Raspberry Pi Official Case - <AUTHOR> https://www.raspberrypi.org/raspberry-pi-official-case/ <comment><USER2> My phone should be doing all of this by now. Technically it's more powerful then the pi (and has a better case then this), just not as good from a usability/hack-ability standpoint.

I wonder what's stopping someone from producing an all in one device: Desktop/phone/hobbyist micro-controller

Startup idea?

<comment><USER3> RPi is $25-35. A phone is at least $100, most probably $300-ish. What would you prefer to accidentally fry when fumbling with DIY electronics?

This one would be enough, but why stop.

A lot of space in RPi and similar boards is dedicated to I/O pins and jacks. Would you carry an 1" thick device (or even an 1.5 cm thick device) instead of your current phone?

RPi runs various flavors of Linux, RPi2 will also run Windows 10, and you can try to run an entirely different OS. Are you comfortable changing the OS of your phone? Is it easy?

Well, you see. A phone is a piece of your life-support infrastructure (think calling 911), while an RPi is an entirely different thing that most people want to keep separate.

<comment><USER4> > A phone is at least $100, most probably $300-ish.

Not really. The prices have dropped tremendously. I recently picked up the Alcatel C1 for just $9 at the local frys. Sure it is under powered compared to the flagship phones, but it is really capable enough for tinkering, it also has a touchscreen and comes installed with Andriod KitKat 4.2, which could also be rooted. [1]

The low end Lumia phones always go on sale and has amazing specs for what you pay. For example Lumia 635 (on sale $19-$49) has IPS display, 5mp camera, Quad core 1.2GHz and a good amount of sensors. [2] However the gripe with these is these are not as hackable as Andriod, so good for backup phone but not so good for DIY projects.

[1] [http://www.cnet.com/products/alcatel-c1/](http://www.cnet.com/products/alcatel-c1/) [2] [http://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_lumia_635-6254.php](http://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_lumia_635-6254.php)

<comment><USER5> While you can get phones at these prices, not that they are locked to a provider and subsidized by them. The cheapest 3G+Wifi no-strings-attached phones I could find whenever I looked were always $35-$45, and it's been that way for 3 years now, and they always have mediocre specs (low res screen, low capacity battery, old android).

But they ARE usable for many uses RPi is, and they do have a working 3G and WiFi, and also a touch screen, a speaker and a battery

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Still waiting on that DSI screen [0], which they announced over a year ago, but never actually started producing.

[0] [http://raspi.tv/2014/raspberry-pi-official-7-inch-dsi- protot...](http://raspi.tv/2014/raspberry-pi-official-7-inch-dsi-prototype- preview)

</comment><comment><USER7> Non-stackable case?!?!?

Why, just why did they think that a curved top was more important than the ability to stack more devices together, or to make it easier to fit in a simple and precise slot.

<comment><USER2> Same reason why all cars nowadays look like cough drops. Aerodynamics.

It's a common feature added to many objects. My laptop, furniture, shampoo bottle, my backpack, my smart phone etc.. etc.

Whenever I see an aerodynamic building I just laugh, because when I throw my ugly smart phone into the trash, at least the aerodynamics makes it a bit faster while it's flying through the air. But buildings? Why? those things don't even move.

<comment> extropic-engine Actually, aerodynamics are really important for buildings, especially tall ones. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_engineering](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_engineering)

(OK, you were probably being sarcastic! But wind engineering is cool!)

<comment><USER8> The Citicorp building in New York City was a particularly scary case of wind engineering (or lack of):

[http://www.damninteresting.com/a-potentially-disastrous- desi...](http://www.damninteresting.com/a-potentially-disastrous-design- error/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I quite like the ModMyPi Modular Case[1] for being nicely built, and having things like optional locking covers for the SD card and USB/HDMI ports, which can be set up so they're only removable after you open the whole case. Or you can trim the tabs and they are just aesthetic/strain relief.

The best part is a bunch of stackable spacer-plates between case and lid that let you put various stack-ups of expansion boards and still get the lid on.

My biggest complaints would be the lack of good mechanical drawings (although that's true of I think every single case I've looked at), and that the slots for LCD/camera ribbons are default-open, when they could have been a snap-away seam or something since I'm not convinced most Pis have them attached anyway.

This new one looks interesting, but the curvy bits will be a nightmare to put UI controls (buttons, etc) in, and (probably) can't easily be swapped for laser-cut replacements. Maybe 3d-printed ones? Although I don't know how durable a 1-2mm thick panel would be with most hobby technologies, and how long htey'd take to make.

[1] [https://www.modmypi.com/raspberry-pi/cases/modmypi-single- co...](https://www.modmypi.com/raspberry-pi/cases/modmypi-single- colour/modmypi-modular-rpi-b-plus-case-black)

</comment><comment><USER10> I cut some holes in the box it came in and am using that as a case. It's not pretty but it sits at the back of a shelf so no one sees it anyway.

I feel it embodies the hacker mentality of the pi.

</comment><comment><USER11> I just want a thick, 6 or 7 inch laptop with a foldable keyboard.

I don't know why nobody is doing such a pocket "laptop". It would be really great to type code. I can't really type properly with a touchscreen, it can be sluggish, maybe I need to get used to it, bu typing characters like []{}(); etc is not really practical.

Maybe because there's nothing else than android for something between a laptop and a smartphone. One might want a minimal OS, but that could do a little more than android.

<comment><USER12> The Sony Vaio P is a 8" laptop, closest to this. It has an insane high res screen too. It's really small, I had one.

<comment><USER13> Unfortunately it's kind of outdated and no manufacturer has taken up this unique form factor since the VAIO P. When they do, they are guaranteed to have my money.

For someone who heavily relies on keyboard use and mobility, I find it has upsides relatively to the tablet + keyboard cover in several ways. First, the specialized dimensions of the screen, chosen to match a decently sized keyboard, no more and no less. Second, the absence of a kickstand and the flexible rigidity of the keyboard/screen joint, making it a real "laptop": you can use it on your lap and on uneven surfaces.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> A case? Seriously, what?

There's an unused display connector on millions of Pis, and the firmware stuff for CSI is not open so you can't connect $random_camera_chip to your Pi.

That's where the priorities should be, imho.

<comment><USER15> Please remember that Raspberry Pi is an educational charity, with a focus on advancing computing education.

For parents and kids, a nice case to protect the hardware with easy access to GPIO pins is probably more of a priority.

<comment><USER14> But there's already a huge external market for cases of all sorts, I wonder why the Foundation needs to throw in yet another option...

<comment><USER16> Call it what it is - an extra way to raise funds. Because they're non-profit and could supposedly use the proceeds on the next iteration, I have less qualms with them doing it than the myriad of case manufacturers out there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> It doesn't seem like they would stack very well, which might be an issue for some users. It looks pretty, though!

</comment><comment><USER18> I absolutely love it when companies publish their product development stories. Being forced to switch injection molding suppliers mid-production is often a nightmare scenario for product developers, and it's great that they were able to salvage their tooling. I'd love to learn more about what exactly was wrong and how they were able to fix it.

</comment><comment><USER19> Nice story, and the new case looks cool. Will get one. Just wanted to chime in that I've been hacking a bit with the r-pi again the last few weekends and that the recent Raspbian distro is really quite polished, especially compared to where we came from back in 2012.

Had some sensor/gpio fun (1-wire temperature probe, http post to web, SQLite and some Google Charts), with a random wifi dongle, working quite nicely straight from the box. Same with another pi (classic model b), 1usd aliexpress webcam, humidity sensor, some quick scripts and another random wifi dongle.

Great fun and highly recommended for a weekend of (home automation) hacking.

<comment><USER20> > the recent Raspbian distro is really quite polished, especially compared to > where we came from back in 2012

The background of the original Raspbian is easily my favorite part of the entire Raspberry Pi story.

[http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/03/how- tw...](http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/03/how-two- volunteers-built-the-raspberry-pis-operating-system/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> For just about $8, this is awesome. I wonder if they will open-source its design files for 3D printers.

</comment><comment><USER22> Quite cool but I prefer to build a custom lego case, which brings a DIY feeling. :)

</comment><comment><USER23> Technical Specifications:

\- Official enclosure from the Raspberry Pi Foundation

\- 5 part enclosure

\- Dimensions: 96mm x 70mm x 25mm

\- Raspberry coloured enclosure with White removable lid and sides

\- Removable lid is provided for easy access to the camera and display ports. This removable lid will also support access to an attached Raspberry Pi HAT device.

\- Removable GPIO side is provided for easy access to the 40-pin GPIO port (and attaching a ribbon cable).

\- Compatible with the Raspberry Pi 2 Model B and Raspberry Pi Model B+

Source: [http://raspberry.piaustralia.com.au/products/raspberry-pi- of...](http://raspberry.piaustralia.com.au/products/raspberry-pi-official- case)

</comment><comment><USER24> I am a huge fan of this[1] case. I like the single power input for powering the pi and a USB hub. I like the room inside the case for adding things; hhd, gpio pins. I just wish this design was more common... and cheaper.

1\. [https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00JNXERM2/ref=aw_wl_ov_dp_1_...](https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00JNXERM2/ref=aw_wl_ov_dp_1_4?colid=PQH6ARGND1VQ&coliid=I2JRCBRXH0TEKZ)

</comment><comment><USER25> Had been looking at some fancier ones with wood or aluminum accents on Amazon, but cheap is good. I almost picked up a cheesy case at Micro Center today, but now I think I'll go with this cheesy one instead. Priced right at less than $10, and the removable lid is a nice touch.

</comment><comment><USER9> Those copper blocks about halfway down look a whole lot like sinker EDM[1] electrodes, which makes me question the accompanying quote: " _instead you have to use magic electrolysis (like they taught you at school)_ ". Spark erosion isn't really electrolysis in any way I can think of, and is sufficiently awesome of its own right that it deserves more attention :)

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_discharge_machining...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_discharge_machining#Sinker_EDM)

<comment><USER26> Correct. I think Gordon just used the wrong word as he's a hardware rather than a plastics guy :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Injection moulding is one of those ubiquitous technologies that appears deceptively simple (heat plastic; squish into mould; eject), but in reality is amazingly complex.

The number one fact people seem to know about it is "Oh, the mould tooling is really really expensive", which is kind of true, but doesn't really tell the full story.

The issue is that the mould is operating at very high pressures, rapidly temperature cycling, and still requires very high accuracy. Plus you need it to survive for the life of your production run.

On a large scale, this means using hardened steel[1[ milled or EDM'd from a solid block. The texture of the inside of the mould cavity directly determines the surface finish of your parts, so it needs to be polished mirror smooth, even though it's probably not flat.

Then it gets even more fancy. The moulds usually need channels bored through them as close as possible to the cavity, which will allow coolant to be pumped through to set the plastic faster so it can be ejected. Some complex shapes also have internally embedded heating elements to keep the plastic liquified for long enough to reach where it needs to be.

Then you have the ejector mechanisms, usually some pins driven pneumatically to push the solid moulding out of the fixture at the end of the cycle. They need to retract to precisely the right depth during moulding otherwise you end up with those little dimples characteristic of IM parts.

And it gets crazier still: some parts will have embedded metal or other plastic parts such as bearings or threaded screw inserts. These get inserted each cycle by a robotic fixture when the mould is open. It then closes up and the plastic is injected around them. Doing this with multiple types or colours of plastic is the 'double-shot' technique that lets you put rubberised grips or other embedded features into things.

Oh, and time is money, so each part is ejected as soon as possible to start on the next cycle, so everything has to be incredibly delicately choreographed, but left long enough that you get a decent yield of useable parts.

When I learned about all of that (and probably a whole lot more I don't know), it makes sense how expensive the whole thing is upfront. There's also the costs incurred by your factory in shutting down production to change out the tooling to run your job.

One of the coolest things I've seen online is Kenneth Maxon's home-made injection moulding rig[3] (although just about all the other things he does are pretty astounding too. I'd claim it's only technically home-made because he lives there ;p)

[1] Protomold[2] get away with doing it a lot cheaper because they mill moulds out of aluminium, which is much less durable but entirely acceptable for short production runs.

[2] [http://www.protolabs.com/injection-molding/fundamentals- of-m...](http://www.protolabs.com/injection-molding/fundamentals-of-molding)

[3] [http://www.users.qwest.net/~kmaxon/page/side/mold_mach_137.h...](http://www.users.qwest.net/~kmaxon/page/side/mold_mach_137.htm) [4]

[4] WARNING: serious 90's webdesign, and sadly a lot of broken images.

</comment><comment><USER27> Very nice, most cases really don't take into account the fact that you want the GPIO easily accessible while the Pi is in a case.

But I'm still very much waiting on this touchscreen: [http://techcrunch.com/2014/10/21/pi- pads/](http://techcrunch.com/2014/10/21/pi-pads/) It was announced for and of 2014. Does anybody have any news on this?

</comment><comment><USER28> What is wrong with cases that can be properly stacked up? I find these cases with odd shapes and curved tops a total waste of space. If you have four of these on a shelf you prefer to stack them up and save space. Why can't designers be more sensible and give practicality more importance than looks? Computer equipment doesn't exist to be admired. It exists to be put to work.

</comment><comment><USER29> The site is down for me. Here's a cached version: [https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:MXZRQ7...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:MXZRQ7LhaaEJ:https://www.raspberrypi.org/raspberry- pi-official-case/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk)

</comment><comment><USER30> very disappointing to see this company not spending one single thought about environmentally acceptable materials, instead polluting the world with even more plastic.

please do not even start with "but recycling works" \- it does not. We have to stop using these materials, now.

Apple, of course, is allowed to produce plastic poison products, because they have such a cool logo and buying their stuff makes me a soldier of the cool army of individualists, that I am so proud of being allowed to march in step with.

</comment><comment><USER31> No power button?</comment>


Crypt·o·phobe - <AUTHOR> https://www.cryptophobia.com/ <comment><USER2> Well, I guess this raises the question: is it good to use shame or the feeling of public disapproval to achieve (good!) political ends?

Ideally, it would be best if each person could be convinced of the truth as to what is best without any rhetoric, but "purely rationally" (or, purely rationally after a shared base foundation of ideas of what is good, and things like that.)

But totally accomplishing this seems, um, is "intractable" the right word?

So, does this mean that we should [rhetoric] throw that ideal out the window? [/(?maybe?)rhetoric]

What standards of discussion and debate should we hold ourselves to, knowing that those we disagree with might not follow the same standards?

I find the rhetoric on this site "personally effective" (I mean, as someone who already agreed with the viewpoint it expresses, the rhetoric "resonates" or whatever with me.), but does that mean that we should use it?

I don't know that the rhetoric it uses works because the viewpoint is right, instead of regardless of it being right. I think it probably doesn't. That is, I think that effectively the same rhetoric could be used to argue for something false, and that it would be pretty much as convincing.

Should we use/accept(/tolerate?) rhetoric that can be used for bad just as much as for good?

I don't know.

If we should, this seems like it could work, but I feel like maybe we shouldn't.

Thoughts?</comment>


Ask: why some neighbourhoods feel more lively/alive than the others - <AUTHOR> Long time back I had seen a lecture video (black and white on youtube, don't remember exactly but was pretty lengthy) about why some neighbourhoods feels more lively/alive than the other, I am not able to find that anymore. By any chance anyone here is aware of what i am referring to, it'll be great if can provide me any additional detail that'll help me find that masterpiece. <comment><USER2> Unfortunately I haven't seen the video but it sounds interesting.

Last night I was reading a Brazilian article, based on a study, about how (what the author called) "centrality" plays a large part in the success of a neighborhood. "The concept applies to places with high concentration of economic activity, intense circulation of people and a large diversity of services." In short, it seems living where you work makes for a nice neighborhood.

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps a video version of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_and_Life_of_Great_Am...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_and_Life_of_Great_American_Cities)? Good book.</comment>


How to pass a programming interview (2016) - <AUTHOR> https://triplebyte.com/blog/how-to-pass-a-programming-interview <comment><USER2> Funny, I just went through a pre-screen assessment for one of the big ones and it was not one but _two_ DP problems. I could have probably come up with a slow solution using recursion and a bit more of time, but was given only 90 minutes. And I thought to myself, what exactly did they learn about _me_ after this exercise? Absolutely nothing, except that I can't solve DP problems on the spot. What a waste of time.

And the funny thing is, I work as an embedded developer and actually have to look up a topic or two from CLR at least once a year for work stuff (which is not very common). But DP? I've never needed it or used it. Why the emphasis in it then?

It feels a lot like software interviewing is just a bunch of rain dances and cargo culting and those that know the dance get through the hoop. I guess I'll have to order Elements of Rain Dancing from Amazon and get to practicing.

<comment><USER3> I have yet to find an interview process that works better than RPI (Rob's Pairing Interview)[1] plus a day-in-the-life[2].

It gives both the employer and the candidate a chance to evaluate each other in context.

As an employer, you get to see how the candidate performs on two different real-world tasks, as well as how they interact with existing employees.

As an employee, you get to see what the company is _really_ like to work with. No amount of whiteboarding can deliver that.

And at the end of the day, if that relationship feels good, both parties can choose to continue onwards towards full employment.

On the other hand, computer science trivia, by which I mean "implement Dijkstra or quicksort on a whiteboard", is a very poor means indeed by which to test for the ability to do real-world work in a real-world context.

Sure, it's valuable to have a broad understanding of algorithms and data structures. But whiteboard interviews on those types of problems only tests how well you would do competing in an ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) challenge, not how well you can deal with "here is a totally new- to-you problem that lacks a precise solution, now work productively with a team to solve it under the constraints of an operating business"

[1] [https://builttoadapt.io/the-developer-hiring-process-is- brok...](https://builttoadapt.io/the-developer-hiring-process-is- broken-672bf273c183)

[2] [https://blog.jonrshar.pe/2016/Dec/05/pivotal- interviews.html](https://blog.jonrshar.pe/2016/Dec/05/pivotal-interviews.html)

<comment><USER4> This is absolutely horrible.

"We believe coding is a social activity. In fact, we're testing you to see how social you can be around coding."

<comment><USER5> It's worth understanding that Pivotal are hiring for a work environment that is almost entirely pair-programming, with teams of 2 to 8 engineers that rotate pairs almost every day. With that in mind, it's absolutely critical that Pivotal consider the social side of candidates while pairing.

That makes the process less suitable for other types of working environments.

<comment><USER6> It seems to me that "programming" there means glorified devops and the primary goal is a headcount of young compliant workers to show off to investors.

Probably activity is valued higher than progress.

They are certainly not looking for Knuth, who would likely fail the interview.

<comment><USER7> Unless your business goal is to advance computer science research, why would you want to hire Knuth and why would he want to work for you?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> _They eat large sprawling problems for breakfast, but they balk at 45-min algorithm challenges._

If a candidate can solve large, complex problems but bombs your interview, the problem is your interview. TripleByte should focus on this problem and educate these companies on effective interviewing techniques. For example, if your interview overemphasizes coding challenges, puzzles, quizzes, or otherwise feels more like being on Jeopardy than real-world applicable, you're doing it wrong.

Candidates should be focused on their skill set and filling in gaps (i.e. I've toyed with Python but I see it being in demand so let me get better at syntax, packages, thinking in pythonic way).

<comment><USER9> Okay, but the problem is, 45-60 minutes is usually all hiring managers have to assess a candidate. What can you do in that amount of time to assess someone's real world performance? Having a high level conversation about technology and problem solving approach helps but often doesn't translate into writing code. Tech-stack specific challenges are no good because general programming ability is more important, you can learn a new language on the job. Algorithm puzzle problems aren't great because then we're selecting for people who spend a lot of time on hackerrank or whatever.

Maybe effective programmer hiring is just an unsolved problem.

<comment><USER10> What's so friggin' different about hiring software developers that we've gotta get all weird about it and come up with some brand new thing? What's the hiring process like for other office workers? How about for other technical or specialist roles that are somewhat similar to software developer? Engineers of various sorts, maybe? Accountants? Hell, lawyers even? There's got to be some set of existing practices that'll fit this _just fine_. It's simply not. That. Special.

<comment><USER11> My brother is a mechanical engineer, and his org hires by bringing in graduates on a low salary, moving the competent ones to roles that make use of their competencies, and moving the incompetent ones to roles that are pretty much the same as unskilled technicians. Sometimes the boss meets a candidate at a conference or over beers and fast-tracks them. They have literally no women in the entire engineering department.

I'm not defending whiteboarding the knapsack problem so much as I'm defending the difficulty of hiring skilled workers from different walks of life. Tech isn't special, hiring is just hard, and a lot of other industries are actually worse.

<comment><USER12> The software engineer analogue of this would be consulting. You hire everyone out of college. Start them off at a salary such that they are still net positive even if they only ever stay at the lowest possible billable rate. If you get good enough to command higher rates (or the effective rate through increasing the success rate of projects), you'll keep on getting commensurate raises.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> A recent experience I've had with programming screens, not whiteboard interviews specifically, is the lack of feedback. I'm given a programming problem (or a set of problem), given about 2 hours to do it, I do it in the allotted time, check my code, verify to the best of my ability that what I've come up with in the limited time is correct, I verify I'm passing the provided test cases and some test cases I come up with. Then it's basically a coin flip whether anyone follows up. No feedback, no reason why they're not moving forward besides maybe some generic HR response about my qualifications or 'decided to go in another direction'. Quite annoying and a waste of time on my end. Is this it? Is this really the best way to filter down the pool of resumes? Feels like it's a very high false positive rate and one that pushes all the time costs onto the applicant (multiply ~2hr by say 5 companies that want you to do a coding challenge).

<comment><USER14> I've gotten feedback, and even more frustrating than no feedback is demonstrably false feedback.

Google said I should try contributing to an open source project to improve my resume... when I had literally a million lines of code in a major open source project, and that was written on my resume.

Was it a mistake? Was there a mixup and had they interviewed me thinking I was someone else? Did they have a corrupt copy of my resume? More likely was it a throwaway comment from someone just saying something to be polite? No idea, but it's more frustrating than just 'no thanks' because it didn't even make any sense.

Imagine if you tried to improve yourself based on that feedback, applied again, and then they overlooked it again and gave you the same feedback!

<comment><USER13> I could see how this might be an issue with someone early in their career who has a low-profile project or two, but your resume would stand out very quickly among the rest so for this to happen is alarming.

Feels like a very similar occurrence to what happened to the homebrew dev who got reject by google (albeit different circumstance to your false feedback)

<comment><USER15> The homebrew guy was subsequently hired by Apple, but later left, saying in a (now deleted) tweet that big company life wasn't his bag. Link from around that time: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12276219](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12276219)

There's a non-zero chance that the Google interviewers were able to pick up on this. Those of us not directly involved only ever got one side of this particular story.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> The best part about these types of interviews is how they don't even treat you like a human being. There's absolutely zero interest in you whatsoever, and moreso every single word that comes out of your mouth is by default treated as a lie until they've had you submit to their Leetcode questions and determined you to be worthy of even speaking to. It's why I've become so incredulous at even being asked anything in the first round; anything I have to say here is completely meaningless and has no bearing whatsoever on any kind of hiring decision until that test has been passed. The utterly degrading inhumanity of this process had driven me to an emotional breaking point until I started interviewing outside the bay area. And what do you know? It's a completely different world. To anyone else stuck in this nightmare, just leave. Another 20% take home pay is simply not worth your sanity.

<comment><USER13> When you say outside the bay area, do you also mean companies are not 'tech- first' type companies? (companies that hire devs, but their primary domain is not just some app/website/saas) I've applied to many jobs in Canada, but I've still noticed a large tendency for companies to put you through a screen even before they speak to you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I like to imagine the movie trailer voice over guy

"Do you have what it takes?"

"Do think you're tough enough!?"

"You call yourself a...."

"PROGRAMMER?"

"Then... SORT... MY... LIST... WHILE... TALKING... OUT... LOUD"

But really, I feel like the whole process is uniquely American, kind of like crossfit. Very intense very trying. Like Nike; "JUST DO IT!"

The problem about this very intense "game" of interviewing is it's for a job, for you to eat, to afford healthcare, to survive. To afford basic necessities and save for retirement. To buy a house. To start a family. To afford a car. Or even simply to not be just another body stepped over on Market street.

You've probably enjoyed 7 some years as a web developer, as a productive team member or consulting for happy clients. Now some stranger is dangling a carrot in front of your face telling you to implement an LRU cache under bright fluorescent lights while badgering you with "what are you thinking, I need to know what you're thinking" ... after you've just spent the last 5 hours talking about your work history etc

</comment><comment><USER18> #1 on that list is enthusiasm for the company. Really...? So, you gotta be a good bullsh!tter? I can see this for small startups, because passion will take you to places. But for large companies, their software products are so diverse.

I work for a manufacturing company and my application space has nothing to do with manufacturing. Every space has their challenges and pitfalls. As long as you have good tech, good people, and aren't doing anything unethical, I'll want to work for you.

Also, I've thought about the interviewing problem a bit. I don't do the interview for my team...but if I have the opportunity to interview and was given free range, I think I would create a small application using our tech stack. Put some bugs in there, put some bad practices, and let the interviewee fix it. Talk about the tech stack, how to scale it, design trade offs, etc. IMHO reading code and maintaining code is more important than knowing bfs and dfs by heart.

<comment><USER19> This is a decent start, but then again remember you only have 60 minutes. And what might seem relatively easy to you, might not be so easy to someone with a time limit (60 mins), and pressure (trying to get a job you want).

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I'd say rather than practicing interview questions, work on a side project that really stretches your technical ability. And a _hard_ project, something that you don't even know where to start, not just "I'm going to rewrite this todo app in vue.js". I think that gives your brain more of a workout than droning through interview questions day after day. Even though you could say "you don't run marathons to practice for a sprint", just in my experience it works better. The interview practice websites are too easy to get distracted from, or look up the answer, or whatever, and your brain really doesn't get the workout that a solid long-term low level project gives it.

Plus, at the end, at least you have a project you've done.

<comment><USER21> [https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768?lang=en](https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768?lang=en)

<comment><USER20> Yeah that occurred to me just after I submitted the post. I'll still stand by my own experience though. I felt so much more prepared on this latest round of interviews after having worked on a type inference engine side project for the previous couple months, than I ever did after spending a couple months stressing over leet. Just, brain felt stronger for whatever reason.

And I think it makes sense too. When I conduct interviews, I look more for how is this person thinking about the problem, than can they solve the question in isolation in the allotted time. Because unlike leet, it's _not_ in isolation. There's always some back and forth, and that's where I think leet's shallowness shows.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> > To do well in an interview, then, you need to be able to solve small > problems quickly, under duress, while explaining your thoughts clearly.

The under duress part is the dumbest part of coding interviews.

I understand the approximation of small coding challenges, why explaining your thoughts is beneficial, as is understanding how a candidate approachs problem solving.

Causing duress to a candidate purposefully has no value what-so-ever in the workplace.

<comment><USER23> I think the interview process itself causes duress to candidates intrinsically. There is probably no way to eliminate it completely.

That said, there probably is a reason for testing candidates under duress. Some companies may want to push people hard, and knowing they can deal with stress is valuable.

<comment><USER22> I don't agree that programming interviews are conducted to see how well candidates will fare in a dysfunctional workplace.

Anecdotally, programmers thrive in quiet environments where they can have focused uninterrupted time. As open-offices have become the norm, most programmers have headphones they use to isolate background sounds.

Constantly peppering candidates with questions while they are trying to do a task that is mentally intensive is not close to the type of stress candidates face on the job.

Even the most work-life balanced places do these same types of interviews.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> PSA: if you take TripleByte's online quiz, they don't have the capability of giving you the results of the quiz. At least, that's what I was told when I took the online quiz -- they couldn't share the results with me because the quiz is "adaptive" and scores and questions vary each time the quiz is taken. (I have no idea how they're able to do anything useful with the quiz results if they don't record them and the scores vary so greatly.)

I have no faith in TripleByte or their process at this point, especially since I feel I was somewhat taken advantage of (I did the online quiz expecting to get some feedback -- isn't that the point?). I'm certain they will use the collected data from my quiz to build their product, though.

<comment><USER23> I did it within the last week and got scored in 6 areas. It's just a whole number out of 5 points in each area, no further info.

I did the 2hr phone interview later and received my interviewer's notes on my performance, which were more detailed and helpful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> > These are concepts that are far more common in interviews than they are in > production web programming

So of course let's talk about a dozen different types of them!

Welcome to Ford! To be considered for this position, please list every GM Model from 1983 to 1987.

</comment><comment><USER26> The last good paying work I had I somehow passed the coding interview, but I bombed out of the last few I had and went back to basics. I signed up to Project Euler and Hacker Rank and have been doing problems from them.

What I do is start the Linux program "recordmydesktop", and then go about solving the problem as if I am interviewing, i.e. on the clock.

One thing I noticed is these programs use maps, characters, use 64 bit long numbers, do string manipulation, do certain type conversions and so on more than I usually do programming. Some of these things I would usually look up, such as how to type convert a character '7' to an integer, or create and populate a multi-array and things like that. So I made sure how to memorize how to do these test-tending things.

Then I watched over my recordmydesktop sessions to see where I ran into trouble. I noticed array one-offs were a problem - getting an index out of bound error, using < instead of <= etc. Or I would declare a variable before a loop and use it initially, but forget to assign or reset it at the end of the loop when it needed that. Sometimes I would declare a variable like k and then re-use it in the same method. Also, if I ever have to switch to a web browser to look up what call does a string reversal, I note that as well, and if it is common enough, I memorize how it is done so I don't have to look it up again.

Memorizing the string manipulation, map etc. functions is already working for me. I am getting better at some of the other problems, like not assigning/resetting variables at the end of loops (I put a comment next to them that they will need to be assigned/reset, and then do it later, and then erase the comment). Some I still have to work on, like reasoning about exactly where the array boundary is. These aren't things I mess up necessarily, but things that slow me down, and cause bad compiles or runtime errors.

I can already see the improvement in the problems I am doing. I had been letting myself naturally memorize some of these things, I guess it's not so bad that I am memorizing more of them that I may need.

</comment><comment><USER27> For anyone interested, I took notes on _The Algorithm Design Manual_ for JavaScript if you are studying chapters 3 through 5 like the blog post suggested:

[https://userinterfacing.com/tag/algorithms](https://userinterfacing.com/tag/algorithms)

<comment><USER28> Thank you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Big discussion at the time: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11246917](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11246917).

</comment><comment><USER30> Is it just me, or does this read like a massive farce? That everything that Triplebyte is trying to solve they just... can't?

</comment><comment><USER31> I just went through a small exercise with a company ... we did an hour screensharing on coderpad.

basic exercise was in php (mix of systems, but there's existing php to touch). financial service industry, and they'd mocked up a rough idea of a typical problem. The example code _clearly_ wasn't production, and was generic, but also illustrated the problem domain well enough for them to get an idea of how well I could adapt.

I got through the 'nut' of the problem in about 10-15 minutes, talking through some issues. One thing I'd ignored (and said I'd be ignoring) was date handling - they wanted some date sorting thing, but since this was just 'raw' code without any good helper libraries, I suggested we punt on that (and I named the libraries I'd typically use for date handling).

There was one spot where the interviewer suggested the ?? 'newer' null coalescing, where I'd been looking at doing some 'array_key_exists' checking. he'd suggested that the ?? syntax was easier and more compact, and I'd countered with I'd prefer to be more explicit about the specific keys I wanted to check for, and that ideally I'd be using a class or some other more defined structure to ensure some degree of valid data shape as a first level of sanity checking. I'd felt I may have pushed back a bit hard on that point, but, we moved on.

After the first 15 min or so, we'd spent another 15-20 talking about different ways to do other types of error handling, some potential performance issues, etc. High level stuff, mainly, which... there's only so much you can do with coderpad (my jetbrains and vim muscle memory did me no good in the browser!)

All in all, though, I'd felt it was a decent exchange. They were able to show a 'real' problem without relying on any proprietary stuff, it was difficult enough that someone junior probably would have struggled a bit more, the guy on the other end was pleasant, and engaged appropriately (responded to questions and casual banter, and interjected now and then to ask questions and give feedback in real time). It was probably one of the better 'tech interviews' I've had (although I haven't had many in recent years, so, hard to compare). It did seem better than many I read about, and certainly better than some from 10-15 years ago.

<comment><USER32> I'm the CoderPad guy dropping in to mention you can switch to vi keybindings in CoderPad settings!

<comment><USER31> Thanks. I didn't see that up front, and was more concerned about the timed aspect of our meeting/review, but I'll keep it in mind. Thanks for the tool!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> (I think I made a similar comment to a similar submission a while back)

I suggest this type of interview:

Both the interviewer and interviewee get a problem to solve and they work _together_ to solve it. It should be new to both of them, so the interviewer can better assess its level of difficulty without the bias of knowing the solution beforehand. This will enable natural empathy for the candidate.

It also shows how interaction would look like in every day kind of work. You can learn a lot about another person's skill by doing pair programming.

Logistically speaking, you can whiteboard the design/code, or sit around a big screen for the coding part, with whatever tools/IDE the candidate likes to use (s/he should be writing most of the code, even if the solution/design was a common process).

</comment><comment><USER34> It's a programming "test" right? Sometimes I wonder if it's better to solve the problem in isolation, to show that I can sit on a problem and go at it, or to solve it in a collaborative manner with the interviewer, to show I'd play well in a team.

Sometimes when I read people saying the end goal is not to solve the problem weird. Does that mean those who solved the problem alone by losing a few hairs actually scored worse than an outspoken candidate who solved it with help from the interviewer?

<comment><USER35> You can ask them what they prefer. Also, communication is an important element - in real work you may be spending time on something that's already obvious to someone else, or getting stuck on an approach which is known to not work.

I think actually solving those problems or failing in the end is random (unless you know the answer already). But if you get a good chat out of it, it may be in your favour.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I came up with my own set of questions that hopefully show how a person can deal with human complexity at work (the bulk of our issues), rather than memorizing algorithms. Some people don't like it - but it works for me: [https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-realistic-hackerrank- develo...](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-realistic-hackerrank-developer- interview-question-list.html)

</comment><comment><USER37> I recently came across some videos from Interview.io, which seems to be in the same business as triplebyte, the company behind TFA.

I thought the interview seemed quite nice. Is this the type of coding interviews, HN is always complaining about, or is it some rosy best-case exhibition?

Example interview: [https://youtu.be/tj_sBZw9nS0](https://youtu.be/tj_sBZw9nS0)

</comment><comment><USER38> > Mentioning other offers in an interview heavily biases the interviewer in > your favor.

Is this really true? Also, how do you just mention offers? And will the programmer interviewing me really care? Should this only be done at the HR stage?

Like, what's a good way to let the other person know that they're not the only one.

</comment><comment><USER39> Triplebyte/HackerRank etc is a great filter for companies that view their developers so low they would subject them to such pre-employment screens that no other employees in the organization must jump through.

<comment><USER40> I took their test once for fun once a few years ago. A few months ago they suddenly added me to their "newsletter". Every week I would unsubscribe and the next week I would receive their spam like clockwork. I complained that they need to fix the unsubscribe link. Two months later some hapless customer support person gave me a very informative email about clicking the unsubscribe link at the bottom of their emails.

Not a company that has things together to say the least.

<comment><USER41> Same experience here, did their challenge once, only feedback they will give you about your performance is something like "exceptional" and then they keep spamming you every day even if you said in the questionnaire you aren't interested in a new job.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> <irrelevant comment deleted>

<comment><USER43> you probably wanted to comment on [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19344146](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19344146)

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> The key to success in any interview, but especially in a programming interview, is practicing as much as possible. It's not enough to start just a few days before the real thing. The best method of preparing is incorporating your interview prep into your everyday coding practice, so that you'll never fall behind, even if you aren't currently searching for a job. But the plan "to practice" is too vague and leaves a lot of programmers unsure of how to get started in the process, which can be overwhelming. If you're frustrated and aren't sure how to get going on your coding interview practice, follow these steps to get started.

1\. Review the basics. Even experienced programmers and engineers can get tripped up when questions about algorithms and data structure come up. If you haven't yet mastered the basics, focus on this for a few weeks or months to get yourself ready to tackle the bigger problems. It's crucial, not only for a coding interview, but for the entirety of your professional career, that you understand the basics. They are your foundational skills upon which you will build and master your expertise.

2\. Solve coding problems and work on projects. Online coding practice problems are a great place to start. Apply your knowledge and work on projects you enjoy. Write code. Build things. Put your skills to use. This should be the fun part - if you aren't enjoying the journey and the process of building your coding skills, you'll have a difficult career as a programmer. Sure, there will be moments of frustration where you'll want to smash your computer screen and throw your mouse at the wall. But forge on. Keep trying. Find those bugs and destroy them. Build great things, and immerse yourself in online forums and other communities where you can turn to for help when you really get stuck.

3\. Use online coding interview platforms for practice. This is a great way to get exposure to how the real coding interview will feel. Smash your nerves and anxiety by conducting a full coding interview with a partner. On platforms like Pramp and Leetcode, you'll get paired with another programmer of a similar skill level, so it will scale to your ability. Together you'll experience the coding interview from both perspectives. Performing the role of the interviewer and the interviewee will teach you a lot. After the mock run, you'll both leave each other feedback, and this is a great thing to have to tailor your practice schedule and for identifying what you need to work on the most.

</comment><comment><USER45> Is there any evidence that coding interviews aren't just tests for 1) general fluid intelligence or 2) memorization?</comment>


Ask HN: How do I resign? - <AUTHOR> Without giving too much detail, I'm a pivotal member of my small startup.
Things are to a point that I am unable to cope with the effects it's had on the rest of my life nor can I even manage the workload of the rest of my life weren't an issue.
Part of this is my own failings. I got into the role much too early in my career and have a number of shortcomings that definitely didn't help me along.
I tried hiring but struggled to find someone good enough at the salary I was permitted to give.
Overall, it's coming to an end, and shouting out "I quit!" becomes more attractive by the day. Even by the minute.
All that said, I want to be responsible while still moving quickly toward my goal of being gone. What things do I need to consider? Am I open to any legal ramifications (co-founder status, technically a C-level)? I'm in over my head and can't sustain it any longer. <comment><USER2> If you're a co-founder, get legal advice. Don't rely on what people have to say here. Speaking from experience as someone who started a business with a friend, things can get ugly when you want to part ways; even in the very early stages. Sorry to hear that it didn't go well, and best of luck in your future.</comment>


Ask HN: How long till the worlds Lego bricks biodegrade? - <AUTHOR> Will civilizations a million years in the future be digging up Lego?
What is the half life of a Lego Brick - is it longer than Plutonium?
If Lego keep making more and more Lego, how long till the world fills up with Lego? <comment><USER2> > Most LEGO pieces are made of durable ABS plastic and will never decompose. > Some pieces are made of other plastics, metals, silicon, and other elements.

Source: [http://www.brickrecycler.com/lego-fun- facts/](http://www.brickrecycler.com/lego-fun-facts/)

Also of interest there was an article that found bricks keep their holding strength for ~37k attachments.

</comment><comment><USER3> When it gets caught in a forest fire, it will melt, boil.

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

</comment><comment><USER4> What's the point of your question? Why do you target Lego specifically? I don't think that thrown out Lego bricks has any measurable impact on our environment compared to other sources of plastic waste.

</comment><comment><USER5> I don't care how long it takes them to biodegrade. I just want to know how long before they become worn enough to not cause the most agonizing foot pain known to humankind.

<comment><USER6> Never.</comment></comment>


Study: Redbox Will Destroy the Entertainment Industry - <AUTHOR> http://newteevee.com/2009/12/08/study-redbox-will-destroy-the-entertainment-industry/

<comment><USER2> I think Redbox is part of a bigger trend: automation will destroy tons of service jobs and "hurt" a lot of established industries in the process. Blockbuster/Redbox is a good example. I can replace a 5000 sq ft store and 10 employees with a kiosk that takes up a few sq ft. Selection might not be as good, but it's good enough for most people.

Or take your typical restaurant. There's almost no reason that 95% of the waitstaff couldn't be replaced by ordering kiosks at each table. It would reduce errors and reduce costs. Or what about convenience stores? Figure out which items make up 90% of your sales, put them in an automated kiosk and put one on every street corner. You're now selling almost as much (or maybe even more) with dramatically lower costs.

I think it's a good thing overall, but there will definitely be some big losers economically from such a dramatic shift.

<comment><USER3> Good thought analysis, but in general, there will always be people willing to pay to be waited on (in your restaurant example). If anything it would be more accurate to say fast-food workers would be most in trouble. Being a waiter is a skilled job afterall =)

<comment><USER2> There may always be those people, but convenience and price win over personal service. Example: Wal-Mart.

<comment><USER4> if it was for price people wouldn't go at a restaurant, but just buy the cooked food and eat it home.

Most non-cheap restaurant ($12 per meal and over) will just not automate. Think about it, you can get your coke/cola from a vending machine and it has been like that for ages, but you are still not able to get the beer/fancy drink. Even if sometimes they can be rude, a bartender is part of the experience.

<comment><USER3> I should have also edited my post to add:

I frequently (3 times per week) go to tea houses to program, in order to get out of the house. Some spots cost upwards of $6 dollars, for TEA! Do I spend the money? Hell yes;

very simply because pretty asian girls serve you the tea with a smile.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> from the article: It should be noted that LAEDC's mission is to "attract, retain and grow businesses and jobs for the regions of L.A. County," so it has an agenda.

</comment><comment><USER6> Study: On-demand instant HD movie streaming will destroy Redbox.

<comment><USER7> "Acquiring Rights" for DVD rentals is vastly easier than getting the streaming rights to HD content.

<comment><USER8> As you can tell by comparing the Netflix DVD library to the Netflix streaming library. And that's with all the money and influence of Netflix, plus a strategic partnership with Starz (which itself has clout).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I had a terrible experience with Redbox, I liked the idea of avoiding the teenagers at Blockbuster, but when I rented a movie it was unplayable because it was scratched beyond repair. I suppose I could have contacted their customer service reps, but at the price of a rental vs. my time it just didn't make sense.

On the other hand, I wish I had shares in their company.

<comment><USER10> No need to wish, they are part of a publicly traded company, cstr (Redbox is owned by Coinstar).

[http://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:CSTR](http://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:CSTR)

<comment><USER11> Which is also one of those "Why didn't I think of it?" companies.

Coinstar makes machines you dump your change into and, for a percent of the transaction, prints out paper bills.

Free money! You build the machine, give the store a percent of the cut, and every (non-premium) store will let you put one of those up front.

They're in every Safeway I've ever been in. I'd expect to see them in Wal- Marts, Targets, etc. too.

<comment><USER12> It has to pay the store well enough to cover the cost of the Safeway manager standing in front of the machine, scratching his head when it jams up.

<comment><USER8> Really?

Vending machines, pay phones, and coin-op laundry machines are all the same business model, and typically, that business model involves the owner of wherever the thing is installed calling the owner/operator of the machine when it breaks down instead of fixing it yourself. My landlord knows nothing about fixing the washer and dryer in my apartment building, that much is for sure.

All the head-scratching should probably boil down to "put an out of order sign on it and call Coinstar" at worst.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I understand DVD sales from retail outlets being harmed. However, I've always wondered why rentals get harmed, doesn't Redbox have to follow the same channels as Netflix, Blockbuster and pay for DVD's that are rented? I've always wondered how the rental portion of the market in terms of revenues works.

<comment><USER14> I don't work for Redbox so I don't know for sure, but I'm speculating that they maybe using the Krispy Kreme model (i.e. their growth is based on expansion). In other words, since they keep opening up new kiosks they can move product that is not selling well in one kiosk to another new kiosk, rather than it being a sunk cost if they buy product for an area and it doesn't end up selling well. At some point, they may end up collapsing in on themselves if they are not able to raise their prices to account for such write-offs (as their expansion slows). Though my theories could just be hot air since I neither work for them nor am I an MBA (or an economics major at that).

I know that they are looking to raise prices: [http://www.insideredbox.com/redbox-begins-testing-higher- ren...](http://www.insideredbox.com/redbox-begins-testing-higher-rental- prices/)

Blockbuster is trying to compete with kiosks too: [http://paidcontent.org/article/419-blockbuster-adds-dvd- vend...](http://paidcontent.org/article/419-blockbuster-adds-dvd-vending- kiosks-50-machine-pilot-redbox/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I don't really see why...$1/rental is cheap but then if you watch a lot of movies Netflix is arguably cheaper (and has a vastly better selection). I think they ought to be more worried about movie downloads for a monthly flat rate.

</comment><comment><USER16> I realized yesterday, DVDs take the piss. A hand-span of plastic to store less data than you could fit on a micro-SD the size of your fingernail. This is an obsolete medium.

I wonder how soon the general public will see it?

</comment><comment><USER17> Redbox = dvd for big screen and instantly accessible to the mainstream customer. It has already crossed the chas. When everyone has set top boxes it will be obsolete. But that is not happening for a long time.</comment>


Some people swear by Alcoholics Anonymous and others despise it - <AUTHOR> https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/1/2/16181734/12-steps-aa-na-studies <comment><USER2> My name is Cliff and I'm an addict.

I see a lot of misunderstanding in the article and in the comments here that I would like to address. I am very familiar with NA, AA's narcotics-focused sibling, having found sobriety for 15 years now. I will be saying NA, but please understand that what I say also applies to AA.

I never really understood why the twelve steps work, until I did. This is a long and rambling explanation of what I have learned.

If an actual cure for addiction was found, almost everyone in recovery would jump at the chance. The view in NA is that addiction is a disease and that there is no cure the best we can hope for is being "in recovery" as opposed to being "in active addiction".

There are three main phases to a success story in NA: the newcomer, the sponsor and the relapse. All three are necessary for long-term treatment of addiction.

The newcomer is a very emotional person often burying their emotions at the expense of those around them. Imagine the cognitive dissonance of one who loves their family members, but steals from them all-the-same. There is nobody with whom to discuss these feelings outside of NA, nobody who will understand. This leads to coping strategies which are unique but ultimately ineffectual.

Addicts typically exhibit above-average intelligence. It is very difficult to maintain a $200 per day addiction while your social skills, dependability and general appearance are quickly declining. This intelligence allows an addict to continue in life by "working around" the issues they encounter until that becomes impossible, this is what is referred to as "rock-bottom". At rock bottom the only choices are jails, institutions, death or recovery. For those lucky enough to seek recovery, NA provides a vocabulary and tool-set for correcting those the issues which have been piling up in the addicts life.

The twelve steps start off with three steps which are impossible to achieve without hitting rock-bottom. Admitting powerlessness over addiction, believing that there is a power greater than oneself which could restore sanity and making a decision to turn one's will and life over to that higher power. Once an addict is ready, these steps take very little time to complete.

The remainder of the steps walk one through the process of coming to terms with their lies, justifications, crimes and other misdeeds. Often the last 9 steps are just repeating your inner-dialog of the past few years out loud with another person, because it is hard to hide the faulty logic when there is someone actively listening.

Once an addict is able to face reality, it is important to engage the community and to start collecting responsibilities such as making the coffee before the meeting or setting up the chairs. These small responsibilities provide a way to prove oneself to the group as well as to oneself. The responsibilities allow an addict to begin rebuilding a life where they are used to being relied upon.

Once someone is able to feel good about where they are in life, it is time to move onto the next phase, sponsorship. It is easy to justify relapse once you are in a good place, after you managed to crawl out from rock-bottom. That is why sponsorship is so vital.

It is said in "the rooms" that "we keep what we have only by giving it away". To avoid relapse, we need to be aware of what is called "euphoric recall" where you only remember the good and forget the bad. To keep the memories accurate, we need to constantly talk about the problems caused by addiction and to keep from having the same conversations over and over again, newcomers are essential. sponsorship is a two-way street with the newcomer gaining an understanding support group and the sponsor being reminded of the malfeasance of addiction.

Sponsorship is also the next step in collecting responsibilities. It moves the responsibility from the group to another individual who relies on you in a life-or-death sort of way. The stakes are much higher and one is hopefully less likely to lapse on them.

The third and final stage is relapse. Relapse is a part of recovery and if we fail to recognize this, it is only that much more difficult to revisit the idea of recovery. Relapse can happen at any time and with or without reason.

In the end, the twelve steps are one way to treat addiction and it works for a lot of people. I believe that it is better if we try something which is sensible and has been shown to work. That being said the twelve steps do not claim to be a cure, but rather a rocky and dangerous road which leads back to sanity.

"Keep coming back, it works if you work it, so work it because you're worth it."

PS. The higher power I chose was NA itself, this allowed me to avoid the religious aspects while putting my faith in something more than a door-knob.

<comment><USER3> Hi, my name is reactor and I'm an addict.

I can concur, I'm going on two months of sobriety from alcohol and stimulants tomorrow morning, only on using the 1st three steps and my employer's EAP. For now, the 1st three steps are enough to get me going plus an intense fear of where I was headed for (jails or institutions or death). I know I will have to ask for help to complete the 4th step but I still don't talk a lot at the meetings beside presenting myself when I'm asked so this will come when I'm ready or meet a suitable sponsor I guess. Maybe I will ask publicly if someone is looking for a "protégé" \- is that the right word? - and would be interested to help me when I go get my 2 months' key ring on Saturday evening. I think it would avoid the awkwardness of asking to many people. Anyway, what Cliff is saying is exactly right as far as I can tell so far..

* I'm also reading Russell Brand's book on the 12 steps, it's called "Freedom from Our Addictions". It's a very good "update" for newer generations about what the 12 steps are and why you should follow them if you need to.

<comment><USER2> Thanks for sharing, I would advise you to hang around after the meetings and just get to know people after that you should ask if any commitments are available and take any that pop up. Finding a sponsor is a personal journey, and you should concentrate on finding someone who you can relate to and who you can look up to; remember it's a two-way street.

Do not rush into anything, this is a journey and the first steps are enough until they're not and when that happens you will know it and hopefully you will have become familiar enough with the regulars that the choice of sponsor will become obvious.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I suppose I'm in the "despise AA" camp. After decades of alcohol abuse, I quit drinking using Naltrexone following the "Sinclair Method". In my opinion it's a far more rational and reasonable treatment program as compared to AA's 12 step.

I would encourage anyone who wants to stop drinking and doesn't feel well served by AA to try to find a doc willing to prescribe Naltrexone and give it a try.

<comment><USER5> Did you pair with CBT or something else or just the Naltrexone?

<comment><USER6> In the UK Nalmefene is approved for this kind of alcohol treatment also. It's less toxic to the liver than naltrexone so GPs can prescribe it (without specialist intervention and liver checks).

Disclaimer: am shareholder in manufacturer. Feel there is a massive lack of emphasis on novel pharmaceutical interventions in drug and alcohol rehabilitation.

<comment><USER7> > In the UK Nalmefene is approved for this kind of alcohol treatment also. > It's less toxic to the liver than naltrexone so GPs can prescribe it > (without specialist intervention and liver checks).

Hadn't heard of nalmefene, thanks for the reference. Naltrexone is also useful in much lower doses than the standard 50mg tablets, as "low-dose naltrexone" (1-5mg).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Bill Wilson, one of the two founders of AA, was an enthusiastic proponent of using LSD to treat alcoholism. He had taken LSD himself, found it helped him, and thought it could help others.[1][2]

Needless to say, AA itself rejected this approach, and Wilson's experience with and advocacy of LSD as a promising treatment for alcoholism is not something they like to publicize.

[1] - [https://aaagnostica.org/2015/05/10/bill-wilsons- experience-w...](https://aaagnostica.org/2015/05/10/bill-wilsons-experience- with-lsd/)

[2] - [https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/aug/23/lsd-help- alc...](https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/aug/23/lsd-help-alcoholics- theory)

<comment><USER9> Considering the amazing preliminary results for LSD and ketamine in treating depression and other illnesses likely related to neurotransmitter issues, I won't be surprised at all if LSD helps addicts as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Anecdotal experience with a men's AA group that a friend of mind joined (and brought me along for moral support): a big part of the value that AA provides is a support network for dealing with some of the trauma and self-loathing that they had previously been using alcohol to drown out.

The degree of emotional intimacy in the relationships was something I missed when I moved to a different city and (not being alcoholic) no longer felt comfortable going to meetings.

<comment><USER11> The one thing I am noticing is that every group seems different. I have been several times however found the religious aspect very off putting. I did find being able to talk to others helpful however. If there wasn't the god bothering aspect I'd probably still go semi-frequently today having been sober for over ten years now.

To anyone like me out there, anti-theist but alcoholic, it is probably still a good idea to go to a meeting, at least once. Your group might be very different and even if you don't agree with everything it will show you that you aren't alone.

<comment><USER12> Meetings have made me very accepting of people with different views on these subjects than myself. One story I often return to is of a guy who had been so far gone, when he went to visit his mother the first time in years, she simply closed the door in his face without saying a word. If a man's path from that to healing involves Jesus, I am not going to stand in the way.

I can't remember ever having to explicitly ask for tolerance of my non-belief. We speak for ourselves, in the meetings and afterwards.

I should say that I'm not in the US, and that this might be reflective of being in a society where public displays of religiosity are, generally, less common and less accepted.

<comment><USER11> I am in the UK.

I was certainly welcomed to the meetings and at no point felt uncomfortable or was made to feel 'bad' for my non-belief. I just find when everyone talks of how Jesus helped them, and the hand holding prayer sessions an obstacle to my participation.

I believe it's possible to get sober without needing a 'higher-power'.

Interested to see the downvotes to my comment. HN is a funny place indeed!

<comment><USER13> I dated a sober person in the AA program for a number of years. They had 15+ years which I applaud.

I agree with you that one of the things I didn't like was the whole higher power cruft. They say it can be anything as long as you acknowledge that it's greater then you. I know some people who's higher power was the sun or other celestial bodies, because they were atheist and highly scientifically minded.

I'm with you, I believe it's possible to get sober without a higher power. I think I remember reading some where that while AA doesn't publish success rates, at one time they did and it's 5%, which is the same percent for cold turkey.

<comment><USER11> Thanks for the comment.

My logic is that to overcome your addiction _you_ need to take control. Having a higher power is unnecessary, you have to want to do it for yourself and only you can actually achieve it. Others can help, but mentally, physically and emotionally it needs to be all your own work or it won't work.

That said, if it works for people then great! I think such an organisation is very important, it's just a shame for me I can't participate as the I disagree with the fundamental element. Ancillary stuff is great.

If there was need for it, I'd be up for helping with any online, atheist/secular AA style program. I feel some sort of duty to help others as unless you have been there, through all the shite that goes with it, it's hard to understand.

<comment><USER13> Right on!

It's funny, I was raised in a restrictive religious environment and rebelled against it early on. I remember asking my dad one day why god couldn't help me clean my room, the response was, "God helps those who help them selves".

So I do the work and he gets credit? No thank you!

You're absolutely correct, it is up to you. There are external(non super natural) forces that can help, but ultimately it is the internal that has to start and sustain through change.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> So... the big factor muddying the waters for AA is that it is, in many cases a state-sanctioned option where "anonymous" behavior modification (have you checked in with your sponsor?) takes on the force of law. It's possible to have a substantial variation in your treatment by the courts as a result of whether heavily AA-associated folks around you say that you are getting with the program or whether you are still in 'denial' (it's not just a river in Egypt, fnarr fnarr). I have met people whose continued freedom as non- violators of probation or parole more or less depends on the say-so of various quasi-governmental types as to whether they are paying lip service to Bill Wilson.

I'm going to say that I'm fine with the idea that if people find the rooms work for them, great. However, the idea that a program that doesn't show any real statistical effectiveness as compared to secular programs should be adopted by the state is creepy and weird and fucked up, and no amount of bullshit dodges ("your higher power can be a cat, or a doorknob") makes this less fucked up.

<comment><USER2> I agree, I do not like the idea of mandating a twelve step program in a legal setting. It actually makes the rooms a little more hostile, but it is accepted because maybe one of the people ordered to attend might be willing and ready to take part in recovery and it would be a shame for that person to miss out.

I was ordered to attend, but luckily it was after a long time being in the rooms willingly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> My father was an alcoholic and went to meetings for over 20 years. Then, one day he felt strong enough to stop going to meetings. A few years later, he was dependant on opioids, which began as a perscription to back pain. I have my doubts he would have gone this direction had he still had the support of being "in the program".

Also, I'd say I've been to well over 100 of these meetings as a youth. I'm really happy I did, as it led me to see how some of the most beautiful people lost everything due to their substance abuse issues, which in turn led me to lead a clean life.

</comment><comment><USER16> Look. The posts talking from experience about naltrexone and therapy are good...But let's not mislead people.

AA has been incredibly successful over the years. Yes, it needs to be done in conjunction with therapy. Yes, psycho-pharma can help in massive ways. Those are things that anyone trying to get sober should also look at.

AA doesn't work for all personality types. But it's far too fashionable for armchair scientists on the internet to shit on something that has helped more people than you can possibly imagine.

Just because you are a smart person and you get all the jokes in Rick and Morty doesn't mean that you are the all singing all dancing voice of dispassionate inquiry. There are people that need to know that help if available to them and that it works.

Your opinions on this and most other subjects are useless, but in this case it might stop someone from getting help.

If you think you have a problem, please talk to a doctor or find an AA chapter. They will help you.

<comment><USER17> AA has not been "incredibly successful" over the years, that's just factually incorrect. AA fails for the vast majority of people who try it.

[https://www.vox.com/policy-and- politics/2018/1/2/16181734/12...](https://www.vox.com/policy-and- politics/2018/1/2/16181734/12-steps-aa-na-studies)

>Lance Dodes, a retired psychiatry professor from Harvard Medical School, looked at Alcoholics Anonymous's retention rates along with studies on sobriety and rates of active involvement (attending meetings regularly and working the program) among AA members. Based on these data, he put AA's actual success rate somewhere between 5 and 8 percent. That is just a rough estimate, but it's the most precise one I've been able to find.

A big reason why people criticized AA/12-steps is because it is not evidence based and, frankly, some of it teachings are factually incorrect.

And the biggest problem with AA is stated in TFA: "rigid interpretations of the 12 steps can even lead people to reject treatments or approaches that work for some people."

Expecting a treatment to be evidence based isn't being "an armchair scientist." We should absolutely demand evidence based treatment!!

AA is really just a support group/fellowship. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not a medical treatment so let's not keep pretending it is. I think this quote from TFA is spot on: "...one of the big non-spiritual reasons that 12-step treatment and AA work for some people: They help foster changes in a person's social network."

[https://psmag.com/.amp/social-justice/75-years-alcoholics- an...](https://psmag.com/.amp/social-justice/75-years-alcoholics-anonymous- time-admit-problem-74268)

>In any other area of medicine, if your doctor told you that the cure for your disease involved surrendering to a "higher power," praying to have your "defects of character" lifted, and accepting your "powerlessness," as outlined in the original 12 steps, you'd probably seek a second opinion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Kind of tangential, but I found the AA 12 traditions really interesting; these aren't about recovery, but about how the groups are organized:

1\. Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon A.A. unity.

2\. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority – a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.

3\. The only requirement for A.A. membership is a desire to stop drinking.

4\. Each group should be autonomous except in matters affecting other groups or A.A. as a whole.

5\. Each group has but one primary purpose – to carry its message to the alcoholic who still suffers.

6\. An A.A. group ought never endorse, finance, or lend the A.A. name to any related facility our outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property, and prestige divert us from our primary purpose.

7\. Every A.A. group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.

8\. Alcoholics Anonymous should remain forever non-professional, but our service centers may employ special workers.

9\. A.A., as such, ought never be organized; but we may create service boards and committees directly responsible to those they serve.

10\. Alcoholics Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the A.A. name ought never be drawn into public controversy.

11\. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, and films.

12\. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities.

Specifically I find it interesting how the anonymity really comes out not in how people relate to each other, but in how the group relates to the world: there are no formal leaders, entanglements are avoided, professionalization is avoided, and the rules keep the concept of AA from being confused with any individual. The traditions feel like a kind of governance to avoid governance.

<comment><USER19> I really like the traditions. I think they are a very good foundation for keeping small groups of people cooperating and I wish they were emphasized more outside of recovery programs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I have not had a drink for 33 years. I know a fair amount about AA. One fact is that one of the principles of AA is to maintain anonymity at the level of "press, radio and film" This principle has been stretched quite a bit in recent years, but if I was a member, I would not state it in print. I think one of the best description of how/why AA works is by Charlie Munger (Warren Buffet's Partner) in his book "Poor Charlie's Almanack" He describes the various mental models that we humans use, and talks about how AA uses the "Lollapalooza Effect" to help alcoholics beat their addiction. One big issue with AA, as brought out in the article here, is that there is no official AA regulatory branch. In any given cluster there is self policing, but a new person must be aware that this society is a great place for Con artists to hide out also. I know many people who have stopped drinking and gone on to great lives. I also have a great collection of stories about crazy people and cons I have met along the way. TLDR summary: AA really works, but especially at the beginning- be careful.

<comment><USER21> > I also have a great collection of stories about crazy people and cons I have > met along the way.

Sounds interesting and would love to read a blog post if you write one.

<comment><USER20> Thanks, I have been planning to start writing when I grow up for quite some time now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Anecdata aside, it seems like almost no one here has read the article. It talks about research, the scathing Atlantic article, and medication.

My take is this: AA works for some people. That doesn't mean it should be "prescribed". It varies from meeting to meeting, it's shame-based text (Big Book) might cause harm, and secular support groups seem likely to work as well or better.

No one is saying AA didn't work _for you_. That's just a totally different argument than "AA should be society's first (and sometimes only) treatment for the disease known as alcohol addiction."

</comment><comment><USER22> I wish there was something like AA (or any effective treatment) for Internet addiction. Its special feature is that you can't realistically quit the Internet entirely, especially when you have a profession that relies on constant Internet access.

<comment><USER9> I seriously doubt the disease model of alcohol addiction is analogous to Internet addiction...

But there are support groups for almost everything, and there's always talk therapy for your own individual struggles.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> My father was in AA, and I'm reasonably sure it saved his life, or at least lengthened it substantially. It was a major factor in getting him out of a spiral of depression and business failure.

For him, it put him in touch with a community that understood his depression (in a way that I, in particular, never did), and helped him work through that. Stopping drinking was ultimately almost incidental -- it was the initial goal, obviously, but that was only the beginning.

He also said he saw a lot of people come in to the program because they felt like they needed to tick a box labelled "recovery". Some of them had been sent by the courts as a condition of getting visitation rights for their children, or by well-meaning marriage counselors, or to prove to themselves or others that recovery was impossible. Very few of those people stopped drinking and changed their lives. If ticking the box was their goal, then arguably it's a success by that metric, but by the program's own goals, of course it wasn't.

From his point of view, AA is a tool, if you want to change your life, you can use the AA steps and community to do it, and your odds are fair, although of course there are no guarantees ever.

</comment><comment><USER24> I stopped drinking four years ago.

What is consistently missing in the conversation about addiction is Alan Carr's book "The Easy Way to Stop Drinking" and "The Easy Way to Stop Smoking"

reddit/r/stopdrinking is also an invaluable resource.

</comment><comment><USER25> My experience is that people that really get into AA and find it useful have translated one addiction, to alcohol, into another, AA meetings. People that go to a meeting, or more than one, every single day, and get twitchy if they don't get their fix. I suppose that's healthier than getting blotto all the time, but it's not something most people can tolerate, and is difficult to sustain.

It wouldn't be so bad if it was a program solely for people that needed that kind of overriding presence in their life, but AA is also swollen with people that are forced into it because they've fucked up and are court-mandated to attend for X weeks because they made a poor decision and got pinched for a DUI or other alcohol-related brush with the legal system. For those people, it's something they need to endure, and get to the other side of, so that they can get on with their life, and the AA model of perpetual recovery and rhetoric about "dry drunks" if they don't buy in is actively harmful.

<comment><USER17> Yeah, I have a family member who gets his kids for the weekend and instead of interacting with them he leaves them in his house in front of the TV while he drives from AA meeting to AA meeting. All weekend! And he hasn't even drunk alcohol in like 20 years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> The brain is complex. Addiction is complicated. It's just not reasonable - based on our current knowledge of both - to expect every treatment to work everytime for every person.

Perhaps some day we'll figure out how to get the brain to completely unlearn addition. We're not there yet. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try.

p.s. despise is not a good word for this context.

<comment><USER27> addition is an interesting typo because essentially whats going on is brainwashing for the purpose of eliminating an addiction, and we have massive brainwashing infrastructure around substituting many phrases in the place of "addiction" although addition would not have been the first choice LOL.

We have enormous budgets trying to brainwash us to buy laundry detergents and cars and vote for politicians but as we know from extensive work in those fields that the individual susceptibility to brainwashing varies quite a bit by individual, demographic, culture, etc. It would not be a excessive extension to propose that anti-addiction brainwashing is likewise highly unpredictable.

The good side of alcoholism being uncurable is if we found a brainwashing method to perfectly eliminate it, the technique or pill or meme or whatever would be abused for consumerism and political purposes into an amazing dystopia. Admittedly a sober alcoholism free dystopia, but a horrific dystopia none the less.

<comment><USER26> I'm reading "The Brain That Changes Itself." Thus far, very interesting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Anecdotal, but from my own experiences with recovering (and not recovering) addicts in my family, the AA/NA approach seems to only redirect addiction away from the drugs or alcohol outlet, instead of "curing the disease" of addiction itself.

All the recovering addicts I know are still addicted to something in one way or another. The new addiction may or may not be a healthy one. For instance, running 100+ miles a week, every week - while objectively better than drinking yourself out of a job and home - isn't exactly "healthy".

I also notice a higher level of selfish behavior among the recovering addicts I know. It takes an insane amount of pathological selfishness to neglect your responsibilities, especially children, for the bottle. AA doesn't seem to address the selfishness as much as just to get folks to stop drinking.

All of this is preferable to having a raging drug or alcohol addict in the family, but it's far from a perfect solution IMHO.

<comment><USER29> > All the recovering addicts I know are still addicted to something in one way > or another. The new addiction may or may not be a healthy one. For instance, > running 100+ miles a week, every week - while objectively better than > drinking yourself out of a job and home - isn't exactly "healthy".

So very, _very_ frequently, addiction isn't "the" problem, it's a symptom of one. The behaviors you mentioned are in the same vein, something used as a way to work around whatever the problem may be. In my case, the relief I experienced from alcohol blocking out an underlying anxiety problem I didn't understand I had (and made me not care about the ADHD problem I knew I did have), it was like a miracle. The inability to speak to others, rationally work through life's tough issues, heck even my grades went UP... everything got better. And for a good 16 years it kept on being that miracle to me, going so far as to hide the worsening social, emotional, and mental calamities it was causing.

> I also notice a higher level of selfish behavior among the recovering > addicts I know. It takes an insane amount of pathological selfishness to > neglect your responsibilities, especially children, for the bottle.

Funny thing about this... I've come to believe that most folks who haven't experienced addiction just can't initially grasp the fact that (assuming an underlying psychological/emotional issue), the addict doesn't see the addiction as selfish, even when it disrupts everything else in their lives. There's this inexplicable compartmentalization that occurs when self- medicating via addiction, sort of like, "They don't understand how this helps me!". Which, in a way is true; they don't. But neither does the addict. Most folks who are on their way down to the rock-bottom don't understand that the activity or substance is a (terrible, and temporary) way to deal with a larger problem they either don't know they have or don't know how to properly address. All they know is that it works. Even when their destructive behavior completely isolates them, leaving them feeling alone and hopeless because it feels like everyone is against helping you to feel better, it still feels like it works.

> AA doesn't seem to address the selfishness as much as just to get folks to > stop drinking.

AA, in its own way, does its level best to address this given the understanding of psychology/psychiatry at the time the Big Book was written. And to be fair, if everyone actually mustered up enough strength and humility to get past Step 5 (heh, myself included), this might be less of a concern. But from a 30k foot view, it IS a good framework to approach lasting recovery, and you replace "selfishness" with "underlying psychological problem causing the addiction" in your observation, it's probably a bit more of a clearer picture. For me, and for the vast majority of the wonderful people I lived with during my 6 months in a sober living facility, meetings were only going to be as effective as long as I was being monitored. Some folks (like myself) even found that attending meetings and hearing stories about drinking was a trigger, and although I appreciated the friendships, it was counterproductive.

What ultimately and completely removed my desire to self-medicate with whatever was on hand was CBT. The meetings were absolutely necessary for the initial support I needed to stop the destructive behavior, but CBT gave me the tools I truly needed to understand why I felt the way I did, and how to handle the thoughts and emotions that seemed to come from nowhere all my life. Although I am a believer (and give Him the credit for all I am today!), CBT has the benefit of not requiring anything other than walking the difficult path through your own screwiness. Once you've acquired the tools to handle your own brain, attending meetings may not even be necessary in order to maintain lasting sobriety. As always, YMMV, CBT is powerful enough that I'm of the mind non-addicts oughta do it too. Heck, the world would probably be less messed-up place.

Today, I'm ok with not tracking my time spent sober or keeping a heavy constant focus on what was a symptom of my problems. I'm screwed up in all kinds of clinically fascinating ways, but now I deal with it sans substances.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Despite it or love it... all I know is that the fellowships and programs of both AA and NA saved my life, so they worked for me. Thank you Bill and Jimmy and the countless others that came after you.

Does that mean it will work for you??? Who knows? Thing is, what do you have to lose by giving it a try? If it doesn't work, we can always refund your misery (that's an AA joke, lighten up, rule 62).

In all seriousness, whatever treatments or programs you follow which help you overcome your addiction, ( whether its AA, NA, CA, HA, a different A, church, signage, template, rehab, treatment center including Malibu Recovery ) doesn't matter as long as you get better. And don't let anyone ( including me!!! ) tell you different!!!!

"My God bless you and keep you til then"

<comment><USER17> The potential harm was given in this article:

"In some cases, rigid interpretations of the 12 steps can even lead people to reject treatments or approaches that work for some people."

There's a huge for-profit, unregulated "rehab industry" in the US that charges insane amounts of money for all sorts of unproven "treatment." There's harm in getting fleeced to line someone else's pockets.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> AA refuses to publish the data on their effectiveness. Which tells me they are not as good as other secular options.

<comment><USER32> They used to. It's 5%.

Effectiveness for quitting cold turkey...is 5%.

<comment><USER33> I can't imagine they ever published the data since I can't imagine how they could even collect it.

Anyone can walk in and no one needs to provide any identifying information so how would you be able to track anyone over any period of time?

<comment><USER32> They used to publish the effectiveness but quit in the early 80's.

It's easy to track anonymous users when the same anonymous users show up for the same meetings for years. AA has had a LOT of meetings over the years, so coming up with a baseline of effectiveness isn't a vexing problem.

Why they quit publishing those numbers isn't exactly a mystery, either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Somewhat dated, but good:

[https://www.orange-papers.info/orange-secrets.html](https://www.orange- papers.info/orange-secrets.html)

</comment><comment><USER16> Here's what a lot of you are saying:

This treatment devised by sick people for sick people out of desperation doesn't make much sense to me as a healthy person. It doesn't feel very science-y when I think about it.

And a lot of you are quoting Pen and Teller. Good work, you can watch TV. Thanks for you input.

<comment><USER35> Some of us "healthy" people have seen our parents, siblings, spouses, and/or friends go into programs like AA and NA and come out no better or even worse off than before.

Our anecdotal evidence is just as good as yours.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Those that swear by it are those that defeated their alcohol reliance while in AA or replaced their alcohol reliance with a reliance on AA events.

Those that despise it are either aware that AA is a placebo at best and a distraction at worst or they loathe it because it is so heavily established as "that thing you do to manage alcohol problems" that courts can send you there (even if you're not an addict and the reason you ended up in court was poor judgment, e.g. DUI).

<comment><USER37> > Those that swear by it are those that defeated their alcohol reliance while > in AA or replaced their alcohol reliance with a reliance on AA events.

It's anecdotal but in my case I replaced a reliance on alcohol by a reliance on sports. It's likely a lot healthier than drinking but it's a reliance/addiction all the same. I went to a few AA meetings and it didn't work so well for me, always seemed to be a lot of guilt and shame floating around the room, though this could have just been my local meeting, too. In the end, it works for some people and that's great. It didn't work for me but I found another way, and that's great, too.

<comment><USER36> The only problem with saying "it works for some people and that's great" is that it is known that sending people to AA performs worse than just leaving people to their own devices.

If you get the flu it takes about two to three weeks to recover from it naturally. Imagine there's a flu cure that extends that to two to six weeks. Sure, some people take the cure and get better in two weeks while some who don't may only get better after three weeks. But it's still blindingly obvious that you'd be better off avoiding it and those that got better after two weeks would have likely recovered as quickly on their own (or using a different cure).

Some AA advocates argue AA has a higher success rate than widely reported but the problem is that AA is extremely secretive about the actual numbers and sees recovery as a lifestyle rather than a process. AA doesn't aim to cure alcoholism, it just aims to keep people sober.

Some people simply are more prone to addiction. Teaching these people to cope by channeling that addiction into something healthier than drugs (or gambling or whatever) is great but that's not really what AA aims to do.</comment></comment></comment>


Puke Green & Incredibly Ugly Ottoman  - <AUTHOR> http://boston.craigslist.org/gbs/fuo/2144038840.html

<comment><USER2> That is quite ugly, I wonder if woot monkies are accepted for trades</comment>


Thousands to receive basic income in Finland - <AUTHOR> http://www.demoshelsinki.fi/en/2016/08/30/thousands-to-receive-basic-income-in-finland-a-trial-that-could-lead-to-the-greatest-societal-transformation-of-our-time/ <comment><USER2> I've been reading about these kind of experiments for years now and they all do the same mistake: it's not basic income if it has a deadline.

Almost nobody will leave his job / stop looking for one / risk a complete career change if that income is not guaranteed for life.

<comment><USER3> Plus there's always the risk that the government can take your income away from you for any reason.

It's almost like taking away a child's allowance...

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > Finland is about to launch an experiment in which a randomly selected group > of 2,000–3,000 citizens already on unemployment benefits will begin to > receive a monthly basic income of 560 euros (approx. $600). That basic > income will replace their existing benefits. The amount is the same as the > current guaranteed minimum level of Finnish social security support. The > pilot study, running for two years in 2017-2018, aims to assess whether > basic income can help reduce poverty, social exclusion, and bureaucracy, > while increasing the employment rate.

<comment><USER5> Hmmm. Wasn't the idea that basic income would be for everyone? Not just the unemployed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> So what if I got more social benefits before? I suppose I can deny the nomination, but how is it supposed to work in general?

If I got no social benefits before it's all golden. If I get the bare minimum anyways, yay for less bureaucracy and allowing me to take a small job without loosing money by falling out of the social benefits.

But what if I got more? There will be some good reason for me to get more, like illness or handicap, higher income before loosing a job (it's a little strange, but makes sense so people don't loose their house by failing to pay off the loan on it), children, student that needs to pay rent in the city and university etc...

If they get the same it's just a decay of the social state.

</comment><comment><USER7> I thought many countries had already basic income for people not working? In France we have RSA what would be the difference here?</comment>


Remix – A React framework from the creators of React Router - <AUTHOR> https://remix.run/ <comment><USER2> If it's like the early days of React Router, expect major breaking changes every 6 months.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ha!</comment></comment>