Vim, LaTeX and High School - <AUTHOR> http://kramerapps.com/blog/post/33045194977/vim-latex-and-high-school

<comment><USER2> I did the same in high school, and now at uni it is paying off, my work looks great and is at least as easy to write as in a modern word processor _except_ for good spelling and grammar checking. I haven't found a great solution for that yet.

Be sure to keep your tables looking good, look for some resources on it, it's amazing how shoddy even the default tables in LaTeX look, never mind the Excel spreadsheet look everyone seems to go for.

<comment><USER3> I've been using TeXstudio as a LaTeX editor - it's a fork of TeXmaker with more features (notably a user-editable spelling dictionary). The UI is Qt, and it's available cross-platform.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I tried to use LaTeX to take notes in Middle School once, no joke, and I found it quite difficult. LaTeX is meant for explicit typesetting and having fine- grained control over your documents. If you want to write an English or Math paper in it, then it's perfect, but I think it's overkill for notes. I now use reStructuredText to write my notes and rst2pdf when I have to print them out to study. It's very simple and I don't have to worry about typesetting. For math...pen and paper. Your math example was well typeset but I doubt you'd have time to do all that in class short of asking the teacher to stop for 15 minutes.

</comment><comment><USER5> I also did this in HS, and echo what others are saying about this paying off later in life. Four years from now, when you're a junior in college and are scrambling to parallelize the build for your homework due next class, you'll be thankful for the upfront investment ;-). Also, having a LaTeX formatted resume never hurt either.

The one problem I always had was essays. I'd always write essays as plain text, but didn't have a great MLA template ready for LaTeX, so I'd usually just copy/paste my plain text doc into OpenOffice or GDocs. I still sort of wish that I had figured out a better solution for this workflow.

</comment><comment><USER6> This guy is in high school? Amazing!

Either he is going to amazing places, or education is really coming a long way into better integrating technology and open-source.

<comment><USER7> I can't speak for everyone, but it is most likely the former. The handful of maths teachers I know absolutely loathe word-processed assignments since the majority of students don't bother using proper mathematical notation when they type things up (let alone use a proper type-setting program like LaTeX), so you end up with a bunch of students handing in stuff like:

∫e^x dx = e^x + c

Unfortunately, this sometimes results in teachers abandoning word processing altogether and making pen and paper mandatory.

<comment><AUTHOR> Our class has a digital whiteboard (via projection) in the front of the class. Our teacher uses LaTeX to typeset his lessons, displayed on the board.

But yeah, on the projects, the kids are allowed to use pencil and paper to do the things that cannot normally be typed up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Unfortunately using something like Latex in the Real World is just no pheasible unless you're in an area specific for it. you need to share documents and you think your office secretary is going to learn how to use Latex just to edit your company wide email?

microsoft worwd is the defacto standard, no matter how i feel about foss.

<comment><USER9> On the other hand, LaTeX should almost be a required skill for developers and dev managers. If you use it rather than M$Office, your development docs can be source controlled, easily diffed, and otherwise gain all the benefits of code! Design docs, data flow diagrams, architecture layouts, data models, &c., &c. can all be done in LaTeX will look great.

<comment><USER8> I disagree, I've been working on business-area applications for 5 years now and not _once_ have I said to myself, "Man I wish I had some Latex knowledge to work on this document!".

It's just non-existant unless you actually need the math notations and whatnot.</comment></comment></comment>


FCC Chairman: This Is How We Will Ensure Net Neutrality - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2015/02/fcc-chairman-wheeler-net-neutrality/ <comment><USER2>
        Using this authority, I am submitting to my colleagues the strongest
        open internet protections ever proposed by the FCC. These enforceable,
        bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and
        throttling of lawful content and services. I propose to fully
        apply—for the first time ever—those bright-line rules to mobile
        broadband. My proposal assures the rights of internet users to go
        where they want, when they want, and the rights of innovators to
        introduce new products without asking anyone's permission.

I can't believe I'm reading those words!

<comment><USER3>
        These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services

of 'lawful content and services'. I don't mean to ruin a good thing, but is it implied here that ISPs may become the gatekeepers? I don't want what happened to YouTube (automatic content blocking because it's "unlawful") to take place with the general internet. One of the most important aspects of the internet, in my own opinion, is an unfiltered, uncensored stream of data.

I'd be very cautious about what shaping we permit to our network traffic. Laws are fickle, knowledge is power.

<comment><USER4> I think you're reading a LOT more into that than was actually said.

All he is saying is, if an ISP gets a court order, that they can then block access to content like they do now, and the FCC won't go after them as a result.

It isn't a new power or an expansion, just continuing the current situation that exists.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5>
      I personally learned the importance of open networks the
      hard way. In the mid-1980s I was president of a startup,
      NABU: The Home Computer Network. My company was using new
      technology to deliver high-speed data to home computers
      over cable television lines....But NABU went broke while
      AOL became very successful....While delivering better
      service, NABU had to depend on cable television operators
      granting access to their systems....The phone network was
      open whereas the cable networks were closed. End of story."

A person can't go through an experience like this without having it fundamentally affect their worldview. I wonder why, with all of the coverage the lead-up to this decision has gotten, I have not read this story before.

<comment><USER6> How then, with this powerful backstory, did Wheeler choose not to unbundle last mile access?

The cable networks are still closed.

<comment><USER7> I wonder about that too. In my mind at least, there is a distinction between requiring neutral treatment of traffic routing through a network and requiring an operator to let a competitor hook up their equipment in your facilities and sell a competitive service using infrastructure you laid.

The latter IMO is a lot less fair, even though my personal experience is that I had more choices for service when it was done w/ DSL.

<comment><USER8> The latter makes sense for DSL, but most of the cable monopolies are not government-granted at the Federal level. Some localities have a cable monopoly, but the local government is responsible for that.

Yes, the cable companies have gotten government hand-outs to build out infrastructure, but teasing apart which of that was public and private money (and therefore which would be 'fair' to force open) would be a nightmare.

<comment><USER6> Many things that are worth doing are difficult. This is one of them.

<comment><USER8> My point was mostly that the argument for doing so w/ DSL is more cut-and-dry in that most/all of the infrastructure was laid under a nation-wide government-granted monopoly. The Federal government weighing in on the matter makes sense.

<comment><USER6> I agree with you except where you imply that the Federal government weighing in on cable doesn't make sense.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9>
        The internet wouldn't have emerged as it did, for instance,
        if the FCC hadn't mandated open access for network equipment
        in the late 1960s. Before then, AT&T prohibited anyone
        from attaching non-AT&T equipment to the network.

By the 1960s AT&T was a well-established government-sanctioned monopoly [0]. It's a bold claim that says we wouldn't have gotten an internet without FCC regulation of AT&T. An easier conclusion to draw is that we wouldn't have needed an FCC if we hadn't given Ma Bell a pass on being a monopoly for the previous 5 decades and instead focused on policies that encourage innovation and investment at the local level.

Yes, the last-mile is a natural monopoly, but there's a wide gulf of possible solutions between " _Let AT &T kill all competitors_" as they have been for the last century and " _Have the FCC regulate competition into existence_ " as they did in 1996 [1]. Neither of those extremes worked, and to the extent that this policy seems to understand that, it looks like a good outcome. The line about " _no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling_ " is especially promising in this regard.

However, the proof is in the pudding, and I think we have yet to see an FCC that is truly effective in inspiring local broadband competition through regulatory policies.

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

[1]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996)

<comment><USER10> Darn it if this isn't correct. It is very true to say we don't really know what the market forces would've done, because it was all already mucked with. I'm not sure I agree though that the last mile is a natural monopoly. A market could create more distributed solutions, we're seeing that with solar grid power contribution. The early Edison systems were sometimes a single location for DC power. The early net benefited from something a little more peer-to- peer than it is today.

Also all of these things will never exist independently of each other. If we had an anarcho-syndicalist system, we'd be complaining about the inability to use omnidirectional antennas effectively because of all of the interference of the airwaves, possibly...

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Apparently I'm in the minority here, but I have some concerns.

1) The problem this fixes is largely non-existent today. The threat of fast and slow-lanes is one I've yet to experience.

2) Opening the door for more internet regulation seems risky. At first, things may go swimmingly, but I suspect regulatory capture will creep up on this industry, just as it has so many others. You may trust Obama and the current FCC head, but if and when the next Nixon comes to power, will you be as comfortable with his appointee?

3) The language "lawful content and services" seems like the kind of opening that could be the death of services like Bit Torrent or Tor.

4) Holding up the old telephonic lines as having been improved by regulation seems specious. In fact, the telephone system has been frozen in amber for decades. Perhaps overregulation is part of the reason we get our high-speed internet via the much less regulated cable lines and not phone lines.

<comment><USER12> What? The Netflix/Verizon paid peering agreement was a fast/slow lane issue, was it not?

<comment> 0x5f3759df-i Or Comcast blocking/throttling all bittorrent traffic? \

[http://www.cnet.com/news/comcast-really-does-block- bittorren...](http://www.cnet.com/news/comcast-really-does-block-bittorrent- traffic-after-all/)

<comment><USER13> That actually was a fast/slow lane issue, and you may remember that was resolved without additional regulation or legislation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I violated Responsible Reading Of The Internet Rule #1 and accidentally looked at the comments. I am having a hard time reconciling the vehement anti-net- neutrality anti-government hair-on-fire screaming there with the reasoned discussion and general attitude here---I would have thought the majority of readers of Wired would be of similar mind to HN readers.

<comment><USER15> For what it's worth, it was linked to from Drudge.

<comment><USER16> This is the real reason. You can go to any article that is linked on drudge and you will see the exact same kind of comments.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> So as someone who has been lightly following the debate, and is not familiar with the FCC's process, what are the next steps to actually start enforcing mobile and landline broadband as Title II? I also wonder how long it will take for the reclassification to become enforceable, and how long the existing companies will have to "become compliant".

<comment><USER18> > So as someone who has been lightly following the debate, and is not familiar > with the FCC's process, what are the next steps to actually start enforcing > mobile and landline broadband as Title II?

The next step is for the FCC to vote on the proposal Wheeler is submitting and officially propose the rules (depending on whether they choose to do so as an Notice of Proposed Rulemaking or as a Interim Final Rule with Comment Period, there may or may not be a separate action after that needed to actually put the rules into effect; since this is the action in response to comment on a previous NPRM, I don't think they need to go the NPRM route again, but I think they can choose to, but my knowledge of the detailed requirements of federal administrative procedure is somewhat fuzzy.)

> I also wonder how long it will take for the reclassification to become > enforceable, and how long the existing companies will have to "become > compliant".

I think that the effective dates would be specified in the proposal, so when the FCC officially issues it we'll know.

<comment><USER19> The unspoken next step will be the dozen lawsuits from Verizon, AT&T, etc. Comcast's actions actually seem to be on the right side, here, though maybe that's simply a side-effect of their NBC merger terms.

<comment><USER20> And Comcast still wants to merge with Time Warner, so there will be a certain amount of playing nice (at least for a while).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> The comments on this post are some of the most depressing things I've ever read in response to a regulatory decision. References to Tom Wheeler being a Nazi. Someone calling the plan "Obama-fi." A user who says this:

> tom wheeler, seriously, it would be a great thing if you and everyone like > you contracted ebola and died a horrible death.

This is like giving the entire U.S. population free pizza for a year, and half the population complaining because there's cheese on it.

<comment><USER22> Because you don't understand their argument, they must be wrong, right?

And no I can't explain you their argument because whenever I do so I get downvoted.

The government wants their hands on all means of communication. The FCC basically shunned the public from using radio waves and TV waves. Now they're going to shun us away from the internet. The _same_ organization, the FCC, will do this as they previously did with other means of communication, and you cheerleaders are being fooled and don't even know it. Not only that but you criticize those who see this for the fascism it is. It must be great to be ignorant because you can even attack those who read history and think you're coming out on top.

<comment><USER23> Can you please explain this argument? Who cares if you get downvoted. I do not understand how a reasonable person who is not in cahoots with "big internet" can see this as a bad thing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The New Yorker, last May: "Obama's Bad Pick: A Former Lobbyist at the F.C.C." [http://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/obamas-bad- pick-a...](http://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/obamas-bad-pick-a- former-lobbyist-at-the-f-c-c)

"Rewarding campaign contributors is par for the course in Washington, of course. Usually, though, the prizes are ambassadorships or appointments to obscure boards rather than the chairmanship of a big federal regulatory agency. That's another thing that makes Wheeler's appointment look like just the sort of Washington inside job that Obama used to decry as a candidate. […] Perhaps the best that can be said about his nomination is that, assuming he's confirmed, he'll have an incentive to demonstrate that he isn't a patsy for the companies he used to lobby for."

<comment><USER25> Yeah I think it's time more than a few people eat a little crow.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Obama deserves some credit for pushing and supporting Wheeler on this!

<comment><USER27> I couldn't imagine if Romney was in office right now...

<comment><USER28> I suspect it might possibly be the same. Public sentiment is pretty strong about it, and it would be easy for the Republicans to take the angle of "freedom for small businesses and the free market" or whatever.

<comment><USER29> Public sentiment on the right is definitely not in favor of net neutrality...

In Romney's own words:

        It is not the role of any government to "manage" the
        Internet. The Internet has flourished precisely because
        government has so far refrained from regulating this
        dynamic and essential cornerstone of our economy. I
        would rely primarily on innovation and market forces,
        not bureaucrats, to shape the Internet and maximize its
        economic, social and scientific value.

        Specifically, the FCC's "Net Neutrality" regulation
        represents an Obama campaign promise fulfilled on behalf
        of certain special interests, but ultimately a "solution"
        in search of a problem. The government has now interjected
        itself in how networks will be constructed and managed,
        picked winners and losers in the marketplace, and
        determined how consumers will receive access to tomorrow's
        new applications and services. The Obama Administration's
        overreaching has replaced innovators and investors with
        Washington bureaucrats.

From here: [http://sciencedebate.org/2012/debate12/#9](http://sciencedebate.org/2012/debate12/#9)

<comment><USER28> That's because they've spun it as "Obama trying to control the Internet" or whatever. Most rank-and-file conservatives didn't even know what it was until the GOP Powers That Be decided to take up the crusade.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> No last mile unbundling: does it mean that every operator has to deploy its own cable from street to home?

<comment><USER31> That's my (rather depressing) understanding.

I still dream of a non-profit or municipal cable plant, serviced by multiple ISPs. The last mile is a natural monopoly, and we need to stop pretending otherwise.

<comment><USER32> Wireless last mile might be an option if the FCC actually opens up the 3.5ghz "innovation band" : [http://www.fcc.gov/blog/35-ghz-new-ideas-innovation- band](http://www.fcc.gov/blog/35-ghz-new-ideas-innovation-band)

<comment><USER33> That proposal seems to be for a 150MHz block. If you try to offer broadband speeds to multiple customers simultaneously with that little spectrum you'll end up needing to use cell sizes so small that it would essentially become a fiber to the curb deployment, at which point you might as well finish off with a handful of ethernet segments instead of several radio links that won't work well.

<comment><USER32> LTE seems to work well enough with less bandwidth (~60MHz). However I'm not sure what kind of range you can get with 3.5ghz. Surely at least a few city blocks?

<comment><USER33> LTE works well by the standards of its predecessors, when constrained by draconian data caps and overage charges. It is completely unsuitable as a replacement for wired connections like VDSL and DOCSIS.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Well, I believe this kicks off the biggest lobbying effort seen in a long time to get this to not happen. I certainly hope that the US internet gets Title II.

<comment> 0x5f3759df-i The lobbying has been in full effect for a year, looks like they already lost this one.

<comment><USER35> I'm curious, how much effect do lobbyists have on the FCC, since they aren't exactly elected officials?

<comment><USER18> > I'm curious, how much effect do lobbyists have on the FCC, since they aren't > exactly elected officials?

The members of the FCC are all political appointees of elected officials, and, like most regulators, two of their primary future employment prospects after their term ends are (1) further political appointments, and (2) employment, often as lobbyists, in the industry regulated by the regulatory body they currently serve on.

So, while they may not be amenable directly to the same kind of campaign- support influence that elected officials are, there are good reason to think that lobbyists can influence them in ways beyond the persuasiveness of their substantive policy arguments.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> > The proposal I present to the commission will ensure the internet remains > open, now and in the future, for all Americans.

I really wish they would acknowledge that this type of decision isn't just "for Americans". Pretty much the entire world was watching to see how they were going to handle it.

</comment><comment><USER37> "there will be no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling"

Translation?

<comment><USER38> Title II includes several sorts of provisions that apply to "common carriers" very similar to, e.g., how railroads were regulated back in the day. The government sets the prices for carriage (rate regulation), and carriers have to lobby the government to change prices (tariffs). Last-mile unbundling means that carriers must lease out their physical infrastructure to competitors at some wholesale price.

These things are bad, which is why the FCC is saying it will not apply these provisions. For example, even today most municipalities set a regulated rate for basic cable service. It averages about $20/month nationwide, and doesn't come close to covering the cost of actually building a modern cable network out to a neighborhood.

Unbundling kills investment into the network, because why spend billions of dollars on infrastructure that you'll have to lease out at wholesale prices to your competitors?[1]

My theory is that unbundling is what killed DSL as a competitor to cable here in the U.S. FTTN has been quite successful in the U.K.,[2] as a gradual scheme for building fiber further into the network, with a last-hop of VDSL that can get faster as it gets shorter. There has been little FTTN deployment here in the U.S., because there's just no way for telcos to recoup the billions of dollars spent on fiber if they're forced to lease the VDSL at the other end to competitors for a song.

[1] See this Brookings Institute (not exactly a conservative hotbed) analysis, which calls the U.S. experiment with unbundling "disastrous" and concludes that it reduces capital investigate. [http://www.pff.org/events/eventpowerpoints/022207BrusselsCom...](http://www.pff.org/events/eventpowerpoints/022207BrusselsComm/Crandall.ppt).

[2] Unbundling is part of the strategy in the U.K. too, but it's structured so that the prices BT charges to competitors are guaranteed to generate a substantial profit.

<comment><USER39> You appear to be quite against this (judging by your other posts on the matter). The fact remains that the current system is not going to hold, and that left to its own devices will end up with a bunch of walled gardens and other issues.

I agree that it is wise to be wary of regulation in this case--but honestly, I think it's time we at least experiment. The market and regulatory forces at play have basically forced themselves into this position.

<comment><USER38> My complaint is that everyone's ignoring the economics of the situation. What becomes apparent if you dig into the numbers is that there's no money in building these networks, at least at scale--they are justified only when there's a money-making opportunity with respect to the content flowing through them. Historically, this has been the cable video service that brings in the lion's share of revenue. Even with Google--I have yet to see a story for the profitability of Fiber that isn't predicated on the nexus with Google services.

You can't legislate-away economics. If you make cable and fiber networks into an unattractive investment, nobody will invest in them, and they'll go on life-support just like the phone network. Cable companies will pivot to content, like Comcast is already doing with its purchase of NBC. The vacuum won't be filled, because at the end of the day no VC is going to put up billions of dollars to eke out shit returns on a heavily-regulated service.

<comment><USER40> > What becomes apparent if you dig into the numbers is that there's no money > in building these networks, at least at scale--they are justified only when > there's a money-making opportunity with respect to the content flowing > through them.

It seems like the crux of your argument is that it costs something like $60/month to provide internet service and $20/month on top of that to provide TV service but they charge $50/month for each, so they wouldn't be profitable without the TV service. But who is setting these prices?

Is there some law that requires them to charge a money losing price for internet service and then make it up on TV service? Why don't they just charge a profit-making price for internet service?

<comment><USER38> The market sets the prices of the services at what people are willing to pay. If the cable companies could charge more for internet than they are now, don't you think they would? People are willing to pay a lot more for television service,[1] so if the product you're selling is TV+internet, you can charge enough to justify building a modern fiber/coax network. If it's just internet, you probably can't, at least not in many places.

[1] In my building, in downtown Baltimore, I can get 50/15 FiOS for $50/month, no cap but no TV service, or triple-play cable at 50/5, capped for $109 per month. Almost everyone subscribes to cable rather than FiOS.

<comment><USER40> I don't get your argument. You seem to be saying that if the internet-only plan is made too expensive then customers will subscribe to the not very much more expensive TV+internet plan. Isn't that what they want customers to do?

<comment><USER38> No, in this hypothetical the net neutrality advocates have won decisively and the cable companies are in the business of building "dumb pipes."

<comment><USER40> So you're proposing there is no TV+internet package available from the ISP, they offer only internet and you get your TV from someone like Netflix.

If the ISPs at this point charge a price for just internet service that makes offering that service profitable, what are you expecting customers to do? Go without internet service?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> This looks much better than what I feared. I'm glad they're just not regulating it under Title II, but are modernizing it:

       For example, there will be no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling.

<comment><USER42> From an outsiders perspective, the last mile in unfeeling is the only bit that matters, market forces can resolve everything else, but it's not really possible to lay a dozen sets of last mile infrastructure.

<comment><USER41> Last mile unbundling isn't about neutrality though, it's about getting better service. If one wants to advocate for that, it should be decoupled from net neutrality. Net neutrality is about preventing fast lanes, charging companies for access to the network, and degrading competitors products.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> This is all pretty great. For the first time in a while I feel optimistic about the future of the open internet. My only concern is a small detail: "These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services."

The specification of 'lawful content and services' seems a bit ominous to me. Does this imply there may be ways to monitor/limit/restrict internet traffic? To use his example, would this language be used to describe the open phone network?

<comment><USER44> I suspect you need such a carve out to be able to legally block denial-of- service attacks and other such network events that are intended to disrupt regular operation of a service.

<comment><USER22> That's what they'll swear to you, but of course the government will use it for censorship just like the FCC nowadays censors the TV and Radio.

Read up the history of the FCC. At the time it was also "necessary" to regulate airwaves because of several noble reasons but of course what ends up happening is that now you have to get a license from the government to say something on radio waves.

You will have to get a license to have a website in the future if the FCC has its way online. Write my words.

<comment><USER45> I don't think people should be downvoting you, but I think you're conflating a bunch of things.

For radio, the broadcasting space is limited and multiple people broadcasting onto the same frequencies would ruin it for everyone. By your standard, why haven't they started censoring telephone conversations? The pressures that brought the FCC into putting those regulations in place just don't make sense for the internet.

<comment><USER22> > multiple people broadcasting onto the same frequencies would ruin it for > everyone.

Let's see who is conflating things. Enforcing the rights of frequency band owners has nothing to do with needing an FCC. All you need is regular enforcement of property rights. If someone has a right to use a frequency and someone else is disturbing that right then they will be prosecuted according to the law. Just like with land.

Ok, so what's the problem with the FCC? If I find a frequency that is unassigned (no current owner) and unused (no current squatter) then I _can 't_ start using it (homesteading) and I _can 't_ acquire property rights from mixing my labor with it. Instead, I have to go to the FCC and hope they approve me for broadcast license; and they will approve it or not depending on their political opinions about what I am going to be saying in that frequency. Also, broadcasting licenses are non-transferable so I can't buy your license even if we both agree on the transaction - the FCC needs to vet me first. This is a huge problem, as I hope you can see. That means the government must approve of my message before I can say it. It is an impingement on free speech. If people could yell high enough that others could hear without needing radio waves (websites = yelling high enough) then the government would want to curb that too (and indeed it is, with Net Neutrality).

Hopefully this clarifies my point.

> why haven't they started censoring telephone conversations

Because it is usually two-way, with both parties usually being part of the government's tax farm (ie. regular folks), in which case there's more in it for the government if they record our conversations than if they censored it (which would make people weary of communicating, and harder for the government to spy on its citizens).

Also the telephone is usually one-to-one communication, not one-to-many like radio stations, tv channels and internet websites. So the damage from unwanted information getting out to the public at large easily, and therefore the need to censor it, are almost non-existent.

And just to clarify for the impolite person below, Karunamon:

By censorhip I don't mean censoring existing stations. I mean disallowing stations from ever coming to be, because the FCC disagrees politically with the folks asking for a broadcast license. The public at large ends up losing out, because they have only government-approved stations to listen to, and never get to hear _truly dissenting opinions_. This is curbed free speech.

As for the excuse that one must get a license to prove they are technically capable, a technical test would suffice, just like a technical test suffices for handling guns. The government can't choose not to give guns to people of certain political opinions, but it can choose not to give broadcast licenses to those people. That's what's wrong. If you own a frequency and it is disturbed you have the right to sue and collect reparation from the person who disturbed your property. The FCC is not needed for this just as there's no FCC for land - if someone disturbs your land you call the police.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> ArsTechnica's article[0] mentions this:

"To preserve incentives for broadband operators to invest in their networks, my proposal will modernize Title II, tailoring it for the 21st century..."

 _This_ concerns me. What kinds of changes are coming to Title II?

0 - [http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/02/why-the-ex-cable- lob...](http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/02/why-the-ex-cable-lobbyist- running-the-fcc-turned-against-his-old-clients/)

</comment><comment><USER47> Careful here boys and girls. Words matter, and the word to focus on in his statement is "lawful" content and services. What exactly is defined as lawful? Is porn lawful? What about torrents to pirated software? What about stuff the government just doesn't like. This same paragraph could be read in China and be just as accurate, but China has a very different definition of "lawful content and services".

<comment><USER48> I would imagine it means anything that is not legislated to be unlawful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> Holy shit. We did it.

<comment><USER50> There's a republican congress that will shut this down. No we didn't.

<comment><USER51> The FCC is an 'independent' agency which means that while congress can ask questions, make suggestions, apply pressure, and vote on members of the commission it cannot force the FCC to introduce, accept, or reject any proposed rule-making. Like most regulatory agencies, the purse power is limited since the FCC is funded by regulatory fees (I say limited and not zero because I believe the fees are paid by industry to the treasury and then allocated by congress). Also, like most regulatory agencies the makeup of the commission is statutorily party-balanced with the president selecting the chairman.

The commission still has to vote on this proposed rule-making though.

<comment><USER52> The FCC exists by authority of Congress. Congress can expand or limit this authority at will, including any regulations promulgated by the FCC. So, Congress can basically do what it wants. This is true of any federal agency. The "independent" part means independent of the President, as they are not part of the executive branch.

However, I don't think Congress will act in this case. One reason Congress delegates regulation to specific agencies is because Congress does not have the expertise to craft the proper regulations. As a Republican, it seems to me the FCC has taken a balanced approach to regulation in this case, so I don't see much negative feedback by Congress.

<comment><USER53> > As a Republican, it seems to me the FCC has taken a balanced approach to > regulation in this case, so I don't see much negative feedback by Congress.

What about the extremist anti-regulatory positions of many in the GOP? Not every Republican thinks that way, but enough to do generate a lot of noise and elect a substantial portion of Congress.

<comment><USER52> It's true my first reaction was against internet regulation. If it ain't broke... However, I read his statement, and his decision seems well considered. And, the regulations are in the direction of ensuring openness. My biggest concern is that now that there is regulation, it can go in any direction in the future.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> > The internet wouldn't have emerged as it did, for instance, if the FCC > hadn't mandated open access for network equipment in the late 1960s. Before > then, AT&T prohibited anyone from attaching non-AT&T equipment to the > network. The modems that enabled the internet were usable only because the > FCC required the network to be open.

DAMN right.

</comment><comment><USER55> Why are libertarians so pro- free market when this is a perfect example of how the 'unregulated free market' has no problem manipulating in the name of greed and control at the expense of consumers?

This seems to be strong evidence that government is better at keeping trade free than an 'unregulated free market'?

<comment><USER56> Not to dive too off topic, but the telecom industry has been heavily regulated and in no way represents a free market.

Through franchise fees, fighting public right of way sharing, and other forms of lobbying these large corporations have used law and regulation to their favor. This is not a position libertarians support and it is not a market anyone would point at and call "unregulated" in any sense of the term.

<comment><USER57> Is it fair to call it regulation when the corporation benefits? (regulation tends to mean "regulation against corporations")

<comment><USER18> > Is it fair to call it regulation when the corporation benefits?

Yes. Most regulation benefits some corporations, because there are very few regulatory issues where there aren't corporations on all sides of the issue.

> (regulation tends to mean "regulation against corporations")

No, it doesn't. There is certainly a particular faction that sees regulation as inherently "anti-business", and a popular association of business = corporation, so I can see how that idea would come about, but its not at all what regulation _means_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> Thank you, Tom Wheeler. Today is a good day for the Internet.

</comment><comment><USER59> "For example, there will be no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling."

No last-mile unbundling means instead of fostering better service through competition, we're attempting to foster better service through regulation.

</comment><comment><USER60> I read this as beneficial to the wireless data carriers. Toward the bottom:

      "there will be no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling"

Meaning no more MVNOs and no more competition other than the "big 4". Read the arstech article here: [http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/06/we-dont- need-net-...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/06/we-dont-need-net- neutrality-we-need-competition/) to see how unbundling would have been best for the consumer; without it, looks like the wireless co's win big actually.

<comment><USER61> MVNOs don't exist because of regulation - they exist because some wireless carriers have decided that they'd rather sell wholesale access to their network instead of leaving the market entirely to their competitors.

I don't have a problem with the lack of unbundling. I was a Covad customer for a number of years, and it was atrocious - whenever there was an issue, Covad and Ameritech/SBC/AT&T would go round and round with finger-pointing. Later, when AT&T began their U-verse (FTTN) deployment, Covad was shut out, stuck with the longer copper lines all the way back to the CO.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> This is neutrality for big data sources only. _" For example, there will be no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling."_ This is a deal for Netflix and Google. It won't get you out from under AT&T forcing you to take their TV service to get their Internet service.

There was a time when you could rent a local loop from a regulated telco and have it connected to an independent Internet service provider. Remember independent DSL ISPs? I still have a connection through one, "Sonic.net". They no longer offer that to new customers.

</comment><comment><USER13> So, will this make it illegal for GoGo to block streaming video sites on airplanes during domestic flights?

200 people trying to stream Netflix over a satellite downlink? That should be a _riot_.

<comment><USER63> > So, will this make it illegal for GoGo to block streaming video sites on > airplanes during domestic flights?

It should allow them to be consistent about it and rate-limit everyone evenly, which would have the same effect.

The really interesting question would be what happens with their on-plan video systems – my understanding is that they cache a selection of videos on the plane which are pre-seeded to avoid clogging the connection. Even running a public proxy wouldn't help with that unless everyone is watching the same Netflix/Hulu/etc. videos. I'm not sure whether they could get some sort of waiver but it's definitely something to look for as the policy details emerge.

<comment><USER13> > It should allow them to be consistent about it and rate-limit everyone > evenly, which would have the same effect.

That's an allocation of about 450kbit/sec (~56kb/sec) down per seat on a 737 assuming the plane is outfitted with GoGo's latest tech. Upload would be a tiny fraction of that. It's in everyone's interest to disallow high-throughput usage while permitting burstable high-bandwidth low-throughput usage.

"Bright line" rules that no type or source of content may be discriminated against by carriers only make sense if bandwidth is not a scarce resource.

<comment><USER63> > It's in everyone's interest to disallow high-throughput usage while > permitting burstable high-bandwidth low-throughput usage. > "Bright line" > rules that no type or source of content may be discriminated against by > carriers only make sense if bandwidth is not a scarce resource.

There's no reason to believe that this couldn't be solved with some variation of fair queuing with bursting and since that's content and source neutral because it applies to all users equally.

This is a basic network admin skill and the technology is already pervasively deployed – in the 90s, 56kpbs was the speed you assumed for the average home users and businesses used to have a hundred people behind a 1.5Mb T1. The only challenges since then have either been extreme scale or the more expensive things the major ISPs have tried to do to throttle traffic selectively.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> > ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of _lawful_ content > and services.

Too bad the regulation isnt simply this one line of text without the "lawful" caveat

<comment><USER65> Why is that too bad? Do you think that the rules would stand of that caveat weren't present? Do you think that ISP's should not have the ability to block illegal traffic? What happens when they receive a court order to do so, yet doing so would violate FCC regulations? Don't be naive; that exception _must_ be there, and out changes nothing in regards to the current situation.

<comment><USER64> My biggest problem with that caveat is that its really just a foot in the door for further regulation by the federal government, none of which has anything to do with network neutrality.

Network neutrality by definition is about all packets being treated equally regardless of the source or destination.

<comment><USER65> It's not though because it changes nothing. The government can already stop traffic via a court order. Besides, the FCC is not a legislative body. A set of rules which allowed, for example, unimpeded access to child pornography would never be allowed, nor should it. Net neutrality can exist alongside the laws which govern what is and is not ok to do on the internet.

<comment><USER64> Does the FCC currently have rules that allow the blocking of "illegal" traffic?

<comment><USER18> The FCC currently has no rules on blocking, so providers can freely block legal and illegal traffic.

(The FCC adopted non-blocking rules for lawful content and applications in the previous Open Internet Order that was struck down by the courts.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> I don't think I've ever cussed on my HN account, but unfuckingbelievable.

I'm in complete and utter awe that they listened to the people and not the rich corporations for once.

</comment><comment><USER67> I think this is the first time in my life that I've been happy about and excited by news of government action concerning the Internet.

</comment><comment><USER68> > my proposal includes a general conduct rule that can be used to stop new and > novel threats to the internet. This means the action we take will be strong > enough and flexible enough not only to deal with the realities of today, but > also to establish ground rules for the as yet unimagined.

What does that mean? Sounds like a euphemism for an Internet kill switch?

<comment><USER18> From the text and context, it sounds like in addition to the bright-line rules on things like throttling, paid prioritization, and blocking of lawful content and services, there is a more general rule prohibiting conduct by ISPs that discriminates against or impedes access to lawful content but doesn't fall into neat buckets of blocking, throttling, etc.

But, yeah, this is one thing (of many) that its going to be worth reading the actual text, when it is made public, to understand.

</comment></comment><comment><USER69> I like how many times he says "Congress gave us the power to make this decision".

Kind of like he's daring them to try and stop him.

<comment><USER70> I think it's more a justification to explain why non-elected officials are putting laws into motion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER71> This is very nice but I hope that it will be able to withstand the impending lawsuits by the ISPs. One can only hope.

</comment><comment><USER72> This thread is old, and has tons of comments. I searched for "paid prioritization" to see if anyone else had the thought I just did about what may be happening here. I don't believe anyone has yet, so either I'm wrong about my assertion or I'm the first to post. :)

> These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization

'Prioritize' means arranging things in order of their relative importance. Paid prioritization means arranging delivery of goods (Internet services for example) by order of the relative amount you charge for things that are important to you. Revenue, for example. Or no revenue, more specifically.

My gut says that free Internet should be a basic human right. Period. Nobody should be able to charge for it. I'm not sure how in the hell we're going to put that into practice though. I'm thinking about it.

As for compute services, well, those aren't free to run. And those compute jobs require bandwidth to complete. Should those be free? I think not. Should someone be allowed to use their 'free' allowance of Internet when it takes away from the compute services interconnects? No.

I could be off on a wrong tangent, so I'll just stop now.

</comment><comment><USER73> Serious question: I was under the impression that mobile data networks were exempted from this type of regulation, is what he proposing going to eliminated things like the throttling AT&T / T-Mobile / Sprint does above a certain data threshold?

</comment><comment><USER74> As I'm writing this the stock market is having the opposite take on this than I Would have expected. Netflix is down while the providers (ATT, Verizon, Comcast) are up.

Is there something going on here that's not obvious?

<comment><USER75> Yes! The public has amnesia and doesn't remember the history of progressive regulation :)

In a nutshell, in order for big business to cut production and raise prices, they need the state to act as an enforcer or regulator for their cartel. Their strategy has been to lobby under the guise of a public good, in this case "net neutrality" (a term which I'd bet has its origins with some very expensive marketing/PR firm), but the end effect is for state regulation to create artificial scarcity and subsidize costs to increase profits for big business. This is state capitalism, or corporate liberalism - how corporatism operates in the U.S. Big corporations want regulation because they fear competition.

Before the Progressive Era, big businesses wanted to cut production and increase prices, but failed in doing so in the (relatively) free market that existed at the time. New competitors would arise or cartel members would cheat and lower prices, and the cartel agreement would fall apart. This kept prices low, trending toward the cost of production, which was great for consumers.

However, with state regulation, cartels can be maintained. The state can raise barriers to entry to protect cartel members from competition, and it can also bring down the hammer on cartel members who cheat and try to lower prices.

Of course, this isn't how it's sold to the public. Lobbyists tell the story of how "big bad corporations" need to be reigned in for the public good by benevolent big government, and voters seem to buy it every time. Behind the scenes, big business is colluding with the state for monopoly privilege. See the history of railroads, Big Agri, Big Oil, the telecoms, the Federal Reserve for examples of this playing out.

The state has granted corporations so many privileges, it's really quite unbelievable -- tariffs, patents, copyrights, licensing, regulation -- all of this subsidized by the public to grant corporations the privilege of giving us less for more. For our own good, of course.

This is how the rich get richer, and wealth continues to centralize and concentrate. By conning the public, and using the state as a blunt force instrument to keep competition out, and keep prices high.

Murray Rothbard gave a short lecture on the history of progressive regulation [1], and he also wrote a book called Power and Market [2] if you want a detailed overview of power dynamics in the market.

Rothbard was heavily influenced by Gabriel Kolko, a Progressive Era historian and leftist anti-capitalist, who wrote:

> Despite the large number of mergers, and the growth in the absolute size of > many corporations, the dominant tendency in the American economy at the > beginning of this [the twentieth] century was toward growing competition. > Competition was unacceptable to many key business and financial interests... > As new competitors sprang up, and as economic power was diffused throughout > an expanding nation, it became apparent to many important businessmen that > only the national government could rationalize the economy. Although > specific conditions varied from industry to industry, internal problems that > could be solved only by political means were the common denominator in those > industries whose leaders advocated greater federal regulation. Ironically, > contrary to the consensus of historians, it was not the existence of > monopoly that caused the federal government to intervene in the economy, but > the lack of it.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62rI8OYFzGg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62rI8OYFzGg)

[2] [http://mises.org/sites/default/files/Man,%20Economy,%20and%2...](http://mises.org/sites/default/files/Man,%20Economy,%20and%20State,%20with%20Power%20and%20Market_2.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> In general I think this is a sign that many people in D.C. actually do want to do the right thing, but have (for too long) let the wrong people tell them what the right thing is.

</comment><comment><USER77> What does the phrase "bright-line rules" mean?

<comment><USER78> [http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002367.h...](http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002367.html)

>>bright-line rule = a judicial rule of decision that is simple and straightforward and that avoids or ignore the ambiguities or difficulties of the problems at hand. The phrase dates from the mid-20th century. The metaphor of a bright line is somewhat older than the phrase bright-line rule - e.g.: "The difficult part of this case comes with regard to ... the activity of the Board of Temperance ....A bright line between that which brings conviction to one person and its influence on the body politic cannot be drawn." Girard Trust Co. v. I.R.C., 122 F.2d 108, 110 (3d Cir. 1941)./"[T]he McCambridge majority opinion ... agrees that the Kirby bright-line-rule is but a mere formalism ...." J.G.Trichter, Bright-Lining Away the Right to Counsel, Tex. Law., 6 Nov. 1989, at 26. Cf. hard and fast rule.

</comment></comment><comment><USER79> Is usage-based internet billing a possibility now (e.g., $0.05 per gigabyte of data), just as electric companies charge per kilowatt-hour?

</comment><comment><USER80> This is really encouraging. Having trouble not assuming it'll get torn down by 'interested parties', though.

</comment><comment><USER81> The "thoughts and feelings" are in the right direction...now let's wait for the actual proposal.

</comment><comment><USER82> If millions of people can shut down SOPA/PIPA, millions of dollars can make this not happen, sadly.

<comment><USER83> Those two things are exactly opposite, surely?

Millions of people beat millions of dollars with SOPA. the same seems to be happening here.

Say what you like about the slacktivism online but when the actual web is threatened people do seem to mobilize effectively.

We can't get complacent though their pockets are deep and their patience is endless. SOPA will be back and this needs riding all the way to signature.

</comment></comment><comment><USER84> Turns out that the cable company screwed him too...nice. This is turning out to be great news.

</comment><comment><USER70> The comments on the article make me really, really sad.

</comment><comment><USER85> Good to see someone make an effort in this regard.

</comment><comment><USER86> This, to me, is one of the most interesting topics of our time, and I find it fascinating the similarities (both philosophically and economically) to that of the railroads at the turn of the 20th century.

Much like net neutrality is the topic of the FCC, cargo neutrality on rail lines was the topic of the ICC [1] in their day. The problem of the early 1900s began with a bounty of riches in the highly competitive American Railway sector. Merchants using the railways were demanding "rebates" from railway companies for large shipments threatening to take business elsewhere and driving their shipping costs down. Of course, the same leverage was not available to smaller shippers, making their rates much higher and forcing them to raise the prices of their goods. The system was out of balance.

In 1903, congress and President Theodore Roosevelt, passed the Elkins Act [2], which eliminated rebates, but had the unfortunate side-effect of increasing price collusion between shippers and the railroads. The Elkins act did not establish a fixed rate, leaving interests to make deals that, again, were disadvantageous for smaller businesses. The only metric of discrimination was the diverting from a fixed railway schedule [3].

To correct the problems of the Elkins Act, the Hepburn Act was passed in 1906 greatly expanding the power of the ICC to regulate the Railroad Industry. The result was fixed prices on shipping deemed "just and reasonable" by the ICC, increased penalties for non-compliance, and an open and standard accounting system for the railroad companies. (As an aside, the depreciation of railway companies contributed to the Panic of 1907. A good word on that here: [4])

If all this back and forth sounds familiar, it is because we are facing the same problem today shipping bits that we were shipping coal and shirts all those years ago. The idea of prioritized delivery is not new or novel, but was dealt with before Netflix and Verizon began suing one another. What interests me is whether we will see legislation similar to the Elkins and Hepburn act for digital goods and services. I doubt very seriously that we will get fixed $/(Mbps) or $/GB mandates from the FCC, but already we are seeing definitions being made and lines being drawn [5]. There is already language from Wheeler about "responsibility to the 20 percent [without 25down/3up]", just as there was strong language from Roosevelt about the railway industries.

2015 will be an interesting year indeed.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Commerce_Commission](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Commerce_Commission) [2] [http://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Learn-About-TR/TR- Enc...](http://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Learn-About-TR/TR- Encyclopedia/Capitalism-and-Labor/The-Elkins-Act.aspx) [3] [http://books.google.com/books?id=g-pCAAAAIAAJ&dq=elkins%20ac...](http://books.google.com/books?id=g-pCAAAAIAAJ&dq=elkins%20act&pg=PA201#v=onepage&q=roosevelt&f=false) [4] [http://books.google.com/books?id=R3koAAAAYAAJ&hl=en](http://books.google.com/books?id=R3koAAAAYAAJ&hl=en) [5] [http://www.fiercetelecom.com/story/broadband-now- defined-25-...](http://www.fiercetelecom.com/story/broadband-now- defined-25-mbps-fcc-says/2015-01-29)

</comment><comment><USER87> Tom Wheeler for president

</comment><comment><USER22> Read the history of the FCC, folks. You're being lead on like sheeple. "I can't believe how good this sounds". No kidding.

<comment><USER88> Are you going to elaborate, or just leave it as a snarky comment?

</comment></comment><comment><USER89> Make a deal with the Devil and you'll only get burned. The FCC regulating the internet, what could go wrong?

<comment><USER90> Future HN comments when things go wrong:

This isn't what we wanted...

We never indented for X to be interpreted that way...

It would have worked, but they didn't go far enough...

It would have worked, but they went too far...

We need this new law X to protect the cable companies because upstart Y's new technology doesn't have to deal with FCC regulation which gives it an unfair advantage...

Give it ten years and the FCC will be about as popular as TSA or the NSA on HN.

<comment><USER89> What's terribly sad to me is the pro-authority comments here on HN. The Tech world doesn't seem to understand the true nature of regulation. Well, they're going to get what they deserve to the detriment of everyone else.

<comment><USER90> Sure they will, but they won't blame themselves.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Play20Back.com – Music Videos from Exactly 20 Years Ago (Updated Daily) - <AUTHOR> http://www.play20back.com/?hn2

<comment><USER2> no, it's not exactly (daily) correct, you can check wikipedia information for the songs</comment>


A HireVoice postmortem - lessons learned trying to get a startup off the ground - <AUTHOR> http://www.etiennegarbugli.com/getting-out-of-recruitment-a-hirevoice-post-mortem/

<comment><USER2> Uargs. Who had the idea of having every paragraph leading up to a quote that has a big "Tweet this"-link next to it? It feels like a kid jumping up and down, desperately trying to get more attention.

<comment><USER3> I wouldn't object to it quite so much if it wasn't for the "Tweet This" links _next to every one_.

<comment><USER2> Even then, I find the style debatable. I think its overused, with some quotes only separated by a small sentence. But "tweet this" is definitely the thing that kills it all.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> > "Bootstrapping a startup when you're 30 and have a rent to pay is incredibly > hard"

I think bootstrapping a startup when you have no capital is incredibly hard. The age you are and whether you're renting or not are merely contributory factors - imagine if you were paying a _mortgage_ rather than rent...this could make bootstrapping even harder ( _could_ being the important word here, before someone corrects me!).

(maybe this is a controversial viewpoint, but I feel Twitter is for 140 character insights, and a blog post is for longer ones. Having _24_ quote blocks with 'Tweet This' next to it didn't make for a great reading experience)

<comment><USER4> 100% agreed on the age thing. Comments like this just reinforce the stereotype (myth?) of 20 year olds chasing multimillion dollar lean startup VC IPO dreams. Many people over 25 start up organizations/companies.

You can look at it as "oh it's so hard, i've got a mortgage!". Or you can look at it as "Wow, I've got some really good experience in industry X, skills to sell, and established roots in industry X and my local/regional area to help me get moving faster!".

There's a few entrepreneurs/startups in our area that I really respect, and most of them started over 30. One was closer to 40 before he started, and wasn't really rocking it until 40 or just a bit after I think.

Living at home with your parents, no rent/food to pay would still be hard if you didn't have enough money for a computer and net connection (assuming you're trying to work online). Having capital relative to your startup needs is key - age is immaterial.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Less than a year and 5 different products? I'm all for validated learning but it seems like they needed to stick to an idea longer than an average of two months.

</comment><comment><USER6> > "I had learned that, with half the time you get half the results so, for > HireVoice, I was all-in, committed to success or, at least, piling up > debts."

If you look at the author's LinkedIn, you'll see he started another consulting job after four months working on HireVoice full time. Is this because he realized the initial idea wasn't going to pay the bills?

I wonder if he would have been better off getting a full-time job first and iterating on this idea as a side project? It seems like someone who is fully employed would be more rigorous in choosing which idea to spend their precious spare time on.

</comment><comment><USER7> What's with all the blockquotes? Made it a bit difficult to read => Sentence "Blockquote" Sentence "Blockquote".

<comment><USER8> Agreed, make it a bulleted list instead.

      1. People

      2. Like

      3. Lists

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> >Btw landing pages and mockups don't create a lot of trust...

Why do you say that?

<comment><USER9> Demos build more trust. Working products even more. Revenue builds more trust yet. Customers with recognizable names in your target market helps even more. A long track record of revenue showing the health of the company helps more, too-- nobody wants to be a customer of a company that's likely to disappear. It's like the opposite of the saying "nobody got fired for choosing IBM."

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> What's with the random words and phrases _italicized_? It didn't even look like it was for emphasis.</comment>


Ask HN: Automated trading on April 1 - <AUTHOR> Would love to hear from folks who build automated trading systems based on Semantic analysis about how they handle the goofy stories on April 1. <comment><USER2> <http://www.advancedtrading.com/infrastructure/229301185>

Serious HFT players are either relying solely on news feeds that won't include April Fools stories or are factor in the date for sources that might report them (like CNN). All of the April Fools stories from legitimate news providers have also clearly explained these were jokes and didn't focus a piece primarily on one company.

</comment><comment><USER3> A shame that there aren't any responses (yet) from people with relevant projects.

Is it possible that those programmers merely take the easy (although not completely fool proof) route and exclude all data from April 1, and all data that refers to April Fools Day?

</comment><comment><USER4> Somewhat Related:

Does Anne Hathaway News Drive Berkshire Hathaway's Stock?

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2341008>

<comment><USER5> Valid. If everyone else is using the same news, doesn't matter if it makes sense or not.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Related: are there any good sites/communities/blogs to discuss HFT that anyone can point to?

Am really interested in this field, anything like a crash course in what it involves would be nice by anyone familiar.

How much cash do you generally start with, and how liquid are you?

<comment><USER7> <http://howtohft.wordpress.com/>

<comment><USER6> Thanks, good links in the blogroll as well, appreciated.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The thing about building automated trading systems (related or not to Semantic analysis) is that the things you tend to track are compared to other things you are tracking. After all, if there is an issue with a data stream you wouldn't want to bet the farm on it. You check with other streams. So goofy stories on april first wouldn't affect the algorithms too much unless they were reported the same way in disparate news/feed sources.

</comment><comment><USER9> How many goofy stories have you seen today that affect publicly traded companies? I don't think I have seen any yet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Google launching a new product. Atlassian entering into gaming. TSA mandating self pat down system. Oracles Ellison accused of running Executive fighting ring. Facebook and Zynga team up to merge Romance and gaming. Toshiba develops 3-D monocle. Nvidia to unlock SLI on AMD 990 series motherboards. NOTE: the Nvidia and Ellison stories might not be April fools jokes, theres no way to tell until the silliness subsides. Edit: Google hiring auto-completers. Could affect employment related numbers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10>
      date = today();
      if (date.month() == APRIL && date.day() == 1) {
        robot_trader.take_day_off(today());
      }

</comment><comment><USER11> Read as "Automated Trolling."

<comment><USER12> "Trading" is discussed on Hacker News at about a 1.5-to-1 ratio with "trolling". FYI, Google Fight accepts the same "site:" specifier that Google Search does. For example:

[http://www.googlefight.com/index.php?lang=en_GB&word1=si...](http://www.googlefight.com/index.php?lang=en_GB&word1=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+trading&word2=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+trolling)

If you have reading problems, you could use that technique to determine which of 2 words you're more likely to be reading here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Cool to see that the second time you submitted the question you got some answers.

<comment><AUTHOR> It wasnt the second time. Since it was an Ask HN, people continued voting for it from what I guess is the ask tab on the main page. At some point it picked up ~15 votes and broke on through to the main page. Also, if you look at the posts so far, none of them answers the question.

<comment><USER13>
      > It wasn't the second time. Since it was an Ask HN,
      > people continued voting for it from what I guess is
      > the ask tab on the main page.

Ah - nice to know that happens sometimes. I guess you must have deleted your rather wistful comment lamenting that no one had replied.

      > Also, if you look at the posts so far, none of them
      > answers the question.

I wonder if there's no one here who uses semantic analysis in automated trading systems. Maybe the semantic analysis people who are here felt excluded by your question.

Who knows. Perhaps there's a better question to ask, or a better way of hooking the people you want into answering.

But I'm pleased you got traction, even if you haven't actually got answers.

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed I did delete my comment :). I have been interested in the white spy / black spy aspect of semantic trading for sometime and the trust related issues. However I have no expertise in the area and no one in my network works in the area. Folks doing technology in finance usually document their work much lesser than other fields, perhaps because of the financial incentives to keep secrets. So I thought tapping the wisdom of HN was my best bet to scratch my curiosity scratch.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Linux security flaw lets hackers inject malware into downloads, disrupt Tor, etc. - <AUTHOR> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/08/10/linux_tor_users_open_corrupted_communications/ <comment><USER2> Part of the reason I stopped reading Slashdot was the daily The Register article on the front page. We have got 2 of these on HN front-page today.

I wish people would stop relying on tabloids like that, specially here.

</comment><comment><USER3> > For encrypted HTTPS or SSH transmissions the worst that can be done is to > break the connection

Another reason to only use encrypted connections.

</comment><comment><USER4> So is this patched in popular distributions or is everyone vulnerable right now?

<comment><USER5> RedHat and Fedora: [https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/cve-2016-5696](https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/cve-2016-5696) [https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1354708](https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1354708)

"This issue does not affect the Linux kernels as shipped with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 and 5.

This issue affects the Linux kernels as shipped with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, 7 and Red Hat Enterprise MRG 2 and will be addressed in a future update."

Ubuntu: [https://people.canonical.com/~ubuntu- security/cve/2016/CVE-2...](https://people.canonical.com/~ubuntu- security/cve/2016/CVE-2016-5696.html)

Debian: [https://security- tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2016-5696](https://security- tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2016-5696)

Linux Kernel (4.7 carries the fix): [https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/75ff39ccc1bd5d3c455...](https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/75ff39ccc1bd5d3c455b6822ab09e533c551f758)

Arch Linux will shortly release 4.7, which is how I see them fixing this issue instead of patching.</comment></comment>


Fluid Simulation for Video Games (part 1 of 10) - <AUTHOR> http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/fluid-simulation-for-video-games-part-1/

<comment><USER2> The algorithms are embarrassingly parallel, but he doesn't use the GPU because it's busy rendering. I wonder if intel's increasingly powerful integrated graphics (usually supplanted with a video card) could be used for this?

> In the endeavor to achieve real-time fluid motion, some other fluid > simulations exploit general-purpose computing on graphics processing unit > (GPGPU). However clever, such approaches do not help with current gaming > hardware, because in video games, the GPU tends to be busy with rendering > and has no time left over for simulation. [http://software.intel.com/en- > us/articles/fluid-simulation-fo...](http://software.intel.com/en- > us/articles/fluid-simulation-for-video-games-part-3/)

Also: pretty videos <http://www.youtube.com/mijagourlay#p/u/4/G9E8xEjGzk0> (download <http://software.intel.com/file/23546/>)

<comment><USER3> GPGPU is incredibly overkill for simulating a water surface.

Create two 256x256 RGB textures, call them foo and bar.

The R channel will store current height of wave. The G channel will store the previous height of wave (allowing you to derive velocity).

      ... each frame ...
      render_to(bar)
      sample_from(foo)
      /* insert fancy partial differential algorithm */
      foo,bar = bar,foo

In other words, you're "ping pong"-ing between two textures.

Now if you set an arbitrary texel to, say, 1.0 (maximum), that texel will propogate outwards as if it were a ripple.

Bonus: the result is a seamless tilable texture.

Look up "toyshop rain" for the exact details. But I used this method to augment an ingame lake surface's normal map (thunderstorm effect --- rippling raindrops propagating across the lake). This was in 2007, running on 2007 hardware. GPGPU need not apply.

<comment><USER2> "toyshop rain" <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtxvpS5AYHQ> (but youtube video content seems to be down at the moment, at least here in Australia anyway)

BTW: The article (10 parts!) deals with other fluid effects besides surfaces, the first few paragraphs even distinguish between them and gases.

<comment><USER3> Thank you. Probably my favorite tech demo of all time. It gives me goosebumps every time I watch it. Likely watched it at least 30 times by now.

Everything about it is beautiful, from the art to the music to the sound effects to the incredible feeling of "being drenched". Natalya Tatarchuk is truly a hero.

Watch it all the way through, with headphones, in fullscreen, or don't watch it at all!

The experience was so much more intense back in 2007; it was breathtaking.

(Nooooo I don't wanna get old! Make it stop!)

<comment><USER2> In case you haven't seen it, _From Dust_ uses fluid simulation as a game mechanic. It's a god game, with flowing water that erodes rivers etc, at a constant 30 fps. There's an xbox demo, and a PC demo to come. Here's a video: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSOQGazo7Oo&t=33s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSOQGazo7Oo&t=33s) (I think the fluid grid is slightly coaster in the actual game, but water basically flows the same). BTW: I think it's fantastic as a toy, less good as a game.

However, from what you're saying, the fluid simulation isn't as expensive as I thought.

<comment><USER3> Wow, that's incredible! Thanks for sharing.

Sorry, I miscommunicated --- fluid simulation isn't expensive _as long as_ it doesn't affect gameplay. Because then you can do it all on the GPU, and you don't have to transfer it back to the CPU (to perform checks like "is the water touching me?")

In this case, _From Dust_ is simulating the fluids on the CPU, then building geometry / textures on the fly and uploading that to the GPU and rendering. It's quite an impressive tech demo, both from a technical and artistic standpoint.

<comment><USER2> There's the possibility of shared memory, between CPU and integrated GPU, as John Carmack noted, skipping the transfer. Apparently, the xbox does this already.

Big extrapolation: If intel can pull this off, they may be able to own the next platform, of GPU-based computation. I suggest that's the next platform because it seems to be the only place where many-core code is really happening. And many-core is the only way to get Moore power, since clock rates hit a wall.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> <http://http.developer.nvidia.com/GPUGems/gpugems_ch38.html>

^This is another great tutorial for real-time fluid simulation. If anyone's interested, I adapted this method to simulate fire as well. (demo here: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIi62cwjqMA>)

</comment><comment><USER5> Are fluid simulations for video games different from "actual" fluid simulations? The article just seemed like a discussion about fluid dynamics, but when it says things like "... for games", I always think it's about making something _look_ realistic without actually solving the real equations.

<comment><USER6> Yes, actual fluid dynamics are extremely slow and not needed just for the visuals.

Read this seminal paper for the details:

[http://www.dgp.toronto.edu/people/stam/reality/Research/pdf/...](http://www.dgp.toronto.edu/people/stam/reality/Research/pdf/GDC03.pdf)

Sample quote:

We believe that a better alternative is to use the physics of fluid flows which have been developed since the time of Euler, Navier and Stokes (from the 1750's to the 1850's). These developments have led to the so-called Navier- Stokes Equations, a precise mathematical model for most fluid flows occurring in Nature. These equations, however, only admit analytical solutions in very simple cases. No progress was therefore made until the 1950's when researchers started to use computers and develop numerical algorithms to solve the equations. In general, these algorithms strive for accuracy and are fairly complex and time consuming. This is because the applications that require these solvers have to be physically accurate. It is obviously crucial that the stresses and drag on an airplane or a bridge are calculated precisely.

In computer graphics and in games on the other hand what matters most is that the simulations both look convincing and are fast. In addition it is important that the solvers aren't too complex so that they can be implemented on standard PCs, game consoles or PDAs. In this paper we present a set of algorithms which meet these requirements. To achieve these goals we depart from conventional wisdom in computational physics and develop algorithms custom tailored for creating visual effects. Unlike physically accurate solvers which have strict bounds on their time steps, our algorithms are stable, and never "blow up."

<comment><USER7> Thanks. This is a very useful info.</comment></comment></comment>


Five-Eyes nations to force encryption backdoors - <AUTHOR> https://www.itnews.com.au/news/five-eyes-nations-to-force-encryption-backdoors-511865 <comment><USER2> HN post from yesterday [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17898498](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17898498)

</comment><comment><USER3> I know I'm preaching to the choir here but... I'm glad all those law abiding criminals and terrorists will only use government sanctioned services with the back doors in. They'll never think about using anything else. Oh wait. They will. So all the government will be spying on will be law abiding citizens. So when the system is inevitably breachrd, only law abiding citizen will have their data expossed. The people pushing this are either very smart, very stupid, or a mixture of the both wth the smart channeling the stupid.

<comment><USER4> It's worth pointing out. I don't think all the people pushing this are stupid. I'm sure some are, but there are plenty of 'clever' ones who are comforted by the thought that, under whatever guise, their citizens are monitored. I am pessimistic enough in these matters to believe in a kind of reverse Hanlon's razor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> My basic stance at this point is that, even with the best justification in the world for breaking encryption, governments cannot be trusted to safeguard keys.

They WILL be stolen by adversaries. Full stop.

<comment><USER6> You don't need full sized, nor declared, adversaries. NSA workers, and associated private contractors have lost, leaked or even published backdoors and other very private information in the not so far past, along with questionable security practices in their own computers. Individuals, criminal organizations, corporations and so on will get pretty soon access to those backdoors, and that is something that will impact everyone.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Better link:

[https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about/national- security/five-...](https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about/national- security/five-country-ministerial-2018)

Relevant text here would be:

""" Encryption

18 Encryption is vital to the digital economy, a secure cyberspace and the protection of personal, commercial and government information. The five countries have no interest or intention to weaken encryption mechanisms. We recognise, however, that encryption, including end-to-end encryption, is also used in the conduct of terrorist and criminal activities. The inability of intelligence and law enforcement agencies to lawfully access encrypted data and communications poses challenges to law enforcement agencies' efforts to protect our communities. Therefore, we agreed to the urgent need for law enforcement to gain targeted access to data, subject to strict safeguards, legal limitations, and respective domestic consultations. We have agreed to a _Statement of Principles on Access to Evidence and Encryption_ ([https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about/national- security/five-...](https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about/national- security/five-country-ministerial-2018/access-evidence-encryption) ) that sets out a framework for discussion with industry on resolving the challenges to lawful access posed by encryption, while respecting human rights and fundamental freedoms. """

<comment><USER8> Let me clarify the phrase "targeted access to data", as we already know what that means — a good example sits right in front of us. The current NSA wiretaps and massive information gathering operations including wiretaps, fiber optic splices, and equipment installed at network exchange points are what is understood by "targeted access to data".

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > A free, open, safe and secure internet

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.

We can hope that the LEOs who propose these regulations hold limited sway against the legislators who we elect to represent our will.

EDIT: downvoters, please join the debate.

</comment><comment><USER10> Wasn't this settled by djb? The US government can't punish you for publishing encryption software because it is protected by the first amendment.

<comment><USER11> Sadly other countries (I'm in the UK) don't have such protections.</comment></comment>


"Stupid Questions VCs Ask" Oldie but a Goodie - <AUTHOR> http://18.104.22.168/video/466653/Stupid_Questions_VCs_Ask

<comment><USER2> The link is broken.

      Error 1003 Ray ID: 204ef17e06e31ba9 • 2015-07-12 18:52:06 UTC
      Direct IP access not allowed    What happened?</comment>


Ask YC: Want to learn about GPS/Location Based Programming. Where to start?  - <AUTHOR> Hi all - I'm fascinated by the notion of GPS/Location Based programming and generally programming mobile apps that are location aware. I've read some primers and have a tech background, so wondering if the community had links or background to share to learn more?
I guess the fundamental questions are:
1) How much can a programmer do without striking deals with the big telecoms (i.e. can you now get around it with the new location aware phones). 2) What kind of APIs already exist? 3) At the end of the day, the challenge is to get the location (longitude/latititude) of a phone user. The rest is up to the idea/execution of the app. I need to know what to read/learn to enable me to hack an app to get that location.
I know this is HUGELY simplified, but hope you get the gist. <comment><USER2> I can give you a teeny tiny head start. Here is the logic for determining the distance (in miles) between two points.

        sqrt((power(69.1 * (latitude1 - latitude2),2) + power(69.1 * (longitude1 - longitude2) * cos(latitude1 / 57.3), 2)))

This is coming from SQL server... it took a little fidgeting to get the actual distances right because of the weird curvature of the earth issue; but it should get you close for reasonable distances.

The Yahoo! geocoding API is pretty nice for getting lats and longs for addresses in the US:

<http://developer.yahoo.com/maps/rest/V1/geocode.html>

<comment><USER3> > _it took a little fidgeting to get the actual distances right because of the > weird curvature of the earth issue; but it should get you close for > reasonable distances._

Probably can't tell you how we solve it at work, but the very much publicly- available book _Computational Geometry: Algorithms and Applications, Third Edition_ by de Berg, Cheong, et al., mentions something about the robustness of geometric algorithms using inexact (floating point) vs. exact arithmetic. :-)

<comment><USER2> I can never tell the appropriate way to say thank you to a poster here. Should I upvote? Should I leave a comment? In this case, I'll do both.

Thanks for the recommendation, most of the maths work I do these days is financial, so geometry is a nice diversion. I hadn't seen this text before so I've got it bookmarked for some reading now.

As an aside, is this something I would have gotten some exposure to if I'd been a college grad? Any time I see things like this, I worry there are large swaths of text I've missed in self-study.

<comment><USER3> > _As an aside, is this something I would have gotten some exposure to if I'd > been a college grad?_

You might have had some exposure to the subject, but probably as part of other problems, i.e. not under the name _Computational Geometry_. For me, the most valuable thing was learning that this was an actual field with a name, which gave me a starting point for self-study.

Also check out _Computational Geometry in C_ , Second Ed., by O'Rourke. It goes into more low-level implementation details (the first book I mentioned is a good high-level introduction to reasoning about geometric algorithms, so you should read that first).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Having spent many years working on this problem in the US market, here's my two cents ...

There are tens of millions of mainstream handsets on the market that contain GPS, including virtually all phones sold by Sprint and Verizon in the past few years and most new AT&T phones going forward. However, location is typically locked down and requires a relationship with the carrier to access the handset location APIs. For location privacy and business reasons, making a deal with a carrier for a location-enabled application is often a multi-year process.

The other possibility is to target smart phones such as the Nokia N95, iPhone, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, or Android that provide more open access to location. This is a good audience of early adopters with high data usage, but it's a very small percentage of total phones on the market.

Handsets using carrier-assisted GPS will typically have better performance than smartphones. The 'autonomous GPS' in most smart phones takes a long time to get an initial fix and is less accurate than carrier assisted, or aGPS handsets, which utilize cell towers on the network to enhance performance. Note: The new iPhone will combine GPS, Wi-fi, and cell tower location and so should be fairly fast and accurate.

One means by which developers can gain access to location across multiple carriers is through WHERE <http://developer.where.com> (caveat: i work there).

I'm working on a white paper covering all of this in more detail. If you're interested in getting a preview copy, let me know.

<comment><USER5> I also work at a startup in the location space. If you're just looking to play around and have fun, I'd definitely recommend avoiding the "feature phones" (J2ME and BREW) and focusing instead in Symbian and Blackberry.

Most Windows Mobile devices in the US don't allow access to GPS or have it deliberatly crippled (The Sprint Mogul and AT&T Tilt are the only two I know of with user accessible GPS).

iPhone is still an unknown, as I doubt Apple will open up its app store to every developer and every app. Right now it's probably best to wait and see.

Android is, well, not out yet. Wait for a device to make it to market.

WHERE is also a fast easy way to get one shot fixes and rapidly deploy an application to the millions of "feature phones" out there already, but it won't give you background updates or complete control over the user experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here are my delicious location links:

<http://del.icio.us/jmatt.peterson/location>

There are a lot of APIs if you are going from address, city, zip. All sorts of variations - free, commercial, metadata, super accurate, international, US only, shipping, etc.

There are fewer and they are less reliable if you have a latitude / longitude and want address, major intersection, city, etc.

Initially I'd code for phones that provide basic location information like lat/long/precision. Personally I've written code for the iphone and android. I'd avoid any of the older phones that don't provide some sort of API. Your initial users presumably will be techies with newer phones. If you have some initial success you can add support for older phones that don't have a friendly API.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks this is fantastic. Going from address is fairly straightforward as you say.

However, I am looking to use the GPS or tower triangulation built into newer phones. I'm assuming this is available through the ipHone and android APAs?

Is any of your code open-source by any chance? Just looking for some tips as to how to get started - even the basics.

<comment><USER7> There's plenty of code on the Nokia wiki, including a complete compass application: <http://wiki.forum.nokia.com/index.php/GPS_Compass>

(See also, the location category index [http://wiki.forum.nokia.com/index.php/Symbian_C%2B%2B_Locati...](http://wiki.forum.nokia.com/index.php/Symbian_C%2B%2B_Location_Articles) )

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Try postgis, it's really cool with postgres. You can add a column which makes evaluating distance between points really easy. If you want to find out what points are near a given lat,long.

</comment><comment><USER9> DISCLAIMER: I work for the Yahoo Developer Network

Yahoo recently released an updated version of the Where On Earth (WOE) API for Where 2.0 (more info at <http://developer.yahoo.com/geo/>).

It's pretty cool, I especially like the way that WOE deals with hierarchy in places. So a street address is normally part of neighbourhood or area of a city, which is part of a state, etc.

One of my other favourite projects at Y! at the moment is also about LBS. Fireagle is one of the Brickhouse projects, so those guys are actually based in San Francisco. <http://fireeagle.yahoo.net> is still invite only, but that's mostly to hide it from consumers until it's ready to go. Fireeagle acts as middlewear, allowing users to update their location in lots of ways through an API (Text string, GPS units, Cell phone via services like Navizon, etc) and then share is with apps of their choice. This means that the user only has to update Fireeagle to update all their apps.

It also means app developers don't need to provide lots of ways to specify location. They can just use Fireeagle and forget about the rest.

I have some invites so if you have a good idea let me know and I'll hook you up.

</comment><comment><USER10> I've looked into it a little bit and FireEagle(<http://fireeagle.yahoo.net/>) seem's ok, but it works with Navizon (<http://www.navizon.com/>) which I think would be a better solution if it provided api access to the free users of it's product.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> What about Google Gears/Android and the iPhone API? If you build an application that uses those two APIs, won't that cover most of the future mobile market? If so, is there any need to dig under the covers - just make the simple API calls??

</comment><comment><USER11> Check this out: <http://del.icio.us/popular/gis> and <http://developer.yahoo.com/geo/>

</comment><comment><USER12> This site is a bit more hardware orientated but you may find some of it useful:

<http://www.hackaday.com/search/?q=gps>

</comment><comment><USER13> A bunch of APIs, data, and examples here:

<http://del.icio.us/pskomoroch/gis>

</comment><comment><USER14> The GPS chip/unit embeded in cell phones is incredibly minimal (at least when I reviewed the topic a couple years ago). The phone itself does not calculate lat/lon. The phone captures the bare timebase GPS signal, uplinks the raw sat numbers to a server which calculates the actual coords and transmits that back to the phone.

But privacy issues are probably the biggest reason lat/lon is not more available for app usage.

<comment><USER7> That's nonsense. I know of no phone or device that does this, it's not like the calculations needed are exactly challenging even for your typical phone with a 200Mhz arm chip.</comment></comment>


Is grad school valuable to an entrepreneur? - <AUTHOR> http://cs.illinois.edu/current-students/graduate-students/professional-masters-mcs Considering this program, while I work or do my startup. I want to gain a formal engineering education to make a better product, and ultimately, a better product market fit. <comment><AUTHOR> Considering this professional masters in cs program, while working at an enterprise software company or doing my own. I want to gain a formal engineering education inorder to create a better product solution.

</comment><comment><USER2> How are you going to hire your first 10 employees?

<comment><AUTHOR> Mainly through my existing networks or other hiring tactics. I work with a code school (12 week learn ruby front end yada yada) and probably focus on their grads as well as colleagues in my program.</comment></comment>