k base (H-1B filing)

Programming monkey:

15 year exp: 185k base

10 year: 150-160k base

3(?) year: 130k base (in demand specialty)

<comment><USER33> Geographic area matters a lot.

<comment><USER19> SV ;)</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Any examples of currying that's not toy stuff? - <AUTHOR>

I mean, we've all seen the "add N to value" kind of examples.<p>Are there also any uses for the real world, or does it only apply to a specific kind of programming and is only relevant there? <comment><USER2> The problem is that currying is useful for so many things that this is a bit like asking 'what is addition useful for?'

Currying can always be implemented just by lambdas, so it does not actually enable any new behaviour, but it makes a lot of things simpler - any time you want to close over values, it can normally be neatened by using currying.

Let's say you're making a 3D renderer. You have a list of vertices (points) in object space, and you want to transform them to screenspace by multiplying by a modelview matrix and then a projection matrix.

Without currying:

      vectors fmap (\x -> multiply modelview x ) fmap (\x -> multiply projection x)

With currying:

      vectors fmap (multiply modelview) fmap (multiply projection)

</comment><comment><USER3> I'll use a C example, GUI toolkits. Look at the code example for GTK+ at:

[http://zetcode.com/tutorials/gtktutorial/gtklayoutmanagement...](http://zetcode.com/tutorials/gtktutorial/gtklayoutmanagement/)

All of the calls to gtk_fixed_put are of the form:

        gtk_fixed_put(GTK_FIXED(fixed), button1, 150, 50);

For most applications, the leftmost argument is going to be exactly the same window/buffer/menu/etc. for several calls in a row. A shortcut version like this is nice if you are going to add 25 buttons to the same widget:

        curried_put(button1, 150, 50);

You can do this sort of thing with curry, making a shortcut function.

</comment><comment><USER4> Partial application is syntactic sugar over lambdas. For example, say you have a print_with_color function:

        print_with_color(color.RED, level.INFO, "some message")

But it's to long to type, each time you want to print a message, so you define some wrappers:

        info=lambda m: print_with_color(color.GRAY, level.INFO, m)
        error=lambda m: print_with_color(color.RED, level.ERROR, m)
        warning=lambda m: print_with_color(color.YELLOW, level.WARNING, m)
        info('hi im an info')

Which works, but it is perhaps nicer to use partial:

        info=partial(print_with_color, color.GRAY, level.INFO)
        error=partial(print_with_color, color.RED, level.ERROR)
        warning=partial(print_with_color, color.YELLOW, level.WARNING)
        info('hi im an info')

You could also use it on objects:

        std=partial(stdlog.log, level.INFO)
        std('hi')
        err=partial(errlog.log, level.ERROR)
        err('bad')

Partial application saves you more in languages with syntactic support for them. There api producers design their functions with partial application in mind, unlike python where you often wish for an rpartial function because you want to partially apply from "the other side."

</comment><comment><USER5> We can think of methods in Object Oriented programming as functions with their first argument (self/this/etc.) curried.

This is a very limited form of currying though, since a) only the first argument gets curried and b) in order to access these curried functions (methods), we have to qualify them with the object they're inside. This pretty much 'cancels out' any syntactic saving we might have hoped for.

For example, compare these two implementations of the same algorithm:

        foo = function(this, x) { run(this, x, x); }
        foo(obj, 10);

        class Bar {
          function bar(x) { this.run(x, x); }
        }
        obj.bar(10);

The "foo" implementation requires us to pass in an explicit object parameter like "obj", which is then explicitly passed along to the "run" function. However, the "bar" functions are wrapped in objects, so we must specify which one we want in order to call it (eg. "obj.bar"). Likewise, inside "bar" we must look up the "run" function inside "this", so we've not actually gained anything here; we've just shuffled the tokens around!

</comment><comment><USER6> Dependency injection using currying would be some real-world example.

<comment><USER7> Can you link to an example? I've never heard of this technique and I'd like to learn more.

<comment><USER5> This has a fancy name: The Reader Monad.

Don't be scared though! Essentially it's a way of composing functions together, like a(b(c(d(...)))), but it 'skips' the first argument of every function, leaving a 'hole'. We get back a function which plugs its argument into all of these holes, ie. dependency injection!

I found these links useful for understanding the technique:

[http://lambdaman.blogspot.co.uk/2007/10/monadreader.html](http://lambdaman.blogspot.co.uk/2007/10/monadreader.html) [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14178889/reader-monad- pur...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14178889/reader-monad-purpose)

<comment><USER7> Oh, cool! I've seen examples of the Reader monad in Scala, but we use the Cake pattern for dependency injection (self types and multiple inheritance)

[http://www.cakesolutions.net/teamblogs/2011/12/19/cake- patte...](http://www.cakesolutions.net/teamblogs/2011/12/19/cake-pattern-in- depth/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I had this feeling for a while, then I notice some places it fitted into Django - for creating actions. I wrote it up.

[http://colinkingswood.blogspot.com.es/2012/04/currying-to- dy...](http://colinkingswood.blogspot.com.es/2012/04/currying-to-dynamically- poulate-django.html)</comment>


Google Rolls Out Its Panda Update Internationally - <AUTHOR> http://searchengineland.com/google-rolls-out-its-panda-update-internationally-and-begins-incorporating-searcher-blocking-data-72497

<comment><USER2> One of my sites (U.S.) got hit by this update today. It seems that it's more than just an expansion of the existing algorithm, but it looks like the use of site-blocking data will have real impact.</comment>


Wireless vehicle-to-vehicle communication would be required in new cars - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/13/13936342/wireless-vehicle-to-vehicle-communication-v2v-v2i-dot-nhtsa <comment><USER2> From the fact sheet [https://www.safercar.gov/v2v/pdf/V2V_NPRM_Fact_Sheet_121316_...](https://www.safercar.gov/v2v/pdf/V2V_NPRM_Fact_Sheet_121316_v1.pdf):

What data is exchanged? The data, known as the "basic safety message" (BSM), is exchanged between vehicles and contains vehicle dynamics information such as heading, speed, and location. The BSM is updated and broadcast up to 10 times per second to surrounding vehicles. The information is received by other vehicles equipped with V2V devices and processed to determine collision threats. Based on that information, if required, a warning could be issued to drivers to take appropriate action to avoid an imminent crash.

Will drivers' privacy be at riskw hen V2V is deployed? By design, the V2V system will not collect, broadcast, or share information linked or linkable, as a practical matter, to individuals or their vehicles. V2V-enabled vehicles exchange only generic safety information. The system is designed to operate without using any personal information about specific vehicles or drivers.

The details are at: [http://www.safercar.gov/v2v/pdf/V2V%20NPRM_Web_Version.pdf](http://www.safercar.gov/v2v/pdf/V2V%20NPRM_Web_Version.pdf) See particularly "Proposed V2V Basic Safety Message (BSM) Content". This includes a 32-bit random id, transmitting 10 messages per second, to include time, lat/lng/elevation, speed, heading, acceleration, and yaw (yaw being the rate at which the vehicle's direction is changing (i.e., the rate at which the vehicle's face is pivoting towards the left or the right).

Range will be about 300 meters.

And this goody: A PER of less than 10% aligns with the ASTM standard E2213-03 (2003) 220.127.116.11 where "(2) DSRC devices must be capable of transferring messages to and from vehicles at speeds of 85 mph with a Packet Error Rate (PER) of less than 10 % for PSDU lengths of 1000 bytes and to and from vehicles at speeds of 120 mph with a PER of less than 10 % for PSDU lengths of 64 bytes."

I expect real benefits when traffic lights could also transmit messages such as "Hey you people coming from the North and Sound, I'm going to turn red in 10 seconds."

And as an urban pedestrian, I want a portable unit. Sorry, Tesla owners, your "Ludicrous" mode may be periodically downgraded to "Meek and Mild" mode.</comment>


A radically new type of engine - <AUTHOR> http://www.autoblog.com/2009/11/30/autoline-on-autoblog-with-john-mcelroy/

<comment><USER2> It looks like a beautiful piece of engineering! I hope they are able to find a viable niche for it and push it to market!

</comment><comment><USER3> I sure wish those animations would loop. I guess I'll just cross my fingers and hope the engine is eventually featured on animatedengines.com!

<comment><USER4> You can download from <http://www.blogcdn.com/videos/www.autoblog.com/897.flv> then play in a loop using VLC. (Though yes, looping without faffing about would be great.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> How can they call this a radically new type of engine when it is still ran on petrol / diesel ( ie fossil fuel )?

</comment><comment><USER6> I remember hearing about this, and the problem was wear on the moving parts. The engine does not last long enough.

</comment><comment><USER7> It's been done (better) 60years ago - look up 'Deltic'

<comment><USER8> As for new, this engine design goes well back to steam engines. Hardly new.

<comment><USER9> Yeah I was pretty sure I'd seen that concept somewhere before. It looks cool, but certainly not "different" enough from any other piston engine design to not have been conceived and tried by now. Thanks.

<comment><USER10> It seems like the difference is how the pistons are fired. There's no fuel lost when you spontaneously start and stop the pistons with electricity, so you can only run X at a time and get better fuel economy when you don't need all the available horsepower.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Good to know that most ideas didn't have a real look : "In most cases, I simply deleted each release and went on with my work." I was just asking myself why we are still locked with petrol engines...

</comment><comment><USER12> how is this different from a flat-twin? <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat- twin>

<comment><USER13> There are two opposing pistons in each cylinder. This enables the power of a 2-stroke engine, but without the horrible emissions and inefficiency normally inherent in a 2-stroke engine, and without the valvetrain complexity of a 4-stroke.</comment></comment>


Hiring Developers in a Remote and Distributed Company - <AUTHOR> https://softwaremill.com/hiring-developers-remote-distributed-company/ <comment><USER3> I wish companies were more open about their salaries, esp. in remote roles. The discrepancies between what companies offer can be so big (like up to 3x for essentially the same job), that I often don't apply based on my prejudices ("they don't look like they'd be willing to pay too much") - and with time, I've found that my prejudices can sometimes be dead wrong.

<comment><USER4> The phrase "we want to hire passionate people" tends to re-enforce that prejudice to me. It frequently seems like marketing speak for "we want people who will write code for us outside business hours without reasonable compensation".

<comment><AUTHOR> Luckily, none of the sort. We'd like to hire people who think and think independently. There's no such thing as you've mentioned here. Good point about the wording, though, haven't thought it's used like this.

<comment><USER5> I thought you tempered your use of "passionate" with specific examples that showed it wasn't exploitive or BS. It was clear you were looking for people who could write really high quality code and who had strong thoughts on what was right.

It's when you see "passionate" without any context that it becomes a turn off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Polish language as a requirement is a big blocker I'd assume.

<comment><AUTHOR> We hire people remotely, though so it happens that they dwell mostly in Poland (plus on in the UK and one moving to SF); that gives us a bigger advantage over companies that employ locally people that must communicate in English only, e.g. by easier company get-togethers and basically smoother in-house communication.

<comment><USER7> "Next, there's a short Skype/mobile call that basically makes sure you can communicate in both Polish and English"

You hire people remotely, but they have to speak polish?

<comment><AUTHOR> From all over the country, usually. We do have two people working from abroad, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Very interesting.

"But all in all, we take aboard around 20% of the applicants who started the recruitment process."

What is the % that take the survey and move forward?

Since the 'recruitment' process starts after passing the survey.. Have you given thought to analyzing the survey results of the 80% that don't make it, and see if you could better adjust the survey or conditions to weed out more undesirable candidates earlier? It seems quite resource intensive on your side to perform this process.

<comment><AUTHOR> Around 90%.

That's a neat idea, I passed it to the recruiting tribe :) As for what's causing the people to drop out, it's mostly the tech stuff that's hard to notice in a short survey.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> An interesting post, but I'm not quite sure I see a difference in hiring protocol between hiring for remote and non-remote work.

The remote hiring process listed in the blog posts goes:

1.) Application (survey) step

2.) Basic Skype call

3.) Programming task

4.) Feedback on programming task

5.) Long technical interview

6.) Lunch invitation

At least from my own personal experiences as well as outside information I've gathered over the years, isn't this process relatively the same for hiring non-remote workers?

<comment><AUTHOR> Might be! Yet we've stumbled upon so many different doubts concerning remote work, including tracking people, mistrust, overt disregard and more, that we've thought: why not show people how we do it? Plus, some non-remote works require you to pair-program, which may be stressful for some and actually making some good impression face-to-face at which some people may not, well, excel. And talking via Skype from your living room is more comfortable than visiting an office, suited-up. Plus, you don't waste time for commuting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Do you follow up the candidates that drop out of inactivity? Is the reason that they feel they're not up to the task, lack of time or do they pursue other opportunities?

Personally I find the a technical assignment really necessary as part of an recruitment process to really get down to the candidate's "coding personality". Weakness, strengths, interesting, motivation, etc. When doing recruiting I've found that more "open answered" technical assignment are better than "solve this very specific problem".

A solution that could be discussed and put in different perspectives ("what would be the first thing you do if traffic suddenly jumped by a factor 1000", "...if the amount of data was much larger", "...if you had to support feature x...") generally reveal more skills than something more focused on specific algorithms or even syntax.

<comment><AUTHOR> We don't follow them as a rule, most of the time we hear about them doing sth else - seems that it's option 2 &3 then :)

The tech assignment is meant to check how you think AND how much you know - <USER2> think that it's easier for a programmer to spend time coding and learning than "reprogramming" their mindset (the coding personality).

As for the solution discussed - well, this checks the self-independence of a candidate, doesn't it? ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> If everyone is remote, where is that lunch held? Do you fly to them, or do they fly in to some "central" location? Just wondering what that location is if you are truly distributed...

<comment><AUTHOR> As I answered you under the blog post itself, it's mostly held in Warsaw or any other big Polish city the person applying is based near :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Makes sense until you get to the part about "having lunch together".

How does that work when remote workers are hundreds of miles away?

</comment><comment><USER13> "We don't have HR"... Sounds like they are risking a github-style fiasco.</comment>