In Search of Uber's Unicorn - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2014/10/uber_driver_salary_the_ride_sharing_company_says_its_drivers_make_great.single.html <comment><USER2> Unless I'm missing something, the claim that becoming a taxi driver can become a well-salaried, middle-class job for a significant number of people is _patent nonsense_. There is a reason that taxis look the way they do and are driven by the people who currently drive them, and regulations and licensing is only a small part of that.

Uber might disrupt the taxi industry, maybe for the better, but once equilibrium is reached, incomes for drivers will have shifted to the right slightly, _at best_.

It's hard for me to understand what the long play is for Uber's investors. Given the sheer volume of demand for rides, the relative ease of copying this service, and the number of cars owned by Americans, I don't see how their large revenues can be anything other than temporary. I think the investors are playing the short game.

<comment><USER3> > _Given the sheer volume of demand for rides, the relative ease of copying > this service, and the number of cars owned by Americans, I don 't see how > their large revenues can be anything other than temporary. I think the > investors are playing the short game._

The long game is in capitalizing on (a) network effects and (b) the effects of changing technology on consumer behavior and market structure.

Start with network effects. I live in New York. There are many transportation options. Like my tendency to default to a "top of my wallet" credit card, I tend to fire up Uber first. Other options are considered if Uber disappoints. It seldom does; Uber remains at the top of my "stack". This leads to me demanding several rides a day more from Uber than from its competitors. That, in turn, makes Uber marginally more attractive to drivers. The technology is easy to copy, but the ecosystem is not: network effects.

Let's now consider the effects of changing technology on consumer behaviour. I can walk out of the aeroport in San Francisco, Paris, Austin or Abu Dhabi and have an Uber fueled and ready. Uber has been the driving factor behind me abandoning my driver's license, and with it expectations of ever owning a car.

Here's another technology: driverless cars. Driverless cars reduce fleet costs and risks, and increase scalability on the supply-side (i.e. scale is no longer limited by driver availability and quality). If I were writing Uber's strategy, everything until the availability of fully automated automobiles would be geared towards establishing a strong opening for driverless cars. The tactical phase deploys in force only after the supply side of the scaling problem has been kicked away.

<comment><USER2> But neither network effects nor technology will change overall number of people who need rides (demand) and the fact that driving cars is unskilled labor.

If Uber pays more, taxi drivers will make rational decisions and become Uber drivers. Or Lyft drivers. Or whatever other competitor.

If Uber has nicer cars or more efficient service, taxi services will adapt or go out of business. The drivers will go elsewhere, not change industries.

And so on.

<comment><USER3> > _But neither network effects nor technology will change overall number of > people who need rides_

It did with me (granted, N=1). I reduced my own driving to zero and replaced it mostly with Uber. That isn't just a shift in my quantity of rides demanded, it's a shift in my demand curve.

> _driving cars is unskilled labor_

I would not have given up driving if the alternative were yellow cabs. New York taxi drivers are not knowledgeable about routes. Further, it is not uncommon for a trip to end with a debate over whether the credit card reader works. I will pay extra for even a minimally professional Uber driver over an unprofessional yellow taxi.

The correlation between driver skill and rider experience is one of the problems Uber is running into when it considers scaling. That limitation is one that would be mitigated by driverless cars.

> _The drivers will go elsewhere, not find other jobs_

Network effects limit the viability of alternatives: there will be less demand on those platforms. As mentioned above, I do not believe most yellow taxi drivers would do well as Uber drivers–the supply is not fungible.

<comment><USER2> If Uber _significantly_ affects demand, then we might see seismic shifts in the demographics of drivers.

As for the existing drivers, my point is that the effects you're touting are temporary. Taxi companies that provide a lesser service will die off and be replaced by others that follow the example of Uber. The overall economics of the thing will not change unless there is a significant change in demand. I don't think this is going to happen due to Uber any more than it did due to ZipCar.

<comment><USER3> > _Taxi companies that provide a lesser service will die off and be replaced > by others that follow the example of Uber._

I don't think Uber in its present form will shift the demand curve dramatically. Driverless cars will. A world with driverless cars could follow two models. Let's call them Apple and IBM.

Apple: each household owns a driverless car. Perhaps it can be occasionally rideshared via UberX, Lyft, etc. In this world, you are right: Uber tomorrow will be Uber today.

IBM: Uber (or Google or Tesla...) owns (and finances and repairs and replenishes) a fleet of driverless cars. Households pay it use fees. In this world, Uber's strategic autonomy is dramatically improved over today. If I were Uber, this is the long game I'd be playing for. I would be (a) training riders to depend on hiring cars with minimal personal contact, (b) encouraging the development of driverless cars, and (c) building a cash pile for rapidly acquiring a vast fleet of driverless cars the moment they become viable.

<comment><USER2> You are far more optimistic than me about the future of driverless cars. Given N driverless cars, some fraction p will eventually run over and kill small children. Stand back and watch the hysteria and the end of driverless cars.

Also, before driverless cars become widespread, they will need to be first proven and then regulated. Imagine the fantastic force of the driving lobby that will oppose that from happening: taxi drivers, truck drivers, fleet drivers.

Why do trains and subways still have a human sitting in them?

<comment><USER4> You chose to make your point with probability, which is actually what will most likely make people accept driverless cars in the end.

It's amusing to read the same reasoning after striking away "driverless":

"You are far more optimistic than me about the future of cars. Given N cars, some fraction p will eventually run over and kill small children. Stand back and watch the hysteria and the end of cars."

or with elevators:

"You are far more optimistic than me about the future of automatic elevators. Given N elevators, some fraction p will eventually malfunction and kill small children. Stand back and watch the hysteria and the end of elevators."

If the accident probabilities can be brought to acceptable levels, why wouldn't we adopt them?

PS: With trains and subways we have 1 driver per dozens of passengers, where the savings gained from reducing it to 0 may not outweigh the risk increase/loss of safety feeling.

<comment><USER2> Good point. I totally agree that if the risk is low, we should adopt the technologies.

I was addressing how I believe these sorts of accidents will portrayed in the news and media, especially if there is an organization with an agenda behind the coverage.

<comment><USER4> Yes, I think (automatic) car makers will have to be extremely careful. If we have dramatic accidents to soon, it may be hard to sway the public opinion with statistics (as is the current case with nuclear power).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is not based on any kind of deep analysis whatsoever, but I'm starting to get the same vibe from Uber as I got from Groupon several years ago.

Groupon's promise to local business owners was that offering a Groupon deal was an easy way to attract new long-term customers en masse, despite the sizable up-front loss. History showed that that did not happen for many businesses who used Groupon.

Similarly, so much of Uber's marketing is targeted towards the supply side (i.e. drivers) and the promise of making more than they could at any other available job, with "flexible hours" and other dubious perks. This is just the latest article to show that that is not the case.

Groupon's and Uber's business both depend on acquiring and retaining the best local businesses and drivers respectively, and as these kinds of stories keep coming to light, I wonder whether Uber will be able to retain all the drivers they acquire. Lyft has focused from the start on making their drivers happy, which is a smart way to differentiate from Uber's mercenary mindset, but I also wonder if that is enough to really differentiate itself in the eyes of drivers, at least enough to make Uber really worry.

In all honesty, I am rooting for someone to beat out Uber. When I first learned about them about 2 years ago, I marveled at their business model innovation and their ability to execute. But everything I read (and personally experience) about Uber tells me that they are becoming the new Investment Bank, both philosophically and culturally.

<comment><USER6> Quite honestly - do you believe that making more than $50,000 per year for a HS grad is a bad thing? I am not saying that they should not make more, but for most non college educated individuals - $50,000 is above US average income. Uber may have shady tactics, and might be deceiving drivers - that's true. But the reality is that the opportunities they are giving drivers are not insignificant. Unfortunately - these drivers are paying with their wages the price of a market equilibrium that has not been found yet in terms of finding the right pricing model to match supply and demand. This is the problem that has existed in all major Internet marketplaces where you deal with people's businesses - with eBay, Uber, Amazon, oDesk, etc....

<comment><USER7> How are drivers making $50,000? According to the article it's more like ~$12 an hour. Working full-time, 40 hours a week, that's only ~25k. 12 * 2048 = $24,576

<comment><USER6> 1/ They mention drivers making $1000/week. 2/ Smarter drivers are driving very gas efficient cars with much lower gas costs 3/ Wages are way better if you drive during peak hours. I did and it is pretty neat how much you can make.

<comment><USER8> Read again. $1000 / 40 hours a week is without costs subtracted. The drivers end up with about $400. That's $20000/year.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> >Median uberX Small Business Income Per Year: $90,766 (NYC); $74,191 (SF) [http://blog.uber.com/uberimpact](http://blog.uber.com/uberimpact)

Is it pretty much accepted that Uber is outright lying here? Does anyone believe there is a driver out there banking $100,000 driving a taxi?

I know the company is shady but hoping they can generate enough new blood to compensate for burnout of drivers chasing the dream seems abusive.

<comment><USER10> They may not be lying - that could be raw revenue. Unlike white collar jobs driving a car for a living comes with a _lot_ of costs that kill your actual take-home income, far above and beyond just taxes.

Maintenance, repairs, insurance, and gas are all direct costs that don't really improve with economies of scale. Car payments too - though white collar workers may also be hit with that, but probably less so.

I think there's a bit of deliberate obfuscation here where Uber wants you, the office worker, to think of that $90K without all the strings attached, in which case it would be a pretty decent income.

<comment><USER11> Even if it's raw revenue...where are the 100s of drivers making that much that Uber claims exist?

<comment><USER12> Could this be, hmm, not so much lying as willful ignorance?

There are probably middle-men in the Uber industry just as there are middle- men in the taxi industry, who own a car and pay people to drive it with Uber. If they have one account per car, the account could me making $100k / year via driving 24/7, and Uber could be choosing to believe that these accounts represent a single self-employed driver.

<comment><USER13> Being a middleman would be extremely hard as you have to provide a profile picture and passengers use the picture to verify they have the correct driver.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> We at Sherpa has collected around 1M trips from Uber and Lyft. The average hourly rate of Uber driver is around $15 -- varies among cities. If you work 8 hours a day for 365 days, you will earn around $43,800. Of course, if you drive for 24 hours a day, you will earn as much as $131,400.

</comment><comment><USER15> Do drivers collect the additional income during surge pricing or does the delta simply line uber's pockets? It seems like you could game the system by simply only driving during surge pricing.

<comment><USER16> The supposed purpose of surge pricing is to get more drivers on the street, so that implies that the drivers see some portion of the extra payment.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's the same 80/20 split as usual. If your fare is $11 including a $1 "safety fee," then drivers see $8. If you're in x2.0 surge and so your fare is $21, drivers see $16. For UberX.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Really cool article I found it pretty informative. I think the Uber/On-Demand Taxi Service was a revolutionary idea but the question is how successful will it be in the long term, and how much power does uber truly have over controlling the price? I think they've taken a risky route and may be susceptible to failure without some type of change.

</comment><comment><USER18> Why wasn't this story deduped?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8519585](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8519585)</comment>


The way we board airplanes - <AUTHOR> http://www.vox.com/2014/4/25/5647696/the-way-we-board-airplanes-makes-absolutely-no-sense <comment><USER2> You can't control how the airline orchestrates boarding, but you can control how you board. It's much less stressful to stay seated in the lounge while everyone waits in line, then jump up at the end.

I understand the impulse to _get on the plane_ , but it's irrational if you aren't using the overhead bins. (As a rule, I do not. I always check my bag plane-side.) Getting on the plane earlier won't get you to your destination faster. So, don't stress about it, sit down and relax.

Although, my attitude could end up screwing up these optimized methods. But I don't think it hurts in the back-of-the-plane-first method.

<comment><USER3> I like to get on early if I'm not already super comfortable. A: Get comfy, get drinks, and get to sleep or into a book. B: Turn off all the TVs in vision since half the people don't actually watch and won't figure out how to turn them on.

Also I've found that a lot of people have an affinity for taking the better seats (last row of front cabin on a lot of United's fleet has space under the seat in addition to in front). While you _can_ let them know and ask them to move, it makes you feel a bit like a jerk, especially if they switched seats to sit next to a companion. Or if they got "confused" and took the other side to avoid the sun and then say "oh I'm sorry, do you mind taking mine or shall I move my stuff over to the other side of the cabin"?

This doesn't seem to happen in proper First cabins.

<comment><USER4> Whenever I fly, the TVs auto on to show ads, sadetyt video, and more ads. The only solution I found is to physically destroy the offending devices.

<comment><USER5> Or press "brightness -" until they turn off...

<comment><USER6> I tried. They disable the control functionality for the first set of ads. I press brightness until screen is off as soon as I sit down. Screen comes on for the ads and the safety video. Screen goes back to off for the rest of the flight. Happened this week on a United on a 737.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> We once did a transposed Steffen on a high school marching band trip. Crew said they'd never seen a plane fill that quickly. Unfortunately, this is harder to coordinate when the passengers aren't all members of an organization that practices standing in lines.

<comment><USER8> I think this is really the biggest obstacle to any of these 'superior' methods; getting everyone to do it. For one thing, not everyone is ready to board when you first start boarding. People will show up at different times, after their own group was supposed to board. People won't line up in the right order, no matter how hard you try to enforce it.

<comment><USER9> A very interesting question is how each of these methods degrades as more people get further out of place.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> One factor that has to be taken into account is the "social" one, i.e. how can we enforce that the ultra-fast amazingly optimal sitting scheme will be used.

Let's conduct a thought experiment. My grandma (that has difficulty hearing) is boarding a plane. Try explaining to her, in a sensible and efficient manner that only the people at the windows should get in first.

Ok, maybe my grandma is an extreme example. But think of a first time flyer. Lots of people would be confused.

Also, as already stated, people that travel together sit side by side. Are you going to split the young couple of newly weds during boarding? Is that really sensible? Or the mother and her five kids?

The main takeaway that I get is that you should let people get in without any pre-ordering. Unless you can devise a socially acceptable way to enforce outside-in boarding, that is. I'm not.

You see, the bottom line for me is that simulations are really valuable, but not taking into account the human factors involving the business, how the people actually consume your product, you can have great ideas that work on excel and flunk marvelously on the market.

<comment><USER11> "Now boarding people requiring special assistance or those with priority seating"

"now boarding seats A and F."

"now boarding seats B and E"...

Seems simple enough. Priority seating would just be a box that you check off, only available to people travelling in groups. Seat these people as far back and as close to a wall as possible.

<comment><USER12> Sounds simple, but I have yet to be on a flight where nobody misses the guidelines. There are always quite a few people "lost" and most of the time intentionally.

<comment><USER13> Even if we just start with the assumption that n% of people will misunderstand, it still strikes me as unlikely that the best algorithm will be the current one.

I think we have the next round of tests though. See how many people you need to randomly swap before Steffen is worse than back-to-front.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I always have to laugh when, at the end of a flight, the majority of passengers jump up and elbow their way into the aisle, even though in many cases they'll be standing there for at least 5 minutes.

While sitting in the aisle seat, I've had passengers that were sitting beside me fall into my lap as they try to jostle their way by, just to get a place in the (stationary) line.

What's even funnier is when you see these people waiting around the baggage claim 10 minutes later.

Crowd psychology is a funny thing.

<comment><USER15> I elbow my way into the aisle because, like anyone over 6 feet, I don't fit comfortably into an airline seat and would dearly like to stand up. I would also like people to figure out how to get their bags out of the overhead and find their children before the aisle in front of them is clear, but I'll settle for being able to stretch.

<comment><USER14> As a fellow 6'\+ person, one of the main reasons I stay seated is so that I don't have to stoop below the overhead bins and/or subject my face to the flurry of arms. :p

<comment><USER16> I thought I'd found the solution to the height + plane drama. I took a load of sleeping pills. Every time I woke up I took more. It got me from NZ to Europe feeling great, until the last 30 mins of the 30ish hour saga. I'd fallen asleep with crossed legs and my upper leg had cut return circulation off (I assume) and had gone red, swollen and painful. Somehow I limped off the plane. I think the strategy is great but DVT stockings are needed to prevent something like death occurring.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The simplest way to avoid standing in line is to be fashionably late. You sit and read a book until everyone else has boarded, and only then do you go through.

I'm always surprised how everyone rushes to stand in line the moment boarding starts. Rationally speaking they should wait until the last reasonable moment to board, because the seat in the terminal is more comfortable than the one in the airplane.

<comment><USER18> Though, as others have pointed out, carry-ons can put a damper on the idea, I tend to do this. Even before carry-ons became a consideration, I've been mystified by people that want to get on the plane first. Umm, more time in the aluminum tube in an uncomfortable seat? No thanks, I'll wait. I understand that it may not work for everyone, but I typically check everything but a laptop bag, and get on as late as I can. Grab a latte after getting off the plane, and stand by the luggage output for 15 minutes while sipping my delicious (okay, it's the airport: barely palatable) coffee beverage.

Even today when you get booked flights with no carry-on room, the gate agent comes on the PA: "if you check your carry-on, we'll let you board first!" If I check my bag and don't have a carry-on anymore, and I have an assigned seat, how about I board dead last instead? Because I personally don't view being first on the plane as a reward.

<comment><USER19> You've never been bumped off a flight?

<comment><USER18> Never that I can recall. Common problem for others?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> This had been known for a while. Yet there are different considerations besides fastest boarding time. First, people traveling together tend to sit next to each other, so ordering by "columns" instead of rows breaks them apart in the queue which may be either uncomfortable or downright infuriating if you travel with young kids.

I can imagine that letting passengers take their seats at random results in pretty fragmented available seating so if you travel as a large group and want to seat together, this might be a problem too.

<comment><USER21> I think you could still do columns -- just allow people to go out of order if they are going with someone that's going in order.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Every airplane I've ever been on has boarded front to back (which I've always found non-sensical), but the article says most board back to front. Am I going crazy, or are Delta, US Airways, and American Airlines not in that "most US airlines"?

<comment><USER23> It's a recent trend to board front-to-back. This way, the first class cabin/priority sections get first dibs on the overhead bins while the people in the cheap sets get play Tetris meets Sword of Damocles.

<comment><USER24> Nothing to add but the Tetris meets Sword of Damocles made me laugh out loud. Thanks for that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> From my experience, the boarding problem is pretty specific to the US, where everyone seems to have carry on bags perfectly sized to fit the overhead compartments, of which there are not enough to satisfy everyone's need to not check in any baggage (and thus avoid check in charges)

In my opinion the solution would probably be to discourage as much bulk in carry on, rather than herding cats at the gate.

<comment><USER26> Completely agree. It makes no sense to me that you have to pay to check your luggage, while carry-ons are free. It definitely should be the other way around.

<comment><USER27> Each checked item costs the airline: moving them around requires labour and equipment, and there are further expenses dealing with the inevitable proportion of lost, stolen, delayed or damaged bags. It probably shouldn't be surprising that they seek to pass that on.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Sounds nice in theory, but it totally breaks down with airlines' policies of charging for checked luggage. Getting onboard first guarantees you a coveted overhead bin spot, aisle clogging be damned.

<comment><USER29> Do any airlines charge to check luggage once the overhead bins are full? I'm generally too lazy to board in the proper order, and I always get my would- have-been-a-carry-on checked for free.

<comment><USER30> I take pleasure in the way this works out:

1\. The airline tries to nickel-and-dime customers by charging for checked bags.

2\. Their customers respond by carrying on bags.

3\. The airline lacks capacity for the carry-ons

4\. The customers end up with a freebie: Free checked bags at the gate (instead of waiting in line in the lobby).

</comment></comment></comment><comment> vim-guru I'm sure it could be improved further by a re-design of aircrafts. We could board a capsule beforehand or make the entire aircraft with falcon-walls. But the Steffen method sounds pretty good to :)

<comment><USER31> I'm not sure a redesign of aircraft is necessary - simply allowing both back to front and front to back entry should make boarding times much faster. It will require that airports are redesigned to support this though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> I wonder if you could build a passenger pod which attaches to the airframe. The pods get swapped when the plane comes in to the terminal. The new pod would already be fully boarded, and deplaning people on the arriving pod would not hold everything up.

I guess whether this would be worth it or not depends on whether the advantages of "0 boarding time" from the airline's point of view offset the cost of the infrastructure and extra weight required to support such a system.

From a security point of view, you could keep the pod completely decoupled from the other parts of the aircraft (e.g. no cabin access, not "coupled into" control systems).

<comment><USER4> That sounds incredibly crash-prone. I prefer to fly in one-piece airplanes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Boarding time isn't a bottleneck ergo it's not a problem.

The real time suck when a plane is grounded is emptying the latrine, loading the water, refueling, doing engine checks.

The lack of major airlines and the high entry costs in the space mean that it's unlikely you'll lose travelers over user experience.

RyanAir is a prime example of this....just imho though.

<comment><USER34> Exactly, there is no incentive or profit for the airlines to speed the boarding process. In fact, it takes a fixed amount of time to turn around a plane so if you can make it seem like it is the passengers fault and not their, all the better. It might even be that it is to the benefit of the airlines for it to take longer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> The article ends by saying that most airlines don't do the optimal methods of boarding in order to encourage people to upgrade to priority/early boarding, and that it makes them more money that way.

Wouldn't it make the airlines even more money to optimize boarding, which would enhance customer experience, which would increase the likelihood of them flying with you on future flights?

I'm sure some accountant somewhere has numbers that say otherwise but it's difficult to accurately measure how that small of a chance could increase brand loyalty (a major factor in Southwest's success). In my opinion, other airlines should reconsider the decision to leave boarding unoptimized.

Is that the wrong way to think about business decisions or should you always trust the predicted numbers no matter what?

<comment><USER36> Probably not, I have a feeling 9/10 people just buy the cheapest tickets regardless of the airline. The other 10% go with Virgin or something with fun branding.

Customer satisfaction is already in the negatives, they're being wise and playing their strong points: upgrades.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> This should take into consideration the time to organize the people before they enter the plane. I may have missed it, but I didn't see the research cover that. I bet the "most efficient" method pointed is one of the less efficient methods to organize people outside.

<comment><USER37> Imagine trying to implement the Steffen proposal. Everyone has to be in exactly the right position in line for their seat. You'd essentially need to number the seats in the preflight lounge and loosely enforce seat numbers at that point.

<comment><USER38> I imagine this could also get very confusing when a number of passengers show up at the last minute.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> guard-of-terra In Europe this doesn't happen (in my limited experience). People board in random order in which they lined up towards the gate or get off the airport bus.

I think this is because americans can't ever let anybody loiter so they just have to push people into some order, even inferior one.

<comment><USER39> I'm a frequent flyer, mostly within Europe, and this is true. The exception is boarding a bigger plane like the 747. But iirc the ordering is then more coarse grained (based on aisles instead of seats).

And I guess I'm not the only European who immediately thinks of low fares, blue and yellow plastic, non-reclining seats and lottery ticket sales, when reading about that damned random method.

<comment><USER40> At least they've finally switched to preassigned seating a la Easy jet though. Alleluia, it's so much more relaxing!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> The article doesn't capture the fact that half of the time the boarding delay is caused by people looking for available space in the overhead bins. Even in the best workflow he demonstrated, there will still be people going back and forth to find a bin.

</comment><comment><USER42> I'm not seeing any Group 1 passengers arriving late and having to board with Group 3 or 4 and that happens on pretty much every flight I've been on.

Maybe we're simulating a delayed flight then?

But if the flight's already delayed, who even cares anymore.

</comment><comment><USER43> That Steffen method looks much more theoretical than the other ones. The problem is you will have to line everyone perfectly at the boarding gate, and I believe this is pretty much impossible (everyone wants to get in first, they're barely ok with letting other people go in front of them because even if it's faster on the whole, it's slower for that person, which is all that matters). The outside-in should be implementable, but people who travel together want to stay together, so it's going against them.

Back-to-front still seems like the easiest method for an un-ordered, mildly- cooperative group of agents.

</comment><comment><USER9> _" those who pay extra are sitting on planes longer than necessary"_

Only if the passengers boarding is the thing that takes the longest (as opposed to refueling, inspections, loading luggage, getting clearance). This may very well be the case some or even all the time, but I don't know that it is.

</comment><comment><USER44> What's interesting to me (as a very frequent traveller) is that I have routinely seen completely full 747-size planes board in 10-15 minutes in Japan. This has much to do with the culture I suspect, plus smaller size humans, and less tendancy to take bigger bags. Still, it's impressive.

</comment><comment><USER45> > These methods are all unquestionably faster than the standard method, so > would speed up the turnaround times, theoretically saving airlines money.

That's assuming boarding is the bottleneck in the turnaround process. Is it?

</comment><comment><USER46> Although the boarding time is improved, there is overhead in the sorting algorithms. Try to run a bubble sort on a family and see how that goes.

The time gained in the speed of sitting is lost in the sorting.

<comment><USER47> The boarding time for an A380 is 45min to 1hr before departure. When you count how much money is being spent, they probably wouldn't mind printing sequence numbers on the boarding pass.

The article doesn't state how much time would be saved for a big plane, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Easyjet is also quite efficient. You have 2 enterances (front and back). You are designated to a specific enterance (based on your seat number). This already reduces the problem.

</comment><comment><USER49> I once had a colleague with the following idea:print the seat numbers and assign them as people queue to board the plane. In practise this would fill the plane from back to front

<comment><USER50> Unfortunately the front seats are usually mist desirable. That system would incentivise people to the back of the queue - nobody would stand up first!

Might be possible to undo this effect by filling up front-to-back - but that creates other practical problems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> It's all about the baggage policy, not the boarding policy.

</comment><comment><USER52> They just need to get rid of the overhead luggage compartments. Unchecked luggage is the entire boarding problem. It is also what holds up the security lines.

Make checking luggage much faster/easier and at the destination get it out for pick up much faster than is done now. Dramatically shrink or remove the overhead bins. Boarding and security line problems solved.

<comment><USER8> They would also have to stop charging for checked bags.

No matter how efficient they get at checking bags, though, not having to do it will always be faster.

I don't really see how much faster they can get in terms of unloading the bags... you will still have to wait for all the bags to come out on the conveyer belt, and whoever gets the last bag will have to wait quite a bit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> There was a Mythbusters episode a while back testing different boarding methods. If I recall correctly, having a "free-for-all" seating arrangement was the fastest, although it received the lowest customer satisfaction score from customers. The most satisfactory method of boarding was "WILMA[1] with blocks" which involves having business board first, followed by a combination of back-to-front and WILMA boarding while each zone was boarded with the WILMA method, starting from the back.

[1] Stands for "windows-middles-aisles". See [http://take.ms/znON7](http://take.ms/znON7) for a definition.

<comment><USER54> This information is already in the article.</comment></comment>


The Technology Stack of Billion Dollar Startups - <AUTHOR> https://www.cbinsights.com/blog/tech-stack-startups-billion-dollar

<comment><USER2> This is painfully uninteresting. Git is the most used library? Why not just say "The Internet" is the #1 technology of billion dollar companies.. All billion dollar companies use "The Internet"</comment>


Ask HN: Do Startups Want Design Intern? - <AUTHOR>

I've been a designer for many years now and have always had a deep interest in startups and the passionate teams that they tend to consist of.  This summer, I'm looking for an internship at a promising startup where I can contribute with my skills in UI/UX and just overall design sense.<p>Are there startups, preferably in the Bay Area, that are looking for anyone with this skillset?  Or is it something that is not really needed? <comment><USER2> Just looked at your portfolio. You should have no problem finding an internship.</comment>


Scaling My Side Project From $5K to $25K per month - <AUTHOR> https://campfirelabs.co/blog-1/2019/1/17/what-i-learned-scaling-from-5k-to-25k-per-month <comment><USER2> @michael2477

The post series is great! I have a couple of questions as I have to build out something similar for my client this week!

1) Did you niches down into verticals, ie insurance etc

2)Do you use a particular tech stack?

3) You nention the free trial to show lead quality, do you help them convert the lead or do you just provide as much information as possible?

4) Typically do you suppply the leads in a spreadsheet or API or do you put it in a CRM?

I'm typically seeing comyhaving no real prospecting process and that leaves leads on the table, rotting, making the service look bad?

<comment><USER3> 1/ We focused almost primarily on B2B tech

2/ I ended up partnering with some guys who built a custom scraper. Will describe that in more detail in part 3.

3/ We just provided about 10-15 pieces of info including name, email, and demographic info

4/ We sent Google Sheets or CSV per their request

Hope that is helpful!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> These posts are a blueprint for a successful business that read like a gripping novel -- really enjoyed it!

Bookmarked and will refer back to this as I develop [http://www.blog2video.com](http://www.blog2video.com) as I eventually want to get to the point of scaling and ultimately selling the business.

Quick question: what form of free trial structure ended up working best for you? I like the risk-free offer and am trying to craft one of my own.

<comment><USER3> I originally started with 100 lead free trial since I wanted people to convert one and then sign up for 1,000 or more. But it ended up being costly and not everyone converted their 100. So I switched it to 25 and communicated that the goal wasn't to convert a lead in the free trial but just show the quality of the data we could provide.

I think that's an important an often overlooked idea: you really need to help your customer think about how to try your product. Guide them along that process based on what you've seen work in the past. Don't let them figure it out and evaluate on their own.

<comment><USER4> "Think about how to try your product" \-- exactly what I needed today. Thanks Michael!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Thanks for sharing your experience :) I'm curious about your hiring process, how did you found your candidates and interviewed them?

<comment><USER3> Great question! AngelList is a great source for inbound. That's how I found the operations person.

Right when I started looking for a salesperson Zirtual (a similar company) shut down and laid off all their employees so I sent about 5 people messages on LinkedIn and asked if they'd be interested in chatting. Two responded and I hired one of them.

This is a great book on hiring and more about running an interview process - [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001EL6RWY/ref=dp-kindle- redirect?...](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001EL6RWY/ref=dp-kindle- redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1)

<comment><USER5> Did you hired them as full time employee in the US or as a freelancer?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> really enjoyable read, especially the evernote on customer journey!

I think it would benefit if you wrote a blurb about yourself at the end. I.e. your accomplishments and where you are now etc. The story would be more interesting if we knew the person behind the story!

</comment><comment><USER7> like how tactical this is. right down to the specifics.

</comment><comment><USER3> author of the post here! happy to answer any questions</comment>


The net negative producing programmer [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.pyxisinc.com/NNPP_Article.pdf

<comment><USER2> There's something wrong with this whole line of thinking. Perhaps its the measuring of productivity by loc, or pages of documentation written (shudder). Or maybe its the strong negative tone of the whole document.

Maybe it's me, but if a manager can't figure out the good and the bad performers in the group and figure out how to get the most of the resources available, then perhaps the most useful change would be at the management level.

Get to know your people. Look at their code, talk to them about ideas. Are they producing? Is there resentment among the group?

Please don't measure productivity by loc/day or worse yet pages of documentation. Short and sweet can be _much_ more productive than overly verbose and redundant.

<comment><USER3> From what I've heard and read, it tends to have more to do with the manager either not working closely with the individuals and/or not understanding what they are doing. This is especially common when it's a non-developer managing the group.

The best measure of productivity is the amount of functionality added and the number of bugs produced. Secondary metrics would be the same two numbers for when someone else makes the changes. Of course, the real trick is in accurately gauging the difficulty of the tasks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I am really suspicious of these 100:1 metrics because I don't think they're across the board. That is - they apply to different people at different times. Let me give you an example. One thing I do at work is crunch numbers and make predictions. I do this a lot, and I can grab data from all over the place, parse it or munge it, fit curves, draw graphs, show how two or more datasets are correlated, package all this into a nice report, schedule it to run regularly or generate the report in response to some event, blah blah. Sometimes I can turn around requests in just a few minutes because I have a ton of Python I've already written, I know where to find all the data, and so on. Another _equally talented_ person could take a week or two to do some of this stuff, if they started from scratch and didn't have my mathematical background. And there's stuff they can do that I'd be so much slower at. For any given task, 100:1 differences in performance between team members is _normal_. Over time, tho', over a range of tasks, I doubt there's even a 5:1 difference within most teams, maybe not even 2:1.

</comment><comment><USER5> isn't the NNPP the reason middle management exists :)</comment>


Introducing MapKit JS - <AUTHOR> https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2018/212/ <comment><USER2> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17232169](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17232169).

</comment><comment><USER3> This is beta.

250,000 map initializations 25,000 service requests

Per day. Correct me (it is quite late here) if I'm wrong but isn't this x10 the Google maps free tier?

No pricing information beyond this so far, they just suggest you contact them if you want more. They're probably still deciding.

Edit: I think Apple are specifically releasing it now because this week was the week the new Google Maps Platform ([https://cloud.google.com/maps- platform/](https://cloud.google.com/maps-platform/)) pay as you go pricing kicks in, the deadline has been pushed back by a month.

Under the new pricing you get $200 worth of credits as a monthly free tier which approximately maps (har har) to what this Apple beta gives you a _day_.

<comment><USER4> I hope it will affect Google's pricing, so I don't have to rewrite everything.

<comment><USER5> Rewrite these things under an abstraction layer so that you don't have to worry about third parties anymore

<comment><USER6> Google maps api tos forbids third party abstractions.

<comment><USER7> Seems like a great reason to not rely on Google Maps (forced lock in).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> For anyone looking to start using this, I would highly recommend waiting until [https://leafletjs.com](https://leafletjs.com) adds support so you aren't writing MapKit specific code.

<comment><USER9> I wonder if the official MapKit one uses vector rendering? It looks like all leaflet can do is display pretendered tiles.

EDIT: Oooh, [https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl- leaflet](https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-leaflet)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Anyone know what the licensing terms are for data returned by these Apple services - in particular, are there any restrictions on what you can do with latitude/longitude data returned by their geocoding API (or place names and addresses from their reverse geocoder)?

<comment><USER11> Would like to know this as well as possibly map/tile download/caching for offline

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Just saw an Apple Maps camera car in SF a week ago. First one I've seen. So they are at least doing a tiny bit of their own data gathering.

They also opened a 4,500 job facility in Hyderabad in 2016. [1] Presumably to do human editing like google maps does [2].

[1] [https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-to-open-first- offshore-t...](https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-to-open-first-offshore- technology-development-centre-in-india/)

[2] [https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/09/how-g...](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/09/how- google-builds-its-maps-and-what-it-means-for-the-future-of-everything/261913/)

<comment><USER13> And one in St. Louis, first I've noticed here. Haven't seen a Google van in a couple years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Do they have a request limit? Is using it setting some crazy tracking cookies that make it more difficult to achieve GDPR compliance? I like the support for pinch to zoom etc. Google Maps on the web not supporting it ruined so many website visits for me.

<comment><USER15> 250,000 map initializations 25,000 service requests per day.

<comment><USER4> Per website or per developer account, that is the question, because one developer can have several sites using maps.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Some answers to questions I had

Uses WebGL with fall back to server side rendering with tiles, they call it "adaptive rendering modes".

What for? "Unify on a single map provider with familiar, flexible APIs" (from WWDC slides).

      Free tiers
      </comment><comment>----

      Mapbox
        web
        50K map views / mo
        50K geocode / mo
        50K directions / mo
        50K matrix / mo

        mobile
        50K monthly active users
        same requests

      Apple
        web and mobile
        250K map views / *day*
        25K service requests / *day*

      Google (new style $200 credit system)
        (this is too complicated)

        web
        $200 free credit buys one of:
        14K map views embed advanced, might be anything with search/directions/routing, including on mobile / month
        100K map views static on web / month
        28k map views dynamic on web / month (this hurts)

        mobile
        unlimited mobile map views (very simple kind)
        14K map views for anything interesting / month
        40K direction requests / month
        ~10K Places calls / month

That's the max for any one service if you only use that service. So you could use 20K direction requests and 14K dynamic map views for free per month.

Google Maps gets expensive quickly, 71K embedded advanced map views per month is $1000 per month.

      roughly
      Google Maps: very expensive
      Mapbox: moderately priced
      Apple Maps: very cheap

Licensing...

Google is restrictive. Can't be behind a login, can't track vehicles/assets, can't embed in a web view on desktop, in practice can often not embed in an app on iOS.

Mapbox is famously open, you can do all the above.

Apple seems like they might be more like Mapbox, given their goals, but can't find any licensing yet.

If the licensing turns out well, this could very nice for cross platform maps.

<comment><USER16> Last I checked the new Google Maps licensing [1] is a bit more permissive, placing no restrictions on the behind a login bit.

The Google Maps JavaScript API does support UIWebView [2] so it should work embedded on iOS. There's a native SDK too.

[1] [https://cloud.google.com/maps- platform/terms/](https://cloud.google.com/maps-platform/terms/) [2] [https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/...](https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/browsersupport)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is great for a few reasons. There are many annoying user-interface "issues" in the Google Maps JS, especially on mobile. For example on mobile devices, my wife goes absolutely insane when she's prompted to use TWO fingers instead of one to scroll around. I know it's an easy fix for google, but they're probably trying to adhere to some stupid material design standard.

Second, Google already has too much data on people. I think it's been said before, but Apple doesn't really track people as invasively as Google.

Third, as stated, there has desperately been a need for competition in this space. I hope that over time they introduce many of the other features that Google provides to make sure it's totally competitive.

<comment><USER18> Leaflet, esri are pretty great

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Its annoying to me that they basically are just copying the interface that google maps SDK has. I would have hoped for something more declarative and easier to use from a framework like react/vue/elm etc.

<comment><USER20> They actually modelled it on the Swift/Objective-C MapKit interface. (They mentioned this in the WWDC session)

<comment><USER21> Which doesn't make any sense - this is for the web - not a native app

<comment><USER22> Sure it does. Likely the same developers would be implementing it on the web so makes sense to keep the api the same.

<comment><USER23> While it may be easier that way for the developers, it makes sense to make the API more idiotmatic for the target platform/SDK.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Don't see any info on the pricing.

<comment><USER25> You need a developer account - US$99 per annum for an individual.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Competition in the maps space is severally needed right now with the closure of smaller services over the past few years, the amount of data Apple has and CAN expose will make it a real contender, compared to smaller Map data services that don't availability of always-on real time data.

Popular times in Google Maps is incredibly useful but request to open this are ignored. I hope with Apple competing, both make this data available.

I would consider this in my next project, it would be nice to see pricing.

<comment><USER7> Would it be possible for OSM to provide these services at cost to fund their operations?

At some point we need to stop reinventing the wheel at each org and work on contrivuint g collectively for common shared Internet resources (just like Wikipedia).

<comment><USER26> OSM and others have limited availability of real time data, the smaller services leverage data from prediction models and some even get data upstream from Google through third parties.

Every Google Android device is by default a real time tracking device. The usefulness of this data is immensely underrated.

The only way I think real competition can be established here is exactly with news like this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Table stakes for a mapping provider. Good to see Apple moving this to the web as well. Hopefully future updates will provide discerning features.

</comment><comment><USER28> by avoiding Openstreetmap entirely, Apple makes a statement of Ivory Tower. No idea how map data is ingested internally, but I see no indications of OSM data

<comment><USER29> They do not avoid OpenStreetMap entirely. They use OSM (and about 300 other sources). On a map, click on the "legal" link, then click through the "more" link to see the list.

Generally speaking, though, they use TomTom wherever possible.

<comment><USER30> I'm curious how they use OSM. If they mix the OSM data with other data, then OSM's GPL-like 'share alike' licence clause kicks in....

> _They use OSM (and about 300 other sources). On a map, click on the "legal" > link, then click through the "more" link to see the list._

If you don't merge OSM data, then you only need to attribute OSM. And I don't think this is sufficient for the licence, which says: _" You must include a notice ... reasonably calculated to make any Person that is exposed to the Work aware that Content was obtained from [OSM]"_. i.e. basically every map has to say "OSM"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Wouldn't you just use something from Google? They have better mapping data, at least or so I thought...

<comment><USER32> Depends on region. In my city Google maps are terrible. Apple maps are even worse, though. But I can imagine that they might be better somewhere.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> If you are wondering what can these maps be used for, I thought I would post this. We want to have ways for people to stay in our app so we can do geolocation while they are driving. The web doesn't support background geolocation callbacks.

Here is a web based demo we have of a person picking up their friends while driving on the way to an event:

[https://youtu.be/i4nQZ-WN3Uw](https://youtu.be/i4nQZ-WN3Uw)

A lot goes into it including distance and heading calculations, correct 3d transforms for the map and avatars, as well as the usual realtime/offline infrastructure of Qbix Platform on the backend.

It is part of our larger Groups app that we are rolling out later this year that lets users organize group activities and even drive each other to them.

So now this comes at a great time - we are happy to offer a choice of two maps providers instead of just one, soon.

We release the Platform under AGPL on github.com/Qbix and many reusable components as MIT license there. You can see more here:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1O_gmPneI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1O_gmPneI)

Edit: Why so many downvotes? Seems strange.</comment>


YouTube's IE6 support dies on March 13 - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=175292

<comment><USER2> Is Google trying to singlehandedly kill IE6? Interesting when you think about the implications for Chrome... and the fact that an IE6 vulnerability allowed for the China hack debacle.

</comment><comment><USER3> You will still be able to watch videos in IE6 and other old browsers. It's only other, new features of the site that won't be supported.</comment>


Ask HN: What is your personal computing device setup? - <AUTHOR> Given that a majority of people are working from home right now, I'm curious to hear what everybody uses at home - either for their own personal computing activities or to support whatever work computer and equipment their employer may provide.<p>Do you still own personal laptops/computers even when their employer provides them a specced out model (such as Macbook Pro/Surface Book/ThinkPad X1 Carbon/etc)? Do you prefer building your own desktop for the value per dollar or buying a laptop for the flexibility? <comment><USER2> For $DAYJOB work, I have a Dell Latitude 7490. It's nothing fancy, but it does the job. The only real downside is that we're a Windows or Mac only shop from a desktop standpoint. No Linux.

For my own stuff, I use a Dell $SOMETHING_OR_OTHER that I bought used a couple of years ago. It's a beefier machine with 32GB of RAM, 1TB SSD, yadda yadda. On that (and all my personal devices) I run Linux. Usually Fedora or CentOS.

I don't really run servers at home much anymore, but there are a couple of older laptops that are still up and running that serve a few miscellaneous purposes. One sits at my electronics bench, and is mainly for quickly looking up data-sheets, or circuit diagrams, etc. The other is in my bedroom, connected to a 32" display and powered external speakers, and is basically where I watch movies and stuff. And then I do have one little Lenovo tower PC that hosts one specific application that I'm experimenting with and wanted to keep local.

All of my other computing resources are cloud based, using a combination of Linode, Hetzner and AWS.

 _Do you prefer building your own desktop for the value per dollar or buying a laptop for the flexibility?_

I used to, but these days I mostly value my time more. The one thing I may do at some point, is build a dedicated machine learning box with one or more beefy GPU's and what-not.

</comment><comment><USER3> > Do you still own personal laptops/computers even when their employer > provides them a specced out model

Yes.

Reasons:

I control the personal ones (yes, plural), so they run what I want (Linux) and do not spy upon me.

Work machine is a w10 laptop, with all the usual corporate "spy on you" stuff, and the long policy document of "don't use work equipment for ...".

So work machine is used _only_ for work purposes. No personal usage of the work laptop occurs, ever. Then, there is nothing on the work machine that "work" might get all upset about. In fact, the work laptop and VPN hardware box have their own, isolated, ethernet card just for them in my firewall, with strict firewall rules such that the subnet run over that ethernet card has no visibility of anything going on on the rest of my home network.

> Do you prefer building your own desktop for the value per dollar

Yes. In fact, all but one computer is a desktop model. The last one is a laptop, it also runs Linux, just like the rest. The firewall I mentioned above is another desktop model running Linux, which is how I could simply add another ethernet card and configure the firewall rules to make a hardware and software isolated subnet for the work laptop.

</comment><comment><USER4> macOS: [https://github.com/nikitavoloboev/my-mac- os](https://github.com/nikitavoloboev/my-mac-os)

iOS/watch/iPadOS: [https://github.com/nikitavoloboev/my- ios](https://github.com/nikitavoloboev/my-ios)

<comment><AUTHOR> really awesome documentation of your setup

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Recently, I switched from iOS to Android. And I was missing Apple's Continuity feature. Where I could easily make or receive phone calls on Mac, get access OTPs, messages quickly on my Mac. I noticed I was ending up landing social media or hacker-news :D spending hours every-time I picked up my phone for a call(there're a lot in this work from home situation).

And then after spending a day, going through a lot of spam! I noticed this app on App Store called "Connecton"(I'm surprised why was it hard to find it).

Putting out loud my personal wfh setup, so that I can save someone's time who needs this.</comment>


Why Not To Do a Startup by Dave McClure - <AUTHOR> http://ontwik.com/startup/why-not-to-do-a-startup-dave-mcclure/

<comment><USER2> Great tip at 14:55. He really points out what you have to do to really point out the 'problem'. Make the other person 'feel' the pain. You can't just mention the problem. Visceral!</comment>


An infographic that shows you where your friends travel - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2012/10/05/the-roads-well-traveled-roads-not-taken-of-you-and-all-your-friends/

<comment><USER2> I have heard of many startups trying to tackle this niche. I haven't seen anyone pull it off as gracefully as zetrip (referring especially to the UI as featured on the zetrip.com front page). There is a lot of utility (and thus, profit-potential) in this market, I'm impressed overall and I look forward to seeing the infographic on my fb wall within 24 hrs.

</comment><comment><USER3> the infograhic is pretty cool.

<http://zetrip.com/recommendations/landing?u=4015>

but i'm not sure if i'd keep coming back to the site. what's the long term vision?</comment>


Demand for Android app developers has eclipsed demand for Apple app developers - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2011/tc2011033_078030.htm

<comment><USER2> Hmm... is it perhaps because one may require more resources to develop and support the an app across multiple Android platforms than to do the equivalent for iOS?

Just a thought...

<comment><USER3> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zebra_(medicine)></comment></comment>


Show HN: Pitch, a free podcast hosting platform - <AUTHOR> https://www.getpitch.io <comment><AUTHOR> Hi Show HN,

I'm really honored to share with you what me and my colleagues have been working on as a side project since the beginning of this year.

We are a three people team, all three of us are engineers or en route to a degree in engineering and this poses a nice challenge, since the product, UI and marketing we all have to figure out as we code the MVP.

Our Stack:

* Node.js with Typescript and Nest.js for Backend

* React over Next.js for Frontend

* PostgreSQL for database

Pitch is a podcast hosting platform that allows Content Creators to host their podcasts for free, without any severe limitation, such as minutes, number of episodes, number of podcasts, etc. I believe that the incentives of a paid platform are really bad, because they severely restrain the ability of any podcast to grow or even to bootstrap, as you have to pay for the scale or might have to pay to use it anytime in the future. Many people just have podcasts as a hobby and it is not nice to pay a non-null amount of dollars for having a hobby.

With that in mind, we are going to grow our user base first and then offer an _optional_ revenue share program for the content creator. I believe this incentive is good because growing the content creator's reach is as much a success for them as it would be for us, making this model the perfect alignment of interests between us and the content creator. Of course there are other variables that we will also optimize for, such as user satisfaction - one of our KPIs - and quality of the advertising/content.

Podcast hosting is one of the tools we are offering our users and we will add other tools, such as one-click distribution, RSS feed, Analytics dashboard, etc.

I really hope to have some feedback - good or otherwise - so that I can improve my product and have this side-project become a company that I can grow and impact society positively.

<comment><USER2> How do you plan to host the audio files? Won't the bandwidth costs be very expensive for you?

<comment><AUTHOR> We plan to put it on AWS. We are still unsure if the BW costs will be overwhelming, but we will give it a try.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> You should spend some time to improve your landing page. Also, the app has issues with image file upload and podcast link. Image is broken after upload. The podcast link is not accessible, it's returning XML access denied error

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll get that fixed right away. Thanks for the feedback</comment></comment>


Toilet Paper dispenser uses facial recognition to limit amount of TP dispensed - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/nehring_daniel/status/1304700742511374337 <comment><USER2> I have to ask if this isn't the wrong end of the torso to recognize? I mean "ha ha butt recognition!" jokes aside, shouldn't it be able to dispense an amount of toilet paper proportionate to the mess to be wiped up?

Otherwise, this just smacks of Sovietism in sheep's clothes. "Here, Taxpayer, is the amount of TP you've been allotted! Pay homage to the market for its ability to provide you with cleanliness!"

</comment><comment><USER3> i love this idea..altho' i imagine toilet paper is just to test the concept. this can be applied to a whole other lot of resources from the commons that are disproportionately appropriated by only certain people.

i am not there yet where there is actual denial of use(it depends..i mean, nothing is GOLD at this point), but its a good way to track per person usage.

having said that, i wouldnt be surprised if 100-200 years from now, when fresh water is rationed(guaranteed), this kind of tech is used to measure units allocated per person. i'd also like to imagine that this would be in a future where everything is free. like water, food and all shareable resources from the commons.

<comment><USER4> Pervasive automated measuring for the purposes of Denial-of-Access is an attack, and is a path best walked carefully, or better yet, never trod close enough to to have to worry about it.

Furthermore, of all things, toilet paper? You're going to unilaterally leave someone in a position to not be able to clean up after visiting the toilet? This is a great way to not make friends. If your threat model involves people walking off with toilet paper putting a meaningful dent in your OP-ex, I'm fairly sure you have much bigger issues currently, and definitely will once people really start getting sour and vandalizing your bathrooms/ridiculously expensive dispensers.

And a final point: You can't take back biometrics, and if you've got a functional setup to do this, you're one step away from either implementing something actively harmful to society at large, or a bonanza target for those looking to get their hands on someone else's biometrics. There are some things that just aren't worth doing this is one them.</comment></comment>


Migrating from EC2-Classic to VPC with zero downtime - <AUTHOR> https://playfab.com/blog/2015/03/10/how-playfab-migrated-ec2-classic-vpc-zero-downtime

<comment><USER2> "Security groups (which define what IPs can access what ports, similar to basic IPTables firewall rules) cannot be shared between EC2-Classic and EC2-VPC,"

That is no longer true. In December 2014 Amazon launched ClassicLink, which lets you add EC2-Classic instances to VPC security groups.

[https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/classiclink-private- communi...](https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/classiclink-private- communication-between-classic-ec2-instances-vpc-resources/)

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HexrVfuIY1k&t=33m33s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HexrVfuIY1k&t=33m33s)

<comment><USER3> Author here - Actually, the big problem was RDS EC2-Classic DB security groups, which ClassicLink doesn't help with. ClassicLink certainly is a feature, but it's not one that would have helped with the subset of groups that we were having trouble with.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Similarly, Instagram faced similar issues and developed Neti for the task.

[https://github.com/Instagram/neti](https://github.com/Instagram/neti)

And the blog article:

[http://instagram- engineering.tumblr.com/post/89992572022/mig...](http://instagram- engineering.tumblr.com/post/89992572022/migrating-aws-fb)

Now, Instgram's path was AWS EC2-Classic -> AWS VPC -> FB, however it is still relevant.

</comment><comment><USER5> Nice writeup, Tiru!</comment>


Parish priest argues rationally for shoplifting - <AUTHOR> http://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/4813866.Full_transcript_of_the_sermon_given_by_Father_Tim_Jones <comment><USER2> _Let my words not be misrepresented as a simplistic call for people to shoplift. The observation that shoplifting is the best option that some people are left with is a_ grim indictment of who we are _. Rather, this is a call for our society no longer to treat its most vulnerable people with indifference and contempt._

<comment><USER3> _The observation that shoplifting is the best option that some people are left with is a grim indictment of who we are._

Britain is already a welfare state. How much more welfare-y does he want it to be?

Also, doesn't "caring for the truly needy" fall into the Church's mission statement? If a starving person comes to a priest, shouldn't the priest share his own food rather than telling him to go steal from someone else?

<comment><USER4> Agreed. Certainly the Church has not exhausted its resources feeding the poor, and it should do so before it resorts to encouraging them to steal.

<comment><USER5> _the Church has not exhausted its resources feeding the poor_

And should it? Should we for example sell our local building to pay the heating bills of the local poor? How then will we meet the spiritual needs of the people. Where can we congregate. How will we organise the meeting of the physical and spiritual needs in future years without somewhere to meet together, work together, pray together?

<comment><USER4> Given that your moral code preaches altruism and self-sacrifice, yes. If someone is in the situation that they will _die_ if they do not get material resources from somewhere, you should give them what they need to survive before you pay your own heating bills. Otherwise, you're hypocrites.

I'm going to tell poor people that if they _have_ to steal in order to survive, they should steal from churches.

<comment><USER5> I'm poor (according to our government we live well below the poverty line but things are not that bad, gov metrics are just screwy; I digress) how would I gain from stealing from other poor people. Surely to increase the wealth amongst the poor, money needs to be taken from the wealthy - Tesco make how many million UKP every day?

Stealing from poor people is simply stupid, morality aside.

If I give everything away today then tomorrow the guys who I've helped are still going to be needy but my family and myself will also be in need. How is that helping.

We do what we can whilst maintaining our own existence. Granted I bought trousers yesterday giving me 2 pairs that don't have holes in (4 pairs I can wear in public) but it does make it difficult to work without having clean clothes to change into.

I don't think it is hypocritical to hold that others with more resources should help more than me. Christianity does teach altruism and self-sacrifice but these are not the prime message - relationship with God is utmost and we are not taught to be stupid but instead to be generous with the things (and time) we are blessed with.

(Incidentally not paying heating bills is also theft as gas is paid in arrears.)

<comment><USER4> I didn't say YOU should give poor people money, I said the Church should. And I'm not going to tell poor people to steal from you; I'm going to tell them to steal from the Church.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This shouldn't shock anyone. It has long been the position of the RC Church that property rights are secondary compared to the right to live.

<comment><USER3> Indeed. Christianity, as a religion, is designed to appeal to folks at the low end of society, so it's not too surprising. Nietzsche goes on about this kind of thing a lot:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master-slave_morality>

<comment><USER7> Is there a religion that doesn't?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's not exactly suggesting that the Irish eat their children, but it's an interesting take nonetheless.

<comment><USER9> That's how I read it - a Swiftian proposal to make more fortunate people think what it would be like to be in a situation (e.g. 100 pounds to live on for six weeks) where shoplifting is the best option. At least, it made me think about that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> His argument was certainly not rational.

<comment><AUTHOR> How so? I take a pretty dim view of most organized religion, and found this to be one of the more rational sermons I have read or heard.

He suggests that in a dire situation, stealing from the shelves of a major chain store is a less evil alternative than violent crime or prostitution.

The obvious flaw in his argument would pointing out that this is a false dilemma, that there are many other alternatives. But for the example of the recently released prisoner he cites, I'm not sure which obvious ones he's failing to consider. I'm not pro-shoplifting, but given his scenario it seems better than robbery.

<comment><USER3> _But for the example of the recently released prisoner he cites, I'm not sure which obvious ones he's failing to consider._

Begging and dying would seem to both be more morally acceptable than stealing.

<comment><USER5> As someone else pointed out the Church holds that the right to live is greater than the right to [individual?] ownership of property. This has some interesting consequences which I'll enjoy meating out with friends in the Church in the next few weeks - very apposite.

Begging, agreed. Though when I look at it hard and consider that begging demands the poor to give up their dignity then it reinforces in me that we should endeavour not to leave people in a position where it is ever necessary.

I think just the fact that so many are now considering the position of the poor facing moral choices of theft or starvation makes this an excellent sermon.

<comment><USER3> _I think just the fact that so many are now considering the position of the poor facing moral choices of theft or starvation makes this an excellent sermon._

When was the last time anybody actually managed to starve to death in Great Britain? Great Britain is already a welfare state. It's easy to get paid for not working. If you fall through the cracks of that system there are dozens of charities devoted to helping those in genuine need. In addition, there's a beggar on every street corner. Oh, and there's always the Church, which really should be working on feeding the hungry itself (perhaps by reducing its own gold-plated candelabra budget) instead of sending 'em to knock over Tesco's.

Finally, if you somehow manage to be completely unable to find food _anywhere_ , and you haven't eaten for days and you're actually in danger of dying of starvation, all you need to do is go to hospital, where they'll say "hey, this guy is dying of starvation" and give you free food and medical treatment.

In conclusion, dying for lack of food in modern Britain is very, very difficult.

<comment><USER5> When I said "not to leave people in a position ..." I wasn't really thinking of people in the UK.

If you can walk into hospital then you're not going to be treated for hunger, if you can't then you'll possibly die where you sleep. I'll agree, in winter in the UK you'll die from exposure before you die technically from starvation.

Yes, in my city the best (in fact only) street work is paid for by the local Church - they do a rolling program of food/shelter moving between a few of the city centre church buildings.

" _Finally, if you somehow manage to be completely unable to find food anywhere_ "

Isn't the point kinda that you can walk into this huge building, nearby and full of food, 20% of which will probably just be binned, and help yourself??

[I'm really not a strong advocate of theft!]</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to best catch up / learn about AWS and GCP - <AUTHOR> I've been a sysadmin and infra architect on a very legacy project for last decade. I'm aware of AWS, GCP, and have my VCA (working on VCP), but want to really dive into it in an orderly fashion and progress my theoretical and than practical knowledge.
I tend to be a bookworm - I like to learn about a topic and get the general framework figured out in my mind, before starting to hands-on-keyboard mess around it. My preferred way of learning a new topic is a big book or seven on a beach - but some topics seem to move too fast for that. I've explored Udemy/Pluralsight courses, and Amazon books, but am concerned these two platforms may move too fast to be captured in such a static way. Is there hope? :)
Many thanks! <comment><AUTHOR> For what it may be worth, my background is as PeopleSoft Administrator - Unix/Linux, DB2/Oracle, Tuxedo/Weblogic, peppered with bash/Perl, some network design and diagnostic, and whatever else is needed in service of the PeopleSoft vertical stack. This would put me squarely in the HackerNews- Dreaded category of "Enterprise Software" :=>

I'm in serious danger of moving from technology architect to middle management, and while I'm eager to learn more about people and get better at facilitating productive teams (etc etc etc;), I don't want to lose track of my core passion - and feel I may need to "reinvent myself" soon, lest I go in the wrong track via inertia...

Thx all! :->

</comment><comment><USER2> AWS and GCP have certifications too.

GCP - [https://cloud.google.com/certification/](https://cloud.google.com/certification/)

AWS - [https://aws.amazon.com/certification/](https://aws.amazon.com/certification/)

Personally I just learn whatever I need for my current task by reading documentation and sample code.

</comment><comment><USER3> [https://www.edx.org/school/aws](https://www.edx.org/school/aws)

3 courses with hands-on exercises, and you can't beat the price either. They are also run by AWS Tech Training staff. I finished the "building" one, and I'm looking at starting deploying soon

</comment><comment><USER4> Pick a single platform, and implement a small project. serverless-stack.com is decent for this.

Amazon has well over a hundred services, but an awful lot of them will never apply to what you're working on. You're right-- any print book is out of date by the time it hits stores.</comment>


Tiny Chiplets: A New Level of Micro Manufacturing - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/09/science/tiny-chiplets-are-a-new-level-of-micro-manufacturing.html

<comment><USER2> I was going to submit this. Then I read it and realized it said nothing. And in a confusing way.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is brilliant.

One problem with today's chip manufacturing tech is if you want to build system with multiple manufacturing technologies(digital/RAM/Flash/Analog) it increases your price by much because you have to package each part(which also limits your designs), test it and assemble it on a relatively large pcb. So in order to save money, you manufacture everything using the same un-optimal process.

So this is why microcontrollers like the arduino have relatively low memory.

Now if you could easily and cheaply assemble miniature electronic components - suddenly you get the optimal composition of your circuit, by picking an matching low cost components.

So you want to make an arduino cpu with megabytes of ram and flash ? now that's possible and very cheap(probably in the cents). Even something like microcontroller that could run linux and python would seem possible.

Can't wait to see it deployed.

<comment><USER4> One solution to this using conventional CMOS technology is to use 3D stacking, where each layer uses a different technology.

<comment><USER3> You're right , but that's a pretty difficult and expensive solution.

The more practical solution for now is 2.5D stacking - stacking all the un- packaged chips on silicon/glass die instead of a pcb. That's already being used in some fpga and communications equipment.

But 2.5d is still pretty expensive and complex. Not yet ready for low cost stuff.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This technology looks very intriguing to me but I'm confused about potential applications for it. That is, what's it good for?

<comment><USER5> If I read it correctly, essentially, tiny circuit boards full of components that can be printed. It seems like it would make the manufacture of electrical devices easier, and perhaps even more accessible to hobbyists, if the production machines and "chiplets" are affordable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Lots of NYTimes articles on HN lately. While I think most of the topics are worthy of the front page, it really sucks when you hit their "10 articles a month" pay wall. Wish posters would look for alternative, free versions of some of these stories (I'm aware that might not always be possible).

<comment><USER7> If you are hitting their pay wall every month, may I suggest you subscribe to the Times? You obviously want to read their content at least that much. To get that kind of quality writing isn't free, the writers really have spent years on their craft (a close family member of mine is a journalist). I don't subscribe, but I typically am not interested in their articles more than a couple times each month.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> >The emerging printing technology poses a heretical idea: Rather than squeezing more transistors into the same small space, why not smear the transistors across a much larger surface?

Did they forget about the speed of light?

<comment><USER9> This isn't for performance, it's for the capability at all.

Would you rather have:

1\. No ability to create your own silicon logic outside of FPGA/CPLD chips or having an ASIC fabbed, all of which tend to be very high cost per unit and have large board outlines, and are limited in i/o by the predefined capabilities of the chip?

2\. The ability to whip out cheap prototypes whose performance is nowhere near state of the art in a few hours with a laser printer style device onto substrates on an arbitrary surface.

New tech is frequently disruptive in ways different from how things were envisioned - for example, I doubt people reading Stephenson's "Diamond Age" would have envisioned the plastic PLA/ABS fiber printers as the first major incarnation of the 3D printing revolution.

<comment><USER10> I don't have a good mental model for this. What sorts of problems are more suited to a network of tiny ICs rather than a FPGA or a microprocessor?</comment></comment></comment>