Hitchhiker's Tour of the BEAM (Erlang VM) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.erlang-factory.com/upload/presentations/708/HitchhikersTouroftheBEAM.pdf <comment><USER2> As I saw this in person presented at the London Erlang Factory Lite on Thursday, I rely recommend giving it a through read - very interesting stuff!

<comment><USER3> Yes, a great in-depth talk. Got also front row tickets to his talk last thursday.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There should be a sub-project named "Gunslinger".</comment>


Ask HN: Fire your whole team or another chance? - <AUTHOR> Hi, imagine you had a team of friends of yours in a startup. It's getting less productive week after week. Would you fire your whole team after countless tries of getting them to start doing? Is it the fault of yourself hiring them? Would you keep trying?<p>What's your opinion <comment><USER2> Don't do business with friends. You will loose both friends and money.

</comment><comment><USER3> Have a frank discussion about needs, abilities, expectations, and commitment. If this is a business and not a hobby or lark it deserves clarity. Equity is for going the distance not just showing up occasionally.

</comment><comment><USER4> it's everyone's fault, but that's not the issue here.

the real issue is you're working with people who you are not satisfied with.

in my experience, if you have to motivate people you work with in order to get things done, it's already over, because it means the culture is fucked. I've never seen it work. The ideal picture is if you work with people who inspire you every day.

Next time try to be careful when looking for who you work with.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks a lot! I'm at the very beginning of managing a team and culture is key. I'll probably have to turn that around.</comment></comment>


Facebook Valued At $67.5 Billion In SecondMarket's 10th Auction - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/18/facebook-secondmarket/

<comment><USER2> Why do we care about the value of facebook stock on the play by play?

Facebook's value has not moved significantly. This is starting to sound like a stock ticker...

</comment><comment><USER3> This is getting absurd.</comment>


Signing an Adobe AIR application with a startssl.com certificate - <AUTHOR> http://podman.posterous.com/misadventures-in-signing-adobe-air-applicatio

<comment><AUTHOR> I apologize in advance if this post is rambling.</comment>


What do you need to do before you quit your job to form a startup company? - <AUTHOR> http://www.startupcompanylawyer.com/2009/01/08/what-do-you-need-to-do-before-you-quit-your-job-to-form-a-startup-company/

<comment><USER2> This was from a legal perspective, and a good one at that, but I was also thinking of:

Health care stuff. If you're due for new glasses, braces, try and get it in before you quit your "normal" W2 job. (And of course research health care stuff before you quit, related thread here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=560169> .)

<comment><USER3> And by "health care stuff" don't automatically assume that means insurance. If you require prescription drugs, research the price of them. Some drugs cost hundreds, others you can pay closer to $20 for a 3 month supply. Sometimes there are alternative drugs for the same condition that aren't normally prescribed, but work just as well--dessicated thyroid for hypothyroidism instead of levothyroxine, for instance. See how much you can afford paying for out of pocket or out of HSA before thinking about what kind of benefits you want from insurance.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I hung out with Yokum on Friday and essentially went through the "how do I find and hire a lawyer" bit he refers to at the end of his essay: [http://www.sachinagarwal.com/how-to-legally-incorporate- your...](http://www.sachinagarwal.com/how-to-legally-incorporate-your-startup- quick)

<comment><USER5> Thanks for reminding me that I have that post on "How do I find and hire a lawyer" that I've been meaning to write at some point.

<comment><USER6> Get on that. I am both interested in reading what you will produce, and expect you to produce it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> 1\. Save up lots of cash 2\. Get rid of any junk debt like car payments, store cards or credit cards and cut your expenses way down 3\. If you have a significant other, make sure they are _very_ understanding and supportive, because times will get tough 4\. Read and understand all the legal stuff and get it right from the get-go

</comment><comment><USER8> I don't see anyone else mentioning a line of credit - when you're young and without many assets, it's easier to apply and get one while still employed, and perhaps a bit more flexible than a credit card. I definitely having one useful a few times when cash was tight starting my company.

</comment><comment><USER9> * Have a co-founder (or founders)

* Have some ideas

* Have some savings (I quit with above 1 year or rent)

* Have equipment, backup drive, laptop, and ec2 (servers)

* Setup some ways to quickly get moving Wiki, Blog, Github, Ticking System

* Have a layer to help you incorporate and deal with anything that comes up.

We quit having a few ideas and not knowing which we would start with. I guess if you aren't in a rush I wouldn't quit until you had the idea you really wanted to start working on.

</comment><comment><USER10> Before you quit your job?

Enough paying customers and savings that it isn't financial suicide.

Sorry, I know it was about legal stuff :)</comment>


Elon Musk gives first glimpse inside Tesla Model 3 production line - <AUTHOR> https://electrek.co/2018/04/11/elon-musk-inside-tesla-model-3-production-line/ <comment><USER2> I known someone who has been to the Tesla Model 3 production line. He said it was very advanced compared to other production lines and that was part of the issue. Advanced means theoretically better, but it also means more risky to get going, lots of unknowns and new things. Apparently it is filled with ex- Toyota people.

<comment><USER3> Yes, supposedly there is plenty of exploration going on in making the process more automated than it usually is. Unsurprisingly, and not unlike software, bringing about masses of issues of things not working out-of-the-box.

It will probably be great in the end, but stressful if the guy doing the exploring is you.

<comment><USER4> Good to see them pushing the boundaries. The payoff will be huge if they can achieve faster velocity of iterative improvements.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Why is "sleeping in a sleeping bag on the factory floor." a good thing?

It seems utterly ridiculous to me. A good night's sleep is a must to be most effektiv at any task. In addition you can't tell me Musk can't get a bed in his office.

<comment><USER6> > Why is "sleeping in a sleeping bag on the factory floor." a good thing?

Who said that quote? Nobody in any of the videos on the linked page said it.

I assume "sleeping on the factory floor" means sleeping at the factory, in a camp-bed, or similar. "The factory floor" is a synecdoche for "the factory".

<comment><USER7> That phrase is also a modern aphorism, an allusion to the many inspiring stories of an entrepreneur's will and dedication to commercial success. Edison slept in his lab, for instance.

On a side note, your use of "synecdoche" reminded me that I should make a more systematic effort to introduce my daughters to the uses and benefits of figures of speech. Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > "I don't believe like people should be experiencing hardship while the CEO > is like off on vacation."

People will respect a leader who is in the trenches with them.

<comment><USER9> When you can walk away from the trenches at any time without risk, you're not really "in the trenches."

<comment><USER10> Pretty big reputational risk, actually.

Musk isn't going hungry any time, but it's easier for reputation for any employee to leave Tesla and join some other venture than it would be for Musk.

(I don't think this should be taken as an argument that we should feel bad for the rich and that the rich shouldn't pay their fair share at all.... In fact the opposite is true: the very rich are primarily focused on relative reputation, so you can happily tax them all without any reduction in relative reputation).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'd like to consider the general atrophy on a macro scale of the manufacturing capabilities in the US. My theory is that because we outsourced the making of so many things to so many other places (China), we generally lost the skills necessary to make things. Not to say that really advanced things aren't actually made in the US. It is more to say that the general population of able bodied workers do not have the skills and knowledge their ancestors did when it came to working in a factory. It is that actual work - the day in day out grind - that fosters innovation. Other comments point out that the Tesla factory is generally staffed with ex-Toyota folks. Why is that? Because Toyota has been pushing the envelope in Japan making all kinds of interesting things and developing a mentality of manufacturing innovation all along the way.

Thoughts?

<comment><USER12> I don't buy this, the United States is still the second largest manufacturing country in the world.

<comment><USER13> Not that I doubt you, but by what metrics?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Some nice PR plays by Elon. Our general is sleeping on the floor! Hey Elon, please wake up I need to sweep here. It is quite Henry V @ Agincourt-esque. Honestly I am cheering for Elon to succeed since he has become a symbol of western innovation.

</comment><comment><USER3> I guess we'll see more when the story actually airs tomorrow.</comment>


How a 'growth mindset' can lead to success - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200306-the-surprising-truth-about-finding-your-passion-at-work <comment><USER4> I've met a lot of people (and got to know them intensely) who seem to not allow themselves to learn new things in specific areas (or maybe a lot of areas), while being proactive in others. Looking at myself, I had a hard time learning and maintaining interest about building physical things, or doing home improvement (all things where I need a hardware shop from).

My theory is that active discouragement during childhood is a driving factor here. My father often yelled at me if I broke something physical, or asked "stupid" questions while building an RC car together. He also wanted to do all the home improvement stuff alone, and never actively explained anything to me there. So for me, home improvement equals discouragement, resulting in a feeling of I-can't-do-that. (This kind of thing seems to be passed on - <USER2> father's father also shouted at him when doing something wrong).

On the flipside, my father at some point bought a PC and let me play with it, and seemed to not have any concerns whatsoever about that. He got some floppy disk games for me, installed the office suite, and let me have at it, sometimes grunting encouragement.

Now guess what my favorite activity is, and what I built my career around - home improvement, or computers?

<comment><USER5> Extending a little charity to your father, maybe he recognized your strengths and helped you develop those. Maybe, for some reason, handiwork is _not_ your thing so he was directing you to where you felt more joy.

My father also was both technical and handy, and while I would enjoy an afternoon working with him on something or other, I didn't naturally drift toward it. I had a couple of small projects (a weight bench is one I still remember) and I never got very far with it. It worked ok, but was kinda shitty. I never put any love into it.

But the Heathkit digital electronics course? I couldn't stay away.

<comment><USER4> Well you cannot expect a 6yo to know how to correctly hold a soldering iron, I guess :) I don't think his critisicm was warranted at the time.

<comment><USER6> Yeah, I think the most charitable explanation is that as one gains expertise one is looking for and increasingly helped only by ever more critical and precise review. One may have trouble seeing the difference in what a beginner needs and think "better" review is a short cut around "wasted" time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> It's important to note that mindset theory has recently come under question: [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/095679761989758...](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0956797619897588?journalCode=pssa)

For a twitter summary of the above paper, see here: [https://twitter.com/BrookeMacnamara/status/12247169045745459...](https://twitter.com/BrookeMacnamara/status/1224716904574545920)

<comment><USER8> Reading these tweets, I realize I had no idea that "growth mindset" had very specific claims. Finding evidence to either invalidate or lessen the validity of said claims doesn't take away from the main lessons I've had from growth mindset ideas though. Tweeter seems to be quibbling with details and semantics, which may or may not be helpful. If "growth mindset" is a specific theoretical framework with clearly defined points for the sake of marketing one Carol Dweck and other people cannot use the phrase for what they thought it meant, fine, whatever.

But the lesson I took from the idea was that people who think that people cannot grow find themselves in a self-fulfilling prophecy where they don't try to grow. They potentially can get stuck in their careers and potentially might get bitter about things if they are not satisfied, wondering why the world is unfair, while other people who apply themselves can continue to grow. Yes, many variables and factors also influence how things happen, but the fundamental idea that people actually do limit themselves for no good reason is also frequently seen. How many people in the world are like this, I don't know, but they exist, and we should encourage those people to change the way they think. I am not sure how anyone would be able to argue against that being true.

<comment><USER9> > people who think that people cannot grow

I don't believe that these exist, which was the point. Everyone knows that people can learn things and become more skilled, claiming that some people don't believe this is straw-manning and hence bad science.

It is true that some people give up and stop growing, but I don't believe at all that it is related to "growth-mindset". More likely they just feel that the growth isn't worth the effort, they are happy enough where they are. Claiming that these people lack "growth-mindset" is like claiming that people who fail to reach their fitness goal lacks "growth-mindset" instead of just lacking motivation to work hard but still having enough motivation to talk constantly about it.

<comment><USER10> Counter-example: mathematics. I can't count how many times I've encountered people who "just aren't good at math". Besides those few with a condition to justify it, those people aren't good at math because they've been told all their life that math is hard and they can never be good at it. There's nothing inherently blocking them from excelling at it.

I also suspect that a lot of people claiming that they just aren't interested or motivated to learn X are often covering for their own insecurities. I know I'm personally guilt of it.

<comment><USER9> There are some people who say that they can't do math when they never tried just because it is a meme, but many people did actually try hard and still failed. After enough tries and failures they gave up and said "I am just not good at math". There is no point for such people to try harder at math, there are others for which the subject is a breeze so them trying is just a waste of time and effort for humanity. Not everyone needs to be good at it, humans can cooperate and cover for each others weaknesses.

And I am 100% sure that mathematical talent is a thing. I learned all concepts below college level the instant I saw them, and I completed a masters degree in math with just going to lessons and not studying at home, there is no way math is that easy for most people. A person like me will never feel they just aren't good at math, and people comparing themselves to me will rightfully acknowledge that they lack the kind of talent I have.

Now the situation is a lot less stark between most people, but I am pretty sure that the difference in talent is still there.

<comment><USER10> Right, I'm not trying to claim that _everyone_ can be good at math, or should be. There is some level of talent involved, and of course certain brain configurations that help or hurt (like discalcula or photographic memory).

However, it's still the case that a huge quantity of people simply give up on the subject because they don't believe they'll ever be any good at it, without even giving it a real try. They shut themselves down. Just because that doesn't apply to absolutely everyone doesn't make it something that's not important to recognize and combat.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> One thing I admire about my most successful coworkers is their lack of fear when diving headfirst into something new. "Hey, we've got this problem, can you take a look?"

And they say sure.

They will research, then code, then hit a roadblock and pick a new direction, and repeat. They assume they can get past whatever roadblocks they have, and they're always correct.

Other people will research until they think they've got a plan to get around every bit of friction they'll encounter. The longer you take to get started, the longer achieving a workable solution will take.

<comment><USER12> _and they 're always correct_

Survivorship bias. For every fearless, boots'n'all person I know in a variety of fields (not just dev) who's "succeeded", I know many more whose headlong attempts crashed and burned. Consequences ranged from merely becoming more cautious, to homelessness and suicide.

<comment><USER13> What the "survivorship bias" dismissal of things like this always neglects is that something can be a necessary, but not sufficient condition for success.

Ok, some people who dive in and try things don't succeed. But do any people who _don 't_ dive in and try things succeed?

Yeah, if you try you might still fail. Most intelligent people realize this is a possibility. If you don't try you will definitely fail though.

<comment><USER12> I was responding to _They assume they can get past whatever roadblocks they have, and they 're always correct._ I believe this _specific assertion_ to be false, and was not saying anything generic about fearlessness as a route to 'success' (a concept whose coherence I'm in any case deeply sceptical about).

<comment><USER13> The point still stands. Maybe some people who assume they can get past a roadblock are wrong. But the people who _don 't_ think they can get past it definitely won't

<comment><USER12> I'm not sure what 'stands' means in this context. It may or may not be a _true_ statement (I don't care because I'm radically uninterested in the dubious concept of 'success'), but in any case it's not a response to the comment you're replying to.

<comment><USER13> You seem to be fixated on some woo-woo, self-help meaning of "success". I just mean whether you complete the thing you're trying to do or not.

<comment><USER12> No, I was focusing (or fixating if you prefer the derogatory) on the _specific claim_ that fearlessness inevitably dissolves roadblocks. That's all. I have no opinion whatsoever on (nor interest in) general routes to 'success' (however scanned), as I thought I had made plain. Would repetition help - should I type it a few times more?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I made an attempt to find an actual definition:

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

> According to Carol Dweck,[11] individuals can be placed on a continuum > according to their implicit views of "where ability comes from".

> Dweck states that there are two categories (growth mindset versus fixed > mindset) that can group individuals based on their behaviour, specifically > their reaction to failure. Those with a "fixed mindset" believe that > abilities are mostly innate and interpret failure as the lack of necessary > basic abilities, while those with a "growth mindset" believe that they can > acquire any given ability provided they invest effort or study. In > particular, an individual's mindset impacts how they face and cope with > challenges, such as the transition into junior high school from elementary > school or losing your job.[11] According to Dweck, individuals with a > "growth" theory are more likely to continue working hard despite setbacks.

I have some poison I'd like to administer: You think this is great, but I find it sinister. It's a wonderful way to blame failure on the person, for if they were growers they'd win no matter what they had to work from. Are some people worse, or simply worse-off? "Use the growth mindset!" the growers can scoff! "There's nothing you can't achieve in the end!" and if you don't, well, they can just condescend. It's impossible to win against such philosophy; it allows them to ignore serious issues, and just fail to see a jammed-up or scammy underlying system, in which you can't rise and must always get pissed on.

But enough of my cynical snarling. I'm sure my growth mindset will let me be the first 36-year-old NCAA champion. You know, unless coronavirus destroys it utterly.

<comment><USER15> Well, if a person doesn't see any possible path toward some destination, then they will probably not even try.

If I see a path toward the destination, but it will take me a million years of walking, then that's not a fault of mindset theory. It doesn't promise that I'll be able to muster the million mile walk, it just promises that if I look closely enough, I might be able to make out the path there.

I am somewhat skeptical of mindset theory but intuitively, it makes sense and tracks with how I expect a human mind to react to difficult projects.

<comment><USER16> For sake of argument, if it doesn't promise that a growth mindset will allow you to succeed, then what good is it? How is it different than blind faith?

<comment><USER17> Is the promise that a growth mindset will allow you to succeed? Or, instead, to improve? Is that what's meant by "succeed"?

<comment><USER9> There is no point to improve if improving doesn't ultimately lead to some kind of success. Then instead you should try to work on improving in other areas where your hard work is more likely to pay off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> My take from the article is that one needs sufficient confidence and persistence to set a goal, a plan to achieve it, and the self-discipline to do the work to achieve it. Self directed learners have a better possibility to do this, especially if they have mentors to help them to get over the hard spots. Of course, one wants to "pay forward" this type of help.

<comment><USER19> I agree its about self-confidence, also desire to achieve a goal. Confidence and desire, the rest follows naturally.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I read Carol Dweck's book [0] on the recommendation of Satya Nadella. I learned to look at a few of my recent conflicts with others in a new way, and I would recommend the book as well.

[0] [https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B000FCKPHG](https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B000FCKPHG)

</comment><comment><USER21> Most of the growth mindset literature hasn't replicated...

<comment><USER22> ...that sounds like fixed mindset about growth mindset! Or maybe a better reply is: [https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulmsutter/2018/12/17/stop- usi...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulmsutter/2018/12/17/stop-using- science-to-validate-your-beliefs/#2f7f18896f27)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> How flogging the "growth mindset" concept can sell more books and earn the author more commissions.

</comment><comment><USER24> There is a misconception that passion is a singular positive emotion. Remember that sometimes passion can derail you, make you mad and angry. It involves more than one emotion. By all means, find your passion, but don't turn it into an obsession that can derail you.

</comment><comment><USER25> growth mindset: drinking is just a particular behavior, it's totally within my control, and all i have to do is learn how to make the choice not to drink irresponsibly.

fixed mindset: i'm an alcoholic, i'll always be an alcoholic, it's beyond my power to change that fact, so all I can do is try to let some other power help me to stop drinking.

the recent meta-analysis offering some limited support for AA got me thinking about this -- it's an interesting case where for a lot of people, a fixed mindset is what they need to make a positive change. i think there probably are many situations like this, where accepting something as a fixed trait actually helps you deal with it better.

<comment><USER26> Not the best example due to the physical addiction factor, but overall you're right. Just knowing/believing that things can change/be different is enough of a push for one to actually try and make the change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> If we really care about social mobility, it is on the economy that we should focus most of our attention [http://archive.vn/YJx0E](http://archive.vn/YJx0E)

</comment><comment><USER27> "I was an ordinary person who studied hard. There's no miracle people!" \--Feynman

<comment><USER28> Yet he often talked about the huge influence his farther had on him. In particular in encouraging him to question the world around him.

<comment><USER29> True. But I think he said this mainly to stop other people from believing that one is born as a genius.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I'm growing cucumbers in my garden, I am successful!

</comment><comment><USER31> I think it's not a great article. I mean 'improving your passion'? Really? Yeah collecting garbage currently sucks but in ten years time I expect to look forward to collecting everyday.

</comment><comment><USER32> > Or Donald Trump: "Without passion, you don't have energy. Without energy, > you have nothing."

He doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who is passionate about his job.

<comment><USER33> Let's not have political flamebait here please. That leads away from intellectually curious conversation, which is what we want on HN.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

<comment><USER12> Given that the 45 quote came directly from the article in question, this strikes me as a tad unreasonable in this case. At the very least, the 45 reference could quite reasonably lead to interrogation of the article author's superficial concept of 'success' (regardless of one's politics).

<comment><USER34> I think commenting on a politician's character or personality is 'political flamebait' whatever quote from the article it's placed under.

<comment><USER12> Even if it's a response to that politician's own statement specifically commenting on questions of character? I really can't agree - <USER3> between 'political flamebait' and 'reflexively tugging the forelock to those in authority' clearly requires judgement, but the line isn't quite that fine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Everything in AtOmXpLuS.CoM</comment>


First insider build of Windows Server arrives with new virtualization features - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/07/first-insider-build-of-windows-server-arrives-with-new-virtualization-features/ <comment><USER2> > Upgrading and maintaining Nano Server will be done through updating the > container image.

Sounds like the SmartOS approach.</comment>


Angie Hicks, Founder of Angie's List: Challenges Faced By Female Entrepreneurs - <AUTHOR> http://infochachkie.com/angie/

<comment><USER2> Rather inaccurate title? Unless I've missed some major section of the article, all that she has to say on the subject of gender is:

"I don't think this is a gender issue."</comment>


Crowdfunding the Recovery of a Lost Spacecraft - <AUTHOR> http://makezine.com/2014/04/24/crowdfunding-the-recovery-of-a-lost-spacecraft/

<comment><AUTHOR> I'd proposed an attempt at retrieving this spacecraft ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7199692](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7199692)) and a lot of good information was contributed. While I couldn't interest the appropriate departments at our university, it's great to see that we're not letting a functional spacecraft go to waste. You can help support the effort at their crowd-funding page: [http://www.rockethub.com/42228](http://www.rockethub.com/42228).</comment>


Why Founders Should Be The Developers  - <AUTHOR>

All too often I have seen great developers fall into the investment trap. They build a cool product, they receive investment and it is now their duty to manage a company. Their main intention was to spend time building products people like, but now they are told to raise more money, to grow faster, to generate more money, to build a bigger team, to make more profit and to sell their company for more than it is worth. And then go back to being a programmer.<p>It reminds me of the "The American Tourist and Mexican Fisherman" http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/fisherman.html <comment><USER2> Essentially, that's what happens when you take in outside investment. If you can build a cool product and bootstrap it, it need not be that way. Once you're taking in external shareholders, you're semi-bounded by their wishes.

</comment><comment><USER3> Hell yeah

On a related note I like founder over entrepreneur. I think of myself as a craftsman, not a business person. I love building cool stuff.

</comment><comment><USER4> Yes its easy to build what you are thinking if you are a developer. Founders should also be able to sell.</comment>


Why Flamingos Are More Stable on One Leg Than Two - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/05/flamingos-one-leg/527781/?single_page=true <comment><USER2> Another great example of evolutionary wonders in birds is the albatross. They have a tendon sheath that allows them to lock their wings open. This, combined with their giant wingspan, their relative heft (albatrosses are porkers), and some mysterious sensory mechanism and they are able to take advantage of wind gradients to perform a maneuver called "dynamic soaring", wherein the bird extracts energy from the wind. Scientists have measured the heartrate of soaring albatrosses, and found it to be not much higher than their resting heart rate. Albatrosses use this advantage to journey thousands of miles across the pacific, without landing once.

Some more info:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albatross#Morphology_and_fligh...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albatross#Morphology_and_flight)

<comment><USER3> > wherein the bird extracts energy from the wind.

Just to be clear for others: the bird is gaining kinetic energy and/or elevation (potential energy). It's not extracting energy from the wind and converting it to chemical energy (fat/sugar).

<comment><USER2> Right, it still has to eat along the way :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> That was a lot of explanation about how the joints lock into place, but that's not what's interesting to me. If I took a steel rod and put a stuffed animal at the top of it, I wouldn't expect it to be inherently stable.

<comment><USER2> Well, as the article lays out, it's a little more complicated than the leg joints just locking into place. They couldn't figure out how the leg was locking. It's only when they engaged the lock (by picking up the bird by the shin) that they realized the entire body reconfigures to achieve the needed stability:

> When a flamingo shifts onto one leg, two things happen. First, the leg > inclines so that the foot moves from being directly under the hip to being > directly under the center of the body. Second, the center of mass moves to > just in front of the flamingo's (hidden) knee, so its body weight naturally > pulls the hip and knee forward. These two changes, combined with gravity's > pull and the shape of the leg bones, keeps all the joints in place.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> The reason anything with two legs is more stable on one foot is that it has the choice to immediately put the free foot anywhere in order to bring about stability.

I have taught this to hikers who were struggling to get over some obstacles such as boulders. Quit standing on both feet and teetering. Always keep one in the air. When you step onto the next rock, lift the recovering foot, and keep it up until you decide the next step.

<comment><USER6> You said yourself that putting the second foot down doesn't increase stability. It's a paradox.

<comment><USER7> To answer this from the taijiquan perspective, the stability comes from being properly balanced on one leg. The second leg is a spare for when something happens unexpectedly like a gust of wind. By forcing people to keep one leg off the ground, you're forcing them to balance on one leg and learn to be more stable like that.

If you have no balance, it doesn't work. That's why tai chi is often recommended for older people to improve their balance and reduce the risk of falls.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> A much better write up of this, from one of the people who actually worked on it, was posted the other day: [https://theconversation.com/neuromechanics-of- flamingos-amaz...](https://theconversation.com/neuromechanics-of-flamingos- amazing-feats-of-balance-78160)

And the HN discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14408786](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14408786)

The Atlantic story linked here dumbs it down quite a bit.

</comment><comment><USER9> Heh... Interesting article.

I have a standing desk, and oddly enough, find it much easier to stand on 1 leg than 2. If it didn't take effort to keep my second leg up (in the yoga pose) I could see standing like that for hours. My knee joint locks, and I keep my balance easily with the support of the desk. For some reason, standing on 2 feet is far less comfortable and requires more 'effort'.

<comment><USER10> Woah I never noticed this but yea, when I am at my standing desk I shift from standing on one leg to standing on the other leg, shifting when my foot complains.

(to address your yoga pose, just sort of half wrap the ankle around the back, doesn't require much/any effort for the second leg if you let the toe drag all the way down towards the ground)

<comment><USER9> Interesting, I'll give that a try. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This article reminded me of a hiking skill I never mastered - the Rocky Mountain Rest Step (the name I learned it by, but I have heard others). It's pretty simple - when hiking on steep slopes, especially with weight (a heavy pack), you train yourself to lock your knee when stepping up to conserve energy and "rest". I always found it rather uncomfortable, but I have climbed with many strong mountaineers who swear by it.

[http://rockymountainhikingtrails.blogspot.com/2012/09/learni...](http://rockymountainhikingtrails.blogspot.com/2012/09/learning- rest-step.html?m=1)

</comment><comment><USER12> > "We really wanted to do an experiment where we just walked over and gave > them a little prod," says Chang. "But the zoo wouldn't let us."

This is _hilarious_.

<comment><USER13> Though I doubt that the flamingo would let you come near it, but it could have been a nice alternative to cow tipping:

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Also dead fish can swim upstream... evolution has a way of just making things work well mechanically.

<comment><USER15> I don't think 's true. What fish would that be?

<comment><USER16> It seems to be possible: [http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~glauder/reprints_unzipped...](http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~glauder/reprints_unzipped/BealEtAl2006.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> TL;DR (quoted from the article):

"When a flamingo shifts onto one leg, two things happen. First, the leg inclines so that the foot moves from being directly under the hip to being directly under the center of the body. Second, the center of mass moves to just in front of the flamingo's (hidden) knee, so its body weight naturally pulls the hip and knee forward. These two changes, combined with gravity's pull and the shape of the leg bones, keeps all the joints in place."

</comment><comment><USER18> flamingos are cool

<comment><USER19> and smelly

<comment><USER20> Nature smells so bad.

I grew up in Alaska and oh God seals and whales smell so bad.</comment></comment></comment>


Apache RocketMQ – Distributed Messaging and Streaming Platform - <AUTHOR> https://rocketmq.apache.org/ <comment><AUTHOR> Anyone using this ? What is the diff between this and kafka ? (Apart from the fact kafka is now widely known and used ).

<comment><USER2> The 'Architecture' Documentation page states:

      Why RocketMQ?
      Based on our research, with increased queues and virtual topics in use,
      ActiveMQ IO module reaches a bottleneck. We tried our best to solve this
      problem through throttling, circuit breaker or degradation, but it did not
      work well. So we begin to focus on the popular messaging solution Kafka at
      that time. Unfortunately, Kafka can not meet our requirements especially
      in terms of low latency and high reliability, see [here] for details."

[here] [https://rocketmq.apache.org/rocketmq/how-to-support-more- que...](https://rocketmq.apache.org/rocketmq/how-to-support-more-queues-in- rocketmq/)

<comment><AUTHOR> I just found out this link and states the difference [https://rocketmq.apache.org/docs/motivation/](https://rocketmq.apache.org/docs/motivation/)</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Health Insurance for Entrepreneurs? - <AUTHOR>

I left my "real job" over a year ago and I've been bootstrapping ever since. For the most part, I've been able to get by without the benefits of a full-time job. However, I find that health insurance is just too expensive as an individual. Are there any plans out there that are affordable for entrepreneurs like myself? <comment><USER2> Get real "insurance", just buy a catastrophic plan, ie high deductible. Pay for everything else with cash, ask for a discount because of it, you'll be amazed at how much drugs and doctors visits are discounted if you pay cash at the visit so they don't have to do the paperwork.

</comment><comment><USER3> Look into something with an HSA (Health Savings Account). That lets you put pretax money into an account to pay for medical expenses, and will have a relatively high deductible (and thus a lower premium).

<comment><USER4> www.selfdirectedhsa.com

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> What would be affordable for you?

<comment><AUTHOR> My sister is also self-employed and I believe she pays ~$600/mo. That's too much. I'd like to get the best coverage I can for $200/mo tops.</comment></comment>


We need dedicated Footer email field - <AUTHOR> Everyone reading business emails surely knows the pain of scrolling through an email thread. Usually there are a handful of one-line messages and a whole mess of company contact details, confidentiality boilerplate, logos and other crap. Can we introduce a Footer field to email standards, hide it in readers and put an end to the madness? <comment><USER2> There is one. It's two hyphens followed by a trailing space and newline: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_block](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_block)</comment>


Ideas That Changed My Life - <AUTHOR> https://www.perell.com/blog/50-ideas-that-changed-my-life?ref=alexcarpenter.me <comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23445944](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23445944)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> > 16\. Russell Conjugation: Journalists often change the meaning of a sentence > by replacing one word with a synonym that implies a different meaning. For > example, the same person can support an estate tax but oppose a death tax — > even though they are the same thing.

I found this one particularly interesting

<comment><USER3> The most recent famous example I can think of is "Obamacare" versus the "Affordable Care Act".

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sx2scvIFGjE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sx2scvIFGjE)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "11\. The Never-Ending Now: The structure of our social media feeds blinds us to history, as it causes us to live in an endless cycle of ephemeral content consumption. The structure of the Internet pulls people away from age-old wisdom. "

I frequently find myself in this mode. Whether it's the latest youtube video or tweet. There's something to be said about looking back at past events and investigating what you might have failed to learn or appreciate.

</comment><comment><USER5> > 9\. Competition is for Losers: Avoid competition. Stop copying what > everybody else is doing. If you work at a for-profit company, work on > problems that would not otherwise be solved. If you're at a non-profit, fix > unpopular problems. Life is easier when you don't compete. (Hint: don't > start another bottled water company).

The problem here is making sure that you are solving a real problem at all.

There are many companies out there doing something unique, but that is because what they are doing has limited/no value. Juicero comes to mind.

Without competition, you also cannot get an honest assessment of where you stand.

<comment><USER6> I totally agree with your first point, and you lost me on the last sentence. Competition is a great data point, but just because you don't have any competition doesn't mean you aren't solving a real problem.

<comment><USER5> To me it would be extremely rare that the identification of a problem is unique. A particular solution? Sure.

On the other hand, lots of people are solving problems which are not real.

I agree that finding a unique problem is possible, but it is more probable that you are missing something.

<comment><USER6> Sure. I also wonder if Perrel is hitting on the idea of avoiding competition by Thiel.

[https://mastersofscale.com/peter-thiel-escape-the- competitio...](https://mastersofscale.com/peter-thiel-escape-the-competition/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I got to #15...

"15\. Law of Shitty Click-Through Rates: Most marketing strategies have a short window of success, as click-through rates decrease as tactics mature. For example, the first banner-ad has a click-through rate of more than 70%. Now we avoid them with ad-blockers."

And I thought WOW, 70% and I was curious if that's true. At least according to The Atlantic that is not true, but the number is still pretty darn high.

"The banner ad that's widely described as the first ever was a little rectangle purchased by AT&T on HotWired.com in 1994. About 44 percent of the people who saw it actually clicked on it."

[https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:rH9hEb...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:rH9hEb025K0J:https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/04/the- first-ever-banner-ad-on-the-web/523728/+&cd=11&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

(Not trying to take away anything from this list, just sharing what I found)

<comment><USER8> This should be considered for every business that optimizes for "engagement". When introducing a change to increase engagement, ask yourself whether people actually want to engage. Otherwise, you'll end up increasing your metric in the short-term but lose in the long term on customer satisfaction or another metric you are not tracking (or can't track in an automated way).

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > 8\. Talent vs. Genius: Society is good at training talent but terrible at > cultivating genius. Talented people are good at hitting targets others can't > hit, but geniuses find targets others can't see. They are opposite modes of > excellence. Talent is predictable, genius is unpredictable.

This, at least in US, I think the society is focusing too much energy on cultivating genius, and a lot of talents are left idle with literally meaningless work (for example, convincing people to click on ads).

</comment><comment><USER10> This is a listicle of context-free ideas distilled into bon mots. Great for going viral, especially among the VC twitter crowd.

The problem with these lists is that they give the impression that you're learning something when you're really just consuming Content.

<comment><USER6> This is true. The only way you actually learn something here is by taking ideas as a starting point to identify where they are prevalent in your own life.

<comment><USER10> Which is fair. These can be good jumping off points. It would be wonderful if Perell credited (for example) the book The Goal for his reference to the Theory of Constraints, etc.

<comment><USER6> Yeah -- I think him and those like him (Tiago Forte, etc) would argue that they have "remixed" the idea enough to call it their own... which is highly debatable IMO.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > 7\. Mimetic Theory of Conflict: People who are similar are more likely to > fight than people who are different. That's why Civil Wars and family feuds > create the worst conflicts. The closer two people are and the more equality > between them, the greater the potential for conflict.

Wars between countries are certainly more common than civil wars, aren't they? And I'm not sure I understand the link between "worst conflicts" and "greater potential for conflict."

<comment><USER12> > Wars between countries are certainly more common than civil wars, aren't > they?

 _Far_ more people are killed in intrastate armed conflict than interstate:

[https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/Du...](https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/Dupuy%252C%2520Rustad-%2520Trends%2520in%2520Armed%2520Conflict%252C%25201946%25E2%2580%25932017%252C%2520Conflict%2520Trends%25205-2018.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> #20 - The Bike-Shed Affect seems to plague everyone. In fact, this article from Perrell is what inspired me to write about how to use collaborative meeting agendas to stop this from happening.

TL;DR: Force everyone to make the simple and easy decisions asynchronously before you get into a synchronous meeting. This forces you to talk about the big, hard problems when you are meeting live. It has saved our team hours of wasted meeting time.

[https://productsolving.substack.com/p/bike-shed- effect](https://productsolving.substack.com/p/bike-shed-effect)</comment>


Letter of Recommendation: Digging a Trench - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/16/magazine/letter-of-recommendation-digging-a-trench.html <comment><USER2> Yes, very Zen. And good exercise, if you're young enough.

But me, I'd have just found the shutoff valve for the sprinkler system.

And actually, something like that happened to me. We'd bought this very old house. With an electrical box that had evolved since ~1900. It met code, but was a rat's nest. So we hired an electrician to bring order.

Long story short, we found a circuit that led to an old iron pipe, which had supplied a long-gone outbuilding. The circuit hadn't shorted out, but the pipe was so rusted out that the circuit drew ~5A whenever it rained.

Edit: spelling

<comment><USER2> Belated edit: It looks like _Bring Out the Dog_ is a must read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is probably deep and profound, but I'm not advanced enough to get the point. Guy found some leakage of water in his backyard, went digging around to find the source and meanwhile had some existential epiphanies of epic scale.

<comment><USER4> With writing like this, I think trying to "get the point" is... missing the point for lack of a better expression.

For me the question is simply does this piece make you feel something or not? A piece like this invites the reader to make their own connection to what the narrator is experiencing, and if a reader doesn't make that connection then that is okay, and it certainly does not mean that the reader is in any way less "advanced."

<comment><USER5> I used to think that writing or storytelling that "doesn't have a point," so to speak, was more profound or enduring, but later in life I no longer feel this way and have come to regard the modern trend to create film and written artwork like this as a mistake.

Maybe it goes in cycles? If society is prepccupied with formulaic narratives that stick to a tight setvof themes, then material written without a specific aim in terms of "a point" might help broaden discourse or generate discussion.

But if society is already floundering around with aimless discussion in a lot of areas, with big conflicts in terms of the basic moral or ethical premises of the world, then writing succinct, direct stories that have a point may be more useful.

<comment><USER4> > But if society is already floundering around with aimless discussion in a > lot of areas, with big conflicts in terms of the basic moral or ethical > premises of the world, then writing succinct, direct stories that have a > point may be more useful.

Maybe more useful, but I think purely utilitarian writing does less to broaden a reader's mind than more ambiguous writing that they have to struggle with. I know it did for me. But I understand what you are saying, and I too outgrew reading "challenging" novels because I feel like my mind has been broadened enough and also I feel like I just have less time (although maybe I am just getting older).

I haven't read this essay in a while, but as I remember it Jonathen Franzen's essay "Perchance to dream" takes on this exact subject and is an excellent read. Regrettably it is not available online.

<comment><USER6> I fully support challenging writing that has a deeper meaning and that forces you to think about it to truly understand the author's larger concept. But there's an awful lot of stuff that is closer to a Rorschach test, where by thinking hard enough you can create your own signal from the noise.

It's much easier to create the second type than the first, and superficially it's really hard to tell them apart. Like a complicated looking puzzle that turns out to have no solution, your mind may manage to make some random connections, but ultimately it's not teaching you any kind of better way of thinking. You can waste a lot of time trying to extract the true deeper meaning when there's none there.

<comment><USER5> > "But there's an awful lot of stuff that is closer to a Rorschach test, where > by thinking hard enough you can create your own signal from the noise."

This is a close match to the spirit of my comment, well put.

It's very easy to write drivel that essentially means anything the reader wants it to mean, and then try to weasel out of it by claiming there is no point, and that pointlessness is part of the artistic merit.

Another thing that irks me is that quite often there really is an intentional thought process by the artist as they create something. Why make Bob say such and such to Alice at that moment? Why choose a certain style of paint that introduces a texture? You literally can go ask the artist to explain the exact intentionality beyond various choices.

Except in cases where the artist uses some sort of free association / subconscious technique, usually resulting in abstract or surreal art, there's no intellectually honest way for an artist to claim there's no "true" meaning, because at bare minimum there is the brain state of the artist at the time they used willful intention to create it one way and not all other possible ways.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> In praise of CBT. By doing, feeling becomes meaning.

<comment><USER8> Yes!! Thank you! I've been fumbling with trying to put that thought into a form as succinct as that.

<comment><USER7> I think other koans could be better. Nice game to play reducing acronyms down to short non acronymic description.

Maybe it's doing through meaning becomes being?

<comment><USER8> Yes, nice game.

The first koan resonated more with me :) However I see beauty in that "be" is there twice in the second one. If we prune the second, we get: Doing through meaning becomes.

That's not full capture of the thing.

I think this might be closer: "Meaning through doing becomes."

It's a little stilted and unnatural, but to me it indicates a loop, which is a life mechanism or pattern which CBT has pointed me towards.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I did some car work yesterday. Struts, so nothing hard, just needed to put in the time. The next thing to do was always obvious. I don't think I had a complex thought the whole time. I was just there. I came back to myself feeling like my mind was awakening from a long nap and my body had just done something difficult and wondrous without me. I felt more refreshed than I usually do after a vacation. I can think of no better reason to write than to share such feelings. To grant meaning to the effort, and share that meaning with others.

</comment><comment><USER10> Wow, so well written. I really enjoyed that!

<comment><USER11> A real writer. I've never been able to achieve something so... fluid, complete, interesting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Lovely piece of writing.</comment>


Show HN: My private.xml for Karabiner - enhanced keyboard controls for OS X - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/mien/private.xml

<comment><AUTHOR> For users of Karabiner, a keyboard customising utility for OS X ([https://pqrs.org/osx/karabiner/](https://pqrs.org/osx/karabiner/))

Karabiner enables users to extend its features by writing custom xml to a private.xml file. This is my private.xml file, along with associated secondary xml files and some applescripts

Features include:

\- an enhanced Mousekeys mode for controlling the cursor with your keyboard

\- easy shifting between tabs in Firefox, Chrome, Totalfinder, Sublime Text, iTerm2, Microsoft Excel, and Bean (tap command-R/option-R)

\- easy shifting between spaces (tap option-L/command-L)

\- easy shifting between multiple windows of an app (tap shift-R)

\- control Spotify using OS X's media keys (must change media keys to standard FN keys through System Preferences first)

\- a simple Hyper key implementation, using control-L (use Seil to remap capslock as control - [https://pqrs.org/osx/karabiner/seil.html.en](https://pqrs.org/osx/karabiner/seil.html.en))

\- disabling of the Sysdiagnose keys

\- some keys for zooming/navigating Preview documents using a more ergonomic group of keys.</comment>


Working for startups sucks, you'll be happier working for The Man - <AUTHOR> http://substitute.livejournal.com/1921465.html <comment><USER2> "The dot coms I have known were all doomed. Almost all of them were the classic two-founder startups going after a niche in the market. All of them needed outside money to achieve their goals, and in every case the outside money wrecked the company. Uncontrolled hiring wiped out the competence and the culture of these places within months. Executives who came in with the outside money were out of their depth and resorted to arbitrary decision- making and tyranny, and sometimes deliberately failed at their fiduciary responsibilities. "

I worked for a company matching that description precisely, and can attest to the fact that it really sucked, a lot. The strange thing for me was that it was a subtle shift from "wow, this is so exciting" to "I can't believe how much this sucks". I can't even pinpoint exactly when it happened.

In the beginning it was exciting. Lot's of money floating around, everyone assuming things would be wildly successful and we'd all be rich. Reality was a hard pill to swallow (I was the fifth employee of a company that grew to just over 100 then contracted to around 25). That said, I'm not really tempted to go to the corporate world. I can't just unplug my ambition and accept being a small cog in a giant machine. I would much rather take all the lessons I've learned on "what not to do" and channel that into a new (and hopefully better) startup.

</comment><comment><USER3> I've worked at the two extremes he describes. I've worked for Fortune 250 and 500 companies with cubicle farms and bureaucracy and I've worked for a 2-founder startup with an office overlooking the beach and all glass furniture. Each had its ups and downs. Working for the "Man" meant I was just a cog in an amorphous machine that always made money no matter what I did. Working at a frathouse masquerading as a business, I learned a lot and got free beer every Friday.

Now I'm working for a company in the middle. It was a hip startup in 1998 but has now grown up to be profitable. The older guys are still here, but there is fresh energy too. The company expanded way beyond its original purpose (remember when Amazon only sold books? We're like that), and each vertical feels like a small startup sharing space with other startups. I think it's a good fit for me, but I can't help but think that if I create a startup now, in 10 years I could be the one running a place like this.

<comment><USER4> Completely off topic, but this is the sort of place I'm looking for now. I've sat in the start up, older dot com, and now in the ginormous corporation but I'm looking for a middle ground. I'd be curious to find out where you work, but I won't pry. Of course, I've been told I should set up shop for myself more than once. I'm just not sure its time yet.

<comment><USER3> To satisfy your curiosity, I work for Internet Brands. The name change reflects its "grownup-ness" over the past decade since it started off as CarsDirect.com back in 1998. I like that each vertical is like a separate company with a startup feel, but all sharing one big office space.

Since the company started out in an incubator (Idealab), I think they (subconsciously or consciously) kept that incubator feel. For example, when my team is working on a site and we have a vBulletin question, we can walk to the other side of the floor and talk to the people who wrote vBulletin.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Summary: Working in a really bad start-up is less good than working in a really good corporate environment.

There are shitty, corrupt, nepotistic, lying corporations and there are also sterling start-ups. The world's not black and white.

<comment><USER6> No, there are some things that happen in startups which absolutely don't happen in established businesses in North America. I've seen fraud, overt sexism, early-stage employees fired the week before they vest, and tyrannical abuse of underlings.

That said, the author of the post works only in the LA area, so I think all his experience has been with media-oriented startups. I have a feeling there's a higher degree of frat boy douchiness in that world. San Francisco startups tend to have a more placid, nerdy, bike-rack-in-the-lobby atmosphere, although they can ultimately be just as cruel.

<comment><USER7> Big companies have fraud, just look at Enron. The sexism isn't overt for legal reasons, but that doesn't change the end results. One very big, very old company I worked had a manager who loved hiring attractive female interns and another who almost exclusively hired people from his home country and all but openly admired to preferential hiring based on nationality.

When someone at a big company is conveniently let go before their green card is approved or that big bonus is paid out, it isn't a "firing," but a "layoff" as the company "right-sizes." Bad bosses abuse underlings when they think the job market lets them get away with it and will not hesitate to punish those who step out of line.

Come to think of it, I've seen everything you describe at some of the many Fortune 500 companies I've consulted at. Sadly, human nature defies corporate size, and bad behavior can even creep into very big companies.

<comment><USER8> That's true, but what's also true is that virtually every bigco has checks and balances to address that problem, whereas the job of HR in a post-A-round startup is mostly to screw you on health insurance.

Whether those checks function well or not, there's usually nothing you can do about an irrational or abusive CEO or VP/Eng at a startup.

<comment><USER9> _the job of HR in a post-A-round startup is mostly to screw you on health insurance_

That goes only for the USA. Sorry to touch _that topic_ , but it's true.

<comment><USER10> I've always had good experience with health insurance at the startups I've worked for.

<comment><USER9> IN the UK, it's just not an issue that you think about. Your NHS cover is unaffected by who, if anyone, employs you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The honest truth is that it's often unsettling for people to work at startups. They are chaotic and messy.

It's not right for everyone.

The best people we hired into our startup were often refugees from the cubicle world looking for a little adventure and ok with making less money. In the interview we would try to paint a picture of daily life in a startup, the true odds of success, or even survival, and how different a work experience this was going to be for them.

And what an adventure we gave them. Some stayed, others ran back to cubicle farms. Some had been at such bad places that in our worst moment they still said "this isn't that bad.. I've been in worse jobs!".

I've been taking a 'break' from the startup world at a large gaming company and I totally understand the appeal of an established company.

There are times in your life when you don't want work to be an adventure.

<comment><USER8> I have a little speech I give candidates about how bad life is going to be at our little company. When you find someone you want to hire, especially if you've been looking for a long time, your brain switches to a mode that says "don't screw this up!" Which is bad, because the thing that's worse than not managing to hire an excellent candidate is hiring an otherwise-excellent candidate who can't handle the company you're running.

It's actually worse to hire someone who is awesome and a deal-breaker culture mismatch than it is to hire someone incompetent. The incompetent you can send on their way. With a real talent, there's hard feelings and reputation hit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> You know, I think the real insight in the piece is about the two startup founders where no one is really in charge. I think it's a good kick to remind founders that there needs to be a process for decision-making so you don't end up in stalemates.

<comment><USER13> I've found there doesn't necessarily have to be one founder who's in charge, just that founders have to be able to cooperate. If the founders can't work together, it's not likely to solve the problem to designate one as the boss.

Nor is the problem limited to groups of 2 founders. You can have groups of 2 that work together well and groups of 3 that bicker. I'm guessing the author just had a limited sample size.

<comment><AUTHOR> Who doesn't have a small sample size when it comes to work? Even the most determined job-hopper can only work at a small number of companies long enough to really understand the dynamic. And even the most perceptive outside observer won't really know what it's like to have devoted a big chunk of one's life to a job.

There's an endless variety of human experience and we only get to live one fragment of it ourselves. That's the point of swapping stories.

<comment><USER13> I agree entirely. One of the great things about the Internet, which I believe we still don't appreciate fully, is the degree to which it allows us to step back and see the mosaic formed by these fragments.

The post in question is a good example. It's much more valuable when combined with the comments on HN, many of them by people with first-hand experience of startups, than it would have been as an isolated article in the print media.

Merely enabling us to collect and collate information we already "knew" is surprisingly valuable. The clearest example may be open source software, but I think we will see similar gains in almost all fields.

<comment><AUTHOR> Actually, I found it curious that the livejournal comments were far more interesting than the thread here. The OP has some very articulate friends.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I can relate to this article.

I have experienced working for startups and large businesses. In my experience I have preferred working for large businesses. For me, I actually find a lot of the "perks" of startups to overall be worse for the environment. Sure, I can show up whenever I want and dress how I like, but overall is this really a good thing? Or does it just trend toward laziness and lack of personal responsibility? What's so bad about a little structure -- I grew up in a structured educational environment and learned to thrive in it.

Beyond this though, what I really like about larger companies is the expertise at my fingertips. I think I'm a pretty good programmer, but I can't do everything, and I don't have the experience to be good at everything.

At Corporation A, adding a new feature requires the following process: marketing identifies a need, project manager creates a plan, software architect decides how it should be implemented, programmer implements the feature, designer spruces it up, QA ensures that it is correct, and sales creates a pitch. Money rolls in.

At Startup B, it works like this: Investor X identifies a need, Investor Y disagrees on implementation, 95% of time is spent discussing exact wording instead of the usefulness of said feature. Programmer implements it, no one remembers what it was for, it gets dropped at the next redesign.

People say they don't want to just be a "cog in a wheel", but I see nothing wrong with being a cog in well-oiled, efficient machine. I find it very satisfying to be a small but significant part of something larger than I could ever create on my own.

<comment><USER15> I work at a start up now after working at the largest software corporation for about two years, and I guess I see the complete opposite. Sure, at the start up, we can dress how we like, show up when we want, etc.. but honestly, people dress the same as they did at the corporation, and people show up at roughly the same time. And I feel (and see) more of a trend of personal responsibility at the start up. With 20 engineers, there's no one to pass the buck to: if something breaks from your area, you fix it. Especially dealing with a live site with millions of customers, versus a two year release cycle at my previous job.

I'm going to have to disagree on the point of expertise too. At my corporate job, I tried bringing up functional programming at a happy hour and got a lot of blank stares. Anything programming related that was not directly related to the job, my coworkers didn't seem to care about. At the start up, people learn different languages for fun and try to stay up with new technology.

I know that all I've done is provide more anecdotal evidence, but my experience has been so 180 degree opposite from yours, Markus, that I felt compelled to comment. I guess the big difference I see is that of passion: corporate programmers are rarely super excited about what they work on, and start up programmers almost have to be. I'm not saying passion means a better product or success, but I'd choose working with passionate people any day of the week.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Perhaps the OP would be happier again working for an organically grown startup (rather than a "well" funded one). In such companies "Real money is being made and lost" - and a lot more directly than in a huge company (with all its inefficiencies). What each employee does matters, and stupidity is punished.

<comment><USER17> As someone bootstrapping a company that has no chance of getting funded by doing consulting - and having started from next to nothing in savings + high living expenses inherited from salaried days - I couldn't agree more.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've found I was most happiest in a startup environment. Even a couple of hundred people feels too big for me.

I think it comes down to where your interests lie. I love wearing multiple hats, and working on a million different things, and the excitement of that type of environment.

<comment><USER8> I'm definitely happier in startups too. Being in the middle of a startup with traction [1] keeps you sharp. I tell myself that it also makes me more valuable in either a bigco or another startup.

At some point though you need to seperate the emotional from the rational. And building up career qualifications in challenging startups stops meaning that much when you lose sight of any ways to deploy those qualifications down the road.

[1] _Important qualifier_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> To paraphrase: you'll be happier working for The Man than working for The Boys.

I think the point here is he's talking about being an employee, not a founder or a partner. The great benefit of _running_ a startup is doing things your way. Unless employees believe in and are able to contribute to the startups direction, they're just as powerless as they'd be at BigCo with none of the upside that stablity brings.

</comment><comment><USER20> I suggest trying both. Completely different worlds and each satisfies different financial, career and personal needs.

My only "sucks" advice other than that: when looking at startups avoid family run businesses where there is even a hint of nepotism like the plague.

<comment><USER21> Most start-ups are usually founded by close friends who hire more close friends and so on... So one can hardly avoid nepotism in start-up sphere, at least this is my experience.

<comment><USER22> I'm not sure if that's nepotism though. When I think nepotism I think of people getting hired purely because of their relationship to the boss. If I was doing a startup I'd be hiring people I knew could do a great job because I'd done good work with them in the past.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> There is a corollary to this which almost runs counter to the author's argument. In my experience, if you work for a startup where you enjoy your work, and the startup gets acquired, chances are your work will start sucking within the year.

This is both because the culture will change very fast (except in rare cases) and almost always the type of people who enjoy working for startups find it very hard to enjoy working for BigCos.

</comment><comment><USER24> I know its hard for us at HN to believe to someone is actually happier working for the man. It's a personal choice. He likes the structure of cooperate life to the adhoc environment in the previous startups he worked for. I can appreciate his sentiments.

</comment><comment><USER25> Having worked both, I can say I too definitely prefer working in a startup environment. I give this guy in the article a few months before he changes his tune. Working for a large company, I often felt like slamming my head against my desk. If you enjoy bureaucy and make that work for you, then you'll probably do well otherwise try a startup. Personally, I enjoy consulting now but in a down economy it can be tough yet BS free. Work is work at the end of the day, you have to do it. Nose to the grind stone.

<comment><USER15> I wouldn't be so sure he'll change his tune. At my corporate job, the majority of the people were very happy there. They were mostly older, with families, kids, mortgages, etc.. just happy to be doing a job and being compensated well for it. I was the only squeaky wheel (mostly because I was younger and didn't want that other stuff yet), and I left as soon as I could.

<comment><USER25> Full agree. Large companies are great if you have a familiy, not if you've something to prove.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> This guy should not have been working for a startup. That's the main lesson. For people that like them, they're really good.

<comment><USER27> Working as an employee at a startup is a gamble. A startup employee needs to be willing to look out for himself or herself. Employees need to be willing to pick up and leave if they're consistently treated poorly.

Unpaid, un-comped overtime? Leave. Political bullshit? Leave. Illegal activities? Leave.

The other mistake I see commonly made is employees assuming their options will be worth something. Unless there's a market where the stock's value is known (and the stock can be sold), it's a gamble with crappy odds.

Not all startups suck, but only fools stay at the ones that do. This guy (girl?) left, and it was the right call. In fact, being willing to leave means this person was exactly right for a startup.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Startups make bad day-jobs. They make good "doing important stuff" vehicles. BigCo is great when you just want to not care, and sometimes, that's perfectly valid. (e.g. when I was doing most of my open source work and needed something to pay the bills)

</comment><comment><USER29> This post reminds me of the seminal "EA Spouse" post (<http://ea- spouse.livejournal.com/274.html>). Together the two posts bookend the pitfalls of both startup and big company high tech employment.

</comment><comment><USER30> He compares some aspects of the bubble lifestyle to a typical corporate job. He's right that _even typical corporate jobs_ are often far better than big bubble blowouts.

In the kind of startup he describes, a large amount of outside money is injected into the company. Predictably, this makes all kinds of things go wrong. You'll notice that one of the nice things he says about the big corporation is essentially that there's some sanity there. Again, when compared to a bubble company, that's very true in some ways.

</comment><comment><USER31> I worked in a large successful tech company right after school. One of the best periods of my life. I learned a lot, worked on really cool technology, and I was treated well. I left for reasons unconnected to them, with much regret.

There exist great start-ups, great big companies, lousy start-ups and lousy big companies. And within great companies, big or small, there exist lousy situations. Your immediate boss and your colleagues have more to do with your happiness than almost anything else.

</comment><comment><USER32> This sounds just like my last start-up. It went to hell. We had a perfectly great (SaaS) product and a great team (5 employees - 1 founder, 1 programmer & myself, 1 salesperson/marketing, 1 human resources/finance.).

Things were great until after the second round of funding: The board basically took over: \- They forced us to increase to about 20 employees (within a few months). \- We hired former "big time" CEO/Presidents/Vice Presidents as our EVP's to help us grow fast. \- We were basically working 12 - 16 hours a day. I slept many times at work during data migration (which took for ever) \- We were taking more customers than we could handle which resulted in lawsuits because we could not deliver on time (even after postponement).

Finally (after 2 years) the board fired the founder, brought in a new CEO from "big time" company. Needless to say employee moral died and I and the original employees were forced to resign (I was personally already on my way out). Two months later at the collapse of the financial system, unable to get more funding, they filled for chapter 11 . Everybody got fired and also lost their shares, health insurance etc.

I now run my personal consulting firm and I am loving it. I actually get to see my son everyday.

</comment><comment><USER33> This is rosy if that's what you want to accomplish in your life, but you're ignoring the upside potential. Maybe you just saddled up with the wrong founders?

<comment><USER8> What upside potential? The notion that a startup is going to make you a millionaire (or even --- what you're telling yourself right now --- a hundredthousandaire) is one of the most misleading things about startup culture.

You will make more money plugging away diligently at a career in the Fortune 500 than you will spending the same 30 years in startups. I use the word "will" here in the same same sense as you "will" win with KK facing 72 unsuited. Anybody here capable of starting a company is equally capable of walking in the door at six figures in a big company.

The reason this "upside" notion is so pernicious is that it's fed by powerful biases. We read about the successes. Even the failures we hear about, we're reading about them by and large because they were "successful". The overwhelming majority of startups won't get fundng, won't get significant customer traction, won't feed their founders 2 years out, and won't get enough press attention for us ever to hear about. Their stories are also boring.

As for what you accomplish with your life, remember this: over 10-20 years at a big company, you will build things that people will use. Over the same years at a startup, you're inevitably going to pour your heart and soul into code that nobody will ever see. If you're unfortunate enough to "score" any funding, even after the company dies, you're probably not going to get to do anything with that code.

<comment><USER34> The economics for a non-founder in a startup are drastically different than they are for a founder; however, the risk is only slightly better than the founders. It is among the worst risk/reward tradeoffs I can think of.

The two reasons to do it are (1) some people love the opportunity for responsibility/growth or environment and/or (2) the poor risk/reward is actually an investment in themselves, so that they can gain the skills to become a founder.

For founders, I don't believe it's relevant that the median startup doesn't make money: the more you found, the better you become; a diligent and intelligent founder is bound to ultimately make quite a bit of money, but it may be a good number of tough years and failed startups before that happens.

<comment><USER8> Your reasoning here is tainted by survivorship bias.

Yes, founders and employees share similar levels of risk in a startup that has reached the point where it can hire FT employees.

But before the startup hit that point, it endured a period of drastically higher risk, which the employees never saw, and which the founders are being compensated for.

<comment><USER34> The only conditions that must be true in my reasoning is that (1) an early non-founding employee faces substantially higher risk than a corporate job, (2) at lower pay and with substantially less equity than would compensate for that risk.

That the risk was higher for the founders prior to the FTE is certainly true, but irrelevant, because we are not comparing whether an FTE has a good risk/reward tradeoff relative to an opportunity to join earlier in the startup under the same terms, but rather relative to a corporate job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> "They were all white college grad males."

I think it is irrelevant here - everybody is free to start a startup, this is not a sign of any conspiracy or discrimination.

<comment><USER36> I don't think he was implying conspiracy or discrimination as much as noting a common thread.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> I feel completely the opposite. I personally will avoid by any means to join a company who silences my thoughts and ideas. In a startups your ideas might not always be put into action, but from my experience they're heard and maybe discussed further. Do you know how long it takes to make a simple change to a production environment in a big corporation. It's called change control, I get it, a lot can go wrong, a lot can be lost. I choose not to be a part of it. I've been fortunate and have live through the journey of going from a startup to a publicly traded company. It was a great experience and I learned a ton. I've worked for a few big corp / business casual companies and It's not what I enjoy, it's not how I choose to spend my work day.

</comment><comment><USER38> It's nice to see an alternative view for a change.

</comment><comment><USER15> I think the main take away is: some jobs/companies are good, some are bad.

</comment><comment><USER39> The Man was once a startup.

<comment><USER40> I don't think this is entirely accurate. There are a lot of companies out there that end up being bought by wealthy investors or companies. These investors or companies may have gotten their riches through inheritance or by some other means.

Even then, The Man may have been a startup, but money and power can transform people in surprising ways, or they might have been The Man from the beginning.

I think that generally you don't really want to be working for the man whether it's in the context of a startup or a large company.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Nonsense.

I've worked with several venture funded startups, all entirely satisfying experiences, and twice for large corporations. The big places were both good for the first six months, and then you ask yourself repeatedly 'what kind of fucken life is _this_?'

edit: important to note, the caliber of the founders is key. if they have done this before, or if they've held senior positions at large organizations before, then it's a good bet.

</comment><comment><USER42> I'd like to question the two founders paradigm. We see Microsoft, apple, facebook all with one iconic leader. Having _cofounders_ implies each of the founders are equally invested and dedicated, which the article shows can cause power struggles. So it seems the best mix of founders is to have one lunatic visionary dominate and regular people cofound.

<comment><USER43> > So it seems the best mix of founders is to have one lunatic visionary > dominate and regular people cofound.

Woz and Paul Allen were pretty visionary themselves. I think working at the same company after they've made it doesn't appeal to everyone and Allen actually got sick and left. Microsoft was well on it's way to being massive so I wouldn't chaulk it up to Bill Gates alone.

<comment><USER42> Then why would most people attribute apple with jobs, Microsoft with gates, facebook with zuckerberg, and yahoo with yang?

There is one guy who is more invested in it than the others right?

You should get someone to help, but I don't think it would be good to have two founders who have visions for the company. Their respective visions would eventually diverge and then conflict would arise.

<comment><USER43> Woz left Apple a long time ago, so did Allen and Filo (Yahoo Co-Founder). It's a bit of survivor bias and interest in the limelight that the more famous names persist.

<comment><USER42> If they left then that's a sign that they had less interest or was less invested in the company.

You can't have two people trying to dominate. Unless both founders have perfectly matching visions, their joint command will be as bad as design by committee. Someone is bound to leave or become somewhat subordinate to the other. In the end one person will come out as the _main_ visionary guy for a specific company.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> I suppose it's a good thing, then, that I've apparently been saddled with the leadership aspect of my own venture. Sure, it means I have to make all the decisions (and yes, there've been a few nightmares), but at least somebody making the decisions, right?

</comment><comment><USER45> It makes sense that even if the mean quality of work experiences at a startup, the standard deviation would be so much higher than in a corporate environment that the worst experiences are much worse.

</comment><comment><USER46> It's fun to watch the Justification Machine rumble on, here on HN. Not that it ever turns off.

The past few days I've been counting the number of articles on the front page that are "meta." That is, to do with HN itself, or meatless 'questions' such as "What are the true traits of an entrepreneur?" (Not an actual news item, but it captures the idea nicely.)

It hovers around 30%.

Everybody here is getting high on their own supply.

The value of HN to me has dropped dramatically over the past 9 mos. The critical thinking has all but disappeared, and the boosterism (Yay startups! I have the traits of a true entrepreneur!) has gone way up.

This author makes very many excellent points, but sure, go ahead, dismiss them out of hand as jealousy or aversion to "risk" rather than a well-formed critique.

</comment><comment><USER47> Ok, so working for a company is better than working for a doomed startup, full of racists and incompetents. Really? That certainly is good advice, I am just not sure that anyone else needs that to be explicitlt pointed out. I can't wait for your next article, eating a donut is better than being punching in the face.</comment>