Hidden motors in cycling: Van den Dreissche banned for 6 years, titles stripped - <AUTHOR> http://cyclingtips.com/2016/04/hidden-motors-van-den-dreissche-banned-for-six-years-stripped-of-european-and-belgian-under-23-titles/ <comment><AUTHOR> This is a follow-up to discussions on "mechanical doping" in cycling.

The first story I recall on this topic was in 2010: [http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2010/may/19/cycling- motors-...](http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2010/may/19/cycling-motors- mechanical-doping)

This is now 6 years later, and we finally have the first pro cyclist banned based on being caught red-handed at an event with a motor in her bicycle.

The type of motor she used was a Vivak, one of these: [http://www.vivax- assist.com/en/produkte/vivax-assist-4-0/viv...](http://www.vivax- assist.com/en/produkte/vivax-assist-4-0/vivax-assist_4-0.php) though probably with a slightly modified button to make it more discreet.

<comment><USER2> "It was controlled by a Bluetooth switch installed underneath the handlebar tape." (in the article)

<comment><USER3> They should install Bluetooth sniffers before steep sections, it would be cool to see a little ping on the radio and then watch one of the racers magically pull ahead.

<comment><USER4> Cyclist also (legally) use wireless candance, speed, power, gear ratio, heart rate sensors, etc. Though they're normally ANT+ and not Bluetooth.

<comment><USER5> BTLE is becoming increasingly popular (eg Polar has moved entirely to using it).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> >She also said that this bike was taken by accident by her helpers to the pit area.

>She claimed that he had put a motor in unbeknownst to her

What is with athletes and never admitting their mistakes. You were caught, I would have much more respect for someone if they just came out and said "Yes, I did it, I take full responsibility." Instead they come up with these ridiculous excuses that do nothing but continue to degrade their integrity.

<comment><USER7> Marion Jones is the only person I can think of that has actually done this.

[http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/10/05/jones.doping/index.html?ere...](http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/10/05/jones.doping/index.html?eref=time_us)

<comment><USER6> I seem to remember Andy Pettitte immediately taking responsibility, as opposed to Roger Clemens who denied it for awhile. However, I'm not positive.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> How does the UCI enforce a fine? When you race do you have to sign a contract stating that you will pay any penalties, or can the fine be seen as "must be paid before competing again"?

<comment><USER9> You don't have to pay it, but you won't be racing again. As a former USA Cycling official, I'd occasionally fine riders for infractions (usually $20-50 payable to the youth rider fund). They didn't have to pay it, as I had no enforcement authority outside of bike races. However, if I saw you next week and you hadn't paid the fine, you won't be at the start line. I couldn't make you pay it, but I could prevent you from racing.

</comment></comment><comment> atom-morgan I don't see it in the article but I heard it recently so I guess I'll share.

Lance Armstrong was on the Joe Rogan Experience and discussed doping within the sport. He said at one point in time, people would thread fishing line through a wine cork. They'd tie the line to the tail of a car and stick the cork in their mouth. As the car starts moving, the cork pulls against your teeth giving you just enough pull.

<comment><USER10> Sounds like a fine way to lose your teeth.

<comment><USER11> pretty sure the cork would break before your teeth.

<comment><USER10> I wouldn't want to test that theory.

<comment><USER12> Then you're not a professional cyclist ;) The lengths they will go to for a small advantage...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Infrared FLIR cameras are being used to help spot the cheaters.

[http://hackaday.com/2016/04/25/cyclists-use-tiny-motors- to-c...](http://hackaday.com/2016/04/25/cyclists-use-tiny-motors-to-cheat/)

<comment><USER14> That news article may not be entirely correct: [https://www.eptc.co/watts-the- deal-with-motors/](https://www.eptc.co/watts-the-deal-with-motors/)

<comment><USER15> This guy analysed a control image - image taken of a KNOWN bike with a vivax motor - and came to a conclusion there is no motor in that picture.

<comment><USER16> What's more it claims that friction is the biggest source of losses in an electric motor, when it's actually a very minor source of losses. The biggest losses are from resistive heating. See section "Motor Efficiency" at:

[http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/energy/products/reference/15297](http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/energy/products/reference/15297)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> If the motor was installed by a family friend, why would that person need to conceal the switch?

<comment><USER18> It was alleged, that the bike with the motor, was not her bike but a friend's bike, that was left in their tent, and mistaken to be the althlete's bike. But also supports your statement, if this wasn't the athlete's bike, why go through the effort to hide the switch or mechanism at all if you're not competing?

On the flip side, if the bike was actually a friend's bike, what do you say to that friend that got you banned?

<comment><USER19> More convoluted than even that.

She admits that it WAS her bike. But that she sold her bike to a friend who then installed a motor, brought it to her event, then her "helpers" mistakenly brought it out to the pit area.

See, her original explanation that it was just a friend's random bike didn't wash with it being painted like her other race bikes are. This new explanation of it being one of her bikes that she sold to a friend, now fits in with the narrative she is trying to spin.

Honestly the whole story is nonsense.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> What's interesting to me is that these folks, from Lance to moto-users, think there's a reasonable chance they won't get caught cheating at one of the most observed, recorded, scrutinized events in the world. They're playing a delicate game of signaling and information theory.

Either they're right and the ones who were actually caught were only the tip of the iceberg, or they're making what should be a blatantly obvious miscalculation of the odds of getting caught. Not sure which yet.

</comment><comment><USER21> It makes me wonder if the engines would be this sophisticated if they weren't for cheating?

<comment><USER22> Even rather casual cyclists will want something as light as possible and the in-frame hub drive arrangement has nice aesthetics.

<comment><USER23> Yes but casual cyclists will not pay €2499 for the pleasure of doing so

<comment><USER24> It depends how you define "casual". I tend to think of casual cyclists as avid cyclists who don't race. Anybody who isn't avid is just a guy/gal on a bike.

By that definition, casual cyclists spend ridiculous amounts of money on cycling kit. $2000 for a set of carbon fiber wheels. $1000 for a power meter. Trek has a custom line of bikes (Project One) that retail in the $7000-$15000 range (US).

<comment><USER25> By my thoughts, somebody who's spent more than $1000 or so on bike and gear, maximum, isn't a "casual" cyclist.

If they're buying individual parts that cost more than an entire road bike that would be recommended by a store clerk to some guy walking in off the street, they're well beyond "casual".

<comment><USER26> That isn't too much to spend on a bike. My bike is more than that and isn't special in any way, just a good regular bike. And I just use it to ride to work, this isn't anything I'm enthusiastic about.

Add the bags/panniers, lights, pump, clothing and other accessories on top.

I get about 100 miles a week, 8-9 months a year so it justifies the investment.

<comment><USER27> I'd say anyone who has special clothing for cycling is an enthusiast, particularly if it's more than $50 worth.

<comment><USER26> I don't have that either. Just some gear to withstand light rain and cold. Nothing that's especially made for cycling, I use this with other outdoors activities too. My way to work is too long to comfortably ride in work clothes. Imagine riding 8 miles in your jeans and sweater and then sitting in front of the computer all day in the same clothes after that.

You're trying to label people "cycling enthusiasts" in your heads (and I know _exactly_ the stereotype you're thinking of). They do exist, but for most people riding a bike, it's just their daily commute. It might need a decent bike and a few items of clothing.

You don't call every car owner a "car enthusiast" even though taking the train/bus is a viable option in many places of the world and owning a car is much more expensive than a bike.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> _"I was stood in the pit next to Femke's entourage," he said then. "I don't quite know what it was, but something seemed a bit weird there. The whole team had walkie talkie radios, ear pieces and seemed pretty anxious and, overall, just a bit odd. I'd never seen that before and it kind of stuck in my head."_

Very clear that everyone knew about it.

<comment><USER29> No it's not.

The quote and your command are all based on feelings and assumptions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Being a cycling fan and rider, and reading quite a bit about the various allegations and methods of cheating over the years have led to me becoming quite jaded — and not surprised in the least at this announcement.

Thinking of all the ways riders have cheated, from Lance's blood-doping to the Festina Affair to Marco Pantani...it just seems like many of the icons of the sport are mired in cheating and doping scandals, and this story is further evidence that while testing may have evolved, so too have the methods of cheating.

This leads me to wonder why cheating is so rampant in the sport? I used to think it was only due to lax testing policies, but now think it is more a product of the insane amount of stress the grueling courses put on a rider's body, along with the likelihood that anyone in this very individual sport is probably more competitive than most other people by nature.

It just disheartens me as a fan. I truly wonder sometimes if the testing and oversight can ever catch up with all the cheating. A part of me wants to think yes...but stories like this continue to make me think otherwise.

<comment><USER31> >>This leads me to wonder why cheating is so rampant in the sport?

May be one of the major reasons is money involved. Cheating is one side the other is fixing: with aim to get more and quick money. In first case, i.e. of cheating, you aim for money by becoming famous and then grab advert contracts. In the other case, you get direct money to lose.

Money and advertisement are destroying many a sports. Sadly, it seems to go worse.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Why do they care about such a niche/illegal market, this idea is fantastic, imagine Boris bikes in London for example - they could recharge batteries when docked, it would be awesome to have this kind of engine in those tank-bikes.

Extra points - please distribute heat on the handles because it's often cold. Thank you.

<comment><USER33> Apparently they were trialling/planning to trial electric boris bikes in some parts of London in 2013. I've been googling and can't find any follow up to it though

<comment><USER27> The hire bikes in Copenhagen have electric motors. And ipads mounted on the handlebars.

I don't know why, the system doesn't seem especially useful in a flat city.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> What about Ryder Hesjedal's bike spinning on itself a few years back?

Are we addressing that as well? It feels like the UCI is only going after easy pickings to prove a point and not doing its best to actually to fight mechanical cheating in fear of yet another scandal.

<comment><USER35> That's already been demonstrated to be a side effect of a still-spinning rear wheel:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak7xP8eghog](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak7xP8eghog)

It should also be noted that "incident" occurred on a fast downhill section while Hesjedal wasn't pedaling so even if there were a motor it is exceedingly unlikely it would still be engaged at the time of the crash.

With a plausible physical explanation and no way to go back in time to check the bike for a motor, there's not much for the UCI to go after even if it felt the need to.

<comment><USER36> I'm not convinced. Compare:

[https://youtu.be/ynLMfzLTc8M?t=8](https://youtu.be/ynLMfzLTc8M?t=8)

and

[https://youtu.be/Ak7xP8eghog?t=13](https://youtu.be/Ak7xP8eghog?t=13)

That was the best run in that video. The wheel spun less than 180 degrees after being carefully placed on the ground. In the original video the wheel was in contact with the ground for _seconds_ before it got free to spin. It then spun for more than 180 degrees and seemed to be accelerating.

I know such motors are supposed to stop when you stop pedaling, but it could be a different one. There's still enough evidence to look damning.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Has this specific bike in question been show to the public?

I'm very much aware the technology exists where this can realistically be a problem, but I'm surprised that the actual smoking gun has not been shown.

</comment><comment><USER38> Are there any competitions where this sort of motor assist is legal? It seems like that might be an interesting sport.

<comment><USER39> [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorcycle_sport](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorcycle_sport)

<comment><USER25> Yeah - if you allow any kind of motors as a standard part of the ruleset, you've basically got 'lightweight motorcycle racing'.

You can get something like this already with trial riding or motocross races, where having a lightweight motorcycle is essential for handling in rough terrain and to take falls and jumps without breaking the suspension.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Did anyone listen too the Telegraph Cycling Podcast - they were talking about respected journalists being convinced some of the big names have been using motors. They expect any revelations to come before the tour of italy or france - as is normal for big cycling stories

</comment><comment><USER41> Yeah, but that's yesterday's news.

Today had Marcel Kittel winning a snow-shortened stage in the Tour de Romandie and Sacha Modolo winning in the Tour of Turkey.

Also, the guidebook for the upcoming Giro d'Italia has been published: [http://static2.giroditalia.it/wp- content/uploads/2016/04/Gar...](http://static2.giroditalia.it/wp- content/uploads/2016/04/Garibaldi-affiancate.pdf)

Looks to be a great race, although I think there's a risk that stages 19 and 20, which thread their way through the Alps on the French-Italian border will get cancelled or rerouted due to snow.

The stage in Friuli looks like it could be particularly good, and the Dolomite stage is going to be awesome!

On a personal level, watching the Giro will make me nostalgic, I'm sure. One stage, Modena-Asolo even goes over some of the roads that I used to ride on near Padova.

<comment><USER42> I used to really like to follow cycling -- I have now concluded it is the dirtiest sport there is. They are the original dopers -- note that the list starts in the 1800's:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_doping_cases_in_cyclin...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_doping_cases_in_cycling)

        e.g. 1930 "The acceptance of drug-taking in the Tour de
        France was so complete by 1930 that the rule book,
        distributed by Henri Desgrange, reminded riders that
        drugs would not be provided by the organizers."

Now their "doping" the bikes.

<comment><USER41> Oh, bullshit.

Look at how rotten soccer is from FIFA on down. Look at US sports where those guys were oozing steroids out there ears with basically no consequences.

It's just that cycling is kind of a working man's sport in Europe and is sort of caught in a no-man's land: it's not wealthy enough to buy its way out of trouble like soccer and US sports, but does have enough money to attract cheaters.

When the scandal linked below hit, all the cyclists got caught and punished (rightfully so!), but people in other sports? The judge has ordered the evidence destroyed!

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operaci%C3%B3n_Puerto_doping_c...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operaci%C3%B3n_Puerto_doping_case)

This was roughly the time period when the Spanish soccer team was running away with all kinds of international success.

Cycling has surely had its share of problems, but it is also making a big effort to clean things up, with fairly draconian out of competition testing that would no way, no how be accepted by stars in other sports.

See also: [https://twitter.com/veloropa/status/725359244443262976](https://twitter.com/veloropa/status/725359244443262976)

And like the response says, the only reason soccer doesn't have a bunch more is because they don't test well. If there's doping in cycling, you can bet that, at 10X (at least) the money in soccer, there's some serious doping going on there too.

<comment><USER42> I get it -- you like cycling -- I do to. I think the races are so grueling that it was the first sport to find methods to endure the inhumane distances and terrain. But if you really like cycling you got to come to grips with how dirty the profession is -- real change won't happen until the organizers pull their heads out of the sand.

Take a look at the leaderboards at the Tour de France -- these are just those that are caught:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_at_the_Tour_de_France#2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_at_the_Tour_de_France#2008_Tour_de_France)

It doesn't do any good to point at FIFA soccer... their dirt is more in the power and financial aspect of their sport -- and its horrible. Cycling has far higher demands on the human body in terms of endurance and a willingness to suffer -- thus drugs (and hidden motors) will always be a real temptation.

<comment><USER41> I like cycling, and I like clean cycling, and it does not do any good to smear the whole sport with "dirty!".

What's that do to the guys who are competing clean? It pisses all over their efforts is what it does. It's not fair, and it does not help.

Soccer is certainly not as hard as cycling ( [https://s-media-cache- ak0.pinimg.com/736x/55/b5/51/55b551bfa...](https://s-media-cache- ak0.pinimg.com/736x/55/b5/51/55b551bfa7e05c39e32972920940e16c.jpg) ) , but with that much money involved, being relatively fresh after 80 minutes can count for a lot.

<comment><USER9> _What 's that do to the guys who are competing clean?_

And just who would be on that short list? Like the commenter to whom you reply, I too used to be into cycling. Paid for streaming all the races. Used to race myself, and was a race official. But one after another got popped. I used to say that if Jens Voigt ever tested positive, I'd quit watching the sport, because I thought him to be the epitome of the hard-working rider who gets by on hard work and talent. Now I'm pretty sure Jens is on the juice, too. Hell, amateurs are getting popped for doping in Grand Fondos, where there's no money and no one gives a shit. Yeah, I'm going to smear the whole sport, because it's demonstrated to be dirty top to bottom. Go read _A Dog in a Hat_ , about an American's time low-level racing in Europe. In that author's experience, _everybody_ dopes. Doping _defines_ cycling, IMO, and it's been that way for years.

So I don't pay any attention the sport at all and watch MotoGP instead. Because playing the game of "who's clean and who's not" is not why I watched the sport. Sure, the sprinkling of clean riders get caught in the downward spiraling revenues, but that's not my problem.

<comment><USER41> I'd bet good money that Taylor Phinney competes clean.

Also: Jens Voigt retired a few years ago.

<comment><USER9> _I 'd bet good money that Taylor Phinney competes clean._

There was a time I'd bet good money that a number of riders competed clean. I no longer hold that opinion. Not to disparage Mr. Phinney; if I had to bet, I'd put money on him. Seems like a stand-up guy, tech inspected his bike once, really nice and down-to-earth. But I'd still only bet money I could afford to lose.

 _Also: Jens Voigt retired a few years ago._

Shows how long it's been since I've paid attention. :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> I've seen videos of this it's got to be one of the lowest things in a sport you could do.

But I had to laugh out loud when I saw a video bikes crashing yet the back wheel was still spinning.

<comment><USER44> > But I had to laugh out loud when I saw a video bikes crashing yet the back > wheel was still spinning.

Was that the old chestnut with Hesjedal's crash? Com on, that's just nonsense. The wheel was spinning after the crash from inertia — that is not only plausible, it's entirely expected, and the case in major crashes all the time. There's absolutely _no_ reason to believe that this was caused by a motor.

Besides most of these motors (including the one just found) spin the _pedals_. So if the pedals continued rotating after the crash, you'd have a point. The ones that propel the wheels directly with neodymium magnets cost like 50k a wheel and are probably a lot less common to begin with, if they're even being used at all.

<comment><USER43> I don't know who it was I'm not into cycling or its famous athletes I saw a few crashes on an Italian investigative TV show with French subtitles. I don't read or speak either language so I have no idea who they were talking about.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Small note to dang about the title: here and in the original title is wrong. The name is 'Van den Driessche' so with the i and e switched.

</comment><comment><USER45> Part of me wonders why only 6 years.

It doesn't seem like someone who would do this has much respect for the sport.

<comment><USER46> It's enough to destroy her career which is all they really needed to do.

To do it you have to have no respect at all. Sure EPO is awful, but an extra 200 watts for no extra work is a different level.

<comment><USER11> It's really not. At least it doesn't fuck her body up for the rest of her life. Because everyone was taking EPO, to compete you had to take EPO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Just be like formula 1 - create passing zones where they can use the motors (I know it's DRS and not the motor, but that concept) remotely disable them otherwise. Regulate everything.

Cycling needs a shake up, way too many scandals recently...

</comment><comment><USER48> This is unrelated, but that has to be the most confusing way to write a price I've ever seen: 2.699,00 - a period for the thousands separator, and a decimal comma for the cents.

I am aware of decimal commas - but a period for the thousands? I thought they used a space, or an apostrophe? 2'699,00

It must be tough writing code in Europe - computers only use decimal points, not decimal commas. And how do you make an international interface for money, when you never know how people will enter things?

<comment><USER49> We detached this subthread from [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11581036](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11581036) and marked it off-topic.

<comment><USER50> Out of curiosity, what does marking a subthread off topic entail?

<comment><USER49> It makes it rank lower.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Cleanweb Manifesto: "We will work on projects with true meaning" - <AUTHOR> http://www.cleanweb.org.uk/manifesto.html

<comment><USER2> This manifesto only commits people to good intentions (possibly with a lefty bent) - it doesn't actually commit anyone to anything. It's not even really clear what a Cleanweb would be

<comment><USER3> _> It's not even really clear what a Cleanweb would be_

<http://www.cleanweb.org.uk/about.html> "We have a big problem to solve, and the web is the fastest-moving tool we have. Whether you're building energy monitoring systems, helping people network around local food, or making the web itself greener, if you're developing online tools for sustainability, you're part of the cleanweb"

<comment><USER4> Was that excerpt intended to rebut the statement "It's not even really clear what a Cleanweb would be", or to support it?

To me, it does the latter.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Who decides what 'true meaning' is? This term is ill-defined.

The 'meaning' of what you work on is often susceptible to change over time.

<comment><USER6> To me the phrase seems kind of arrogant, like their goals are inherently more important simply because they appear further in the future.

Thing is, they aren't even thinking long-term themselves. In the _real_ long- term, the universe is going to implode and destroy everything, so their so- called meaningful work will have made no more difference than anyone else's :P

<comment><USER3> But if you're going to take the Nihilist position, why do anything?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Oh you poms and your manifestoes :D</comment>


Missing XCode UI Elements - <AUTHOR>

Hello, I'm learning Swift in my spare time. Still pretty new at it (so forgive my ignorance in advance). Anyhow, I'm trying to build a library of custom UI controls in Swift. I know there are open-source projects out there but I'm trying to build something from scratch myself.
For example, I've used Visual Studio in the past and I wish there were Checkboxes, perhaps Dropboxes, ViewBoxes (which automatically resizes the content inside of them), Charts, etc.
What about you? Are there specific controls that you wish were available in XCode? Or cool ones you wish existed?
Your help would be very helpful in getting me started. Thanks :) <comment><USER2> Charts might be something neat to have! But like you said, there are probably some good projects on github for that.

As for the other elements, there's a reason those are "missing". iOS already has UI elements that serve those purposes. Instead of checkboxes we have UISwitches. Instead of dropboxes, we have Action Sheets. For a good example, go to the Settings app on an iPhone and look through the settings; it's all form entry, but you won't find a checkbox or dropbox.

This is a conversation I've had with product managers and designers many times, and is part of the transition for people who are used to designing/developing for other platforms. For your app to look and feel like a native iOS app that users will intuitively interact with, it's best to stick to the system controls available. Or if you're making custom UIControls, to stick to the general behavior of the UIControl you're replacing. A checkbox on iOS would look fairly out of place.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks you for your reply. It makes sense what you said. Although, I just want to clarify that I'm not only talking about visual elements. There's also UI elements for the purpose of presenting the data in different ways -- for example, Collection Views vs Table Views. Again, checkboxes and dropboxes were just arbitrary examples.

My goal is to try to fill avoid while continuing to learn Swift programming with a fun project. Thanks.</comment></comment>


The Rise of Bay Area Rents - <AUTHOR> http://priceonomics.com/the-rise-of-bay-area-rent-prices/ <comment><USER2> The other way to look at this is apartment rental prices are merely "correcting" upwards to be less out of line with the housing prices.

A $1 million SF home has to charge $6000 in rent each month to break even, to cover cost of capital, taxes, and maintenance. Apartment rents cover utilities to varying degrees, as well.

A nice three bedroom apartment is the equivalent of a $600k or $800k condo, which "should" charge $4000+ per month. What is the going price for that rental? Across the bay area, the median is $2500. That makes sense in San Jose, but in other areas, not so much....

So is the issue that house prices are unsustainably high? Or is it the renters have gotten used to prices that lingered unsustainably low for a surprisingly long time?

IMO it is a bit of both. But we have probably under built rental units in some markets.

<comment><USER3> May I ask where you got the rent to ownership conversion numbers?

I ran this awhile back with the nytimes buy-rent calculator: [http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/business/buy-rent- calcula...](http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/business/buy-rent- calculator.html)

With a 4.8% mortgage rate, 20% down, 37% marginal tax rates, 3% inflation, closing/buying costs around 3%, 9% rate of return on capital and ~$700/month:

Buying a $600k place is break-even with renting at $2500/month after 4 years and buying is better thereafter. $800k is break-even at around $3300/month

There is government distortion playing in. The mortgage tax deduction (esp. in a state with high income tax rates) provides huge incentives to buy. $4,000 a month in rent is only equal to $800k buying if you are below the 15% income tax bracket.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It's a gold rush. California is famous for them. Quality of life for most of the tech workers is pretty low, but everyone is focused on the stock option lottery, and there are plenty of winners (next up: Twitter) to keep up faith in the system.

Ironically, most of my friends who have liquidated their options end up moving out of the city.

<comment><USER5> >Quality of life for most of the tech workers is pretty low,

Can you expand on this point?

<comment><USER4> Quality of life is low in the sense that they are paying a huge % of monthly income in rent and usually sharing sub-standard housing accommodations. They don't save much. They work a lot and rarely have time to enjoy the area.

Quality of life is high in the sense that they enjoy what they are working on and feel like there's a decent chance it will make them rich. They are in the middle of a boom and millionaires are being minted left and right. They now have friends they went to school with, who they know well, who have millions of dollars in the bank who rent yachts, vacation in Ibiza, and bang models in Las Vegas (while plotting angel investments and new startups). They feel very close to an indescribable grandeur and if they just keep grinding away they will get there.

So in some ways it sucks, and in some ways it's awesome and they will look back on this period as the best time of their lives. But very few of them think about this as ''real life'' the way people elsewhere in the country seem to, when they think about what community they want to live in, who they want to date or marry, where their kids will go to school and how their life will unfold in the decades ahead of them.

<comment><USER6> I can't relate to this at all. I'd argue that the quality of life is actually much higher here. Even with longer work hours.

Sure rental prices suck, but to name a few things:

* Weather is amazing. * Wages are higher than anywhere else for my profession. * The quality of food/produce is better than anywhere else I've lived, year-round. * Within a 4-hour driving radius, I can be skiing, surfing, hiking or tasting world-class wine. * Easy to meet up with like-minded people.

<comment><USER7> Exactly. Any place that has high quality of life + young life will have high rents naturally.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is the third or so time this blog has been posted to HN and every time people ask where they got their data and every time there is no response. This time, some of their data doesn't look so good, at least with the boundaries on the map being all messed up. Also it's not clear if they adjust for inflation.

<comment><USER9> (I work at Priceonomics)

Sorry to hear the map boundaries are looking weird to you.

We're using US Census boundary shapefiles to draw the city limits. This is how the map should appear: [http://i.imgur.com/xk8WI6Q.png](http://i.imgur.com/xk8WI6Q.png) \- does it look different on your end?

Email me if there's anything else I can do -- firstname.lastname@example.com.

<comment><USER10> You completely (again!) ignored his question about where you get your data from. That was extremely rude of you.

<comment><USER11> Is it really rude to not answer a question? I guess it is a little rude to ignore it. He could say something like, "I'm sorry, but I can't answer that question."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> We actually recently made a similar map for a number of metros, normalized by square footage to control for different unit sizes. It's interesting to note the differences in the map between the two metrics (total rent and per sqft):

[https://kwelia.com/maps/choropleth?metro_group=SF+Bay+Area](https://kwelia.com/maps/choropleth?metro_group=SF+Bay+Area)

<comment><USER13> This is really awesome. I'm also curious to know where you got your data from.

<comment><USER12> Thanks!

We currently get the majority of our data from publicly available online listings (predominately from [https://3taps.com/](https://3taps.com/) and [http://www.rentjungle.com/.](http://www.rentjungle.com/.))

Increasingly, we are also adding actual data from integrations with our customers' property management systems. We think this data set will be more accurate and more valuable, although it obviously takes a lot more work to build.

One of our goals is to be able to understand the difference between listed and actual prices in various markets.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Would have to disagree on everyone being focused on the stock option lottery. 1st its not a lottery. You can do analysis that shows that working for large entrenched dominate company, think Apple, Google or such over 5 years will beat a engineer joining a series B,C company that makes it. For startups there is often a trade of salary for ownership. If you calculate it over many years and payrises, bonus's etc... the numbers may play even.

Many many people in the Bay Area are not in startups at all and not playing the option lottery, they are married with children. Some play the management ranks and others contract, etc... I met a woman once in the dot com boom that confided in me that she made $1mill in 2000 over a short time. It got me thinking about the real equations at work. You need to do math, simple math but you need the data which you may not have.

Anyhow, that said, it is true I think that engineers do not get their fair share of equity many times in companies even with dozens of people. So this is when ownership or foundership or close to starting is a stock option play. Options are a contract to own at a price set on the contract. If the price rises dramatically you have a massive amount of capital. Stock options are very risky, compared to straight risk adverse salary jobs. For risk there is reward. It has not much to do with lottery, manly with risk and reward and statistics. You need to crunch the numbers and consider risk and then decide on your career paths.

<comment><USER15> > It has not much to do with lottery, manly with risk and reward and > statistics.

A lottery is risk, reward, and statistics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> A scale that goes from green to red? I'm unable to discern the difference between colors evenly spaced on either side of the middle line.

Mousing over to see change does help. Perhaps instead of simply colors (please, designers, don't rely on color alone to convey information. Think of the chil^H^H^H^H color blind individuals) you could have patterns for the fills.

</comment><comment><USER17> It will be interesting to bookmark this, and then look at it 18 months from now when the market grows by about 28% (number of rental units in the SF bay area expected to come available due to new construction) SF itself has a huge number of apartment projects being built, as do many peninsula cities.

<comment><USER18> Not sure if you are implying there will be 28% more rentals available in 18 months than there currently is, but thats totally untrue. There is about 135k current apartments in SF.

About 8,000 new apartments, mostly in mid-rise and high-rise buildings, will come on line between now and 2015. Thats around a 6% increase.

However, remember that we also have population gains in SF right now from incoming tech workers. Prices in rent are very unlikely to go down, however they will most likely stabilize.

You may be saying that more properties are going to be available around SF, but that has never changed value in SF before (oakland boom, for instance) and instead just made those surrounding areas go up.

<comment><USER17> New building permits in the nine bay area counties. Not just the city of San Francisco. I'll see if I can track down first hand sources for the summary I read.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I'd be interested to know how they are collecting their data. Rent prices are very hard track, short of asking tenants how much they pay.

You can monitor Craigslist, but then you are tracking rental advertisements instead of what tenants are actually paying.

<comment><USER20> If you want to account for actual pay vs. advertised, you could probably model it to some order of effectiveness by applying a decay function of price vs. age of listing. This operates on the assumption that bargain rentals are on the market briefly, while overpriced rentals languish on the market.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I'm no longer jealous of all those american dev that makes 100k+ in that area.

Damn... 3000$ to rent... for a MONTH?!

I could get one hell of a house here at that price...

<comment><USER22> I know five guys living in a 4BR in Palo Alto and they pay $1200 each. All of them are devs that make $130-$150.

If you are single or willing to leave cheap there is good options

<comment><USER23> 5 guys in a 4BR? So are two of them in a relationship and sharing a room, or is one paying $1200 to sleep on a couch?

<comment><USER24> Welcome to SF.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Time to move to Texas.

<comment><USER25> It's a very pleasant 96*F today!

<comment><USER26> Air conditioning's been around for 100+ years. Start using it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Interesting! So why are rents on HUD a lot lower? e.g., the rent for 1 BR in SF is $1579 according to [http://www.huduser.org/portal/datasets/50per.html](http://www.huduser.org/portal/datasets/50per.html)

<comment><USER3> Good question. It's not clear where there data source is coming from (well, their own service, but where is that coming from?). Data source is important: Using craigslist for instance will ignore tons of places on the low end causing distortions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Are there any studies relating rent control and pro/anti landlord policies in these cities and how they relate to the availability of inventory and rental prices in the bay?

</comment><comment><USER29> You should come live in Santa Cruz. Ocean, mountains, cheaper. We have a tech scene here - really!

<comment><USER30> Santa Cruz is historically low on rental inventory and (notoriously) low on local jobs. How has this changed in the past 10-15 years?

<comment><USER29> Telecommuting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Why don't people live in Oakland and commute?

Google Maps gives a < 1 hour each way commute (BART or bike + ferry), which I don't think is horrible. Is Google Maps just super optimistic?

<comment><USER32> You don't think people already do this?

<comment><USER31> I know people already do this. My intent was to ask why it's not the default for people who would save $1-2k every month. It seems the assumption is working in SF means living in SF for software developers making > $100k/year.</comment></comment></comment>


The chunking express: another approach to foreign-language learning - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2015/10/johnson-pedagogy <comment><USER2> This is a great approach -- don't just learn words (and string them together in sequences taken from your native language... not likely to be right!); learn common chunks that you can re-use everywhere.

There are still verb tenses that I haven't properly learned in French, but I use them because I learned some chunks that use them. I'm not at ease with using the tenses involved in "I should have ___ but I ___" \-- but I know the chunks for that particular phrase without thinking about it (e.g., _J 'aurais dû lui dire mais j'avais complètement oublié_) -- that's technically conditional past then pluperfect.. which I had to look up just now; I don't really know them! There are oddities with imperative form that I only really know through chunks -- but "don't be afraid" ( _n 'aies pas peur_) is easy even though it's irregular, just because I know that one.

And now they're less alien-feeling, so -- being comfortable with the chunked versions -- I now have mental hooks that let me recognize similar conjugations used on other verbs when I run into them.

</comment><comment><USER3> Idiomatic expressions (like "come in handy") have to be learned as complete pieces, because they're, well, idiomatic -- they can't be predicted from simple rules. I remember studying Spanish idiomatic expressions in Spanish classes I took years ago. Chunks, as described in this article, seem to be perhaps somehow more general than idioms; evidently, chunks seem to span across different languages and capture a broader range of constructs. However, most of the examples given could be considered examples of idioms. Thus it's not clear to me exactly how the two concepts differ in practice.

</comment><comment><USER4> The article says McWhorter keeps a list of essential chunks. I did a Google search but came up empty handed.

Anyone know where it is?

<comment><USER5> It's actually not necessary to have such a list. Just buy a book with the kind of language that you want to use (comic book are great because they are full of dialog, but you could easily pick up a script for a play, for instance). It will contain the essential chunks. How do I know? Because they are essential ;-)

I used to worry about "getting the basics", but there is a hypothesis called the "natural order hypothesis" which states that you will naturally acquire grammar in a specific order, no matter how it is presented: [http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/natural- order](http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/natural-order)

Lists are OK, but in order to create fluency you need to acquire the ability to produce the idiomatically correct chunks without undue thinking. This requires you to be exposed to the opportunities to use the language.

For example, you can easily just harvest example sentences from grammar text books (and if you need to pass tests, this is the technique I would suggest), but while you will be able to produce and understand that grammar, you will still need to be exposed to a large volume of realistic usage of that language to be able to select the idiomatically correct grammar in various situations.

The following has worked incredibly well for me (and for the students I was teaching English to):

\- Buy a book you are interested in reading.

\- Work out the meaning of any sentence you can't understand (with a grammar dictionary, or some people simply buy the book translated into their native language).

\- Memorise the sentence meanings using flashcards (or better: spaced repetition software -- anki is good, but for some reason they have a self signed certificate on their site, which I haven't checked out yet, so I won't link to it). Always drill from your native language to the foreign language. Theory suggests that production is not that important for learning, but it is very easy to fool yourself into thinking that you "know" a grammar point, when you can only recognize it. Production is the test to show that you actually know it.

\- If you are a very basic beginner (say less than 2-3000 words of vocabulary), memorize basic vocabulary. After you get 3000 words or so, this becomes less necessary.

\- Converse every chance you get. Read with all the free time that you have. Watch TV (with subtitles until you can understand the language) when you are tired of reading. This is essential because memorizing chunks will only leave you with memorized chunks. You need to exercise your ability to comprehend the application of those chunks.

\- You will also need to practice the physical skills of speaking. I have found that singing pop songs works very well (I don't know if it would be beneficial for languages with a lot of tones). You can also often find websites with both spoken and written language. You can read along with the speaker to get rhythm and facility with speaking. An audio book will also work well if the language you are learning has audio books (some cultures do not seem to be interested in them).

The main thing is being realistic about the speed that you can acquire language. The average adult who has gone to university has well over 20,000 words of vocabulary (and probably 3,500 grammar points). The average child acquires about 1000 words of vocabulary a year. The average child takes 15-20 years to acquire adult level proficiency (duh ;-) ). You can do it faster, but there seems to be a limit to the speed you can do it. Expect to take at least 10 years for your first foreign language. Memorization and acquisition are different. I seem to be able to memorize 1000 words of vocabulary per month with spaced repetition software without strain. But it takes a considerable amount of time for that vocabulary to settle in my brain. I have found that alternating periods of hard study and fun application (say one month each) is ideal for me. I have not had a chance to test it on other people, so YMMV.

<comment><USER6> That sounds like a very pragmatic approach.

> The main thing is being realistic about the speed that you can acquire > language.... Expect to take at least 10 years for your first foreign > language.

Nobody ever seems to mention this explicitly about language, nor the fact that you need to apply yourself _consistently_ to the task over that time.

I think that's because it's off-putting to hear you won't achieve high level language for a very long time.

The point is though, you can get yourself to a level of mutual understanding within fairly short time (a few month to a year.) The rest of the time is spent increasing vocabulary, improving grammatical understanding and learning the myriad of unwritten grammatical (and often ungrammatical!) constructs and idiomatic use that people _actually_ use to communicate.

<comment><USER5> There are some very unfortunate beliefs around language acquisition which torpedoes people's attempts to learn language, I think.

One of the most damaging and prevalent beliefs is that memorizing 2-3000 words of vocabulary will make you "fluent". When I taught English, my co-workers would even tell their students this outright. But 2-3000 words gets you to the level of a 3 year old child. Even 10,000 words will bring you up to the level of a 8-10 year old only. If you further dilute your vocabulary with useless words like "unemployment" and "discrimination" like they often do in schools, you will have the working vocabulary of a 5 year old -- i.e., you can talk at length about Pokemon (as long as you watch it over and over again), but not much else.

"Communication" is such a tenuous concept. You don't need _any_ formal language to communicate in a convenience store, for instance. Hand gestures will do nicely. I had a friend who learned Japanese primarily by chatting up girls at the train station. At first he communicated any way that he could and slowly made progress. He supplemented that by reading science fiction novels in Japanese. It's a crazy way to study, but was very effective (I should mention that his success rate with the girls was absolutely dreadful).</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Twingly's TechCrunch Disrupt Live Board - <AUTHOR> http://liveboard.twingly.com/tcdisrupt

<comment><USER2> Hi, thanks for posting this! Was just going to post myself to ask for feedback.

Twingly Liveboard is an HTML5 web app aggregating users, mentions, hashtags, links etc in everything posted on Twitter in a combination of search terms.

Far from all of the stats gathered is so far displayed in the app, but I think it's a good start.

The app utilizes Orbited for realtime transport/Comet. The backend is in Python.

The app was made especially with iPad in mind, but text rendering on canvas doesn't seem to work right on iPad so all text is actually absolute-positioned div elements on top of the canvases. The diagrams are made from scratch on <canvas>, no libraries are involved.

It as an awesome experience doing the diagrams from scratch instead of using a lib, I can really recommend this if you have a few extra days to spend. It gives an uncomparable freedom to invent new ways of visualizing the data.

Anyway, if there are any questions I'll be happy to answer them, and feedback is very much appreciated!

<comment><USER3> What features needed by this site are unsupported by Firefox? It looks like it works with Webkit browsers only? Also, what is the offline storage needed for? As a Firefox user, it seems incongruous that the website tells me it won't work with my browser - but I still get a Firefox message that the website is requesting offline data storage.

<comment><USER2> Hi, valid questions. FF support could be added with a few hours of work, it is simply not done (yet). The request for local storage is strange, to my knowledge there is nothing in the app that should cause it. I'll have a look and see what could be the reason for it. It appears only in firefox.</comment></comment></comment>


Center for Humane Technology - <AUTHOR> http://humanetech.com/problem <comment><USER2> When I saw my first computer and it had a painting program, I was blown away at the creative possibilities.

Today many people have a super computer in their pocket, but 99% do nothing creative with this power. [1]

TV, Radio, Books we've always seen the potential to amplify humanity early in roll-out of the technology, but eventually settle on the lowest common denominator as human behavior gravitates towards self-indulgence and entertainment.

We should try to curb corporate abuses, but I don't expect a shift in how the masses use technology.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule_(Internet_culture)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule_\(Internet_culture\))

<comment><USER3> I have long wondered how much Mozart could have composed with a modern synthesizer and garageband. And similarly, Shakespeare with an electric typewriter, or (more incredible yet) a word processing rather than a quill and ink!

But then my cynicism kicks in and I imagine them each spending days on facebook and watching cat videos.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This reminds me of tobacco company funded anti-smoking campaigns. I'm sure they hope it doesn't work too well...

<comment><USER5> Mh, indeed curious somehow. Their list of countermeasures: [http://humanetech.com/take-control/](http://humanetech.com/take-control/)

While it mentions uBlock in their list of recommended apps, it does not seem to give ad-blocking much importance with a dedicated description. At least in this list it seems less important than, e.g. "go grayscale". The countermeasures subpage does not even mention ads.

</comment></comment><comment> GCU-Empiricist The general problem will always be that the lowest common denominator of users will always fall into Skinner boxes, and barring a complete change how resources are allocated services that use low level manipulation of human psychology will attract advertising dollars.

<comment><USER3> So long as we accept the idea of being the product that is sold, yes, that is the case. I expect the market to stratify though, as some not-insignificant percentage realizes their life/time is too valuable to be wasted on someone else's marketing spend.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> the smug, it is strong with these ones.

They might as well say "We are your betters and you should live how we think is best for you"

Maybe I _like_ the YouTube feature that autostreams the next video. It's like they didn't even consider that maybe not everyone wants to live exactly their way.

They even go so far as "We are advising governments on smart policies and better user protections." Please save me from the Youtube autostreaming feature! Please save me from looking at my friends' selfies on Instagram.

Jesus Christ people.

<comment><USER7> You're right, it would be great if we could all use software how we wanted.

Unfortunately by exploiting people's psychologies, what people want and what people do become very different things for some.

For example, it's currently not possible to turn off youtube's autoplay feature on some devices. This is a practice that could be deemed unethical.

Of course, as an adult, I can actively seek out forms of improving my self control and getting out of habit loops, but children are not educated in these subjects and need to seek them out themselves. They could be taught these subjects in school.

These are just some areas that governments could help with that could potentially help people achieve more of what they want in life without infringing on what anyone wants to do with software.

<comment><USER6> "These are just some areas that governments could help with that could potentially help people achieve more of what they want in life without infringing on what anyone wants to do with software."

Governmen should get involved with whether or not YouTube autoplays the next video? Are you serious?

Out of curiosity, what do you think government should NOT be involved in?

<comment><USER7> "Governmen should get involved with whether or not YouTube autoplays the next video?"

This is reductive. The government should be involved in preventing practices that harm consumers. Some consumers would find that they can't help themselves from watching endless videos. And no, they should not be involved in whether it autoplays. They should be involved in allowing OPTIONS deciding whether it autoplays. This was just an example. Why should the government not help consumers who feel harmed in a way that would not impact others just because you wouldn't find a use for it?

"Out of curiosity, what do you think government should NOT be involved in?"

This is also a reductive. I have only named one area the government should be involved in. I am not a statist. There is a clear harm caused by certain practices which exploit the behavioural instincts of humans. I think there is enough harm to warrant government involvement to protect consumers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> On the plus side, Netflix is saving children from hundreds of hours of commercials a year!

Snapchat does add the metric of conversation streaks, but _that isnt the point_ and it's honestly not enough to keep me using it. I like snapchat cuz I like seeing people's faces or the random things that they are seeing.

This is a stupid initiative.

<comment><USER7> I think it's great that you don't find that Snapchat impacts your life negatively, and you're probably in good company. For many people this isn't the case.

All we have is our life. Some people feel that they waste theirs on platforms like Snapchat and they're powerless to stop. I don't think that for those people this initiative is stupid.

<comment><USER8> "People can't help themselves" lacks so much persuasion. You'd be at home in puritan Massachusetts, where all fun is banned.

<comment><USER7> "People can't help themselves" is natural.

The fact that there is a gap between who people want to be and the choices they make is not a disputed fact.

Without it, we would have no concept of shame, motivation, or self improvement.

Further, it's not disputed that companies have now been studying and exploiting the mechanisms of human behavioural triggers for the better part of a century now (just look into the history of advertising strategies).

Outright banning is not what I would want, and I would hope that it isn't what anyone would want. It's about giving MORE people the freedom to use software how they want. Options to control their use of software should they need it. Education for children on these exploitation techniques in order to protect them from it. Not banning anything.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


ABC to look at 'Star Wars' live-action TV series - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/11/showbiz/tv/abc-star-wars-tv-series-ew/index.html?hpt=hp_t3 <comment><USER2> The case is against live-action for many reasons:

A. Disney just took things over from LA, so its a very risky decision to fun a live-action series because A. Star Wars came into prominence as a movie B. The New Content won't be the same (Yoda-Obi Wan are both ghosts now, Luke might be a old man now, and lot of the real life actors are either old or have moved on to other projects). At this point, they would certainly introduce a lot of new characters, A movie is the safe bet I think honestly.

B. The return on 120 minute content for a movie vs a live-action tv series are worlds apart. Movies make a lot of money for a lot less content.

C. Movies stars and Movie Production houses have a bigger mass appeal and reach than TV ones.

<comment><USER3> Who said the TV series would have to take the place of the final 3 movies? The star wars universe is vast in both history and size, they could set a TV show at any of a hundred interesting times without tying directly into the movies at all.

<comment><USER2> true, but they already announced that the upcoming movies would be set after the story line of the movies. While they are doing that, on the second hand funding a live-action somewhere else in the star wars timeline might be to hush hush!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Is it only me that thought of the conjecture/theorem abc?</comment>


Y Combinator Challenge #4 - Outsourced IT  - <AUTHOR> http://astartupaday.wordpress.com/2008/07/24/y-combinator-challenge-4-outsourced-it/

<comment><USER2> Vignette's CMS has offered this functionality for years in the commercial enterprise space, and Adobe/Macromedia Contribute has offered this functionality for years in the commercial consumer space.

</comment><comment><USER3> That's actually kind of a neat idea. I think the word widget might be appropriate in there somewhere.

I wouldn't use it, but grandma might. And there are lots of grandmas out there!

</comment><comment><USER4> AFAICT, this idea is for a CMS that offers in-place editing of key content areas or design elements.

O'Reilly OSCON, wrapping up Friday, had two exhibitors showing open source CMS products with in-place editing: 'Concrete5' and 'PlainBlack WebGUI'.

<comment><USER5> Cool, I'll have to check those out. I was selfishly hoping that something like this is already out there.

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the links - I checked these out, and while they are cool CMS products, it's not quite what I had in mind. I'm not looking for a full CMS system or framework, I just want a simple library + compiler that can plug into any existing site that is not built on top of a CMS backend.</comment></comment></comment>


Why podcasts are suddenly "back" - <AUTHOR> http://www.marco.org/2014/11/16/why-podcasts-are-suddenly-back

<comment><USER2> If short of time, you can get something from this article just by skimming the first section about hipsters in Hastings. The gist is that there is often a PR company (or wave of them) behind a story pushing a particular angle.</comment>


PepsiCo cuts out grocery stores and sells directly to consumers - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/lanabandoim/2020/05/16/pepsico-cuts-out-grocery-stores-and-sells-directly-to-consumers-through-new-websites/ <comment><USER2> This could be mildy interesting if it (eventually) lets people order parts of their catalog that are less well distributed.

There are often limited time flavors that may not warrant shelf space in every store, but likely also don't warrant a lenghty trip to find them. If they could be ordered, that would be nice.

You could maybe get these from Amazon, but it would be better to order direct and have the care and attention to detail in packing that Amazon lacks.

<comment><USER3> Even a locator to find the limited flavors would be an improvement. I get around enough that some grocery store stocking it would be not too far out of my way to stock up, but I can't stop at every grocery store in the metro hoping to find it.

<comment><USER4> [https://contact.pepsico.com/pepsi/product- locator](https://contact.pepsico.com/pepsi/product-locator)

[https://www.mountaindew.com/store- locator/](https://www.mountaindew.com/store-locator/)

I used these to watch Diet Mountain Dew Code Red slowly disappear from my area, then region, then entire coast over the course of a few years. Haven't had it in ages now.

<comment><USER3> I was using these when the real sugar dr pepper was a thing, and they never seemed accurate.

At the time, anyway, it felt like they were flagging the whole regional grocery chain as carrying it, when only select stores ever actually had it. I'd go and there would be no stock, and no place on the shelf for it either.

<comment><USER5> It may no longer be true, but several decades ago it was possible to find sugar-sweetened soft drinks in the US by looking for kosher labels.

(I have a coke can next to me as I type; it is sugar-sweetened)

<comment><USER3> I've never actually seen coke made with sugar in cans! I've always heard of "kosher coke"/"passover coke" but never been able to find it.

Pepsi was selling "Dr Pepper Heritage" (green/yellow cans) and "Pepsi Throwback" for a few years around a decade ago. It was pretty widely available at gas stations in the midwest, although 12-packs of the Dr Pepper was not very common.

"Mexican coke" is still made with real sugar. Costco has it in glass bottles pretty consistently, and sometimes has pepsi in glass bottles with real sugar as well (although the pepsi isn't labeled like it's a Mexico product).

They have glass bottles of pepsi and coke around Kansas City in Mexican grocery stores as well as, oddly enough, the gas stations on the Kansas Turnpike. Half liter bottles are more common in the Mexican stores, but wal- mart often has 12 oz bottles of Mexican coke in the Hispanic section.

<comment><USER5> Sorry about that. I'm not sure why we get sugar* and you all don't, but it's probably something to do with the invisible hand.

* just checked all the cans in my house. Six-packs in the fridge from the grocery came from the EU, and have sugar. Two-fours in the basement from the discounter came from some nordic-speaking country, and have sugar.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Why not just cut out the middleman and eat from a bag of sugar directly?

<comment><USER7> Fun Dip was basically exactly this. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fun_Dip](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fun_Dip)

<comment><USER8> Wow. What a product. I would have killed to see that pitch meeting. Not only do you just eat sugar out of a bag - but the utensil (stick for feeding) is also made of sugar.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think the title is misleading. But "PepsiCo recognizes need for shopping without stores and offers home delivery website as an option" doesn't sound as sexy.

<comment><USER10> This is a more important market indicator then your comment implies. I work for a very large CPG and certain brands, such as food staples are crushing it, but impulse type products are really struggling. With uncertainty around when we return to "normal" companies such as PepsiCo are scrambling to figure out how best to connect directly to the consumer to maintain market share. CPGs are investing a ton of resources testing and learning in this space.

I haven't commented in this community in a long time, but as you all are entrepreneurs it is worth noting that this moment is an opportunity to disrupt 100 year-old entrenched CPG enterprises as the supply chain to the consumer is in disarray.

<comment><USER11> To save others the lookup:

CPG = Consumer packaged goods

<comment><USER12> When I was a kid, we were taught in school that before you initialize, you spell it out, and then put the initialism in parantheses afterward.

<comment><USER13> When I became an adult, I realized that people like to feel better about themselves by using short forms that others wouldn't know.

<comment><USER11> Eh, if it's part of your job where you're used to using the abbreviation because you're used to everyone around you using it and knowing what it means then sometimes it can be easy to let it slip when having discussions out of work that pertain to your line of work (as with the parent).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Links to the sites:

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

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

(Forbes apparently doesn't believe in linking to the site(s) they're talking about.)

<comment><USER15> With all the hate being lobbed at sodas in this thread it's pretty disappointing that they don't actually sell soda. I rarely eat sweets or have dessert after a meal. Pretty much the only thing I consume that's actually sweet with added sugar is a soda here and there. I find the sugar lite and sugar free alternatives like La Croix and diet coke to just be disgusting and would rather just consume water when I attend some tech event and the host thinks they're doing the attendees a favor by only offering "healthy alternatives". Without a car soda is pretty much the most annoying grocery item to get.

Two liters are pretty much impossible to consume before they go flat unless you drink way too much soda already so only individually packaged sodas make sense to buy. But they are extremely bulky and you pretty much have no room for other groceries.

Online they tend to go for nearly twice the price as the grocery store and they have less flavors. Also the only time I've ever had a delivery cancelled because of a shipping problem is because the sodas weren't packaged correctly and ruined a package. This happened a few times before I realised how badly I was getting ripped off. Buying soda at cost from the manufacturer that actually specializes in soda logistics would have been amazing.

<comment><USER16> Try SodaStream. You can buy Coke/Pepsi pop syrups and use those instead of the SodaStream ones. Coke/Pepsi won't sell you syrup direct but there are other vendors.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> They say they built it in 30 days but I remember an elixir job ad from last year where they were already hinting at selling directly to consumers.

Found it: [https://www.pepsicojobs.com/main/jobs/206608BR?lang=en- us](https://www.pepsicojobs.com/main/jobs/206608BR?lang=en-us)

</comment><comment><USER18> Keep in mind, PepsiCo is huge, and not just 'Pepsi' as its name makes one think. They own or are affiliated with a large portion of your typical drink, snack, breakfast, and juice aisles of the grocery store.

</comment><comment><USER19> That reminds me of when I was a kid in Ontario and we had pop delivered in refillable glass bottles the way other people had milk delivered.

</comment><comment><USER20> > _"...developed from concept to execution in less than 30 days..."_

I can believe that for a website, but I _can 't_ believe that about logistics. How is the site's stock being supplied by PepsiCo? Where is it being warehoused? Who's handling fulfillment? Who's handling customer service? Returns?

It goes without saying they must be using a third-party fulfillment center, but _still_ just to set that up, sign contracts, send first (massive) shipments to the warehouse, get all the products registered and stocked... is that possible to do in 30 days for something at the national scale of PepsiCo?

<comment><USER2> With a quick process, I assum they're either outsourcing the whole delivery portion, or they're reusing their existing distribution network. Their distribution network may have a lot of excess capacity right now, as many smaller retail outlets are closed or seeing less sales. If uptake is slow, they can learn as they go, and then start advertising as things start working.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Tangentially I never understood. If a consumer would be willing to buy a few year supply of a non perishable product, why isn't there a way they can purchase at wholesale prices? Assume they'd be buying in the same bulk that a connivence store would buy for a months supply.

For example, if I have a certain protein bar I ate twice a day. Why can't I buy a years supply at wholesale?

<comment><USER22> If you're a Costco member, you can always go to Costco business center [0], it doesn't require a special membership other than the usual Costco one. It's where some of the smaller retailers and restaurants (eg. mom and pop gas stations and convenience stores) shop for individually packaged snacks and drinks.

[0] [https://www.costco.com/my-life-costco-business-center- benefi...](https://www.costco.com/my-life-costco-business-center- benefits.html)

<comment><USER21> Is that cheaper than Costco proper?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I'm curious about the economics of this. It appears that both of the new websites offer free shipping with fairly low minimum purchases ($15 and ~$30).

The products being offered almost universally cost a lot to ship (by either being high weight for liquids or high volume for chip bags) while being very low value.

<comment><USER24> My bet is they're repurposing the delivery vans and light trucks normally used to restock restaurants, vending machines and like. If they get the route planning right it's not so bad but probably gives worse margins than their grocery store channels.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Not a bad idea. I can think of a couple improvements:

1\. Let me search, I don't want to scroll through a hundred options.

2\. Bring more flavor variety. Hello, ketchup chips!??!

</comment><comment><USER26> I read about a large beer brewer doing this recently too, testing the concept in Brazil first - I think it was AB InBev. I think if makes sense to open a new sales channel, but it can't be easy for a manufactering org to build the processes and infrastructure for this - it must be like starting a whole new company from scratch.

</comment><comment><USER27> Pepsi didn't stop selling to grocery stores. They just started selling directly to consumers in addition to their existing channels.

Coke has been doing this for years...

</comment><comment><USER28> Why not work with those home soda machine makers and sell the syrup packages to end consumers so they have freshly made soda of whatever flavor they order?

<comment><USER29> Tap water quality is generally terrible for carbonation and it would result in a poor product

<comment><USER30> Why is that? I am genuinely curious but did not find any good links. I use filtered water from a Brita system with my Sodastream and it definitely does not taste like, or as good as, industrial carbonation. I had always assumed the limiting factor was the amount of pressure the system can withstand so the water is not as carbonated.

<comment><USER16> The way the syrup mixes with the carbonated water is different in a commercial pop tower and causes a better mix. I think you're correct about carbonation as well.

Any time you've had fountain pop it's just been made with straight municipal tap water.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Any idea how much snacks.com could have sold for? A quick Google search didn't bring anything up. I'm guessing at least low 7 figures...

</comment><comment><USER21> The main value would be to avoid retail markup and give costumers those wholesale prices. The article seemed quite in that point.

</comment><comment><USER32> I get the combination of products around a theme (like 'breakfast'). But if you want to sell around breakfast, at least add milk.

</comment><comment> mark-r The title implies that Pepsi will stop supplying grocery stores, while the article makes no such claim. Very misleading.

</comment><comment><USER33> PepsiCo products are typically very unhealthy options. Giving consumers more access to them is bad for public health.

I typically support the free market, but I think most of their products are addictive and harmful enough to have their costs increased and supply limited similar to Tobacco and Alcohol products.

<comment><USER34> [https://www.fastcompany.com/90425011/coca-cola-nestle-and- pe...](https://www.fastcompany.com/90425011/coca-cola-nestle-and-pepsico-are- the-worlds-biggest-plastic-polluters-again)

Not to mention they're among the largest plastic polluters in the world next to Nestle and Coca-Cola.

[https://content.sierraclub.org/evguide/blog/2014/07/how- much...](https://content.sierraclub.org/evguide/blog/2014/07/how-much-water- poisoned-produce-barrel-tar-sands-just-ask-pepsi)

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Nothing like Pepsi straight from the cannery. That fresh crack, that sweet tang, it just hits different from the kind you buy at the store.

<comment><USER36> I wish! No straight-up soft drinks available: only "hydration products"... (must be higher margins)</comment></comment>