Five reasons Cuil won't kill Google...yet - <AUTHOR> http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/five-reasons-cuil-wont-kill/story.aspx?guid=%7BEF2DFCAB%2D2957%2D402A%2D974E%2D8FA3C7DC8018%7D

<comment><USER2> Already with the speculation?

 _Google got there first, and is friendly enough to consumers to keep them coming back with free email, free photo sharing, free web applications and so forth._

So did MySpace. Then along came Facebook.

 _First impressions matter a lot and while Cuil's search results may be better, more complete, or even more aesthetically pleasing, the fact that the site is stumbling in its first day out will leave a lot of potential users unimpressed._

Anyone who looks at a new piece of software, web based or desktop branded and expects it to work flawlessly out of the box needs to get out of this industry right now.

 _Analyzing searchers may not be popular with the public, but it's insanely popular with advertisers who, after all, are search engines' real customers._

Summize, an analyzing searcher was popular, and it got acquired.

 _It's unlikely that making search results better, even a lot better, will be enough by itself to capture the attention of users. The Google toolbar is already well established on tens of millions of search browsers._

Taking something good, and making it better wont attract users. The thought behind this is laugable, but wrong. Ex-Google employees make a search engine that techies are going to flock to. When techies flock to something, they're going to be the first to point out flaws, suggest improvements and make it even better. That way, when the rest of the world catches on, it's a much better version than the oh so elusive one-size-fits-all debut release.

 _However dubious Google's privacy protections may be, it has yet to prove evil enough to topple Microsoft in the annals of technological villainy_

This isn't even relevant to anything.

<comment><USER3> 1) Facebook offered something significant to its users over MySpace. Personal networks are HUGE, and they are far more usable if you're Facebook's target audience. With a search engine, all you're doing is searching. Google's enough.

2) Anybody who expects a flawed piece of software to ever compete with Google needs to get out of this industry right now.

3) The article doesn't mention being acquired. It talks only about direct competition. Summize was the equivalent of Google in this scenario: it was the first one to do it well.

4) Techies only have influence when what they flock to is something that matters to users. Look at Linux. Techies LOVE Linux. But most people use Microsoft, because it's all they need.

5) Of course it is. The only way for Google to lose is if the masses boycott it or pull something similar. Otherwise, there's no incentive to switch.

I love being cynical against articles too, as much as anybody, but in this case the article did a good job of explaining things. You're just wasting time.</comment></comment>


NASA is bringing cryosleep chambers out of fiction - <AUTHOR> http://www.syfy.com/syfywire/nasa-is-bringing-cryosleep-chambers-out-of-fiction-and-into-science <comment><USER2> This is a big deal. Cryosleep is probably the most likely change to occur in our lifetimes that could bring about significant social change.

Given that it slows your metabolism, I think it's likely that we'll be able to extend overall lifespan. Effectively we maybe able to put people to sleep, and have them wake up 50 years later.

Those "temporal refugees" will of course be completely out of sync with society, and like a living message from the past.

Of all the weird sci-fi stuff, I think this is the most likely to actually happen and the impact could be massive.

<comment><USER3> I think the big use case would be to skip a couple of days or a week at a time. A week living in the real world, a week asleep. You don't miss much and you can effectively double your lifespan.

<comment><USER4> Or you set a trigger with your fund manager. You put in 100K and tell him to wake you when you have $2m (in today's dollars) or less than $50K.

<comment><USER5> I was thinking of this today: enter stasis and set a trigger to emerge only once one's wealth has compounded to place them within the vaunted "top 1%" or leave one in cryosleep indefinitely.

<comment><USER4> Except so many people would do that that it might as well be a death sentence since the cryo fees would eat away at your money faster than it could grow compared to all of the other people in the world.

<comment><USER6> Cryo fees and compound interest are separate concepts. Just because the second is present, doesn't mean the first one will grow. The opposite is true: When more people want something, you scale up production (or someone else does) and the prices (generally) go down.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > the first crews to Mars may have to deal with day after day of seeing > nothing but the star-flecked blackness of space. At least they will probably > have wifi.

If only. TCP at those latencies will be completely unusable.

Even if you manage to "trick" TCP with a middlebox that fakes ACKs you'd still be waiting minutes just for an HTTPS connection to establish.

<comment><USER8> The obvious solution is to download the entire internet onto the spacecraft.

Seriously though, they'll need to have some sort of non-work, non-research activities to last the months it will take to get anywhere. You can only have sex and play Monopoly so many times.

<comment><USER9> Stock up on movies, and books? I mean that's pretty much the daily life of most people on this planet right now. Go to work, come home, engage in entertainment / sex. Beyond that, they can't really expect to be able to go outside and walk in the park. I think everyone is overestimating how much free time these guys will have. It's not the equivalent of sitting in a prison cell without mission responsibilities(experiments, chores, food).

<comment><USER10> Exercise, books, chess, learn a language, I can think of plenty of stuff to do. People in prison sometimes enjoy the opportunity they have to focus on self improvement without the stress of having to make money for food/shelter.

Surely being on a craft in deep space is not that much different to being on a nuclear sub for months and months on end, smaller I guess.

<comment><USER11> Do the subs not have internet access or comms to outside world?

<comment><USER12> Nuclear subs predate the Internet and I suppose you also want to limit your non-internet comm activity when sitting somewhere in the ocean waiting for a Russian first strike.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This got me thinking about stasis pods (as opposed to the hibernation pods in the article). When I think of stasis pods I always think of space travel. But ... now I wonder how many people on Earth would use them? I can see plenty of people in the valley being rich enough and crazy enough to stasis themselves so they can see the future and reap its benefits.

But maybe it's not crazy. If given the choice; would you choose to live now, or in the future? There aren't many people I know who aren't cynical about the present. The more I think about it, the more I wonder just how _many_ people might do it.

But then, when would you stop? Would you wake up in 100 years, experience the new, brighter future, only to become cynical again and jump to the next era?

What would our world be like if we were carrying around half our population in stasis pods? all of them hopping from one era to the next, never satisfied.

Sci-fi technology always seems to provoke the most interesting human dilemmas.

<comment><USER14> > But maybe it's not crazy. If given the choice; would you choose to live now, > or in the future? There aren't many people I know who aren't cynical about > the present. The more I think about it, the more I wonder just how _many_ > people might do it.

If you're truly cynical about the present, I actually think stasis would be a far worse option:

1) If you're really cynical about things like climate change, thermonuclear war, etc. the future could easily be much, much worse than the present. Imagine waking up out of stasis to find yourself in the world from "The Road".

2) If you're cynical but with a glimmer of hope, you're essentially banking on the idea that not everyone like yourself will go into stasis. Otherwise, how would things ever get better?

<comment><USER15> I've seen point 2 covered before...[https://xkcd.com/989/](https://xkcd.com/989/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> As a physician who has submitted multiple job applications to SpaceX, I would decline space travel if this procedure was a requirement. The TPN requirement alone vastly more risky than just living 4 years of life in a spaceship. Building giant centrifugal units in space for gravity simulation makes more sense.

<comment><USER17> Thanks. I had a family member on TPN, and you confirmed my impression from the docs: nutrition is hard and TPN usage is risky, especially for long-term use. It's not like the movies.

What are the biggest risks? Or can you point us toward a more comprehensive description?

<comment><USER16> Infections are the major issue with TPN (you're basically mainlining glucose). Keeping someone sedated for 2 weeks will significantly increased their risk of thromboembolic disease (cooling them also increases the risk of thrombus). The sedation meds are going to be hard on their livers, kidneys, etc. The antibiotics necessary to prevent infections will also be hard on their livers, possibly kidneys. This would all require management by a critical care intensivist (anasthesiologist, pulmonologist, etc), who would escalate problems too ... where?

You're taking astronauts and turning them into ICU patients. This seems incredibly bad.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> There has been real research on this, led by Dr. Peter Rhee [0] the famous trauma surgeon who treated former Congresswoman Gabriel Giffords after she was critically injured.

There are various terms like "protective hypothermia"[2] used or "targeted temperature management"[3] and these methods have been used in brain surgery for decades. [4] Suspended animation [5] is the more publicly known term, although often inaccurate.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_M._Rhee#Research_interes...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_M._Rhee#Research_interests)

[1] [https://www.idgconnect.com/abstract/7539/doctors-suspend- tra...](https://www.idgconnect.com/abstract/7539/doctors-suspend-trauma- patients-then-revive-them-back-life)

[2] [https://www.americannursetoday.com/therapeutic- hypothermia-a...](https://www.americannursetoday.com/therapeutic-hypothermia- after-cardiac-arrest-what-why-who-and-how/)

[3] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Targeted_temperature_managemen...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Targeted_temperature_management)

[4] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_hypothermic_circulatory_a...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_hypothermic_circulatory_arrest)

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

</comment><comment><USER19> Source: [https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/NIAC_Torpor_H...](https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/NIAC_Torpor_Habitat_for_Human_Stasis.pdf)

<comment><USER20> Here's where that comes from: [https://www.nasa.gov/content/torpor-inducing- transfer-habita...](https://www.nasa.gov/content/torpor-inducing-transfer- habitat-for-human-stasis-to-mars)

Looks like its from 2013

<comment><USER21> This looks like a private venture that was selected - along with 11 other ventures - for $100,000 in NASA funding back in 2013: [https://www.nasa.gov/content/niac-2013-phase-i-and-phase- ii-...](https://www.nasa.gov/content/niac-2013-phase-i-and-phase-ii- selections)

Nothing more recent than 2016 on their own website for "human stasis": [http://spaceworkseng.com/tag/human- stasis/](http://spaceworkseng.com/tag/human-stasis/)

Why is this news?

<comment><USER22> Somebody wanted it to be.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Since presumably they won't be exercising while in cryo sleep, how will the astronauts loss of bone and muscle mass while in zero-g be addressed?

</comment><comment><USER24> > At least they will probably have wifi.

These days it will be practical to include an enormous reading library.</comment>


Ask Hn: What should I change about my first web app? - <AUTHOR> http://www.spoiledgrapes.com

<comment><USER2> Great work Matt! I would focus a bit more on design and layout and give more data.

When looking at a list of wines, you've got the score, the name and the price, all widely spaced out, there is nothing attractive about it, it doesn't make me want to go buy, doesn't link to the reviews, etc etc.

I was going to learn ember this weekend, and if you'd like, I'd be happy to do a bit of a design exercise and see what I could do interesting with your data. Free of charge of course, it's just so I can learn and maybe add to my front- end portfolio. Let me know if you're interested, email is in my portfolio.

A few weeks ago I did a windows 8 design idea, in angular, it's in my hn submissions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point about the limited data.

This very moment I am working on doing a page for each specific bottle. When you click the bottle on the query page it will bring you to the bottle page.

For starters I was going to have a short description of the wine and a picture. Linking to the reviews is an interesting idea though.

An email has been sent.

P.S. the windows 8 thing looks cool

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> You are only letting people have one thin slice of cake at a time by restricting your search. Why not just spit out a sortable table and let people have more control.

I just used this: [https://github.com/joequery/Stupid-Table- Plugin](https://github.com/joequery/Stupid-Table-Plugin) and it was very nice to work with.

Best of luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> That plugin looks super cool! I have practically no js knowledge, but this seems like a great way to learn.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There appears to be an issue with sorting some of the wines by low price. For some types it appears to sort correctly but for others, the results are not actually sorted by price. The error appeared for Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel, Sauvignon Blanc, and Riesling.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for pointed that out. I will play around with the console to see if I can figure out what is going on.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> It basically searches 80k+ wine reviews and cross references with a listing of wine that is available in my province.

Gives you the best wine for the money you can actually buy.</comment>


Experiment: I'm making Tasskr free. - <AUTHOR> http://blog.tasskr.com/tasskr-is-now-free

<comment><USER2> This is the "show" post to HN: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2442498>

I dug this up as im curious to know:

What it was costing to use the site before?

What the plan is to support the site, now that it is free (the experiment)?

From that link, there is some great feedback. <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2442724>

<comment><AUTHOR> Before it was free for limited features, pay for all features. Now it's free for all features. If you pay $2/month you're supporting the site and the ads go away.

I use reminders and recurring tasks a lot now. Before, people using the free version didn't have access to them which I think is the coolest part of the app.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'm curious, what platform / technologies is Tasskr running on?

<comment><AUTHOR> Rails, Heroku, Jquery. Devise, nested_set, chronic, acts-as-taggable-on, acts_as_indexed gems. Spreedly for recurring payments. Getlocalization.com for translations. Clicky for realtime stats.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> You spelled "thier" incorrectly in the example email address, just a heads up.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, fixed.</comment></comment>


The nicest prison in the world - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/24/world/europe/norway-prison-bastoy-nicest/index.html?hpt=hp_c2

<comment><USER2> Fascinating story. But interesting that despite all the efforts of this particular prison, its recidivism rate is 16% compared to Norway's national average of 20%.</comment>


Apple's New Map, Expansion #7: Final Parts of the Continental U.S. - <AUTHOR> https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps-continental-united-states <comment><USER2> There was off ramp that changed 4 years ago near where I live. Google maps was correct, but Apple always would have you take the wrong exit and you had to loop back. With the most recent update this is finally fixed. However most people still saying that Apple Maps in unreliable. Having big issues like that for years can really damage people's perception of your product long after it has been changed.

<comment><USER3> And yet it's still wrong often enough to be useless. I'm in near-Boston suburbs (Arlington), and every so often I give Apple Maps a try, and __literally every single time I do __it 's just awful. I just asked it for directions from my work to my house, for example, and it routed me on a limited-access, no motor vehicle bicycle path.

<comment><USER4> Is that true now with the new data?

<comment><USER3> True as of just now, so yes.

<comment><USER4> That's not good!

I'd highly encourage you to report this issue. Can't promise it'll be looked at anytime soon, but it's good to put into the queue:

[https://www.macrumors.com/how-to/report-errors-in-apple- maps...](https://www.macrumors.com/how-to/report-errors-in-apple-maps/)

<comment><USER5> I posted this on another comment but I curious if you have any advice.

I work in downtown Boston and my building's address isn't in Apple Maps. It "corrects" it to some place in JP, which is a residential address. There are several restaurants and and companies in this building, all marked as being in JP. I have submitted a lot of map corrections but all that does is move the location of the business on the map to the right place even though it still has the wrong address listed. That means if you actually try to navigate to them, it brings you to the wrong place. It also means no location based triggers work for things like Homekit and/or reminders. There are hundreds of people in this building, right in downtown. How do I get it to understand this address?

<comment><USER3> Yup. I live in Arlingon. I put in 123 mystreet street, arlington, ma ... and it navigates to 123 mystreet ROAD, belmont, ma.

My street has existed for 150 years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've recently switched to using apple maps exclusively as much as possible, and TBH its gotten quite comparable to Google maps. There are still remote places (e.g an address in a small town) which apple maps struggles to find, but for the most part within cities I find myself reaching more often for apple maps.

I'm also one of those people who struggles to translate navigation instructions on a map to real world turns. So features such as highlighting and Stop signs & Traffic signals go a long way in helping me navigate safely.

<comment><USER7> Apple Maps displaying stop signs and traffic lights is a killer feature for me. Made me switch from Gmaps.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> How does he get those cutout comparison tiles exactly identical in perspective, position, and zoom level? Does he have some call that allows doing that?

<comment><USER9> Was wondering that myself. Presumably when you update your maps app or when the server updated, you have no more access to the old maps. Unless he took a whole lot of screenshots in preparation?

<comment> et-al The URL to an Apple Maps tile includes a version number and numerous style options. It's possible the author knows about historical tile versions and updates the URL to fetch older versions, or has been archiving Apple's tiles periodically _.

      https://cdn4.apple-mapkit.com/md/v1/vtile?x=1310&y=3166&z=13&scale=2&style=1&v=2002014&type=poi&lang=en&tint=light&emphasis=standard

Grabbed the tile from Apple's page here: [https://developer.apple.com/maps/web/](https://developer.apple.com/maps/web/)

The author also has their email address listed on their site if we'd like a definite answer.

\- - -

_Edit: Looks like MapKit provides an easy way to take snapshots: [https://developer.apple.com/documentation/snapshots](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/snapshots)

<comment><USER9> I completely forgot about Mapkit JS! I wonder how feature complete it is compared to Leaflet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Perhaps soon we'll get cycling directions.

</comment><comment><USER11> There is still too much use of green. At least for me, I think green = park. I live near the end of a bypass and on apple maps it looks like a big park. I don't think I would want to go have a picnic on the slope of an off-ramp.

</comment><comment><USER12> Can someone tell me where did Apple get all this new data from? Was it taken from OSM, bought from Here Maps or some other provider or just built on their own from sattelites and on the ground surveys?

<comment><USER13> Previously they licensed TomTom's data and tried to fill in gaps with data from OpenStreetMap and others.

Now they have decided to build their own data set from scratch.

>So a new effort was created to begin generating its own base maps, the very lowest building block of any really good mapping system. After that, Apple would begin layering on living location data, high-resolution satellite imagery and brand new intensely high-resolution image data gathered from its ground cars until it had what it felt was a "best in class" mapping product.

[https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/29/apple-is-rebuilding- maps-f...](https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/29/apple-is-rebuilding-maps-from- the-ground-up/)

That TechCrunch article has a good overview of their old and new mapping systems.

<comment><USER14> I don't have any insight into how they are choosing, but they are investing in improving OpenStreetMap in many places:

[https://github.com/osmlab/appledata/issues](https://github.com/osmlab/appledata/issues)

<comment><USER13> Here, Bing, and Apple have all pitched in to help OpenStreetMaps improve their processes and their dataset.

<comment><USER14> What's Here done?

Microsoft has long made Bing imagery available for tracing, it's only recently that they have done much with data.

None of the companies have really touched "processes", because OpenStreetMap doesn't really have any formal processes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Recent and related: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22193657](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22193657)

</comment><comment><USER16> I appreciate the work this author does to compile these posts, but man, every time I visit his site, I get frustrated that there's no way to stop the map animations to inspect in detail what has actually changed. Invariably, I get frustrated by the constant flashing back and forth and just close the tab without getting the information I'd actually like to get.

</comment><comment><USER17> Always a wonderful work by Justin.

</comment><comment><USER18> Apple Maps is no where near google maps. It took me to someone's driveway as "an entrance to" an elementary school, when in reality the school was behind their backyard with no direct access. They haven't fixed one thing I painstakingly reported over the years. I wanted Apple Maps to succeed but from what I gather they are too disorganized to compete with Google Maps.

</comment><comment><USER19> How are they generating the 3D models of various landmark buildings? It's hard to believe that they were generated from photos, since the lines look so clean. But there are too many of them to do by hand, no?

<comment><USER20> The author of this post made other posts, including one discussing the building generation:

[https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple- maps](https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps)

It appears to be a combination of algorithmic work from satellites with manual generation mixed in.</comment></comment>


How do I know the best time to buy smartphones, PCs, and TVs? - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/guides/2011/08/how-to-find-out-when-to-buy-smartphones-tvs-or-pcs.ars <comment><USER2> There's an app for that (actually, a website):

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

More info:

[http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/20/decide-com-the- fare...](http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/20/decide-com-the-farecast-for- electronics/)

</comment><comment><USER3> The time is right when two conditions are met. 1) When you want it and 2) when you can afford it.</comment>


Dart Using Managed VMs on Google Cloud - <AUTHOR> http://www.dartdocs.org/documentation/appengine/0.2.1/index.html#appengine

<comment><AUTHOR> Context: this is the `pub` package that just got released.</comment>


Show HN: iOS Ref – a quick reference site for iOS developers - <AUTHOR> https://iosref.com/ <comment><USER2> This is great, appreciate having all of this in one place. Handy reference.

</comment><comment><USER3> Very cool resource</comment>


Ask HN: What SaaS customer service tools does your startup use? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER9> HelpScout ([https://www.helpscout.net/](https://www.helpscout.net/)). Brilliant piece of software built by a bunch of people that really care. Regular new features and improvements, an intelligent help desk that just gets out of the way, and docs for customer self-service (they have a private option for docs which we use for internal knowledgebases too)

<comment><USER10> We're not a startup, but we've had great success with Helpscout too. Our customer service team absolutely love it, to the point where it's difficult to convince them that Intercom is worth trying!

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> We build all our tools from customer support, CRM, billing, payroll to accounting -> [https://erpnext.com](https://erpnext.com). Its also open source, and would love more startups to use it. [https://github.com/frappe/erpnext](https://github.com/frappe/erpnext)

The benefit of open sources is that you can build deep integration to your processes and also grow it as your company grows. With closed tools, you will end up paying a lot and also lose the opportunity to drive more team productivity by being unable hack and extend your tools.

</comment><comment><USER12> We have started doing blog posts reviewing the various SaaS services we use: [http://blog.opencagedata.com/tagged/toolsweuse](http://blog.opencagedata.com/tagged/toolsweuse)

so far we've covered * Baremetrics * Quaderno

coming soon: * Statsbot * Hosted Graphite * StatusCake * TravisCI * Drip * TransferWise (not a SaaS service, but saves us a ton of money)

<comment><USER13> Is there really much to say about StatusCake ? I use it and I have to say that it seems too much simple (not enough alert terms, hasn't got hooks, too expensive)..

<comment><USER14> StatusCake does support web hooks, along with 10 other integrations including fully supporting advance alert routing. We also have all the features of major monitoring services as well as virus scanning, domain monitoring, SSL certificate monitoring and so many other features.

I mean, we also have a free plan that gives you monitoring (and hooks) along with a wide range of features for an unlimited amount of sites!

Kind Regards, Daniel.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> StatusGator uses Freshdesk on the free plan and it's adequate for our needs.

Freshdesk has worked flawlessly and beautifully handles triaging a few support requests and product feature suggestions every day. (Aside from a hiccup where I misconfigured notifications and inadvertently ignored dozens of tickets for a month... a PEBKAC issue.)

<comment><USER16> +1 for Freshdesk. Came over from Zendesk and at the time at least it was (much) lower cost and worked better for our small biz. Great API as well with good docs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> We've used Desk.com for the past 2 or so years. For the most part, it has met our needs. We built 3 separate knowledge bases for 3 separate products, used macros to speed up answering common questions, and integrated third party phone and chat apps so we can keep records all in one place. That being said, we're probably going to be switching away. A few reasons here. First, it seems like we encounter bugs, crashes, and more serious service-level disruptions too often. Second, it is pretty expensive compared to other products out there.

We came to Desk.com when we were really small. Our CTO was still the only dev we had so we were looking for an out of the box solution that could be customized by someone who was relatively non-technical. Desk can pretty much handle a lot of this customization but what results is something a bit clunky to use. This is not a criticism of Desk itself, more just an observation about tools that promise customization without dev resources.

Anyway, I think we'll switch to HelpScout. I like that HelpScout defaults to sending plain-text emails, where Desk emails look like they come from someone using support desk software. Plus, they have all of the essential features we're looking for at a better price.

Plus, I love HelpScout's content. I'm sure their marketers will love hearing this, but all their blog posts and resources give me the impression that they are a thoughtful company that understands customer support. It's always surprising to see how many customer support tools offer horrible customer support themselves. From my experience, that disconnect does not bode well for their product.

</comment><comment><USER18> For [https://ipinfo.io](https://ipinfo.io) I use:

        - <USER2>
        - <USER3>
        - <USER4>
        - <USER5>
        - <USER6>
        - <USER7>
        - <USER8>

</comment><comment><USER19> None at Notebook.ai other than being active and responsive on social media and linking various Google Forms on-site for reporting bugs, requesting features, etc. Follow-up on those is by email. Since we're open source, we also invite anyone to create issues on GitHub as well, though it's usually the more technical crowd that do so.

Reasoning: 1) it's free, 2) quality customer service is free advertising when it's public, and 3) there's less friction to "get in touch" with us (and follow up quickly) when it's on a platform a user is already using.

Would definitely love to hear about a (free) quality customer service tool if there are any out there, though. I think we're starting to outgrow Forms/email, as some way to aggregate common requests together (without manually building a spreadsheet, like now) and sort/filter/rank them would be beneficial.

</comment><comment><USER20> For [https://snapcx.io](https://snapcx.io) , I have been experimenting with freshdesk, zendesk and zoho too. In end, as we are simple startup, I decided to stick with

      - Straight email support
      - asciidoc generated html pages for documentation https://snapcx.io/docs
      - self hosted contact us form. (it sends email to support)
      - free zendesk chat. (as of today, it's one or two chat request, which sends email to support email)
      - As we are selling API subscription, I am hosting swagger based api explorer. (simple html page)
      - https://snapcx.io/addressValidationAPI

My current gap is more intuitive documentation, which has search functionality and also in-built api explorer. I believe readme.io has both but no customer support features.

<comment><USER21> Hi Ajainy!

Engineer from ReadMe here. We do have a support forum that you can enable[0] for your users. Is that the kind of customer support you were talking about? If not, I'd be curious to know what you meant!

>[0] [https://readme.readme.io/docs/submit-a- question](https://readme.readme.io/docs/submit-a-question)

<comment><USER20> I was talking about support ticket etc.

<comment><USER21> Ah I see, we also have Zendesk integration so you can add the Zendesk widget to your ReadMe site.

> > [https://readme.readme.io/docs/zendesk](https://readme.readme.io/docs/zendesk)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Groove ([https://www.groovehq.com/](https://www.groovehq.com/)) only. We're super happy with it!

<comment><USER23> We use Groove also. It works fine but we do wish it had any kind of mobile support. Even if the desktop site would just function in a mobile browser would be helpful. Two way Slack integration would be a dream (it has notification only now. You can't respond to tickets from slack).

<comment><USER24> it looks like Groove will be releasing a mobile app any day now (expected release early March 2017).

[https://help.groovehq.com/knowledge_base/topics/does- groove-...](https://help.groovehq.com/knowledge_base/topics/does-groove-have- a-mobile-app)

<comment><USER25> I really hope they do, but be aware that this date keeps changing. The last time I checked this page, it was spring 2016.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Drift has worked pretty well for me so far. Use Zendesk for another product and I'm not a big fan.

<comment><USER27> Second on [http://Drift.com](http://Drift.com). Pleasantly surprised how many great conversations it drives for us at [https://DNSFilter.com](https://DNSFilter.com)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Olark really helped us with our customer service, we use both the live chat feature, and the 'email us' feature for when nobody is available on live chat.

We expected it would help us to respond to support requests better - which it did, but it also offered some advantages that we didn't expect:

\- Users are way more likely to reach out in the first place due to the easy live chat/email widget on each page

\- In some cases we have actually been able to use the data from Olark to determine the quality of our traffic and landing page (e.g. users are not understanding our message, or we are getting a lot of queries about something unrelated to our product [targeting issue])

<comment><USER29> We have just implemented Olark as well. We had a problem where a ton of our new users were signing up for our product and then radio silence. Wouldn't log in again, wouldn't respond to personal emails from myself. We implemented Olark to hopefully catch those people when they are signing up and get them engaged. It hasn't been long enough to tell if it's working or not, but we're hoping.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Self-Plug. We use our own product ([http://www.enchant.com](http://www.enchant.com)) to support our customers .. It covers email support, a knowledge base website, live chat widget for the marketing site (i.e. sales), and an in-app widget that offers both live chat and an embedded knowledge base.

Try it out - it's faster than gmail :)

<comment><USER31> I'm a very happy paying customer of Enchant. We tested Intercom (much broader scope than we wanted), Helpscout (among other things, no Markdown support), and a handful of other tools. Enchant does what we need, nothing we don't, and stays out of the way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> We just finished building our own customer support tool to save some money (we're a bootstrapped startup). We wanted live chat for customers that went straight to our Slack, since we already use it for so much. We couldn't find anything else that worked the way we wanted, so we built it.

<comment><USER29> That's very interesting. We use Slack a ton and just recently started on the Olark free plan (22 chats/month). I would love for chats to go to a separate slack channel instead of having to keep another tab open. Not to mention Olark doesn't have mobile support.

<comment><USER33> We had the same desire, that is why we built Chatlio a few years ago. [https://chatlio.com/](https://chatlio.com/)

<comment><USER29> Looks great! Thanks for sharing the link.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Drift [https://www.drift.com](https://www.drift.com)

</comment><comment><USER35> Plug: we are in private beta with Feedback[1], the customer support version of BugReplay[2]. We integrate with Zendesk aside from our standard custom JavaScript integration.

In short, it's a product for Web development teams to collect perfect no- hassle bug reports from their users with all the details (video, network traffic, js logs) required to analyze and reproduce a problem.

[1]: [https://www.bugreplay.com/feedback-by- bugreplay](https://www.bugreplay.com/feedback-by-bugreplay)

[2]: [https://www.bugreplay.com](https://www.bugreplay.com)

</comment><comment><USER36> At viurdata.com we use Live Chat [https://www.livechatinc.com/](https://www.livechatinc.com/) Good piece of software and we also take advantage of their ticket system

</comment><comment><USER37> This has been interesting to read and raises an interesting question: it appears lots of you are leaving Zendesk and now using something else...

1) We still Zendesk here, what inspired you to leave?

2) What do you like about where you landed?

<comment><USER38> We moved to Zendesk from Intercom for support. We still use Intercom, but just for product outreach and triggered messages.

We have two former Zendeskers on our team, which is part of the reason we made the switch. But also because Zendesk has things that Intercom doesn't/didn't have at the time, like a help desk.

You can also customize Zendesk with integrations pretty easily, such as by adding widgets[1]. Building and maintaining a Zendesk widget is a great developer experience.

[1] [https://www.zendesk.com/embeddables/](https://www.zendesk.com/embeddables/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> None. Reason: Capacity and focus on product. Are we doing it wrong?

<comment><USER40> Do you have a feedback channel? How do you know your product is on track to meet customer needs?

<comment><USER39> We do have a "Beta feedback" process for all users (which is essentially a one-way communication for now) which allows us to gather their input. In addition to our Pirate analytics, we also use Mouseflow to observe user behavior. So we are gathering data both directly from users (although we could probably improve the beta feedback process) and from analytics, we just don't have a lot of extra time since we have other jobs at the moment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Zendesk. We are thinking about switching to something else (currently looking at Freshdesk) as the service is getting disproportionally expensive with many users.

<comment><USER42> [EDIT] I intended to make this comment about Desk.com, not Zendesk. Sorry! I can't speak to Zendesk, it might be amazing.

[Original comment] Exporting your data when you leave is almost impossible. You'll need to keep paying even after you leave to keep your ticket history. I'd suggest moving sooner rather than later.

<comment><USER43> I came across this[0] yesterday on HN. Apparently they can migrate ticket history, knowledge base, etc between Zendesk and Freshdesk.

[0] [https://www.help-desk-migration.com](https://www.help-desk-migration.com)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> HelpSpot for HelpDesk [https://helpspot.com/](https://helpspot.com/) Discourse for public discussion [https://www.discourse.org/](https://www.discourse.org/)

Both can be self-hosted or SaaS which provides some nice flexibility.

</comment><comment><USER45> Front + Intercom which gives us an email-based help desk, in-app chat and messaging, and a self-service FAQ help desk.

<comment><USER46> Front + Intercom is the same combination we use. We're happy with Front's Intercom integration.

We're still using Zendesk for Help Centre, but considering alternatives. Last time I checked, Intercom's help centre product was still lacking some features we needed, unfortunately.

I think a big opportunity for Front is to make it easier to source content from different knowledge base systems (like Zendesk) to include snippets/links in emails without leaving Front. Perhaps a search box that inserts linked titles for Help Centre articles.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> Helpmonks ([https://helpmonks.com](https://helpmonks.com)) is being used by a lot of startups. One of the main reasons is because the price is based on mailbox(es) and not on users.

</comment><comment><USER48> At [http://formbit.co](http://formbit.co), I use UserDeck. It has Guides (knowledge base) and Mailboxes, which serves our purpose. I looked at some other mentioned in this thread, but this works well for me.

</comment><comment><USER49> Shameless plug. We built a Voice of the Customer tool - [https://insightstash.com](https://insightstash.com) Collect feedback from visitors directly on your site. Lots of features and customizations.

</comment><comment><USER50> We're using our own service for customer feedback, crowdsourcing and also bug tracking: [https://www.stomt.com/stomt](https://www.stomt.com/stomt)

</comment><comment><USER51> [https://liveformhq.com/](https://liveformhq.com/) uses Mixpanel for tracking behavior to improve our product. We also used Zendesk for a while.

</comment><comment><USER52> For customer communication... at AuthorityLabs we're using:

1) Intercom for chat and notifications

2) PagePilot (pagepilot.io) for the knowledgebase

3) G Suite for support@

4) Campaign Monitor for mass emails

Note: PagePilot is a new project of ours. Looking for beta testers :)

</comment><comment><USER53> At LogRocket we use

\- Intercom for chat / email

\- Readme for docs

\- ...LogRocket for issue reproduction

</comment><comment><USER54> Using Tidio Chat. Seems okay so far. - [http://tidiochat.com](http://tidiochat.com)

Edit: Misread the question.

</comment><comment><USER43> Gingr (gingrapp.com) uses Freshdesk for ticketing, live chat, and knowledge base. Recently hit ticket #20000 and we are very happy with it.

</comment><comment><USER55> At ScreenSquid ([https://screensquid.com](https://screensquid.com)), we're using:

\- Zoho Suite (CRM, Subscriptions, Books, Campaigns)

\- Loggly

\- Heroku

\- S3

\- Mixpanel Free

\- New Relic

\- Compose.io

\- Mandrill

<comment><USER38> How do you find Zoho? I didn't know they offered recurring billing.

<comment><USER55> It's awesome how the CRM, support, billing, campaigns, and accounting software all works together. The price is great, because you're getting full featured apps for only $60/seat.

However, the _way_ you connect the services is kinda janky, and I find myself wishing for more modern features sometimes. There's also competing products within the same ecosystem (social, email campaigns, and now recurring billing).

The support is great and it's been great to start. I can see us growing out of it but it's doing the job for now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Zendesk for email

Intercom for chat

And we dogfood getkookoo for phone support

</comment><comment><USER57> Self-plug alert. At Smooz we use... Smooz ([https://www.smooz.io](https://www.smooz.io)) to open 800+ shared Slack channels with each team who install the app in their Slack team. Obviously, not everyone answers, but these conversation provide 1) incredible insights into use case, unclear onboarding flow, etc 2) help convert prospects 3) help retain users

</comment><comment><USER58> Cachet and StyleCI use Helpscout.

We've had no real qualms with it.

</comment><comment><USER59> Intercom for in-app chat and email messaging.

</comment><comment><USER60> Freshdesk at Gozoomo.</comment>


Remote execution vulnerability in IE and Edge - <AUTHOR> https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms16-129 <comment><USER2> EDIT: Report is exactly a month to the day old, this was patched a while ago.

Time to push buttons on the ol' WSUS server. Thanks for the heads up.</comment>


Best Way to Check Someone's References - <AUTHOR> http://ben.casnocha.com/2009/06/best-reference-check-strategy-ever.html <comment><USER2> It's a clever idea, but as someone who has worked for (and listed as references) supervisors who were extremely flaky, extremely busy, or both, I would never want to judge someone based solely on whether or not their references promptly return a call.

<comment><USER3> I love the idea. I've always been skeptical of references - if anyone asked me about any staff I've had, I'd be pretty positive. Why burn bridges and start vendettas? There's definitely a few people I wouldn't call back for, but I'd call back for any of the people that were fantastic to work with. That means either really good at their job, or average+ with an amazing attitude (which can be the right ticket for some roles).

I might halfway pause and start a bad reference with, "Well..." and let the manager guess if he's perceptive enough, but I'd never speak ill of a former staff member. Too much chance of it biting the company back - it'd be pretty damn irresponsible of me to do that. But not calling back? Yeah, I'd do that. For great people? Callback the same day I get the message, no matter how busy, at least for a 90 second chat. Maybe I'm not everybody, but I think most halfway competent managers go out of their way to take care of the great people they've worked with.

<comment><USER4> Why would you bother or care about the opportunities of some guy who you might never meet again, especially if you are trying to meet a deadline or had a bad day or whatever.

<comment><USER3> You need to have fierce loyalty to the people that help you do great things in life. When someone works with you, and especially when they work under your guidance, they're making you successful and the company successful. In return, you do what's right by them, keep them informed, equipped, protect them, stand with them, and so on.

I've got fierce loyalty pretty high in my ethics, but there's a lot of pragmatic reasons too. On any one event, you could blow it off, but it's pretty obvious on the whole who goes to bat for their people and who doesn't. It's not something you make a calculation on - "Hmm, no one will know or care if I don't help this particular time." It's a way of life - take care of people that take care of you. Feels good inside, world sees it, recognizes it, and treats you well. A good thing, top to bottom.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Anyone have any evidence that this works? Other than just the fact that it sounds like a nice idea.

In years of calling references I _never_ found them to be a predictor of _anything at all_. You get great references for awful candidates and vice versa. I don't even bother any more unless I know the reference personally.

<comment><USER6> Yup. This is especially true if a person is still employed. I've known bosses to give absolutely glowing references to otherwise-unfireable people just in the hopes of getting rid of them.

<comment><USER7> Amen to both of you.

Imho references to people you don't know are close to meaningless, especially in the tech field. It's good to know where a given candidate has worked before and what his duties were. But that's normally in their CV and from there it's all up to your judgement and testing.

A few more reasons why references are worthless:

\- Many countries have laws that explicitly forbid said references to tell you anything that could "hinder the candidates efforts to find a new job".

\- Without knowing the company and people the candidate listed as reference you have little means to judge their assessment.

\- Even if a candidate delivered perfect results in his previous environment that does not mean he'll function equally well in _your_ environment. Your people, your tech, your salary will all be different.

The article looks like the typical pseudo-science to me (is the author selling a book, perhaps?). In reality the references are amongst the smallest factors to consider.

At least in the tech-field a skilled interviewer will know what he needs to know after an hour of talking to the candidate. Paperwork is secondary.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8>
       However, if only 2 or 3 of the 10 references selected by the candidate return your call

who the hell gives 10 references when applying for a job?

</comment><comment><USER9> This only works if you're requiring _lots_ of references, so you can look at the percentage response. Most hiring processes want 2-3. That's an awful lot to leave up to chance.

Far better just to know how to interview a reference on the phone. If you're looking for the "is the candidate outstanding" response, just ask for specific details about what made the candidate outstanding. A crappy pro-forma reference won't have any.

If you were really serious about references, you'd track down backdoor references anyways.

<comment><USER10> _If you're looking for the "is the candidate outstanding" response, just ask for specific details about what made the candidate outstanding._

The strategy, such that it is, is designed to get around the reality that many, many bosses are only allowed to say "I can confirm that $CANDIDATE worked from $START_DATE to $END_DATE and his final position was $TITLE." If you ask "Is the candidate outstanding? What specifically makes you think so?", you will hear "I can confirm that $CANDIDATE worked from $START_DATE to $END_DATE and his final position was $TITLE."

That said, like many brilliant engineering ideas for evading legal requirements by simple logical tricks that a profession filled with people who are paid $300 an hour to think of loopholes _totally can't see coming_ , I strongly doubt this idea will work. You're not selecting for outstanding candidates, you're selecting for managers who are not risk-adverse.

A risk-adverse manager will ignore your little logic trap, call you, and say "I am returning your phone call with regards to $CANDIDATE. I can confirm that $CANDIDATE worked from $START_DATE to $END_DATE and his final position was $TITLE. Have a nice day." He will then document that he was asked for a reference for $CANDIDATE and followed company procedure to the letter. You have learned no useful information from this, aside from "Ahh, $PREVIOUS_COMPANY has a corporate policy to not provide useful references"

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> As much as this is great for the employer, it really stinks for the candidate. Even a mediocre reference is a reference. It proves that you at least worked somewhere and did something. That said, I'd never list a bad reference.

References are funny things. If you have to call them, you probably shouldn't hire the candidate anyways. If you have that much doubt in their skills, or integrity you're likely to feel that way regardless of their references.

</comment><comment><USER12> On the other side, if you ask someone to be a reference, make sure 1) that you had a real working relationship and 2) to explicitly ask them 'would you be willing to provide a _strong_ reference for me'.

</comment><comment><USER13> Sorry, I disagree. It's disrespectful to both parties (applicant and reference). Sounds like a tool.

If I were to receive this kind of call, I'd contact the applicant and ask WTF was going on.

</comment><comment><USER14> In computational theory this would be called a zero-knowledge proof. Especially if the inquirer doesn't pick up any return calls... Sorry, just had an exam.

</comment><comment><USER15> I find LinkedIn recommendations works pretty well too.

</comment><comment><USER16> Seeking Reference != Seeking Recommendation

</comment><comment><USER17> This link should be titled:

Good Method to Check Someone's References?</comment>


Show HN: Hackjob.io – HN job listings done a bit better - <AUTHOR> https://hackjobio.herokuapp.com

<comment><USER2> It would be nice if there were an indication when there's 0 matches found. I was briefly confused as nothing on the page changed at all when I hit 'Search' after entering my criteria.

</comment><comment><USER3> To me, the tag box has incorrect UX. I would personally expect that hitting the spacebar would end one tag and let me enter a second tag, especially since it is clear that you do not permit spaces in tags. I would also expect the "enter" key to conduct the search. Instead, spacebar adds a space that will get converted to a hyphen anyway, and enter ends one tag and lets me create a second one.

Good job overall; I like the idea. It will be an interesting challenge to capture meaning from these raw text posts. For example, I tried to search for jobs in Florida, but typing in "FL" gives a lot of false positives. That will be the

<comment><USER4> Well first of all I looked through the recent thread and saw 0 postings in FL.

Little bit of a sidetrack, but it's seriously depressing that 90% of the jobs posted are SF and NY. These companies are seriously limiting their applicant pools.

<comment><USER5> Outside of helping build a startup, you have literally every other job site at your disposal. Go on any of them.

Within the context of building a startup, Sam Altman suggests it is more than 10x easier in SF and SV - however I think it is more like 50x easier. You can talk to 50 people on "startup" terms in FL before you'll find one person who is as qualified and willing to work on a startup, who will actually do it, as you can find in SF.

For better or for worse, HN is a YC property, and it's mostly about startups. In that sense even NY ranks far behind SF.

In fact, you can go farther and say that inside SF, twenty people can build the better part of a billion dollars in value together from nothing. Outside SF, you will get accused of being a thief and trying to take advantage of the same developers. It's a complete non-starter.

I realize most people posting advertisements are somewhat farther along, but the point stands. SF is where they are funded and able to post startup jobs.

<comment><USER4> I think you are underestimating the SE. They have the talent but not the employers. I, like most educated young folks I knew from FL, had to move out of the state for non military tech jobs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> A progress bar that takes 20 seconds to load? What year is this?

<comment><USER7> ...followed by a UI that totally could have been shown while data loaded in the background.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> It is open source btw: [https://github.com/dvx/hackjob](https://github.com/dvx/hackjob)

What is the meaning of 'stateless:

> and wanted to build a stateless product using Firebase.

<comment><USER9> seems like a massive waste of resources... you're making 800 http requests to firebase. If you don't want to use a database at least setup some sort of cron that just updates a giant JSON file so the users don't have to DDOS firebase.

Other than that it looks great.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Can you add another filter rule where we can remove jobs from the results that aren't interesting to us?

For example, searching for "Remote" and I may stumble onto a post that has "sorry no remote" and I'd like to clear that from the results (so that in the end, I end up only with the jobs that I'd be most interested in applying to).

<comment><USER11> Per-job 'ignore' flag would be good, too. Could just save to a cookie. Also, per-job 'notes' field, eg. status = applied, sounds like it's run by a control freak, bad weather, etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> All great ideas! May implement some of these today.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I have two minor comments:

1) Linking to the original HN hiring post is helpful, and

2) I'm on a poor internet connection now, and this page took about a minute to load. [http://hnhiring.com/](http://hnhiring.com/) and the original July 2015 thread ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9812245](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9812245)) load in ~5 seconds.

<comment><AUTHOR> (1) is probably going to make it in at some point! Unfortunately, I need to make an HTTP request for every post (that's how the HN Firebase API works) and that gets pretty expensive on slow connections. :/

<comment><USER13> Yeah, I build [http://hnhiring.me](http://hnhiring.me) well before the API via scraping. I looked into moving over after it was released but found it completely impractical for this sort of thing.

Hopefully it'll be improved at some point, especially given how bad the HN markup is (fun fact: all comments are at the same level in the dom; the indentation is achieved via a blank gif with a width property).

<comment><AUTHOR> Ouch, that sounds painful. Glad I didn't go the scraping route :P

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is pretty neat stateless app, however the current implementation leads to performance issues on slower connections.

Have you thought about some optimizations you could make to filtering/searching to minimize the initial load time, while still keeping all the logic client-side?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! And yeah, I'm probably going to cache the results in localStorage at some point.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Couple of updates: made job listings easier to read + added a permalink link for the people that want to see original posts.

TODO: dates, viewing comments, storing data in localStorage after initial download.

</comment><comment><USER15> I know there's an icon to tell posts apart but there needs to be more done to differentiate posts. I shouldn't have to be so careful

<comment><AUTHOR> Just pushed an update that should make things easier to differentiate!

<comment><USER15> Can't be better than that. Awesome

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I would love and/or keywords. Eg. I'd like to find a job in Chicago for either C# or django work.

<comment><USER17> I believe you can achieve that by adding custom filters like here [http://angjobs.com/#!/jobs/inbox/hn](http://angjobs.com/#!/jobs/inbox/hn)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> You should add some blank space between the posts, it will make it easier to read.

Same with titles and paragraphs.

<comment><AUTHOR> Done!

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Swiping back on safari mobile reset my search results and search criteria.

</comment><comment><USER20> > Try searching for technologies (Java, C,

Yeah, working search for C. Sure. I believe.

<comment><USER21> I don't mind [non-working search] for C, but inability to search C++ constantly annoys me. But this is not the case for this site, great.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The date of the original posting would be a useful addition.

</comment><comment><USER23> This is awesome! Great job!

</comment><comment><USER24> Great Job!

</comment><comment><USER25> thanks for creating this</comment>


Moving Mountains of Data to AWS - <AUTHOR> https://engineering.riotgames.com/news/moving-mountains-data-aws <comment><AUTHOR> > League of Legends' international community generates an enormous amount of > data. Since the game launched in 2009, we've collected 26 petabytes of how > players interact with the game and our websites, which we use to improve the > player experience through projects like game balance and bot detection.

twenty six freaking petabytes. I feel sorry for the future people who'll be ploughing through all this stuff.</comment>


I just stole Startup Weekend and put it online - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/p/4ad2418a2a05/

<comment><USER2> It's not a good marketing tactic to disguise a startup launch with a linkbaity title and passive-aggressive copy.</comment>


We bend time to make our world make sense - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/9/time/making-good-use-of-bad-timing

<comment><USER2> If anyone is curious, my colleagues and I have a study published on this sort of stuff, which has a nice background section.

Open-Access:

[http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00...](http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00046/abstract)

Our finding is that these effects can actually stick around for a bit if you adapt to one condition (say causing something to occur with a motor act) and then change it up (having something occur without a motor act).</comment>


Show HN: A JSON Viewer with indentation based highlighting, and table-view mode - <AUTHOR> https://json-viewer.sohamkamani.com <comment><USER2> Is this similar to [http://json2table.com](http://json2table.com)?</comment>


JSON5 – a superset of JSON with comments, multiline string, trailing comma, etc. - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/json5/json5 <comment><USER2> [https://cuelang.org](https://cuelang.org) is a unified logical language that replaces the need for all these data format enhancements and tools.

Definitely my new favorite language and tech, super powerful and solves a ton of problems all at once.

It's quickly improving, and while it is immature, I think it's safe to start building with. Docs need to be expanded once things settle in the next few months.</comment>


Yahoo is sending email from firstname.lastname@example.com - <AUTHOR> I just received an Unexpected sign-in attempt email from yahoo. The from address is email@example.com. I was sure this was a phishing email. But this is the from address yahoo chooses to use for official account related emails. This seems like a really poor choice for people trying to determine if emails are from the actual company. Anyone have any thoughts or insight on this? Why not use email@example.com or even firstname.lastname@example.com so it's more clear it's from Yahoo. <comment><USER2> Try to check the SPF and DKIM against Yahoo's to help determine whether the email is real or not.

To answer your point though, it is unfortunately very common for organisations to use alternate domains for services you'd expect to have a high level of security.

For example many banks have their online banking portal on a completely separate domain. The main website might be "examplebank.tld", while the online banking portal is "examplebank-portal.tld".

Why they don't just use "portal.examplebank.tld" is a mystery...

</comment><comment><USER3> Employees have @yahoo-inc.com email addresses so technically it's more trust- worthy than coming from @yahoo.com. A random internet user could register firstname.lastname@example.com, harder to impossible with yahoo-inc.com. The differentiation started 20 years ago when Yahoo! launched their email service. Yes, it's confusing. (Having a ! as part of your branding is also confusing).

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey, now that makes sense, I'd rather see inc.yahoo.com or official.yahoo.com but this makes sense. I'd never noticed/ran across it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> If you are only looking at the email From: header value, that is trivial for a phisher to fake.

You really need to read all of the Received: headers to see where the email transited (and, note, a phisher can insert fake Received: headers as well, so you have to be careful analyzing them to detect something amiss).

</comment><comment><USER5> I would trust a random phisher way more than the real Yahoo.</comment>


An Interesting SETI Candidate in Hercules - <AUTHOR> http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=36248 <comment><AUTHOR> We should not get our hope too high. It is 6.3 billion light years away, the signal generated even before our solar system existed. See also "Possible Signs of Extraterrestrial Intelligence?" [1] from February discussing the then hot Tabetha's Star / alien megastructure.

[1] [http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-blogs/cosmic- relief...](http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-blogs/cosmic-relief-david- grinspoon/could-it-be-possible-signs-of-e-t-intelligence/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Looks like it could be similar to the Wow signal, a brief strong transient that was never re-observed. Hopefully this time, the Allen Telescope Array can keep an eye on it long term.

An issue in SETI is the duty cycle problem. If a transmitter is cycling between targets (an isotropic beacon would require insane amounts of power), the receiver needs to be looking at the transmitter at the right time.</comment>


Get Current Url in PHP - <AUTHOR> http://mitchj.info/blog/2010/07/get-current-url/ <comment><USER2> Why was this posted to HN? Doesn't seem appropriate, and since your username and domain name seem the same, it appears like selfpromotional spam. Flagging it now.

</comment><comment><USER3> Should use $_SERVER["SERVER_PORT"] to detect if it's SSL or not rather than blindly using <http://>.</comment>


1 million fps Slow Motion video of bullet impacts by Werner Mehl - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfDoQwIAaXg&feature=related

<comment><AUTHOR> Last 3 minute is extreme</comment>


Ask HN: Alternative to Stripe? - <AUTHOR> I live in a country that Stripe, PayPal or any of the other payment processors support, so i am wondering what alternatives i have for me as an individual or for my business?
It is really frustrating because for me to have an online business i either have to be a partner with someone abroad and have them register a firm there that can take all the payments or i have to limit myself to B2B kinda service where i can send invoices to the clients manually.
Does anyone in a similar situation have any suggestions? <comment><USER2> You could open an Estonian company you fully own and manage using the e-Residency programme [https://e-resident.gov.ee/](https://e-resident.gov.ee/). Caveat: not all payment service providers that usually accept Estonian clients will also work with a company managed from abroad (iirc Stripe requires you to live in another country they support) but at least one most likely will.

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps Adyen ([https://www.adyen.com/](https://www.adyen.com/)) would work for you?

<comment><AUTHOR> I looked into Ayden and i can't register an account with the country i live in.</comment></comment>


The Meme Hustler - <AUTHOR>

http://www.thebaffler.com/past/the_meme_hustler <comment><USER2> You can directly post the link instead of sub linking.</comment>


Oracle's Larry Ellison Calls Uber and WeWork 'Almost Worthless' - <AUTHOR> https://www.barrons.com/articles/oracles-larry-ellison-calls-uber-and-wework-almost-worthless-51568924122 <comment><USER2> Neither of these companies is actually adding any value at all as far as I can tell. Uber is undercutting taxis/transit with investor-subsidized rides and still has no idea how it's going to turn a profit unless it becomes the only ride in town. WeWork is pure middleman with some good branding. It amazes me that people believe these valuations. However, I can't agree with the cat comment; I'm sure Uber engineering are tackling tough technical problems.

<comment><USER3> I think Uber (and Lyft) are absolutely adding value. I now regularly take ride shares when I would previously have driven or _extremely reluctantly_ taken cabs. I also talk to my rideshare drivers and the platforms provide some much needed cashflow (and perhaps day-filling) for people who seem genuinely happy to avail themselves of the income opportunity provided.

I see no reason to think that those two companies couldn't be quite profitable in their core businesses in their established cities. (I think they already are.)

That said, their valuations in the market are comically/insanely/unjustifiably high, but that's quite different from saying they "add no value".

<comment><USER4> They may add value vs taxis, but would Uber or Lyft add value vs any other startup taxi service?

Expanding further, How about a taxi-app you and I could sit down and hack out? How much value-add is there in an Uber or Lyft vs what we could do?

<comment><USER5> In my area, they add no real value over the standard taxi companies. Literally the only advantage to them is that they're cheaper (which is an artificial and unsustainable difference). Everything else they do is also done equally well by the cab companies.

That may be why there aren't an increasing number of Uber and Lyft drivers here, but the taxi companies are expanding.

<comment><USER6> In your area, do taxi companies operate a service "Lift Line" or the uber equivalent, in which you share a taxis with strangers who are going in a similar direction?

I have never seen a non-app taxi service do this, and it's a real genuine technology enabled value add. Is it 50 billion bucks worth? Probably not. But it isn't 0 either.

<comment><USER7> I grew up with something like this. We called them buses, they were pretty cool :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Well I've been pretty negative about Uber and WeWork up to now, but if Larry Ellison is against them, maybe it's time to reconsider.

Kidding, I'm kidding. Sort of.

</comment><comment> trey-jones He isn't the only ones to make that assessment either. I think you will find this to be a common opinion among people who are paying attention.

</comment><comment><USER9> I feel like many people don't remember a few short years ago when your options after a night of drinking were to call a friend, wait an hour for a taxi that might arrive and definitely doesn't take credit cards, or drive home drunk.

</comment><comment><USER10> I hate to agree with this asshat, but he's right.

<comment><USER11> Oracle Linux, its flagship database and many of their products are utterly worseless.

<comment><USER12> I don't like Oracle any more than the next person, but this just isn't true at all. Oracle is a robust product which fills an important part of any technical stack. Building and supporting databases is hard.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Now that we've nearly migrated everything off Sparc & Oracle DB I'm ready to declare Oracle almost worthless too. At last.

<comment><USER14> Considering how often they sue their customers, increase prices after lockin is established, triple their support fees, etc etc. one might consider Oracle less than worthless. Sometimes it's a liability.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> At first I thought Uber will be a great business charging 20% of rides if they can ramp up to many millions of riders.

Now they squeeze drivers harder and harder for bigger and bigger percentages. Yet they are losing money faster and faster.

The problem is they've hired armies of very talented people, each one-upping the next on initiatives to screw drivers a little worse, or create some lame promotion, and pretty soon you have a ruthless company that is also drowning in expenses and headcount.

</comment><comment><USER16> The is a valid point to Ellison comment regarding loyalty. If you don't care about profit, like Uber, then you can undercut your competitors. Neither drivers nor customers would care if Uber suffers, if they can get a better deal else where.

The technology also isn't special enough that it alone can support the massive value of Ubers stock.

</comment><comment><USER17> Both of these companies provide a valuable service, and in Uber's case a massively world changing one. Even if these companies only end up being worth single digit billions, they are still great companies independent of Saudi money pumping valuations into the absurd.

</comment><comment><USER18> Uber provides great value to people like me who can't afford the burden of having a car and driving and only need a car maybe 20% of the time for various occasions. However, if Uber had to charge rates that would make them a real profit, people like me will simply no longer be able to afford it. We would go back to walking, biking, or taking the bus.

Just my 2 cents here.

</comment><comment><USER19> Last time I used Uber? this week. Last time I used coworking space? This week. Last time I used Oracle? ...

<comment><USER20> Last time you used a service backed by a service run likely by oracle? Multitudes of times this week.

<comment><USER19> And most of those are legacy companies that are in their sunset.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > [Uber has] an app my cat could have written

The other day on HN's frontpage was an article ("Software architecture is overrated") in which the author mentioned something that made me shudder:

"Rewriting the Uber app was a project that a few hundred engineers worked simultaneously on, porting existing functionality to a new architecture."

I keep not understanding how it is possible that companies whose core business is very far from IT (e.g. taxi and ride sharing for Uber, or television for Netflix) can be considered high-tech companies and take pride in investing inordinate amounts of money on engineering. What is the point? What is Netflix doing in the company of Facebook, Apple, Amazon and Google?

</comment><comment><USER22> Uber is good only for Uber itself and (temporarily till the collapse) the customers. It is a SCAM for drivers and investors.

caveat emptor.

</comment><comment><USER23> outline [https://outline.com/TfLjdh](https://outline.com/TfLjdh)

</comment><comment><USER24> Isn't he a director of former?

</comment><comment><USER25> Shortet some stock Larry, didn't we?</comment>


"I'm surrounded by people - but I feel so lonely" - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-45561334 <comment><USER2> I think the way the internet has changed in the last decade has contributed to loneliness significantly.

10-15 years ago, the internet was full of small independent communities: message boards, IRC channels, chat rooms of all kinds, etc. You could really "hang out" with the same people and get to know them.

But something killed pretty much all of them. Instead we have centralized "social media" that is at best all about narcissism and self-promotion. Sites like Reddit where there is too many people and everyone converges to a single "hive-mind", you cannot have someone reply to an interesting post you made years ago, and that really take the humanity out of the whole thing (like Facebook or Tinder or what not). Even HN is problematic in this regard - it is good for the purpose it exists for, but you cannot have any sort of casual threads or discussions just to get any sort of rapport within the community.

Even messengers have somehow become worse in this regard. Yahoo/MSN messengers, ICQ etc. were somehow all about having connections with online friends. Maybe it is just me, but there just doesn't seem to be an option that works for this as well nowadays. Or at least people do not seem to use the existing options in the same way.

<comment><USER3> > _message boards, IRC channels, chat rooms of all kinds, etc_

> _But something killed pretty much all of them._

Not in the least.

Interest-driven, channel-centric communities are alive and kicking, from IRC through Discord, Steam and other gaming communities, to Youtube/BitChute comment sections (nasty as they may be) and new meta-/platforms like Mastodon or Minds.com.

What has changed is the expanded version of Eternal September - influx of newcommers who join the ?book / ?gram / ?itter du jour, enjoy the interface candy and the occasional outrage, and are very slow to - or even fail to - explore the wider net of chats and other communities. It certainly doesn't help that media tend to paint all non-mainstream platforms as dark, scarry underbelly of the internet with nothing of value to offer, best to be avoided. [1]

The slow filtering in of new users into smaller communities is not even necessarily a bad thing, as quick influx of newcommers to interest communities can easily disrupt them to the point of derailing. The IRC and the likes being a cozy hangout where friendships are forged and projects are kicked off isn't based on a particular technical quirk of the IRC protocol or clients. It's all thanks to the established, cozy & social culture[2] being able to take in a certain amount of newcomers, guide them in and let them grow into part of the community. _Moving too fast tends to break things._

[1] the smartphone is also partly to blame, as it's much less comfortable for extended back-and-forth conversations than a computer; IMO it's more of a prepackaged content consumption terminal. But that's a personal, debatable opinion.

[2] certain glaring exceptions notwithstanding

<comment><USER2> I remember often stumbling on online communities and message boards on Google when looking for something ~15 years ago. Most people in those communities also stumbled on them through Google. I cannot remember a single time I saw one in search results recently.

So either Google is deliberately excluding them, or they actually ceased to exist for the most part, or it has been a self-perpetuating cycle and one cannot pinpoint what came first - exodus to 'social media' or disappearance from Google search results.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I think this is a major factor why I'm afraid to leave my job and find something more fulfilling and better paying; at this moment, without my job and colleagues (and the light casual interactions I have during the day), my social life would be reduced to some online friends (who are lately only intermittently active themselves) and my cat. I'm sure I'd be able to rebuild, and it might even be a good development in the long run both socially and financially, but in the short term it'll be a problem.

But that's how it goes. Every time I (/ one) leaves their school or job or the place they live, most of the people you see daily will be out of your life completely. I'm not the type to really reach out like "hey you wanna hang out", but then apparently nobody else is either so idk if it's just me.

<comment><USER5> A crucial thing to do as you pass out of your 20's is to figure out a mechanism to regularly get together with the people in your life. It's simple stuff, like throwing a monthly happy hour, or dinner parties, or a yearly camping trip, or whatever. The details don't really matter that much, they should match who you are.

Invite all the people you'd really like to see and stay in touch with. And an important point, don't _worry_ about it. Many times people won't be able to come, or won't care, or will drop out for awhile and return, or who knows.

That's not important, and it's really important to dispense with the anxiety that comes from being a host, worrying about if people will like it, if they'll like you, if they're happy, if enough people are coming, all that. Don't worry about that part, the point is just to have some kind of reference point and the ability to reach out to people and say hey let's stay in contact in the real world.

A lot of people let this slip, and end up ten years later surrounded exclusively by people they connect to through work or parenting, plus occasional family. That's a mistake in my opinion.

<comment><USER6> I would very much second this advice. I've only recently started to take a more concerted effort to stay in touch with people. I was terrible in my 20s (I'm now 35) with avoiding all the social contact that I could. My girlfriend took the opposite approach and would just go out and develop new friendships.

I'm lucky to have developed strong friendships from work colleagues over the years but I feel like I neglected some of my transient friendships.

That said it's never too late, it's easy to convince yourself "oh this person will never want to hear from me after all this time" but you'd be surprised. The older you get the less I find the time between meeting matters, it's the fact you're reaching out.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Being old and lonely / alone is really terrifying.

> Jack still misses his late wife desperately. [...] "The weekend is a dismal > time," says Jack. "The time can drag. I don't have any friends because all > my friends are dead. All the ladies I loved are dead. At this age nearly > everybody is dead - except me. I'm still here at 96-and-a-half."

<comment><USER8> So make new friends. Old people are people.

<comment><USER9> It's hard to make friends with people and I'm in my 30s. I can't imagine how hard it would be to "find new people" when you are 90+ and probably can't even drive.

<comment><USER10> My grandfather, who is 85, made a new friend a few months ago. He's in his 80s as well.

So it's definitely possible!

<comment><USER11> Yeah, my grandma had an extremely active social life well into her 80s (she died at 85ish) even with significant mobility problems. She lost my grandpa 15 years before she died.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The key is intimacy, not mere headcount.

And intimacy is superficial when the other is just an account on some social website. It's very easy to ignore the plight of the other, or tune out to more entertaining things.

<comment><USER13> _And intimacy is superficial when the other is just an account on some social website. It 's very easy to ignore the plight of the other, or tune out to more entertaining things._

Sure, it can be. Or it might be the opposite. I met my spouse playing some random online game. I moved across an ocean a few years after we met, and I'm still happy 5 years later. I have had friendships that are just as meaningful as the in-person friendships I've had.

The only time it isn't possible to tune out the plight of others is when the others live with you. Even then, there are ways.

<comment><USER12> > _Sure, it can be. Or it might be the opposite._

As with everything that's not a law of physics or logic.

But it's more often that way than the opposite, and the nature of the "online friend" relationship (remote, mediated by UIs, not committal, etc) makes it so.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Proposed definition: Loneliness is needing some kind of interaction from other people, and not getting it.

Proposed understanding: People likely need to have enough of each of several different kinds of interaction (analogy: nutrients), and different people need different amounts of them. Kinds of interaction that at least some people need probably include: intellectual, sharing of problems, "merely seeing another human's face", romantic, sexual, sharing of hobbies/interests...

<comment><USER15> I believe that loneliness comes from lacking people that are emotionally invested in you. The strongest bonds and closest relationships people tend to have are family (blood and marriage), which often come with a high cost to sever. The easier it is to walk away, the more superficial the relationship. Loneliness is a realization (or fear) that nobody is there when you need them. It isn't a modern problem, but modern life seems to be exacerbating it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Above a certain age, you need to make a determined effort to meet new friends. My partner and I both work freelance, and so we are aware of the potential to cloister up, particularly in a cold eastern European winter. So we make definite effort to meet new people, go for drinks or dinner, and maintain and develop such friendships and give them a chance.

<comment><USER17> _Above a certain age_

I've wondered about this a lot. I don't think our generation (I'm assuming most of us are millenials) operates in this regard in the way even our parents did and other than the prevalence of social media and possibly because of more diverse demographics, I can't really understand why that is.

Why _do_ we suddenly get very inward-looking in our 30s when it comes to forming new friendships, especially among the more affluent?

<comment><USER18> > _Why do we suddenly get very inward-looking in our 30s when it comes to > forming new friendships_

This is typically the time when you or those in your age cohort are focusing on their families. Time is at a premium.

<comment><USER19> It happens equally to single people.

<comment><USER2> People become jaded?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Finding a good neighborhood helps a lot with this.

We've made more friends in a couple years in the suburbs than the 8 we lived in SF. We know everyone on our block. We all go out after work so people's kids can play with eachother in our street - even people without kids come out to chat about things. People invite others over to BBQ. And so on.

</comment><comment><USER21> Now when I think about it, I spend _a lot_ of my time alone. I lived alone from 17 to 37, I parted ways with my only true friend when I was 24… yet I do not recall being horribly lonely. And I think people should learn to spend more time alone and, most important, undistracted. It looks like many are afraid ot the silence, or the voices from within they'd hear if they are alone and in silence. Forget your headphones (and maybe phone too) and go for a half-days walk. You may find something interesting even without going to the new places.

<comment><USER22> " And I think people should learn to spend more time alone and, most important, undistracted. It looks like many are afraid ot the silence, or the voices from within they'd hear if they are alone and in silence."

I am totally guilty of this. I really just can't sit in a silent environment without going crazy. At least need music. My GF and I broke up after a 2yr long relationship, having shared an apartment. She left and moved to a different city, coming home to an empty place after a long day at work was a bit too much sometimes, especially during the weekends. So when the contract ended I actually moved into a house share, where I like the company, there is usually someone always around.

I am 35 and have never ever lived in a place by myself, apart from when I was in a relationship or something.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I still have my IRC friends. That might sound sad to you, dear reader, but the bonds are strong.

We've gone through life together. Being primarily online means I can "uproot" and move anywhere. Sure, I miss going and having a beer or a hackathon, but flights are fairly cheap so we can do it once a while and those interactions are actually better for that.

I am super lucky to have what amounts to a social group that's been around 15+ years. I wonder if this level of interaction is enough for everyone or if I'll have some weird breakdown in 5 years.

</comment><comment><USER24> Scream. Express yourself. That's how you get out of loneliness. It's awkward if not painful for many (including me) but based on my own experience that's how you solve it.

</comment><comment><USER25> In my view, a significant factor in people feeling lonely is due to the unwillingness of most to reach out to others. Many people, and in my experience younger ones more than older, are waiting to be approached, queried, interviewed, prompted. I think there's a failure to realize that most people have good intent, and would be willing to help out with advice and opinion, but this opportunity is rarely exploited.

</comment><comment><USER26> a child in the park

said hello to me today

she mustn't have been

four years old

not yet old enough

to be scared

of an old hobo

sitting on a bench

levity for my worn soul

a barrel fire

in blast winter cold

so rare to feel something real

i smiled a lot as a child

i remember ms gibson

her jocular bellow

'ain't startin' this class

'til that boy stops smiling'

the same ms gibson

who said

seriously this time

'y'all poor, all of youse'

'y'all ain't amount to nothin'

i guess she knew

a teacher's clairvoyance

look at me now:

a hobo sitting on a bench

how did i get here?

how can i be so alone?

that a small child's hello

could move me so?

</comment><comment><USER27> Some of the loneliest people are those faces you see on television. Some of them have no real friends even though they are mixing it with the celebrity famous types and have adoring fans. In reality they might have their parents and that is it for support, then those parents might be the pushy types that wanted superstar kids so not the best type of loving parents.

This absence and loneliness is hard to imagine given the public persona. Seemingly they have it all. But, after the studio lights go down they get bundled off into a taxi, to get driven home. Meanwhile the rest of the production crew pack up and go to the pub because 'it is a wrap'.

The production crew will also be professional in that they will respect the 'talent' (people in front of camera are 'talent') and not make clumsy, unprofessional advances. This is not always the case, in Hollywood women are still expected to sleep with the producer or director to keep getting the roles, however, this is the exception, your average lighting engineer or sound guy will have nothing but professional respect.

These lonely stars of TV also don't really relate to their fans, it is a different world they work in and know. It is also a one-way relationship, a fan may know everything about the lonely 'star' but the 'star' will know nothing of the fan's life. So sometimes you do get major 'A list' celebrities types hitching their wagon to some member of the crew who can relate to them.

Because of how TV gigs are freelance there is also no feeling for the 'talent' that they are part of a company thing. They are just hired for the day, with no continuity. They also might have to spend half their time on location or living in hotels, in this way they end up with no community and don't know their neighbours.

Then youth gets extinguished and the wrinkles set in... So then the gigs are few and far between. Life becomes a struggle.

Think of how many celebrity types from TV and music die horrifically alone. Or with a substance abuse problem for company. It happens all the time. Despite the millions of fans they can end up knowing nobody with nobody to trust.

Margaret Thatcher died as a very lonely woman, yet once their was a time when the world would hang on her every word, albeit to probably hate her. Her family didn't care, however, due to being a former Prime Minister she did have police protection until the bitter end. Yet nobody could even be bothered to throw insults at her, and, as every narcissist knows, hate is at least 'attention'. She wasn't even getting that during her final days, a cruel and unusual punishment. Tony Blair is probably in the same predicament, I found his autobiography at the local tip the other day and I am sure that is indicative of how people feel about the 'once great man'.

At the other end of the scale are people that work and live in a small community, e.g. village sized, know everyone, have lovely family, a life long partner and not a lot of material riches. These are some of the happiest and least lonely people in the world. They might not have got very far, e.g. to spend their working life as a local builder, they might not know anyone famous and yet they have all the ingredients for the rewarding life that eludes those faces on TV that seem to have it all.

In an age when everyone seeks superstardom - 'get rich or die trying' \- the local folk that 'did not get very far' are having the last laugh.

</comment><comment><USER28> welcome to the modern world! the media and other influences have done a great job in driving a wedge between all different types of people to the point that were all barely able to communicate let alone socialise or possibly make friends

<comment><USER29> Friends aren't profitable. You are much easier to be exploited if you are by yourself.

<comment><USER30> Anecdotally, the people I know who socialize (IRL) the most also spend the most, often into debt. Friends pull you into expensive activities, provoke a need of one-upmanship, etc. Whereas the people who give up "the race" are often loners.

(This is not an argument against having friends, mind you!)

Of course, it could be argued that social networks are a way to re-engineer "friendships" so that they provoke the spending part (looking good on the feed, winning in stupid games, etc) without giving the satisfaction that one might get from just spending time with them.

<comment><USER29> >Of course, it could be argued that social networks are a way to re-engineer "friendships" so that they provoke the spending part (looking good on the feed, winning in stupid games, etc) without giving the satisfaction that one might get from just spending time with them.

I'm actually seing similar strategies employed all over the place. Ever brand wants to build a "community" around them. But they are not doing anything to foster the connection between members. Because if the members formed connections they could act in solidarity with eachother and actually gain some amount of power through collective action.

No, the only part of "community" they foster is the loyalty aspect. Loyalty to the brand. Because that is the part that is profitable.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


'Hot Dog Water' seller in Vancouver gets laughs to prove point - <AUTHOR> https://www.ctvnews.ca/lifestyle/hot-dog-water-seller-in-vancouver-gets-laughs-to-prove-point-1.3984356 <comment><USER3> If we imagine that each of the bottles was 1 liter, his experiment grossed him $2.2k at a minimum in a day. Minus the cost of the hot dogs and water bottles, not a bad profit!

In all seriousness, it's amusing to see the correlation people put on monetary cost and the supposed effects of a product. Time and time again we've all seen studies of higher priced items performing better than the exact same product at a lower price point. If a bottle of hot dog water costs $38, it must work!

While this was intended as a jab at "holistic" products that get sold with dubious health claims, it turned into a case study on marketing and positioning your product using pricing to convey value; even if that value is actually bogus in any measured context.

<comment><USER4> People who paid $38 for his hot dog water would not have bought it if it weren't for the experience he offered them, which to me looked like the opportunity to turn the tables for a minute at a fair and act like hucksters.

I can think of two ways he can scale this offering. He could focus more on the personal aspect, then he'd be turning into an actual product huckster and is moving towards the space occupied by pitchmen like Billy Mays and Vince Offer.

Or he put his hot dog water up on the Internet with some funny copy, putting it in Pet Rock territory.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Missed opportunity to call it Hogwash.

</comment><comment><USER6> A Croatian artist launched a controversial petition – and proved people will sign anything

[http://www.calvertjournal.com/news/show/10196/sinisa- labrovi...](http://www.calvertjournal.com/news/show/10196/sinisa-labrovic- petition-priests-catholic-church-child-abuse-croatia)

</comment><comment><USER7> Kickstarter next. Or maybe an ICO complete with white paper. The wonders of a DNA based blockchain could be leveraged to guarantee that the product is legit. Then get a few Youtube 'influencers' in on the gig, giving them promo codes that, if used, give them a $10 back-hander. Plus the $75 Google give you for your first goes at ad-words. I would love to be stalked everywhere I go online by 'HOT DOG WATER'. Then there is affiliate marketing. That would work.

A back-story is needed too. Some story about how the product was discovered in Germany by some gay Jewish-Romanian autistic savant in the 1930's, for the Nazis to spare him from 'Aktion T4' due to his discovery. Maybe they mixed it with amphetamines so that the Luftwaffe could fly 24/7.

The concentration of 'Hot Dog Water' in the rebooted product could differ from the original in that the 'water' collected from the nether ends of pigs is pasteurized, homogonised, denatured and FDA approved for modern 'tastes'.

The inevitable court case could also be part of the 'art performance', to take the piss out of how big pharma defend their opioid products.

<comment><USER8> > an ICO complete with white paper. The wonders of a DNA based blockchain > could be leveraged to guarantee that the product is legit.

The got dog man is Satoshi!!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Had he kept the gag on the dl he probably could have raised a nice little cocktail wiener round.

</comment><comment><USER10> Before we all get swooned by the effectiveness of his business model - <USER2> people probably bought this as a gag gift rather than because they believed in its medicinal properties. Because if they didn't, these sales would qualify as a scam.

<comment><USER11> So where do you place Aethaer who are selling bottles of "fresh" air? [http://www.aethaer.com/shop](http://www.aethaer.com/shop) There are companies selling other nationalities of air. (It's bad enough just writing that out)

Aethaer seem to have grown since their little bit of viral fame a few years ago.

<comment><USER8> And let's not forget the billion dollar industry that is pouring tap water into a container and selling it for $15/gallaon.

Pepsi (Aquafina) and Coca Cola (Dasani) have an... "amazingly loyal" group of customers. They're buying soda, with everything that makes it soda removed, and paying the same price as if they bought actual soda.

<comment><USER12> > with everything that makes it soda removed

Everything that makes soda soda is bad for me. I could buy soda and remove that stuff myself, which is a fair bit of work. Or I could pay someone to do it for me. The fact that Pepsi does this at no additional premium over the soda is something I appreciate.

<comment><USER11> Or you could, you know, fill a bottle from the tap before leaving home?

<comment><USER10> There are quite a few places where you have to filter and boil tap water before filling a bottle with it.

<comment><USER11> Dasani and Aquafina are quite literally tap water, filtered, but not boiled, then bottled with a trace amount of salt added.

So for most people with safe municipal supply it's a complete waste of money no matter what Coke's marketing might try to imply.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Trustworthiness plays at least a minor role in this kind of sells, even though you could say it's not the point. His good nature, honest appearance, and probably knowledge of science could confuse people, so he shouldn't sell the product himself to prove a point.

Did you know that spruce resin, nature's own goodie, is highly effective in curing wounds? Or is it? 20$ a bottle. It works like this. These and these compounds make it work. Do you follow? 20$ a bottle.

</comment><comment><USER14> Where can I buy bulk amounts of HÕT DÕG WATER?

</comment><comment><USER15> So is this hot dog or not hot dog?</comment>