Erlang for Skeptics - <AUTHOR> http://erlangforsceptics.com/book/

<comment><USER2> Hi Guys,

My name is Luke Venediger, I'm the author of Erlang for Skeptics. Thanks for visiting my book and for the comments. It's very much a work in progress and has a long way to go, but I'm excited about getting the community involved early on. I'm working on a public feedback mechanism, but for now please post feedback below this comment.

I've been using Google Wave to build the plot and outline, together with my friends TheColonial (<http://buffered.io/>) and StackingIt (<http://www.blog.stackingit.com/>). Wave rocks as a real-time review system, and has definitely improved the quality of my book.

I'll have a more substantial website up in the next week or so that will have a comments section and an RSS feed for updates. In the mean time you can follow @erlangforskeptics or myself @lukevenediger on twitter.

Thanks again, Luke Venediger

</comment><comment><USER3> I only have some familiarity with Erlang, Does anyone know the rational behind not being able to change a variable's value? Is it simply historical?

It seems you have to call f() to 'forget' a variable before assigning a new value to it - what a maddening name for a built-in function ;-)

<comment><USER4> The rationale behind immutable (a.k.a. unchangeable) variables is rooted in Erlang being designed as a concurrent functional programming language from the bottom up. Whenever you have multiple operations manipulating a single value, you're immediately responsible for synchronizing access to that value and ensuring it always exists in a consistent state.

Rather than deal with the complexities of synchronization, some languages opt to make all their data immutable and encourage the programmer to write code in a functional style. The fact that the f() function seems unintuitive is because that's not how code is written in Erlang. f() is merely a convenience function for unbinding a value from the Erlang shell, and it is not used in the real world. Rather, you setup initial bindings and then use recursive functions to yield new values as needed.

This requires a shift in your thinking about programming, but it offers huge advantages when working within a concurrent model. For more info on the dangers of mutable state in concurrent systems, I suggest the following article:

<http://www.artima.com/articles/hickey_on_time.html>

<comment><USER5> I've done some programming in Erlang and I found the immutable variables to be a total pain in the ass that gave no benefit. Your code ends up littered with var=1 var2=var+1 type idioms.

Also, the immutable variable have nothing to do with concurrency. Since threads cant touch each others data, and they can only talk to each other through messages, immutability only applies to a local scope, where its really no big deal.

Last time I checked somebody was making a scripting language built on top of the erlang runtime and he says that immutable variables are nonsense.

<comment><USER6> If your code ends up littered with Var2 = Var1 + 1 type "idioms", then you are probably doing it wrong. I hardly ever write code like that (or see other's Erlang code like that). It's by no means an idiom.

<comment><USER5> From programming erlang by Joe Armstrong:

At this point you might be wondering how it's possible to program with- out variables. How can you express something like X = X + 1 in Erlang? The answer is easy. Invent a new variable whose name hasn't been used before (say X1), and write X1 = X + 1.

      X=#todo{}.
      X1 = #todo{status=urgent, text="Fix errata in book"}.
      X2 = X1#todo{status=done}.

From Armstrongs thesis

      X = 5; X1 = X + 10;

I found those just by searching on "X1". There are more X1 examples in the erlang otp sources. Who knows what else is in there.

<comment><USER6> I'm not saying this _never_ happens.

It does, but you'll _rarely_ see this pattern in any real Erlang code base. And when you see it, it will not be "littered". It's an exception, not an idiom.

And those samples from Joe's book and thesis are just snippets with no context. BTW, O'Reilly's "Erlang Programming" doesn't even provide such an example.

Edit: One example when I _do_ use this pattern is constructing proplists for some function calls.

<comment><USER7> Erlang's style was _very_ strongly influenced by Prolog, and in Prolog code, it's quite common to see e.g. "X1 = X + 1", but having X2, X3, etc. as well is rare - there's usually not a succession of modified versions of a variable in the same function (clause), because it's a sign that you could break things up better. The same is true in Erlang - code with several such variables is written with a strong Java accent (or whatever), not in idiomatic Erlang.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> You forgot to include Vim in the "Erlang Editors and IDEs" section.

</comment><comment><USER9> Why code listings are empty?

<comment><USER7> It looks like a work-in-progress.

<comment><USER10> You've got to love the economy of words that the introduction displays. It's only one sentence: "The introduction."

(That's a good way to do things. Write some meat first, _then_ you'll know exactly what you've got to introduce.)

<comment><USER2> In my first (now trashed) version of the book I had started writing an introduction, but it got long-winded and verbose because I didn't know what I was introducing! Better to add the introduction in at the end, as you've mentioned :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Cant see images on opera mobile or teashark.</comment>


Ask HN: What countries is it impossible to accept payments from? - <AUTHOR> PayPal does not currently work with the following list of 19 countries:

    Afghanistan
    Bangladesh
    Central African Republic
    North Korea
    Equatorial Guinea
    Ghana
    Haiti
    Iran
    Iraq
    Lebanon
    Liberia
    Libya
    Myanmar
    Pakistan
    South Sudan
    Sudan
    Syria
    Timor-Leste / East Timor
    Uzbekistan
 As far as I know, it is impossible to register a PayPal account in any of those countries, and if a PayPal account is logged into from any of those countries it will be suspended until further investigation.
Stripe's global page [0] claims that I will "be able to accept payments from customers anywhere in the world" which sounds amazing, but how true is that statement really?
Does Visa even issue credit cards in the above list of 19 countries? Or is it a common thing for a Bangladeshi citizen to have a US-based credit card for online ordering?
I am posing this question because I am re-writing a SaaS website of mine, and I want to block access to my free-trial offer to any visitors from countries that it is impossible to make payments from. I would appreciate any comments relating to this as well, because I am torn as to whether or not that is the right thing to do.
[0] https://stripe.com/global <comment><USER2> If you're dealing with payments, check embargo and money laundering regulations from first hand sources, don't second-guess what another website is doing.

International transfer of funds done wrong could get you into incredible 'I need a lawyer' territory very quickly.

BTW, Visa does not issue credit cards, Visa partners do. And they certainly do and work in most of the countries you listed.

</comment><comment><USER3> First, I think you misread the Stripe global page. There is still restrictions on countries there.

Second, IANAL, but if you are a US-based company you may run into restrictions with accepting payments from customers in embargoed countries (i.e. Iran, Syria, etc...).

</comment><comment><USER4> Any country that does not have a credit card / online banking system, which represents easily a quarter of the world's countries.

However you may have people who live in those countries, with dual citizenships/also live abroad, that make purchases from within those countries.</comment>


Modified Nintendo Game Console Controlled by Modular Synthesizer (video) - <AUTHOR> http://casperelectronics.com/finished-pieces/nintendo/ <comment><AUTHOR> More mod's found here:

"The core of most of these items are modified circuits from children's toys. In some cases custom built or found and unmodified circuits from other devices (such as audio amplifiers, timers or regulated power supplies) were added to expand a pieces' functionality."

<http://casperelectronics.com/finished-pieces/></comment>


Flickr-like ticket server in ~100 lines of Perl (~8k tickets/s) - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/cosimo/TicketServer

<comment><USER2> Hmm. I see "ENGINE=MyISAM" in the code. Nowadays I can't stomach using MyISAM for anything I care about not having some sort of corruption. Given sufficient time and scale, I've seen far too many issues with MyISAM.

It'd be great to be able to specify that in the code so the user can opt for InnoDB (or engine of their choice). Perhaps a pull request is in my future...

<comment><AUTHOR> I seem to remember that the MySQL behavior this is based on will only work with the MyISAM engine. In fact, Flickr is using MyISAM for this, IIRC. Anyway, your changes make perfect sense, so I merged them.

Will try what happens to the test suite with InnoDB.

<comment><AUTHOR> Actually it works just fine ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I wasn't familiar with what 'Flickr tickets' were so I did a little Google-fu and found this excellent explanation:

[http://code.flickr.com/blog/2010/02/08/ticket-servers- distri...](http://code.flickr.com/blog/2010/02/08/ticket-servers-distributed- unique-primary-keys-on-the-cheap/)

<comment><AUTHOR> I had included a link to this post in the README file.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Very nice!</comment>


What Happened to the Thiel Fellows - <AUTHOR> https://backchannel.com/inside-peter-thiels-genius-factory-7bf38303c7be#.fjc1bmv7x <comment><USER2> > none of the successful dropouts ever went back to school. Bill Gates didn't > go back. Mark Zuckerberg didn't go back. To go back would imply personal > failure.

I suppose if you view college solely as a means to an end (success), then sure; however, a liberal education has value in and of itself.

But I suppose the above thinking is what we get when we make college a prerequisite for secure employment. People go to college to be successful. If you're already successful, what could you possibly learn at a college?

I want to say the self-centered egoism of believing that there is nothing you could gain from attending a place of higher learning is shocking. But it's not. Not here.

<comment><USER3> An alternative view is: "If you're already successful, everything you could learn at a college you can also learn out of college (see: the internet)".

<comment><USER4> That would be an incorrect view.

First, few are so motivated that they'd devote years to self-learning at the same scale as university provide. Next, it would be difficult to put together a cohesive curriculum for yourself because you don't know what you don't know. Relatedly, understanding the arc/trajectory to pick it difficult, and to do it all alone with no guidance means there's no one qualified that you can ask questions from on the daily. It also ignores the value of mentorship, learning from your peers, and being inspired and pushed by your environment. It also is isolating and does not give you any social benefits, business or personal networks.

<comment><USER5> You can be motivated without going to school. It would take seconds to find curricula from major universities. You can find most textbooks for free on Libgen. You can talk to people over the internet and find better mentors than people you'd find in your local university. It's not isolating any more than going to the university and staying in your dorm reading textbooks is.

So, yeah. It seems like a completely correct view. My guess is that it will only become more and more correct with time, as the internet provides all the building blocks that colleges provide currently. The knowledge is already there. Credentials are there for some professions (Github > sheepskin). Networking is probably the hardest part, but hardly sounds undoable.

<comment><USER4> Pirating textbooks can be done in college or not in college, just as you can buy textbooks in college or not. But if you're not in college, then you most likely won't know what to buy, and certainly won't have anyone to explain it all to you in depth.

It is difficult for most to self-motivate 4+ years worth of self-study in isolation. Few would do that on their own. Further, getting a random stranger to mentor you for any real period of time is a difficult proposition without anything in return. Typically this only happens in extreme cases such as if you are a superstar and "worth their time."

If all you do is stay in your dorm and never venture out, then you're not getting much out of what the university offers, so that's not particularly relevant. You can also just not attend any classes either but that's not much of a comparison.

You're also ignoring majorly important components such as opportunistic learning from peers, being motivated by your environment, and having others guide you through subject matter when you don't know what you don't know. The internet cannot replace any of that as effectively.

<comment><USER5> Guess what, people in college don't know either what textbooks you should buy. Maybe they're the teacher's favorite textbook, or a textbook the teacher wrote him/herself. Will that be the best textbook for you? Maybe. Maybe not.

Regardless, as mentioned before, if you think colleges do choose the best textbooks, you can find what textbooks they're using very easily.

My experience is that the best thing you can do is sample many textbooks and keep the ones you like best and are most likely to learn from.

That few people are willing to self-motivate for 4 years doesn't invalidate the possibility of doing it. I would also question the necessity to study for 4 years to learn most subjects.

The point about staying in your dorm is that if you're studying (i.e. not going out with your friends), it doesn't matter whether you're doing it at home or in a college dorm. You can socialize in other ways.

Serendipitous learning happens outside of colleges too. Etc. Etc.

Having been through college, and having learned a lot of things on my own, the only thing I think (some) colleges provide is just sheepskin prestige. If you want to work for a company that screens based on what university you went to, don't make the mistake of skipping that part. Learning-wise? I don't think it makes much of a difference.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's kind of a big claim, that the most important thing that people got from Thiel Fellowship was the network. If that's really and truly the case, then how is this different from the universities of old?

I don't mean that as a challenge. I really do mean to pick it apart. You can argue that this one is more meritocratic. It's also blatantly clear that it had an admissions committee of one.

Edit: And as someone else pointed out, you don't get the hard skills training that you get in university.

<comment><USER7> I think university networks are overrated a bit. When you're just one of thousands of graduates you need to bring more to the table than just having the same alma mater. All your peers are trying to leverage the same connections to fit through a skinny pipe.

For every one time I leverage my college network I have 10 where I leverage my network I built after college.

<comment><USER6> That's true. Then what'd happen to the Thiel Fellowship if you were to scale it the same way? I think you can likewise make the argument that it's kind of an extra-fancy MBA.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The real long-term business value of an Ivy League education is also the network. So if he really was trying to replicate that, he succeeded.

But as someone who went to a non-Ivy school, and spent my 4 years getting an education that I truly feel has added a ton of value to my life, and to who I am... I just get offended at his attitude that college is for dunces. (And yes, it is my own problem if someone offends me, but that is a separate discussion). I will never claim that college is the right path for everybody, and I think that getting a job is the wrong reason to go. But the snide attitude that going to college actually makes you a lesser person, and recommending people drop out... that shows a deep misunderstanding of what higher education is really about.

</comment><comment><USER9> Also let's be real here -- I know a lot of the fellows and all the ones I've met definitely do not qualify as geniuses. Smart, motivated, sure, but when it comes to solving real hard problems whether in physics, biotech, or AI they are by far not the first people I'd turn to. There's a reason most of them are working on knockoff consumer apps or got shunted into programs like the google brain residency.

</comment><comment><USER10> Just another front in Thiel's continued war against education. You need an education and experience in order to make the kinds of meaningful breakthroughs we need these days; the valley pushes the college drop-out mythos a little too much.

<comment><USER11> You need knowledge and smarts, one is given by your genetics the other is free online. "The liberal education" is granfalloon pushed by a rent-seeking administrative and professorial class. When we outlawed IQ tests for employment, we became unable to train engineers and other high-IQ professions in house, as minds capable of doing these jobs are rare, companies need to pre-filter before investing resources. As universities are allowed to use such tests, we use education as a proxy for IQ and conscientiousness, as we are outlawed from directly measuring these characteristics. Thus the education bubble.

Thiel is offering alternatives, and rather charitably. Is offering alternatives an act of war?

<comment><USER12> No one is threatened by Thiel. Annoyed, yes, but threatened no. Does anyone seriously think that these Thiel payed dropouts are going to be making breakthroughs in physics, engineering, medicine? No, of course not. They'll be in soft positions where their main skill is interacting with people. E.g. CEO, managers, etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The trouble with modern universities is that they often conflate what are at least three separate concerns: intellectual formation/pedagogy, job training and research. Typically, when you ask someone why they want to go to college or why they did go to college, the automatic answer that they've been taught to give is "to get a job" (otherwise, you're going to "work at McDonald's"). The result, broadly speaking, is that these three concerns compete with each other, causing the university to suffer in the process.

</comment><comment><USER14> > Abraham dropped out of the University of Pennsylvania to run Milo, which > sold to Amazon by the time he was 25.

Milo was sold to eBay, not Amazon.

</comment><comment><USER15> To me the premise to this argument was always incomplete. It's true that college does not matter "to some people". You can always find individuals that will be successful whether they go to college or not. There's a reason Thiel hand picked the people that would get his money. He picked the best he could find because he knew that they had a better chance to succeed. If he really wanted to prove his point, he would have picked them at random from those that were slated to go to college anyway. To me he has not proven anything, college is still important to the great majority of people and telling people differently does not help society worse yet it makes it more difficult on those that follow his advice.

</comment><comment><USER16> The network is what really matters: you go from someone who knows professors and peers to someone who knows Peter Thiel and his peers.

I'm sure there is some meritocracy involved too, but I'm willing to bet that as a Thiel Fellow, you would learn faster than a university would allow (school of hard knocks?), while still accomplishing less than a more experienced entrepreneur. Experience matters, and being a Thiel Fellow is just a riskier but potentially faster way of acquiring it.

</comment><comment><USER17> The way I look at is that you need to educate yourself, you mostly don't need an education. All of those fellows are constantly educating themselves.

I am pretty sure Theil would agree that some things do require an education such as hard science, medical or engineering. (Although it's certainly possible without)

</comment><comment><USER18> What a vapid puff piece. For example:

> It became one of the most elite credentials for young entrepreneurs.

Umm, really? "Elite" in the classical sense of "drawn out of the larger pool", sure, but in the sense of somehow being better than the run of the mill group, I don't see it.

> none of the successful dropouts ever went back to school.

Famously Michal Dell did to make his mum happy. Woz, under an alias.

</comment><comment><USER19> > _none of the successful dropouts ever went back to school. Bill Gates didn't > go back. Mark Zuckerberg didn't go back. To go back would imply personal > failure._

Steve Wozniak went back to school (UC Berkeley, using an alias) and finished a degree. Though I suppose he's kind of a special case.

</comment><comment><USER20> You have to think who says a 15 year old can't do Advanced Physics, Run a Corporation, Perform Some Surgery. There are definitely works for which hours of experience are necessary, but for most of the things we do today perhaps age is really not a factor.

<comment><USER12> If experience isn't necessary for a task, you have to ask how hard it really is and how much it should really be rewarded.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Anything that can create an alternative for universities is very valuable. Stanford tuition has doubled in the past 20 years -- so has the price of gasoline -- I don't see people suggesting government subsidized loans for gasoline.

</comment><comment><USER22> Don't fix something that isn't broken.

Can the institutionalized top down approach to education have room for improvement? Yes. The education to economic output per student ratio can always improve (I don't have a number for this).

But the role diploma, degrees, certificates play as _social credits_ that gives preferential treatment over the have-nots in terms of opening doors is understated.

</comment><comment><USER23> It looks like now more of a YC for necessarily young and solo founders than any substitute for college.

</comment><comment><USER24> Are these the blood donors?

</comment><comment><USER14> Can we change the title to "Entrepreneurship Factory" instead of "Genius Factory"? The article is definitely not about genius. Let's not cheapen the definition any further by misapplying it.

</comment><comment><USER25> Brilliant technical minds denied the opportunity to gain awareness of the world through liberal arts exposure, are that much more easily pushed into working towards essentially sociopathic endeavors (like making it easier to sue media outlets wealthy people don't like out of existence).

<comment><USER26> As a former literature grad student I was liking where the first clause of your sentence was headed, but then you ruined it with the sort of denunciatory name-calling ("sociopathic") that the HN guidelines ask you not to do in comments here. We're trying for a discourse in which people don't hit each other with such sticks, so please don't bring them in to conversation.

<comment><USER27> I took the OP to mean "lacking in empathy, contextual awareness, and premised on a specific—and potentially very damaging—notion of capitalism." Based on the interviews I've read and the description of the Thiel fellows, this seems like a fair characterization, if hyperbole.

Rather, I think "sociopathic" is deficient in that it underplays the structural determinants of such behaviors, while placing judgment on the fellows themselves. That's not fair—they are basically high schoolers, often without the cultural capital and social analytical skills conferred by top schools.

<comment><USER25> I was going for the "lacking in empathy" description completely - and in description of specific endeavors, not individual people.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft has lost $9 billion on Bing - <AUTHOR> http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/20/technology/microsoft_bing/index.htm?source=cnn_bin

<comment><USER2> > Stefan Weitz, Microsoft's director of Bing, believes that if Bing can change > the way people think about search, sooner or later users will switch over > from Google.

For that to work people would have to change the way they think about microsoft as well, not how they think about search.

Right now there are several ecosystems on the web that you can be part of. There is the 'social' ecosystem which governs you interactions with other people rather than with other services. Facebook, twitter, google+ etc. Then there is 'mobile', which is a gateway to a bunch of data and to information. Then there is your work and the applications you use to do that work. Finally there is search.

Search is different from all the others in that you _could_ switch overnight to a new provider, but just like any other good infrastructure component, you probably will not do that if you are satisfied with your current provider. Search is not visible enough to warrant a conscious decision until you are dissatisfied.

Changing your thinking on search is one hurdle that is going to be hard to cross without say google going down for a couple of weeks or some major mishap that would make their search results unusable for any period of time. That would give an upstart a better chance at a first shot at retaining the users.

Changing the way you think about microsoft is going to be a very hard obstacle to clear as well. Microsoft is synonymous with software that you use on your desktop and with several botched attempts at doing search. Before you try them again you'd have to see google performing worse than the _best_ that microsoft has ever presented in this field.

Frankly I'm surprised that they keep sinking money into this, they've clearly failed to establish a profitable beach head, meanwhile google is making money hand over fist in the exact same domain. I'm happy they do, more competition is better but for now google seems to be acing them. Microsoft will have to be very careful that 'search' does not turn in to their Afghanistan.

<comment><USER3> >Frankly I'm surprised that they keep sinking money into this, they've clearly failed to establish a profitable beach head, meanwhile google is making money hand over fist in the exact same domain.

This seems to be Microsoft's MO, and it seems to have worked with the XBox. Push hard, buy a second place position with massive marketing, investment, and underpricing, and continue to maintain it while losing billions and billions. Then the first place company inevitably, eventually makes a series of horrible, very public missteps, and Microsoft is positioned as "The Alternative."

On one hand, I think it's a pretty sleazy tactic, but on the other hand I rarely ever see any corporation thinking in the long term, especially to this absurd degree. I'm not exactly sure what the strategy is to defend against this, either.

<comment><USER4> Microsoft deserves some credit for the XBOX.

They had the foresight to include a NIC (Network Interface Card) in the XBOX, right out of the gate. It was also the first game console to include a hard disk.

The PS2 did not initially include a NIC, and Sony offered the add-on PlayStation Network Adapter in order to compete with Microsoft. In addition, Microsoft launched XBOX Live _approximately four years_ ahead of Playstation Network.

Regarding missteps, Microsoft has experienced their share of technical hurdles [1].

Regarding financial losses, Sony has experienced the same [2].

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox_360_technical_problems>

[2] [http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/25/sony-still-losing- money-o...](http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/25/sony-still-losing-money-of- ps3-slim-hardware)

<comment><USER5> Didn't Microsoft shun any mention of the word "Microsoft" in XBOX marketing, at least initially? That might've played a big part in it's success. Or at least a big part in giving it a fair shot.

<comment><USER4> _Didn't Microsoft shun any mention of the word "Microsoft" in XBOX marketing, at least initially?_

I do not know the answer to your question, but I would venture to say that the target audience would have known either way. The adult game cognoscenti are obviously dialed into magazines, blogs, etc. Kids are of course in the know as well, and in cases where they do not have purchasing power, they will undoubtedly provide the necessary counsel to those above them that do :)

 _That might've played a big part in it's success. Or at least a big part in giving it a fair shot._

My opinion is that the XBOX's success was largely due to the quintessential launch title, _Halo: Combat Evolved._ This is one of the driving factors behind the XBOX's sell-out launch in North America.

<comment><USER6> Bungie was always Microsoft's ace in the hole. Online gaming helped, but it was more incremental and more easily copied. Now that Bungie's out of Microsoft's grasp, I'm betting Sony takes back the lead (though in a much closer race) for the next generation of consoles.

<comment><USER4> Yes, it will be interesting to see how the Bungie-Activision relationship unfolds. I am sure that Bungie is happy to have moved on from the Halo franchise in order to work on new projects, but perhaps in a mixed-emotions sort of way that we all feel when we want to move on, but at the same time let go.

Meanwhile, the Halo torch has been passed to Microsoft's 343 Industries, with their sights set on developing Halo 4.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _"Bing will likely be better than Google over time, but even if it is, users and advertisers still need to go to them," said Sid Parakh, analyst at McAdams Wright Ragen. "To be clear, this will take a long, long time to play out. This is something Microsoft will continue to lose money on."_

That's an example of an annoying tendency that I see in many news sources. Why is a vague quote from an investment advisor relevant here? Who is Sid Parakh and what justifies his opinion? I see nothing related to search on his linkedin profile, at least.

<comment> brown9-2 Even more, why does Sid Parakh believe that Bing will "likely" be better over time? He doesn't even qualify his own statements.

<comment><USER8> It seems unlikely that bing will be better over time, since google has more data and will continue amassing more click-through data with which to improve the results.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Please retain original article titles as per the guidelines [1]. In this case, the new title is also inaccurate.

This article is actually called "Microsoft's plan to stop Bing's $1 billion bleeding", and the loss on Bing alone is $5.5 billion _since mid-2009_. It was only Microsoft's _total online services division losses_ that reached $9 billion, and that was _since 2007_.

[1] <http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>

<comment><USER10> I wonder what else is in the online services division?

<comment><USER2> MSN, messenger.

<comment><USER11> I think messenger is part of windows live, which I've been told falls under the windows umbrella.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> In certain verticals, Bing really outshines Google like travel search, video search, and image search. Bing maps is really quite good.

Microsoft is a cash cow, and has multiple sources of strong revenue. Google has one: advertising. Microsoft can afford to bleed cash for years, just to give Google a black eye.

Microsoft only this past year got out from under government oversight for antitrust violations. I've spent quite a bit of time talking to people at Microsoft the past 2 years. A lot of the BizSpark team are ex-Sun people. And a number of them have mentioned to me how shocked they were at how profoundly the anti trust litigation still affected employees within the company 10 years later.

Windows 8 is the first OS since ME that comes out without government anti trust oversight, and it looks like Microsoft has come out swinging, both at Apple and Google. <http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/BUILD/BUILD2011/KEY-0001>

Google is just now starting to get into anti trust how water, and I have no idea how they are going to get out of it. I think Yelp in particular has a really strong case: [http://www.pcworld.com/article/240330/google_faces_antitrust...](http://www.pcworld.com/article/240330/google_faces_antitrust_accusers_expedia_nextag_and_yelp_wednesday.html)

<comment><USER13>
      Microsoft can afford to bleed cash for years

Except that's exactly what they've been doing for a long time now. Microsoft reminds me of a cliche fat cat executive who's always red in the face, yells and bosses everyone around, and acts like he's invincible... until he keels over from a heart attack.

<comment><USER14> Except that for pretty much every year it has been in business the revenue and the profits have been growing.

<comment><USER13> Sure the company as a whole is profitable. But if their internet businesses were it's own company, and run in this manner, they wouldn't survive. They're sure good at keeping up an appearance of extreme arrogance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Another half assed analysis of Microsoft's Online Services Division.

OSD includes Bing, MSN, Live Mail and Messenger...aka support services they provide to their internal and external customers (e.g. Windows Phone 7 uses Live Mail). It doesn't include profit centers like Xbox Live or their various enterprise level cloud services.

OSD is primarily a cost center for marketing. Microsoft attributes half the value of its goodwill to OSD (US $6B).

[[http://www.microsoft.com/investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Earn...](http://www.microsoft.com/investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Earnings/FinancialStatements/FY11/Q1/IRFinancialStatementsPopups.aspx?tag=msft:GoodwillDisclosureTextBlock&title=Goodwill)]

In addition, it's revenues don't reflect any savings Microsoft realizes by advertising it's own products on it's own ad network or by promoting its own brands on MSN (e.g. stories from MSNBC).

Finally, the value of the data collected by the OSD is not directly reflected as revenue. That data provides Microsoft with insight regarding search, shopping, social networks, news interests, etc.

<comment><USER16> All Windows Live properties are in the "Windows and Windows Live" division under Sinofsky. Not in OSD.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft#Windows_.26_Windows_L...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft#Windows_.26_Windows_Live_Division.2C_Server_and_Tools.2C_Online_Services_Division)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> The one thing you can say for Microsoft is that they stick to their guns and keep trying.

With Google, you never know if a product has a team behind it or it was someone's side project that got out of hand and received too much press that they'll kill a couple in a couple months because it didn't get enough traction.

Now sure, in the startup world the idea of sticking with an idea and plotting along losing money is a terrible sign, but on a personal level I can't help admiring Microsoft's fierce tenacity.

</comment><comment><USER18> The examples of "semantic search" reported in the article don't look innovative at all to me. Giving you specialized results (eg maps) based on the search query has been done for ages, and expanding on that can be useful but it will hardly be revolutionary.

Moreover, trying to guess the semantics of user's queries can be very annoying to some users, especially the geekier ones which are often also the trend setters in this area - there are lots of people already being pissed off by google when they search for synonyms of what you type, and not exactly what you type.

Competition is always good and I hope that Bing and Google will make search always better, but I'm not so sure how useful will be what was reported in this article.

<comment><USER19> The article _is_ thin on the use cases of semantic search, which is the market Bing says it's trying to serve ("a decision support tool").

The article raises the question of "how will Bing make money" and then drops the question, and goes on to talk about competing with Google. Lazy thinking by the writer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Sounds like bing probably represents better bang for your advertising buck than google at this point. Could be good deals there for marketers.

For microsoft's part, it just seems like they're always one step behind google, which is one step behind Facebook, which sooner or later will be one step behind someone else when they've maxed their revenue from their current business and feel compelled to stray from their core competencies. History repeats itself and the young grow old.

Also, thought it was an interesting bit about bing gaining marketshare from yahoo (their partner) and not google. Ouch.

<comment> brown9-2 Can you explain why you think Bing would be a better bang for your advertising dollars? Because less users would mean lower ad rates?

<comment><USER20> Sure, fewer advertisers = lower demand & lower prices, less users OTOH = less supply & higher prices... not sure which side of the equation is having more effect (I suspect it varies) but I'm thinking there's some value there over adwords.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> From last year:

 _When you hear the word "startup", you most likely think of an Internet startup. Maybe it's funded, maybe not, but its burn rate almost for sure puts it in the red each quarter. Obviously, Microsoft is not a startup. Nor have they been a startup for a long time. But what if you thought of their Online Division as an Internet startup? One funded by Microsoft. The thought it terrifying. Or it should be. To Microsoft._

 _Microsoft released their Q1 2011 earnings today. The results were very good except for one very big blemish: the Online Division. Last quarter, the division lost $560 million for Microsoft. That's better than the previous quarter when it lost a staggering $696 million, but it's much worse than a year ago, when it lost $477 million. In the past year, Microsoft has lost well over $2 billion from the division._

<http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/28/microsoft-online-business/>

</comment><comment><USER22> I think that I have a similar problem to many other users... It's not that Bing is a bad product, it may be the best thing out there. The problem is that I've lost confidence in Microsoft as a company to objectively serve me information. It's a trust issues that I don't have with Google or Apple... yet. Those companies have their warts too, but nothing like I experienced in the 20+ years I was locked into the MS ecosystem.

As long as a guy like Steve Ballmer is running the company, I will stay far away. Perhaps when management changes down the road result in MS better demonstrating that they are more interested in producing great products rather than gaining market share at any cost, I'll take them seriously again. We're starting to see some of that with windows mobile and win8.

</comment><comment><USER23> The sad thing is that they are spending this on a fight that's largely been over for a few years. Hell, the social fight is nearing a conclusion were it not for g+, MS is not just trailing in the Internet space, they are in a time machine.

</comment><comment><USER24> As much as I'm happy to see Microsoft losing money, this is actually very bad news. Any competition for Google is a good thing, and at this rate it won't be long before Microsoft cuts expenses on Bing...

</comment><comment><USER25> I get that Bing is no success, but how is it losing so much money? That can't just be developer salaries can it?

<comment><USER26> Advertising I'd imagine

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> Why I don't use Bing:

1\. I hate the stupid pictures and the other stupid fluff.

2\. It is called "Bing" (the only worse brand name is "Yaris"... what are they thinking?)

3\. Microsoft doesn't help fund and staff a LOT of the Free software infrastructue I depend on.

<comment><USER28> >It is called "Bing"

I've always wondered about names...is Bing only a bad name because they haven't been successful? Is Google only a good name because they've been incredibly successful? I wonder how many people said the same thing about Google 12 years ago?

<comment><USER29> I still see Google as a silly name, but at least it has some rationale in the corporate philosophy and a hint of geek cred. "Bing" just smacks of a committee of corporate drones trying to look hip with an unintentional parody of younger, cooler Web 2.0 company names.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Providing the same services as Google will not get people to switch from Google, even if Bing provided somewhat better results. Google got people to switch because they didn't just provide astonishingly better results, they did things quite differently than others. If Bing wanted people to switch, they have to do something different, not just do the same things "better".

Bing can't win by offering "a better way to Google": <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYVCk10AzS0>

</comment><comment><USER31> I suspect part of Google's success is not just front-page search but also site-specific searches (how some sites use Google as a a back-end search).

Perhaps more significant is their number of AdSense affiliates. (After all, search doesn't make money, advertising does.) Blog after blog and developer and developer continue to embed Google ads, and are thus themselves bound to Google and encouraging others to do so.

</comment><comment><USER32> A couple of years ago they'd lost something like $8 to $10 billion on xbox too.

</comment><comment><USER33> Well, Bing always feels slow and 'baroque' in visual looks. Google always is fast and has a very clean visual look. Duckduckgo is slow and has a clean visual look (and doesn't track me).

I use DDG. :-)

</comment><comment><USER34> Thats a lot of money. Is duckduckgo profitable yet? I bet its not losing $1 billion per quarter. But then again I suppose Bing has hugely more market share than duckduckgo.

</comment><comment><USER35> One wonders why with an apparent 15% share they're losing so much?

Also find it interesting that they're gaining share, while the article states it's from other providers but Google, doesn't that still mean that these users are actually choosing Bing over Google? That they're chosen it because it's better?

<comment> brown9-2 They are losing money because they are pouring money into buying that 15% with advertising, deals with mobile carriers, etc. The division also has thousands of employees.

Bing is not like a small but scrappy startup who can make a profit off their small market share because they are lean.</comment></comment>


Scoble: Why I'm treating startups more critically lately - <AUTHOR> https://plus.google.com/111091089527727420853/posts/NN7YJRT7S8m <comment><USER2> MVPs force founders to (1) talk to customers and (2) actually ship something.

Most early-stage founders I meet are working in a vacuum. They have ideas, but no way to validate those ideas against reality. Mostly, they're just wasting time on half-baked visions of world domination. The game doesn't start until you ask a customer for money.

It's a bit like whitewater kayaking: You can float around all day looking at the rapids, but eventually you've got to let the current suck you downstream towards the waves and rocks.

Now, maybe in Scoble's world, the rules are different. He sees so many startups that anything less than perfection on the first try is a failure. But this suggests that Scoble's market is getting saturated—perhaps we already have enough mobile/social/local apps for tech bloggers?

Maybe it's time to listen to patio11, and find markets where _any_ solution at all will make users climb across their desks with a checkbook in hand.

<comment><USER3> It takes an awful lot of work to be the sixth most impressive thing Scoble (or the New York Times, or Techcrunch, or $PICK_A_GATEKEEPER) will see this week. It takes much, much less work to offer a better user experience than a) an Excel spreadsheet sent over email, b) having your office manager act as the endpoint to a REST API, or c) doing anything involving actual paper. These are frequently the competition in underserved markets.

There's a million fun, valuable, important problems to solve out there which you go grow old and die without ever reading about on a Valley blog.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Tons of useless advice from a guy who never delivered a product himself -- excuse my harsh words. Scoble was/is/stays a blogger, always blogging while having a safe job. He never raised, never started a real venture or done an exit. This guy hasn't got the vaguest idea of what it is to quit your job, start a venture and take high risks. Never experienced how the lowest points of a startup-life full of despair can feel. His words are counter-productive, destroy motivation and are just wrong in many regards (e.g. MVP, etc.).

Those who can, do -- those who can't, teach.

Why should we listen to him?

<comment><USER5> _Why should we listen to him?_

Because he spends a lot of time looking at new products and technologies. He really tries them out. He does fantastic interviews with founders, often asking quite good questions about the products.

He's built a huge network of people who consider him a credible source for new product recommendations. Getting featured by him can be huge for an early stage product.

Just because someone is a blogger, it doesn't make their advice useless.

Programming is not the only valuable thing in the world. Learn to respect other professions. You're not going to make it without them.

<comment><USER4> Everybody can

\- spend a lot of time with new products and tech (no achievement)

\- try them really out (no achievement)

\- do interviews and they are not fantastic (no achievement)

\- nowadays build a huge network w/Facebook, G+, LinkedIn (no achievment)

It is no achievement to blog while sitting for years at Microsoft doing some wishy-washy corporate job. But it is an achievement to build a startup, get traction and raise money w/empty pockets and a family to feed -- and that's just more than "programming". Don't get me wrong but this is a different psychological level than blogging from your safe job.

<comment><USER6> He hasn't been at Microsoft in years, and has taken positions at 'upstart' type companies or divisions within larger companies (podtech and rackspace spring to mind).

His 'blogging from his safe job' involves a fair amount of travel, disruption to routine home/family life, and an insane amount of work that goes in to his productions (hint - he does a lot of video, not just 'text blogging').

All that said, I think he (and most of tech journalism) has given most startups a bit of a free pass, and glad to see his current stance (although it feels about 5 years too late).

<comment><USER4> Either you start a start-up or you don't -- just being employed by an startup doesn't make you a good advisor for founders -- again Scoble never founded something, he is just blogging while having a safe job.

<comment><USER6> If "founders" are that selective and narrow about who they take advice from, they're going to have much bigger problems down the road.

That accountant they use? Never built a startup.

The lawyer who's managing all their contracts? Never built a startup.

The bankers at Goldman Sachs who's taking them public? Never built a startup.

Yeah - to hell with all of them - they've never been a "founder" so what the fuck would they know about "founding" something, right?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Scoble is telling you what he wants to see before you show it to him and hope he writes about it, but that's literally miles away from where a startup first gets off the ground.

Before even talking to Scoble, a startup should have come up with the idea, have built a first version, launched as early as possible (but only after what you have is better/more useful than what is currently out there), found a core group of users that sticks around and uses the product, and iterated based on their feedback.

The fact is, this is likely to take at least a year, if not more. And only after you think you've achieved product-market fit should you be going after the press "big guns".

Don't take Scoble's post as advice on how to get a startup off the ground -- take it as advice on how far along you should be before you pitch him.

<comment><USER8> No please _do_ take this as advice on how to get a startup off the ground. There's more here than "Scoble wants polished startups."

What he's saying is that many products are similar to other efforts with additional features. That's not going to cut it. Page Rank wasn't a little bit better than existing search engines. It wasn't Yahoo but with feature x,y,z; it was a completely new approach to vetting results. I won't switch for a few features. I don't care if you're better; I care if you're solidly different.

Show us the insight! Show us the corner turned. Show us why this rocket has escape velocity when all others fell back to earth. Stop trying to simply make money and start trying to significantly innovate.

<comment><USER9> I don't know, he doesn't sound like he would've given a damn about PageRank if Sergey and Larry had gone to talk to him back then. He might have dismissed the first version of Google because they didn't index as many pages as the leading search engines. Look at his own example:

> Another company tonight that I met showed me a similar app, when I started > it up (I do that while you talk to me) it gave me an error. Gone.

For all we know that company might have created some revolutionary technology but, who knows, their build system is still crappy and they forgot to change a symlink somewhere?

<comment><USER8> _he doesn't sound like he would given a damn about PageRank_

He wouldn't have. If probably wouldn't have -- if they pitched the idea but the site wasn't working. But the first time I used Google I said, "Wow! This is vastly superior to anything else."

If I understand him correctly, he's not saying, "Don't launch until it's perfect." He's saying, "Differentiate yourself." He can't see that if your site doesn't work or it's just Existing Site X with a couple more features. An MVP works. An MVP shows how it is Significantly Different. In fact, that's exactly the purpose of an MVP -- not to show that you could build and publish.

<comment><USER10> _But the first time I used Google I said, "Wow! This is vastly superior to anything else."_

That was exactly my experience. I first became curious about Google because it was spidering my personal website, well before when Google became the name of the project. By tracing back where the Web spider came from, I tried out searches, and by the time Google was Google, I was recommending it to all my friends as much superior to AltaVista (the king of the hill in search in those days), and all the more superior to the also-rans in search. Being substantially better at something is what every startup needs to achieve.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Scoble is the TMZ of the tech industry. I view him largely in the same sense as paparazzi. He has a video camera and a bunch of followers, but little in the way of substance.

His past proclamations, i.e. Google Gears will kill MS Office, Google Chrome OS has already won, put him on very shaky ground with me from a credibility standpoint. That said, I don't discount all future comments from the guy.

In this post, he does offer up some sound advice: clear use case, compelling product -- but really, if you're in the business this shouldn't be news to you anyway.

Unfortunately, one is forced to look past the short-sighted, the mis-aligned or the presumptive to find any take-away value. Focus on a use-case, but make sure the app works for everybody? Magical applications are those where people make comments right away? Without Facebook or Twitter integration, your app is lame? The narrow-minded-ness of these comments simply reflect Robert's lack of scope on the world.

The fact that he's arriving at these conclusions now shows more about his thought process than anything else.

</comment><comment><USER12> _"Instagram? I had five comments within two minutes (and that was back when there was only 80 users on it)."_

Take note: ask your friends back at the HQ to pose as enthusiastic users while you're pitching your next app :)

<comment><USER13> Better yet, just Mechanical_Turk it. 2 cents per comment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> _If it doesn't do something with both Facebook and Twitter (with Google+ to come) then you are gonna look lame._

Am I the only person who feels slightly bored that about 50% of startups I hear about are basically all about sharing links on social networking websites?

<comment><USER15> Well I agree. There are billions of bucks to be made in the domains of enterprise and industrial applications, and social network integration is not really a business case there - maybe just a potential security issue.

Since when did start-up become synonymous with _consumer application_ start- up?

<comment><USER16> _Since when did start-up become synonymous with consumer application start- up?_

If it makes you feel any better, our startup is enterprise focused. Not _everybody_ is focused on just consumer apps.

I don't know about you guys, but I am enticed by the idea of selling something to organizations that generally expect to (and do) spend actual money on products and services. The whole advertising based, or even freemium model, world of consumer apps just doesn't resonate with me. Not saying it doesn't work, obviously it does. Just saying that it doesn't feel like where I personally want to be.

<comment><USER14> Your right, almost all of the consumer apps seem to revolve around ads and harvesting data. Is there not a market for pay-for consumer apps that let people do something interesting with their devices?

<comment><USER17> Actually I don't think there is. Consumers have gotten used to free, and 50% daily deals... The only way to make a profitable consumer business is to make the consumers the products themselves. This is with apps though, with hardware it's different obviously. There are some exceptions like Photoshop, and operating systems... but by and large, it's hard

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Gruber: Tells you to develop apps for iPhone -- doesn't develop apps for iPhone

Scoble: Tells you how to create a successful startup -- never even tried

Can we start getting some advice from people who actually do this shit for a living?

<comment><USER19> Scoble isn't telling you how to create a successful startup. He's telling you how to create something that he'll use and in turn hype and recommend. If that's what you want, then listen to his advice. Otherwise, just forget it.

<comment><USER18> He is telling you how to create a successful startup (see: the ordered list under "Some advice:"). He just also sprinkles in little hints on how to wow him personally. He talks about how he scolds CEOs/entrepreneurs because he doesn't agree with how they're doing things or what they think will make them succeed. Yet he can only speculate on what might make you succeed.

That's the same as Darren Rowse (problogger.net) not having a blog and never having blogged before but still giving you advice on how to become a pro blogger.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I love how he has 7 key pieces of advice for startups to follow if they don't want to fail, and there is not a single mention of revenue, let alone profit, whatsoever.

But don't forget to integrate with Twitter or you'll look like a dummy!

<comment><USER5> If no one uses the damn thing, you won't even get a shot at making any revenue. That's what he's getting at.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I am assuming Scoble is a famous guy. As he expects quality from wannabe entreprenours, I would then expect quality in his analysis, which I don't think (allow me to give a honest opinion) is true.

He forgets totally about the business sector. A crappy looking app with some errors would still be years of light ahead of consolidating a P&L from 30 different excel files sent from 30 different parts of the world.

Don't know, maybe people are focusing too much on the same thing.

<comment><USER22> Examine what he says a little closer:

"...the market is very crowded now for certain kinds of apps. Especially location-based and social network ones. So, if you're gonna pitch me something it better provide magic. Angels better sing when I open your app up. Otherwise, why should I use your app instead of Instagram, Foodspotting, Foursquare, Yelp, or my new ones, Batch, SocialCam, or Oink?"

So yes, he's not concentrating on the business sector. On the other hand, the very first piece of advice he gives would rule your hypothetical application in _in_ :

1\. Have at least one very clear, and cool, use case. I.E. have something you can show someone else that makes them say "oh, my, that's freaking useful."

In fact the first 5 pieces of advice also apply.

<comment><USER21> I did read that, but the focus of his article was clearly on quality good looking apps. I would push more for quality of processes. How does this app make the business more efficient? How much the client saves using this app? Etc.

He makes some good point, they just don't apply everywhere. And even if he says people are doing too many similar apps, his examples are still about the kind of apps he complains about in the first place. You see the flaw?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I don't know a single app(?) whose names he mentioned in this article. I simply can not connect these new product/startup names with what they're supposed to be doing for me.

Curious if anyone else has this experience.

</comment><comment><USER24> I'm reminded of a scene in the now-defunct "Playmakers" TV series. It entails a football player mouthing off to an aide who then bets the player that he can get the ball further down the field than the arrogant player. The player takes the bet and launches the ball a solid distance down the field. The aide waits for a maintenance cart to drive past. He tosses the ball into the back of the cart and watches as it rolls past the player's ball.

The player assumed that winning the game depended on his arm alone when the truth was many things had to align with that arm to win games. The vantage point from the turf isn't the only one.

<comment><USER16> _The player takes the bet and launches the ball a solid distance down the field. The aide waits for a maintenance cart to drive past. He tosses the ball into the back of the cart and watches as it rolls past the player's ball._

There's a similar sequence in the movie "Tin Cup" where two golfers make a bet about who can hit a ball the farthest. One hits his ball actually onto the golf course where lands in some grass, rolls a foot or two and stops. The other guy hits his ball onto the highway where it lands on the asphalt and rolls and rolls and rolls and rolls...

 _The player assumed that winning the game depended on his arm alone when the truth was many things had to align with that arm to win games. The vantage point from the turf isn't the only one._

Indeed. Having something like that to break one out of one's tunnel vision and preconceived notions can be a powerful thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> If I were to make an app/product, I hope Scoble is the LAST guy in my target audience. I want moms, corporate CEOs, team leads, fitness trainers, restaurant owners, heck even teachers.. anyone but Scoble.

</comment><comment><USER25> If I say that he sounds like a Hollywood Producer talking about what he wants to see in his next script then I hope people follow the analogy.

He uses 33000 people to tell him it's good. So you get things that appeal to the average.

There is no place for niche apps and no cult hits in his world. Just the sexy and the summer blockbuster.

But there are other lots of other bloggers out there in the world.

</comment><comment><USER4> My thoughts to his post consolidated: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3243330>

</comment><comment><USER26> If your app is targeted at the 40 something marketing demographic, Scoble and his audience can provide you quite a bit of sound advice.

</comment><comment><USER27> I was hoping to see something about having an actual business model in his advice. Alas.</comment>


Ask HN: Aside from big business and Twitter, who actually won tonight? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Racists.

Now, hear me out - I'm not saying that Trump is a racist himself (I'm also not saying he isn't), but it's undeniable that his candidacy has been boosted by racist supporters. They will take this victory to heart and consider it a validation of their world view, irrespective of whether it actually is or not. Worse, future political candidates will see this victory and pander to these same impulses in the future.

On a more general note, it's really damn difficult to know who wins here. Because what does a Trump/Republican administration look like? Trumpism is really quite different to Republicanism (particularly where big business is concerned) and there's a lot to be decided in how this will go.

Oh, wall builders. They might be winners.

</comment><comment><USER3> This [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_Uni...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_United_States)

</comment><comment><USER4> Scott Adams (author of dilbert) and Mike Cernovich - built massive following and sold a lot of books for correctly predicting a Trump win.

</comment><comment><USER5> This guy [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us- electio...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/us- election-2016-donald-trump-president-win-bets-london-gambler-a7404666.html)

</comment><comment><USER6> I guess real estate agents in Hollywood will make nice commission money. They'll be busy selling all these villas belonging to actors who promised to leave the US if Trump were to win.</comment>


Adventures in Programming Interviews: Misleadingly Simple NP-Hard Problem - <AUTHOR> https://hackernoon.com/adventures-in-programming-interviews-misleadingly-difficult-np-hard-problem-43092597018c <comment><USER2> We start from a set of people who sum their loans/debts up to zero. I think the problem reduces to finding subsets of people who sum up to zero, then solved recursively for each subset. If there are no subsets, then it requires n-1 payments.

Finding the subsets could be solved with dynamic programming, so it's not NP- hard. [http://www.geeksforgeeks.org/dynamic-programming-subset- sum-...](http://www.geeksforgeeks.org/dynamic-programming-subset-sum-problem/)

<comment><USER3> The site you linked mentions:

> The above solution may try all subsets of given set in worst case. Therefore > time complexity of the above solution is exponential. The problem is in-fact > NP-Complete (There is no known polynomial time solution for this problem).

That contradicts your statement, since any NP-complete problem is by definition NP-hard.

<comment><USER2> Yes, you're right. NP-complete. My mistake

This arXiv paper shows the STOA from 2015: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1507.02318.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1507.02318.pdf)

It works in pseudopolynomial time. I read that it's quite an important problem, related to graphs and encryption.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do we create AI that's accountable? - <AUTHOR> I suspect that the way is through Natural Language and Machine Learning algorithms.
Language shapes society, it can shape bots too. Algorithms compute and reach a decision, they can have inference steps that make the decision ready to be questioned. (Read DNC by Deepmind)
What do you guys think? <comment><AUTHOR> Anyone?</comment>


The Three Christs of Ypsilanti (2013) - <AUTHOR> http://www.damninteresting.com/three-thrown-over-the-cuckoos-nest/

<comment><USER2> I would highly recommend that anyone who finds this interesting read the book by Rokeach (there's a good, cheap edition from NYRB that I buy a lot of people as a gift) -- goes into far more detail, particularly with respect to the medical aspects.

It's also a great case study to demonstrate the falsity of the idea that there's any rationality to delusion -- the mind routes around thinking critically about true delusions in a fundamental way. It's not possible to reason your way out of a delusional state.

<comment><USER3> I read Rokeach's book a good few years ago, and found it more interesting for the incidental detail than for the larger narrative or for drawing conclusions from.

As the article notes, as a "scientific" experiment, the methodology was badly flawed, and the narrative (as I recall) is impaired by the repetitious and somewhat theory-laden recounting of the trajectories of the inmates.

Nonetheless, as you say, it's worth reading for anyone whose interest is caught by the article. I'd also recommend another book I read around the same time, _Operators and Things_ [1], which is at the opposite end of the spectrum from _Three Christs_ , having been (apparently) written by someone visited suddenly by clinical paranoia about that experience; it's strong on narrative, weak on clinical detail, quite possibly fictional, and with perhaps a more cheerful ending.

[1] [http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/761935.Operators_and_Thin...](http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/761935.Operators_and_Things)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Never imagined I would see an article involving Ypsilanti on HN.

<comment><USER5> Same here. Have lived in Ypsi for many years and learned of this study and book a few years back. Absolutley fascinating though very unethical study.

Btw, the site was bought by Toyota years ago and the hospital is long demolished.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Whenever I read of messiah delusions I'm reminded of this short story:

[http://squid314.livejournal.com/324957.html](http://squid314.livejournal.com/324957.html)

</comment><comment><USER7> What was done to those patients seemed incredibly cruel. It's one thing to have the patients confront each others' delusions. It's quite another to cause them distress just to see what happens.

<comment><USER8> The author came to agree with this over time:

"Rokeach came to think that his research had been manipulative and unethical, and he offered an apology in the afterword of the 1984 edition of the book: "I really had no right, even in the name of science, to play God and interfere round the clock with their daily lives."

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Christs_of_Ypsilanti](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Christs_of_Ypsilanti)

<comment><USER9> It's poignant how he inadvertently mentions four gods, then realizes that he was the fourth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > What might happen, he wondered, if a psychologist were to deliberately pair > up patients who held directly conflicting identity delusions? Perhaps such > psychological leverage could be used to pry at the cracks of an irrational > psyche to let in the light of reason.

> Over time, each Christ cultivated new delusions to retain his claim to > godliness.

somehow not surprising seeing how people in general defend their irrational psyche - ideologies, believes, superstitions, etc... - from the light of reason. It is just a theory which will trickle down by God's will, i guess.

</comment><comment><USER11> This was a very interesting read, but I feel too groggy today to pull out an appropriate conclusion--especially since, in the author's own words, this was a useless study that did neither the patients, nor the scientific community, any good.

<comment><USER11> Let me rephrase that: What impact on psychology did this study have? Is it solely noted today for influencing some laws protecting the subjects of psychological treatment/research, or did it end up benefiting the scientific community in some way?

<comment><USER12> Whoa there. As a past inpatient of a psychiatric hospital, I can tell you that respecting the human rights of patients is the number one area of failure of the psychiatric "community". As such, increased respect for the human rights of patients is not to be sneezed at.

As far as benefit to science is concerned, things don't look good on that front. Psychiatry is essentially a state-sponsored pseudoscience, concerned far more with normative behaviour and social control that with understanding mental illness. It's an unpleasant field to work in, with the result (I suspect) that only the stupid or unfortunate in the medical professions end up there.

(Richard Bentall's books are a good place to start if you want a balanced, "evidence based" and intellectually rigorous perspective on the field.)</comment></comment></comment>


Amazon Is Data Mining Reviewers' Personal Relationships - <AUTHOR> http://consumerist.com/2015/07/06/amazon-is-data-mining-reviewers-personal-relationships/#

<comment><AUTHOR> This article shows a key problem with not revealing how Amazon thinks it knows this information: when Amazon gets it wrong, there's no recourse.</comment>


I have promblem with my memory - <AUTHOR> I have a problem with memory, sometimes 3 or 4 days, I lost a quarter of the memory, and it makes it hard for me to learn programming, is there anyone who has experienced something like me? <comment><USER2> Make sure you get sleep tested for sleep apnea. (see a pulmonologist.) Don't worry if you don't mean the typical patient criteria. I didn't. (I wasn't overweight, didn't really snore, etc.)

It's a largely undiagnosed problem because most people just "adapt" and it's not until you get to be in your 40's or 50's that your heart starts to show signs of problems. IF you have sleep apnea, you are missing out on a lot of REM sleep, where your repair hormones are released and also, long-term memory assimilation occurs.

The first night I used my machine correctly, I woke up 4 hours before my normal wakeup time, thinking I overslept. I went back to bed again and woke up normally and for the first time in year, realized my EYES didn't hurt. Went and did like 16 hours of straight work after that.

Long-term effects? I'm pretty sure my functioning IQ went up 10 points thought that's obviously a subjective sample size of 1. Bottom-line though, I just seem to figure things out quicker and have a lot more energy.

I hope this is your problem because it's a real easy fix. Just go to bed.

<comment><USER3> That is awesome. CPAP did fuck all for me. And they won't let me have the surgery. FML. OP, get tested, it could be life-changing.

<comment><USER2> There is a sleep/cpap technician who has a youtube channel. Try it again, seriously, change something but don't just accept it as "FML".

[https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLankyLefty27](https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLankyLefty27) that's his Youtube Channel

Have enough patience/motivation to experiment until it works. You'll know when it does. You might need a different mask, a refit, switch from nose to full- face, something.

My problem was I'm slightly claustrobic - and wearing the full mask reminded me of my mask I wear at the Fire Department. There I can always mentally power through it and focus - but with the CPAP, you literally can't focus while you are TRYING TO FALL ASLEEP. I ripped the damn thing off my first night.

I watched that Youtuber's videos and found one of the tips about relaxing and used it on the 2nd night and have never looked back. I'm talking "from my cold dead hands" will you take my cpap away.

<comment><USER3> I appreciate the encouragement, but I flew out to Stanford on my own dime and they gave me a pressure over 20. (22 maybe? I can't remember.) They told me 'this still isn't high enough but if we set it any higher the pressure itself wakes you up so that's as good at you're gonna get'. I've tried plenty of masks.

<comment><USER2> Crap, that sucks. Unless you can pull a Vader and perhaps have a room with negative pressure it seems like the surgery is your best bet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Try using Anki or another Spaced Repetition (SRS) program. Anki specifically has been life-changing for me.

\- [https://apps.ankiweb.net](https://apps.ankiweb.net)

\- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition)

</comment><comment><USER5> Write down stuff with _paper_.

Seriously, when you write down stuff you read/hear you're making your brain process the same information several times (reading/hearing, understanding, rephrasing, converting that info to letters, hand movement to write that letters, understandig).

This helps retention a lot, plus you'll have notes that you can refer later.

Don't use a computer to keep notes: keyboard punching needs far less neurons than handwriting and retention is less effective.

I think there is some research about that, btw.

</comment><comment><USER6> You are actually not alone.

You need to revisit new information because we forget things exponentially unless we remind ourselves. In psychology, such pattern is shown by the forgetting curve [0].

Similar to you, I was concerned once that I was forgetting a lot of new information about programming. Therefore I wrote an open source software to automate spaced repetition with minimal friction while coding [1]. Basically, you write down new information as you come across it, and you get a weekly digest email.

Everyday, try to write information down on a piece of paper or on your machine. The act of writing down the information in your own words alone could help you retain memory. The retention could be all the more improved when you continually revisit what you have written down. This habit has worked well in my case for the last 2-3 years. Hope it could work for you too.

\- [0] [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting_curve](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting_curve)

\- [1] [https://github.com/dnote/dnote](https://github.com/dnote/dnote)

</comment><comment><USER7> Programming doesn't really need that much memory. The average brain can juggle around 3-7 pieces of information at a time. The trick is to keep it around 3.

Make heavy use of todo lists, probably plaintext. Often when you're programming something, a lot of tiny issues crop up that wreak havoc with your short term memory. It's sort of like doing calculus, you just have to learn to write more steps, instead of trying to skip a few steps ahead.

Keep as few tabs open at a time as possible. Ideally, around 4 or so.

One function should do only one thing. Memorize the shortcut for jumping to a function by name. If it's too hard to understand what a function is doing, split it into more.

</comment><comment><USER8> Make sure you're getting enough sleep in between major concepts. Sleep consolidates memory.

Also, revisit already learned stuff again 3 to 4 days later. Multiple spaced repetition makes the concepts stick.

Also, don't be pressured by others' performance. It's your pace and your schedules. Don't believe those book covers either ... you cannot learn programming in "24 hours" or even "21 days".

Shit is hard for everyone. Oh ya, did I mention getting enough sleep? Min 8 hours a day.

</comment><comment><USER9> Make sure you have ruled out medical reasons for the memory loss. Healthy diet, adequate sleep and exercise support memory development and preservation.

</comment><comment><USER10> maybe get a carbon monoxide detector.

and as others said, get good sleep.

</comment><comment><USER11> I dont think so.. it can be just your drama or dorama in my country said</comment>


How good is your website? - <AUTHOR> https://www.talentcupboard.com/website-grader/ <comment><USER2> Data was ok on your website and found few good suggestion.</comment>


Dropbox Disaster with Selective Sync - <AUTHOR> A warning to users of DropBox Take note! There is a serious problem with Dropbox,  if you use Dropbox, make sure you have a second backup.  …A  warning if you use it, for you too can loose thousand of images…I have been in communication with Dropbox for over two months and I have not had satisfactory response.  I need an alternative method to resolve this issue.  I have done everything that I could do with Dropbox to no avail. They are not taking this situation seriously.  No images recovered, photos that were only stored on Dropbox gone,  I had a local drive but it crashed so I have no way to recuperate my images, two years of professional and personal art work for the moment lost.  Has any one else had similar problems with Dropbox? Does anyone know how to get Dropbox to react and recuperate lost images <comment><USER2> > if you use Dropbox, make sure you have a second backup

"make sure you have a backup" Dropbox is not a backup service. It's a collaboration / sharing space. It's a multi-desktop sync tool. But it's not a backup tool - in the same way a RAID with daily snapshots isn't a backup.

<comment><USER3> Dropbox advertises "120 days of file recovery" for paying users, though, along with snapshots of file versions. The description of the feature is titled "File back up and recovery".

<comment><USER2> Sure, but you don't know how they're storing it / how mixed is it with current data. An ideal backup is something you can disconnect from the system to guarantee it doesn't change and can be used in read-only mode. Dropbox is doing something slightly in that direction, but not completely.</comment></comment></comment>