Ask HN: Recommendations on Learning Photoshop? - <AUTHOR>

Hi, over the years I've worked to round out my design skills by reading books like Don't Make Me Think, the Non-Designers Design Book, Bulletproof CSS, and Handcrafted CSS.
One area where I feel like I'm sorely lacking is Photoshop. Right now I cobble some basic stuff together using Acorn.  I'm looking for a good way of learning PS from the perspective of modern web/app design.  I don't care about photo editing, etc. which many books focus on.  I want to be able to rely on myself for cranking out your standard web/app elements.  The more of this I can do on my own, the better since it means I can iterate faster without waiting for a designer to send stuff my way.
By no means do I think designers are irrelevant.  I just need "good enough" to let me iterate faster.  Any recommendations? <comment><USER2> I think the best way is just by doing. You start with an idea in mind, for example a metallic logo for a website , or a wood background texture for an iphone app, or rounded border gradient button. So look for tutorials in google, you will find a lot, so look for one you like the final result and make it.

By doing tutorials you will learn a lot of tricks and concepts on how to combine layers, styles, create shapes, etc... at the same time you will get work done (with better or worse results but done) Then becoming a pixel perfect designer it's just a matter of practice, and by combining the tricks and concepts you will learn in the tutorials, you will be able to do whatever you may want.

You will find nice tutorials in places like:

<http://psd.tutsplus.com/>

<http://www.smashingmagazine.com/>

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd consider Illustrator instead. It's vector based, it's great for layout, and boxes are _boxes_ , not a set of pixels are are coincidentally shaped like a rectangle (admittedly, Photoshop is also capable of this, but it's much more limited). It's also intuitive - you move things by clicking on them and dragging them. Pretty much all of the things it seems that you'd like to do would be possible and easy to do in Illustrator. As you said, you're not interested in photo editing.

If you do decide to stick with Photoshop (and they're by no means mutually exclusive, as long as you're willing to pay for both), stay away from old tutorials. Recent versions introduced nice nondestructive things, like smart objects, smart filters, and layer styles. Those are much preferable to the destructive alternatives that we had to use in the past.

<comment><USER4> Don't ever use illustrator for web design. Monitors uses pixels and you need to work in pixels if you expect to do great work. Use Illustrator when you are illustrating.

<comment><USER5> My design partner uses Illustrator for layout quite successfully. It doesn't handle pixel perfect layouts but gets us so close so quickly that it's well worth it. Out final stage involves editing the UI "sprites" in Photoshop for pixel perfection. So, yes, Illustrator is a valid web design package.

<comment><USER6> No need for that step, ask you designer to try this. In settings, make set all increments to pixels. Then set the grid to 1px X 1px (in some unobtrusive color) When creating a new doc, always go to view / (check) snap to grid / then whenever making a sprite simply put everything together, and draw a rectangle around it. With the rectangle still selected, make sure its height and width are in even pixels, and Go to object / artboards / convert to artboard. Hit save for web, and you are done! (hint, make sure strokes are always set to inside, or outside, and never centered, adobe defaults to center, so creating some reusable graphic styles can make this quicker) I have created a special key command for convert to artboard, since I use it about 80 times a day. Also, its typically better to double click and enter height and width then to draw a rectangle to insure the dimensions are in absolute pixels.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _Don't learn Photoshop._

"I want to be able to rely on myself for cranking out your standard web/app elements."

I had the same problem (learning Photoshop) with that exact reasoning a year ago. I learned Photoshop and got pretty decent with it in terms of what I could do, although I was far from able to design anything beautiful.

Then I learned there is a much better way for us developers: buying templates.

If what you want is to have a decent design for your site, but you can't afford or don't want to wait for a professional designer, buying templates is the _best_ thing you can do. You can get a beautiful-looking template for as little as $10-$20 dollars, and they'll be much better than you could hope to accomplish with limited time.

Also, if you're looking to just throw up a website quickly, I'd look into getting it set up with WordPress + a commercial template. It will take you 3 hours to get a beautiful-looking website up on the net, and you can always copy the design (and the design's code) if you want to make a web-app with the same theme. This is what I use for all my sites - a quick WordPress site with a theme from WooThemes, and a web-app (sitting on a subdomain) with the same theme, copied from the original template.

Resources:

WooThemes - beautiful and very easy to use themes for WordPress (and a few other CMS', I believe). <http://www.woothemes.com/>

ThemeForest - also great themes, available for WordPress or as just plain html/css/js files you can play with. <http://themeforest.net/>

ThemeForest Admin Templates - I just learned about this one. ThemeForest templates, but that are specifically designed to serve as an "administration interface" for a webapp. In other words, if you're building a web application, these themes have _everything_ you need. I haven't used one yet, but I'll definitely be buying a theme from here the next time I build a webapp. [http://themeforest.net/category/site-templates/admin- templat...](http://themeforest.net/category/site-templates/admin-templates)

Oh, by the way, if you're interested in learning Photoshop just for fun, I really recommend the Lynda videos - <http://www.lynda.com/>.

<comment><USER8> themeforest: no, no, no!!

I've made the mistake of using those for some clients sites on a budget. Like 7 of them, so a good sample.

Can you believe on average the bugs in those themes actually made us waste more time than building our own?

WPMU Dev themes also have a low quality level (one didn't even validate...).

I don't know about woothemes or elegantthemes, they might have a good quality and support but there are too much of them around and looking exactly like a site I've already seen is a bad thing in my book.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I've been designing (read: wasting time) in Photoshop for years now. Taking your path now - lest Photoshop. I use it to generate nice noise. Make some visual effects or resize thigns.

Biggest reason is that photoshop forces you to get into details. Taking your focus away from design - that' will be _why something is there_? Is it the best way to put it? best size? Can there be better layout? What do you want users to do? What do you want them to think? THat's design and Photoshop doesn't respect it.

Do not waste a single minute trying to learn that monster. It's meant for Photos, not for design.

</comment><comment><USER10> Sounds like you should learn some Illustrator as well for the type of geometric elements you seem to have in mind. What I like to do is create elements in Illustrator, then copy & paste them into Photoshop for assembly. That way you get an immediate reality check by rasterizing. Of course you save the Illustrator file with all it's elements so you can re-paste as needed. (Illustrator's typography works better than Photoshop's; and of course there is a much better set of drawing tools.)

</comment><comment><USER11> Just been going through this process myself. I usually use Fireworks, but wanted to learn Photoshop since there are so many more resources available. Here's some that I've found helpful:

\- <http://365psd.com/> and <http://designmoo.com/> \- Both have free, high- quality (for the most part) PSD's you can download. Sometimes for me the most helpful thing is just seeing how someone else constructed something. How many layers they used, which layer styles created a certain effect, etc.

\- <http://methodandcraft.com/> \- Just recently launched, but already has some nice videos I've learned a lot from.

\- <http://photoshopetiquette.com/> \- A bunch of quick tips

\- <http://bjango.com/articles/> \- All the design articles are great

\- <http://designthencode.com/> \- Can't vouch for this personally as I haven't gone through it myself, but looks like a really great and detailed guide.

</comment><comment><USER12> I love Photoshop and have been using it forever, but it is really for photos. For web graphics its really all about Illustrator, and maybe InDesign if you want to get into layouts - they're almost the same, but InDesign is geared more towards print so you get a lot more visual queues for object placement, etc. I would go with Illustrator though, and with growing browser support for the SVG format knowing how to create vector images will become an increasingly important skill for developers/designers.

If you just want something to touch up photos, GIMP is pretty good and free. Its like an older version of Photoshop. If I just need to fix the color balance or crop an image, I usually find myself opening up GIMP just to knock it out quickly.

With any of these programs, its good to spend time playing around (sometimes known as practice), and then you'll have a better basis for understanding the more in-depth features. There's tons of stuff on Youtube dealing with specific tasks, you just need to know what to search for in the first place.

</comment><comment><USER13> For color correction you cannot do better than this book: [http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Photoshop-Classic- Guide-C...](http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Photoshop-Classic-Guide- Correction/dp/0764536958)

It's a great book for engineers working with color, as its principles are explained through color theory and the mathematical relationships between colors.

Most photoshop 'experts' are people who have dicked around with it forever and just haphazardly learned the tools, Margulis comes from a much more empirical place and shows how to manipulate color in ways that are more natural and less damaging to images by using as few tools as possible.

Additionally, you'll learn a ton about color theory, which is worthwhile by itself.

If you finish that book, this one is awesome as well: [http://www.amazon.com/Photoshop-LAB-Color-Adventures- Colorsp...](http://www.amazon.com/Photoshop-LAB-Color-Adventures- Colorspace/dp/0321356780)

<comment><USER14> That is, indeed, good material, but I suspect that OP is probably better served by content that addresses how to draw with vectors, use layer styles, etc. That stuff is the juice for making UI elements and mockups.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> To threadjack a bit, what about the equivalent for Illustrator? I've made myself minimally proficient in photoshop, but when it comes to creating something new (like an icon, etc.) I'm lost in Illustrator.

<comment><USER16> Going with the same theme as the advice I gave above I'd suggest visiting Nettuts Vector/Illustrator site: <http://vector.tutsplus.com/>

They posted a tutorial just today that would probably teach you a good 80% of what you need to know: <http://tinyurl.com/3vo3cqv>

<comment><USER15> Fantastic. Thank you, good sir.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Check out lynda.com. They have some good lectures for free, and a huge library for 25/mo.

</comment><comment><USER18> This may be unorthodox but maybe try learning without Photoshop? I built <http://gumroad.com/> without it and it has the added benefits of: 1) forced simplicity, 2) speed building it and, 3) speed for users.

</comment><comment><USER19> Strongly agree that using photoshop for web design is going the way of the dinosaurs. Don't bother learning the wrong skills. Designers who can't code will need to adapt to new tools or (figuratively) die off. Browser-based web design applications are going to be the wave of the future.

My take on the browser-based web design web app (+ css animation) First prototype: <http://editroom.splatcollision.com> HN thread: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2408173>

</comment><comment><USER20> Once I started treating "learning X" with the following mentality, I had the best results:

Have a project. Want to learn some photoshop, find a picture/logo/whatever that you want to emulate. Or whatever you want to create, think of what techniques are involved and learn those. Don't try and learn 3D text if you're thinking of creating a logo with a gradient. Google "photoshop gradients", and make sure it's from a credible source (such as psdtuts).

I find if I'm only learning what I want to learn, I don't get bored, so I stay motivated to learn, and simply exploring a tool/language/et al, I will become curious and branch out from what I was originally planning to learn, and thus learn new things organically, rather than forced. So for example, if I'm creating a Web 2.0 and I start using Inner glow, that might entice me to learn about drop shadows, and how the overlay tool works and what the difference is between "Multiply" and "Darker". Give it a shot and see if that gives you some direction.

</comment><comment><USER21> Having been in your position about 6 years ago, reading a ton of books and websites, I'd def. say don't waste your money on books about programs like photoshop/illustrator, etc, as they become outdated very quickly.

Take fgblanch's advice, he (she) knows what they are talking about. The number one place to become a psd ninja would def. be psdtuts (psd.tutsplus.com). The great thing about it is besides the fact that they have video and step by step tutorial, if you are in a hurry, most times you can just download the already created 'standard web element' being featured in the tutorial, and tweak it to your liking.

Also smashing mag is pretty awesome too, they feature great step by step tutorials, and also frequently post beautiful icon sets, images, fonts, textures and examples for your graphic inspiration needs.

</comment><comment><USER16> I was looking for the same thing a while back and a friend recommended a book to me called Photoshop: Down and Dirty Tricks (<http://tinyurl.com/3hqdumj>). For me it was the best advice because I prefer to learn by doing. The Amazon link I provided has a "look inside" feature so you can see how the tutorials are structured and decide for yourself if it would work for you.

It is meant for people who already know a little Photoshop but if you know enough to use Acorn you should be fine.

</comment><comment><USER22> I haven't tried it myself yet but a lot of people seem to prefer Fireworks. My experience with Photoshop so far is that it's adequate for web work but clearly wasn't designed with this in mind.

</comment><comment><USER23> I'd recommend Fireworks if you want to iterate the whole layout and if you don't need to invest too much time polishing the graphic style of UI elements. Fireworks has a lot more direct manipulation of the canvas elements.

Photoshop on the other hand has more and better graphics manipulation tools: color pickers blending options and effects. It you need to come up with a carefully crafted graphic style, use Photoshop.

I use both, depends on the task I need to do.

</comment><comment><USER24> I also used Acorn but found DrawIt to be much better suited for web stuff (icons, buttons, gradients, etc.), and it's way simpler than Photoshop.

</comment><comment><USER25> Do LOTS of tutorials on the adobe site of the type of things you're trying to do. Get a "learn by tutorial" book. You'll pick up the toolset that way pretty fast.

I do second the person in this thread though that points you at fireworks. While I can do things in photoshop, many items come super fast in fireworks.

</comment><comment><USER26> To become proficient in PhotoShop will take a long time. If anything it will make you iterate slower, much slooower !

Just hire a comptent designer and work together to iterate fast, really FAST! It will work out less costly and your productivity will increase.

</comment><comment><USER27> learn to leverage layer styles

<comment><USER28> It's all about vectors masks and layer styles. Wanna make a sweet glossy button? It's just a simple rounded rectangle vector mask with a gradient fill, drop shadow, inner/outer glow and texture overlay.

Also learn about blending options/modes (i.e. screen, multiply, overlay, etc.) for combining effects.

Also subscribe to the RSS feed of 365psd.com, download each day's psd and figure out how it works.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Check out youtube for the "You suck at photoshop" tutorials. They are amusing and really informative.

</comment><comment><USER30> You should definitely learn how holding control, shift and alt (or some combo thereof) in combination with the mouse (click, drag, wheel) will effect all the various tools. This goes for any mouse heavy graphical editor (illustrator, blend, fireworks, etc)

</comment><comment><USER31> the only tutorial you need is: <http://bit.ly/56xOzK></comment>


Windows 10, the cluelessness shows at step one - <AUTHOR> http://fourlightyears.blogspot.com/2015/06/windows-10-cluelessness-shows-at-step.html

<comment><USER2> The user is presented with a ready-made ISO image, yet the writer finds using it to be "deeply arcane, difficult and problematic"?

Wow.

Had he shown up at old-school Linux copyfests and installfests, he'd probably have us participants all burned as witches.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unix people and technical people in general have a hard time grasping how ordinary people would feel about such a task.

<comment><USER3> Exactly. It's no problem at all for someone who knows what they're doing, and this guy clearly isn't a really technical person, but Windows 10 is a consumer product. It's 2015 - make your damn computers easier to use.</comment></comment></comment>


"The way C handles pointers was a brilliant innovation." (1993 Knuth interview) - <AUTHOR> http://tex.loria.fr/historique/interviews/knuth-clb1993.html <comment><USER2> _I spent fifteen years using electronic mail on the ARPANET and the Internet. Then, in January 1990, I stopped, because it was taking up too much of my time to sift through garbage._

</comment><comment><USER3> I think this paragraph was very interesting:

> All through my life, I've always used the programming language that blended > best with the debugging system and operating system that I'm using. If I had > a better debugger for language X, and if X went well with the operating > system, I would be using that.

I love Lisp, I love Python. But are their debugging tools and OS integration as good as .NET development or Java development?

<comment><USER4> _But are their debugging tools and OS integration as good as .NET development or Java development?_

Most Lisp programmers don't dig themselves into the holes that the .NET and Java debuggers are good at getting you out of.

Also, if Emacs is your OS, CL integrates quite well.

<comment><USER5> What you're saying is that Python & Lisp debugging tools and OS integration are as good as .NET and Java. I agree.

The problem is that it's hard to convince other people of that, without forcing them to try it for a while.

<comment><USER4> Agreed. UNIX is the IDE for Lisp and Python. It's very functional and very customizable, but the learning curve is kind of high. So high, in fact, that most people never realize it's an IDE.

<comment><USER6> How high? I've been trying to learn lisp for a while, and it's been kicking my ass. How long did it take you?

<comment><USER4> A day spent reading the emacs lisp manual was enough to productive. CL is a whole 'nother animal, but once you get a feel for the language, it's just a matter of searching the hyperspec. Eventually you learn that the function you are trying to implement is probably already built in in about 12 different variants.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > I'm going to have fascicles of about 128 pages coming out twice a year. > We're gathering four of them before we come out with the first two actually; > we're going to keep some in the pipeline! Look for the first fascicles in > 1995 or 1996; they will be beta-test versions of the real books. I'm > thinking I can finish Volume IV (parts A, B, and C) in the year 2003, Volume > V in 2008, then come out with new editions of Volume I, II, and III, then > work on VI and VII... There will be a "Reader's Digest" version of volumes I > through V.

I guess there's been a little bit of schedule slippage:

<http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/taocp.html>

Volume 5 is "Estimated to be ready in 2015."

</comment><comment><USER8> Doing away with bare pointers and having "object references" was an even better one. You get the most useful part of the power of pointers, but none of the potential headaches.

</comment><comment><USER9> I think his comment about IMP might apply to a few of the terser modern languages (emphasis mine):

"The second thing about IMP was that it was an extremely terse language. For example, where in PASCAL you would say "IF X > 0 THEN...", in IMP you say "X+=>". In other words, your program was very short. _You felt like you were writing elegant programs, because there were only a few characters, but you couldn't read them the next day!_ Being very terse meant that you couldn't fathom this bunch of marks on the page..."</comment>


Simple Contracts are Better Contracts: the Meltdown of the DAO - <AUTHOR> https://blog.blockstack.org/simple-contracts-are-better-contracts-what-we-can-learn-from-the-dao-6293214bad3a#.x8njdgum1 <comment><USER2> How many of the TheDAO Curator members are lawyers?

Contracts are agreements that are meant to be legally enforceable. The enforcer has always been the King, a local governmental authority and a third party. The very concept of a contract assumes the neutral third party. That third party is to interpret the contract, identify potential scoundrels, nullify illegal contracts and generally make sure everyone isn't playing games. Smart contracts seek to sidestep that ancient structure by replacing the neutral third party with an inflexible machine. Good luck with that.

Contract language is also meant as a manifestation of intent. Smart contracts seek a perfect manifestation, dismissing all notions of imperfect knowledge or misunderstanding. Typos rarely matter in real contracts. Intent can trump language where appropriate. But in smart contracts typos are everything. Good luck with that too.

<comment><USER3> I'll make a prediction about where this is going longterm. Smart contracts will take off despite their rigidity but we will start writing them to include common law arbitration protocols. The arbiters will initially be 1 or more human but as the block chain begins to evolve it's own common law(s), fuzzy machine arbiters will emerge to fill the "incompleteness".

<comment><USER2> >>... to include common law arbitration protocols.

That's a great example of the sort of ambiguity that an arbitrator must deal with. Do you mean to refer to "the common law" as in the body of law descending from the brits, or do you mean the common law principals of precedent and authority? Or do you mean only the concept of precedent by which past decisions under similar fact patterns are used to inform decisions regarding new fact patterns. I have some assumptions based on your choice of language and my best guesses as to your cultural background, but good luck finding a machine capable of such understanding. If we crack that, then much of our culture is moot and the robots can be left to run things.

<comment><USER3> I mean a "concept of precedent by which past decisions under similar fact patterns are used to inform decisions regarding new fact patterns." Without the need for territorial jurisdiction there will be many competing (but still distinct) common law groups. Signatories would pick a lineage at signing (npm install JAMS).

We'll start with human only arbiters, (panel of three from JAMS for example) then moved to mixed panels, then totally mechanical arbiters will handle most disputes once they're good enough.

<comment><USER4> _then totally mechanical arbiters will handle most disputes once they 're good enough._

I'm not seeing it. Who's going to enforce the outcomes of machine dispute resolution? I mean, who's going to even want to sign up to the machine dispute resolution? Not me, no way, that's the freaky dystopian future we're supposed to be trying to avoid.

<comment><USER3> Business wants a reliable and predictable legal system. They don't care that the judge has a pulse. If the machine looses it and starts making terrible decisions, people would just start using a different arbitration group. You could probably even update old (well written) contracts to accommodate that.

<comment><USER2> Business wants a just and fair legal system.

Reliability and predictability are extraordinarily easy. For example: he who pays the most to the judge wins. That's very reliable, very predictable. It can be automated. Decisions can be taken instantaneously with absolute and perfect certainty as to who should be the victor. But it isn't just or fair, nor is it friendly to business.

<comment><USER5> Business wants to maximize profit. It supports justice and fairness to the extent that they aid the production of profit and absolutely no further.

A just legal system may be imposed upon businesses, but the desire of each business is to transform that system into one where it receives maximum benefit for minimum expenditure.

Your example isn't desirable because it maximizes expenditure, not because it minimizes justice.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Can code both embody and replace law for the exact function for which it is set up?

DAO strives to execute through code an idealized pooled investment system by which contract issues are resolved entirely by code and wholly apart from any external societal legal or enforcement mechanisms.

All well and good but, where people are involved, code simply cannot define all the relations needed to capture what the law does (and, indeed, and in spite of its flaws, does very well indeed).

Consider the argument that the exploit here is not a flaw at all but just another variation on what the code does, with the result that investors who suddenly are $50M lighter in their wallets have not been harmed at all and should have no recourse to any remedy to restore their funds to them. The idea here is that the code _is_ the contract and, if that is what the code does, well, that is what you bargained for, whether this is good or bad from any particular moral perspective. Right at the entry point of the system is a prominent disclaimer that says this in exact words. So a contract is a contract. If you don't like the result, tough.

The participants here are wealthy and presumably sophisticated investors. What if they aren't? What if this were marketed to a lot of gullible small investors who were induced to part with their money through various representations stating that their funds were entirely safe, subject only to normal investment risks relating to the underlying companies they funded? What does society do when people like this lose their life savings when some newly discovered "feature" of the code allows a sharpie to walk away with their funds? Are they to have no legal recourse because a "contract is a contract," especially if it embodied in code?

And what happens if a system is set up and the person or persons who find the new "feature" enabling them to walk away with other people's funds are the very people who organized the fund? Does law from the broader world step in to provide a remedy to those who lost their money? Or does the "contract is a contract, especially in code" logic work to deny any remedy to the participants here as well?

And, setting aside any of the more extreme examples, what if it is simply the case that those who did participate had reasonable expectations that any code that would define and limit their rights would do all that was expected in terms of defining their investments but would include safeguards that would prevent anyone from simply coming in to remove their funds altogether (dare I say "steal")? What if they were misled into having such expectations by promoters of the venture who said or implied that such safeguards existed? Is it enough to say that none of this matters because of some disclaimer buried in fine print? Is all of this simply irrelevant just because a "contract is a contract, especially in code"?

Contracts are part of any system of law that includes private property, and a very important part at that.

But contracts can never define the totality of the law that applies to a given situation, even if the parties swear up and down that that is their intent.

That is why securities laws exist, to help investors who get swindled by sharpies with well-honed contracts.

That is why the laws relating to fraud exist, to help those who are misled by others to their financial detriment.

Indeed, that is why a sophisticated body of laws exists relating to contracts themselves, to cover cases where the intent of the parties is sometimes so frustrated by one thing or another as to make it inequitable to enforce a contract.

Law is and always has existed in multiple layers. Legislatures pass statutes but courts exist to interpret them to cover specific cases as disputes arise. The same with administrative regulations promulgated by agencies. Even within the courts themselves, common law courts would declare legal "rules" only to have courts of equity intervene to correct things where the "rules" led to harsh or inequitable results.

Basically, all of this is another way of saying that human relations are complex and any system of laws and justice needs to be able to handle such complexity if it is to be worthy of being a system of justice.

Perhaps in narrow cases, things such as DAO can be set up to create a rich guy's playground of sorts in which, for the overwhelming number of cases, outside laws play no part within the self-contained system. Perhaps there is even an ideal of some type to be realized here (get rid of lawyers, etc.).

But no such system can ever be utterly divorced from the rules of the broader society. Ideal or no ideal, this is just not how the law works. Apart perhaps from some survivalist society or other, people simply cannot exempt themselves from the general rules of law no matter how much they desire to do so. They can limit the application of such broader laws to a degree but, when key bounds are transgressed, the law will apply in its full force regardless of their intentions.

So, I would say that the curators here probably had no choice. It was either do what they did or watch as lawsuits followed, probably in abundance. This may have violated some ideal in play here but it was a pragmatic necessity given how law in reality works (and always will work).

<comment><USER7> > But contracts can never define the totality of the law that applies to a > given situation, even if the parties swear up and down that that is their > intent.

I think this is true, and this is probably all you had to say.

> Can code both embody and replace law for the exact function for which it is > set up?

Sure, yeah. 99.9999% of people in rich code-enforced transactional systems like EVE Online and the NASDAQ order book are content with how code has replaced and embodied the "law" (or more broadly, "how things work"), despite the fact that people win and lose at this video game and in the real stock market all the time. It's clearly not just about people being mad and losing a ton of their money, because that happens in the stock market all the time but losers rarely sue NASDAQ.

It's just when people do sue NASDAQ, hilariously, it's when there's bugs in the order book / exchange code, or shutdowns of the market due to technical errors. Do you see how that is different? What matters isn't whether or not a "contract is a contract," but whether or not there are bugs.

A bug is a concrete thing. It's not something you can abstract away into your bigger point about "human relations" and a "system of laws."

You can write a test for nearly all kinds of bugs and show very confidently that whatever the issue was, it won't happen again. There's no such thing as unit tests for laws, unless you get so abstract as to lose everything essential about unit tests. You can reproduce bugs in code infinitely, but you don't get to re-adjudicate disagreements in contracts infinitely. There's so much that's different between disagreements over legal interpretations and a software bug that you're missing why people view the fork as relatively uncontroversial.

There was a bug in the code which led to an exploit. It isn't a refutation of law being embodied in code. It's just a refutation that this particular exciting contract system wasn't treated like the multi-hundred-million dollar software product it turned out to be. The story is smaller than you make it to be.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> There are two fundamental problems with Etherium contracts.

1\. They're executable programs. They could have been a set of declarative rules listed in priority order, but no, the designers went overboard and made them general programs with loops and recursion. There are straightforward ways to analyze sets of rules; they're usually amenable to case analysis. It's hard to analyze programs.

Writing a declarative contract language is a challenge. But doing so forces the designers to think through what they want the system to be able to do, and what they don't want it to do. Doing contracts as executable programs is punting on the problem. It says "we don't know how to do this, so we'll dump the problem on the users."

2\. The stack overflow problem is idiotic. The system should have been designed so that if a program aborts, anything it did is rolled back. That's the design flaw this attack exploits.

<comment><USER9> To be fair, ethereum has bytecode at its base- almost certainly someone will wrote a more declarative language on top of it now to help minimize the chance that unexpected calling trees can lead to unexpected behavior.

Also, the existing solidity language is pretty well designed, it's just a hard problem and an even better design may be needed.

<comment><USER8> _Almost certainly someone will wrote a more declarative language on top of it_

Papering over the mold seldom works. It makes things _easier_ , not _more reliable_. See C++ templates.

<comment><USER9> A better example is Haskell, which usually compiles down to a low level C dialect.

<comment><USER10> Any language can compile to the low level C dialect.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Bailing out the DAO undermines the core value propositions of Ethereum - contract immutability (stability) and decentralization. I understand that the argument is "this is a special (ie, too big to fail) case; however, who can be sure?

IMO the better way to handle this is to acknowledge the mistake and let it fail. It's embarrassing I get it. Honestly, the big bank types who threw millions at this tech without doing due diligence deserve to lose their shirt. It's called speculation for a reason.

If the core team cares about the long term credibility of the project with the people who real matter - the tech community - they will not bail it out.

Edit:

For anyone interested, there's a really great discussion on this subject at the Ethereum reddit [https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/4oiqj7/critical_u...](https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/4oiqj7/critical_update_re_dao_vulnerability/)

</comment><comment><USER12> "Simple Contracts are Better Contracts" has always been the mantra of the Ethereum and DAO team. Most times when a security question was raised, "simple contracts" was their defacto answer [1].

This exploit suggests that the most competent developers in this space, who always preached simple contracts, are not yet able to consistently write secure contracts.

Also, the OP states the importance of being able to update a contract. As of last year that meant the original contract MUST include a self-modifying code provision. Self-modifying code doesn't align well with keeping your code simple.

As an aside, "contracts" are Ethereum's raison d'être and the Ether currency value is largely based on adoption. Even though this exploit did not expose a flaw in the Ethereum block chain, the Ether sell-off is an expected consequence.

Lastly does anyone have a link to the original contract code and how it could be rewritten so that it isn't vulnerable to this exploit ?

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cahj4WJtp20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cahj4WJtp20) Q&A at 42m44s is relevant.

Edit: corrected time stamp for above video

<comment><USER13> "Most competent developers"? There are probably thousands of better informed developers/researchers who would not attempt to set up such a company _before they have stronger formal guarantees_.

Of course, if you want to be first-to-market, none of that seems to matter.

<comment><USER14> Strong formal guarantees are complicated see? and we run around telling ourselves that simple is better, so we keep writing shit code.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Simple contracts then are only as scalable, reliable, and secure as the code that runs off the blockchain.

Arguably, that defeats the whole purpose because it is then who controls the code (since it is no longer decentralized), controls the contract.

If I'm reading this right (I'm not 100% sure of that), this is the equivalent almost of not running a blockchain at all (if the idea is taken to its finality).

Storing the who and the what of contracts has never really been the issue, its been the execution and the honoring of the contract that man has not yet solved.

But centralizing the code that runs the contracts, and taking it off the blockchain doesn't sound like the way to do it.

<comment><USER4> What is supposed to give us the impression the problem of contract execution hasn't been solved?

A huge majority of contracts are never disputed, carried out to completion or ran as a going concern without any issues. Contracts are routinely renegotiated when one or both parties have a change in circumstances, or at specific time intervals. Only a very tiny fraction of contracts are ever disputed, and fewer of those reach the courts.

I don't understand the problem trying to be solved here.

<comment><USER2> >> I don't understand the problem trying to be solved here.

Lawyers. They want to get rid of the lawyers.

It's a common desire. Like politicians, you want to get rid of them up until the day you actually need one. That day may have come for smart contracts. Does anyone here doubt TheDAO are now seeking legal advice on this matter?

<comment><USER4> Exactly. If you write a crummy contract but believe it is sound, then set out to convince other people of it soundness, and they sign up and pour their money in, and then the contract leaks, who's responsible? ... well, next minute: lawyers.

We'll first have to invent, and deploy at scale, the immutable person before we can have the perfect contract 100% of the time.

So long as people change, minds are fallible, misunderstandings and disagreements continue to occur, interpretation and intent are going to be fuzzy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> As a software engineer everything here rings true to me.

Use as simple of tools as possible when programming and offer many ways for mere humans to change code and review correctness and review, approve and roll back critical transactions.

But this sounds effectively like the status quo with credit cards and Kickstarter.

So I'm not sure what a blockchain adds other than a different platform and maintainers than the existing financial and group purchasing corporations.

</comment><comment><USER17> The AI equivalent to a recursive call bug are self-replicating Von Neumann probe paperclip maximixers that consume the entire universe. We're going to be in a world of hurt if we aren't able to sort this out. It's pretty essential that machines are able to discern our intent or the spirit of our contracts one way or another.

<comment><USER18> Easy solution: just hide all of the paper in some other universe :) On a serious note, well said.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> If the contract code can be upgraded by the majority of involved parties, it would be simple to buy 51% of the voting power and change the code to pay out everything else. Each takeover would double your wallet. Am I missing something here?

<comment><USER17> 51% attacks are a known issue. A sustained 51% attack is pretty much an existential threat to any blockchain. So I doubt the issue gets any better when dealing with individual contracts.

[https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/05/15/long-range-attacks- the-...](https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/05/15/long-range-attacks-the-serious- problem-with-adaptive-proof-of-work/)

[http://ethereum.stackexchange.com/a/544](http://ethereum.stackexchange.com/a/544)

<comment><USER19> Thank you for your valuable input. The problem I see is not in having 51% of the whole capacity of the blockchain, but of the smaller entities/organizations/contract codes. With the proposed simple contracts, the little 'start-up' contract codes with little voting power will easily get acquired by bigger ones, which then vote for a code change to pay out the remaining shares. This is much more realistic that the traditional 51% attacks. Letting the majority of a small DAO-like organization vote for code change (which translates to law-change) will not only be used to fix bugs, but to change the contract to the majorities advantage. This may eventually result in one single big contract code that incorporates every new organization on the horizon.

<comment><USER20> It should be possible to define that you need e.g. 90% of the shareholders to approve a change to the contract. The 90% could still steal money from the 10%.

<comment><USER17> It is. The example code for a DAO [0] illustrates how everything from minimum quorum for proposals to margin of votes for a majority is configurable. However like you said, so long as the contract is mutable, it's possible for a majority to subvert it.

[0]: [https://www.ethereum.org/dao](https://www.ethereum.org/dao)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> If simple contracts, where much of the code is off chain, are to be the way of things it begs the question, why do we even need Turing complete contacts in the first place. A blockchain could be created which has a few fixed rules which enable the basics of a DAO with much lower risk.

</comment><comment><USER22> I ended up writing an article explaining my position on the whole thing: [https://blog.simpleblend.net/dao-attack-whos- blame/](https://blog.simpleblend.net/dao-attack-whos-blame/)

</comment><comment><USER23> Thought this was a commentary on the poor API contracts exposed by data access objects

</comment><comment><USER24> I may be stepping outside of my area of expertise, but doesn't this seem like a perfect place to apply formal verification tools? As long as the contract isn't too long, it should be possible to ensure that the implementation exactly matches the specification.

</comment><comment><USER25> I really wanted to know about the Data Access Object.

</comment><comment><USER26> Just from reading commentators here at HN, it doesn't seem like these issues were unforeseen. Rather, it seemed that whatever intense optimism exists around cryptocurrencies is capable of overwhelming investor sense in return for the promise of some ideological "win".

<comment><USER27> I feel like this might be a semi-unpopular opinion, but frankly I'm getting tired of the idea that a blockchain is the solution to every single problem the human race faces.

There's this almost religious level of looking the other way whenever there's some sort of failure in a blockchain system, and they always say "that was a one-off situation"

<comment><USER28> I'm also finding the "blockchain all the things" concept ... perplexing.

I really don't understand the mechanism or dynamics.

It seems I'm not the only one.

There's a growing set of evidence of breakdown among institutions founded on or around Blockchain: Bitcoin, MtGox, Ethereum, others.

And a profound failure to either understand or acknowledge (and I'm not sure which of the two it is predominantly, or how much it varies by individual) what money, currency, and contract actually are.

<comment><USER27> I'm not a dumb person by any stretch of the imagination, and I actually got lost in the weeds when trying to read _The DAO_ 's website and what exactly it does and how it works.

(which is a hilariously confusing thing to name a brand; "Which DAO are you talking about?" "The DAO" "Yes but which one")

There's situations where blockchains are a good idea, but there's many cases where they aren't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Code is law! Ohh, ummm, err, uhhh, except when we say it's not.</comment>


Show HN: Building a Formula1 (Game) Telemetry Display Using Crystal and RethinkDB - <AUTHOR> http://devan.blaze.com.au/blog/2017/10/28/racing-along-building-a-telemetry-system-using-crystal-rethinkdb <comment><USER2> Very cool. Is there any need to wait until after pushing to rethinkdb before updating the websockets? I'd look for I/O concurrency here and block until they're all complete.

<comment><AUTHOR> Possibly, that might make it faster and eliminate further blocking.

The entire convert/save/push to websockets activity though, is done on a separate _fibre_ in Crystal - essentially a spawned background thread. So even if one packet went awry, it shouldn't really block subsequent packets from coming through. I suppose I could go further, and within the spawned fibre, I could spawn _another_ fibre for the write ops so it didn't get in the way of the web socket push op.

But then again, when I checked the Crystal CPU and memory footprint, it was really low, and even at the highest UDP telemetry rate of 60Hz, I don't think I lost any packets due to Crystal's sheer speed of handling them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Any reason on why not open-sourcing this? Seems like a fun project to work on. Not much in worth tho.

<comment><AUTHOR> I may do that, once I clean up the code a little I might throw it up on Github so that others can tweak and improve it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Really surprised codemasters included a telemetry feed from the game, that's so cool.

Imagine if more games did that?

<comment><AUTHOR> I believe _most_ of the Codemasters racing games do have this feature. Documentation is a little scarce though, and we have to rely on their forum for information.

I was actually surprised by the number of third party racing wheels and displays that took advantage of this telemetry though. There are a lot of them that are now virtually indistinguishable from the real hardware in how they operate.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How did you find your side project partner? - <AUTHOR> Non-solo founders...
If you're technical, how did you find the business person?
If you're the business brains, where did you find your technical partner?
Who came up with the idea? <comment><USER2> My first business partner was a good friend from high school and college roommate after college I convinced him he could build something I wanted to try, and then gave him half the company :). We worked together for ~12 years and then went our separate ways after a few companies together. It didn't end well but that is a separate story.

New business partner, I found on HN, hired him for some freelance work for 6 months, then pitched him on an idea and now working on it together :).

</comment><comment><USER3> Non-technical founder here. I found my side-project co-founder by talking about my ideas with everyone who might listen. He was a colleague who had a little extra time.

</comment><comment><USER4> It's a lot like dating. Sometimes you just pick up anyone who's happy to listen.

</comment><comment><USER5> I found my last co-founder on CoFoundersLab. Always open for new adventures btw.</comment>


Unfortunately.tech – a collection of rejection letters - <AUTHOR> https://unfortunately.tech/ <comment><USER2> When I was job hunting I sincerely appreciated any rejection letter at any stage of the process, be it automated or personal. Obviously an offer letter would be better but the absolute worst is hearing nothing back. We should be praising the companies that take the time (or implement the automated process) to send the rejection letters and not leave us hanging.

<comment><USER3> _Obviously an offer letter would be better but the absolute worst is hearing nothing back._

No. One thing that's worse is they schedule a follow-up call, then blow off the call. Happened to me.

<comment> 52-6F-62 IBM got me with that one

<comment><USER4> LinkedIn, too...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi Hacker news!

So yea ... hug of death. Wasn't expecting it to get any attention at all (but that begs the question, why did I submit??).

Anyway, this is an idea I've been sitting on for a while and finally got around to doing something with it. Nothing fancy (this is the first personal project that I've "deployed", and would really appreciate any sort of feedback).

I think it's interesting to look at how companies write rejection letters. It's also a bit cathartic -- I'm finishing up uni and starting to look for work, having a collection of rejection letters makes me feel better about receiving them.

<comment><USER5> Tangential pro-tip: "begging the question" has traditionally meant something very different: [0]

[0] [http://grammarist.com/rhetoric/begging-the-question- fallacy/](http://grammarist.com/rhetoric/begging-the-question-fallacy/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. I didn't know that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I was devastated when I got a rejection letter from <script>alert('hello')</script>.

</comment><comment><USER7> "We're sorry, but something went wrong."

Looks like the website rejected me :(

<comment><USER8> I get the same thing, and DownForEveryone tells me "It's just you. unfortunately.tech is up..." So invalidating. :-)

[https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/unfortunately.tech](https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/unfortunately.tech)

<comment><USER9> It is up, it just happens to be serving an error message instead of the content you want :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Unfortunately, rails is difficult to scale on a shoestring budget.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately, that is true :(

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Last year, I got rejected by Google after going onsite for a day of interviews. The recruiter called me and gave me feedback both positive and negative from each interviewer and how I could improve. My respect for Google grew tremendously on account of that.

Contrast that with Slack & TwitchTV. Companies where I got rejected after taking their pre-screen homework test even after spending a few hours on their test & submitting a correct working solution. No feedback provided even after request. Wish there was a repository of companies which expect applicants to waste a bunch of time without even providing feedback. Will know to avoid those in the future.

</comment><comment><USER12> SpaceX sent me a rejection letter but I never applied. I really wish I had a copy to submit.

<comment><USER13> Reminds me of one of my favorite Simpsons gags ever.

"Marge: [sifting through mail] Aww. A rejection letter from the New Yorker subscription department."

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Looking at the list by company, it seems like the most valuable part of this project will be the data set you're collecting for testing input validation.

</comment><comment><USER15> This domain could've been better-used for a collection of IoT devices that shouldn't be IoT devices

<comment><USER16> [https://twitter.com/internetofshit](https://twitter.com/internetofshit)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Unsure what this is supposed to be solving. Is this just a misery-loves- company thing? Or??

<comment><USER18> Why does a website have to "solve" something? It's cool to just put stuff out there!

<comment><USER19> Things tech is allowed to do in 2018:

      * Disrupt ${thing}
      * Solve a clearly defined problem
      * Harvest personal data for a variety of ethically questionable reasons.
      * Distributed transactions ledgers (NOTE: Blockchain only)

Nothing else is acceptable.

<comment><USER19> For record " _personal data harvesting not yet disrupted with blockchain_ " constitutes a clearly defined problem in this instance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> We're sorry, but something went wrong. If you are the application owner check the logs for more information.

</comment><comment><USER21> Cached: [https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:5zk3Sv...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:5zk3SvwhDPUJ:https://unfortunately.tech/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk)

</comment><comment><USER22> why?

<comment><USER18> A better question to ask is "Why not?" :D</comment></comment>


Bitcoin Pioneer Says New Coin to Work on Multiple Blockchains - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-24/bitcoin-pioneer-says-new-coin-to-work-on-multiple-blockchains <comment><USER2> > _Its authors will receive a one-time retention of 20% (2 million) of the > initial MTN supply._

Need to say anything else? Sounds really shady to me.. Anyway, the Sidechain Project which is in development by the Blockstream team is supposed to do that, but above the bitcoin protocol itself, not in a 'new coin'.

<comment><USER3> Classic pump and dump (PnD).

If they were serious about developing a better crypto, they would have divested almost all of their coins. This ratio shows that the devs only want to make a quick buck.

<comment><USER4> This is the depressing state of the cryptocurrency world these days. A sucker born every minute, and an "ICO" starting every hour.

<comment><USER5> Agree. If devs want their ICO to be taken seriously then they need to do the leg work first and show us at leas a working prototype.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > Bloq and Metronome's authors will receive 20% of the initial MTN offering as > a one-time author's retention.

I don't know Jeff Garzik's reputation well, but I've heard his name many times.

The fact that he endorses Segwit2x [1] and that he wants a premine/grant for his altcoin are concerning IMO.

[1] [https://medium.com/@jgarzik/why-segwit2x-is-the-best-path- fo...](https://medium.com/@jgarzik/why-segwit2x-is-the-best-path-for- bitcoin-d9a4103f2fda)

<comment><USER7> What's the problem with endorsing Segwit2x?

<comment><USER8> It would degrade Bitcoin security, but worse, it's untested, behind several releases, has no replay protection and the nodes are designed to pretend to be core nodes to confuse the network.

It's literally malware at this point.

<comment><USER9> I did not think Core propaganda would have made its way to HN :-(

Segwit2x would _not_ degrade security. People think it would because they assume larger blocks would reduce the absolute number of full nodes, but historically this is not what we have seen: [https://twitter.com/zorinaq/status/918133693964865538](https://twitter.com/zorinaq/status/918133693964865538)

The "untested" claim is false. The BTC1 reference implementation has unit tests, and is currently run by at least ~700 nodes: [https://coin.dance/nodes](https://coin.dance/nodes)

The fact the BTC1 repo is currently based on Core 0.14.2 (released June 18, 2017) instead of Core 0.15.0.1 (released Sep 19, 2017) is not really much of a problem.

It has been explained numerous time why we do _not_ want replay protection: to remove the need to upgrade millions of SPV wallets.

BTC1 nodes do not pretend to be Core nodes to "confuse" the network. They did it ([https://github.com/btc1/bitcoin/commit/28ebbdb1f4ab632a1500b...](https://github.com/btc1/bitcoin/commit/28ebbdb1f4ab632a1500b2c412a157839608fed0)) in response to Bitcoin Core's hostile attempt to disconnect segwit2x nodes ([https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/pull/10982](https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/pull/10982)) which would have made the network less reliable between now and the HF, by intentionally disconnecting nodes just because they are not "liked".

<comment><USER8> Also, it's very notable that none of the people supporting the 2x scam understand bitcoin, either that or they tell lies about how it works to support the scam.

If you take the time to read the white paper and listen to the people who are explaining how things work you won't fall for the propaganda that has you posting this kind of nonsense.

But I do credit you for admitting that BTC1 is months behind.

<comment><USER10> Thanks for discussing this. I have not read the paper, but was hoping you could provide a link to it. Doubling the supply of currency (well, giving people who had orange coins an equal number of orange and yellow coins) at no expense is tempting, but what are the implications down the line?

[https://twitter.com/zorinaq](https://twitter.com/zorinaq) This guy seems to support it and also knows how Bitcoin works.

<comment><USER8> Bitcoin has layers. One of the layers people don't understand is the layer called "core". The creators of bitcoin were cypherpunks and so they had a decade before bitcoin existed where people worked out how such a system would work. Those cypherpunks became core. While people think of bitcoin as the software, or the network or the white paper, what it really is, is a collection of engineers (you have to trust the engineers to trust the software and network and ultimately money) that is very diverse, and a genuine meritocracy. Since bitcoin attracted a lot of libertarians and wanna-be-I- think-I-am-libertarians its relatively easy to say "core is the new evil overlords! a monopoly!" when the reality is that core is a large number of people who don't agree on a lot of stuff and have developed a process of reaching consensus. So, unfortunately, some uneducated non-engineer felon like Roger Ver can spread a lot of claims about core and those get believed despite core people explaining patiently in engineering terms why the claims are false (eg: big blocks are not free scaling, segwit is more efficient, etc.)

Non-engineers simply cannot understand the technology arguments and so they are manipulatable via social engineering, which in this case is literally legions of paid shills ([http://birds.bitcoin.com](http://birds.bitcoin.com) is the attackers site where shills get paid.)

That's the layer that's under attack now- because the powers that be want to control bitcoin and they can't beat the software, they can't beat the hash power, but they think they can maybe beat the people. (And in Ver's case, he shills BCH to keep its price up while unloading it to get more BTC.)

Actually that twitter account is one that I've seen many times before, and I would not consider him someone who understand how bitcoin works. He seems to be an engineer who has taken a superficial look and then fallen sway to propaganda.

This is the thing about bitcoin, there are layers. Here's some of the layers: 1\. "Bitcoin is internet money" 2\. A block chain is a chain of database entries 3\. I understand what Proof of work is 4\. I understand how economic incentives work in bitcoin 5\. I understand why PoW will always be better than PoS 6\. I understand why ethereum can never work (ultimately) 7\. Now I really understand the economic incentives 8\. Now I understand bitcoin

Of course this is more than a little tongue in cheek.

The white paper can be found here: [https://bitcoin.org/en/bitcoin- paper](https://bitcoin.org/en/bitcoin-paper)

But a lot of the standards are found here (in various levels of adoption)... this bit is really relevant for wallets: [https://github.com/bitcoin/bips#readme](https://github.com/bitcoin/bips#readme)

Read the white paper at least once before holding any bitcoin. And then re- read it at least 5 times one the course of 2 years. It has layers and you will come to understand them over time.

Reading Mastering Bitcoin I understand is really useful too. (I got thrown into the deep end of btcd so I didn't have that luxury)

<comment><USER10> Thanks! I have definitely read the bitcoin white paper sir! I thought there was a whitepaper about Segwit2x or B2X. I read the original Bitcoin paper very shortly after it came out (!) and I am confident in my understanding of Bitcoin, the protocol, how it works, why it is excellent and unparalleled. However, I did not know that Core was a lot of people, and it makes sense that the most precarious link in the chain may be the human element. Happy to hear that the engineers / cypherpunks got it down pat (I was already rather confident in that) ... Question: why does Ethereum not work in the ultimate?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> So basically this guy is forking bitcoin, causing contention between miners, etc, and now is making a new coin that allows him to profit from that contention?

<comment><USER12> > So basically this guy is forking bitcoin

Nope. ~80% of miners, 90% of Bitcoin businesses, and at least half of the community are forking Bitcoin.

Jeff just happens to be the lead developer for the new client. The contention has been there for years and it's been fueled by the horrific sensorship on the main communication channels.

This is sad to see though. I don't know how he'll find time to juggle both of these projects.

<comment><USER8> There's no evidence of that, more than %90 of miners are running core, and there are more businesses opposed to 2x than endorsing it: [http://nob2x.org](http://nob2x.org)

Meanwhile "signers" of the New York "Agreement"[1] are dropping like flies, most recent Coinbase that says they will support the core chain.

Hell the biggest "proponents" of 2X aren't willing to risk their own bitcoin in a swap (eg: Ver who has backed out of such promises in the past too with BCH)

2X is nothing but a scam to get suckers to sell BTC for B2X while people like Ver sell B2X to get more BTC!

Its funny how the bitcoin haters talk about censorship-- reality is /r/bitcoin is not censored, but the entire 2x movement was done behind closed doors, with no peer review, with a heavily censored slack channel and mailing list-- that is if you can get on it in the first place... while bitcoin does all this in public.

2X hasn't had commits or serious work in months last I checked and I really feel sad for the people who bought the propaganda these scammers are selling.

[1] It's not an agreement when only one side agreed with itself.

<comment><USER13> > reality is /r/bitcoin is not censored

As a complete outsider not paying much attention this is the first time I've ever seen anyone try to make this claim, it seems easily disproven.

<comment><USER8> It's easily proven-- go there and look at all the /r/btc brigading going on. The subreddit is full of trolls. And of course whenever one gets abusive and is banned they cry censorship.

Now look at my comment you are replying to-- -3 -- an attempt to downvote it into oblivion with no actual responses (other than yours) to the points I made.

There is censorship going on, but the ones crying the loudest are the worst offenders.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Premine/"founders reward"? Another scamcoin doomed to failure.

</comment><comment><USER15> So now they are trying to sell a Digital-to-Digital (Bit)Coin exchange as a new currency "to rule them all" because it has a blockchain.

</comment><comment><USER16> I think the big breakthrough with cryptocurrency will be when someone invents a "Basic Income" cryptocurrency.

I've been thinking about it for a while, and have even started writing up a specification (may not need to write the actual implementation).

I think it's a tricky problem, but I'm almost 100% certain now that it's probably going to be invented and used in the near future.

EDIT: And by "near future" I mean "within 5-10 years".

<comment><USER8> This doesn't really make sense. The thing that gives cryptocurrencies value is that they are scarce. The thing that gives them security is proof of work, allowing a distributed consensus algorithm that is hard to game.

Cryptocurrency isn't a source of magic money in the sense that you could tap it for a "basic income" type scheme-- where the recipients are not doing anything to earn it.

In cryptocurrency every actor in the system has a job that they do, namely, miners mine and that's how they get paid.

I'm not saying its impossible, it just seems like it doesn't make sense at first look.

<comment><USER16> I agree that it does seem counter-intuitive given what we've come to expect a cryptocurrency to be.

<comment><USER17> Thats.. not a sufficient response..

<comment><USER8> He may have answers to those issues, and I understand he may want to keep them under his hat until they are thought out.

But know this-- if you want a chance at success, peer review is going to be needed when you are ready. And a lot of testing.

<comment><USER16> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15544554](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15544554)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> From the "Owner's Manual" [1], it appears that this is just another ETH ERC20 token. All of the "portability" features of it are just based on atomic swaps, which means that the security of this token for most purposes is equal to the security of the lowest security chain on which it lives. Since participating in this requires being in the ETH ecosystem, and this is not designed to be an "appcoin" (single use token), but instead is designed to be a general purpose currency, I'm unclear what it really brings to the table.

Also, it appears that it will only support being on ETH initially. While I imagine it would be pretty easy to port to ETC, it's probably never going to live on top of Bitcoin, because the smart contracts would be prohibitive in terms of cost.

1 - [https://www.metronome.io/pdf/owners_manual.pdf](https://www.metronome.io/pdf/owners_manual.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER19> The article is a bit vague on how this works. Does anyone know of a good summary?

<comment><USER20> 1\. Promote.

2\. Convert 20% into assets at the peak.

3\. Hide in Uruguay.

<comment><USER3> You don't even need to hide anywhere. Since there is no regulations on pre- mines themselves, only ICOs, you _could_ do a pre-mine in the US and be 100% fine as long as you paid the capital gains tax.

IANAL, so take this with a grain of salt.

Meanwhile, I'm holding out for the day ETH crashes, ICOs end, and pumpers go back to using Litecoin forks. I'm just sitting here with a GTX 1060 ready to mine some scamcoins for lulz.

<comment><USER21> You get good XMR hash rate with that: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nErHc5OvjkI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nErHc5OvjkI)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Amazon Coins Launching - <AUTHOR> https://developer.amazon.com/sdk/coins/landing.html?ref_=pe_132830_29076940 <comment><USER2> So I'm trying to work out why?

And off the top of my head it's probably combination of:

1) Helps with micropayments for low value in-app purchases

2) Creates a disconnect between the real cost and perceived cost

The latter helps Amazon create an artificial incentive that they can use to build their store. For example: Buy something physical off amazon.com and earn 100 free Amazon coins to spend on something digital (implicit: with Amazon).

<comment><USER3> Dan Ariely mentions these types of products (albeit in the context of cheating): the more removed the product is from real money, the easier it becomes to justify all kinds of actions you normally wouldn't perform: stealing it, spending it, etc.

<comment><USER4> You can bet marketers are reading through his books looking for ways to hack consumers.

<comment><USER5> Or they are reading the same marketing textbooks he is reading.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> From the FAQ:

>> _Q: Can customers use their Amazon Coins to buy in-game currencies?_

>> _Yes. Customers will be able to purchase in-game currencies with Amazon Coins._

Good Lord, how many levels of fake money do we have to travel down?

<comment><USER7> ...USD to buy Bitcoins to buy gift cards to buy Amazon coins to buy in-game currency to buy in-game items to build up my virtual character which I sell on ebay for USD to buy Bitcoins...

<comment><USER8> This is what I heard in my head while reading your comment: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FpCM5cWkNM>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5170855> and <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5174832>

</comment><comment><USER10> One big difference that Amazon has with other companies that try and lock people in with virtual currencies - Amazon already has more credit cards on file from customers that trust the service and willingly shop from there than just about any other company in the world.

So I'm sure there's a reason for this, but just because of the sheer number of credit cards they already have on file I'm having a hard time seeing a real rational for this move.

Are they really trying to effectively trick gamers from buying useless game add-ons by divorcing that from its actual monetary cost? Are they betting that heavy hitters on Farmville type games will make this worth their while? That's the only reason I can kind of come up with. If this is the real motive, I'm a bit disappointed because I expect more from Amazon.

<comment><USER11> It's a marketing tool so they can give out promotional credit.

They've been doing it for years by giving out free MP3/Video credits occasionally.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Is it correct to refer to this as a virtual currency? Isn't this just a sort of prepaid debit system like MS and others use in their own markets?

<comment><USER13> They are just trying to cash in on that other *coin virtual currency that's been in the news so much recently.

<comment><USER12> As linked by Lightning this has been in the works for a while now. I don't think bitcoin is their motivation. More likely it's as others pointed out, they get to hold the cash and earn interest/dividends on investments with it until customers spend it. And they can reduce transaction costs because they're handling the transactions, not Paypal/CC/banks.

<comment><USER14> >this has been in the works for a while now

How long is a while? Bitcoin is in its 5th year of being a thing.

<comment><USER12> If this functioned similarly that'd be a fair statement. This is being called a currency, but it's really the same as MS Points or any other similar prepaid card. Amazon has the benefit of restricting where the outflow is and so can also ensure 30% of what comes in to buy coins is profit[1], and then make earnings off the rest. And given how constrained the outflow is this is hardly a competitor to bitcoin or any other attempt at a virtual currency. It's a lockin attempt and a play for earlier access to capital. It will probably be successful on both fronts.

EDIT:

[1] Profit is the wrong word, there are other costs involved that will eat away at that 30%. I should have said 30% was guaranteed revenue.

<comment><USER14> I believe the argument was that the 'name' Amazon Coins is meant to capitalize on things like Bitcoin, Litecoin, PPCoin, NameCoin, FreiCoin, DevCoin, etc.

The function is clearly something more similar to MS Points.

<comment><USER12> I'm still unconvinced that Amazon has any need to try and take advantage of their current popularity. They have sufficient capital and brand recognition to develop this system without riding the coattails of a still (in mainstream) largely not understood or recognized virtual currency.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This move essentially splits Amazon off from the Play ecosystem. I mean they already had their own store which people would "invest" in, but adding a currency/gift cards/freebies will only increase the lockdown/isolation further.

I'll leave it up to the reader to decide if this is a good or bad thing but for me: I am skipping Amazon's ecosystem in the foreseeable future and sticking to a more open alternative (namely the Play store, which works on most Android devices - including Fire tablets).

<comment><USER16> > including Fire tablets

With Amazon starting up with their own store, this may soon be a thing of the past.

<comment><USER17> Why would they do that in immediate future?

<comment><USER16> I highly doubt they would, however as soon as their store gains traction, it makes very little sense for Amazon to support a direct competitor on their own branded devices.

I'm not saying its a good or bad thing; it's just how these vendors operate. You don't have itunes on android devices, and you don't have the google play app available on i-devices. You can still use the Play web app on any device, of course.

<comment><USER18> Technically, they don't support it. People have just figured out how to side- load it and Amazon hasn't done anything to block it.

<comment><USER19> Exactly. So perhaps Amazon might begin to block it in the future. I don't really see that happening soon, however. Amazon hasn't built up enough critical mass to ditch the larger Android ecosystem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> It weird that amazon would move in this direction to split up their customer base onto different forms of currency.

Microsoft is rumored to be tearing down their XBox points system so that there is less fragmentation in payment across their product lines.

<comment><USER21> By far the most aggravating aspect of MS Points are that its not a 1:1 conversion rate. I don't think there's anything inherently 'bad' about an internal payment currency (beyond the fact that consumers generally dislike it.)

<comment><USER22> See, you're considering this from a US-centric view. There are lots of currencies, so there's no single 1:1 conversion rate.

<comment><USER21> Touche -- that's a good point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> This seems like a clear cut way to get developers to develop or port over their current apps to Amazon's app store.

"Sign-up to be a developer for Kindle Fire and submit your apps by April 25th to ensure we have time to review them before millions of dollars in Amazon coins arrive in customers' accounts."

The call to action basically says: We are flooding the market with free money which developers are going to get 70% of.

</comment><comment><USER24> At least it's 1 coin = $0.01 USD. Far better than Microsofts "Points" where it's I think 79 points = $0.99 USD. This makes it really hard to figure out the actual cost of something listed, for example, 600 points. It also makes things seem cheaper than they really are.

</comment><comment><USER25> _> When Amazon Coins launches in May, we will give out tens of millions of dollars in Amazon Coins to customers to spend on Kindle Fire apps, games, or in-app items._

For a split second I thought, "is this a new way for Amazon to spend their free cash flow to the point where their profits approach zero?" but then I realized that this is only for digital purchases so they aren't actually _spending money_ per se and the hit to their actual top line will be a small fraction of the total giveaway (esp. since these coins can't be used on kindle books it seems)

<comment><USER26> If a consumer purchases something then wouldn't Amazon be losing 70% of that as they have to pay the developer of the app the consumer made the purchase on/for?

<comment><USER27> given their history with paying developers that are the app of the day on their store[1], I can see them finding a loophole to avoid paying devs who collect payments with coins.

[1] [http://blog.shiftyjelly.com/2011/08/02/amazon-app-store- rott...](http://blog.shiftyjelly.com/2011/08/02/amazon-app-store-rotten-to- the-core/)

<comment><USER28> As of now, they are claiming they will be paying out exactly the same as if your app was purchased with dollars.

It seems like that's a major part of this push - if you want to receive any of these free Amazon dollars, submit to the app store.

<https://developer.amazon.com/help/faq.html#AmazonCoins>

<comment><USER27> The point remains; I still have very little faith in Amazon's android adventures given their shady history.

<comment><USER28> This is sort of a very different situation - whether or not you agree that their offer to be featured as the free app of the day is valuable, they were upfront that the rev-share in that situation is 0% when they make the offer.

In this situation they are claiming that it's exactly the same as cash to developers - that is, you will receive 70% of the purchase price. I have absolutely no reason to believe that they're attempting to mislead or be dishonest.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Are they trying to capitalize on current Bitcoin hype on the mainstream?

<comment><USER30> This isn't a crypto-currency, only a virtual currency with a single vendor.

Not quite a BTC competitor in any sense yet.

<comment><USER31> It's not a currency at all, they're prepaid gift cards without the card.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> How can a 'new virtual currency' be US residents only?

This is more akin to Disney Dollars, than it is to an actual currency which has controls, an exchange rate, international trade etc.

</comment><comment><USER33> It seems like it's just a way for Amazon to avoid paying transaction fees on real money. With their margins, this could make sense and be a worthwhile endeavor.

</comment><comment><USER34> I can see Amazon using this kind of thing to differentiate better between "real" credit and promotional credit. Like, if I have Prime, and I choose to take a slower shipment time, I can get $1 for MP3 downloads. But that is not the same as if I just had a $1 credit on my Amazon account... it's much less useful. Amazon could make that $1 promotion be a 100 AZC, and it would be a lot more clear.

</comment><comment><USER35> At first glance this appears to be a virtual currency along the likes of Bitcoin but then you actually read what Amazon Coins actually is and it's merely a points system along the likes Microsoft Points merely capitalising on the whole Bitcoin virtual currency craze. The fact that it's US only for the moment is another limiting factor, not really that impressive once you break this thing down.

</comment><comment><USER36> How about fuck no? The whole point of bitcoin is that it's decentralised and you _own_ your coins. This is basically just Zynga.

<comment><USER37> This has nothing to do with Bitcoin, obviously.

<comment><USER36> It, like Bitcoin, is a virtual currency.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Dammit - I read this and thought it was branded bitcoins!

Which reminds me - is there any cryptographic reason this cannot be done ?

<comment><USER18> There are all sorts of off-brand "bit-coins" already. Litecoins are hoisted on certain forums quite regularly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> The 'why' is the same reason Xbox points exist. Because it makes the company more money than dealing with micro transactions. Amazon saw Bitcoin's success and tried to use its popularity to name this a virtual currency. Except they failed in the very first sentence, where they start with 'US only'.

<comment><USER40> Coin has been used to describe currency for far longer than Bitcoin has been around...

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> A US-only virtual currency to buy stuff from a single US merchant seems pretty pointless. Why not just do the Apple trick and aggregate credit card purchases?

Virtual currency sort of makes sense for marginalized communities (unbanked, children, illegals, etc.), but really only makes sense for international.

</comment><comment><USER42> If I never heard of Amazon before and then saw this page, I'd think it was a scam without ever looking back. It looks like another Get Rich Quick-scheme with the obvious gold "Tens of millions of dollars" as first words on the page. That text color also has a goldish tint.

</comment><comment><USER43> Um.... Amazon Vouchers then.

What an vacuous way to market them. I'm having a hard time believing this is anything other than an attempt to hitch a ride on bitcoin's wagon, aimed at exploiting the little bits of info that the uninformed know and/or have heard about "digital coins".

</comment><comment><USER44> It seems like an attempt to convert developers from Play to Amazon Appstore. The $10M seed money will encourage a land rush (or at least they hope).

If it doesn't work out it will be easy enough to phase out the program by converting bought coins back to a store-credit.

</comment><comment><USER45> "... a new virtual currency ..."

It doesn't seem that way to me. It's more like a bus token since you can only spend it in certain venues. Or a coupon if you can redeem it for cash. At best, it's a virtual bank account.

<comment> T-hawk Bus tokens and coupons are also virtual currencies. As a merchant, you're free to accept payment in bus tokens, if you like. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrip>

Every currency or instrument of value can only be spent in certain venues. Try spending USD in a small French village, for example.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> So XBOX is to Kindle Fire as Microsoft Points are to Amazon Coins?

</comment><comment><USER47> I wonder if they'll let you transfer coins to other people easily.

</comment><comment><USER48> I wonder if one has to pay sales taxes on amazon coins. If not, then they have a successful way around that little nuisance.

</comment><comment><USER49> >You will get paid the same 70% revenue share

Guess it sounds better than 'We will take a 30% cut of everything you sell!'

</comment><comment><USER50> What's the exchange rate with Flooz?

</comment><comment><USER51> Amazon is killing it. Any chance they'll become a direct competitor to bitcoin anytime soon!?

<comment><USER18> no.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> Those coin renderings look a lot like Bitcoin. Thanks for adding to the confusion, Amazon.

<comment><USER53> Those coin renderings look a lot like coins.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> Makes me nostalgic for Canadian Tire money...

</comment><comment><USER55> Brilliant. Is this goodbye for BitCoins?

</comment><comment><USER56> Bitcoin envy.

</comment><comment><USER57> Is this the successor to BitCoins?

</comment><comment><USER58> I read "Amazing Coins Launching"

Sorry this comment adds no value ;-)</comment>


Microsoft's Stephen Elop moves to Nokia -- what a waste - <AUTHOR> http://www.betanews.com/joewilcox/article/Microsofts-Stephen-Elop-moves-to-Nokia-what-a-waste/1284136468

<comment><USER2> IMHO, Nokia has to give up on Maemo/Moblin, keep Symbian (but fix it, please) for low-end smartphones (because in a couple years that's the only kind of phone there will be) and adopt Android on the high-end smartphone line and differentiate on hardware (theirs has always been excellent). Maemo/Moblin is going nowhere fast and there is no space for more OSs in this space right now.

If they can fix Symbian and make cheap smartphones that are feature- competitive with Androids, they can also bypass telcos and sell direct to customers.

But that's just my advice. It's unlikely he will follow it.

</comment><comment><USER3> Symbian is a dead broken horse with an outdated kernel. They should instead buy RIM or license Android.</comment>


Securing the .app gTLD for the mobile app software development community - <AUTHOR> https://dotappapp.com/

<comment><USER2> I use ".me" for my personal domain/email and I still get strange looks about this TLD from anyone outside the tech community. E.g. I give my email address to a clerk at a clothing store and I have to convince him that .me is a valid domain ending.

This makes me think it will take a while before it makes sense for companies to embrace the new anything-TLDs as their main web presence. The last thing you want to do is confuse potential customers who are trying to go to your website.

Perhaps .app customers are savvy enough for this not to be a problem, though I don't see why any company would want to take this risk unless there were really no acceptable .com's.

<comment><USER3> Yeah, I would've bought a .name if I was confident that people wouldn't be confused.

On the other hand, I don't quite see the purpose of a new TLD for websites, it's pretty clear that nobody types URLs anymore. Sure, it's a new namespace, so you can choose the name you want, but on the other hand, colliding with a .com can cause confusion in searches, so I wouldn't risk it.

<comment><USER2> Your URL has to at least contain your company name. If it doesn't, your customers would be confused by your email addresses and what popped up in the address bar when they use Google to find your website.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have to wonder if this wouldn't be better if investors had some expectation of what they can expect from their money other than handing the .app domain to this ... organization.

</comment><comment><USER5> Can anyone explain why ICANN is charging $185K? Where did they get this number from and why is it so high?

Something about paying so much for something that I feel should cost next to nothing to produce seems like a scam. I really can't wait for the day when the DNS is open and distrubuted so one central body (or Verisign) can't have a monopoly on a public good.

<comment><USER6> When you buy the TLD, you're not just reserving it for your own use -- you're signing up to operate a registry which will allow anyone else to purchase domains under your TLD. ICANN wants verification that you have sufficient funds to run a registry, for one thing.

They're also a non-profit organization, and they seek the fees to support all the copyright arbitration and legal wrangling that will eventually ensue over the new TLDs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I betcha this project would have more legitimacy if it were hosted on Kickstarter, which previously raised tons of money for Diaspora.

What this really highlights to me is that the web needs a well-made transaction service that is geared toward contingent pledges -- essentially, you pledge money contingent on, say, some minimum total raised, and if the goal isn't hit, you get your money back.

Currently, the major credit card companies' policies make this type of service difficult; there is a relatively short permitted window of time between payment authorization and payment processing.

But if there were an escrow-type service that could collect conditional pledges; hold on to the money in an interest-bearing account; and process payments/refunds, depending on whether the condition is fulfilled ... it would open up a world of possibilities for fundraisers by giving potential donors/investors confidence that their money will only go to viable projects.

<comment><AUTHOR> Kickstarter refused to host it because the target was so high.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> why not use it for general apps, i.e. simple application packages installable on any number of platforms? I see no reason why mobile apps should be privileged in any way, and really, aren't we witnessing a general movement towards making the same apps available on many platforms?

</comment><comment><USER9> The project as it is will fail big time. 1.Nobody will top up some $500k to an anonymous. 2.There's not much details for any legal matter, are we making some kind of an association or what? 3.In the end this .app domain might make profits, if so, will we see any?

<comment><USER10> It's possible enough idiots will fall for it to make a nice payday.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Sounds like someone didn't read the guidelines for this. Raising the $185k is peanuts compared to what else you need. Over the 6+ months you have to prove to ICANN that you have the technical and financial ability to run a registrar which will be able to handle the number of customers you expect.

No group of donators will be able to do this without the support of a major company.

</comment><comment><USER12> The thing about TLDs is that everyone thinks this one will be the next big thing...then when it comes out people just shrug and continue to use .com. Remember .name? .mobi? .biz? .info? .xxx? .tel?

</comment><comment><USER13> There needs to be some disclosure regarding the team behind the initiative. Who am I trusting with my money? Put a list of team members on the site, links to their linkedin/twitter etc.

<comment><USER14> This is an excellent comment - we'll fix this next week.

We have been caught on the hop somewhat by how popular this has been.

I'm the point man on this - Matthew Baxter-Reynolds, <http://about.me/mbrit>, @mbrit and firstname.lastname@example.com.

<comment><USER14> We have also formed a company in the UK to handle the operations - .app Ltd, registered in England number 07869623.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Why pay more money to the ICANN? obscure names+google+app marketplaces for the win.</comment>


Neil Ty, the Scientism Guy - <AUTHOR> https://mises.org/blog/neil-ty-scientism-guy <comment><USER2> >Scientism is the over-reliance on or over-application of the scientific method

>The scientific method is unnecessary or even ill-suited in other areas, however. Consider these questions, and what sort of approach is appropriate to answer them: What is 17 divided by 3? All else held equal, what are the effects of an increase in demand for blue jeans? Who should I invite to my party? What are the effects of expansionary monetary policy on employment, prices, incomes, production, consumption, and borrowing? How should I treat people?

Mises institute at its best.

</comment><comment><USER3> I have given up on watching or reading anything that Neil produces. I find him more of a "true believer" than a rational scientist. He may be quite an intelligent man, but I find his arrogance so bad that, even if he has some good ideas, I just discard what he says as rubbish. I put him in the same basket as "alien lizard people are here" believers.

His pop-stardom has lead him down the wrong path and he now appears as silly as the Kardashians.</comment>


The US Is the Lowest Taxed Large Developed Economy in the World - <AUTHOR> http://thesoundingline.com/taps-coogan-the-us-is-the-lowest-taxed-large-developed-economy-in-the-world/ <comment><USER2> Government spending, not taxes, are the proper measure of the burden of government. Ultimately, the debts will have to be paid whether that be outright, through devaluation of the currency, or a combination of both.

<comment><USER3> No they don't. A monetarily sovereign government with a productive economy, such as the USA, can roll over its debt indefinitely. In fact, the global financial system relies on US debt. Foreign countries call it "reserves."

Also, remember that the size of the public sector's balance sheet isn't what controls inflation, it's too much money chasing too few goods and services. Most money isn't even created by the government, it's created by banks with keystrokes.

<comment><USER4> This idea that debts don't need to paid because they can be rolled over is pretty absurd.

It's true that aggregate debt never need go to zero, but all debt has a carrying cost. Current debt expense is $310BN annually for the federal government [1], and likely going higher. A high amount of debt is very dangerous because the carrying costs could easily rise for reasons beyond our control. In fact carry costs were 4.7% merely ten years ago, vs 2.7% today. If high interest rates return, high debt countries are definitely facing a budget squeeze.

[1] [https://www.thebalance.com/interest-on-the-national- debt-411...](https://www.thebalance.com/interest-on-the-national-debt-4119024)

<comment><USER3> Interest on federal debt owned by the US private sector is fiscal stimulus, because it is net expansive for private balance sheets. Likewise, when the federal reserve holds treasuries and remits the interest back to the treasury it's draining reserves from the economy.

While out of control high interest rates have serious drawbacks, there are definitely solid arguments that rewarding savers with a higher safe return than the current 0.5-2% available now will benefit the people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Couple of observations,

\- most of the countries are in the band of 25% to 30% and its just happens US is a the lower one in that band, so there is no "daylight" per se.

\- Greece is around 38-39% and is notorious for tax evasion.

The graph demonstrates American is low, but not completely out of whack.. now France.. well they are French!

</comment><comment><USER6> Earlier today, I made a little scatter plot comparing the tax burden (tax revenue to GDP ratio) of a bunch of countries against their UN World Happiness Index. This is the result:

[https://snabeltann.no/system/media_attachments/files/000/429...](https://snabeltann.no/system/media_attachments/files/000/429/904/original/80a9d0c9fbaa8be7.png)

</comment><comment><USER7> I'd rather have cheap healthcare thanks

<comment><USER3> I'd rather have an economy where healthcare, housing, and education are so affordable that anyone with a high school diploma or better that is willing to work can afford to cover a family of 4 with money left over for entertainment and savings.

We know this is possible, because the USA used to have it in living memory.

<comment><USER8> To be fair, that was in the post war economy. The U.S. had a massive competitive advantage in having a not-bombed infrastructure. Young workers had a competitive advantage in not having to compete with people who died in the war.

And there was a baby boom and a more economically engaged female population, creating new kinds of demands and opportunities for productivity.

<comment><USER9> Well, Germany had the advantage of having to build a 100% new infrastructure and that helped a lot to overtake those European countries that were on the winning side.

<comment><USER10> It seems like there's a dark joke to be had here about US infrastructure.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> When I compare my tax burden in one country vs. what I would be paying had I been living in another country, I would not use the measure of "Tax revenue as share of GDP". This is the first time I came across such a way of defining the total tax percentage.

Is this include corporate income tax, capital gains tax, personal income tax, social-security payments rolled into one? If so, then it makes sense, as the US has low corporate and cap gains taxes.

</comment><comment><USER12> I find it interesting that Ireland is the lowest taxed country yet they have bet the farm on providing a haven for companies to avoid paying taxes back home. It's a gamble they've made which seems to paying off but I've heard that if other countries closed this loophole they it would absolutely devestate the Irish economy.

<comment><USER13> I know it feels a little unfair to people of higher tax countries who feel like they deserve certain services from their government and (at least the majority) are willing to pay for those services through their taxes. But another cost of these government services that they need to be aware of is that it makes it more difficult to attract large multi-national employers to the country. Large companies can choose which country they are taxed in just like you and I can choose which market we shop at. If your preferred market decides to raise prices while another decides to lower them, this would not be considered a loophole. It would be considered business savvy or competition.

<comment><USER14> ==Large companies can choose which country they are taxed in just like you and I can choose which market we shop at. If your preferred market decides to raise prices while another decides to lower them, this would not be considered a loophole. It would be considered business savvy or competition.==

To complete your market analogy, can you explain what "services" the country provides the company?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The promise that we will retain a healthy divide between the rich and poor is one of the keys to global trade.

That and our hilariously large military.

<comment><USER16> > That and our hilariously large military.

Due to treaties, the US protects one quarter of the world -[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/05/30...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/05/30/map- the-u-s-is-bound-by-treaties-to-defend-a-quarter-of-humanity/)

Also, provides defense to the world's oceans.

And employs millions as a massive jobs program - [https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Robert- Reich/2010/0813/Am...](https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Robert- Reich/2010/0813/America-s-biggest-jobs-program-The-US-military)

<comment><USER17> I often wonder what would happen if the US lowers military spending to European levels.

Will China invade Taiwan? North Korea invade the South? Russia invade Ukraine?

Who will take up the burden the US bears?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> "Low Tax" sounds great. Everybody would want that. Just a pity that so few people benefit from low tax.

<comment><USER2> More than half the country doesn't pay federal income taxes at all. How is that "so few?"

<comment><USER14> Odd that you only mention federal income taxes, there are a bunch of other taxes that people pay (payroll, sales, excise and property to name some).</comment></comment></comment>