I stood up to my boss, then he got promoted - <AUTHOR> https://idiallo.com/blog/become-an-executive-one-promotion-at-a-time <comment><USER3> A few years back I got a new manager and this was her first people manager role. She was awful. Micromanaged about useless things, bother you at odd hours for not very important topics. Her whole team would usually just sit around and say "I can't believe how bad she is."

I got a feedback request from her boss, so I listed 3 things she could do better. Pretty sure her boss wouldn't follow up.

Had my 1-on-1 with her and she asked "Any feedback?". I thought for a second, then just went "what the hell, let's do it", and spent the next 10 minutes telling her all the things she does wrong.

She was incredibly thankful for the feedback as no one else was willing to give her direct feedback.

She didn't change overnight, but we had an absolutely great relationship after that. If I didn't like something she did, I told her right away.

I even blew up at her about a year later because she kept cutting me off on a big presentation. She apologized and it never happened again.

It was a gamble, but it paid off.

<comment><USER4> Ages ago I was a crappy manager at a crappy job and honestly too young to manage myself even.

It was one of those places where managers saw themselves as little hall monitors or police looking at what people had on their desk and I'm ashamed to say I played along.

So one day I'm talking to this guy who was fed up and labeled a problem and he says something like:

"Does any of this even matter, do we do a better job because of it or do any of us get paid more?"

Everyone complained bickered about the rules, but nobody has said it like that...I didn't have an answer.

I suddenly realized, yeah this is all just pointless aggravation for everyone. So I quit enforcing dumb rules and we all had a better time... the managers above me talked about these rules and sent out all sorts of emails and directives to enforce them, and somehow me not doing it wasn't even noticed.

The place didn't get any better, but at least if you were on my team you didn't get hassled about stupid things.

<comment><USER5> It's like tragedy of commons for management. The manager gets nothing by enforcing corporate rules on his team. But not enforcing them usually doesn't cost them anything while improving team morale, good will and in most cases retention, productivity.

I see many managers strictly follow up on logging leaves or restricting work from homes or enforcing release deadlines as if it personally costs them something while usually enforcement is just discretionary. The managers who have figured this out usually have happier teams.

<comment><USER6> Sounds like mismanagement in the higher echelon. The team leader should lead up the chain to ensure deadlines are realistic and hindering restrictions are dealt with.

How does he do this? By complying with corporate rules to show good faith and intervene when necessary.

It's also important that he understands the rules and communicates them to the team.

The team manager should be on good terms with upper management and the team.

This is hard and requires skill.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The lesson is that going over your bosses head and complaining higher up the chain is not seen as initiative. It is seen as a communication failure. If your boss is bad at their job, you are still supposed to be able to communicate with them, work with them, and get problems resolved. If you hold back from talking to your boss, build up grudges, then launch them uphill.... even if your facts are correct, you have just become a problem.

On the other hand, if you had been having ongoing discussions with your boss so everything was out on the table, and just weren't getting anywhere with your boss, then you could mutually escalate it in a productive way, working together to request some higher-level assistance.

Working well with people is often more important than being right. Because a group of people who work well together will work mutually find the correct answers, using everyone's strengths, and helping each other grow in the process.

<comment><USER8> It feels like this comment and the other comments in this thread are all dancing around the same issue: The problem is incompetent people getting ahold of power in an organization. _How_ that comes to pass makes little difference: maybe they have personal connections to leadership, maybe they just got lucky and failed upward, whatever it might be: as soon as leadership fails in their jobs in this way, i.e. promoting the incompetent, then the company is already dead.

These people are like a cancer, and just like a cancer, as their influence grows and their power grows, the patient, the business, suffers. Sometimes businesses can last years, decades, with a number of these tumors if they're controlled, or if the business is just so healthy that it can take the strain they put upon it. But in my mind, as soon as competence takes a back seat to who you know, as soon as that line is crossed by any member of the company leadership, then that's the end. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when.

And this one I don't know how to solve. Were I a C level executive in a company, I'd constantly have my eyes out for this kind of shit, and excise it as soon as I could. But it seems most C-levels don't care all that much. Maybe I wouldn't if I was at that level.

<comment><USER9> The trouble is, everyone thinks their boss is incompetent.

<comment><USER10> I don't.

Our upper management is incompetent because they are so removed from what we actually do, and show no interest in learning about it.

But my immediate manager is very far from incompetent.

<comment><USER11> This is universally true of all upper management. See the SNAFU principle[1]

[1] [http://www.jargon.net/jargonfile/s/SNAFUprinciple.html](http://www.jargon.net/jargonfile/s/SNAFUprinciple.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > I don't know if there is a lesson here. But if you are bad at your job, it > pays to have good connections.

The lesson here is that companies are social entities, not technical ones. Relationships matter more than profit. If you're going to play the "game of thrones" as it were, learn the rules first.

<comment><USER13> > If you're going to play the "game of thrones" as it were, learn the rules > first.

Agreed. Or decide to not play. And just leave to a different job.

One thing though that I see _far_ too commonly is that engineers think that people in power "don't know or care" as opposed to "don't want to know or care" or "know damn well and want it this way". People in power may not be geniuses, but they likely aren't incompetent either. They probably have a fairly solid level of political skill or they wouldn't have gotten to that level.

Start from the assumption that things are shitty for a reason or you are going to miss something important.

<comment><USER14> does "decide to not play" ever worked out well? I have never seen it.

<comment><USER15> Get financial independence and escape the need to kowtow to those who don't have your interests in mind.

Tech is one of the few industries where this is possible fast.

[https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly- si...](https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-simple-math- behind-early-retirement)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is completely typical story. I worked at a bunch of companies and had a chance observing this over and over again.

The truth is that life is not fair.

You and your manager were playing a different game. While you were spending your time and resources trying to do good for your company and to get better at doing that, your manager was spending time scheming in his own interest and also getting better at it.

He beat you with experience. You were spending your time in Jira and IDE while he was building up his own image, perfecting ways to shift blame and building connections.

And you know what? It is fine. Just ask yourself, "would I want to be that person?"

<comment><USER17> My answer is no.

I have a deep lack of respect and huge hatred for these types of ass holes. If I became this type of person I would hate myself.

However, you are right in the fact that many people are like this exist and life is not fair. My hatred is just a personal preference. I can see a lot of people answering your question with a yes... which says a lot about people in general. Most people are ass holes and that's life.

<comment><USER18> > Most people are ass holes and that's life

Whilst I tend to agree with this "between the lines" as it were, it's not an attitude I can healthily recommend. Re-shape it to "most people are trying to get ahead and that's life" is a much more helpful way of looking at various situations, and makes human behavior much easier to understand and predict.

You may also find that it reflects back on you some.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I read it all. Mistakes were made due to inexperience. Lessons should have been learnt. Wiser should he be by now.

Being aware of enterprise politics and learning how to play them will give you the opportunity to really impact the business.

Never be the guy who says:

1\. "nobody does this in the enterprise"

2\. "we are doing all of this wrong"

3\. "we need to start from the beginning"

4\. "my manager is wrong"

Whispers and grabbing coffees with people are much better weapons than being the one that always brings the harsh truth into the meetings.

Beware: pointing fingers to a colleague or your manager to upper management is telling them that they are not making their job good enough, they are not noticing things, and since they tend not to fail and to notice everything, the failure must be you.

<comment><USER20> >2 "we are doing all of this wrong"

I wouldn't put that so boldly, as I've done that many times and so far have had a relatively successful career as a consultant but also full timer (including manager). Admittedly, it made people very skeptical initially and made the first months less pleasurable, including ruffling feathers. Longer term, somehow that approach has been fairly rewarding.

However I'm sure there's a better way. I'm just the inherently direct type.

<comment><USER19> I agree with you, and I've done that approach, but it is really more painful and it only works if later on you are considered a Guru (by them, not by you), hard worker and a go-to guy who always helps. And it takes longer to work.

The subtle way is less painful and you begin with the right foot.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > Other departments rose, the company changed its business model and was > bought for 1.1 billion dollars by a private firm....

> They were not fired. They were promoted. The manager is now the Vice > President. The lead now leads in the most profitable department. The old VP > is now Chief Product Officer....

> But if you are bad at your job, it pays to have good connections.

Were they bad at their jobs? Maybe their job wasn't actually doing good work. It was getting the company purchased for 1.1 billion dollars.

Not the company I want to work at either where that's your job, but it's apparently a lot of the world.

Once I understood this, it made a lot of organizational behavior make more sense to me. It didn't make me _like_ it. But most organizations aren't actually oriented around doing quality work (of _any_ kind of work, internal or external). That is not the job anyone is actually set up to do or incentivized to do. And I'm not totally sure they'd succeed as organizations if they were, that's not the way the world is set up, apparently. Yes, I am having some cynicism problems.

</comment><comment><USER22> In preparation for their first lousy boss (I hope that I'm not it), I advise my less experienced reports to first think hard on what's important to them about their job before acting. Since the organization might not be working from their view of what's fair or rational, they should plan around some best and worst case scenarios of acting on that belief.

For instance, if working at that company in a particular position is the most important thing to you, then standing up to your bosses is a bad tactic. They could clip your wings or worse. Or if the pay is the most important thing to you but you can get that pay somewhere else, then you should probably leave on good terms for another job. I've seen a lot of people put themselves through unnecessary drama because they just reacted.

In my case, I find bad bosses to be intellectually and emotionally offensive. So, I will work the system to either see if they can be better or manage them out. This is a _terrible_ way to manage your career if you care about job security.

But I plan accordingly. I had to build up my savings, create a strong internal network of people across departments with similar values, deliver business results to build credibility with more senior managers and execs, etc. And most importantly, recognize that I could lose and be ok with it. There are some real downsides, but it works for who I am.

I know folks here are beating up the author for being naive or whatever, but I respect people who put skin in the game for what they believe is right, trying to build a better environment, and helping people that they care about.

</comment><comment><USER23> Once a company gets past ~20 employees the CEO can't evaluate employee competence directly and has to rely on proxies.

In sufficiently large companies, gaming these proxies gets you promoted faster than doing great work. This is one reason big incumbents eventually fail.

<comment><USER17> I propose required anonymous 3 month evaluations from all team members to be evaluated by a department that is unbiased.

Maybe even a computing system that raises alarms when a score falls too low to prevent corruption.

You gotta balance this right with more checks and balances though as you don't want employees overpowering management either. It's a complicated thing.

Some managers have

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> The lesson is:

Next time your favorite manager and tech lead quit the company, ask them why.

<comment><USER25> No kidding, after reading about all the antics, I forgot how the story started. That should've been a huge red flag.

<comment><USER26> This has always been a rule that I've followed throughout my working career. Whenever someone leaves or is fired, invite them for a coffee or a drink and listen to their side of the story.

There's this Latin legal maxim that I learnt from my mum when I was a child, and have always remembered ever since: "Audi alteram partem"[1] which roughly translates to the same.

[1]: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audi_alteram_partem](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audi_alteram_partem)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> A bit of a different angle on this.

A companies may value folks in non-management roles who:

* Do what they are asked to

* Don't cause problems

* Solve their own problems

* Make the boss look good?

Note that being right on technical matters may not be on this list! Sometimes the hero's would be great managers - but if they are not manager's, all that good energy may be wasted or a negative from a companies view.

I've had this (unfortunate) experience and learned from it! I really did have the capacity to do all this great stuff. But not in that position.

Some quick suggestions.

* Provide feedback if asked, but get on with things if its not adopted (don't make business personal if you can help it)

* Make some of your own suggestions in areas the boss isn't addressing. That can look a lot like good initiative.

* If you have options take them, don't hang around too long!

* If you don't have good options outside of your current position - check to see if you are overestimating your skill etc.

* Ask yourself - will my pattern of behavior, ignoring the specific technical details, result in others (managers / co-workers) interested in working for me?

* If you want to fight the product fights / set direction - become a manager!

You generally can do this by a) getting some cert / education somewhere AND b) switching jobs OR telling your boss you'd like to become a manager and get them to describe the pathway needed - then check if the timeline they share + 1 year is reasonable.

If you become a manager make sure you can efficiently write memos and can write reasonably well.

If that doesn't work and you are really great - start consulting or start your own shop.

</comment><comment><USER28> I've been in a similar situation. Very well liked and popular at the company, including with the founders. Often gets praised in public and is the go to person from many employees when they want advice or just to gripe. Saw somethings at the company that I thought weren't good, and most of the employees complained about to me as well. I thought I had some influence with the powers that be, and so did many of the other folks (e.g. I was encouraged to speak up because I had influence). So I did, quietly and privately at first, and a little louder as time went on. Everything I did was completely ineffective. I learned that public praise and apparent influence is very superficial, and evaporates when it comes to anything deep rooted.

</comment><comment><USER29> I've been this person a few times, so I sympathize while seeing all the mistakes they made.

Some people have no problem with office politics. Some people don't notice or seem unaffected by it. I have a hero complex (or a sense of ethics if you want to be generous), and I can't be a full time employee anymore. Freelance work helps me keep boundaries in my work.

<comment><USER17> I'm having this problem too. It's hard for me to stay silent. I tell my friends about the things I do or say and they tell me that I'm just giving away all my intentions and political moves.

I don't manipulate people and I'm told I'm extremely straightforward. I'm not a hero though but when politics affects me like it always inevitably does, I don't play the game, I'm emotionally unable to.

<comment><USER30> Refusing to play politics is also a political strategy. It won't work in every situation. Sometimes, being blunt will work out very badly, but sometimes your candor will be respected and your opinion will be sought out because of it. Refusing to play the game can put you in a position above the fray.

You won't be promoted to management, but if that is not your goal, it may not matter.

<comment><USER17> This is true. I've been in this type of situation before but I always attributed to luck rather then a political strategy.

I'm thinking a combination of bluntness and deception is the best middle ground.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Everybody in non-tech companies should realize they are viewed as stupid ants doing all the work while another class rules them with different governance they have no chance to penetrate.

The main issue of our industry is that it is now transforming from tech- friendly into the "same old" approach of other industries, including all FAANGs. There is no space for apolitical geniuses any longer.

<comment><USER32> Not at big companies. But there are lots of smaller ones.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> This blog was painful to read because it hits home on several points. I've been in the working world since the mid-1980s and have seen this type of scenario several times. It's unfortunate, it's frustrating, but there's usually nothing you can do about incompetent management except simply to leave.

Fortunately, technology is a good profession and there are always choices. I've learned over the years not to fight City Hall; if you have no power, you're just a faint buzzing in their ears. Those who are busy sucking all the money out of an organization aren't going to just stop because of a lecture from a technical lead.

Your first duty is to take care of yourself and your family. That may mean removing yourself from a toxic environment and starting over elsewhere, possibly for a cut in pay or seniority, but over the long haul you'll likely be emotionally and professionally better off.

<comment><USER32> The only way to get a serious promotion in this field is to change companies. Start over elsewhere with a boost in pay and seniority, when the getting's good. The company has absolutely no loyalty to you, so you owe it none.

But individuals do deserve loyalty. Try not to lose touch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I read this story and found it interesting to notice how the author seemed not to have any perspective other than his own. He seemed to regard himself as central to the company, when in reality he was just one of many employees, who had been hired to do a job. Those hiring him seemed to be interested in the sale of the company and securing their own positions, which they appear to have managed well, by running a sham department, that they could present as being a success.

<comment><USER35> The author is suffering from "Bridge over the river Kwai" syndrome - <USER2> wholly concerned about technical implementation while ignoring larger strategic concerns.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> The only thing you can do to hurt a bad manager is to quit, depriving him of your good services. Eventually he will be sacked, but not before you.

</comment><comment><USER37> Nothing gets fixed if you don't say anything, but the odds are always supporting the fact that this bozo was placed by another top bozo.

The leaders who appreciate this, will go the extra mile to develop trust and/or open door with ICs but if you aren't 100% sure you have this, it means you don't.

Bozos excel at social aerodynamism and those who start to like them are to be worried about just as much. Bozos can even end up on boards, VCs or public figures. Never assume there are rules, never assume someone is addressing the obvious problem.

In the end, if you sniff a bozo, pack up and go. That's your only move.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericjackson/2012/01/31/why- ever...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericjackson/2012/01/31/why-every- company-needs-a-no-bozo-policy/#26d2e84e11d3)

</comment><comment><USER38> This might not be helpful, but it appears the OP struggled for so long because they were too attached to the project or an unrealistic expectation of growth. It's critical to get feedback about your choices and to second-guess your attachment, if only to have that evidence or perspective available to you. Without it, it's highly likely unexpected events carry greater personal risk, like a re-org causing a lot of distress or even happening unexpectedly at all. How aligned are you with the business leaders? It's worth trying to meet people outside the team on a quarterly basis.

The other sad result here is that the OP chose to fight leveraging a rational argument versus the buy-in of others. It's easy to call the other side stupid, but the reality is you have to convince them of your perspective and not necessarily that your argument is right. To make matters worse, corporate structure is fundamentally opposed to threats from below. You can have green hair and get fired because they only want people with purple hair.

Stories like these suggest (at least to me) that engineers need to work a bit more to reshape the industry into a gig economy. That means being more open to changing jobs, supporting portable and open technologies, and also establishing a more transparent hiring process. There's a huge gap between supply and demand for engineers. That gap will be around for a while. Leveraging that gap should provide a path for preventing stories like these.

<comment><USER38> To the downvoters: would love to hear stories similar to that of the OP. I personally have never seen somebody in that situation win without major buy- in, especially from managers or C-levels. But wouldn't mind being shown wrong.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> All talent should leave these types of companies. Can't be the VP of anything if everyone gets tired of your shit, leaves, and the company fails.

</comment><comment><USER40> > While she was a great lead, we saved the managerial position for someone who > was more suited for the job. Someone who could talk engineer and business > all at the same time. Someone who has been groomed for the job.

I'm struggling with this, and I've struggled with it before. What I think you're saying is that you have an ideal candidate, but they're not enough so you need to pull in the perfect one from the outside. You don't want to invest in them instead, which would be cheaper.

"Someone who has been groomed for the job."

Why not train/groom them yourself? You already have the talent and the potential. That £10k signup bonus could pay for a whole course of training to get a loyal and well educated leader who already knows the business intimately.

It's a problem in its own making because a business fails to appreciate the talent it already has. Which is the same reason why so many people leave for new jobs, because their talent isn't recognised.

Best way to get some acknowledgment is to get a fresh job offer 50+% above what you currently get with wild enthusiasm to get you on board.

<comment><USER41> My impression was that there were two open positions, one for a lead and one for a manager. The team wanted to promote someone from within to be lead and look for a new manager because they didn't have a good candidate to promote from within. The company moved a new manager in from another part of the company and this manager brought in their choice for lead, displacing the person that was favored by the team.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I stayed too long in a job at a company that was turning / had turned toxic. It takes that experience to be able to not only recognize it in the future, but also know to act on it before it goes too far.

The combination of these two statements in the post give me the "chills of recognition" of a bad situation:

> In a company of a thousand, everyone knew me by name. I've created dozens of > tools that are still used in the company to this day.

> I was assuming a position of leadership, I was very popular, yet I had no > power.

If this is you, you need to evaluate your situation coldly and logically. Why do you have no power? You're either delusional about your level of influence and utility within the company, or the company is a boys club (I believe the term 'lifestyle company' was used to describe a previous place of employment of mine) and you're not a member.

And fundamentally, do your "network of influence" research before you tattle on ANYONE. That's a primary school lesson.

</comment><comment><USER42> This is a tough lesson for engineers to learn, but whether you are right or not doesn't even really matter, it's the relationships and how you present it. I cringed when I ready about going over your manager's head in front of all the other managers. Life at work is not a code review where everyone is equal and you get to +1 and -1 everyone's ideas.

<comment><USER43> Should be a minor problem, unless the leaders are psychopaths, which they obviously were in the story so worthless of any effort.

<comment><USER42> If you have to take every problem to a VP or council of managers that means that you are ineffective and unable to sway anyone with your ideas. If the site is truly down like he said and his manager won't fix it, he should let his manager take the fall after raising it. Nobody thanks the messenger in a situation like this.

<comment><USER43> Most problem and change requests should not require manager involvement at all. In practice though, an org tend to optimize for top-brass to micromanage more and more (see: Scrum and "Agile"). You will be told to solve the issues, while higher-ups make all the shots, unwittingly causing some long-term trouble. If you correctly identify gaps and skillfully tell the right managers, they will be very glad for you pointing out risks and suggestions. Just don't expect too much at once and play the long-term game.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Going over your boss's head won't end well because of misaligned incentives.

Your boss's boss is responsible for the boss. Responsible for any failures and any successes. Acting on a failure you reported would be a black mark on their report card. That's not gonna happen.

Few managers care about doing the right thing — that's why they're in politics... ahem....management.

</comment><comment><USER45> Whew, I've seen this one first- and second-hand a few times.

I worked for a global multi-national for around 17 years, through a few acquisitions, and through a 6-9 month lay-off cadence that often came with overall restructuring and rotating/changing managers. I remember one individual, in particular, we'll call him "Bob". This guy's ignorance was rivaled only by his arrogance. Bob ended up taking over the team that myself and a coworker (who I shared an office with) and almost immediately started causing grief. A series of boneheaded, and very expensive decisions were made which effectively eliminated the department at the next lay-off cycle. Somehow the Bob not only survives another set of layoffs, he gets promoted and is now in my direct reporting chain. Almost immediately, any interdepartmental communication was forbidden (and I'm talking "Database Admins" not being allowed to e-mail "Unix sysadmins"), and similarly, much of his department started crumbling. I got out quick and my coworker, Greg (not really), entered a new level of hell.

Though my department changed, my location didn't, and I still worked with Greg 75% of the time. Greg felt his wrath, daily and I got a bit of it "by splash". Then Greg saw an opportunity -- he was asked to discuss a project with the CIO, our department Director and VP. Greg didn't hesitate to bring up Bob[0]. It went over like a lead baloon; holy cow, the whole mood in the room changed. Something we hadn't known -- Bob hung out with a lot of folks in the office outside of work. He worked at the main office, which was much larger and in a different time zone than us and our Director. The VP in the room was also from the main office. Shortly after the meeting, he was informed by his boss that she had spent the last hour "begging for them to not fire [coworker]". Yep. They were all friends.

Well, my story has a bit of an uglier ending, but not one that isn't deserved. The struggling company was purchased by a competitor and the CIO was replaced. Several layers were added above Bob. The new headquarters was in a city far enough away that they had their own networks, isolated from the old guard. Incredibly, Bob started making in-roads well before the acquisition was complete and had already begun trying to sully the reputations of people he considered "enemies". One of those people was Greg.

Now, Greg had a few people who didn't like him. He was very cut-and-dry, blunt, but he was an "attack the idea, not the person" kind of guy and if you understood that, you got along well with him. He was/is crazy smart, articulate and has a personality of the kind that you want to get behind because you know he's going to be doing something great. And he'd slept at the new office the entirety of the previous week making sure that the infrastructure side of things went off without a hitch.

We're in a 9-person meeting "war-room" for the acquisition, and the CIO walks in -- I throw him a (sadly, over-prepared question) about REST and our (non- existent) service infrastructure and he mentioned something about Clojure. My coworker is introduced[1] him and he said "So, what's the deal with Bob? ...". He attacked the person. And went on for 15 minutes, deadpan, facts-only, listing every failure and its inevitable origin: a decision Bob forced down the department's throat. I watched the new CIO get more and more disgusted -- he was a rare beast -- a C-level at a multi-national who understood systems and didn't have a skillset that was a decade out-of-date[2]. The CIO politely excused himself from the room, which was completely silent at this point save for my coworker and remained that way for a solid minute after the guy left the room[3]. Greg had gotten a little loud.

Then we remembered that we were there to watch him address the IT department on the big screen in the room[4]. Someone in tech announced that things would be getting started about 5 minutes late. They started 15-minutes late. Shortly after introducing himself, the CIO apologized and said he had to take care of a "personnel issue" that required a little more time than he had expected. The door opened and our (new) department VP walked in, "[CIO] just got off the phone with HR and Bob. He was informed his services are no longer needed." Greg was on his feet and the room erupted. For literally months after that happened, people from the "old company" would call Greg (remote office) to thank him. What was amazing to me was that literally everyone except for 3 people in IT management and leadership _knew this guy was at fault_ and yet he continued to increase in his ability to cause problems. It turned out that the prior week had been spent by the new CIO trying to wrap his head around the boneheaded architectural decisions he was inheriting. All of these decisions had one name behind them and that guy had been with the company for 10 years!

[0] I don't recommend it. This guy, though, had stones and if given the opportunity to address the issue with someone higher on the chain, it trumped any fears of him losing the job. "If they're not going to trust me to tell the truth when it's hard to hear, they're not someone I can morally work for." He had brought it up to every single person from above him up to the CIO, why not the CIO?

[1] That's an understatement. He was one of the major reasons infrastructure integration happened at all. The CIO looked at him like he was some mad genius.

[2] I recognized the same on the development side when his Clojure response, despite not being a choice I would have made (unfamiliarity), was backed up with an argument that wasn't marketing or otherwise buzz-wordy.

[3] Someone started with a "So......" at some point, I'm sure.

[4] The company had a studio -- really cool -- and complete stage/audience room. We could have gone, and some did, but we were "war rooming" for the past week and a few of us weren't sure if it was just the left-overs from lunch that had stunk up the place.

<comment><USER46> That would have been incredible to witness.

<comment><USER45> So incredible. It still feels like it happened to somebody else. While writing that, yesterday, I realized that I was a participant in the whole situation most of the time. Not the first CIO meeting; George was downright crazy for doing that, but he disagrees with me on that. In that second CIO meeting, I contributed a few points of my own; but really, Greg had the stones to speak up -- I wouldn't have had he not gotten the ball rolling, so my contribution isn't something I really remember much of.

I'm pretty sure I got the quote from the new director perfectly, though -- it was a moment in my life where I felt like I had witnessed "the right decision being made, even though it was tough to make" along with a whole mess of vindication for the tens of times I had butted heads with Bob. Someone looking skeptically might attribute some form of good will toward Bob. That's cool and I hope he's all right. He had family and friends; I'm sure someone found him to delightful. We never met the great Dad that he might be. We got stuck with laser-focused pure-rage.

My favorite Greg, not Bob, story, though is the reason he's among my best friends years after that job. I had started in Desktop Support at a company that was 80% VT-something-or-other _terminals_ in 1997[0]. Greg started a month after me, and shared my work-aholic tendencies[1]. The new VP of our new IT department, who's name is _not_ Wesley, but who was one you could count on to correct you if you didn't use his full, given name, came to our office. We were HQ#2 back then.

To set the stage, he picked a 25-person conference room for all ... 70-or-so? of us, for an hour-long mandatory meeting[2]. He's sitting with his butt leaning against the edge of a whiteboard, standing in the corner, wearing Birkenstock sandals and socks (nothing against Birks; owned 6 pairs in my life), addressing the tightly packed, mostly standing group. Greg is sitting at the oval table in the center. Before Wesley starts talking, it's obvious, he's going for a certain look. It wasn't hipster (AFAIK, too early). Then he started, trying to communicate ... something ... what ... the fsck ... are these words ...? Everyone in the room has a look on their face that resembles some form of straining. He mis-used words, he made new words made out of combinations of obscure words. Poly-isomorphic was used twice among several words that "I don't think it means what you think it means".

Greg told me about a habit he had when people drone on and on. He starts counting those "annoying words", "uh's" and "um's", "you know's" and such and keeps score. It's a curse. I can't help but do the exact same thing[3]. I had to stop when the Migraine hit. Greg was in rapt attention, awkwardly, the only one in the room feigning interest.

Q&A comes up and I ask about our mess-of-an-e-mail[4] platform, and he responds "Netscape"-something-or-other. Greg speaks up and asks if we had evaluated GroupWise, Exchange or another option[5], carefully elevating his vocabulary to sound "intelligent, but not douche-y" and mid-sentence he pauses, blinks, and says "...I'm sorry, ... did you want me to fluff you?"

Now, it's hard to convey how that was delivered without the accompanying voice. Greg's voice is right in the middle; neither booming nor weak. I'd guess he sings around a Tenor range. He delivered this in with the same tone a server at a restaurant, might. There a desire to help in his tone, along with a tinge of innocence, and empathy: "Oh, that's my fault, I forgot to hold the mushrooms for you. Let me just run back and fix that." The words were at a total disconnect with the delivery. He delivered a slap in the face that you feel obligated to tip him for.

It sucked the air out of the room. Wesley lets out an uncomfortable laugh and says, and in his first display of humanity, says "No, no, ..." and the room erupts in laughter. It's 55-minutes into this meeting. Many of the participants in the room are middle-aged very-overweight men who are visibly wet with sweat because it's mid-summer and you _don 't jam that many people into a conference room for an hour_. The collective laughter was like a bomb going off; people left cubicles out of concern to see what the noise was.

Greg was early 20s, I was 19, we were the youngest _in the department_ by at least 5 years, and younger than most by 15. Here's this "equivalent to the cashier" spanking the district manager in front of his entire team on his _day of introduction._ And he was saying exactly what everyone in that room was thinking. _Stones_ on this guy[6].

Funny thing is, for the most part, it became a story and that's it. Our, collective, manager told him "That was awesome" and he never took any heat for it. I'm guessing Wesley was a little embarrassed and just let it go. He stuck around for another year-and-a-half until the first acquisition or-so, and occasionally worked on things with Greg, but it was never brought up between them. Though it wasn't a Hollywood-style "and Wesley had a new found respect for Greg" ... I think Wesley realized, rightly, that Greg was an "equivalent to a cashier" at the time and wouldn't be competing for his job before he was long gone.

[0] That was flipped in 6 months, but the most used app was a $100 product we had to install to handle whatever VT-weird escape sequences this thing used to display colors and accept input.

[1] My dad is a happily retired small business owner with a fierce work-ethic. Some would say workaholic. I was his son. He was an awesome Dad growing up, and is an awesome Dad, now (he doesn't read HN).

[2] I'm bitching, but he brought a fountain coke machine with him for permanent installation on the IT floor only, so we weren't unhappy. Suck it, Google! :)

[3] My apologies if the curse strikes you, now. :(

[4] Lotus CC:Mail - I became an expert in recovering people's inboxes. It was a fantastic piece of software. You could read mountains of e-mail provided you had an IT guy near by who could kill a day helping you de-corrupt your inbox file. It's like your _whole inbox_ was just that _.pst_ file. Still gives me nightmares

[5] I want to say Greg was leaning the lines of postfix/a unix/open-source option, or a straight up Microsoft Exchange buy into the Borg scenario (he was an admirer of Bill Gates back when that was frowned upon /s).

[6] Apologies for the graphic reference ... no better way to describe. It's part bravery. And were it anyone else I'd say "It's a little bit of stupid mixed in" but no, _with rare exception_ this guy knew those were the right words at that time and knew _full well_ he might be forced to walk out of the building (at least, in the early days). I think I've heard him speak a profanity twice, all placed _very_ intentionally to make a point, and used as though they were high explosives to be used in the most dire of situations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> I'd be someone who would have responded to the first HN comment about his workplace as "its a toxic environment, pack your parachute and get out."

I think life is too short to waste it sharing with toxic people. You are just withholding it from the good people. Tolerating political nonsense is a particular kind of fun or challenge for awhile but its really just an opportunity cost in the long term. Be clear about what you see as the benefit when doing so.

This doesn't mean you run from adversity but it does mean you evaluate adversity knowing that it still needs an actual benefit that exceeds its very real cost.

</comment><comment><USER48> Kind of interested in knowing if this was his first job, as there were many, many mistakes made here. This is simply a case of him not understanding his role. Went over bosses head without knowing anything about the relationship between said boss and upper management. Didnt inquire as to why a boss who "burned a team to the ground" in previous position was promoted to his team to begin with. Kept trying to come back to the company for social gatherings even after leaving. Am not sure what the story is here, but I hope he learned some lessons, plural.

</comment><comment><USER49> It's common to promote someone to just get rid of that person :) Sometimes promoting is just easier that firing.

<comment><USER50> Failing upwards, as someone here said

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> Reinforces the idea that managers fail up; engineers fail down.

<comment><USER52> "Promoted to their level of incompetence" is a phrase I've heard before to describe this phenomenon.

<comment><USER32> There is a whole book.

<comment><USER53> The book is _The Peter Principle_ : "In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence."

This leads to Peter's Corollary: "In time, every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out its duties."

The Wikipedia article is a pretty thorough summary of the book:

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> As somebody who was probably promoted up to or above his Peter Principle skills, I sympathize. This isn't how maximally efficient places should work.

But having said that, maximally efficient places are heading to being truly horrible. Taylor time-and-motion and 'sack till it works' is not condusive to good longterm outcome. It works for something like D Day right up until you exhaust the pool of new officers. Then you have to go back and try and instill some motivation in the ones you sidelined hunting for perfection.

</comment><comment><USER55> This story is why you need to spend your f __*s carefully. The author care way too much about his day job. If he's that passionate he needs to start his own company.

</comment><comment><USER56> About 2006, I stood up to my boss trying to cajole me into weakening a credit card processing private network at a big name university. And then I was fired for refusing to do it immediately when all I asked for was to slow down and review the changes. Narcissists throw tantrums if they don't always get their way because they hate not being in complete control. _sigh_

</comment><comment><USER57> I like the inverted pyramid. ;) While not perfect, it is pretty good at exposing unproductive people.

</comment><comment><USER58> Ah the follies of ignoring and not having social capital</comment>


Harvard Asian-American discrimination case opens with packed courtroom - <AUTHOR> https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/harvard-asian-american-discrimination-case-opens-packed-courtroom-n920376 <comment><USER2> Whatever your views on affirmative action, this logic is hard to follow:

 _Harvard 's legal team denied any discrimination in its opening statement at Boston's federal courthouse, saying race is just one factor that's considered and can only help a student's chances of getting admitted._

For institutions that have a limited number of slots available, it's impossible to say race can only help an applicant. I'm not making a value judgement here, just balancing a math equation. If we determine as a society that taking action to correct our structural biases is warranted, then own it. Not just the plus, but also the minus.

<comment><USER3> Unless the external system already has a negative bias against a race and you're correcting for that bias inside your own system by adding race into the equation.

<comment><USER4> I think the issue of affirmative action really comes down to whether people think this is OK or not. The real question is, "is it more right to give privileges to the underprivileged than it is wrong to take away privileges from the privileged?". It'd be nice to just have the former without the latter, but with a limited number of "privileges" available, there just hasn't been a good solution yet (and there may not be one).

<comment><USER5> > "is it more right to give privileges to the underprivileged, or take away > privileges from the privileged?"

In a world with finite resources (admission spots at Harvard) that are already utilized at their full capacity, it is not possible to have one without the other.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As an Asian American I hate how we are "white" or "nonwhite" situationally, to our maximum disadvantage. We're nonwhite so we get racist jokes in middle school and don't get cast as leading actors. But we're white enough to keep out of Harvard and for us to count as "whites and Asians" for tech company hiring.

WTF are "Whites and Asians?" Whites own America, good and bad. They wrote the Constitution and they wrote the Three Fifths Compromise. They created the racial oppression system that Asians fought their way out of. And now because we're successful we're just bucketed in with them when convenient to anyone but us.

<comment><USER7> > the Three Fifths Compromise

Since this is one of my common beefs...

The compromise was written at the behest of the Northern, non-slave states. The Southern slave-holding states would have been perfectly fine with five- fifths representation for each slave. Further, the point of the compromise was to limit the Congressional power of the Southern slave-holding states and was not intended as a value judgement as to the worth of slaves.

<comment><USER8> The compromise was that the Northern states gave southern blacks _any_ representation. The correct value was actually 0/5ths for slaves, not 3/5ths or 5/5ths. Southerners wanted it both ways in that they could justify slavery because blacks were property - more akin to a beast of burden than a farmhand - and not humans with inalienable rights, but when it came to the census, they wanted blacks to be counted as humans, even though they could not vote and had no representation in both the state and federal legal system.

<comment><USER9> > even though they could not vote and had no representation in both the state > and federal legal system.

That wasn't actually always true. In many places there were no race requirements for suffrage and if you were a "free negro" who met the other then-qualifications (male, land owner, etc.) then you could vote. Of course, hardly any black men of the time did, not least because they didn't even have _citizenship_.

This is how we, unlike most other countries, ended up with birthright citizenship after the civil war. It was another compromise. The former slaves don't get citizenship but their children do.

And the issue with counting non-citizens is still true today -- the census still counts non-citizens and federal representation is apportioned based on the census, so the states with large non-citizen populations get representation disproportionate to their number of eligible voters.

<comment><USER10> > In many places there were no race requirements for suffrage and if you were > a "free negro" who met the other then-qualifications (male, land owner, > etc.) then you could vote

Assuming the local official followed the law as written (hint: they didn't). Much like they would have for most of the post-Civil War, pre-Civil Rights Act era, they would have simply come up with an excuse not to let the rare free blacks who met the legal qualifications vote.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > "race is just one factor that's considered and can only help a student's > chances of getting admitted."

If this is their best argument, they'll fail miserably. You're not considered in a vacuum. Your resume is considered relative to the others that have applied. If most other applicants receive +10 bonus points and you don't -- that hurts you. It's not rocket science.

> Yet Mortara argued Monday the lawsuit is not a broader attack on affirmative > action, saying Harvard has simply gone too far in its "zeal" to consider > race. "Diversity and its benefits are not on trial here.

I don't see how they can argue this with a straight face. It's all the same thing just called by different names.

<comment><USER12> > I don't see how they can argue this with a straight face. It's all the same > thing just called by different names.

I think you can argue there is a difference between affirmative action (proactively seeking candidates for racial diversity) and penalizing based on race to keep the number of a particular race down.

<comment><USER6> But admissions to Harvard is a zero sum game. It's not like they say before admissions starts "everyone with 210 points gets in" and then gives 80 points for SAT score, 80 points for GPA, and 25 points for race. It's like an Olympic race where they let the Athlete from the host country start the race 10 seconds early. If the other athletes complained I don't think "we're not hurting you, we're just helping them" would be very satisfying.

<comment><USER13> Say there are 100 people racing, and the top 25% get to advance to the next round. "We're hurting you" is that you have to start 10 seconds late. "We're helping them" is that a few people get to start 10 seconds early. Would you assert that the two scenarios are equivalent?

<comment><USER6> Yes, they're entirely equivalent. I can win the race by 9 seconds and still lose.

<comment><USER13> In this hypothetical, 25% of people advance. If you have to start 10 seconds late, you almost certainly finish outside the top 25% no matter where you were going to finish otherwise. But if a few people get to start 10 seconds early, you'll probably still finish in the top 25% unless you were going to be marginal to begin with.

<comment><USER6> What does it matter how marginal I was? Either I earned it, or I didn't. Does a team only get a Super Bowl parade if they win by 14 points?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Reminder: Harvard consistently rates Asian students lower on personality traits like "likability", which is a part of their admissions process: [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/us/harvard-asian- enrollme...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/us/harvard-asian-enrollment- applicants.html)

<comment><USER15> Despite alumni interviewers rating Asian students about the same as others, I might add.

<comment><USER16> Well presumably if they are alumni then they were given a high enough rating to get in so the numbers are skewed. Unless this is alumni from other universities.

<comment><USER15> No, Harvard alumni interviewing candidates is part of the admissions process. The alumni rated Asian candidates as being just as personable as candidates from other races. Since the alumni are volunteers from all walks of life (other than the obvious fact that they all went to Harvard), the idea is that they aren't affected by whatever is going on inside the admissions office, and the disparity between alumni ratings and admissions office ratings is evidence of systemic bias against Asians.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> If Harvard is trying to admit the top students academically, they must be race blind. If they are trying to admit the future powerful citizens of America, they can use a metric that accounts for that. For example, Beyoncé is more powerful than me, even though I probably had better grades. It wouldn't be outrageous for Harvard to say we want Beyoncé as an alumnus more than me. But be honest about what you're doing then, and don't call your institution an academic one.

<comment><USER17> This really gets to the heart of the matter. Harvard wants to increase its prestige, and it does so by having future CEOs, Senators, and Presidents go to Harvard. But the distribution of potential leaders of society is not equal to the distribution of top GPA/test scores. Should Obama have been passed over from Harvard Law for someone with a higher GPA (or GW Bush for Yale)? If you want to argue that Harvard _should_ only use the grades/test scores metric, you have to argue for it, as it is not self-evident.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Wow, this is a long time coming. Good luck to the Asian-American community.

<comment><USER13> Some (probably lots of) asian-americans don't support this lawsuit, because they see it as a veiled attack on affirmative action: [https://abovethelaw.com/2018/10/first-edward-blum-came- for-t...](https://abovethelaw.com/2018/10/first-edward-blum-came-for-the- voting-rights-act-now-he-aims-to-gut-affirmative-action-with-the-help-of- asian-americans).

<comment><USER19> I'm curious as to why any asian american would support affirmative action.

<comment><USER13> My personal view (as an asian american) is that the United States owes african americans a debt that overrides the goal of perfect fairness to everyone else. Almost all asians came here (or their parents came here) voluntarily. The ancestors of african americans, by contrast, were brought here in slavery and then legally discriminated against until very recently (if that discrimination is even over). The United States has an obligation to fix the damage it caused by that.

I view it not as "discrimination against asians" but a tax to pay for debts long ago incurred. My family came here long after the decision to go to World War II, but I'm obligated to pay taxes to pay off the debt we still carry from that war. Likewise, the United States and the state governments enslaved and discriminated against african americans long before I got here. But those governments still exist as going concerns, are obligated to fix the damage they did, and as someone coming along after the fact benefiting from living in the U.S., I have to pay my fair share of the "tax" needed to fix that damage.

<comment><USER19> Interesting perspective, thanks for sharing. But what about discriminating against asians to help hispanic numbers? Hispanics are also recent arrivals to the USA and were not historically enslaved.

And perhaps even more biting: what about discriminating against asians to help white numbers?

<comment><USER20> The last would definitely be a slam dunk case of discrimination. I guess they are not admitting to discriminating against asians (in favor of whites). How true is that? I dunno.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This article fails to mention that Harvard (and other elite schools) used to apply similar subjective criteria to limit the number of Jews they admitted.

<comment><USER22> Would appreciate any pointers from people who know more about law than I do (which is practically nothing) on what arguments Harvard made back in the day about their discrimination against Jews. Are they structurally similar to the arguments they are making against Asians now? At some point did Harvard acknowledge that the policies that discriminated Jews were a mistake?

<comment><USER21> The argument at the time was that Jews were too focused on academics and didn't play enough sports. Eventually Harvard did acknowledge that religious discrimination was a mistake. (To be clear I don't support discrimination, just supplying some context.)

[https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/harvard-s-jewish- proble...](https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/harvard-s-jewish-problem)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I don't see how anyone could be for race based discrimination.

If we are going to make up for systematic oppression of the past, why not do so far earlier in a person's life instead of waiting til college?

I think it's fairer to help minority mothers with day care help or schooling assistance for their children and even out the playing field there rather than discriminating at the college level to even the playing field.

I just don't see how more discrimination is the answer to past discrimination against minorities. Especially when it's discrimination against one set of minorities to make up for the discrimination against another set of minorities in the past.

<comment><USER24> It isn't like Harvard is choosing between the two options of "nationwide welfare program" or "control admissions" and exclusively choosing the latter, nor are welfare advocates saying "well, Harvard has that admissions program we don't need improved welfare anymore".

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> A few years ago an Indian guy changed his name to get admitted into medical school. I wonder how it would play out if more Asians do this. They should try harder messing with the system, forcing schools to do DNA tests, etc.

<comment><USER26> "Vijay Chokal-Ingam" faked being black to get into med school (he himself came out and explained why he did what he did. Just google his name).

That's how bad it is in the US for Asian kids at every level after High School.

Another aspect of what ends up happening due to this is that Asian grads from such universities are always considered to be top notch by default, because it is assumed that they had to be more competitive to get through the sieve.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> > "Race alone is never the reason a student is granted admission," Lee said. > "And race is never the reason a student is denied."

> He downplayed the influence of any single numerical rating, saying the final > decision comes down to a 40-person committee that spends weeks reviewing and > discussing applications.

I love how Harvard's defense is "We aren't 100% racist, we're only a little racist, but for good!"

<comment><USER28> Your problem appears to be holistic admission in general. And to that, ok, I do agree and it's not consistent or deterministic by design. But the idea that people should get so mad about this that they sue and raise a fit is silly.

There are two competing implicit narratives here -

1) The school you go to doesn't matter and you should do the best where-ever you are (I personally heard this quite a bit).

2) You will be irreparably harmed for life because you didn't get into School N instead of School N - 1.

Which is it?

<comment><USER29> Wait, where are those narratives coming from the same person?

<comment><USER28> Sometimes, yes! But I've heard both repeatedly! It is absolutely maddening.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> People are also taking advantage of affirmative action by claiming to be part of a race if they had one relative from that race 10 generations back i.e. Elizabeth Warren. I feel you should have at least 50% of that DNA in order to be able to claim some racially disadvantaged status.

<comment><USER10> Elizabeth Warren did not receive affirmative action. She didn't even tell anyone about her distant Native American ancestry until after she was a tenured professor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Students for Fair Admissions is a front organization designed to find cases that will hopefully reach the Supreme Court and make affirmative action unconstitutional. Their president, Edward Blum, has stated so on multiple occasions.

The Asian community has a legitimate beef if some of the details regarding Harvard's admissions are true. I would hope that the judge is taking this case with full context and knowledge of SFFA's role, and if they choose to rule in the favor of SFFA, do so narrowly.

American's need to become more aware of organizations like SFFA and The Federalist Society and how they are shaping the court. If you thought the courts were supposed to be a neutral arbiter of law you thought wrong due to how these organizations operate. When you can easily tell how the Supreme Court will vote on major issues simply by knowing the party of the president that appointmented them something is wrong.

</comment><comment><USER32> It makes we wonder what the emergence of an all Asian Ivy league level school would look like, with an endowment to match, similar to historically black colleges. A private college technically can do what they want.

Either you base admission on merit, or you base it on racial % of the US population, and then take from the top of each racial bucket, splitting it 50/50 for men and women. There are good arguments for both cases, but you can't really have a system that tries to be both without having massive exceptions.

If you read Amy Chaus book The Triple Package, its not just Asians that do historically better than native Whites in the US, but also Indians, Cuban exiles, Jews, Nigerians, Lebanese, Iranians and even Mormons. Its often assumed that a merit system favors only Asians and Whites, predominantly Jews, when this is not entirely true.

<comment><USER33> Indians, Lebanese and Iranians are Asians.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Many systems set up to please underrepresented groups such as African Americans and Latinos indirectly hurts Asians. One of the reasons is that Asians are never as vocal and numerous as the other 2 groups. However, the biggest reason is that the white will not set up a system to hurt whites. Only take away from one minority to give to other minority; then just sit there watch 2 minority group fight.

</comment><comment><USER35> Is Harvard not a private school? Discussions of affirmative action/race aside, if they're a private institution, can't they do pretty much whatever they want? By what basis does anyone have authority/standing to sue?

A private club can refuse admittance for any reason, or for no reason. Is this not the case for private schools?

</comment><comment><USER36> Harvard wants to pick the best students. If they do not select the best student they will lose their prestige/position over time. They seem to have a strong incentive. -my 2 cents

</comment><comment><USER37> Can someone knowledgeable answer something: if the judgement goes against Harvard, would this apply to faculty and staff hires, too?

I recall in grad school being in an econ

<comment><USER38> No, faculty/staff are covered under equal protection employment law.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> How do we talk about this issue (and others like it)? Ignoring the politics is as useful and honest as ignoring your black eye when discussing your headache.

We all know the score: For some, it's a way to undermine affirmative action and also a way to distract from the much larger prevalence of racial discrimination against African-Americans and Hispanic-Americans - a way of implying that those issues aren't special problems. Others take the opposing side in order to push back on these issues.

Let's not pretend it is considered on its merits either here or in wider society, though most discussions try to talk as if it is. Possibly it will not be decided on its merits the politicized American judiciary: If it reaches the Supreme Court, for example, I think by only knowing the politics - and no facts or law - we could predict how several justices would vote.

I just wish we would discuss it honestly.</comment>


The reason why we get sick when mixing alchohol - <AUTHOR> https://news.yahoo.com/real-reason-why-mixing-different-000000936.html?nf=1 <comment><USER2> > beer before liquor, never been sicker, liquor before beer, you're in the > clear

Interesting fact: in Russian tradition, if people do mix drinks, they usually do it in the opposite direction: from lower alcohol content drink to higher.

</comment><comment><USER3> I would have thought this is pretty obvious. If you ingest too much ethanol you will get sick. The rhyme should really just be teaching you to moderate yourself. Don't start drinking low alcohol concentrations and then move to high concentration alcohol after your judgement has been impaired. Some alcohol may give certain individuals worse hangovers if they contain tannins and other items that they do not tolerate, but if you drink too much alcohol in any form, you will get sick.

</comment><comment><USER4> They're entirely overlooking genetics in this. Different people process different amounts of alcohol differently quickly. I've seen people with decades of experience with alcohol get unreasonable after some beers, and have a shit time the entire next day. Meanwhile i and my motherly line of ancestors can drink (compared to the people around us) ridiculous amounts of alcohol really quickly, and for extended amounts of time, sober up quickly, stay in control throughout, and not suffer hangover.

It's also not entrainment. My parents and grandparents drink daily, and not in small amounts either, while i drink maybe 6 times or so a year and i have exactly the same kind of quick processing and resistance as they do.

Interestingly it may be related to the fact that my motherly line of ancestors has a lot of east-european blood in it.

<comment><USER5> > It's also not entrainment. My parents and grandparents drink daily, and not > in small amounts either, while i drink maybe 6 times or so a year and i have > exactly the same kind of quick processing and resistance as they do.

This might as well be because you are younger, and thus naturally process alcohol better then they would.

I used to be able to drink a lot and I have never had an hangover until my late twenties even if I got wasted, these days I regularly get it if I drink a bit too much[0].

[0] which might also be habit: I seldom drink much these days, while I did it more often in the past.

<comment><USER4> I'm 32 and process equally well as my mother. So depending on what your theory is (less efficiency through long term exposure, or increased efficiency through entrainment) one of us should be getting hangovers when drinking considerably more than people around us, but it just doesn't happen.

<comment><USER5> I am not saying you don't hold alcohol better than other people, I do believe genetics plays a role (though research is not 100% there, see for example the one on native americans[0]).

I am saying that you might be at tolerance level 8 because your are young, while your parents start at 6 but gain 2 points because of resistance they built up with daily use.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_and_Native_Americans#C...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_and_Native_Americans#Contributing_factors)

<comment><USER4> Ah, you're saying both apply. Maybe. I guess further study is needed. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Saw people going to sleep after slowing down with a glass of beer after drinking vodka shots all night. So only way to stay reputable is to pace yourself and not to get wasted.

IMHO the article author should also have googled how different alcohol make your head hurt :)

</comment><comment><USER7> This is the sort of Hot Take -- sourced from a year-old Buzzfeed article -- that's going to save Yahoo!...</comment>


Ask HN: Password managers? - <AUTHOR>

I've been getting annoyed at dealing with passwords. I have a pretty good mental system for generating good, difficult-to-predict passwords, but even so, I've been thinking about switching to a password manager. I am primarily a Mac user, and it seems that 1Password is a highly-recommended Mac utility, but it makes me a bit nervous.
1. I often use machines other than my primary Mac. These machines include Linux and Windows installations. How can I visit registration-required sites if their long hex-string passwords are trapped on a different machine?
I see that 1Password provides something called my1Password (https://my.1password.com) for web-based password use, but I have just 1Password's word that everything is perfectly secure back-to-front, and that it doesn't have nasty exploits on its site. In addition, how exactly am I supposed to use this password from the browser? Does it show up in clear-text on my.1password.com, and then I'm supposed to copy and paste it into a password field, thereby exposing the password to the system clipboard on a potentially untrusted machine?
2. I don't know if I trust a password manager not to leak the password somehow, somewhere. This particularly applies to banks and other sensitive sites.
3. It doesn't look like 1Password supports passwords for things like remote Unix hosts using ssh. I use passphrase-based private key authentication with ssh, but this does not mean that every Unix machine I log into has passwords completely disabled, which still leaves me with a slew of passwords to track.
So, HN: how does everyone here deal with passwords? Password managers? Paper notes, as Bruce Schneier recommends (http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/06/write_down_your.html)? Mental systems? A hybrid approach (write hex strings on a sheet of paper and import them into password managers on every trusted computer)? Use "Passw0rd" everywhere? <comment><USER2> I created a complex paper-based system once. Then I got bored with the tedium of retyping big strings of characters off a sheet of paper and started just using 1Password for everything.

You can use 1Password to create passwords that aren't associated with websites and stuff them into the equivalent of encrypted notes. When I need one I just pull up 1Password using Quicksilver and do a cut-n-paste. It's a little bit tedious, but not as tedious as paper -- and, as you say, I don't do it that often. I use ssh-keychain for most of my logins.

If you're freaked out about the probability that 1Password will somehow leak your bank password... don't put your bank password into it. Use paper for that. I avoid allowing my laptop's copy of 1Password to know any password that could be used to harm my finances.

If you have a need to log in to registration-required sites on other machines... carry a piece of paper with the passwords you need. 1Password will print things out for you (also good for emergency backup -- stuff a paper log of your passwords in a safe deposit box).

1Password also has an iPhone app. I avoid using it because my need for portable, secure passwords is low compared to my fear of losing the phone and having to change all my passwords.

Really, you shouldn't type secure passwords into random other machines, anyway, since any of them could be compromised. Keysniffers. Rootkits. If you often log into security-sensitive accounts from strangers' machines... perhaps you should consider getting a laptop, an iPhone, a Nokia, or an EEE?

95% of my passwords are of scant interest to anybody, such that the (tiny) risk of allowing a piece of software to remember them for me is nil. I advise getting the software, and letting it go to work on the 95%. If you don't want to trust it with the remaining 5%, don't trust it.

</comment><comment><USER3> I use <http://keepass.info/> and have for a while now. Works great and is free.</comment>


Ask HN: How do I delete my account? - <AUTHOR>

I don't find any functionality to do this.
The market worship is just not for me. I'll probably still visit for the articles, but commenting here just depresses me too much so I don't want to do it anymore.
Not trying to make a big production out of it all, but would like my account deleted. Thanks. <comment><USER2> Just log out. Problem solved.

That being said, don't let the fact that one comment got downmodded scare you away. People have opinions on all sorts of things; eventually you're going to run into the fact that people are bound to disagree with you. Hopefully you can take a few days and realize that there aren't too many places on the net where someone can disagree with you and do it respectfully with reasoned responses.

</comment><comment><USER3> Not to be harsh, but by posting a submission you are making a big production of it.

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm incredibly curious... what was the straw that broke the camel's back here?

I get the sense that HN does lean pro-market, non-political, and unreligious (pg is just about the only person I catch actually bagging on religion, but maybe I am just paying extra attention to him). Reddit leans anti-market, very political, and extreme in the anti-religion aspect.

What are you looking for, and where are you planning on going to contribute after you leave? (I understand you will still be reading articles)

</comment><comment><USER5> What's the negative implication if you just stop submitting and commenting on articles?

Do you want your profile removed from search results?

</comment><comment><USER6> I suggest changing your password to something you won't remember.

<comment><USER4> I agree, deleting is undesireable.

@quoderat I looked at some of your submissions and comments, and I'm hoping you don't get your wish... at least not until I've had time to read through your interesting contributions. :)</comment></comment>


9 Ways Email Is Destroying Your Company - roman-m http://timemanagementninja.com/2010/12/7-ways-email-is-destroying-your-company/

<comment><AUTHOR> Great dissection of why email is currently a problem, but really, really short on anything constructive. In fact, looking at the last part:

      > In the coming days, I will feature some of my favorite
      > tools and techniques for winning the battle against email.
      >
      > Please share your favorites tools, tips, and stories
      > below ... How do you fight the email flood?  Is your
      > company losing the email battle?

What's the bet he's about to do the usual consultant trick and listen to everyone else, then regurgitate the material and claim it's all his own wonderful insight?

I hate these "teaser" posts, outlining a problem that everyone already knows, and claiming there's wonderful material to follow.

Complete waste of time.

</rant>

</comment><comment> roman-m Some time ago I was working two years for small corproration called IBM. Employes from small startups being aqcuired by IBM was shoked by the amount of time they started to spend on email after joined the corporation, the best of them left very shortly after the aqcuasition.</comment>


AMA with Gayle Laakmann Mcdowell - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/ladies-storm-hackathons/lsh-presents-gayle-laakmann-mcdowell-4a281088c98b <comment><USER2> She spent so much time (over two hours!) going through each of these questions, and giving long, well-thought-out, individual responses. It was really great, and I hope to see more stuff like this in LSH's future!

</comment><comment><USER3> Does anyone know of any other AMAs Gayle has done?

This AMA was full of wisdom and I would love to see how she would respond to other questions that I forgot to ask this time around.

</comment><comment><USER4> Awesome</comment>


VS Code Remote Development - <AUTHOR> https://code.visualstudio.com/blogs/2019/05/02/remote-development <comment><AUTHOR> [https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/live- share/issues/74#issuec...](https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/live- share/issues/74#issuecomment-488791816)

[https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/remote/remote- overview](https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/remote/remote-overview)

</comment><comment><USER2> Check out Python remote support as well which was announced today at PyCon:

[https://devblogs.microsoft.com/python/remote-python- developm...](https://devblogs.microsoft.com/python/remote-python-development- in-visual-studio-code/)

</comment><comment><USER3> this is very cool!</comment>


5 + (-sqrt(1-x^2-(y-abs(x))^2))*cos(30*((1-x^2-(y-abs(x))^2))) - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=5+%2B+%28-sqrt%281-x^2-%28y-abs%28x%29%29^2%29%29*cos%2830*%28%281-x^2-%28y-abs%28x%29%29^2%29%29%29%2C+x+is+from+-1+to+1%2C+y+is+from+-1+to+1.5%2C+z+is+from+1+to+6&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

<comment><USER2> I'm going to be the ambassador for the embarrassed math illiterate among us and ask: what's the process for coming up with a function who's graph is a specific image?

<comment><USER3> One possible process for this particular one:

I want to draw a heart symbol. It's symmetric, so I can compose of two identical by mirrored halves. So I need a function that looks like half a heart. Hey, that kind of looks like a parable sliced off just _so_...

After that, it's pretty straightforward mechanical work and a little inspiration to give the whole thing volume by overlaying a sine wave with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> If this were an extremetech.com article, the headline would be, "Scientists Discover The Formula For Love".

</comment><comment><USER5> If anyone would like to see more functions, I've been updating a list of awesome ones to try here: [http://www.webgl.com/2012/03/webgl-demo-google- search-3d-gra...](http://www.webgl.com/2012/03/webgl-demo-google- search-3d-graph/)

<comment><USER6> Hi,

I think you should link back to HN (that is, if you used any of the equations from HN, not from somewhere else). :)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> If you get a message saying WebGL isn't supported in chrome go to chrome://flags/ and enable 'Override software rendering list' and relaunch chrome.

</comment><comment><USER7> Wow. I didn't know Google drew graphs too; does this feature come with an API? That would be cool.

</comment><comment><USER8> dup

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3778633>

<comment><USER9> This isn't about google's new graphing ability, it's about the function _5 + (-sqrt(1-x^2-(y-abs(x))^2))_ cos(30 _((1-x^2-(y-abs(x))^2)))_ and the graph this function produces.

<comment><USER6> Check the 10th link in that comment... It's exactly what this post draws!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Awwwww.

</comment><comment><USER11> ♥</comment>


Tens of thousands of Acer America accounts hacked - <AUTHOR> http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2016/06/22/2003649180 <comment><USER2> the company "inadvertently stored the data in an unsecured format," which hackers were able to access.

Acer said that information, such as names, addresses and credit card numbers, including expiration dates and three-digit security codes, had been compromised.

<comment><AUTHOR> _facepalm_</comment></comment>


The Head-Scratching Case of the Vanishing Bees - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/29/us/the-head-scratching-case-of-the-vanishing-bees.html

<comment><USER2> Mixing in the genuine scientific concern about neonicotinoid systematic pesticides with completely off-the-wall worries about cell phone towers and GM crops is just trying to spread uncertainty and doubt. I can't understand why a journalist would write such a misleading article today after the scientific studies & the EU ban.

Neonicotinoids are applied by treating the _seed_ of the crops. Their very action is that of a nerve agent for insects. It really isn't that surprising that sub-lethal doses might have an effect on the ability of honey bees to navigate back to the hive. This isn't some 'underlying premise', there are a number of careful scientific studies out there out there[1], perhaps the most interesting to the Hacker News audience is where they attached RFID tags to bees[2].

Also, the Varroa destructor mite doesn't tend to do that much damage on its own, it is a vector spreading viruses. The modern mix of viruses swirling around the bee populations are probably not helped by commercial movement of colonies around the country.

[1] [http://www.theguardian.com/environment/damian-carrington- blo...](http://www.theguardian.com/environment/damian-carrington- blog/2013/apr/04/bees-pesticides-neonicotinoid-europe-ban) [2] [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21267650](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21267650)</comment>